Today is a day of peripherating metaphors,
like the weird animal researched in an old encyclopedia
after a strange dream, or the pallbearer
at the funeral of someone lost at sea
carrying the body of God in its purest form across
a parking lot filled with traffic pylons
and Styrofoam cartons. Bell sounds
shake hints of joy from a paradox.
We wish there was a drug that would make sorrow
orgasmic. Or a drug that would help us imagine
better drugs than that. We wish for many things,
mostly drugs that increase our capacity for wishfulness,
but also for love and for other people to resemble us.
Today is a day of replicating metaphors, striations
of shadow running along longitudinal lines,
golden spines swinging like pendulums over parking lots
filled with porcelain fragments and pistachio shells.
Everywhere we go, we find chalk outlines of our ancestors
and small faeries singing pop songs
to the self-righteous clouds. Our bellies are full, stuffed
with drug-induced intuitions and the meat
from a celebrity carcass found on the roadside. With the bones,
we build televisions that crush the transmitted radio waves
into conch shells. We listen to the shells. Deep inside,
invisible soils measure time by way of the flower. Deeper still,
we hear the second heart dreaming of the first.
Philip Jason’s stories can be found in Prairie Schooner, The Pinch, Mid-American Review, Ninth Letter, and J Journal; his poetry in Spillway, Lake Effect, Hawaii Pacific Review, Palette Poetry, and Indianapolis Review. He is the author of the novel Window Eyes (Unsolicited Press 2023). His first collection of poetry, I Don’t Understand Why It’s Crazy to Hear the Beautiful Songs of Nonexistent Birds, is forthcoming from Fernwood Press. For more, please visit philipjason.com.
Image: “Anchor Hocking Vegetable Harvest Dish”
Pine Hills Review 