hive

each mind hides a thousand minds, a bee’s hive, whirring wings of thought. that’s where the voices come from. other people can’t hear them, you see, their other voices—they don’t know that they have so many minds, so many multifarious minds inside that single one. they divide themselves up. they eat the world like pie.

but they’re the blackbirds, oh yes, trapped in that warm, butter-browned flour—they don’t know it, but they that look so whole on the outside are black, sharp-winged chaos within. they walk as if on solid ground; they walk as if they know the truth, as if there is one, but there isn’t. they make it look so solid, so safe, but they’re all on thin ice. it’ll break at any moment. break, break, cold cradle falling, & there’s black black water within—

storm-carriers. that’s it. it’s as if this little leaf, so whole & green, carries the whipped whirlwind within it. is that what the human is? observe it: so neatly stitched up on the outside, as if by patient hands, but inside its mind is deceit within self-deceit. a hall of mirrors. smoke of dust. ashes within bone within ashes—a long corridor of voices, forgotten rooms, & do they remember? no. they don’t hear their own minds. they’re untouched by their own sounds, unmoved, unheard.

but I’m not. I hear everything. (near) everything. the shoe-makers in the wind, thin leaves wagging like tongues—I hear it all, tender storm of words, levels climbed, voices whispering. down down down the bough breaks— down. so gentle. small flowers unlocked like safes. jewels of thought within. stolen all stolen, & released into the night—no voices are mine, all voices are mine, inner & inner & out through the wall. climb up the esplanade. see the dead man fall.