IOWA PRISON WRITING PROJECT
A Specific Gravity
CHRISTIAN M., TEXAS
I have long been encumbered by the wearisome
weight of this world
bearing down on my unconscious mind
the trappings of frantic antics and guile
perturbing my tensile strength,
Anxiety springing forth from a well too deep to sound,
Petty musings in a contemplative reverie
without a single memory,
History doesn’t repeat itself, it just never
changes
the infinite inertia to be a pinball for
our own and other’s existence,
What is suffering but the irony of our incredibly
important self-aggrandizing collective construction
projects,
Seemingly insignificant is the thought
Between the thoughts we feel we have to think
linking our past and our future our now dissolves
into another memory,
How swiftly forgotten the tangibility of a dream,
Open my eyes to the scorching of my consciousness,
Lick my finger to test a sizzle off of my personality,
Hear the crackling of my ego as my instincts
moan in longing for catharsis.
I feel the weight of the stimuli prodding
my brain to connect synapses,
Visions from shapes collide and hormones clash
Within the walls of my skin and consequence,
Does a sound echo in the space
between two feelings
credence lies bereft of justification,
Too much pressure without any vapor,
Inexplicable isn’t visual isn’t auditory either,
Ether insoluble, I can’t take my burdens
For granted (or evaporate them either),
There is no need to diet my intellectual
obesity,
Maybe my soul’s no really fat and
the size proves to be muscle
strength for the oncoming tide’s tussle,
But every time I take a step further
I get a little deeper
I think I know how to breathe
underwater without holding my breath.
The weight of the world is only
noticeable for the time I’ve leaned on it
myself,
Is it necessary to know that the wall isn’t
leaning on
me
interconnected perpetual desiccation of
mankind,
Fatuous expectancy heft of camaraderie
lift me to the stars within my mind
inner-galactic contemplative reverie,
Childhood imaginings while climbing a tree
of the tree volitionally
and consciously supporting me,
Anthropomorphic deity
the whimsy of a juvenile humanity,
Like talking to my cereal
because the last Cheerio might be lonely,
Beauty lies
dormant in the sea of antiquity,
Rising up
from a future full of histories,
Varied perceptions of a single sensation
poke holes through the fabric of my consciousness
to open peepholes to my substrate
Flick flame fluttering fuller
faster
farther
from failing finitude,
Beyond this junkyard landscape of brain-waste love-hate,
Dictionary meaning
so we’re all on the same page,
Born to die, we land roles
with a blank script
on a rigged stage.
I’ve grown heavy
like a magnet
in a bucket full of nails,
Then life deigns to drop me
In this bucket full of snails,
To feel like something’s heavy
I have to feel
there’s something else,
Something separate
emergent property
the illusion of my self,
A conflict formed of nothing
to nothingness will return,
Yet this weight still loads me
and turns me with its burn,
Much fraught appearances wither under scrutiny
and inspection,
With mindful awareness in clarity of introspective
vivid reflection.
That’s what I feel
is weighting
my being,
Is just existence
waiting to come in,
Infinity trying to connect
through the haze of impermanence,
Humanoid suffering
of fear
and cognitive intemperance,
Maybe my soul isn’t growing fatter
and my mind’s circumference
and density
not greater,
Maybe the concept I held to be so real of
boundaries
between me
and you
and the sky so blue,
Aren’t true
and grow blurry
starting to melt into each other.
The weight shifts
and I feel it settle again
but I know it better for what it is,
It’s me trying to get out of existence
trying to get in,
Time comes in waves of bitter battle
from kettle that always squeals,
Pitter-patter
raindrops
from a life’s storm of sights and feels,
Christmas trees and carousels
all dancing with my laughter,
That from before birth
torpid sadness welled
‘til Death’s darkness everafter,
Dancing in my cell
in circles of little space,
Arms ad hands lifted
to fly into outer-space
kissing infinity upon its face
Feel the air swirl around me
molecules so-rounding me
to the vibrating vibrancy
innate in BE,
Open spaces expand from the inside out
‘til you get dizzy
and then some,
Know the of the happy place right
inside your heart-sun,
Confusion everlasting
thinking you’re living right beside it,
You wrote the word
Your answer dwells somewhere deep inside it,
Can a human mind define it
to free it
not confine it,
Use words to give it birth
instead of undermine it,
Can a human mind ungrasp enough
to be full conscious of the grandeur,
To embrace the grace of Nothingness
and mute this world’s demeanor.