The Birthing

You do not seek it,
it seeks you

so birth it in darkened rooms by muted glow of screen
paint ecstasy in grid-like pattern across the harsh, tumbled lines
of your drawn face

your flesh willing, hands stretched, tendons splayed
ready to receive communion of the mind,
pure vision
come
down,
to the supplicant, the faithful
who huddles night after night, your prayers
scraps of tobacco, wilted leaves
mulled tea, in chipped enamel cups
steam rising, like mind waves rise
shifting, pooled,
swirled

---

In light of day, you seek control
to twist here, to tug there, to make the vision fit the ordained
pattern you have chosen
the template

to appease hungry eye
critical hand

losing, always, in every receding step
while the memory of birth
becomes just memory
dying in repeated ticks of fingers on keys

oooooh, but

You wanna tweeeeeak it
You wanna teeeeease it
You wanna smoooooth it

pull it in a million different putty strains at once,
fit every expectation, move it from what it should be
and make it into something it's not

to please hungry eye
critical hand

---

Here, in the darkness, at birth's final gasp,
take the time to run your hand across it,
let the smooth progression become ice and wind

chipped cup, tilted, only food for the swollen eye

lick it, taste it,
for a moment, let it enter you
as you have entered it

tomorrow, it will become a changed thing,
Proteus, a million hues

for the instance before you let it breath and stutter it's own way
in the world,
appreciate

you did not seek it,
it sought you…