There you are, symptomatic. Puffy pink eyes. No sleep. Procrastinator, shirker, louse. "Sugar, get me that -- " No. Not a chance. Three dimensional design, digital advancement: none of these could think you up. Pursed chapstick-shiny lips, shape of a calf, widening midsection. Well, dear, appearances mean nothing. Your half-care semi-awareness. Zilch. Nada. De nada. Dust to ____, powder all over the sink copounter, piddle of yellow drain water. Jammed up pipes. Out of order.

You are mundane. You make me mundane. You make my conversations, my thoughts mundane. That crown molding along the ceiling holds more spark than ewither of us. That's it, sleep on the couch. Drown it out if you can. Fake marble, cheakskate, Jesus lover, faithless. Clicking high heels, patchy colorwork sweather, high pants, thin brown leather butt.

How the sun rises so fast, I will never know. One minute dark, and the next I am sitting stupified in early daylight, the feeling of weakly lukewarm coffee and all-night-paper-writing-even-though-it's-still-so-bad settling around me. I cannot bear to revise it, as it will hurt the pride of my soul. Instead, I allow my cat, the one I like anyways, to turn infinite times upon my lap butting me with his face. Occasionally flecks of inner-ear fluid spray on me when he shakes his head. Alas, he must have stuck his head under the leaky faucet again.

Eventually I push him away. The stench of his posterior overwhelms me and reminds me that it is now my day to empty the litter. So instead I wonder how it could possibly be that such a long time has past since I have written. I feel slightly ashamed but mostly distanced from myself. What I will need is a walk of quiet inspiration, which will mostly lead to unfulfilled angst and self-doubt. My body aches of tiredness, but I feel unsatisfied and cannot sleep, cannot close my eyes. The heat has turned off, my cat has fallen asleep on my dresser, and my sockless feet have begun to shiver. Everything I said I would do I have not and everything I do I say I will not. What if time were inconsequential? What if yesterday were today? What if I looked back and you were there writing a letter to me that I would never read?

It is the quiet that makes me write, makes me need to see the words written down, connected to my fingers. What happened to me? I feel like I lose myself sometimes, hanging off a ceiling rafter, or clinging microscopic to a window blind. I ask myself what I want, because no one has sat me down and shook it out of me yet. I can honestly say that I have no idea, and I am scared out my wits. All I know is what I should want, and the compulsion is so strong, I cannot find my footing in the current. It is churning me to butter.

Everything feels cold cold cold. Cold and pressure. Night and beauty. I want to explode in a fury of blood and flesh coating the asphalt. The leaves. I want to rise and dissipate. I want to cram myself eternally where the wall meets the ceiling, pale line of shadow, inconsistent paint. I want to feel something vast and concrete smashed up against my face. I want something to smash my face. I want to feel. But instead I cannot walk, cannot feel, cannot breathe, cannot write, cannot be.

I know that it is time. It is time to walk into a dark room and peel away layer after layer until I am nothing but imperceptable shimmering awareness. Everything else gathers like onion peels by my feet. And all I want is a drink of water for my dry and barren throat.

Sometimes the moment seems opportune to gather up everything around me and disappear to some unknown corner of the earth. No one would know me, and I would know nothing but the hot sun burning down upon my face. And I would know nothing but the wind tugging at the ends of my newly chopped-off hair. But the difficulty of leaving everything overwhelms me. There are too many loose ends. The impossibility of erasing my presense completely daunts me. Yet eventually, everyone must forget. Then, the horn will sound, the ship will pull out of the dock with me on it. Churning across the waves of a dark sea, clear and so cold as to be on fire. Ice water and night is fire in the wake of a ship with me on it.

Massive rehaul of almost unrecognizable life needed. Problems have yet to arise, yet I feel awkward, asleep in a waking dream. What happened to midnight writing bursts, sobbing over music, watching heady movies and turning page after page unable to stop. I have turned couch potato, spurred on by what others deem to be accomplishments. When stories spin in my mind, perfect prose, they soon melt into nothingness. A simple interruption robs me of my morning's work. Instead, I file file file alphabetize and sort through more papercuts. How has it been so long since I have seen myself? Mirror, hello. Hello.

Summer must be made for laziness.  After a days of summer work, a nap while reading in bed seems only natural.  After dinner of chilled pasta salad, Gaspacho, hotdogs or a good number of popsicles, I settle down for an old movie or more reading.  Perhaps reminiscing distracts me for an hour.  Perhaps the apartment needs sweeping.  Dust accumulates so quickly these days, busy with ins and outs, important errands and idle pacing.

Cicadas swarm outside, landing on shoulders and causing girls to scream and wave their arms helplessly.  Meanwhile a fly finds himself confusedly fascinated by the lamp.  He crashes again and again into the tinted glass of the bulb, heady with infatuation.  Ed Harcout plays on the computer, volume turned up as high as possible.  "Heart of Darkness" brings up memories of the school year, a classroom full of Joseph Conrad and Apocalypse Now, wondrous and full of horror.

The heat and humidity cause me to prespire.  Beads of sweat gather at the nape of my neck.  My armpits become damp.  The silver desk lamp distorts my reflection, and I tilt it, capturing different streched angles of my face.  In my room, I am turned rock star, artist, visionary napper and Kool-aid drinker.

Visions of New York:
The photographer with leaves in his hair, snapping pictures: Children running. Old man slumped shoulders, pants hiked up to his breasts. Foolish man quiet man tired man. Art gallery walking, whispered talking, critic of the times -- nude women, decapitated men, icons and god.

Two women flirt with uniformed police. Marble steps and shoes without socks. A breeze, a storm, of trash. Suppressed. Tired and sleep. Children, running, flying, scootering down the street. Hello, Mustached Man Striped in Gray. May I ask how you do this day?

Pigeon flight, sideways in the wind. Crumbs in the street. . Orange jacket orange hat dark skinned man. Walkman cassette, big breasted daughter. Highschool pranks, a woman's large flanks. Bob and weave, bob and weave. Grandma panties and bunching sweats. Muumuus, fishnets, and open toed shoes -- the height of fashion: welcome to the jungle.


It had been a long time since I had seen the ocean, to say the least. For a moment, the scene made it easy to forget about the academia, the superficiality, the confusing hypocritical tendencies that life and people take. Myself included, no doubt. I wish I knew my reasons. Instead the scenerios play in my head, trying to find comfort in nonexistent entities. And because, because, because.

Yet I remember all the people I did not know today. The lady that smiled and laughed, the man that wished me a good evening, and the awkwardly cute guys at the video store. Sometimes I find it hard to remember little incidences like that. The small openings that give me leeway to enjoy something entirely mine. I would not be able to share it precisely with anyone, but I suppose that is the point. The genuine sincere moments that we never plan for.

Last Answers
Carl Sandburg

I wrote a poem on the mist
And a woman asked me what I meant by it.
I had thought till then only of the beauty of the mist, how pearl and gray of it mix and reel,
And change the drab shanties with lighted lamps at evening into points of mystery quivering with color.

I answered:
The world was mist once long ago and some day it will all go back to mist,
Our skulls and lungs are more water than bone and tissue
And all poets love dust and mist because all the last answers
Go running back to dust and mist.

The most upsetting and rewarding moments I find by myself, alone.  And I don't hate anything right now.