#9

negative nightingales   left roses to lose bloom

                                    looked for nectar elsewhere

                        - or died

                        - doesn’t matter

                                    song stayed so on the inside

not even mirrors could hear it.

*

song is far too frail

notes fall /        voices tend

                        to the downward

strings and skins loosen / break.

*

dawn calls for the sigh

this release      = enough

                                    = puff of frost in winter

                                                - an icon

                                    of another attempt.

*

bridgemakers pray for gaps –

                                    philosophers

                        likewise

                                    and wizening

to the use of holes –

                                    pauses,

                                                lapse

upon these, the future is built.

*

assimilation                  -                       confluence

*

degradation

in

glut

of

forgetfulness

*

lost to conversation, criticism and

            accoutrement.

Kenning (FKA Kenyatta) Jean-Paul García is the author of the notvel OF (What Place Meant), They Say (West Vine Press) and several lyrical speculative ebooks such as ROBOT: the Waste Land Reimaged. Xe is a diarist and performer living in Albany, NY. Xe has degrees in English and linguistics but has spent xyr adult life doing blue collar work. For a dozen years xe worked in restaurants doing everything from dishes to managing. These days, xe is a maintenance worker in a massive two-story box store. Xe has been doing the graveyard shift for 11 years now so writing is the day job but not the job that's called xyr "real job." In addition, xe posts way too much foolishness on social media and tries to go to lots of conferences around the country preferably by train. Xe is also an editor at Rigorous.