Some beasts die without sound ;
and I remember reading Neruda with the blinds down wishing, praying for intoxication -
being drunk somehow connects the lines of lunacy and sweetens the bitterness of my own  biology.


And there in the middle of my average volitility,
was Neruda - shining, scintillating, brimming with fanciful words that mocked my sard, sorry inability to get out of the sheets .
I roll over in bed and he wavers through the duvet
with soulful lines that stack up like stones right behind me - I feel their weight.


Some beasts die without sound ;
and Neruda leads the coup on my slump mood,
my ample unambition like a pot of cooked rice
just sitting on the stove cooling in its plentiful whitness.
He arms himself and I feel the dark part of me getting pushed to Dunkirk - he picks me up from the floor by the scrough of the neck and I'm back behind the type-machine, back in the race,
my foot is approaching the door.






© Orin Patterson