Rehearsal In Relief from Jessica Higgins on Vimeo.
The wallpaper lays
steady and solid
looming vertical,
a precipice
an ascent
to scale.
a - a - a - exhale.
While we pass through all pulped and porous
all knees and elbows.
This greek chorus!
The wallpaper says
O don’t disguise your eyes
from that truth twice.
Literally as in an iteration of an accent - - -
am I speaking in tongues?
And everyone’s talking about the occult.
When the floor is all there is, isn’t it - - -
do I forget where I’m from?
Tiring of the tyres in the twilight
midnight pipes. I said there were ghosts in the house I swear it swept - - -
Three dashes mark a moment when one thinks one is not sure or one shouldn’t say what - - -
There it is again!
The operative phrase.
I lost my accent for a moment
and as I struggled to attune the chords
the pipes closed their locks
and left me dry and unable to shriek and speak of - - -
There she goes again!
Learn by eye the corners and shapes
of a pocket
a fluid poh eh tic.
Learn by sight the ground of a false floor
but don’t fall
for the present in the pouch, the misgiving of
I know what this is
The slant of a hand and sleight of a magic risk
Bags and bags of - - -
5. or how we might break the frieze.
AH AH- is an aversion to counting, anymore
AH- is anno domini before circumstance or what was that?
AH AH AH- is a fissure, a tear
AH A- is the erasure of definition
AHH- is the fog
A H- is sisysisysis
A- is dysphoria
H- staggers, in it’s slippery node
AH AH AH AH AH- is exhausting the illusion of power
AH- is a wild cry.
Do you want it bolder?
In foresight and hindsight
the afterthought of O O O
for sure, for sure
Don’t you want it colder?
a virile flight
the ploy of all ---
tigers in the pockets
violent enclosures O for shame
Do you want it bolder?
the pictures & the pictures & the picture
windows, perpetuate lividity
my deference, my resonance
a new order O
I’m heavily invested in all things i don’t know
Jean explained that she was terrified of ghosts when she was young. Each night she would ritualistically press her closed eyes hard against a pillow. Upon removing the pillow and finding creamy white masses floating around her vision in the twilight bedroom, she would know exactly where they were. By pressing her eyes she would catch them in the act of their floating and rest easier. She would silently speak to them I know you’re there, I see you, and that’s fine, stay a while.
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