The Legacy of Helen Keller

We thought to care for her, to give her life
inside her tomb,
surrounding her with sound and sight
though second-hand, with all the light
of knowledge and the color of our joie
de vivre. We would create in her
a channel to a world she couldn't understand--
then revel in her gratitude.

What irony, that she, the partial woman
that we playful gods created
showed her partiality to other suns she knew
that we did not. Outrageous!
She the teacher that we had to teach
to learn? She, the one who found serenity
in that rich silence unoccluded by
the lightning swords, the battle hymns,
the marchers' vanity called truth.

No, Helen's sight emerges from a realm
that we, encumbered by the ear and eye,
must be denied, lest she let us in to see...
lest she share with us the symphony
upon her private stage, and via
some miraculous device that she
would like to give away to us who wear
our blindfolds much too readily.

I must confess to jealousy
sequestered in my shadowed room,
upon my little bench, and wishing
that I knew what Helen did, and had
resource to reach into my dark
and bring out light, too magnificent
for me alone to keep.
~