Central Understanding

Do I walk near my center or sit in my past?

Central Understanding

Bob Komives

Where old fashions I understand
sought beauty unadorned,
new fashions I misunderstand
cover nudity with nakedness
adorned by tattoo and gold.

Where it was popular to challenge myself
to walk lightly among welcoming mountains,
it is now the mode to attack mountains
as if they stand in our way--
to seek fear and danger where they need not be,
except to separate centuries.

Where a recent age led me to this inner perch
from which I watch mystery making timeless love
with reality (its timeless spouse),
a newer and an older age would push me out
to purchase magical stuffs and wizardly visions
in some timely-magic magic-house.

Is there a central prison
that I can neither see nor appreciate?
I suspect it from the sounds of those who flee.
They speak passions for hand-made risk
and longings for magic peace,
yet hear no contradiction.

I have yet to find center,
nor know how far it lies,
but I know closer feels both better and more lonely,
and that what I preach I may never understand.

Bob Komives :: Fort Collins © 1999 :: Central Understanding :: ,9916