Reveries of Heresy

a buried atavism a guttural howl, a preverbal babble— limbs thrashing without command a depleted engine hurtling its vessel at irrevocable velocity a bottle of neglected lightning imploding wires chafing against wires, inextricably entangled— past the last switch homunculi treading in grey matter, wrenching neuron joysticks from their observation tower axons and dendrites in Cold War, soldiers defaulting, storming to apoptosis myelin stripped— frayed circuits exposed, prisoners of war starving in cells, seeping fumes of dissociation an invisible governor’s thumb bearing down, pressing— a pit spiralling downward, outpacing rising synaptic firing endless motion, eternal stasis

Surely, there lies an immanent core anchored somewhere in this chasm? It swells through roiling hills and vales; a ravine veils the riverbed’s repose. But Eros conspires with the Fates, hurling me headlong through rapids— lovers surge in turbulent throes, and somehow, blindsided by a precipice— I plunge,     limbs flailing,         into the throat of Styx. What’s the point of being prized a rare pearl amidst the silt, then pulverised on a whim—devalued: sham nacre, stripped of lustre? If love is a river, let it be known: I am ravaged by your torrents. Intensity is the counterfeit of love; an undertow that never quenches. So bathe me in gentle streams: Everglades. And if my love takes eras to cascade, at least she’ll run clear, winnowed through cypress knees— a quiet bedrock, unyielding.