Encounter

Image by Victor S. Lamoureux

ENCOUNTER


What is an impression worth?
A frog. And a jar of ruddy leeches.

When I see frog. I think "Frogs.
Frogs are good to think."
The matter of frog experience first floats,
Then sinks mostly unknowable, spuriously
Into the spawning pond of memory.
It's a rich seminal soup, full of eyes.
Magnified, each a natural universe.
These eyes are vocal once they spring
Breaking through the skins of things.
In season -- everywhere -- then they're out.

Wonders of compromise, they extend themselves
To bridge the poles of water world and padded land.
And the extensions can be perceived from the eyes
As orderly change, clear and strange,
As leggy fish with iguana tails,
As animals flying on all fours,
Fully outstretched, twice their size,
Jumping, climbing piggy-back,
Unabashedly clambering onto one another's backs,
Orange on orange, green on green,
Clinging colorfully, eyes bulging,
They seem a surprise even to themselves.

When they leap
From the dense compact of bone and skin,
The plastic tapestry
Takes shape,
As lightning bolts or spotted lilies on fresh
green waters.
Frogs.
Frogs are naturally good to think,
To take inside as part of insubstantial self,
Changing orders, cruising the classifications.


Their song defeats the ears, allegro!
The rhythmic noise communicates,
Encroaching on all other senses,
Setting forth Reverie.

Bullrushes,
Against the moon and stars,
Spiked grasses on the mirror lake,
Edging the weeds, where
Sedge-warblers are sleeping on blue eggs.

The scene you see cannot be forced,
Cannot be tidily arranged
By science or dulling habit.

My eyes within no longer truly see.
There they swim in thicker waters,
As comets,
Shooting the across neural galaxies,
Where they re-connect icons.
From a blade of grass, the rest:
The moon, Stars,
Pond

Echoing ripples across,
Shattering the constellations,
Ruffling the lily pad,
And its camping amphibious motility.

Making the connections symphonic, concrete,
Like visiting forgotten shrines,
so much depends on Memory.
Glazed frogs transporting -- deja vu --
Faint essences to flush meadowlarks
From the nesting spirit
To wild flights of fancy.
Each a winged message,
Calling,
Answering unasked questions.
My gaze, pilgrim in a landscape
Painting itself inside,
Inviting me to choose the color and the brush.

This is a risky business,
Uninhibited mind-blooming,
Thinking
On the odd chance a relevant word
Will leap the illogical impasse


David Gilmour