i insist on suffocating slowly
still
i refuse to die
imposing my will to weakness
avoiding applying the “why”
implications are closing in, oppressive
my mind is open, fluid
suggestive
interposing meaning and form with
the spoken and written letter
the light source filtered through all this
wreckage
the squeaking moving in, oppressive
regressive, the way my vantage remains
a disjointed unit-whole
you persist, and i suffocate quickly
you ask so nicely for me to die
deposing my God damned will to power
why do i seem to avoid the “apply”?
THE SYMBOL ON MY HAND IS BURNING
into the flesh, and back out from inside
illuminates Prison, a chasm, a prism
dividing a spectrum of impossible light
we wholly refract the soma, the psyche
The Panic transforms into beauty inane
compulsion, obsession, redemption, addiction
we know we’re alive
we perpetuate pain
ca. 2006
Justin Aptaker 