Since the civilizing process began
most of us came to breathe by decree and not
in the grace of our mothers, but for our better
we would gather our warmth and self all
day and all night and let harden our skin
to roleplay rock
to let them chip away a shape
everyday in their idleness
or flatten ourselves to be
the canvas that accepts a gentle caress
or stiff bristles for the brain that
holds the deed to our breath.
Since the civilizing process began
we would often sing amid some new end times
finely-crafted by the weathered and
practiced hands of a hungry neighbor
who, gripping,
would squeeze our soft throat
housing a tongue that clucked out
the name of some other ancient or creator
and our eyes bulging in that moment scan
the corners of the hovel where
our history ignites in a flicker
and then dims to cool waste,
and scan for a now-charred manger.
Since the civilizing process began
we wore red and blush and we
swallowed fruit and time, where
passing into cold meat then felt
no different from now and you would
laugh and you would sleep in
a similar sun that slipped into
so many rivers still flowing
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