memory, my dear friends, is a tale for unharmed words that prevents them getting caught up in the not-so-kind process of writing. memory allows one to restore weak eyes or a burnt heart to full strength with the minimum of effort. it also tears down elation with gleeful ease.
must get more shoes
and polish the ones that i have,
where the ocean meets the razor.
i can’t argue with what i know
and therefore am blindfolded
by standard competition ratios
yesterday, music moved away from me
but here i am boxstepping to madonna songs (damn)
am i using wrong tools again
wearing the wrong shoes
or just living small,
without sex in my heart?
ah, like you said, you get eyes,
and that’s something–
but i
must
have
more
shoes.
the day said nothing in my arms.
an obsessive watching of recorded live music performances offered a recreation of sorts, both in scene and chronology. these things happened somewhere else in another time, but now happen for me and with more relevance than the “original”, the weakest of all forms. interest and meaning is layered over the medium during the progression of thought that happens without, but unquestionably within. within and without are not opposites. if i knew not of an occurrence such as that that plays out during the performance, then it would simply reside as another impossibility, one of an impossible number.
it looked up at me and simply asked, motionless.
punctuated silence: the urgent commas of passing freight (which seem louder than usual–are the goods larger, or does sound carry further in the february heat?), the definite full-stop of an unspecified scream from the street, hyphens of conversation (they get closer to my bed), an open bracket (i am, of course, waiting for something as usual, like ellipses, as these are the thoughts i cannot rid).
it writhed and slipped from my grasp, spinning towards the ground.
for a moment, a mistaken interruption, the day must be reinforced with communication, but it eases its way in, an exchange, a duty, i fear to upset no one, i am beyond sleep at this point. i amble into another fatigue though, the drag of unsubstantiated processes. there are things to be written.
it held just above the tiles: point-suspended within the description i had always intended for it.
i know of these things now. i saw them whilst reading kafka. it is ideas for the novel, the novel that we do not talk about, the not-novel, the anything but. it must not know of its own intentions, of its forecoming and pre-influence. it is the beyond, the movement-that-is-future, but given half a chance it will fill the space it tears with anomalies and reversals, denial and self-rejection. it has been said once and will repeat to fade (although nothing disappears), stating over and over that self-awareness is both death and beauty.
it looked at itself, revealed something that blinded me, and spun to the floor but i did not see its descent, only felt it.
i cannot just ignore it; i must not think it, because these days i am too analytical.
i write this to forget. i read it to remember.
this is defiance, i swear.
i have just walked through the opaque streets, and they spoke of nothing. i did all the talking. i will hold these things in my hands, i said, they are mine. but then i remembered that to achieve, i must ask all the questions, and i then saw all the hopeless, blunted shame that arises from an unwilling audience, and i sank again.
time will tell, but only of what concerns it. i will tell, but only of what concerns you. you will tell, and this time i intend to live in every word for it may well be the last, but i am prepared.
this is all good practice.
never write novels about novelists, nor poems about poetry. never think about thinking or ask about asking. self-reflection is the death of being, and all that is lost is always lost, except when it is found.
an alarm sounds. a compact disc burns. the book lied. you lied.
may i go to sleep?
no, not yet.
the floor is a canvas. the broom, a brush.
and i,
the consummate artist,
am sweeping up a masterpiece.
cleaning the toilet as it should be cleaned–
equal amounts of pride and care added to the soap–
is a task of holy and heroic proportions.
scrub brush in hand,
i stand kissing the lips of god.
i have a heavy cold and it makes my head feel like an anvil. i am bursting with happiness inside though, which is strange. i went to write a poem, the best poem i have ever written, all the ideas were there. then i remembered i must clean the car. i went outside and a man in a black car asked me for directions twice, once on the way outside, and again as i walked back. i think he was lost. i said, “that way, i think.” the second time i said, “try down there.” there was lots of rubbish on the floor outside my house so i picked it up and put it in the bin. i felt no better physically, but maybe a little better socially. the happiness is still there, it’s still there, just there. i would shout it from the rooftops but it might hurt my throat, or i might spill my hot coffee, or might get dizzy and fall off. tried to write the best poem i have ever written, but i couldn’t. i think i’ll go to bed for a bit. see if i feel better when i wake up.
we could have hung them with our wasted hours.
an icon of a saga of a character of a story
he stands there convinced that he can see his kin in the distance.
for the lonesome ego must evade the muse
and the confident actor must hunt the lie.
we are ready to go.
and so what if i scream at mirrors?
seeing how i have accomplished
the art of reaching out to people so effectively,
i decide that i can.
(irony is the refuge of the educated man who is out of his depth.)
after the blow, a wreath languishes
amongst the chained angles and cheated compliments.
this is pure attention–the refugee’s love.
this is best for intellectual permutations.
life is a commentary.
people deny that they love
or have ever loved
the mute attraction of order.
i, however, simply toss chalky glances
at starry-eyed verbs,
hoping they will burst.
i talk to myself in the third person
hoping they will burst.
