Perspective

Perspective

A term for one's point-of-view
Sometimes literal, other times figurative
Physical, mental, emotional, spiritual
Everyone's 'take', just a little bit different

Go back to the roots
And it means 'looking through'
As if there were a lens
A filter
A pane of glass
Between the perceived and the observer

But even when the intervening distance
Appears empty, unobstructed
Still there things that color
Distort
Alter the reality
Like heat shimmers rising from a summer road

Just as each of us
Is the sum of our experiences
So, too, are our experiences
Changed by some of 'us'

The mind, the heart, the soul
Cannot help but add their voices
To the cold objective reality around us
For better, or for worse

Best to remember
That each perspective is different
That none of us corners the market on truth
That, perhaps, the mind of man
Will never be broad and strong and clear enough
To see all things objectively

Remember the blind men and the elephant
Each of us holds some piece of the whole
That may never be seen
Without someone else's piece
That fills in the hole we cannot see
Because of what we are looking through.