Joseph Zitt

Joseph Zitt (1995)

Let N be the nexus
  between potential and kinetic fantasy.
Drop a plumb line. Let it sway.
Read the name spelled in its wanderings.

You are here. This is real.
The nictating film that shades averted eyes
presents a question life must leave unanswered.
Look past the dream: the landscape
  of this present flesh
creates a tactile map
where fragile fact trumps possibility.

Let T be the tension
  between conceptual and physical intensity.
Pluck the string. Let mathematical cacophony
Express its pulse in whispered overtones.

This is life. You can taste its breath.
The voices trapped behind your eyes
try calling you away, back to their home.
Listen past their call: the music of a touch
may resolve this inner chord
as senses checked in mating clear the board.

This is not your dream.
This is not a dream at all.
The vicars of the virtual
  practicing their theories
drape their scales across your heart
and hide the keys that would combine
to open you to experience.
This is not what's locked in memory.
The line of years is crossed and made less bold
as fading screams of history
  collapse upon themselves,
their echoes modulating your perceptions of
the tactile and the seen and heard.
Your hands move by their own unspoken wills
exploring flesh as data and as text.

Let C be the collision
  between self and personality.
Gauge the point of impact. Count the chairs.
Launch the point by way of T at N.

These are you. Here is now.
The choreographies of bodies and of souls unfold,
the signatures of passion as their trails.
Reach in, past the dream:
the textures of the temporary real
prevail against detachment.
Today the second age of Man begins.