If only I had heard the words themselves
expelled unmistakably in blades from
a swirling voice, prismatic in black,
and      simply      inescapable permanence
through me, saying
you are condemned, I would have nodded, nodded

Unmistakable, too, though, is my thought
and it lashes      simply      through me
more than a burden      on a via dolorosa
asking what sound the ground would make,
were my shoulder to dip, it to fall, were I, in bareness,
to run towards a break in the confluence

My shoulder throbs critically certain moments,
possibly, the way water when it mantles
under itself, when its skin just about
feels      itself      out
Though solitude, it could be made of wood
to splint or splinter and, further, throbbing is just

blood, in as would be out, so      quickly do my
bones straighten, wait for swirls to slow,
silence to recede back towards
sussurating laodicean voices, again, speaking
only to me, too      too clearly      a calloused truth,  
and for the confluence to nod, nod      then close the break.