Fabric Camera

for Emily

When you were still a kid and liked to sew,
you made a replica of something mine,
my Nikon camera, as way to show
your sewing skills and also as a sign
of love you felt with something made of felt,
a fabric which you used for lots of cute
creations like the camera you built
that made a picture though it couldn’t shoot:
although it had no lens for looking through,
through it, I see your love so beautifully.
As camera, it’s fake, but what is true
is worth far more and means a lot to me:
Though love may not be seen, it may be shown
through something wonderful like what you’ve sewn.

Mario A. Pita

Handwritten

For Harita

How wonderful it feels now to receive
a card or letter written out by hand,
its personal, warm touch that can relieve
the coldness of a digital dry land,
where it’s a species nearly now extinct
as if it had been hunted down or banned
in years elapsing fast as eyes that blinked,
with instant messages in high demand.
But, thankfully, some, like you, keep alive
an art that otherwise would slowly perish,
and, celebrating people, make it thrive,
creating something solid they can cherish.
Computers help write books or lengthy theses.
Your hands, though, keep alive a lovely species.

Mario A. Pita

Brainwaves

Electrodes planted all around my head
sprouted out as rows of wavy lines,
a skilled researcher with some software read,
amazingly then sifting through the signs
of consciousness and firings that led
to motion from a web that intertwines,
through which electric pulses being fed
leave traces while my bulb—awareness—shines.
As I observed the waves traced from my brain,
of sharp or sloping, varied frequencies,
I marveled at how thoughts can fall like rain
and ripple out across electric seas.
I saw as seas the thoughts I felt were deep
and oceans too the ones that made me weep.

Mario A. Pita

Mind World

It seems to be a world of swirling clouds
that shift their shapes as if in gusting wind.
Their quickly changing color thickly shrouds
a surface that’s unseen as they’re not thinned.
I stared in wonder at the world on screen,
at each swirl that looked like a hurricane,
aware that what—in fact—I’d seen
were current fluctuations in my brain.
Electrodes made a movie of that world
that’s in the cosmic darkness of my head,
electrical activity which swirled
transcribed by sensors so it could be read.
Beholding enthralled, I was an astronaut
who stared from orbit at a world of thought.

Mario A. Pita

Supports

We’ve gathered to support each other, speaking
about the ailment we’re afflicted by
and found, in talk, support that we were seeking,
our friends and families could not supply,
as no one understands like those who’ve known
firsthand our challenges and can reply
in ways that make us feel we’re not alone
through gatherings on which we can rely.
But like a bridge requires more than one
support to stand across a rippled river,
we need supports beyond just talk—like fun,
which gives support that talking can’t deliver:
to better face afflictions that may sting,
we gather to support through play—and sing!

Mario A. Pita

Autumn Run

As leaves on trees were turning golden brown,
a runner passed beneath them with her hair
tied in a pony-tail, a wind blown crown,
of hues just like the trees, soon to be bare.
Yet she was in the bloom of youth, life’s spring,
with decades still to pass before its autumn,
with ages left until the years would bring
a running out of time for hair of auburn.
But when I saw her hair and matching leaves,
the two became for me a haunting pair
suggestive of how time runs by and leaves
like foliage that’s blown away by air.
Time ran and blurred for me the young and old,
in a runner’s hair, like leaves, of brownish gold.

Mario A. Pita

Swan Rescue

Strolling by a reservoir, I saw
a swan attack another one: it bit
as though the victim had defied a law
and needed to be punished and submit
to violent retribution he deserved,
to persecution he had to permit.
I felt compelled to help as I observed
his neck was pulled as if for breaking it.
I may have saved the poor swan from a bully,
and I hoped someone too would interfere
with us—the human race—so we live fully
freed of the violence breeding woe and fear.
They left in peace, and I felt hope’s not gone:
we’re no less beautiful than is a swan.

Photo: Lori Wilcox McCray

Mario A. Pita