Pressure

If I could have a way
perhaps
to qualify the
feeling

I would say
it's rather like
a pistol cocked
or
a fire catching O2.

On the other hand
if I could draw
the growing, pressing
weight of things -

I'd sketch a mountain
with deadly paths,
sulfuric breezes
and a endless lake of nails.

Were I a dancer:
ballerina, krumper,
jazz -

I'd let extensions do the talking
with negative space I'd dance the
strain- I'd close my
eyes and express
the pain
that'd make men cry.

If I could sing
a song to tell it I would
wake the rafters up

I'd shake the ground
till your soul felt it
I'd make your eardrums
drunk
off of my arias - they would
want nothing
but to soak me in.

If I could paint the mountain song,
with arms and voice and charcoal pencils -
I'd dance a blaze within a blaze
An arabesque would sound like eternity
-the calm before the shot.

If could do any of these things
perhaps it'd be
more

better

but I cannot.

And so I'll sit and stew and pen a verse-
-I'll spontaneously

combust.