Oxidative Stress Poem by Patti Masterman

I used to hide inside the worlds I found in books,
Pressing them into corners, into the hidden drawers
Of antique chests, between the covers of Grimoires:
The poetry of being, the holiness of breath-
I wanted to hoard it, to save it all for Someday-

Someday, when the other world went missing,
lost on some highway too far to ever find again,
or changed so much, it was no longer recognizable.

But once alone in that grainy darkness, those swelling voids,
the galaxies rotated, there were breathtaking supernovas
Whenever I wasn’t looking; or wars broke out,
While astounding discoveries were made and went forgotten,
completely unobserved.

My worlds became sterile, because they were never seen
by other living eyes,
And would burst into flame and disappear
The instant they were opened, and real oxygen got in.