JOHNMICHAEL SIMON POETRY

You know you’ve been there before

confidence from balls of feet

to upstretched arms

and with a little push

you leave the ground

sail unfettered as a snowflake

a wind-swept leaf a bird

 

Sometimes you wander upside down

across a ceiling perhaps a classroom

at times a vaulted hall a place where

blank eyes congregate

then through an opening that

suddenly appears propel yourself

thrust out over trees buildings

meadows continents and seas

up up towards the gleaming firmament

 

It’s not a dream you tell yourself

remembering images an oft repeated

wonder world where mirrors lined up

face to face like crystal pools or star clusters

reflect your image in thousand facets of

the knowledge; flying is natural as being

 

Today observing from this grounded

ledge of time only your shaving mirror

smiles at you your graying stubble shrugs

you rise up on your toes and push but

nothing happens as you wash the fluffy

foam those recollections swirling in

the water dissipating disappearing now

like galaxies and gulls