Rusty Morrison

notes from the understory (level 17, room five)

sun moves behind the horizon, I let myself lose sight’s 

directive perception, 

& perception’s potential expands.

I can willfully open my eyes, but can I open 

the enacting energy 

from which “opening” itself arises?

crow on the phone-wire cocks his head, 

I call it “listening” 

& the word deafens me to what “listening” 

might mean to me,

to crow.

I fall into patterns of thought—create one example

& listen for others to follow,

while clouds gather & release unidentifiable dimensions above me.

I have ways to frighten myself, but they are 

seemingly controllable

as paying for the travelling show’s rollercoaster ride.

I ignore the feral cat’s eyes 

in the backyard illuminating what in the dark will appear as only 

the first dark this cat observes. 

I imagine this black & white cat combing one knotted darkness

from another darkness. 

I’ve missed seeing how deftly the cat vanishes 

into a night within a night that I will not let myself go near.

note from the understory (level 17, room three)

I yawn with the hope of opening more orifices.

the mossy forest floor is no more my perception

than leaves are their shadows

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~.

notes from the understory (level 17, room two)

a bird’s beak narrows to infinity

the more its breast-feathers bulk with light

& burn my eyes with their all-consuming shine.

six pigeons eating scraps under the overpass

hiss in unison.

the loose dog scavenging in spilled garbage

turns, glances nearly in my direction

then runs into their midst & they swallow him.

was I six? when the animal figurines 

my mother kept in a curio cabinet

& let no one touch

fell five feet 

to the kitchen linoleum

in the middle of the night

during a small California earthquake 

that only her figurines felt.

what I’d thought were easily-classified expressions 

painted shut on their porcelain faces

had always been watching 

what I only now let myself ask if I have ever seen.

notes from the understory (level 17, room one)

I close my left eye to find a means to focus 

on the mocking bird I hear out my window

imprisoning sight in the iris of my right 

where bird’s song snags & deadfalls into silence.

soundless vibrations continue

to make ripples in the window’s 

decades-old glass. I won’t see them happen. I am

myself buried in the understory

while above me fetid soil glistens with fresh

tracks of a snail meeting its mate.

Jenny Johnson