This Joint

There's no manner of speech, nor lineage,

Nor a smooth white cable knit sweater

Nor any clean cut mop atop your so well taught skull

That stays loyal to you, sir

When it confronts that ever brightening orange glow

and that ever distinctive odor emanating through your learned sigh. 

Prose about Prose, and Its Awful Obligations

I'm beginning to become tortured now, aren't I? Those that live in their mind have comfortable space. I find my mind an unsuitable venue, prone to stumbles, flickering lights. The water is too cold, but there's no one to fix the pipes and nothing, no amount of water will rinse the grime off its surface; it is sordid. Insanity, although undiagnosed, undeniably runs on the maternal side of my family and it is a shame I could find nothing beautiful yet, like Hemingway did (although perhaps he did not find his mind beautiful). But I am not tortured by creative genius, merely lack thereof. Or perhaps misplacement. Sometimes I feel it in my heart, but we both know it has no business there, despite what wizened Greek philosophers may have concluded through their pontifications. It belongs in my mind, but as I said, as minds go, mine is not in high demand. It is a sordid, idle, murky place. 

I looked at myself in the mirror and saw what some could call a beauty, but the varnish is unfinished to the discerning eye. The interior lacks attention, and the structure feels the subtle consequences. And I looked myself in the eye and said "I am beginning to become tortured now, aren't I?" Underneath the grime, a reluctant, y

et stoic, "Yes."

I looked out the window, ashamed. My mind, my heart, they all looked away, and we all saw this: a Renaissance of nature, a parade of rosy pink wisps of vapor dancing, twirling, embraced by the wind. In a bed of warm, never-ending cerulean, a moon of no special crescent or impeccable round shape, but a bit shaved off by time on the left side, he quietly observed, let the tones both cloak and reveal him, always moving, always content. My mind did not change its half-lidded gaze, but my heart saw , oh, she saw what these eyes did, and could no longer remain reticent. It was the idea, the Romantic, unattainable beauty, that made her expand towards it, that made her throw herself every which way, against my chest, spine, ribcage, knocking time and time again, pushing the surrounding water out through my black framed eyes, those which looked back into the mirror and tried to tell her what we had just learned: even if there was a way to reach that beauty, even if flooded the most dank and pungent corners of this wholly unenviable mind, and made me as clean as I was back when all it took was water, what, then, would we do? We, my darling, are simply not wise enough to know. 

Yes, she understood, but it did not satisfy. She asked that laughable apartment beneath this tough copper hair, "Why? Why is it beautiful?" hoping his learned logic could satiate her most instinctive urges. He responded, his heavy eyes closing even more, "I haven't the desire to care." 

2.

Asa Nisi Masa.

It's, of course, so many elements.

The deliberate movements, thumb poised

lightly

so lightly

on the nose.

Italian embraces the sounds--the textures of the consonants, air puffed diphthongs--they run their lips and teeth through the meanings, decadence justified for the sake of my enlightenment. I covet their ways. I avoid my words, fear vulnerabilities revealed if my tongue lingers too long on the roof of my mouth.

But the simple, oh painstakingly simple guitar.

4 notes

for my every breath. I cannot blink, I will lose the splendor of her mantra against the languid arpeggios. She whispers within earshot of 40 years but the nun cannot hear. Or perhaps, neither dare disturb the moment.

I was not thinking of you when I watched this scene. I was thinking of Fellini.

The Sentiment

It was so much quieter than she expected it to be.

"Why do you watch that? I swear, you're a sociopath." She could barely hear him. She took a seat in the chair next to the balcony door and took a bite out of her pastry. It was frozen in the middle.

There was nothing to see, really. Just a red truck, a blue truck behind it, the door to the house was wide open. And it was silent. There were no lamentations, nor busy entries and exits, no oxygen tanks or flashing lights. Two men in matching navy shirts loped up the front steps, stretcher in hand. There was no one else.It had never been this quiet. 

They had moved to this house only a month ago, she and him. Every morning there had been something to wake them, a wailing beagle, or the garbage truck, the sharp scratch of a rake against the concrete. The sounds would move around the walls, vibrate up the posts of their bed, shake the pillows beneath them, until they had to surrender. They would crawl out of bed, start the coffee, and stare out the balcony door, glaring daggers into the direction of the noise. Especially her.It had become a necessity of her morning ritual. She paced from one frame of the closed glass doors to the other, her hands clutching the warm sides of the mug, her fingers sliding back and forth through the handle. She blamed the city, the tourists who came to it, the modern world's lack of attention to manners, the economy, the situation in Georgia, her mother--she blamed everything. She would tell him how different it was where she was from. In Virginia it would be a travesty to be this loud, she said. They consider others down south, she said, they may have been Confederates, but they care for their neighbors, no one gives them credit for that. He nodded and refilled the kettle.

Today, though, was different.

"Her mother lives with them, you know," she said. "It must be her."

"Stop watching. It's a personal matter."

"If it was a personal matter there wouldn't be two trucks blocking my driveway. Death is not an exclusive engagement, in case you haven't noticed yet."

He glanced at her. A tuft of her hair stuck out from the rest. He was used to it.

"What time do you have to leave?"

"7. It's always 7. 7:15 and I'm stuck in traffic for half an hour. They've been in that house for a while."

"Who?"

"She was pretty old. I wouldn't be surprised." Her eyes had not moved from the house.

"And you call yourself a humanist. I haven't seen you shed a tear so far."

"That's because I was raised in a church community. We have ways of dealing with death. You know, in Virginia everyone belongs to a church community. Sentimentality is a setback. I grew up on a farm. We didn't name our pets, there was no point. If we had more of that around here, things like this wouldn't happen."

"Things like what?"

"Here they come."

She furrowed her brow and squinted through the glass. The stretcher moved back out of the doorway. It was still empty. The two men loaded it back into the blue truck. The red truck drove away, the blue followed. He watched her shoulders rise and descend: a sigh of disappointment filled the kitchen.

He sighed back. "Well, I suppose that's a good sign."

She turned around in her chair. There was a strange element in her gaze, it was tranquil on the surface, but beneath the clear film, there was a spark of indignation, or perhaps, if he was closer, perhaps rage. He wanted to say he had never seen it before, that it was something unexpected, but now that he thought about it, he wasn't sure. He nervously toyed with the corner of the newspaper page, and she shifted her glare to the clock behind him.

"It's 7."

1.

If I were to remove 

whatever (you might call it love, though your

mouth may be hesitant to move in that way)

we had made

   and throw it on the rain varnished street

            (that street which pleased you before. you had said

the storm gave it a pleasant odor

and i had laughed, without deciding to, and there was something so warm about the side of your arm, only a boy, don't you think? i have never felt skin so warm on me or the girls i tell of you to, no sir, this is your bright

and shining honor)

it would make a noise, i predict, though small

and quick! my lord

it is desperate and aware of its insignificance (there was nothing special about that skin, no sir, blood can be boiled just as water is, and served--now--i am unimpressed)

but in its history, louder than the longest awaited silence, yes. you would notice. I hold it now and i

am

so close to hearing it fall.

(only some minutes left until that

phone continues to lie still for too long.)