"the expression"

for Steve McCaffery

***Those who have asked themselves what it means that a poem is to/for another poet should know that the subsequent poem is inspired from their work ... I usually find what has been neglected, subjected, supressed, or abjected and simply fill in the blank***

my life is chained to a sleeping syntax
preserved and consigned to a second signing
it appears misunderstood
assigned ( as I am ) to some enclosure
perforated in an abjected center
it collapses into a single meaning
distended from the world that signs itself

the signifier consigned to a signature
the signature consigned to a name
the name consigned to a face
and the face ... to an expression