WHEN HANDS WERE FEET AND ARMS WERE LEGS

WHEN HANDS WERE FEET AND ARMS WERE LEGS

The space between times that are named
is sometimes a solemn gestalt:
my companion’s breath heard
in the bathroom,
the rasp of toilet paper,
a tree coughing in the woods,
a train running up and down its ribs
at night

We protect our ears
so we don’t hear ourselves

coughing

We protect our ears
so we don’t hear ourselves–animals–
know ourselves–animals–
as animals
in the bathroom
using toilet paper
in the rasping coughing
nest of porcelain sterile echo place
for our scat
to plap

But it’s rich
that sound
wealth

Yeah, when I close my eyes
and open my mind
I see and I sort

I see and I sort
contrails from fog
discern minnows in the shallows
now-you-see-it now-you-don’t
magic eye mandalas
in my inner ear

From flat black
I turn dividends
from the velvet
of the static hush

I turn the shell inside out
the cornucopia in which I hide
the hall of my lush ecosystem
the hall of my magic kingdom
the echo of the holy bathroom
to shake down an idea

And then I step into the next room
the pocket of parallax
to check my honesty

Integrity sometimes minnows
in a river of batter
sometimes too much,
then pain

I step into that room again,
I step into that room

And do I care?
asks my inner policeman,

Oh yes I do!
I pat myself down.

I say I care,
I do declare
I care
I am conscious
and I assert
I care

When you are a friend
who is next to me
When I have time
and when I am your neighbor
and not just a reference
to an idea

Be sure to say hi
no more ghosts
of living
people

You know?

We are the same
yet everyone is special
no equal sides and no equal angles
yet we asymptote within wind
looking for the ideal
in fluttering inequality
shuttering dichotomy

To be regarded
to be then disregarded
it’s not all very understandable
but it’s all very understandable

Stop stepping in the same place again
Stop stepping in the same place

Consider the dividing line:
when hands were feet
and arms were legs

~ Lady