Smoking Cigarettes after Noon

*image found HERE

Smoking Cigarettes after Noon

Watch,
what most call touch
is thistle;
listen,
a layer among the layers
silent in the bedrock.
Machine language,
viral like soil,
incandescent
like ripples in a soup.
Wait for the dead to fall asleep,
proceed;
swipe the sweat of their brow with cashmere.
pain
is a taught persistence.
Names –
a ritual of needless
in the effigy’s spine.
Gulp. Gurgle. Gush.
Teach yourself to swallow a whole cherry.
Heart – spindle;
sentient pump,
bones of a comatose river,
it will tell what it may.
Whoever hears it
will unhinge their hands like a gateway,
prop you on their tongue
like butterscotch
like all throats are a lament
of an ocean’s feverish rage;
you will be taught
which and what cannot be green,
what can’t be red;
what to say, who can be held
and you will watch
how what most call touch
is thistle.