UNNOTICED
She says, “I bet it’s in the rock”
when we see the weathered sign
nailed to a tree near the summit
creased and bent inwards
all caps, announcing
something going unnoticed:
VEIN QUARTZ.
We look down to see flecks of white
easily mistaken as scratches from boots
plodding up and up the same rock slab
flecks of quartz, deposited ages ago, quietly
telling the history of this mountain, of this earth.
“There is so much we don’t see” I say
I'm thinking of when, just two days ago
the same friend and I walked by a van
parked awkwardly in the middle of the street
windows open, half-blocking the intersection
going unnoticed by so many passersby.
I had tried not to stare, frozen and unsure
While my friend, a future nurse, looked hard
slowing putting the pieces together until
she recognized a man with heatstroke
disoriented, dehydrated and in need of help.
If I prayed, I’d ask more conclusions be
an ever-widening-lens, blurry then crisp
blurry then crisp, if I prayed, I’d ask more
certainty take a good, long trust fall, eyes open
dropping backward into feathers, weightless
letting go, letting go, letting go.
There is so much we do not see.
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