Microcosmic

Susan Ioannou
From:   Where the Light Waits. Victoria, BC: Ekstasis Editions, 1996

What if
the universe is
a single spangle of light

and whenever a first breath
flares out of darkness
time and space unfold

like a giant bloom by Georgia O'Keeffe,
new life a microscopic
vein in a yellow petal?

Or fragrance spills inside out
a cosmos of sun-and-star pollen
floating across the roof of a chlorophyll cell?

Would it matter
that God could puff up
time like opal balloons,

nanoseconds
bulging to eons
high on a transparent string,

or puncture infinity
into a mirror
flash?

Who are we to explain
that man is the measure,
not mites or nebulae,

that air is the mother element,
not water, not silver,
not fire?

What if
the whole wonder
does not revolve on our eye

but
blinks us awake
only when a root groans

or an asteroid
winds up night's clock,
tail showering pollen into new worlds?

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Susan Ioannou's works copyright © to the author.