dissemination

charcoaled fine lines dissolve into the background;
dusk's drop cloth of an orange-rimmed sunset
glistens the tightrope that swings between headway
and steady every day nothing.
gently with the rolls of thunder fracturing in the distance
escaping light breaks over interrupted movements-
the armored trepidation of reality- a tender and tenacious crawl
between yes, no, what you think you know, and what you think
you've been able to say without exactly saying.
this double-edged weapon of verbal explosion
illuminates an obliquely wandering path
far past the horizon, beyond promise and doubt, and it blinks
like headlights or maybe it's blinking like one a.m. in union square-
which, while we're there:

i wish i was still in new york city
where these stomping ruminations get caught, dragged beneath
the break-speed whirl of taxis, the tumultuous ease
of rush hour footsteps. and the lurch of the train
disseminates patterned thoughts, driving conscience
from the unspoken script that multiplied and murmured
endlessly. but here, outside the city limits,

this weighted dance swings heavy and low. wrenched
from the ashen strokes of able distraction, these delicate lines
alight and break from their suffocation, heaving themselves
into the careening traffic of my mind. red lights failed me long ago.
and it rushes me back
to the place where notions
can't break into words thrust from my mouth
and i trip over instead of saunter between the lines,
it's just that, to say, to explain:
when i don't answer i'm always
trying to say yes.