Unlidness

author’s note:

I’m slowly learning to listen.  But I still have a hard time believing what I hear.


UNLIDNESS

What if you had
another head
inside your head--
   a better head
   but hidden.

A head that would call to you

though hard to hear
with your big head talking
all the time, unaware
of that muted voice
trying to get you
to listen.

Unless--as can sometimes happen--
you tilt too far one day
and tumble and land
upside down

then the lid on your big head
flops open
and what comes out
in that shocking moment
is an opera

sung by ravens and lions.

But
by startled reflex
you shove that lid back down
with a firm hand:

ravens and lions are scary, but
even scarier when they sing

Opera.

Thereafter
you’ll keep the lid securely in place

unless
as can sometimes happen...

one day, while I’m distracted
by the mountain clouds,
waiting for the sun to touch
the highest peak...

that lid on my big head
--quietly, secretly--
floats up

floats away.

And this time
as the ravens and lions
raise their choir,
I accept the music

because the singing seems
just the right accompaniment
for the abundance I perceive.

During such moments
of unlidness, I experience
a bigger world and a better me.

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© 2021, Michael R. Patton