am and am not

i am not my thoughts
i am not this thin one letter word
these thoughts are something of me
as snowflakes filling the night sky
are something of the earth

i am my eyes
taking in this light
changing into all that surrounds me
i am my visions of the shadows of the tree
falling across the road

i am the sounds in my chest and gut
am the beat, the pounding
the resonance, the whoosh of breath
i am the pops and gurgles
of chime moving in peristalsis

i am the thrill of acceleration
the fear of falling
when leaning over ledges
i am the warmth
of her hand on the side of my face

i am my teeth
rooted in jaws
being worn away

i am the strength in striated muscles
to hold myself up
propel towards something
or away
to carry things of weights of which
my thoughts doubted i could

i am my passions
soaring hope that is there
that silent joy
shaky fear and dread

i am water
minerals from earth
moving across membranes
combining and dividing
i am lost in evaporation
built in winding double staircases

i am errors and chance
currents and gradients

i am my reactions and impulse
to catch in mid air objects
that slip from fingertip grasp

i am my pains and discomforts

i am my future death and stillness
when some of what is me will end
when my thoughts will end

my thoughts are part of me
i do not live only with them
as cell mates in my head
i live in the world where snowflakes fall at night
filling the sky quietly
as i move through them

recount

in the nondescript three story building
grey and shining glass
i put in my time
the clock showed it passing
one hour of recounting
a process of exposing
my mental and emotional insufficiencies
this is my intro again
this is diving into my own deep end
swimming a crawl badly
sputtering and choking
to get to the side to hang on

who is this stranger
with the name on the door
in this forgettable office
the one i barely look at
but will return to
to cannonball again
hoping this helps
this is what i am doing
i recount

this is a session
i make my intro
tell about the feeling of dread
of clocks squeezing life by the second
and then i'm done
introduced, i walk down the hall
loving the plain blankness of it
the emptiness of the elevator
and it's drop
walk out doors and drive away
red lights light up
the backs of cars
this is the rush hour