Perpendicularities

Space all around-

Three dimensional-

Why not four?

How do our words even meet?

There is no linear track from my mouth to your ear.

None from your eyes to mine.

Just space.

How can what you mean meet what I mean

And converge?

Words can go anywhere

In our three dimensional world-

Why not four?

If they shoot off diagonally from you

To me,

And mine shoot of vertically from me

Away from you,

Would these lines of thought

Encased in word-sound meet?

Not at first. No.

But would they after traveling the world-

Wrap around in a circle,

Compelled by gravity,

And not being parallel?

That is exactly why they meet.

Not being parallel.

We don’t see eye to eye.

But as the words traverse the sky on and on,

Bending back around,

They’ll inevitably meet.

A phenomenon not available to the parallel or to the same.

So don’t move too fast with your disappointment

At our opposing angles

With your frustration-

Of not knowing me and

Of me not knowing you.

Because it’s for that very reason

My meaning will meet your meaning

In this too big, three dimensional space

And then converge.

This, this is communication.

Poem, written by Mary Claire Russell