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The Most Authentic Life
The man lives with what they give him,
being one of those needy people
who can't construct his own
or even select from a much broader range
of things to be.
The man is awed
when he gets the signal to be awed,
when he receives signals about
enormity of this and that
his eyes should be disbelieved.
The signals might say
"this dwarfs you";
or could say, "this is beyond you,"
or that "the beauty here will humble you."
It will.
The Place of Delusion in a World of Fact
Life is small
and simple. Even
The years shrink.
The man knows
that his anomie
comes from the truth.
The world is a
blank on which
many impose comfort.
The truth of the blankness
sometimes leaks through.
That leakage
is the disease
which shuts down
the machinery of joy.
The man knows how
the delusion of self importance
is so much
better than the truth.
Don Schaeffer is a phenomenological poet, devoted to exact description of experience. At the age of 70, he has experienced the institutionalization of his spouse and the re-development of a new life out of the ashes of the old one. His poems reflect the transitions in his life. He currently lives in New York after spending half his adult life in Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada.
Don has previously published six volumes of poetry and stories, his first in 1996, not counting the experiments with self publishing under the name Enthalpy Press. His poetry has appeared in numerous periodicals and has been translated into Chinese for distribution abroad. Don is a habitue of the poetry forum network and has received first prize in the Interboard competition.
He holds a Ph.D. in social psychology from the City University of New York.
Email: Don Schaeffer
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