Shapes of Shadow
(Author:
Bob Kanefsky)
Past where patterned pathways lie,
Magic works, and there work I.
Scaffold boards left far behind,
I mold forms inside my mind.
Forms that kill, and forms that cure.
Forms to teach, or to obscure.
Forms in which the mind ’s eye delves.
Forms for forming forms themselves.
You build worlds with steel and stone.
I build worlds with words alone.
Skilled tradespeople, long years taught:
You shape matter. I shape thought.
Soft, where your works rigid stand,
My works change as times demand.
Yours take years to redesign;
One night’s thought can alter mine.
For you must stop to forge new tools.
I need only change my rules.
You discard old stock in stores;
I discard old metaphors.
You build worlds with steel and stone.
I build worlds with words alone.
Skilled tradespeople, long years taught:
You shape matter. I shape thought.
Some would say my work exists
In the mindless maze’s twists.
They confuse their beer and gin
With the glass they buy them in.
The second’s made to hold the first,
And, empty, cannot quench your thirst.
Like the poet’s scroll and ink:
Less important than you think.
You build worlds with steel and stone.
I build worlds with words alone.
Skilled tradespeople, long years taught:
You shape matter. I shape thought.
Softly through the fertile night,
My work sheds its own clear light.
You still let your lives be run
By the dictates of the sun.
Fearful caveman that you are,
Scurry to your home or bar!
Long before your brain need tire,
Huddle ’round your neon fire.
You build worlds with steel and stone.
I build worlds with words alone.
Skilled tradespeople, long years taught:
You shape matter. I shape thought.
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