Apprehension
Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem
You think that you are seeing him because
You see his face and hair. Of course you know
That other parts are hidden like the laws
Of physics as the ice in Arctic floe
Obscures the depths beneath. You think you hear
Him when you hear his speech. Yet when a man
Talks, he is using only words, too sheer
To carry burdens of his thought or scan
His feelings. Thinking you can touch him, you
Reach out and grasp his shoulder or the skin
Of inner thigh. Now that might lead to true
Awareness. Even that, though, might be thin.
You think you smell his soul in what he writes,
But that reveals much less than smoke in rites.
~ Phillip Whidden
