time is a flat circle, a sweated palm by alain ginsberg

Time is a flat circle or a clock or it keeps / slipping slipping slipping and / once I found myself in the reflection of a lake / or myself / and there was the me that loved everything and the one that lived underwater / Narcissus’ wilted bouquet and / maybe I was alone and it was good or / the hands of a clock hold each other 24 times a day and do not sweat and / maybe the batteries should be replaced or I learned about my name / in the library and checked out the librarian and / not the book or asked for their job and / it was overdue and I do not know how to feel about the poetry section in bookstores anymore and / maybe someone who loved me just keeps dying or I am stuck on a roundabout and / it is not a clock always but / it is a flat circle and sometimes I fall in love every time I learn to love myself more and / for this I should be glad but no one can be there for something that is not always there / for themselves /, that cannot figure out what it is supposed to be, and time / is a sheet of ice and time / does not know how to be a round / thing and also a solid thing and every / time I learn more about myself the people who love me forget how / or I am on a cyclical pattern or / 24 times a day I hold my hands together to remind myself that they too can be held, even if they sweat.

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Alain Ginsberg is an agender writer and performer from Baltimore City whose work focuses on narratives of gender, sexuality, and mental health and the ways in which trauma informs, or skews them. Their work has been featured or is forthcoming on Shabby Doll House, Rogue Agent, decomP, and elsewhere. Outside of writing they tour the country performing in concerts, slams, living rooms, and caverns. They are a taurus. 

facebook.com/ginsbergbutnotginsberg 
twitter.com/anotherginsberg 
anotherginsberg.bandcamp.com