an indiscriminate concert for our ears alone.

empathy is embodiment of another’s
feelings- what are feelings?
serotonin, dopamine, norepinephrine
(to be “balanced” for happiness and contentment,
or else craving, despair, restlessness, NEUROSIS);
memory, thought, daydream
(always after the fact, sense, experience);
repulsion, attraction
(is the law, the draw, the motivation).

i think in text, always after the fact.
clean sights and sounds and arrange them
on a crowded page,
where they jockey for position within
the mind maze,
a labyrinth of the mundane,
occasioned by doom but more often desire.

this texture creates the narrative creates the memory.
the truth?
is on the tip of my tail.
i chase it in circles.
i could do this forever, narcissism junkie.

or sit beside it, idling in the breeze.
presence takes practice.
my mind craves meander.
so then move! from one world to the next,
each one more wild
than the last,
further from yet nearer to the past.

where were we? empathy.
a force that unites spirit and form,
the presence of another’s presence
in whatever way it is inscribed:
a confession.
a secret.
a shared ecstatic flight.
a terrifying fall.
eyes that dare to dive in.
words that tumble out the mouth or pour forth from the fingers, unperturbed
by the double.

-but must it always,
after the fact,
be subsumed within the mindmaze?
chasing, being chased.
where were we once upon?