the mind’s a great one for getting stuck
Stuck in place or stuck going round and round and round about the same point
Said point being a collapsed memory, an errant feeling, a bit of mustard, a sudden lurch
Is it spiraling? Or more like orbiting?
That is to say, is there orbital decay? Or do we need some strong boost to get us out of there?
What a shame it is, one thinks (one being me)
that in all the boundless gulf of brain, the scattering aeons of scintillating thought
we get stuck on such hidebound traumas, such uninvited guests that come to stick
By guests, I mean those thoughts that arrive with much clarion call and explosive force
So much calling out to us, I mean
Who can turn away from wrecks, train or otherwise?
Given some small number of lines, our minds sketch out a face
Faces in trees, hubcaps, cloudscapes, the moonface
there are no faces there
our eyes see no faces there
Only our brain, our pattern-seeking cognition looks to paint faces over every seeming thing
Stay with me, because:
If that’s what happens with simple lines, how then to decipher the patterns dredged up through all the lines of our lives
That is, what is this pattern that we’re finding?
What wrong seemings do we find lurking in small gestures, broken words, a snooze at lunchtime?
Do we find conspiracies on street corners or gods hiding in the springtime?
Are there fairies in the cloverpatch or demons lying in wait, under the rug?
How many ways there are to get stuck, fixating around some central glaring light
Moths, sweater-eating or otherwise, plummet into flame
Do they have some inkling of their fate?
Or are we the only ones who see some glimmer of our doom?