I

In the gap between substance and illusion
we unfurl ourselves to the world, pressing hands
against the fragile glass of existence.

II

We are first bodies, biological mystique,
stardust born and cast into thinking meat:
the baseline of this uncertain existence.

III

We are selves of many kinds, multiplicities:
the child of yesterday, still sobbing in corners,
tomorrow’s reaching and today’s iterations.

IV

Characteristics adhere to our substance
like barnacles to a ship’s hull, be they cruelty,
kindness, courage, hope or faltering.

V

We are defined through connections:
mother, lover, stranger, friend or foe,
the yielding threads that can tether or transform.

VI

Our bodies locating themselves in houses
boardrooms, hospital beds, shops
shaping being in concrete beneath feet.

VII

Time flows through us as change
for we are never the same through
rivers of moments that carve us.

VIII

We arrange ourselves against gravity
standing proud or curled protective in
a syntax of limbs striving for dwelling.

IX

We are the verb doing, and building with
hands creating, writing, touching or destroying,
and mouths blessing, connecting or cursing.

X

The world leaves fingerprints on
our becoming, perhaps wounds or gifts
that mould the contours of our being.

XI

Possessions take selves beyond skin with
digital footprints, cherished objects,
memories claimed and oft forgotten.

punctus contra punctum

But between these categories might there be
ineffability, transcendence of categories,
and a state of simple undefined being here?

 

9/4/2025