Sunday, June 04, 2006

Sugar In The Morning

A black bin bag catches the rain. The tweeters fall from the roof. The grass recedes like the desert doesn’t. The water, though clear, is poison.

I had an opportunity to soak. I tasted seafood for the first time. In the afternoon I visited the Museum of Modern Literature. I saw you there.

In nautical dreaming I wept on board your ship. The bucket I held had a hole in it. Pitching, we almost rocked. We sang You Brought A New Kind of Love To Me.

What’s left of the Roman town is romantic enough. The open blue sky adds to it. Plus the river winding through it. Plus, of course, the multitude of kissing gates.

I held, in my hand, a neat bottle of brown. Vinegar. Down the sink it goes, you said, down the sink it goes. The poor little fishies, they bubbled.

The garden has a tent. The sky holds back the rain. The children have only their hopes, their fears and their happy red faces. Between us we can make the night theirs.

At the Agency For Cultural Affairs I met delegates from Rome. Diplomats from Paris. Bigwigs from North End. We selected plans that best expressed the appeal of travel.

Your desire for manhood comes to fruition. The tests are carried out, the plans are put in place. But you cannot afford the fee. The waiting is the worst of it.

Her grandfather shows you how to fold a lucky crane. He shows you six times even though you got it the first time. He stares at you. His hands shake with the effort.

Cheeses are your speciality. Rocks, paintings, monuments to excess, installations, sculptures, touchables. All made from cheese. Your nose tells you which is which.

On Broadway you have visions of the nineteen forties. The lights dazzle your eyes, the music tickles your ears. Stage doors beckon you. Limousines wait to carry you home.

I softened my cuticles and pushed them back. I used the rubber tip of the hoof stick you gave to me. What’s a hoof stick? I asked. You had no idea.

Lift off, you cry, as you fly over the stone wall. On the other side, a gang of cows. They herd you to the electric fence. Like a hammer it falls hard on the back of your hand.

The smoke from the lamp makes you drowsy. The heat from the fire makes you dream. You are back in Khartoum. You are being chased by hordes of brown and fiery midgets.

The food I eat doesn’t digest. It sits there, at the top of my stomach, refusing to go down. To make room for my next meal I force myself to vomit. The splashes are red.

Two girls walk the path towards the bridge over the river. You watch them until you lose them behind the bushes. They appear again, later. By then you have already gone.

The professor steps to the window. He brings the bottle to his lips and drinks hard. Outside, in the courtyard, snow. He looks for the first footprints of winter.

You are crippled for life. The other driver walks away, Scot free. You wonder, in your daze, who this Scot fellow is. Your wife pushes you home.

The boyfriend is a puzzle to you. She looks great while he looks like a retard. Not a retard, a simpleton, a mental, a mongol. You stare too long for comfort.

The first thing I learn is how to make eggs into ornaments. Then how to bring new life to old furniture. There are twelve more weeks of this. I don’t think I can stand it.

We suspected hypothermia. We removed you from the fridge. In the warmer room you began to glow. When the police arrived you laughed.

The march of the revolutionaries was already in full swing. We climbed down from our bed. But too late, too late. All that was left were the signs.

2 Comments:

Blogger Molly Bloom said...

Sorry...made a mistake...

I love, really love, the first paragraph of this. Very evocative.

Lots of fantastic imagery in this... you can get lost in it. The sheer, twisting turns of each different part. You start to follow one lead and then....you come face-to-face with a new cycle of meaning. Leads to all different places.

11:19 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Lonely little paragraphs, taking a little look at lonely lives. But I like it more than a little.

5:25 PM  

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