Hollowed out heart

I unsheath the telescoping rod
from the vein in my left arm
connecting my ring finger
to the heart
and pierce the stale air
of dwelling in this too-small space
atop the low mountain ridge,
I scream, a hawk echoes me and
I determine to open it up,
as a surgeon might do,
and bleed out the rest of the
swollen lust built up
from impossible dreams
and so many bruised misentries
stain like scar tissue,
there is no feeling in this area
that the immune system
is ill-equipped to treat

As the resistance is overkill,
homeostasis is not a residential zone.
The needle-tip inserts alternate forms
of nourishment and necessity,
only meant to keep the heart
beating me up and down
like a closed fist
striking empty chambers.


Painting by Hans Dahl (1849-1937) 'On the mountaintop' date unknown, in Public Domain. 

Sit & spin

Sometimes the body feels too fleshy,
repulsive and the layering excessive
and feels like swelling-

Other times, my own sharp cheekbones
jab these bulbous thoughts
with sharp words, as in No More,

and I try to swallow them
before they creep out any further
or scrape my pink warm flesh deeper.

Nothing is mine anyway. These hairs grow,
out of my control, these moles do something,
the fingers I stole from my mother.

The time is not mine, not even this one.
The body refuses to cooperate with a grander vision,
without blurring the edges and intruding on space.

My left justifies my right and intentions are made up,
despite knowing that I knew this before the fingers did,
the neuron that jumped at the thought which took credit.

Resistance holds our places in equipoise,
it's nothing to do with style,
just keeping things in place, in check,

afloat in my theoretical state of chaotic
reassembly with additional small parts
never mentioned.

Feel this sitzfleish,
like chain mail
awaiting my reply.



Painting By Daniel Hernández Morillo (Salcabamba, 1856 - Lima, 1932) – painter (Peruvian) Born in Salcabamba, Huancavelica. Dead in Lima. [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

River rocks

The strangest thing about change

is You

who won't move.

Rivers start from a spring-

a need to move

Onward.

Convinced in mossy stoicism,

the rocks jump in

to gather ground.

Bubbling in the hustle,

eddying around,

resisting the rush-

You are the smooth stone.

Let it go.

Image By Rhodington (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.