the pareidolia amok

the muck amuck amok
i see faces repeating and repeating
in these morning flakes
in the bread crusts drear
in the wake of your leaving
as the motes of particulate air roil
about the emptiness you created
by vacating this space inside
my now soiled heart

a conspiracy of eyes and mouths
a cabal of carnal teeth
fangs bared and aglow
limned by the maw
of dark impulses
a face in the strawberry preserves
jesus laughing at me on the face
of the rubbery naan you left
on the plate of hashed teeth

What I’m Reading:

but my hand is full of words like
grass perforating the old lattice

leave your eggs here in the helix of my ear
safe in the ‘world-class banking scheme’

— Mantra Mukim / “Raipur”