identity

say all the right things

at all the right times

and you will divine

nothing

but the refinement

of your 'self'

in the eyes

and minds

of all others


with every lie

your flesh deepens

and your depth weakens

—even as you climb

step by step

up the pyramids of promise

comprised

of those eyes

and those minds

—even as you scale

beyond the clouds

that obscure their peaks

and rise

to the fabled lands

that the rains cannot reach—

you will find nothing

but loss

—the last echo

of the ground

once beneath your feet—

as you lift off

to meet a sea of masks

crafted

from wind and silence,

long without wearers,

and passing forever

into

and through

one another

say all the right things

at all the right times

and you will divine

everything

that the heart of this world

left hidden

long ago

for each of us

to find


person by person

mind by mind

you will crack the foundations

that have long lifted surrender

into those spaces

lofty enough

that the ages

have placed them

outside of time

and named them

divine

with every truth

the pathways

of the unpredicted

sink deeper

into the soil

—chattering cracks

spreading

into stone and root

through bone and brain

opening inside

crown and chain, alike

until the fractures

thread finely enough

to collapse the illusions

of friend and foe

giant and gentile

child and reptile

finally

in a crumbling of the veil

of ascension and separation

revealing

in the dust left rising

nothing other

than the apparition it is

—men

long invested

in everything

other than them

the work, then,

as always,

—no matter where you are,

or where you come from—

is to identify,

identify,

identify.

 
poems & imagesk.w.nicol