Monday, January 8, 2018

THRUM NATION

Sure as the imperious sunlit sky
obscures vast astronomical networks,

this waking life is
merely
obfuscating my illimitable dreaming. sure
let's have another loud

mournful celebration—sure, of the death
of the night, of the life of the world we could
still walk around dead in. sure.

I'm humming, I'm joking, I'm not
humming, I'm scrolling, tearing,
                             improvising through pages—people,
years, projects, dollars. millions of
billions of them out there, but who's counting,
just listen—
even the word "billions" sounds like the coins

getting yanked out of some digital
slot machines' mouths
and hitting the ground sure—just
make up your mind or don't I
don't care just let me make up mine...

in the even audible spaces between breathing, I hear
a kind of existential silence
emanating from all these smart devices.
                                          all trash
compacted news, rude
teenage poltergeists of photographs, clever
ticker tape commentary—

it doesn't matter where. sure,
                          everywhere
the white space tingles. the black
pulses thrash and hum.

Gradually—nothing
has begun 
to crease and to fold and compound itself

out of thin air. out of existence. in a minute 
suffocating it’s own capacity to happen.