The shape of now

I imagine a room with many shelves,
upon which, upon entering,
I know are stacked the relics of a past.
The orange juice of labor.
The stories of a life.
They are tidied up
in little slate cubbies and labelled
and sorted by
what’s inside.

In this room compiled pages catalogue
these objects
crossed in time.

[enter i],
a storied man
sealed in space,
derived from plaster walls and ceiling.

“Think outside the box”, I speak down
that stair
well of inner-monologue.
Think out -top maybe.

There is an empty
empty, filled with nothing.
No color creeps out, not even black.

No sound, movement.
Not a single stir.

I wonder where this empty may be,
where nothing
so pure might be lost without
a crevice to conceal itself.

I am nook and crannied into acts I and II.
You are stereo typing : typed
accidentally for the sake
that I mistake solace for existing.

No doubt, by chance,
you stumbled upon the fate of your proceedings.

But yet we dance,
no concern for past now,
only the slight delay in signals sent
from inches beneath the surface of our skulls.

I cannot see your skull,
but your eyes are nice.
I cannot see your brain,
but your hair is soft.
I cannot see your life,
but your skin glows.

Shake me from this disbelief!

Take me to forests, where dappled light may rain in showers.
Stretch across a desert, where we might pluck a palm or two
to plant in gardens thinly veiled by evening’s warming breath.

Cover me in snow.

Anything
anything to know
that I’ve remembered what I am and what I will become.