Poles Apart Poem by Carey Lenehan

We ran in the same streets, but we walk in different worlds
You and I, poles apart, thinking, not thinking about
understanding each other,
no chance of ever, seeing eye to eye

Equality unequally distributed, you see you at the top
of the food chain,
whereas I, a mere reflection of yourself,
am somewhere down deep in the pond

Skin, stature, sex, sin, sisterhood, you will never
see what I see, only
the walls of the world that fences you in to conformity
with me on the outside because I,
dressed in the threads of exception,
find conformity too straight a jacket

You see the world numerical, divisible, distributable,
Whereas I, who came from the earth and never left,
perceive symbiosis, unity, the absolute
art of the whole,
that radiant goddess from whom you cut chunks and pretend
there flows no blood

You cannot make us alike, because of a deed, a slash of pen
on paper
You drown in uncomprehension as we circle each other
swimming in different waters and
bound only by a name, same same, but different

You have lost the real world,
as you count profits and study the Nasdaq,
allergic to green grass and fresh air
but I am still living there,
treading the wet earth between my toes,
watching the seasons change,
listening to the fading heartbeat of your cash cow

My earth will take me back when I am done
but where will you go to my brother?
Will you be divisible too?
Will your company count your profit and loss and the trees
mourn your passing?

Will the pipelines shed a tear, will your office be refilled with
a clone of you?
Will we be equal?
Can you ever... be my equal?