Borrowed Sight

He held it, small and round, in a piece of soft cloth.

Turned it in the light, a polished, cold moth.

It was his eye, or the space where an eye had been.

This one, a perfect sphere, no real sin

of looking too much, or not enough.

Just a fixed stare, through all the rough

years. A porcelain gaze, not his own.

He rubbed it gently, as if it had known

some dust or slight film. A patient care.

No blink, no tear, just a glassy glare.

I thought of all the parts we swap out, replace.

The knee, the hip, the plastic in a face.

What stays, what goes, when the body gives up ground?

And what kind of seeing happens, when it's not profound?