we three are assigned to signs, second
attention sees
co/incidence
deities woven throughout the web of
creation
when we discover continuity, our
ordinariness
we simultaneously observe the fragmented
guesswork of consciousness, how it
speculates, makes collages, connects
experiences
to make a house inside infinity
Denise says coincidence is poetry
self-other boundary collapses as she
calls across the field
the answer that is no answer confirms
space itself, refuge
of all silence and noise
Denise says death is a kind of language
writes her elegy into the universe
readers, writing is a mystical act
writings are conceptual whirlwinds,
vortices
we enter them and spin
dialogue between living and dead, past
and future
Denise says
your adversary is you
the monster is a puppet
is this why teachers say
invite the demons to tea?
give them an offering
respect their need
to be known and seen
the shapeshifter Proteus
caught in the mesh
has no final form
keeps changing
is mind
Miranda Mellis is the author of the novel Crocosmia (Nightboat Books); three novellas, The Revisionist, The Spokes, and The Quarry; and a short-story collection, None of This Is Real. Her poetry and nonfiction books and chapbooks include The Revolutionary, Demystifications, Unconsciousness Raising, and Materialisms. She is the co-author of two book-length dialogues: The Instead with Emily Abendroth and Passing Through with Rick Moody (forthcoming, Solid Objects 2026). With Tisa Bryant and Kate Schatz, she was a founding co-editor at The Encyclopedia Project. She grew up in San Francisco and now lives in the woods of the Pacific Northwest where she is a professor at The Evergreen State College. Read her intermittencies here.
