I am tempted,
so tempted,
to open up the gourd,
cut its top
and split its sides,
to see the seeds that speak inside
as the ocean speaks inside the shell.
But once I do,
take the voice from the throat,
I will know then
the color, shape and number of those seeds
as I will the inner texture of the gourd itself,
but I will never, never know the message,
the things that those seeds were still to say
when invisible within their shell.
Satisfying one impulse
may destroy the source.
Is there only,
meaningfully,
the whole?
Poem by Erich von Hungen.
Erich is a poet from San Francisco, California. From there, he has established a YouTube channel, PoetryForce, to explore issues of social consciousness as well as matters of the human heart — its uses and misuses. For a collection of short stories, he was the runner-up for The Joseph Henry Jackson Award. Six of these pieces were published by The Colorado Quarterly. His poems have appeared in Cathexis Northwest Press, The Esthetic Apostle, and The Write Launch.
Find him at his YouTube channel “PoetryForce”
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfrxaRRp77aII0_8p56aaEg