Life’s Little Misdirections 🥀🦋

Projector/Breakin’ My Own Heart

Projector (Jump Cut)(In My DNA)

The projector cast spells on my eyes
squinting at bare walls
capturing frames of illusion
causing delusions from spools
of black, filmy stuff humming along
all night until dawn

spawning a bright window or two
but I don’t wake up
I don’t wake up
until shook and I quake
did I dream that?

what involuntary night response did I offer
as I shake my head
shake my head
can’t shake it off
as the projector reloads and spins again?

what a fool I have been
what a fool
what can I do
conditioned by this damned DNA
strung out, clipped and pasted?

I can’t jump cut these scenes
all through night
looping
looping
through dreams looped

legs twitch, head flails,
pillows thrown lay on the rug
not beneath my head
no support for a head
no support
none can know my dread

when the filmy stuff
spools out my mouth like vomit
I should quit here
I should have quit there
I can’t quit
someone clip my DNA

before I splice, tape
all the edited pieces that
I can’t throw away
never throw away

it’s in my DNA.


3.8.23

I go night, night now. Sweet dreams.
I would love a break…from my heart.

Rewrite for Shadows ▼

:

Projector (Jump Cut)(My DNA)
(Jump Cut) filmy, regrettably shot scenes, embedded in these genes (My DNA).

The projector cast spells on my eyes
         squinting at bare walls,
capturing frames of illusion,
         causing delusions from black spools.
Filmy stuff hums night long until dawn,

         spawning a bright window or two.
But I don’t wake up.
I don’t wake up until shook,
and I quake, did I dream that?

What involuntary night response did I offer?
Shake my head, shake my head,
         can’t shake it off.
The projector reloads and spins again.

What a fool I have been.
What a fool, what can I do,
conditioned by this damned DNA
strung out, clipped and pasted?

I can’t jump cut these scenes
all through night
looping,
looping,
through dreams looped.

Legs twitch, head flails,
pillows thrown lay on the rug —
         not beneath my head,
no support for a head,
         no support.
None can know secret dread,

         when the filmy stuff
spools out my mouth like vomit.
I should quit here.
         I should have quit there.
I can’t quit.
Someone clip my DNA

before I splice, haphazard
         tape together mentally,
all the edited pieces that
         I can’t throw away,
never throw away, because

it’s in my DNA. Can’t mutate
a single frame of regret.


3.8.23/3.14.23
40 lines, free verse (adapted from a previous blog entry)

{dropnote:"DNA Editing/Can I Just Explain"}
Genes influence…behavioral…psychological characteristics…intellectual ability, personality…risk for mental illness — all…bearing on both parents and children within a family.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4685725/#:~:text=Genes%20influence%...

Idea of film editing process related to memories (in this case regret), how we messily delude, remember good parts, justify past, forget (impossible?). Advances in science (gene editing, not unlike cloning) has scary potential to avoid adaptation of humanness (that we won’t accept, or our others).
Innocence will be lost either way. There’s only one way to grow up…learn from failures, hope not so big we lose sleep pondering mistakes, how to live better, and finally rest. Though, too late for some, the slow learners who realize without applicable solution, such as an offered poem about the plight.

I go night, night now. Sweet dreams.
I would love a break…from my heart.