They sliced the soles of his feet

open, lengthwise then crosswise

to see if there was some trick,

an explanation

for the man who saw the godhead

with his naked-eye.

They pinned the flaps of skin

open like wings

and searched inside the gristle

for a machine,

a motor and spring, the wheel

inside the bone, the reason

why.

He must have been playing a

a trick on them all this time,

the wool pulled tight

over the collective cyclopic eye,

flashbulb-bright–

he must have, he must have

lied. But the foot was that

of a normal man

after all, after all that

and they sewed his foot together again.

Bridget Lowe