Cry of the Naked Eye

Each day I venture out
into the sun's madness, shielded
only by the occasional kiss
of a tear beneath its dark
blanket lid. Sometimes amazement
stuns me open, I hang
like a sphere of complex aberration
trying to focus or bring
those patterns to coherence,
while the fluid skin of kindness
boils away in the empty air.
It leaves me unguarded as granite
to the plunging glaciers
of closure, their boulders rake me
with hieroglyph furrows
that echo all through the night
in drifting enigmas of yellow
on no-color darkness. And the sun
penetrates the brief defense
of each blink with a casual
flush of blood. Where is my rest
in darkness described by
no degree, the peace
of place before and empty
of all light?

Iowa

27 Jan 69