Because we all want to write more poems.
beneath
While I read,
one hand,
looking for something to do,
busies its fingers on my forehead.
Fingers are curious, restless,
always testing, exploring.
They caress subtleties of skin
probe a landscape of bone beneath:
ridges of polished stone clothed in snug wrappings.
Here are form and façade,
structure and veneer.
Ape brains abuzz,
we are curious too—
but fear sets limits:
skeletons dismay us,
ours carefully buried
in flesh that captivates and enthralls us.
We mistrust their hidden engineering
erector set beneath pretty dressing;
we doubt the bones’ intentions,
cringe at their mechanical demands,
worry at their subterranean pains.
Our usual curiosity stops
at deeply buried things—
sub-cellar foundations,
dark-shrouded mysteries
and the ponderous
roots of things.
- Benjamin Gorman's Shared Poems
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