View-Master Land

The long poem VIEW-MASTER LAND is about the poet's struggle to come to terms with the loss of his wife Lenora and the profound changes to his life that her death has brought. It's also about celebrating companionship and hope with his new love, Mary. It's about how technology like the BlackBerry, which seemed so wondrous when it was first introduced, is now defunct, a relic of the past. It's about the act of seeing, and how that evolves and gains depth as we get older. Bialer shares his memories of the View-Master toy he grew up with and how magical it was to view his favorite childhood TV shows in three dimensions on a special-format stereoscope and corresponding "reels," which are thin cardboard disks. There was even an attempt to bring the View-Master back in cutting-edge VR technology, but that too failed, underscoring its obsolescence. VIEW-MASTER LAND is about how our perception is enhanced as we go through life, and how the most ordinary can become extraordinary.