Ubos-lakás
for BStricken. Sound waves ripple
drop a bass beatand I hear it. Words like clappers
a sonic devastationtolling above me, heavy bell skirts
pound after pound driving inoscillating, filling my head with nothing else,
this pale sternumleaves me reeling, replaces
solar pulses encirclingmy pulse with itself, thrums in my blood.
ribcage shockedEven stopped, I am slammed
into recognitionagain and again in the quiet moments.
comprehension risingNever peace, and I wonder why I
like the dawnkeep going even after the warning,
every word a meteorfor whatever reason, wilfully unaffected,
heedless on the earthmute and sightless, removing my senses
burning into a scarone by one in pursuit of love, lust,
say you can never bemy drug, jaded, jaundiced, blued,
washed by the riverI follow you down the pit, every step,
what do you know about barrierscircle by circle. Today I stopped
you take my collarbonesa disaster of my own making,
my clavicular notch, every onewilled into being. Have I not learned
up to my neck, my chest-plateanything? You must never know
I check to see what’s lefthow much it costs. I must love
and I hear it: love singingthe taste of salt, how it hushes
in the bell tower of my heartin my hands, the simplest alchemy.
Filipino idiom meaning to give the full force or the strongest (literally, with all exhausted strength)
