Tin

I used to have a place I would put my prayers to god

Like a tin of band aids, twine, and kazoos

To add or take an object as time shifted grains

The child in me associated this with his ribcage

As if I folded my palms, thumbs upright steeple pose

Eyelids descended, breath subdued in patient conference

I would rummage to speak in consort about the spider web

Of the morning that netted my nostrils as I rose from the pillow

In the sanctuary the pinchers seized penitent skin

Reserved in tow for a year, a moment of purpose to surface

Like the blow hole of the orca to flash sacredness

Bursting out of the innocuous

A street light pausing traffic to catch the gaze of a passer by

A sacramental stumble chancing the agony of bloodshed

Into a martyred moment of divine fate

That this good was to come of this bad as if mathematics applied

Or there was a beginning or an ending despite this Alpha Omega Grecian dialogue

There was that tin inside me I rummaged for markers

Of why baby teeth catapulted when or

Silence at fifteen years old from a certain physical body

Creates a suicide bomber of hormones hijacking veins

Crumpled purple ink swirly script paper notes in lockers

Mountain for Moses like indelible in memory

Crossroads of identity to trade speech

With the poster of Trent Reznor I hung on the ceiling directly over my bed

To jester the heresy face of that downward spiral

A spiritual mind wanting to know where a self was to fit in

Who is capable of getting this manuscript kept in the tin

The menagerie of scribbled interrogatories

Pecking crow-like on the metal of a necklace printed

Real love is forever

Laughter and stunt doubles Eric Draven and Brandon Lee

As if there is a place beyond this

A coming back from resembling any potency in prayer

That it was never about favors, but presence

Wanting to comprehend more of the puzzle of where do I put these tin contents

So many curves and jigs the lush and the barren hues

To see the fluid on the bandages crimson and dried blacken scat

Voodoo bone readings and tarot junkies mouth-washing with holy water

Spit rollick laughter at seeing a gutter glass shard diamond

I remember the day I quit praying

I quit asking what do you want from me, what is your will

I ceased to see myself as an employed vessel

I resigned evoking the idea that everything

I ever put or took from that tin

Was meant to be in the moment it was touched

And then let go

The very idea of a question to ask became nonsense

Why was nonsense

What next was nonsense

When will was nonsense

Who is it was nonsense

The point was to pay attention

The tin emptied was never touched again

The present moment neutered time

Love is intention to release what we are

Boundaries no longer exist

Separation cannot be

The concept of prayer would require a medium between the present moment

And some conceptual alteration in reality which one aspires to occur

The space between want and is

Illusion so of the ego breeching the pond’s surface

So it is as we breathe beyond breath