Bright or Bereft

Wood
Pillars
Archways

Shelving pressed trees,

Filaments above

See
To
It

That

Old wiring, synapses new
And

Necks cramp to the right,

Left pages turn in squinting
Strain

Necks turn

Again, heads move,

Eyes scan for the source,

A multiverse of illumination

For dead flies,

One hanging light

flickers,

Oragami moths scatter

Lucretius begs in connection

Ahab forming the abstraction

Translating wind, licking the gusts of thought

Goaded toads jump lilypad islands of
Human semblance

When the light flickers,
And dies,
Above

Does someone in this world,
Die
Below?

When electrons cease here,
Do they there for them, though?

Where is our light, our switch?

Twixt injustice's scales
Doth slithering molters
Bequeath experiential elixirs,
Blindly

Do people die with the same frequency
Each time light switches are offed?

Earmark a page:
Does a bone break?

Bend a book spine:
Scoliosis?

Burn literature in protest:
Has a monk self-immolated?

Fill a pen with blood,
Twist fingers into sockets,
Ideas will flow,
Bright or bereft