Cleaning My Empty Room Poem by Ben Gieske

I didn’t know this empty room was so full
Until I began to clean its mess of emptiness.

Vacant houses in corner webs,
Tiny creepers across the floor,
Bits of someone else’s world,
Windswept under the bed,
Startled spiders seeing red.

Worlds within worlds, wee factories,
Neglected cemeteries covering other’s memories,
Uninvited neighbors and silent, secret mini-monsters,

An underworld, an outerworld,
Insect, outsects,
Not all the same,
Not all known by name.

Are we within worlds, within worlds, within worlds
of someone’s cosmos and galaxy?
Do we have worlds within worlds, within worlds,
within our cosmos and galaxy?

- August 22,2006