Real Illusions
Scott Minar*
I wanted to see Troy up close.
So I got out my microscope,
The one I had years ago as a boy,
I wound the dial
Round till sand and sky
Zoomed in. I saw it there
In the sun like a 3-D
Beach towel and floated down
To get into it.
I was aware of my other self
Back home in my laboratory
And kicked the box at my feet
To be sure. But there was no leaving
That place. I had to be in two
Stories at once, this world and that—
Like Dante on the page
Watching Dante with his pen.
It was a paradox I knew
From experience, to be forced outside myself
By circumstances I couldn’t control.
In a kind of enjambment then
I lived my life—sometimes heroically;
sometimes coward, looter, thief.
The line moving down
A page like Sisyphus and his rock.
--poet and singer from USA.