The Oculist Witness by Jay Snodgrass

--As with everything, this is self indulgent

The clinic at the DMV has me in the “Squinters” category

I look like a copse of lavender, with my one eye

Pirate-covered by the little paddle. I see a Z,

A memory of candlelight fading as I close my eyes.

The mind is a marching out of feelers, world replicators.

I’m not afraid to fail, I write a poem at you

Because it has teeth, not daisies. It’s a rage

Not from me, but from the not me.

These imitators can vary the length of a wave of light

Salmon-y, the hand of the optometrist rests heavy

On my shoulder. She smells like your apartment

In that gray I was drunk through. Your portrait

A calm hospital blanket over the jagged buzz

Of Picasso or the nerds lined up to fix your

Computer. Next letter I see is Omega, a listing

For apartments in tiny newspaper print.

It heaves with the functional body, bare ass to the breeze.

She puts the paddle over my right eye and I think

Of how to answer next, L, 5, Gamma. Inside here

Where the test burns me, in the thinking,

A certain descent to the bottom of the swimming pool.

I’m discovering ways to be a new man, a chemist

Or a lunger. Next time I’m in daylight, I’ll strut

With the awarenss of confession. “I can’t make it out.”


Open up to the redness, crinoline chemical on the gaze.

My eyelashes come together like the teeth

Of some tiny machine grinding chocolate. It’s late

Into the vapors, if I faint, it will be into snow

Mellow and loose, the crumpled undertow invents an Alpha.

Or the tumble of ice and waves, a cocktail:

Soft ice, the new glass of teeth. Soft teeth:

The new teeth of glass. In the waiting room

Marked in red pepper, saying goodnight Ms, closing time,

I fill in the bar marked Other with the word

“Breather." I close both my eyes and cave to the failure.

All my life it’s been a struggle to use indifference

As a guiding principle.