The Bell Tolls

I read Plath
And all the while
I was mad
As a March hare.

It’s the relative passage of time
That wrecks us,
Splitting the infinite paradigm
The smallest flecks of
Moment and inkling
Memory as masons, paving neural networks
Christened by the sprinkling
Of patriarchal guesswork
While a fresh pulse of ink flows,
The sands of time fall still
In the aura- outside demands grow-
Earth, round, spins at full tilt.
No sanctum as refuge-
No sanctuary to claim
In the pagan temples of refuse
Maiden debris of names
Cast-offs of Indifference
The altar of unsculpted desires
Running crimson with reverence
Withheld from the fire
And endless rounds of the savage
Beating of drums,
Stanzas repetitively ravaging
Linguistically numb
Quotidian queens in full regalia
Stooped under headdresses
Worn for the staggering saturnalia
Of autochthonous excesses-

And we gurgle, flail, and elsewise drowned,
In the words we repeat, but never write down.