Seen

I am screaming without sound.

Pulsing without rhythm.

Crying without tears.

Breathing without enlargement.

The world is an art gallery,

everywhere I go, the faces, the colors.

I look at them,

but, the gazes are unreflective.

Instead, rounded chins ever illuminated.

Glossy eyes fermenting with that clutter,

the sort which films over the organic,

causing not only chemicals ingested,

but filtering out a sickly hue.

When the body aches and wheezes,

contaminate is quick to incriminate,

yet, when the spirit over-ripens

and begins to mold away in ghastly odor,

the ilk’s restitute lies in discerning contrast.

In those briefest of moments when distraction falters

and we see a soul in its health and vigor.

Only do we discover our own rottingness.

It is then when we no longer share what we saw,

rather, self-forgettingly say what we see.

To look at another not as portrait or parcel,

but a vessel burdened with the same weight of being.

That of joy, fear, and pain.

Lifting upon ourselves that only strain

worthy of being born a hundred times over,

that of beholding those people around us,

moreso, letting them know they are being seen.

And it is only beauty that we find.