Finding the Hidden Things

By The Jotter

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If we go into the world
With eyes open, nostrils flaring
Ears at the ready,
And patience - always patience -
Watching…we will find those things
Which are hidden to the casual passerby,
Hidden from the modern world of fast pacing
That to and fro, from job to party to
Special effect with no story.
But the patient will find
The small beauty, the careful plot of life, the ant still and sensing,
The suggestion of a past not allowed into the rushed life.
The hidden things coming to those
Who hide between the moments of today
And tomorrow.

The hidden watcher camouflaged

In the tree watching the approach of the city
To his home,
Watching for the coming of the four-legged chasers.

One of the hidden, a cousin

To the pursuit of patience.

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Souls,
Hidden in the past
Their direction known but the purpose
Is anyone’s guess.

Their toes once curled around the shifting tan sand

To press forward.
Some with an idea of where they head
Others
Just guessing at their future.
The future sometimes
Only leaves us with footprints
And the past gives us
A walking sun-dream.

The deepest imprints

Will last beyond the wind
Longer than the rest.

The lesson: don’t rest.

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Perhaps they all walked to here.

Where is that hidden crowd,

Leaving one
Alone
Solo in the sun?
Stark white steel and stucco building
Left to rise against the sky
A sloth to rise from its antlike beginnings
But now stabbing the blue sky
Rising like a fat phallus
From the green jungle
At the edge of sand
And footprints.

The fertility of imagination

Is sometimes a blessing.
The imagination of fertility
Can be a curse.

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Where does the seed go?
Blown on the wind
Of chance
Of drifting there
From here
And wafting like the cotton wings it has
The air caressing it and teasing it here,
Then there.

Here, the eventual resting place hidden,

The seeds are laid in the future, the
Billowing
A means for creation to receive
What we conceive.
The milk-weed to arise
Hidden in the small core
Of a small brown seed on the end
Of a white wisp.

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Some of us hide
In the now,
In a crowd
At the back,
Unsure of what we face.
Unsure of what we think.

So we duck.

It’s like it was back in school.

If we look at our feet the gym teacher won’t
Pick us
To demonstrate the new thing.
Being taught today, for that
Act of being picked
Always makes some of us nervous
And calls us out of hiding.

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Not in the sand
Do we hide our heads
And hearts. The Black Swan
Once thought not to exist,
Dreamed by statisticians as the event
Which can’t happen
Statistically. So when it does happen,
It’s a black swan.

It happened.
We can’t hide our heads.
And maybe we haven’t
But we’re certainly near to it
Standing at the edge of a hidden surface
Putting our head in our feathers.

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It’s there
Just beneath the surface
Breaking the tension of water
For air
Concentric circles telltale signs
Of life
Moving below our vision our
Awareness of things on that other side
Weak
How many see only the algae blooms
Not that ancient thing which moves below?

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Where have we gone?
What have we done
That we don’t enjoy the sun?

Parasols protect the empty lounging apparatus,

Those thoroughly modern bygones
Of irony, the desire to enjoy the sun
Hereditary
From the primitive,
But the time to get here
Acquired
From modern work completed inside.

We are not here.

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Hidden power in wind
And water
The broken sea of glass
Turbulent
To match
The mood of the day
The mood of the watcher
Hidden
The coming storm
Behind the rolling power
Of breaking wave and roiling cloud
Of push to shore of intemperate air
Invading the peace
Bringing with it the electricity
Of life and death.

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Life and death.
Dinner hidden
From the seeker.
Life and death,
Predator on stilt legs
Prey under a pebble
Of sand.

Move fast little legs

Or the surf
Will hide you as well.

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Initial fast wing flaps
Giving way to glide
Hidden grace over curling power
Flying away from our approach.

Is it just the bird leaving us?

Or is it the nature
Of nature to flee our advance?

Is nature,
Like the squirrel in the tree,
Watching
For the approach of that without grace?

The hidden grace of wings

The grace of hydro power beneath the waves
The foaming kiss of curling water
To the approaching sand
And in it all
The approaching hidden slap! of water
Flat on sand.

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Big wings or small wings
There is hidden beauty in folded wings,
Crawling on the living leaf,
Drawn by the scent
And the offer of rest.

What would make the world

Open up its wings
Without need of closing
Or rest?

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The appearance of hidden eyes,
Warning predators away
Drawing religious adoration of the ancients.
The seeing eye that brings reward
Or danger if you are not careful.

The key
For the watcher
Is to remain hidden
And not disturb the scene.

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Hidden scavenger on the field of yellow,
If you look close in the middle,
Hidden flowers behind protecting screen,
The power of exploding color
Hidden from those who pass by.

You need to enter

To see the pulse of nature
The yellow below
Matching that of sun above.

Scent on air from open blooms

The full beauty still behind
Closed buds.

The future holds both the fullest delight

Of completed blossoms
And
The full disinterest of decayed spent flowers
Once their duty is complete.

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In our desire, in our
Conceit
We have brought within our boundaries
That which has no boundary.
Nature, hidden behind our fences.
Is it’s power diminished?
We think it is enough
To miniaturize nature
And cage it so that we have a piece caught.

Inside or out, however, the hidden

Gives us a balm, a boon.
Lucky is he who can see into his own soul.
Shared paranoia and delight over the hidden things
We might ourselves become hidden on the cliff,
Overseeing the passage of a river,
In order to cast the spelling words
And discover what passes us by on a typical day.

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All pictures and words © by Steve Ullom
Under Creative Commons licensing

Cover picture is over the Mackinaw river in Illinois.

Squirrel is from backyard in Normal, Illinois.
All other pictures from Florida, near Melbourne.

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