Varifocal
 

I stopped growing.
My eyes didn’t
and now this
magazine is so
close I could eat
its fuzzy photos.
The headlines
aren’t sure what
flavour they are.
I am curling my
index finger
against my
thumb joint
to make a tiny
hole to see
through. An
old trick.
 
Youth sounds
naïve in the
mouth of the
optician. Two
weeks to learn
to see using
three fields
of vision but
I have to wait
until it’s really
bad. My brain
is adrift – that’s
bad.
 
Hopefully rescued,
I’m newly glazed,
on the look-out
as the floor
sneaks away.
I’m fed up
and I’ve given up.
 
I read the advert on the wall. The floor reads it too.
I’ve forgotten it’s day fourteen. Youth was right.
What shall I read for lunch today?
 
Susan Wilson

If you have any thoughts about this poem,  Susan Wilson would be pleased to hear them