i am in some new space, so raw and ill defined
boundless, i can see the horizon up close and yet very far
i’ve been so far from home and only getting further
what strange landscape is this, all gravel and rocks and wind
dead trees and cracked pavement, twisted road
all for comfort, all this i find comfort
bleached sky, no trace of sun
just endless white, the ghost of a dying moon just to the left
have i always been here all along, is this where the roar comes from?
have i finally come home, to this place, to this barren place?
jagged edges and plains wide and spectacular, impossible on the eyes
hard surfaces and forever, dust and life eternal
ageless in the face of pain, of sorrow, of happiness, and rage
as if it all began and ended in this scorpion’s tail
perched before my lips, akin, kin, little brother, little sister
is this where i’ve always belonged? have you missed me?

i look down the cuts in his arm,
not “on”, but “in”
what new thing have i become?
he wonders idly, what if,
what if now, the morning after, i pry each wound re-open,
what if i piss on my arm, what if i smear my shit over the wounds
spiders or leeches or metal shavings
what if what if what if-
what of it?
what new sense is this, what new boundary drawn around me?
i look in the cuts of my arm
not “at”, but “in”
like some new orifice, some new mouth
some new voice speaking to me
revealed suddenly as if some virgin moment
grounding me once again
same as i never was

the all-at-once, breathing everywhere, where have i been, the all-at-once being, cannot make sense of it, breathing, remember to breathe, did you breathe before this, before taking this on, did you forget to breathe, where have you been breathing, stop breathing, stop breathing like this, pushing it down, push it down, the hand on the chest, holding it there, pushing, holding it there, hold it there, breathing, have you breathed today, hold that one breath, everywhere, the all-at-once, one last breath, one last hand pushing, push it down without breathing, crush it down, crush this last breath, without stopping, turning away, stop turning away, stop breathing, one last time, let it go, let it go all-at-once, never let it be all-at-once, just be all-at-once, at all sides, the swirl everywhere, where can i go, further than this, where further this breathing, how to breathe further than this, without stopping, how do i go on without stopping all-at-once?

“the only real thing you are good at,” he says, sitting and swaying the chair back and forth on the rear two legs, ashtray overflowing, the table pock-marked and scarred.
“I mean the only real thing you have talent for,” he stops dead and straight, “is breaking things. that’s it. nothing else.”

and every time he plays with her body it’s a new kind of tune, like something climbing up out of the depths, ancient and old but utterly new and wonderful. he feels her skin across his own like some harmony that reverberates back and forth through time and shakes the cobwebs off his eyes. and when he reveals her pussy the scent of her fills him up, hardens him and urges him, demands of him to inspect this fruit even closer, to ripen it, to open it, to taste it, to quell his hunger and sate her own. and when she takes his prick and massages it he feels an excitement that is at once illicit and natural, as if they were always meant to be like this, hand and mouth on cock, hand and mouth on cunt, eternally. and the chords strike even harder, sharper when she eases his dick inside her, where the sound gets lost in her throat but just escapes and the music plays havoc with him as he becomes lost to their rhythm. until he cums or she cums or they cum, it doesn’t matter, something gets lost in the translation, some thing gets translated between them, some satisfaction that is primal and comforting, staying within her, her staying with him, their bodies still close, breathing in one another. and it isn’t as if he can ever have enough of her, the ghost echoes of desire shoot through him in the night, in his sleep when he believed he already had his fill, finds himself wanting again, wanting to play again a tune that starts from within him and all too soon ends within her.