bourdieu, cavell, pennebaker

I gather, I gather

        up my hands, into the delicate pink knots

    the small, pursed buds

              dropping: another pebble that rolls. I gather.

I worried

about the naked and boney ‘I’

a slender finger held to the lips, the tongue of a gun

the graceless peels it whittles itself from

falling apart and around it like leaves, words

swiftly overturn and flutter, yellow butterflies

across the ground, the trees

a lingering, lemon peach, bursting to pieces: around us, ashes

of sorts: something burns,

something erupts. In pursuit of

gravitas, we swim

in language. Toss a fishing line

we are lost in our language: understanding

is like a very fine line, and it loops

from one tooth of mine

round yours, and swings there

like a jump rope between two children

(settling. at rest. the minimum, upon which

we build, and we swing, and we swing—

growing, swellblooming like a pregnant

woman’s belly. Haven’t you ever heard

of a pregnant silence? Children waiting to be born

our words are children waiting to be born)

Lay beside me like a flower.

Collapse like cards, I could

collapse that way: the feathers

falling into one another: I think of birds

in the luminous trees, endless flight.

Of silent nature: in the spirals of a shell,

 in the bleats of your eyes—

           [per a second, per minute]

                     at one tic after toc, everything

goes sizzling. Of nature: you are sun

and you peel across the world in the low, sliding hum

a brass gong gold, everything swims

everything floats. I give up: I gather

myself from the folds of silence

hold on to you, surrender, cosmos

goes spinning, look at me and whisper

‘it is

inarticulate.’