Cityscapes

The city. 

Where I move blindly every day.

The city.

Where I go to see.

The city.

Where I move blindly.

In my thoughts.

The everyday, 

the common

the expected

that I know already,

closes my mind.

And still

the eye.

 

The eye.

The city.

Where I go to see.

The monument.

I study

and I learn to see

(I learn to see)

The minute detail.

Intricate pattern.

And  even, perhaps,

the mind, 

the thought

that shaped the form.

So, what about the eye?

And what I see?

The eye receives, I thought,

and, thought I,

what it receives, 

I see.

I walked here oftentimes

and saw a wall.

As if my eyes 

expected what to see.

And one day --

I'd heard a church-bell toll,

and then my hand

was haphazardly touched

by someone passing by --

and then 

I saw

The eye.

The wall.

The eye, 

it must have seen it all.

But I, 

my mind,

was closed,

as if there'd been this wall

between.

And then the soft and silent dynamite

of touch and sound

opened me 

to the sense of sight.

To see.

To see.

I know now

that my mind is closed, 

and knowing,

my not seeing,

or, should I say,

my seeing what I expect to see,

is like a repose.

Like resting in the knowledge

that there is more to gather

and that I know 

to see.

Föreningsgatan, Göteborg

Norrköping

London

New Haven

Boston

Gower Mews, London

Florence

Florence

 © David Dickson

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