Poem: $

$

once you leapt from the sea

distilled dawn into beads

brazen on a sunned chest.

danced on the summit of a tooth of a shark,

of mammoth, of walrus,

flirted with peacock feathers,

gleaming on bone, coral, pearl 

and amethyst so brassy and golden,

abalone and chalcedony.

you excelled to dance,

sparkle, flux and fascinate,

lustrous of crystal,

of teal and amber, emerald and silver,

liquid in shawls of sunset orange ruby.

demure there, in the center,

as you and tribes sighed-

by-sighed within a precious time 

of blooms and jests.

 

but now 

you are whispery stacks

of parched tongues of long dead men,

opposing each other 

on two-faced circles and rectangles,

papery or cold metal,

ethereal as a pixel named greed

or fat as an ingot of tongues

which bark to warn of threats

from borders and robbers

while lustful monsters speculate 

on the risk-margins of war.

who is wearing who?

who is whose ring? 

i know what it’s like now 

to be bent into a circle,

my heart leashed to your wallstreet scrawl,

your hammer of logical debt.

i know what it's like now

to be siphoned by mosquito-like numbers,

while electric caterpillars chew across screens,

frantic and stressful,

shapeshifting to become my eyebrows.

every hair on my counted head follows you.

slumped or erect, arched or crushed.

trillions of dollars proliferate, 

insubstantial above crowds,

and yet i fight with all i'm worth

to free a sliver of my needs.

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4/20/26 removed a word

11/29/25 

7/7/25 ... probably a doomed poem.. many edits

3/32/25 modssssssssssssssssss