from (In)directives
Nicholas J.A.
~
Part of this is red on the page.
A way of saying it says nothing at all.*
White ego, who do you think is reading?
Certain sections sound nice and they are underlined, but the whole (as is implied) is not but a body of wandering hands.**
I am.
This is.
* “Oui, je sais qu’au lontain de cette nuit, la Terre/ Jette d’un grand éclat l’insolite mystère/ Sous le siècles hideux qui l’obscurcissent moins.” Stéphane Mallarmé, “Quand l’ombre…”.
** Mimosa, Henri Matisse, 1949-51, Museum of Twentieth Century Art, Itoh City.
~
Streaks of amazement: riding the curves and valleys.
Before, it was my thought.
The skin of an animal that I encounter encounters these hands.
Descriptions: the undulations of this serif.
Before, it was papyrus.
If read otherwise: liposuction to my intent.
Black bloc to this hardcopy.
Before, the poem was on its own.
~
Break loose!
But perhaps it is an insatiable writing, even without language.
Confessionum: the soon-ness of things wearing off.
Silence: always already.*
Death: the beyond-less-ness of humidity.
But what is the opposite of solitude?**
Mild wind.
* “It comes always in the sense it was always here.” William Bronk, Silence and Metaphor.
** “Loneliness.” Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism.
~
Writing silence.
Writing the cosmos.
Shadowplay: then, now, and always.
Every day is history.
Indefinite kaleidoscopes I follow to and fro.
Meanwhile time.
The slim motion of turning creates varied calculations of light.
Nicholas J.A. lives and writes in Detroit. His work has appeared in Otoliths.
