All in One

Modern poetry modern verse contemporary poetry contemporary verse modern poem contemporary poem

“such delight from the whole as is compatible with a distinct gratification from each component part” ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The one is many.  Starfish legs are star

And many constellations, galaxies . . .

The nearest creature is that very far

Away complexity as if the seas

Around your island tell you everywhere

You need to know.  The chambered curling shell

Is not a nautilus alone but blare

Of all creation, an expanding swell

Of beauties and the tragedies we fear,

Those beauties teaching us that we are not

So worthy as we always wished.  We steer

To thinking we are almost naught.

  The tragedies we cannot quite ignore…

    We find that they are not another shore.

~ Phillip Whidden