Owl Eyes

"Poetry is the kind of thing you have to see from the corner of your eye," said the poet William Stafford. "You can be too well prepared for poetry. A conscientious interest in it is worse than no interest at all... It's like a very faint star. If you look straight at it you can't see it, but if you look a little to one side it is there."


I came across part of this quote on the Free Will Astrology blog. It reminded me of a practice I learned about this summer called Owl Eyes. It's an awareness game from the Wilderness Awareness School that builds on the experiences of naturalists and indigenous peoples from the world over. Using Owl Eyes means expanding your vision, utilizing your peripherals broadening your view rather than having a sharp focus. It's contrasted with Eagle Eyes or predatory vision.


You know that tingling feeling when you know someone is watching you? That's the Eagle Eyes. Owl Eyes are a softer kind of vision. Rather than needle-like focus on any one object, you're absorbing the bigger picture.


I'm drawing this analogy from Stafford's quote because in many respects poetry is like that. If you get too caught up in details you can miss the meaning. At the same time, I challenge this quote. As a literary critic, to not take a conscientious look at a text and truly interact with it is tantamount to ignoring it.


Let me return for a moment to the outdoors. Another game I've learned through students of the WAS is the art of Fox Walking. To Fox Walk is to move silently. Instead of each step sliding over the ground (imagine one of those scenes from a Charlie Brown Christmas Special where everyone is dancing), each movement is precisely up and down. Each step is controlled and balanced so that you can stop at any time. You place your foot with care, ghosting into crinkly leaves and crackly twigs without a sound. You center your weight over each foot before moving the next.


Now imagine trying to practice this Fox Walking while looking at the world with Owl Eyes. It's hard to do. If you're focused on broadening your vision, you can't pay as close attention to where you're stepping. And you focus on each step you take, it's difficult to keep a broader awareness of what you're seeing around you. It takes a lot of practice to do these at the same time, so lacking that, what is a budding naturalist to do?


Divide, conquer and imitate the animals.


Every few steps stop, just for a second, and look around. Open your ears and listen. Smell and taste the air. Feel your entire physical being with all your senses.


The same goes with poetry. If all you do is look slant at the words on the page, you miss the stories that aren't hiding. If you only take things at face value, you miss the nuance of metaphor. Feel the poem. What kind of visceral, gut reaction does it invoke?


Learning to look at something out of the corner of your eye is learning to pay a new kind of attention. To direct your focus without actually having to focus directly.

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As human beings, we spend so much of our time and energy screaming, “Understand me, understand me, for the love of God, someone please understand me.” We scream until we are hoarse, until we lose our voices and fall to the ground of exhaustion.

And yet somehow we fail to hear the multitude of voices surrounding us, screaming in time with equal amounts of pain and frustration and longing. We fail to notice the equal vacuum of need pulling at us from all sides.

It is a sad state of affairs when we cannot acknowledge our own hurt, let alone that of those around us.

So I'm trying to retrain myself.

Whisper with me, “Help me understand you.”

It seems so simple. Create a pocket of silence in this chaos and wait. Transform our own energy and need into something useful.

Recognize the world isn't about me.

I need that reminder from time to time. The world isn't about me, I cannot focus on my wants and needs alone, but this also means I cannot be everywhere for everyone. We are not superheroes. It is selfish and arrogant to think that we must solve everyone else's problems.

Rather, and this is something I've learned from social justice communities, we must strive to empower people to take action for themselves, stepping in with further action only when it is absolutely necessary.

So what is most valuable in a world where all anyone wants is attention, love, validation? How do we empower people to find this within themselves?

Start with leading by example. Instead of adding to the noise, remove yourself from it. Turn down the volume even just a fraction. People are drawn to silence, to the open heart and listening ear. It's something we can feel from deep within.

To understand another, you must first start by seeking to understand yourself better. I don't think it's ever possible to understand yourself fully, but in coming to terms with the fact that we will never completely understand and accepting this, we gain something immeasurable. We gain the ability to move on and instead work on being ourselves.

If this sounds absurd to you. If it sounds ridiculously easy, easier said than done, I am not challenging you. It is indeed easier said than done, but this is no reason not to do it anyways.

So go out and find yourself. Come back to me with your findings. Help me understand you.