The winter catacombs had
long since seeped into the skin,
so that my eyes were scarred open
to ransack the surroundings. The faded
room’s flicker of white noise wrangled
itself inside, while droning tones
tucked away each staggered sigh.

Perhaps it’s farce to believe
that feelings can be trapped in
the wavering spaces where we
can never return. Maybe in all
the languid memories that sit
cross-legged on the edge of well
practiced absolution can never
truly be touched: like gripping
yellow, or blinking chromatics.

Despite this, found mangled against
the gate of my ear, is an urgency that
is engulfing. Concave to the outskirts
of breathing, I am told that all one wants,
is for the age of their quiet, non-being,
when the silver knife arrives to cut
silently upon an existence already grown
too thin. Years swell, but each passing
era exiles what it means to be—because
we can only depend on the reality of flesh
and the chance illusions of refracted light,
but never the notion of something more,
so, the dying, jaundice question lingers—
who will wipe this blood off us?