Precision - Edit2

[ellajam]

Hi duke, this reads beautifully now and I'm a fan of the subject, some notes below.

Precision


Piss in a bottle
shit in a jar
bleed in a vial
have your gut scanned ~
all to find out
medically
just how you are.
Nicely blunt, as the reality is. Have you considered an em dash?

Answer the phone
voice-printing “yes”
leave fingerprints,
mucus, saliva,
semen or hair ~
then all will know
forensically
just who you are.
Just right.

Call the heat warm
stare at the stars
envy the birds,
a baby, the dead; Love these two lines, for me they cover the spectrum of what we think we want: Freedom, possibility and relief. Well done.
feel the unseen
from stories you’ve read ~
then you may know
empirically
just what you are.
For some reason I find the repeat at the end unsatisfying. Have you considered swapping the last two lines? "empirically" could then be the final word on the subject, the ending would be a bit of a change up while still maintaining continuity.

P.S. I just read some of the other crit so want to say I love empirically, it has a way of negating, or balancing, the "reality" of what precedes it, a yes for me.

Piss in a bottle
shit in a jar
bleed in a vial
have your gut scanned ~
all to find out
medically
just how you are.

Answer the phone
say the word “yes”
leave fingerprints,
mucus, saliva,
semen or hair ~
then all will know
forensically
just who you are.

Call the heat warm
stare at the stars
envy the birds,
a baby, the dead;
see and believe
what you have read ~
then you shall know
humanistically
just what you are.

Written after the annual physical, and reading that criminal elements are now making calls whose sole purpose is to get the unwary mark to say the word "yes" so it can be spliced in after an unrelated phrase such as, "You agree to pay $500 a month for this service?"