If we spoke to
others
the way we speak to
ourselves,
our calendars would
clear up pretty
quickly.
If we dare say
out loud
all the words we
routinely mutter
within,
we’d show up
no different
than a poor barking
bum on the
B train.

This voice,
bouncing off the blunt
inner bone of our
skull-sized kingdoms,
this buzz that began
babbling back when
we did,
this incessant drivel of
dialogue drowning us in
daily doubt
dammit, even when we
dream –

It was designed for
one thing:
to keep us breathing
Is that a snake in the grass?
No, just a coiled garden hose.
Carry on then.
It is not who
we are.

But there’s a hack
if you can hack it,
if you can just drop
back
way back
behind all that clatter,
all the way
down here
near the stem of the brain,
at its soft, quiet kernel –
we get to observe these
thoughts as they pass
through, unfurling
like vapor trails
under the clear,
cloudless sky
of our minds.