Density

I bled quite a bit

when the hollows

of my bones

filled,

my arms

slammed the floor

just ahead

of my face

as my osseous side,

given the weight

of bricks,

tore its way

into the start of my life

as a vessel

for fragments,

I lost

a lot,

most

of what I had,

I’d say,

if

I could speak,

the gashes

scabbing over

that first

afternoon,

turned black

beneath a moon

waxing gibbous,

almost full

and calcium-white,

a phase

that I watched

from the cavern

where my skull

opened

around vision

afloat,

at a struggle

to focus

on anything

in grey matter

gone to jelly,

exposed

to the night’s

cooling air,

caged in tissue

longing

to be porous

again,

riddled with space,

a frame

for mazes,

back when I was filled

with the strength

to be

mostly nothing,

letting everything

pass through,

instead,

I lie

here,

a pile

of wounds

healing slowly

on a scaffold

I survive,

bear its splinters

and unyielding breaks

like a stockade

I keep bleeding,

breathing,

beating

against.