i.

Following tears falling into an eye,
from blackness behind responses
rises an exactness chaos inside
reacts through, survives as though its

ride beyond those veils occulting this life
denies violent silences
not so provocative as provoking
to surface secrets less vile, less

corrosive than what losses constellate
from messes of mistrust, candour
to rust ground, whittled of its edges
down to what dust when scattered up

covers ceilings with feelings others felt
needed then no longer to be
concealed but, by strangers, experienced
for once, not kept, released, instead,

to help those whose blood has not yet been bled,
to hold in opened confidence
what letters project, this falsest sense of
protection, when even being

                    ii.

protected means keeping from being seen,
so, knowing now how best to go
about speaking without making any
sound, we who take from hidden hurt

what riveted together bolsters words
vanishing behind doors of lips
whose mouths are more than its temple’s porches,
but foyers interior worlds

vestibule with teeth girding tongues for floors
where truth lies guarded, shielded from
palaces built to house spectacle, gods
of grief frolicking among pearls,

grifter deities of alternative
worlds within where soul mixes with
wounds to birth from discouragement what lives
on intuitively when pulled

open by those moments pulling apart
poses chosen to hide those lives
buried behind personas denial
manifests, masks as if shame melts.