1. |
Grayscale
04:19
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We move in shadow; we writhe in sunlight.
In the cave of our mind we live at the mercy
of thought and seizure—what do I think,
and why do I think it? What do I take,
and why do I take it? Easy enough
to walk down the street with an air
of optimism, but the street itself,
the operating table by which
the city removes limbs and lives,
flosses its teeth after a full meal.
You cannot speak in any language.
Rapt with your surroundings,
you admire the way the greenness
of the evening sky glows. Place me
upon the altar. I am a saint. Take me
and burn me. Wilting flowers,
grayscale sunsets.
Color found and bound to the eye.
Try to peel it off—inside the pupil is all
the oil of the land; extract it, yank it like
a string, fibers from the cosmos unwound
like a mind lost in itself. And the black thread
becomes a knot, with you at the center.
The central image of now. And inside
today I am suffering. Have you buried
your child yet? The child is waiting,
there, free from soil, and you still
stand here looking up at black
rain clouds, begging them to sing.
Hold the wilting flowers in your hands,
watch the grayscale sunset split the storm,
and feel an endless kind of numbness tingle
up your spine. You raised me, did you not?
And yet I lie here, quite easily enough.
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2. |
Within the Noise
03:47
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We count our fingers
as if we could grow more.
We glide along rivers
like insects in retreat.
And when the waterfalls come,
we could rise, but instead we choose to fall,
tracing the flowing droplets
with bodies too meek to recognize
the power within the choice,
the anger within the noise;
falling still, we look at the water-necked
rocks and expect everything will be fine.
Everything will solve itself. People will not
keep complicating. Love will not keep
devastating. Blood will not keep spilling
from the doors of the houses
of the people blind enough
to believe the kings
who sing of peace
like a myth of immortality;
but every singer will meet their end,
and their immortality will always outlive them;
and their families will inherit the weight
of their choices, and the towers they build
will be bought by someone else
and torn down. And in their place,
soon, it will just be barren land.
And in their place, you,
you will just be barren land.
We count our fingers
as if we could grow more.
We glide along rivers
like insects in retreat.
And when the waterfalls come,
we could rise.
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3. |
Likeness of a Wasp
04:13
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Lights overhead. A storm gathering
inside—me, everything, no wonder we
all die: magnetized, we stratify against
our own constraints, split in half and half
and half and half and half and half;
we float toward some kind of hole,
and float down, a crucial kind of settling,
whether drenched in chemicals or ignited,
the final ending, taken by the mind,
spreading. There was a story there:
Below the firmament moon glow, my witnesses will go where I have dreamt. Wind, blow. I beckon them.
Ribcages’ faces pressed against the skin,
a sun too strong or too weak bearing down,
and the moon is a kind of release from this
leash of flesh. The sun just makes us sweat,
and the sweat will not feed the crops. You
are the likeness of a wasp, nesting overhead,
holding the self to patience (follow, follow,
where I have led); but waiting to see whom
it is you should hurt. The weakening of
the dirt, the soil softens, and it was all a trick:
mouths open and swallow us: we become
a spirit spinning through the darkness.
Hades, call my name. I am brave.
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4. |
Torture the Sky
04:49
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Compare now with then and be left breathless
by illusions. Muster images of a perfect world:
no eternity, no burning. The stars have been traced
and we still can’t see what they measure. The distance
between self and infinity is a key. Unlock the vision;
believe in what it means to be “saved.” How broad,
each stroke? How vain? We are stars, exploding.
You are a sky, imploding into a portal: an eye:
a creature beyond understanding. If manipulation
is everywhere, where is truth? Which projection
is best kept visible? Insanity ascribes meaning
to even the smallest coincidence; so how do
we change? Someday these songs will end.
Until then, we put our hands together
and bask in the thoughts that bring comfort.
Whose hands? When? A question
lingers on the tongue;
dissipates.
Spoken word part 1:
Crushing, this search for meaning. Empty, this skull, now
pleading, for a blockage, a seal. Stamp the wax and watch it dry
into something you believe in. What is belief when a voice can
take any shape? What is a ghost when the soul doesn’t exist?
How do we see? How to form meaning out of mud—
how to crumble—everything wet dries eventually.
Spoken word part 2:
Every storm becomes a sea. Water gathers in a body, a cult,
a gullet, poisoned. We believe anything that grants passage
from this world; we get buried, we want out, we want to escape.
Being alive is the hardest thing there is. So be reborn. Launch
yourself outward, discover new stars, trace them, and if we cannot
breathe underwater, within the lake, at least we can see.
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5. |
Green Moon
06:57
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The light calls us outside.
Green moon in the sky.
Shoes hit the street
free of thought, free of mind.
Steps taken outside of mine.
I drop everything of the life I've built.
Every house lit on fire.
Hair grown from a rootless skull.
In the garden there is a snake,
the legs of a floating spirit,
the robes of a dying god.
The sky is a prophet
and we are the (witnesses) saved;
be drawn from your door into
the flame. Into the flames.
Chanting in the streets.
Voices shouting
the curses of every language
as if the lightning
striking down would
hear them, care, change
pattern and position,
cease. There is no end
to the end; life is always ending.
Step out your door and embrace this.
Create a life to leave behind.
Then you'll live forever.
Green all around.
We all step outside.
The buildings (our homes)
are on fire. Green moon
in the sky. The lake,
turgid and green,
bleeds into itself.
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Ambien Fairfax, Virginia
when we sleep we float like ghosts
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