Oxygen Song

G.C. Waldrep

I am unstrung: ash in an ash-garden. So say an instrument, tuned in clay, strung with ash. Not a music. A means towards an end which picks each ash-strand from the body, the mind’s camber. So say there is choice, and then choice’s absence. A cold star the mind’s body moves into. And I fled that governance. Say not without terror. In the last photograph I will be the darkness, singing. Unremarked, as any stray or perfect tone. Is not song, as such: these burnt ligatures. They leave bruises. Eye of ash, eye-bramble, ash-lever… .Ash in an ash-garden, weft from warp suspended. Is not the mind’s or any final act’s. A shedding tremor. Love’s thinking lathe, white on white. I am moving away from this blue constellation. Speak ark, speak ash. Be a hearing wound. Mixed with oil, each pale note untrellised. Was not a bridge, was not a harp; am music’s trace, blood-residue. In time or some bright kerning. Not without terror. A paler gash. Not song, nor song’s unflinching charity: I fled that vagile hymnary. So say Ash in an ash-garden. The mind will follow the body almost anywhere, into choice, even (or any final act). If unstrung then O un-bridle me, Master.


 To read more poetry by G.C. Waldrep, purchase issue 72.2 here.