The coming fire

                “Oh, it’s some kind of tumor.”  His mother waved a hand dismissively.  “Who can understand a thing those doctors say nowadays?”

                “But are you going to be all right?” Jonah demanded, a strange feeling of desperation burbling up inside of him.

                “Hmmmn.  Now where did I put that phone number again?”

                “Mom,” Jonah loudly interrupted, “are you going to be all right?”

                “What, dear?  Oh, that.  No, I don’t think so.  Tumors aren't good, you know, and they can’t operate on it for some reason or another.”

                “What are you saying?  Are you going to die?”

                “Well, we’re all going to die, dear.”

                “I mean soon!”

                “It seems that way.  Can you help me find this phone number?”

                Jonah stood there, watching his mother search the roll top desk that used to sit in Grandma Mueller’s dining room.  She’d mis-buttoned the back of her house dress, so that one of the tiny pink plastic buttons stuck out on top by the collar.  “Cheer up sleepy Jean,” she was singing to herself.  “Oh, what can it mean?  To a daydream believer, and a homecoming queen…”

Stuck

The thunder called to me yesterday,

because there is nothing obvious

about inevitability,

and sometimes nothing left to mourn.

We wander in and out of these tunnels,

hugging the walls of our confusion,

our pockets empty after the long journey,

only to find ourselves wishing for the 

destination we avoided most

and have forgotten how to find.

Misconnections

Dream Journal, March 7-8, 2005

Obviously haven’t been keeping the d.j. lately.  Got sick of everything.  Well, I’m back—at least for one day.

Yesterday went to see Linda with Ryan & also on my own.  A bit rough but okay. 

Last night dreamt that Ryan & I were staying in my father’s room.  It looked like his room how I remember it.  It was filled with lots of stuff he had bought on sale, like extra bottles of shampoo.  Anyway, it was late & we were getting ready for bed.  On the way back from the bathroom I saw someone—a young woman/girl—downstairs (weird, since my dad's house is one-story) just break down the back door like it was nothing.  Freaked out, I ran into the bedroom and closed the door & told Ryan what happened.  I tried to call the police but the girl had cut off the phone lines, so I had to use the cell phone.  

After a bit of a delay on the side of 911 I got through & told the police to come.  We then tried to keep her from getting in the bedroom, but she was stronger than us & got inside.  I was terrified of her but she seemed more desperate than anything.  To my disapproval Ryan started handing her lots of cash, something like $150 so that she could eat or whatever.  She was still trying to get stuff from us when the police showed up & arrested her.  They told me that she’d go to prison for at least twelve years—which I wanted—but that when she gets out, she’d come after me, which freaked me out.  Some guy who lived in the house & supposedly took care of the “old people” who lived there seemed surprised someone had broken in but very calmly got back to work to repair the door and come up with a better lock.  He didn't seem super competent to me, nor did he seem all that worried about what had happened.

After that Ryan and I went out.  We all decided to walk the rest of the way to wherever we were headed.  It was gray out & cool but not the dead of winter.  We wound up at some place where my aunt (who is no longer living) was, along with some other people who might have been my extended family members.  My aunt was knitting.  Excited, I told her I liked to knit too, and we proceeded to have a good conversation about knitting that involved her giving me some tips.  It was after this that I realized I hadn't actually been talking to my aunt, but to the girl who had broken into the house.  I was very surprised by the fact that I liked her & that we had so much in common.  When I realized it was her I asked her what she wanted from me.  She smiled, leaned in very close to my ear, and whispered, “Friendship.”  And then she ran off.

Swimming upstream

Do not be afraid, loved one

swim out into that dark ocean

swim to the castle where he

waits for you, his eyes

calling

the dock is behind you now

I will ask nothing more from you.

The unexpected refuge

“She’s down!” someone shouted, but Megan wasn't hurt.  She was just curled up in a ball on the kitchen floor a few feet from where Alturis lay, his dead eyes staring at the Williams-Sonoma Thanksgiving cookbook cover.

Wishing

Back in her room, Kitty opened her jewellery box and took out the bracelet the King had given her.  For months she’d worn it every day, hoping the marble would glow again.  It never did.  The day she had taken it off she’d cried for hours.

Now, here in her dorm room, there was still sadness, tinged with the kind of loss she had hoped she’d never know again.  But as Kitty put the bracelet back in the jewellery box, she heard girls giggling down the hallway; she thought about Shruti, who she was meeting for dinner in the cafeteria, and of her classes that began next week.  She could only hope her new life would help her put the old one to rest once and for all.  

Doubts

why did you bring me here to my cyclone second

when rage engulfs this bridge from earth to heaven                    

cinder through and through                                                                                                                                                                                             

you ask too much                               you do

                                                                                                       

for one whisper like the hint of water splashed on embers

for one storybook of dreams with its message tethered 

to the fading metal moon

          

the sun  it can  be cruel

now that I gave too much                 too soon                                                                

Moving and Fading

We are the paint peel chipping,
dangling over the prickly
bushes,
waiting with an eye
toward falling.
I wonder who I will be
when I am cut and
bleeding -
I wonder who I will be
when I have
given up.

It is like the blanking of
a color screen,
the bleaching of dark
green carpeting.
Hold my hand for just
a little while.
We are moving
and fading
on and on.

Coping mechanisms

“Oh, honey,” his mother said, “don’t cry.  Someday this will all just be a memory.”

Jonah didn’t answer, only buried his face further into his arms.

“In fact,” his mother continued, “if you think about it, the memory is much more important than what actually happens , isn’t it?  Because the memory lasts so much longer, I mean.  So how you choose to remember this—that’s what matters.  Right?”

Not having the slightest clue what she meant, Jonah nodded anyway. 

“Good,” his mother answered, and patted his shoulder.  “Now come into the kitchen, and I’ll make you some graham crackers with chocolate frosting.”

Up against it

April 13, 2004

I remember this feeling.  It’s the feeling I have before/during a flashback—like I want to crawl out of my skin.  I just have to keep it at bay until Thursday.  I don’t want to do this while I'm alone.  And god knows Ryan doesn't need to deal with it.  Thursday.  I just have to wait until Thursday.

A look back

                                                       

                                                  This is my heart in denial                                                        

the scratching of the diamond

against the vinyl

I was young once it seems

and I spun your etched

reflection inside

of me

But reality is the toe breaker

is the dance

is the false teeth sitting

innocent in the glass

Apologies

I haven't been posting new things to my blog for the past four days because our internet connection went down on Monday and was only fixed today.  For all of you who visited during that time, my sincere apologies.  I will start posting again immediately!

Self-protection

            Ursula sent Andy a long email, in which she denounced him as an emotional cripple.  She also compared him to her father, who had never loved anything but the family dog.  Neither one of them (Andy and her father, not the dog) had any idea what emotional intimacy was.   I’m sure you’ve already stopped reading by now, she sniffed at the end, but she was wrong.  Andy read the whole thing.   He even showed it to Hal, who had a good chuckle over it.  “Women,” Hal laughed.  “Always so damn superior.  Talk about needing a psychiatrist, huh?”

            “Yeah.”

            “Well, whadya want with a chick named Ursula?  I’m telling you—stick to the women with normal names.  The ones who sound like they should be in a Bond movie are always psychopaths.” 

            “I’ll keep that in mind,” Andy answered.  But he wasn’t smiling.

The Lost Crossing

Old truths fill the

black hole where

I buried the leaking need

for you

I know all about incurable wounds

            So much and for so many weepy and

            lonely afternoons

            I meant to leave you

            for so much, my friend

                        and I did

Camouflage

Her room looked as if Kitty had merely stepped out for a moment, as opposed to forever.  The sweater she’d been knitting sat in a basket next to the couch; some of her drawings were scattered on the table; and a book she’d been reading laid face down on the couch cushion. 

The King lowered himself down onto the bed.  He glanced at the book—a translation of the Interior’s history—before he turned his attention to the drawings.  Although quite impressed by her skill, Philippe realized with some sadness that Kitty drew what she saw, not what she felt.  Even the few drawings of himself that he found told him nothing.  He would never know the secrets of her well-fortified heart.

A Child's Dream

            “Oh, no,” Meg said, surprised at her own vehemence, “you’ve made a mistake.  Andy and I just know each other from when we were kids—that’s it.  I don’t mean anything to him.”

            “Then why," Alturis patiently returned, "does he stand on the corner, gazing at your house for hours at a time?”

            Megan frowned.  She had never noticed that.

            Smiling, Alturis took another bite of Meg’s pound cake.  “He’s a strange man,” Alturis said.  “From what I understand he has dozens of girlfriends in Chicago, and yet he can’t bring himself to ask you out for dinner.  I wonder why?”

            “Maybe because I’m just his friend and you’ve misunderstood this whole thing entirely?”

            “Or maybe because you are the only one who’s ever meant something to him.”

            “That’s just wonderful,” Megan retorted, suddenly no longer afraid.  Why be afraid?  He was going to kill her anyway.  “You should get your own talk show—since you seem to have people all figured out, that is.  Too bad you’re a raving lunatic.  Maybe you can do a podcast from the federal penitentiary?”

             Alturis smiled as he took a bite of cake.  But the smile never reached his eyes.  

Left behind

Diary entry, November 21, 1983

Today I threw up and was sick.  Mom and Steve fought again.  Mom and Steve are both slamming around.  I hate it when they fight.

Lost

Now our half-truths ship out

under cover of a cloud-filled sky

the sun you once spoke of

never any friend of mine

                                

can you feel it rain

can you?          

Digging out

Debbie had liked to grocery shop.  She said it relaxed her.  Why this was Jonah could never figure out; he would have preferred to speed race through the grocery store.  But there he would be, idling next to the cart, as Debbie read a label on a product he knew she would never buy.  “And how many hours have I spent in Best Buy?” Debbie would pointedly ask him, but he thought this wasn’t a fair comparison.  At least at Best Buy Debbie could walk through the DVD section, scouring it for the classic musicals she loved.  At the grocery store there was nothing for Jonah to do, other than watch Deb read labels for products she would never buy.

After he lost Debbie he did not particularly want to go to the grocery store again.  That only worked for a couple of weeks, though, so he went on Thursday night, when he saw that T.V. was just reruns anyway.  The grocery store was fairly deserted: that meant he could just speed his way right through it, how he’d always wanted.

Except that he didn’t.  In the cereal section he stopped to read the label on Frosted Mini Wheats, just because he was curious.  And in the frozen aisle he spent a long time marveling at the wide selection of frozen entrees out there for people like him—people who didn’t have anyone to go home to.

Ghosts

I hold onto the clothesline as the

wind shrieks through the backyard

oh how I loved you

more than the tides could ever

love the moon

but now silence mocks the faithful

as I ripple with the green grass

go blind from the apathetic sun

The Sore Thumb

Diary entry, 1994

A psychic told me once I was from another planet.  Perhaps she was right after all.  I feel strange enough.

Alone, Pt. 2

Now I whisper to the wind about

my broken heart

failing in slow motion

not a subtle art

toss the stones in the river because

I am

I am here alone at the end

Magic

"But how does it work?” Kitty asked him.

“The stone will glow," the King answered.  "It will be quite obvious to you.”

Frowning now at the bracelet, Kitty returned, “How does it do that?”

“It is magic, of course,” the King replied, causing Kitty to raise her eyes sharply to him.  But the follow-up questions that response prompted—and she had a lot of them—never reached her lips, because Leo broke in. “Your majesty," he said, "we must be leaving."

Unfinished

And when I choose to come here again                                                                     

will it snow how it did in my dreams

                        will I be

a story worth telling

                                    because the sadness—

it crackles in the night

           

for you           

the mistake worth regretting

                                                the faraway voice        filled with belonging

do you see where eternity ends

did you know that you were my friend

this planet a box that holds me

Waiting, Pt. 2

January 9, 1983

Dear Diary,

Today we went to church.  Yuck!  We bought some rolls and French bread after church.  Mom got a pass today.  She came down and took Steve and me out for ice cream.  She said she might have to stay one more week after this.  I hope not.

Consequences

Kitty now saw that the location of the Last Window was not coincidental at all.  Her father had told her he was born in this town, but in a way he had been; here was where he had begun his life as an Outlier.  When that life began to unravel he’d come back to the Last Window, in the hopes that he could find a way back to the world he’d abandoned.  That was why Kitty lived in the same city as the Last Window, and that was why they had found her father dead just across the road from the soccer field.  He hadn’t committed suicide, or died of exposure. 

He’d died trying to return to his world.

Conversation with George, Pt. 4

What if I loved you?

I ask him.

What if I loved how you

think about molecules

racing,

or slowing,

about color,

about owl calls in

the night?

Because I know you

do.

You are no weapon.

You are a boy who listens

to the flow of water in a

stream,

who once had a love affair

with equations.

We could end the war,

rather than start it.

George is quiet for a moment.

Well, he says, you will look

up the difference between

reptiles and amphibians

now, so there might be

something in all of this.

How much we will see.

There are still the dolls to

contend with.

Wondering

is the rain your final call

because I am wondering what this was for

           

why you ever loved me

why you do not anymore

there is no witness here

only ghosts of words that nudged into breath

           the shape of a fool      shivering and wet