Things We Will Never See

In a fable
six blind men explore
the body of an elephant
with their fingertips
and each declare
that the elephant
is a different object

a pillar
a rope
a branch
a pipe
a fan
and a wall

but elephants
are not material things
yes, a pillar, not of cement
but pillars of morals

they are not made of weathered ropes
but intangible bonds that stretch
and rumble prayers beneath land
across time
and despite species

they are not tree branches
swept this way and that
by nature’s vengeance
but a mysterious web
of links connecting
branching, shifting
mapping a platform for
mother and daughter
past and future

and as tight and coiled
as their gray trunks may be
they are not pipes
but cylinders
plunging into
heartbreak, hunger, heroics
and human nature

they aren’t just fans
but winds cooling
and distancing
the danger of corruption
and failed survival

nor are they a wall at all
not a blockage
not a divide
not an impediment

but an open pathway
that allows us to excavate
the pillar
the fan
the rope
the branch
the pipe
in all of us
the things we can only feel
and the things we will never see

Amanda Gorman