Exploration
Body, vessel, frame, figure, meat suit, flesh prison – temple
built from soapstone, decorated in ink and memories,
scars from growing, taking up space,
bent into more agreeable shapes
each increase in visibility and incentive to hide
stretching out and not recognizing
myself in what others perceive –
A body and mind united in trauma.
A Mind, Full
I hear ‘body mind and soul’
as if it’s supposed to make sense
as if I am a puzzle with three pieces and not
a rubik’s cube with a thousand sides,
a paradox in itself,
nothing but carbon and electrons
somehow creating a perpetual existential crisis
simultaneously creating and suffering its own pain.
Agonizingly sustainable.
Palimpsest: Diagnosis
The monster has a name
and its name is Inescapable
I’m its hoard and its claws are stuck in me
Was I not careful what I wished for?
Someone to hold me tight,
to whom I am precious.
What was freeing at first has become a burden
I have traded in doubt for inescapable certainty
Now the symptoms are no longer annoying insects,
swatted aside, distracting but not in focus
The spiderwebs I tear through on my way ahead
have started to cling and burn
— every symptom a branding iron
every pain another claw in my body
strengthening its grip.
Sensation
I got lost in my mind but my body is an anchor
I make it my home through experience
Gratefulness at the gifts I receive
from my ears, the sweetest harmonies,
from my eyes light, made endlessly diverse as if by some magic.
I am grounded
Digging my toes into wet sand
having my hair pulled back by a strong wind,
its cleansing cold stripping away the fog
that tends to cling to me.
And oh the tastes!
The satisfaction of familiarity,
the actualization of a craving even better than imagined
the ecstasy of surprise,
when blandness is but a faint memory in the face of a kaleidoscope of flavour
Not only the taste but the greedy pleasure of a
true mouthful
cuntful, assful,
the build-up of a pocket dimension
starting in the stomach at full density
stretching out into all-encompassing tension
and a release that brings me closer to a blank slate than anything else ever could.
Tonight, Late: Stage
I am a body, trying to understand itself
I am a body, standing on a stage sending signals
to other bodies, trying to explain myself
I take what is hidden
and bring it into a shared space
and I do not want to hide this body
that provides a space to be occupied, and thus shared
It is this body that provides
a voice to speak of itself
and to itself, a physical, somatic prayer: in visibility to thrive.
Pat was listening to Árstíðir performing Heyr himna smiður while writing this piece.
