Ode to a Lens-bearer

Ode to a Lens-Bearer

5/11/2021

Freckles

Like liver spots

Puke-stained dots

Concealing the blemish-free beauty

That surely must live below

Everyone should know

This crooked red hair

And embarrassed stare at my shoes

Shoves my existence

Through an unnecessary meat-grinder

Defined her

By only the parts that she loathes

If they could only see her, me

We

With any other hue of hair

Any other skin

I long to begin again

But, then…

It’s there

Under the glare of the book-store fluorescents

My adolescence comes to a screeching halt

My fault, obviously, being perspective

Rejective of the awe-inspiring, auburn, sun-kissed glow

That clearly shows on the pages of this

One

Amazing

Book

A look at my outsides in

From the inside out

Amorous, crimson yearnings

Rust-tempered joy

Ornery, orange gazes

Pages ablaze with sweet-ginger-joyful eyes

Confident coppery cock-eyed smiles

Every style of chestnut, calm, cheshire grin

And winning contemplative face

Erasing the uncertainty in my heart

I trace the constellations on my arm

Feeling at once proud

Defiant

Ready to claim aloud my inheritance

My sudden charm

A Phoenix from a face of flames

Shame,

Transformed by these frames

And this one famed soul-seer

Named Joel

A million postcards from my amour-propre

For the introduction to my self

My righteous redness

And the misjudged cast-aways of my whole