I.
Voices.
No one listened, no
one listens. Can we
still hear them when
trachealis muscle
rots, leaving
only cartilage ring
and partial rings
(if left intact and not
incinerated or
obliviated by COD)
through which only
imaginary air would blow
ghostly?
Are they echoes that
exist as imprints in the
atmosphere? I hear that
matter, energy is only ever
transferred, but if it
was never recognized
as mattering before will
the void recognize it after
all? Would any of us
recognize, remember,
something that we did
not know, never noticed,
never acknowledged
as needing to be seen
or known? Are the faint
brushes of noise we can't
place, in spite of our
strained ears, echoes
of ourselves from time
future, from whence our
breathlessness begs
anyone to prickle hair
on neck, in ears, in this
time, present, as no other
time exists?
II.
In the desert where we rode
for days and days and all
our life turned into dust
with every step and scurry
of whatever creature,
whatever falling rock,
we waited, and our sides
grew numb with the waiting,
and our eyes began to boil.
And as they down our dirty cheeks
began to drip, we opened our mouths
wide and swallowed the regurgitated
gift from our mother.
And in this time, that's neither
a beginning or a middle or an end,
the paths that cross become the oaths
we choose and choose again or
the ones we dismiss and lose.
And in this time, that's neither light
or dusk or dark, should paths cross
in a muddle or tangle perhaps
unraveling the red yarn will lead us
to the footsteps we made but had
forgotten in our wanderings.
We climb as marsupial
children into the pouch
of tenderness wherever
we may find it- we do not
know any other way
although we may not
know we knew it.
And though we fry
under this lamp
we nestle deeper
into the womb
feeding our voice
through umbilical waves
as though it matters.
III.
Avoid interrogation.
Avoid extrapolation.
Avoid asphyxiation.
IV.
And if you made a mark
carved into a beech, yew,
or ash, soft wood white
and waiting to take the tip
of the blade of genius,
then perhaps the path you
chose, though it leads
to a bluff (and heights make
you dizzy) will still carry
you into the grave knowing
you were known by one.
Does cartilage rot? Or does
it rust? The throat knows,
the voices know, and I must
try to listen for an answer.
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