Poem a day for 17 April: Perspective

Sticky Canopy. Photo by Robert Rath from over here at Robert's website.

Over the last couple of days I've been reading some wonderful poetry by Medbh McGuckian and Lorna Crozier. Today's short poem is kind of a Q&A with myself about why I should write at all, when so many others do it so brilliantly.

Perspective

And you ask yourself: who am I
to explore the delicate skin of things,
to inspect the thin beliefs
that puncture a hungry earth?

Others are more fluent, more able
to unravel the knotted strands of ordinary and
irregular; more able to conjure
wisps of what was known, fragments
that pray to be remembered.

And then you realise: only I
see the folds I see,
only I am in my own place,
only I stand where I stand
in the long shadow of this glittery mystery.

Posted by Jennifer Liston