Compound eyes
provide widest visual range
in animal and insect kingdom,
almost as if each orb
sees all the way around itself—
with ultraviolet light as friend
to butterfly that holds such light
close to itself, maybe to become one
with a certain band in purple spectrum
in winged one’s search for food
and potential mates, and for homing in
on nectars and cues of blossoms
in colors signaling pollination viability,
while in other ways UV light
serves butterfly as protection—
as in lit, patterned disguise
on wings against predators.
– Lynne Goldsmith
My book, Secondary Cicatrices, won the 2018 Halcyon Poetry Prize and was a 2019 Finalist in the American Book Fest Awards and a 2020 Human Relations Indie Book Award Gold Winner. My poetry has been published in such journals as Journal for Critical Animal Studies and The Environmental Magazine.