Jody's Notes
Despite the publication date of 2011, this is an old poem. I wrote it in 1991 or 1992. It echoes, in a funny way, an idea that appeared in Odin gets to see it all: something I was trying to turn into images. The idea of omniscience being a kind of cancerous product of ordinary vision. As I write this idea down now, I can no longer feel the way it gripped me back in those years. But I kept playing around with the idea--for a couple of years--trying to create something with it. Near as I recall, it made itself into only two poems.
As inevitable as a cataract,
light appears,
tarnishing the aging ebony.
I watch from the porch,
see the pigeons
(sullen angels avoiding God)
bob in and out of the streaks.
As visions go,
this is better than most.
Omniscience, I console myself,
is merely vision metastasized,
a bright contemplation sick with overkill.
When dawn has burnt away the shadows,
I will wear sunglasses,
make my way to breakfast,
see whatever I can.
© 2011 Jody Azzouni