3rd Excerpt from Seoul Sonnets

With time, with mind
little things swell and
disappear or stay the same,
making infinite time-stamped
copies of themselves in the
infinite number of moments
making up reality – but
I can’t let you know,
because the lie is better,
sweeter than truth
with its funhouse mirror twisted
refractions hateful to the
eye – warped lightwaves
worming through the retina

In the centre of the black hole,
o what dreams may come
when even light
cannot escape, and all is
infinitely dense and just
as frustrating as before, –
Maybe love is nothing more
than the beating of single
hearts in unison longing
to return to the infinite whole…
Rattling, hip-hop pounding
out of the speakers and
we’re heady with red wine
and time outside of time

From the pills we took
or didn’t take, and our
thoughts flying through
the air, texts we send
drunk and don’t remember,
so heavy in the head
and dizzy with lights and
gibberish and cigarettes
to bring us back down—
I tried to spend the night in
silence, but the phone
wouldn’t stop – “struggling
war desperate suicidal”—
why did she send those words

Flashing through the cold ether
after dark on a February night?
Just to
keep me awake
and on the road—
it worked – she got drunk
on warm cranberry juice and
almost cried over her life—
“What am I doing here?”
I could ask
the very same question, with no
answer to satisfy.
What was it?
a flash of something

Cornered my eye in
the confusion, the
sadness at the end
of the night when
the booze is gone
and you forget why
we got together in the
first place. You’re
sleeping – that’s okay –
I’m awake because
you’re sleeping and I
forget what it means
to kill the monster
in dreams;

I sit in envy of your peace,
your tranquil acceptance
of the conflicts
things that
tie us to the world
and promise rebirth;
Are you just tired
of sleeping alone?
I am too – it’s not
a stab, it’s
just about the only
honest thing
I can say at this moment
when no one can hear.