I wear my life around my neck
heavy and grotesque
carried like a consequence
to actions unknown
It feels natural now to do so
the way it sways and shifts
keeps a rhythm with my pace
movements subtle gifts
Though my neck is sore with the burden
raw and red from the rope
my conscience is clear of the guilt
no act of mine brought this to my throat
The canvas is bright with lights
there lies the future – burning
the dark sutured around it like a wound
slowly cauterized
Violence
strikes in the night
expressed as darkness in geometry
the light extinguished
in triangles
squares
rectangles.
The world disappears
panic is hidden amongst the shadows
the future is mourned
The past ignites in old fires
rising high into the clouds
the corpse pyres of dying dreams
wake something primal.
Dancing flames tell stories
our eyes would not otherwise hear
hearts are warmed while minds break
the end is bright.
Consciousness and form pulled from all directions
screaming out against the cosmos in a vacuum
silent
there is no place for us amongst the stars
they burn for dreams that end in death
rebirth
not fire or embers or kindling
we are invisible heat lifted to the night
rising
when the wind catches us in its tantrums
it carries us away until we are nothing
dissolved
We are places all around – moving
until cooled – and naught but the movement remains
sifting
Maps were drawn
to keep the world at bay
when the world seemed so vast.
Lines were used to convey
a sense of place
restraint,
else how would we face
the endless geography
untamed?
When we could not find words
we used our words instead
reducing the new and strange
to memories alive or dead,
a part of ourselves at play
in labels
for all that is touched by night or day.
Blue is the place beyond our reach
blue is the speech made to subdue
red words they preach of violence to renew our fear
the dawn is near
Yellow slices through the night sky
yellow the dye the river pulls
Green now from cries of full hearts grieving in the stream
to wake from not a dream
Orange is what they left to us
orange the rust that aches for end
purple the lust that will bend truth around morning
a fair warning
Burns
the air around you
rising
swelling
crashing again
the ground stirs
Burns
those lips
apart and broken
set against me
closing in
the bite.
Burns
these bonds
that hold us together
and keep us apart
the rope
burns
Purpose
locked – cocked and ready
action potential set to a trigger
to place the world in sights
and see to it that she is fired upon
and fired upon
and fired upon.
I am told we are violence
we are the natural product of the cosmos
broken, grafted, and manipulated
into perverse projectiles
fired at blistering speeds to our end
a flash of light
a loud noise
a wound.
It hits me with such shock
honesty transcribed in shades of gray
the negative space of brighter days
that lie still in the background,
victims of the machine.
Electric fire shooting through us
as absurd hunger – ruinous
We are ambiguity
broken forms teased by contiguity
No wires stretched between anxious thoughts
leaves on the water’s surface – caught
We are ambiguity
terrified of becoming superfluous
How shameful this time would thus be
our desire all that we can see
self-branded scarlet letter
we wear like winter in a warm sweater
But a sweater is held by thread
while less of us can oft be said
Self-branded scarlet letter
our fiendish addiction to destiny
We pay ourselves gratuity
self-branded scarlet letter
but none of it makes us better
we are ambiguity.
This macrocosm is heavy inside
held by a few dozen windows
a handful of doors
openings that force the world small
less than the words on paper
an image echoed on closed eyes
nothing to desire or be afraid of
Outside – looking in
this place is nothing.
No one looks here on purpose
eyes have better things to do
only visiting when lost.
A world this small from the inside
Leaves no hope for those looking back
to see…
The floors here are disastrous
tornado wreckage
tidal waves retreated
leaving indiscernible trauma
old lives told like nightmares
with baubles and fabric.
Wires could pass as wigs
regurgitated spaghetti
A discarded blue dress
may as well be buried tile
sequins and seaweed
a three-day old corpse;
any of those things.
Three days?
has it only been that long?
Grow Gray With Me 