The Quiet Part Loud

 

All the books are feral,

hanging like bats on dark limbs.

Clocks have sword arms to cut the tough minutes...

Where did you think immortality grew?

If the books don't bite, if they snap

and release, they'll teach you to read.

Like the gnomes with their newsleaves,

gossip gathered vein by vein and underneath,

deep in the root, miles of fungal brain

driving the nerves into print.

It's never time to go, here. Only to stop.

There are fairies in infinity,

their novels starlight and icon and snow.

Gnomes excavate the plot, make bodies

of the cold forever and burn their fears

sticky and melting onto the branches

as they twinkle--laughing in spiral and 

final, crushing, eternity.

Infinity wants its heaven;

wants it goddesses and gods 

and celebrity crushes.

Something for them to eat, upside down, 

all these books gone feral.

-- Chrissa