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A rock on which the sea may crash, revealing endless surfing depths to sky and life, can't hold embrace but yields the water to its waves. Yet scattered waters pool and shimmer, evaporate on summer days, or freeze to make the footsteps shake, or drink into a gull or mouse. Stone so solid mortal too: eroding sand and molecules dissolved will soon release to fall down to the seafloor deeping blue. Through dark and day they stand and seethe, so closely placed by nature’s play. A shore unoceaned never was, nor weeping vastness uncontained. Oh droplet mist! oh crystals drowned! may never merge, but ever churn. (“Eros”) this mess seems a molasses morass under the undulating stomach churn noise wrack-ridden donkey hopers hole-in-one it celophane stretchers babybuggybumping downstairs the goose-alas lass swatting moths aflame ether-breather oracle thoraces crackle gadflown tyrants pop chuckle buttons heaving motorists sputter traffic circle lane changes killerrobots suspect us of disloyalty putter pandas zoo-mewl new eulogies birds dropping out of the sky antipositive ions posit idle locksecrets careless curators’ tendon torsion tightens aching eaglets maw maw for fishsnacks cyanide bombs on the dewstrewn verdure overflight roarsoarers drop engine parts centerheld solidity winds a slow waltz windy galaxy wings collide mercilessly the definition function furnishes fun hideaways calisthenic classes silence spent bitcoins faucet readers ideate vidiotriolic vedas paucity coffers sinkhole hardworking caps-n-gown keys jingle in opening old drawers wary-weary-staring panopticon watchers willaway cadence delivery driver wheelies mudspin may the moon upon us new anew but listen listen to the leaves scutting asphalt in the lot listen listen to my love unfettered from my thoughts limn a lim'rick in the dark just past the busy lights obscene absolving in the deep uncharacter my life control control the giddy gush fitting bark to tender shoots control control the living fire unwaver from the truth God’s voice speaks to the soul The soul speaks to the person Person speaks to tribe Tribe speaks to city City to nation Nation to world World speaks to God’s ear “Might makes right” is an ear speaking to a voice God’s oven houses the world The world’s oven houses the nation Nation houses city City houses tribe Tribe the person Person soul The soul houses God’s flame “Might makes right” is a flame housing an oven A speaking ear and an unhoused flame A listening ear and a cooking flame These are the ways of people in the world. (2016) PAI MEI is walking a mountain trail a track retraced by littler feet the progress of animal vigor kicked rocks line the way scat scattered, twig twisted beasts of scent and chase claw a soul into mountain flesh a rocky brow-wrinkle wrinked by littler creases each a path through unreasoning darkness a disordered ordering of stone by life interspecies cooperation without purpose PAI MEI is walking on this mountain trail footfalls beat rhythm to his center to deepest harmony of his heart the yellowing forest hears him pass he hums the onward toll of time sun-redded flower fuzz (2016) PAI MEI sings a hymn of praise words of love unknown in tender motion drawn springlike from silent pool of cool clear heart "what stirred?“ the water-shadowed whiskers of dormant desire to whom? to where? source without vessel wonder unpurposed notes leap and shrilling melody jerk and haw like a fishhook line PAI MEI sings this song of praise while clubbing meat to death for life "the sound of a fish slapping against the shore” we swim in a river we watch out from ourselves current risen falls like a lapping wave (2016) PAI MEI sleeps in a tiger-trap walking through the woods eyes closed gently chanting he heard the snapping woven branches felt the forest floor collapse the shaking of the fall time stilled to slow to speak the chant’s last syllables to hear his echo in the pit PAI MEI sleeps in this tiger-trap an arm or leg was pierced but heart and voice beat strong he feels the warmth beneath him of a tiger’s fading world a bed of fur and folly to nap until the hunters come These are words that go into your mind. I, Brian Brock, write them from my mind, and at the very moment you read them (now) they go into your mind. I perform a certain activity which, upon sufficient exercise of your own faculties, produces the letters comprising these words. We produce the letters materially into contrasting colors such that the shapes represent conventionally determined sounds and/or their indicated meanings. Whether the meanings are depicted as straightforwardly as possible in this visual medium, or by an intermediate such as sound which by a second layer of convention represents various meaning-forms residing in the space between your mind and the convention, as you read them the meanings impress upon your thoughts. These thoughts place a permanent shape into your feelings, memories, and upon the both recognized and unconscious language network surrounding you and your various interlocutors. This has already happened as a direct result of your having read the preceding sentences, and continues to happen up to this point. I further note that given our language protocol and the necessary investment of self into the acquisition thereof, these meanings and your comprehension of them are an iteration of a continuously refracting portrait of meaning stretched within a language space which comprehends us incomprehensible. This language space precedes our comprehension of it. The meaningful communications which are thus communicated precede this communication. Corn monoculture opposite Prairie remnant restoration Below, the working farmer fields Stalk up green from bare brown dirt Th' ecologists’ 'rods 'n' asters rise Plants and soil all the way down Out the windows as their Subaru Drives the grassy ruts between After joy the wise go home The world is very large Within Krishna’s cloak Many terrors also thrive The vast and frigid ocean Holds a burning core Our world insulates The embracing opposites Joy isn't enlightenment It's a smile of recognition There's a reason old friends Departed long ago Wandering in this forest I've worn a circle path The hissing in the clearing The berries in the brambles So, something compels us to believe in our invisible selves: our common manifestation of the something is in language. This being in whose grammar we reveal our inner divinity is prophet and priest of the oracle. Now, language also breeds humanity’s awakening organism: the overseer, who in ourselves seeing our selves forms and informs eye and optics and object, dwells in the world harvesting selfhood. Now then, a being carries us body and spirit: the being maintains we believe we exist and, in this way, the being emanates insight: God is a Metaphor for God. Impostor: I am not to be believed. Impostor Syndrome: my belief that I am not to be believed is not to be believed. Impostor Impostor Syndrome: my belief that my belief that I am not to be believed is not to be believed is not to be believed. Impostor Impostor Syndrome Syndrome: my belief that my belief that my belief that I am not to be believed is not to be believed is not to be believed is not to be believed. Brian Brock, 2019 |