“Optic devices” and the creation of images in Denise Levertov’s “After ‘Mindwalk’” and Bruno Latour’s “Ou suis-je?"

In her poem "After 'Mindwalk'" from "Evening Train" (1992), Denise Levertov writes of how we must "admit what, / even through eyes not naked but robed / in optic devices, is not perceptible". When I read the poem today, the phrase "optic devices" reminded me of Bruno Latour's description in "Où suis-je? Leçons du confinement à l'usage des terrestres" (2021), which I read earlier this year, of how "optic devices" give us images of his "Univers", the "vaste extérieur" of what he calls "Terre": "nous les lisons, nous les apprenons, nous les calculons, mais toujours de l’intérieur de nos laboratoires, de nos télescopes ou de nos instituts, sans jamais en sortir." (Andrew Shields, #111words, 30 April 2023)