light is perceptible through prisms
the way the sun fills a room,
cascading naked bodies contorted
against each other, or the way you
watch the moon drift behind the
trees from within the glass bottle
sent down river—the way corpus
callosum glows held up to the screen
dark is perceptible through fissures
the way emptiness seeps out from
holes in the wall after you wipe
plaster and dust off your face
or the way you crack open and
charter the fragments and chips
of bone floating in blood, the way
the shadow of the brain oxidizes
when wiped clean of rot and film
but what is perceived in-between?
the way the grey pools in the catacombs
excavated in your skull, or the way you’re
lost beyond reach, suspended in the ether,
until the membrane tears and drags you
through, engulfed in erupted spillage

perception is a prism of
waking up with no mouth
wishing the people you’ve
hurt most can break you
apart and pass through