The Silence and the Speaker

I am the watched and the watcher
There is something missing in my machinery
I am so preoccupied watching and being watched
That I cannot see that it is only I who am doing both
Oh, the wrong that I have done
Please forgive this absent presence
This fool of temperamental inclination
It took too long to see, but I have seen for years now
The distance in time does not make it any easier
The soft touch of my mind inside the refinery shed
I was too quick to call the fool the fool
Too absent to call out myself
No endearing traits remain
Just this tortured heart
And the the memories that I’ve retained
I’ve witnessed the eyes peaking
From the bushes outside the hotel room
I’ve gone through the heroic dialogue
Reasoning and mapping and understanding
And sometimes even forgiving,
But never demanding to be forgiven
The watcher in the bushes,
Seeing my planning
Was only me

See Part II. This was already written about here, Memo: My Witnessing of the United States and this poem Without Homes and Dressings