Prism

With every word,
I try to capture
The essence of you.
But in the act of description,
I lose something
Of your substance,
As if trying to hold the wind
In the palm
Of my outstretched hand.

You are a mystery
Unfathomable,
With depths I can only glimpse.
I try to understand you better,
But my understanding
Is incomplete,
A mere shadow
Of your true self,
Projected through
The prism of my mind.

It seems the closer I get to you,
The more elusive you become,
Like trying to catch a fleeting dream
That disappears upon waking.
My examination distorts you,
Transforming you
From substance to silhouette.

And as I contemplate in silence,
The paradox
Becomes more complex,
Revealing the limitations
Of language
And the distance between two souls.
Every analysis
Creates distance,
Between the subject
And the object,
Between the observer
And the observed.

In this world of subjectivity,
We attempt to map out reality,
To gain a sense of control and meaning,
But the very act of observation,
Alters the very thing we see.
So we must accept the uncertainty,
And the limitations
Of our perception,
And embrace the mystery
Of our existence,
Knowing that we can only approximate,
The essence of reality
And each other.