1. |
Timid
09:11
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From the word to the hand;
From the hand to the loamy ground.
The verdant grass is turning brown
from the beginning.
“. . . The color of the heavy hemlocks.”
Timid forever.
“I saw how the night came . . .”
Always on me.
Controlled, I climb—uncertain of progress.
Craggy border.
This form dissolves to background surface.
Shining circle: burns!
Unfettered, stochastic motion.
Hazy borders.
A piece of wood with patterns and numbers
fuels the fire: burns!
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2. |
||||
Fall down the stairwell, see my mistake again
Repeat shame with a different name
Refine the question
Oh, how I fall.
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3. |
Hollowring
01:46
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4. |
Made Lighter
06:22
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5. |
Leach
10:57
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Smoke mingled in the leaves
Scorched by a bright fever
Betwixt, amid the tempest
Please feed our cat when I’m gone
Smoke lingers and there’s nothing left to do today
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6. |
A Laugh
02:17
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7. |
Tongue Is Nothing
04:02
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I’ve come and left. My eyes obscure the errors of yore.
Not red, nor gold—a single hue burns deep in my thoughts of you.
My tongue unrolls revealing stories that cannot injure.
But clouded eyes conceal from sight a violent picture.
Within her face a crack appears. The reason is clear.
Her blood, not red, drips to the ground—then splits and spreads, always down.
Her body, tense and kneeling, hardens into a boulder—
Now centered in her anger, which I cannot shoulder.
From her rough palm a sparrow flies, but there is no sky.
So on my hand the bird alights, though not in need of respite.
A sudden pressure spreads from the center of my white palm.
The bird with bloody beak aloft—so proud and so calm.
The stigma on my red right hand sheds blood for the land.
And though I cannot truly weep, I paint the blood on both cheeks.
Yet my conciliation quickly transform to terror
As darkness fills my sight, and I realize my error.
I raise my hand toward the sky, a straining eye.
Her craggy body leaves the ground, but I only hear the sound.
I feel my body stiffen, blood from my wound get colder,
But know that I’m safe when the bird lands on my shoulder.
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8. |
K.
12:17
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Vor dem Gesetz:
But the gatekeeper says that he cannot grant him entry at the moment. The man thinks about it and then asks if he will be allowed to come in later on. “It is possible,” says the gatekeeper, “but not now” . . .
. . . he laughs and says: “If it tempts you so much, try it in spite of my prohibition. But take note: I am powerful. And I am only the most lowly gatekeeper. But from room to room stand gatekeepers, each more powerful than the other. I can’t endure even one glimpse of the third” . . .
. . . he decides that it would be better to wait until he gets permission to go inside. The gatekeeper gives him a stool and allows him to sit down at the side in front of the gate. There he sits for days and years. He makes many attempts to be let in, and he wears the gatekeeper out with his requests. The gatekeeper often interrogates him briefly, questioning him about his homeland and many other things, but they are indifferent questions, the kind great men put, and at the end he always tells him once more that he cannot let him inside yet. The man, who has equipped himself with many things for his journey, spends everything, no matter how valuable, to win over the gatekeeper.
K.:
He wanted to follow and know—
the coachman’s insistence enticing—
but he knew nothing of horses . . .
But your . . . your knowledge
is no credential here.
Just take this broom and
this badge. Attach
your deft hands.
“Your tongue is nothing,”
is on your tongue—but
becomes a laugh.
You let yourself go,
because his strength is
behind the gate.
(Recursive images of wood, like fingers, meeting with the wall and other hands—cupping objects of clarity, like figures reading with no speech.)
Her speech, almost painful, is intensified by its silence. Kneeling before age, not sermon, you hear only murmurs, “but what she said”
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Straya Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minneapolis progressive/post-metal group. Sobereyed out everywhere via Chain Letter Collective.
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