the ephemeral question, posed with its hands cupped as
a stone angel in the middle of a fountain in the middle of
a dream I had right before the assassin got shot.
When you asked me why not, and I showed you --
salt on the hands, ant bites around the ankles.
A secret wish, gone to the undertow but some
residue remains. A seaweed goddess slathered
in excuses. Florida scratch of July. This many times
and I can't believe but I forgot to tell you. Before
I died, it was -- a wish, a ring of petals, a staggering
recapitulation. Wing tips ground down. Sneezes blown down
from the Pyrenees, wishes from purer minds tumbling
from the Pyrenees, wishes from purer minds tumbling
over the hills, tiny blue flowers hesitating to announce
something utterly superfluous -- a meteorite's wish,
a prenuptial renunciation, a salutary blessing,
a heavy hand resting on the top of your head,
you're a slender beam of light and this is
the only chance you've got. Something flashing,
the keys got stuck, the accelerator won't
accelerate the way it used to. Little flags announcing
the star-lined finish that will just keep trotting out
its own tired wish of learning to tap-dance, the butter crust
realization burning at the edges in its ridged pie plate.
Before Melrose Place, just one single-serving packet away
from microwavable bliss. Beetles scuttle across the floorboards
without reproach. I try to censor them with my laser eyes
Before Melrose Place, just one single-serving packet away
from microwavable bliss. Beetles scuttle across the floorboards
without reproach. I try to censor them with my laser eyes
but they just scuttle away. Without the lion mask and without the djembe
our dreams feel vaguely empty, like a light socket, like a thing
you've forgotten the use for. Was that how I felt when you left
me for Academy, the Bay for the coast? Something buzzes
and faintly blurs, but it's all a buzz saw as far as I'm concerned.
A tangle of wires, a wooden tarantula, a kitchen stool that's lost
its tripod. How are we to move on if we keep
revolving in our radioactive antechamber? Longing for
sunlight and sleep and longing for something more
substantial to return. We worry actively about sunscreen,
mosquito bites, all of the different strands of the UV spectrum.
Strangely enough none of them looks purple or even bluish
up close. Nibble California pills, take Vitamin D tablets.
Our dreams suffer from sundowning. I catch them roaming
the halls at night in their blue smocks, so ghostlike
in the fluorescent light like pale moths who are the
bastions of something I can only mouth, my face right up close
to the window, leaving a small circlet of breath on the glass.
Curbing the line between sanity and insanity, like a circus
clown who does hydraulics. Not even they know what
goes on inside their heads. I try to ask them for advice
but they just lean forward and whisper fortune cookies
into my ears, long ribbons of sound advice, lottery numbers,
words for "pig" and "choke," which I will surely never need
if I should travel to Beijing or to Sun Mun Wei for a pig's ear
pickled in a jar.
Here goes nothing:
http://www.godlivesonline.com/blog/mp3s/Hop%20Along%20-%20Bride%20And%20Groom%20Hot%20Air%20Balloon.mp3
http://www.godlivesonline.com/blog/mp3s/Hop%20Along%20-%20Bride%20And%20Groom%20Hot%20Air%20Balloon.mp3
