Kyra for John.
The image of Ariel floated as an angel before his mind. She didn't deserve this. Neither did Kyra.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
496. Neither
John slouched in the chair, the green glow of the data slate illuminating his haggard face against the pitch blackness of his thoughts. The message blinked as if alive.
The image of Ariel floated as an angel before his mind. She didn't deserve this. Neither did Kyra.
The image of Ariel floated as an angel before his mind. She didn't deserve this. Neither did Kyra.
495. Falling
"You don't have to talk about it," said Em. Trev stood facing the cosmos, his back, bare, tight, sand duney in light and shadow to the caravan of her pouty lips. "I'm not asking. So you know."
Trev looked down as her hands traced the outline of his shoulders. "It's not that."
Em traced kisses across the sky of his horizon. Her arms reached around his chest and pulled his back to her cheek. "It's the past," she said.
"I'm not sure what that means. The feeling is now. The memories are now."
"And so am I," she said. He tensed. His muscle feeling more like marble than flesh, suddenly cold, not warm. She regretted.
"Okay."
"Hold me." He did. "Tighter."
"I don't want to hurt you."
"Hurt comes from withholding. I want to hold all of you, the pain as well as the pleasure. I want to know you can let me there, allow me to sit, with you, in that place. And in that place, that place that Kyra talks about, in that warmth, in that openness, is healing, joining, a place where your beginning and my ending glide as waves."
Trev laughed. "How long you been saving that up?"
"Oh, about a year, maybe more."
"Really? A year?"
"Yep. Remember that first karaoke night?"
"Sure."
"Well, I had some thoughts."
"I see."
"So?"
"So what?"
"You lettin' me in?"
"I'm not sure how to put it into words. The feeling is like a living thing, moving, changing, never exactly the same from one moment to the next. Trying to describe it is like trying to grasp a handful of water."
"Find a corner and show me that. Not the whole thing, just a little corner."
Trev sighed. "Okay. The feeling sits in your gut. It feels heavy, without being solid. It feels warm, but not in a cozy way, warm in a wet your pants kinda way, but the feeling is not temporal, not like something that is going to happen and then be over. Imagine wetting your pants in public but the wetting doesn't stop." Trev paused.
"Don't stop," she said.
He started laughing.
"I didn't mean it like that," she said.
"So you want me to urinate on you."
"Nooooo. You know what I meant."
"I'm just teasing you. I just don't feel like I'm doing a very good job."
"Just focus on that corner. Think of it like a tent. Lift the corner and let me get my foot underneath."
"Okay. The feeling, and I can't think of a better way to put it, is like a sinking feeling, like your stomach is an elevator, in free fall. And you can't stop it. And the mercy of a bottom, an ending, is denied you. The odd thing is, your head is not falling, but everything else is, almost like some horrible magic trick gone wrong where your head is visible to the audience, but everything else is really gone. And you are the only one that knows it. Imagine that. People come by and talk to your head, as if nothing is wrong and if you try and tell them, they look at you like you are crazy. And then . . ."
"And then what?"
"They leave. And the night comes. And you are still falling. And you feel smaller and smaller and smaller all the while the pain grows bigger and bigger and bigger and you have this odd house of horrors sensation of a feeling that won't fit your body and then there is that sick sensation again. I don't know how to explain it. A sense of losing control. And there is nothing you can do. And so you wait. Wait to hit bottom. And there is no bottom. Just a falling. Like a dead animal voiding its bladder, only you are still alive."
Saturday, April 26, 2008
494. Endogenous Etiology: 1
Transcript from sometime in the future. Location unknown. Names redacted.
Q.
A. High gamma. Overexposed. Blown out highlights. Blacks blacker than black and dream-like fuzzy.
Q.
A. Like cobwebs in my esophagus. Treble hooks below my eyes pulling the skin with lead weights. Cheekbones feel porcelain brittle, not living, ossified within my decaying flesh. Air heavy. Like water. My lungs work as bilge pumps. On a sinking vessel. Laboring to pull air in, mechanically working to expel.
Q.
A. Sharp. Exaggerated. Everything over the top. No middle ground. Nothing subtle. Aroma hurts. Cuts. Stabs. Bites. Claws. Gnaws. Eats. Sucks. Teasing nauseousness. Invading. Attacking. Omnipresent. Nothing smells as it once did.
Q.
A. Whatever is not in focus is grey, but moving as if the grey knows, as if the grey is whispering and pointing. Talking. Gossiping. Assuming. Looking from corners. From eyes shaded.
Q.
A. Shrill. Irritating. High-pitched. Relentless. Consuming. Everywhere. My own voice labored. Tinny. Like I'm talking underwater. No one can hear me. Talking louder doesn't work. Has no effect. People talk over me. Around me. All sounds are sharp. But voices. Voices are muted.
Q.
A. Hyper-sensitive. Beyond drugs. I am no longer able to become intoxicated--no matter how much I drink.
Q.
A. Nothing satisfies. Not in the bite. Not in the meal. I eat more than I used to. The strange thing is, I look forward to eating. The memory of what it was like to eat is still there and I approach each meal as if this time things will be different. Be as they were.
Q.
A. Never.
Q.
A. I know at the first bite. So I eat more. I couldn't tell you what propels me. The experience is almost out of body. I watch myself eat.
Q.
A. I’ve lost all peripheral vision. I see, sometimes vaguely, only what is in front of me. Sometimes I see nothing at all.
Q.
A. Yes.
Q.
A. I thought it would. It didn’t. If anything, it only made things worse.
Q.
A. Constricted. Especially my heart. I don’t think it is functioning correctly. I feel a gurgling in my chest. Something I’d never felt before. I’m cold too. Seems I can never get warm. I take a lot of baths--hot. It helps. For awhile. I used to light candles but I can no longer stand the fragrance. So, I bought scent-free candles and I found the light bothered my eyes, so I closed my eyes and I swear, the sound, the sound of the flame, irritated the heck out of me. I bathe without light now. (pause) I want to come back to sound. Everything I said before--not always so.
Q.
A. Sometimes sound passes through me. Like I was a ghost. Like I can’t hear it. Don’t hear it. And words are just sounds. I hear them them without listening. And others know I’m not listening. Yet, and this is the strange thing, when they confront me on not listening, I can repeat in detail everything they just said. You should see the look of disgust on their faces. But they were right. I wasn’t listening.
Q.
A. Little things. Details. Like zooming into a fractal. Getting deeper and deeper and seeing the same patterns. Little things seem like everything. Big things like nothing.
Q.
Death.
Q.
A. I have this overwhelming desire to cut my grass with a pair of scissors. A few blades at a time. Taking pains to get it right--height, level, etc. And watering my lawn--not with a hose or a sprinkler, both of which I have, but with a bucket. A small bucket. Red. I fill it up inside the house, bypassing the outside facet and going up the stairs, in the house and filling up my small red bucket in the kitchen sink. Just watching the water flow. Careful not to over fill it. That is very important. I could tell you the grass knows the care I take, but that would be silly.
Q.
A. I pick my spots. I know how to pretend, to act normal. Or so I believe. Its exhausting. Maintaining that belief. Heck, just acting normal, and I never know if I’m doing it right, because, fuck me, if I knew, I wouldn’t have to act. Right?
Q.
A. A good set of hair. You know. Young hair. Thick. Rich. Luxurious. The color of rosewood. Deep. Soft. Textured. I miss that. You know what I like the most? Where it bends. The hair. And the light catches that bend. That bar of light on the height of the curve. I could stare at that bar of light all day. That and the fine texture of clean straight hair, the slight variation of hue and saturation and value. Try and paint that hair, try and get the HSV right and you’ll appreciate what I’m talking about. Most people look at me like I’m crazy when I describe hair like that. And you know what else. Reminds me a little of grass. Fine blades of grass. Some days I just lie in the yard and run my fingers through the grass. Soft. Alive. Delicate. Defenseless.
Q.
A. They don’t come around much anymore. And when they do, I can’t recall they have much to say. Of course, they seem equally disinterested in what I want to talk about.
Q.
A. Details. The world in a grain of sand. As they say. Like . . . Never mind.
Q.
A. A glass of wine.
Q.
A. There was a time a glass of wine was not just a glass of wine. And you know the fuck what? There is nothing more lonely than knowing a glass of wine is not just a glass of wine and nobody else knows what the fuck you are talking about and there is no way to explain it to them. But you know what? I don’t have that problem no more. Jack.
Q.
A. (eyes water. tear runs down cheek)
Q.
A. No, what do you want to know?
Q.
A. Haven’t talked to her in awhile. Last I heard she was doing well.
Q.
A. Hard to say.
Q.
A. Thanks.
Q.
--Break--
Q.
A. I put headphones on and look at myself in the mirror. I look more handsome with headphones on.
Q.
A. After reading. I mean, I can no longer read without my headphones on. Music playing. It has to be headphones. I can’t read if the music is playing without headphones. But I can’t read without headphones playing music. And that is when it occurs to me.
Q.
A. To go to the mirror and look at myself. Sometimes with the music still playing. But mostly with the music off. Seems sacrilegious to look at oneself with headphones on and music playing. Like adding something profane to the reverent. If you are looking in the right way. Don’t you think? I mean, to look upon oneself is to look at the great unknown. You might as well walk outside and stare up into the dark soul of the sky. The two are ‘bout the fucking same. Right. And it is what it is. Music just adds something extra, like a small child taking a crayon and adding some birds to a masterpiece of art.
Q.
A. No. Never.
Q.
A. Maybe.
Q.
A. Let me touch your hair.
Q.
A. Well, there you go.
Q.
A. Yeah. The reading. Opens my soul. I don’t like what I see. Music creates a barrier. Between me and the darkness. A wall. Protection. Gives me a coat against the cold infinite bottomless pit of nothingness. That pit, in my mind, has eyes. They don’t blink and sometimes I swear there are more than just two. Music distracts me. Or maybe, it is a tether. A lifeline to the world I know when the world I don’t know threatens to consume me. So I hold on.
Q.
A. It's not that I want to read. It's just that I can’t not read. Each book is like a person. And each one is in my life for a purpose. Hell, I’m that one that brought them into my house. They didn’t just show up. I am cause. I am effect. And they sit on my selves just waiting for me to pick them up. Patient little bastards. I’ve got more than I can attend to properly. And yet, get this. I keep adding to the flock. I’m sure the bastards hate me. Would explain why they torture me so. Nice theory. Complete shite. But it sounds nice.
Q.
A. Don’t matter. Don’t you see that. It’s not the book. It’s not the message. It is the act. Reading is not reading. You know, it really pisses me off when you smile like that.
Q.
A. Accepted.
Q.
A. I once had a baby chick. You know, the one you take home from school when they teach you about babies and do the incubation thing. Every kid gets a chick after they hatch. Well, I don’t remember this story myself, but the story goes the chick, the one I took home, was doing what little chicks do when taken away. Chirping. Endlessly. And the story goes, I silenced that chick. With my own hands. Now, like I said, I have no memory of this event. Only the retelling of it. But the adults in my life at the time, keepers of the tale, say it is true. But you know what bothers me to this day?
Q.
A. No.
Q.
A. The way they told it. Like it was funny. Like it was their story. Like I didn’t matter. Like that chick didn’t matter. And they seemed to enjoy telling it. Mostly, it seemed, only when I was there to hear it.
Q.
A. Yes. That’s when I knew. And you know what else. I think they knew too. And I think they thought they could laugh it away. Kill it in the telling over and over again. Then again, I imagine a lot of shite. Who the frack knows what they were thinking.
Q.
A. Nope. What it did was lead me to hate them. To hate the pleasure they took at my expense.
Q.
A. Weakness. Or stupidity. Or both. You know what I wonder? Why. Why I did it. What impulse at that innocent age had taken root and I wonder if they knew, knew the root within me, the one they had witnessed, the one they laughed about and recounted endless times--to the same circle of family I give you. It was not like there was a new audience. They all knew the story. Yet, still, within them, a need. To tell it again. With me present. I see the laughter to this day. And I see little difference between that laughter and a knife twisted in my chest. And I wonder, how much fear they had. Knowing this was one root they could not pull. Did not know how to yank. Think about that.
--Break--
Q.
A. Fear. It dominates everything I do. I live in the spaces between it, where it allows me to venture. I live in those well-worn ruts, trotting routine into the soil of my prison yard. And I feel shame. Not what you think. Not shameful for the fear. I see the fear as something not of me so I have no shame for it. No. Shame for not trying to escape. Shame for not having the courage to end it all. I could do it. No. That’s not right. I can’t do it. So I cower. I live in the shadow of fear. And I cloak myself in the shame of knowing I have not the courage to end it. End it all.
--Break--
Q.
A. I feel like something inside of me is falling. Just falling. I feel it. Not just a thought, but a physical sensation. I feel it mostly in my chest as if my heart was lead, not flesh. The image of water flowing over a cliff is what I see. I don’t see the bottom. I don’t see the top. I just see the infinite flowing, the infinite falling. Falling without beginning and without end. Without start or stop. (pause) I see it in hair too. Not curly hair. Hair that flows. A graceful, tragic, curve. Like your hair. (smiles)
--Break--
Q.
A. Handwriting becomes tedious. Every letter, of every word, is an effort. Just forming each letter becomes almost impossible. So my writing can’t be read by anyone else. Actually, within a few days, I can hardly read what I’ve written either. And I know, I tried, with tremendous effort, to write legibly. My own hand mocks me. It doesn’t shake, like an old person. My hand is steady. It just refuses to allow me to write clearly. I can’t explain it. So I don’t write so much anymore.
Q.
A. When connected. Like climbing a mountain and we feel the belay--above and below--and we know connection, togetherness, in life, in the support of life. And no one on a mountain, belayed, is laughing at the one above or below. People look at me today and they don’t belay. They choose not to connect. They walk on past. I see it. I feel it. And I withdraw. Further. Like a shadow. Growing with the falling sun. Waiting to be consumed in the encroaching, inevitable darkness of night. Think about that. Think of yourself as a shadow. And night is coming. How would you feel? Think about it. Think about what that shadow is thinking. How do you stop the coming of night?
Q.
A. I sit and watch the seconds tick by. I see my life, alone on that mountain, dripping away, each second a drop of blood from a vein that won’t coagulate. Sometimes those drops are not blood, but poison, like chemo, dripping into my veins and I can’t stop the poison and it drips, into me. Nobody comes to stop it.
Q.
A. Right. Yes. I’ll schedule it.
Q.
A. High gamma. Overexposed. Blown out highlights. Blacks blacker than black and dream-like fuzzy.
Q.
A. Like cobwebs in my esophagus. Treble hooks below my eyes pulling the skin with lead weights. Cheekbones feel porcelain brittle, not living, ossified within my decaying flesh. Air heavy. Like water. My lungs work as bilge pumps. On a sinking vessel. Laboring to pull air in, mechanically working to expel.
Q.
A. Sharp. Exaggerated. Everything over the top. No middle ground. Nothing subtle. Aroma hurts. Cuts. Stabs. Bites. Claws. Gnaws. Eats. Sucks. Teasing nauseousness. Invading. Attacking. Omnipresent. Nothing smells as it once did.
Q.
A. Whatever is not in focus is grey, but moving as if the grey knows, as if the grey is whispering and pointing. Talking. Gossiping. Assuming. Looking from corners. From eyes shaded.
Q.
A. Shrill. Irritating. High-pitched. Relentless. Consuming. Everywhere. My own voice labored. Tinny. Like I'm talking underwater. No one can hear me. Talking louder doesn't work. Has no effect. People talk over me. Around me. All sounds are sharp. But voices. Voices are muted.
Q.
A. Hyper-sensitive. Beyond drugs. I am no longer able to become intoxicated--no matter how much I drink.
Q.
A. Nothing satisfies. Not in the bite. Not in the meal. I eat more than I used to. The strange thing is, I look forward to eating. The memory of what it was like to eat is still there and I approach each meal as if this time things will be different. Be as they were.
Q.
A. Never.
Q.
A. I know at the first bite. So I eat more. I couldn't tell you what propels me. The experience is almost out of body. I watch myself eat.
Q.
A. I’ve lost all peripheral vision. I see, sometimes vaguely, only what is in front of me. Sometimes I see nothing at all.
Q.
A. Yes.
Q.
A. I thought it would. It didn’t. If anything, it only made things worse.
Q.
A. Constricted. Especially my heart. I don’t think it is functioning correctly. I feel a gurgling in my chest. Something I’d never felt before. I’m cold too. Seems I can never get warm. I take a lot of baths--hot. It helps. For awhile. I used to light candles but I can no longer stand the fragrance. So, I bought scent-free candles and I found the light bothered my eyes, so I closed my eyes and I swear, the sound, the sound of the flame, irritated the heck out of me. I bathe without light now. (pause) I want to come back to sound. Everything I said before--not always so.
Q.
A. Sometimes sound passes through me. Like I was a ghost. Like I can’t hear it. Don’t hear it. And words are just sounds. I hear them them without listening. And others know I’m not listening. Yet, and this is the strange thing, when they confront me on not listening, I can repeat in detail everything they just said. You should see the look of disgust on their faces. But they were right. I wasn’t listening.
Q.
A. Little things. Details. Like zooming into a fractal. Getting deeper and deeper and seeing the same patterns. Little things seem like everything. Big things like nothing.
Q.
Death.
Q.
A. I have this overwhelming desire to cut my grass with a pair of scissors. A few blades at a time. Taking pains to get it right--height, level, etc. And watering my lawn--not with a hose or a sprinkler, both of which I have, but with a bucket. A small bucket. Red. I fill it up inside the house, bypassing the outside facet and going up the stairs, in the house and filling up my small red bucket in the kitchen sink. Just watching the water flow. Careful not to over fill it. That is very important. I could tell you the grass knows the care I take, but that would be silly.
Q.
A. I pick my spots. I know how to pretend, to act normal. Or so I believe. Its exhausting. Maintaining that belief. Heck, just acting normal, and I never know if I’m doing it right, because, fuck me, if I knew, I wouldn’t have to act. Right?
Q.
A. A good set of hair. You know. Young hair. Thick. Rich. Luxurious. The color of rosewood. Deep. Soft. Textured. I miss that. You know what I like the most? Where it bends. The hair. And the light catches that bend. That bar of light on the height of the curve. I could stare at that bar of light all day. That and the fine texture of clean straight hair, the slight variation of hue and saturation and value. Try and paint that hair, try and get the HSV right and you’ll appreciate what I’m talking about. Most people look at me like I’m crazy when I describe hair like that. And you know what else. Reminds me a little of grass. Fine blades of grass. Some days I just lie in the yard and run my fingers through the grass. Soft. Alive. Delicate. Defenseless.
Q.
A. They don’t come around much anymore. And when they do, I can’t recall they have much to say. Of course, they seem equally disinterested in what I want to talk about.
Q.
A. Details. The world in a grain of sand. As they say. Like . . . Never mind.
Q.
A. A glass of wine.
Q.
A. There was a time a glass of wine was not just a glass of wine. And you know the fuck what? There is nothing more lonely than knowing a glass of wine is not just a glass of wine and nobody else knows what the fuck you are talking about and there is no way to explain it to them. But you know what? I don’t have that problem no more. Jack.
Q.
A. (eyes water. tear runs down cheek)
Q.
A. No, what do you want to know?
Q.
A. Haven’t talked to her in awhile. Last I heard she was doing well.
Q.
A. Hard to say.
Q.
A. Thanks.
Q.
--Break--
Q.
A. I put headphones on and look at myself in the mirror. I look more handsome with headphones on.
Q.
A. After reading. I mean, I can no longer read without my headphones on. Music playing. It has to be headphones. I can’t read if the music is playing without headphones. But I can’t read without headphones playing music. And that is when it occurs to me.
Q.
A. To go to the mirror and look at myself. Sometimes with the music still playing. But mostly with the music off. Seems sacrilegious to look at oneself with headphones on and music playing. Like adding something profane to the reverent. If you are looking in the right way. Don’t you think? I mean, to look upon oneself is to look at the great unknown. You might as well walk outside and stare up into the dark soul of the sky. The two are ‘bout the fucking same. Right. And it is what it is. Music just adds something extra, like a small child taking a crayon and adding some birds to a masterpiece of art.
Q.
A. No. Never.
Q.
A. Maybe.
Q.
A. Let me touch your hair.
Q.
A. Well, there you go.
Q.
A. Yeah. The reading. Opens my soul. I don’t like what I see. Music creates a barrier. Between me and the darkness. A wall. Protection. Gives me a coat against the cold infinite bottomless pit of nothingness. That pit, in my mind, has eyes. They don’t blink and sometimes I swear there are more than just two. Music distracts me. Or maybe, it is a tether. A lifeline to the world I know when the world I don’t know threatens to consume me. So I hold on.
Q.
A. It's not that I want to read. It's just that I can’t not read. Each book is like a person. And each one is in my life for a purpose. Hell, I’m that one that brought them into my house. They didn’t just show up. I am cause. I am effect. And they sit on my selves just waiting for me to pick them up. Patient little bastards. I’ve got more than I can attend to properly. And yet, get this. I keep adding to the flock. I’m sure the bastards hate me. Would explain why they torture me so. Nice theory. Complete shite. But it sounds nice.
Q.
A. Don’t matter. Don’t you see that. It’s not the book. It’s not the message. It is the act. Reading is not reading. You know, it really pisses me off when you smile like that.
Q.
A. Accepted.
Q.
A. I once had a baby chick. You know, the one you take home from school when they teach you about babies and do the incubation thing. Every kid gets a chick after they hatch. Well, I don’t remember this story myself, but the story goes the chick, the one I took home, was doing what little chicks do when taken away. Chirping. Endlessly. And the story goes, I silenced that chick. With my own hands. Now, like I said, I have no memory of this event. Only the retelling of it. But the adults in my life at the time, keepers of the tale, say it is true. But you know what bothers me to this day?
Q.
A. No.
Q.
A. The way they told it. Like it was funny. Like it was their story. Like I didn’t matter. Like that chick didn’t matter. And they seemed to enjoy telling it. Mostly, it seemed, only when I was there to hear it.
Q.
A. Yes. That’s when I knew. And you know what else. I think they knew too. And I think they thought they could laugh it away. Kill it in the telling over and over again. Then again, I imagine a lot of shite. Who the frack knows what they were thinking.
Q.
A. Nope. What it did was lead me to hate them. To hate the pleasure they took at my expense.
Q.
A. Weakness. Or stupidity. Or both. You know what I wonder? Why. Why I did it. What impulse at that innocent age had taken root and I wonder if they knew, knew the root within me, the one they had witnessed, the one they laughed about and recounted endless times--to the same circle of family I give you. It was not like there was a new audience. They all knew the story. Yet, still, within them, a need. To tell it again. With me present. I see the laughter to this day. And I see little difference between that laughter and a knife twisted in my chest. And I wonder, how much fear they had. Knowing this was one root they could not pull. Did not know how to yank. Think about that.
--Break--
Q.
A. Fear. It dominates everything I do. I live in the spaces between it, where it allows me to venture. I live in those well-worn ruts, trotting routine into the soil of my prison yard. And I feel shame. Not what you think. Not shameful for the fear. I see the fear as something not of me so I have no shame for it. No. Shame for not trying to escape. Shame for not having the courage to end it all. I could do it. No. That’s not right. I can’t do it. So I cower. I live in the shadow of fear. And I cloak myself in the shame of knowing I have not the courage to end it. End it all.
--Break--
Q.
A. I feel like something inside of me is falling. Just falling. I feel it. Not just a thought, but a physical sensation. I feel it mostly in my chest as if my heart was lead, not flesh. The image of water flowing over a cliff is what I see. I don’t see the bottom. I don’t see the top. I just see the infinite flowing, the infinite falling. Falling without beginning and without end. Without start or stop. (pause) I see it in hair too. Not curly hair. Hair that flows. A graceful, tragic, curve. Like your hair. (smiles)
--Break--
Q.
A. Handwriting becomes tedious. Every letter, of every word, is an effort. Just forming each letter becomes almost impossible. So my writing can’t be read by anyone else. Actually, within a few days, I can hardly read what I’ve written either. And I know, I tried, with tremendous effort, to write legibly. My own hand mocks me. It doesn’t shake, like an old person. My hand is steady. It just refuses to allow me to write clearly. I can’t explain it. So I don’t write so much anymore.
Q.
A. When connected. Like climbing a mountain and we feel the belay--above and below--and we know connection, togetherness, in life, in the support of life. And no one on a mountain, belayed, is laughing at the one above or below. People look at me today and they don’t belay. They choose not to connect. They walk on past. I see it. I feel it. And I withdraw. Further. Like a shadow. Growing with the falling sun. Waiting to be consumed in the encroaching, inevitable darkness of night. Think about that. Think of yourself as a shadow. And night is coming. How would you feel? Think about it. Think about what that shadow is thinking. How do you stop the coming of night?
Q.
A. I sit and watch the seconds tick by. I see my life, alone on that mountain, dripping away, each second a drop of blood from a vein that won’t coagulate. Sometimes those drops are not blood, but poison, like chemo, dripping into my veins and I can’t stop the poison and it drips, into me. Nobody comes to stop it.
Q.
A. Right. Yes. I’ll schedule it.
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
493. Storms of Dislike
Papa and Kyra were on the third day of a week long camping trip. Standing before the lake of eternal wisdom, they watched as a storm rolled over the mountains.
"Papa, perhaps we should leave."
"We could," he said, continuing to watch the sky in the distance.
"Well, don't you think we should start packing?"
"If you think we should go." Again, Papa stood without moving, his shoulders relaxed and his eyes clear, watching.
"I don't like storms. I think we should."
Papa remained still.
"Papa? You're not moving. You don't like storms, do you?"
"I suppose its not a matter of liking or not liking. Storms are. They perfectly are. Nothing added. Nothing subtracted. Just a beautifully perfect expression of nature. Here, come stand with me. Now open your arms, palms upward and turn your face to the sky. Feel that?"
"Feel what?"
"That cool breeze. Nature's calling card. And you know what?"
"What?"
"You only ever feel that breeze before a storm."
"Okay."
"Kyra, many never feel that breeze." Papa knelt down and took Kyra's hand. Her large round eyes opened to his, each reflected in the other. "I never want you to miss that breeze, to miss the harmony of the universe, to resist what is."
Kyra's eyes held wide without blinking. Rain, soft drops, begin to fall. "How do I know I'm going to miss something?"
Papa smiled. "Whenever you use the word like or dislike."
-----------
The servitor approached Kyra and hummed in position until she opened her eyes. "The Hood will see you now. Please follow me."
"Papa, perhaps we should leave."
"We could," he said, continuing to watch the sky in the distance.
"Well, don't you think we should start packing?"
"If you think we should go." Again, Papa stood without moving, his shoulders relaxed and his eyes clear, watching.
"I don't like storms. I think we should."
Papa remained still.
"Papa? You're not moving. You don't like storms, do you?"
"I suppose its not a matter of liking or not liking. Storms are. They perfectly are. Nothing added. Nothing subtracted. Just a beautifully perfect expression of nature. Here, come stand with me. Now open your arms, palms upward and turn your face to the sky. Feel that?"
"Feel what?"
"That cool breeze. Nature's calling card. And you know what?"
"What?"
"You only ever feel that breeze before a storm."
"Okay."
"Kyra, many never feel that breeze." Papa knelt down and took Kyra's hand. Her large round eyes opened to his, each reflected in the other. "I never want you to miss that breeze, to miss the harmony of the universe, to resist what is."
Kyra's eyes held wide without blinking. Rain, soft drops, begin to fall. "How do I know I'm going to miss something?"
Papa smiled. "Whenever you use the word like or dislike."
-----------
The servitor approached Kyra and hummed in position until she opened her eyes. "The Hood will see you now. Please follow me."
Monday, April 21, 2008
492. Spring
Zeke rubbed the sleep from his clear grey eyes and with hands mindful, almost prayful, opened the ocean front window in the master bedroom as he had done a thousand times before. Light poured forth warming wood and face with hues of yellow and orange as the clear translucent teal waves gently laid sparkling lace upon the whey beach with the practiced grace of a thousand years; an act performed for neither eye nor ear, beast nor man, seeking no reward save expression. A breeze sensual, messenger of flowers and trees alike, combed his silver locks with gentle fragrant fingers and taking breath he honored the gift with a moment uninterrupted. From a distance both near and far, birds chripped playful morning notes, flirting from tree to tree, weaving the day with threads of joy. The bright ocean sung a song for his soul as if sound itself could cleanse the weight of the unseen and he took another breath as one takes the guilty pleasure of candy from a platter. The villa was quiet, with the exception of Blu. Today he would walk, barefoot, upon the carpet of nature, the world as his orchestra, the sun as his beacon.
Thursday, April 17, 2008
491. Late
She sat in her hopper as a sack of grain sits in a wagon
Tears falling like the rain outside
The grey underbelly of the sky opened and closed
Windshield or eyes or both turned the world Monet
Steady rain sounded like static
Her heart thumped in her chest and her neck felt tight and her nose ran of its own
Images moved on the wet dock like the internal pieces of a clock
The sign flashed: Bravo-Four-Zero--Departed
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
490. Von Listens
Von sits and listens with eyes closed as Zoe continues to tell her story with Ceru.
Saturday, April 12, 2008
Wednesday, April 09, 2008
486. Girl
Scene: Morning of Trev's departure. Girl sits at table, letter open, warm snizzle turning cold. Her mother stands at the sink washing the morning dishes.
Mother: You going?
Girl: No, I don't think so.
Mother: I think you should.
Girl: Yeah, well, I don't see the point.
Mother: What does he say in the letter?
Girl: Same as always. Loves me to the end of hyneria and all the rest.
Mother: I meant about today. What did he say?
Girl: Wants to see me. Last time, something he wants to say.
Mother: You should go.
Girl: Why?
Mother: He loves you.
Girl: He has a strange way of showing it.
Mother: He's young.
Girl: He's strange.
Mother: I still think you should go.
Girl: I don't love him. And even if I did, what would it matter. He's got a ticket, not me. It's not like he is inviting me to go with him.
Mother: Go for me.
Girl: What does that mean? For you?
Mother: He will kiss you.
Girl: Yeah?
Mother: Have you ever been kissed by someone who loves you? Kissed for the very last time? Kissed not to be kissed, but kissed in the moment in the wish that it was eternity? He will kiss you like that. And you know what, I want to hear about it. I want you to come back and tell me what that was like. I want to know what it is like to be looked at with those eyes, to be held in those arms, to have his soul pressed against yours and to feel lips against yours that tremble with things said and unsaid.
Girl: I don't see the point.
Mother: The point is, everything is not always about you.
Mother: You going?
Girl: No, I don't think so.
Mother: I think you should.
Girl: Yeah, well, I don't see the point.
Mother: What does he say in the letter?
Girl: Same as always. Loves me to the end of hyneria and all the rest.
Mother: I meant about today. What did he say?
Girl: Wants to see me. Last time, something he wants to say.
Mother: You should go.
Girl: Why?
Mother: He loves you.
Girl: He has a strange way of showing it.
Mother: He's young.
Girl: He's strange.
Mother: I still think you should go.
Girl: I don't love him. And even if I did, what would it matter. He's got a ticket, not me. It's not like he is inviting me to go with him.
Mother: Go for me.
Girl: What does that mean? For you?
Mother: He will kiss you.
Girl: Yeah?
Mother: Have you ever been kissed by someone who loves you? Kissed for the very last time? Kissed not to be kissed, but kissed in the moment in the wish that it was eternity? He will kiss you like that. And you know what, I want to hear about it. I want you to come back and tell me what that was like. I want to know what it is like to be looked at with those eyes, to be held in those arms, to have his soul pressed against yours and to feel lips against yours that tremble with things said and unsaid.
Girl: I don't see the point.
Mother: The point is, everything is not always about you.
Tuesday, April 08, 2008
Sunday, April 06, 2008
485. The Last Letter
Fragments of the last letter Trev wrote on Hyneria
"Trev, I want to show you something," said Em. "I've never shown these to anyone. Promise me you won't laugh." Em opened the drawer to her desk and pulled out several letters. "I've been writing these since we left Hyneria, almost two hundred by last count."
Trev picked up a letter. Ran his finger alone the edge, flipped it over and back. Holding it to the light, he remarked the ink, the handwriting, the care and penmanship.
"You think I'm silly, don't you," said Em.
"Who do you write them to?"
"My dad."
"All of them?"
"Yep."
"All handwritten. On paper."
Em grabbed the letter from his hand. "I'm sorry I showed them to you."
"No, no."
"You think I'm crazy. I can see it in your eyes."
"Em--"
"Just go. Please, go."
"Baby," Trev reached out to move the hair from her eyes. "Look at me. I don't think you're crazy."
"Then what?"
Trev looked away. "It's just . . ."
Em reached to his face. "Just what?"
"It's just that I used to write letters too. Handwritten. Maybe not two hundred. But I wrote a lot of them. Posted every one."
With her other hand, Em brought Trev's face to hers. "Tell me."
"I suppose, like your letters, I never got a response. Never knew if they were received. Never knew if they were read. Each one, a hope. Each one, a piece of me. The ink might has well been my blood. You can only bleed so much. You can only hope so long, but you know what?"
"What baby, tell me?"
"I wrote them anyway. I wrote them to the last. And I held hope, to the bitter end."
"Your tears on the dock. She didn't show did she?"
"Nope. She didn't show."
Friday, April 04, 2008
484. Perhaps
. . . and upon the light of ancient stars a request was uttered, demanded perhaps. The womb of her eternal salvation sought, implored perhaps, the rod of his eternal righteousness . . .
483. Everything
Papa dropped a pebble into the lake. "See those ripples?"
"Yes," said Kyra.
"They touch everything, everywhere. Try it."
Kyra picked up a pebble and dropped it into the lake. Ripples spread in all directions.
"Kyra. Everything. Every thought. Every word. Every deed. Touches every thing."
Kyra looked at Papa, her eyes clear. Then she picked up another pebble and dropped it. Papa stood and watched as Kyra picked up another and then another. Dropping them one upon the other.
"Yes," said Kyra.
"They touch everything, everywhere. Try it."
Kyra picked up a pebble and dropped it into the lake. Ripples spread in all directions.
"Kyra. Everything. Every thought. Every word. Every deed. Touches every thing."
Kyra looked at Papa, her eyes clear. Then she picked up another pebble and dropped it. Papa stood and watched as Kyra picked up another and then another. Dropping them one upon the other.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)