We lay there together in pools of heat and shivers and broken mirrors. She mumbled dreams and slept. I waited patiently for daylight. It was darkness except the intermittent flicker of light in the corner of my eye. From some late night frantic, a speed car racer, or a flash lit patrol, occasionally reflecting off a painting or photograph. So many balmy collections of dried out memories. I remember now, her framed photos of reruns, classes, teachers, a brown eyed horse named Morris. Another flicker of schizophrenic light. A reproduction of a famous Monet momentarily glimmers then fades. Why is she surrounded with yesterdays and carbon copies of death? It’s strange and sad and depressing yet beautiful. Everything beautiful is dead or imaginary. Almost everything. All we can do is collect these tokens of what has been lost, I guess. I need a cigarette. I need to fill my head with chemicals and hysterias. The brooding presence of fresh air and solitude is suicide. We need fast paces and five degrees, twenty seldom friends, living relatives, on both sides, and occasional conversations. I need to hold a burning slice of death in my hand and consume it. Conquer my fear of living by slowly dying. She says don’t smoke in the apartment. The veneer will crack and the books will swell. Carpet will smell. It already smells. The fire alarm will explode. It doesn’t matter. She says not to smoke in here, anyways its bad for you. I love her. I think I love her- love her as much as I know what it means. Only lie occasionally, to protect her, to hide away seldom small pieces of my shadows. I get up, quickly, carefully shifting her brilliant form away and considering my options. Ill go outside. The public balcony. It’s rusty and always inhabited by scared victims of reality, melting and held together by bits of patience and patchwork. I need to scream death and breath epiphanies, deeply deep.
-james thatcher III |