24"x18" oil and acrylic on panel, 1996

the pan optic wounds within...

What disease discovered, what vantage narrowed, what dialogue eclipsed,

peering up my womb?

What convoltion, evolution, revolution, breeds understanding?

What maladies served, what injustice raised, what conscience shed?

 

Which voices register, which pleas sting, which sooths smothered,

nursing in the tomb?

Which yelled, welled, felled, bares light?

Which circumstances make, which suppositions flaw, which actions stray?

 

Where dangles hope, where nestle lesions, where deepen stains,

supplanting each bloom?

Where leads, bleeds, feeds, compassion after dark?

Where burrowed, where deemed, where sung,

a constellation unborn?