He looks through a hole

in the woven straw hat

that covers his face in the sun.

The glint that he sees there
creates prisms of spun glass
on a palette of sunset pastels

 

that lie behind black lines

which pattern themselves

as the organic rhythms

 

of tree rings, as malachite

and crystals

spilling the spectrum,

 

as striations swirling

like phantom fractals

embedded in a jewel.

 

In the hole of his hat:

the universe.

 

 

From Casting for Meteors (Finishing Line Press, 2011).
This poem first appeared in Avocet (Fall 2010). 
Used here with the author’s permission.