Clarity
Screens are blinding
this old man: visions
of things seen by no one
these measley offerings
add nothing to my off-
spring’s desire
*****
Going blind is never a blessing
my mother said in 1949,
whatever took her sight
took her life
and the young boy of myself
intuited that she’d seen enough
*****
Those sights of backwater Brooklyn
above the produce wholesaler
an olfactory of rotting fruit
remain crystal clear
while the now of Temple
Terrace fades to blurry
*****
Off balanced I have fallen
clarity a lost friend
but still there’s Dr. Hue,
Penelope and my loving sister
who saw the peace of Europe
before the evil came
*****
American Dutch Russian Jew
my family fractures before birth
and all that badness just a distant
madness, what was it for
Arendt calls it merely banal
where the monsters imply
*****
nothing personal, just doing jobs.
Our lives in this condo courtyard
Dr. Hue says is an actual mirage
of us in the act of passing…
Penelope suggests the Dali Museum
for the collective spectacle