How to Go to the New World
(either way)

I still don’t know what
To say to you
Today

I mean
This is me
And I don’t know
Not knowing
Words
And something of their use
Often
Re-rendered
When conscripted
Into verse

Or let the message
Be a branch
Or bird
Inside the tree

Or something of the sun
Through clouds
Below
Leaving a gospel
In a shadow

But something new
Or affirming
Something old
Or even ancient
Like virtue
And its complement
Of rules
We take for argument
From Greeks
Who took things
From Egyptians
Then both subsumed
By Rome

And so
What’s happening
In Asia
All the while

And then the holy
And the Roman
Christians
Establish empire
Where for eons
There had been those
Who fought
And
Dwelled
Expanded and
Diminished
On their own
To have the only world
They knew
And it was vast
More than enough
Until the white gods
Came
The devils
To deceive us

A whole world
For its varied understanding
Of
The way things go
And on another side
How seasons
Turn
To go another way
And so subvert
The growing year
Of Gregory

So much
So many
To have touched
On so few
And in one time
And so
Move forward
When complexities
Are
Rife with
Differences
Agendas
Styles
And signals
Of the fear of the unknown
Toward other people
In the shadows
From our light
Whose singularity
Makes others
Fearsome in the dark
That we have made
Much darker
Not
To behold
Their part
In the same light

We could tone down ourselves
And so inquire
Of the ones
We do not know
But could
In openness
And inquiry
The way we learned research
In school
Before the grown-ups interests
And fear for profit
Took us over

We could learn to love
The differences
As might have been
Our first impressions
When meeting
As children
Invested by impulse
With curiosity

And let the world change
With our acquaintance
Let everyone be different
Just a little
For having met
With outstretched hand
Empty for introduction
While the other hand
At our side
Is open
Too
With honesty
Allowed to gain
Through inquiry
And
Once permitted
Exploration

C L Couch


Photo by James Coleman on Unsplash