the limits of this light

My skin is the color of blood and dust, dull and blotchy in the limits of this light. I put the lights out so much earlier. Give my countenance a little ease from all that shine. Forget all the mirrors, ignore the peering window glass. Only the glow of this screen, empty and without purpose. Only these trailing words and simple mistakes. Nothing precious, nothing pretty. Just a sweat soaked shirt and a clock that doesn't even pretend to care. A sore neck and dim eyes, a dark room and a weary keyboard.

My hands are dowsed in shadows, sunken like so many wrecks before them, and livid in their task of plastic and pretense. They lead and they dodge, taking my advice on occasion. Then again they pick the keys for their qwerty placement, for the stretch or ease of each strike. They trail words and breaths held and smothered. They leave trails of statements that serve as maps and epitaphs. This work they pretend after, this task I can no longer separate from tedium. My hands caress the plastic alphabet, a little harder than is needed, but not as hard as the letters would like.

I empty the shelf of want when the room gets this quiet. I forget the polestars of tomorrow when my heart handles all the cards. When desire runs riot, I resort to ritual. When want fills this shape, I extinguish all the possible. Know yourself well enough, and it gets a little easier to bide all this time. Know yourself well enough, and it is hard to be in the same room so often with that jerk. I let the music pass through me, letting the songs linger but never stay. I let the feelings kick the bones until they bruise them, then I watch as they show themselves out. Alone does not need all this telling. Alone doesn't need these words following words, trailing the page in martial columns. So many words, when all I need are whispers. So much waste, when I am waiting for one held breath.