Love, a Bilingual Handbook

____Keep my feet on ground and my head in the clouds.
__________Matisyahu

Henry Clark, 1952, referenced from: this is glamorous

i am relentless in my search for bliss.
i have glimpsed it... (also you, because you make me happy...
_____________ _which is important not because you make me happy, but because with you
_____________ _there is nothing worth being unhappy about,
_____________ _and i'm saddest when i hear about you crying (with of course you can handle
_____________ _just fine on your own) (but because i believe i know a spot to kiss, a shortcut
_____________ _to making it all better, which you know how to do for me lipless, mouthless,
_____________ _alone just your soul (but i am not so strong like that. so soulful as you). (but i have lips
_____________ _that know how to find the right patch of skin. clavicles are too often ignored,
_____________ _kissing bones i feel so close to you. knees too. ankles.)

i have glimpsed it... (but cannot understand the relentless machinery of hindsight that colors:
_____________ _trees, houses (now homes), cars, the patchy discolorations of people's skin
_____________ _rainbows now (that i don't remember seeing then), vibrations in the air between
_____________ _breaths (kissing is like being underwater/too far in the clouds)- earthquakes,
_____________ _trembling, falling... Mona picked me up from the airport when i first came
_____________ _to LA. she drove me home. next night took me out for my birthday. i'm glad.
_____________ _she's the right face for a thing like that. (must be the freckles, i'm nuts about them)

i have glimpsed it... (if i close my eyes, does that count?, is that real too? if i close my eyes, then
_____________ _i see bookshelves, and trees and women's bodies (which almost spell happiness
_____________ _all by themselves), and pianos, and the color black that only exists on the
_____________ _skin of pianos, and the way my fingertips feel (along keys and women's
_____________ _skin (which is the same thing anyway)), and i cannot dance, but see in black's
_____________ _closed-eye rendering, how beautiful my body sways and moves to music
_____________ _when i inhale sound and trapped in my lungs it tightens my muscles, and
_____________ _delays my eyes and transports my knees (am i writing about love making
_____________ _or dancing?... is there a difference?)

i have glimpsed it... (space. dreams. the sadness of childhood... the thrill of it. the excitement,
_____________ _the brilliance of miracles, the sweat of hard-work, the brutality of failure,
_____________ _the fear of everything (afterall, i'm still a child too), the brilliance of everything
_____________ _(afterall, i'm still a child too)

i have glimpsed it... (all the places i'd rather be. all the people i'd rather be with. (all the versions
_____________ _of myself that have to die so that all the other versions can be born...
_____________ _and mostly, i am happy.sad (together, wed, simultaneously) in a huge, married
_____________ _way that i cannot describe. cannot understand. cannot grasp, but am...
_____________ _and pant, breathless, from the burden of such steeps,
_____________ _and really want nothing more at 12:10am than to:

____________a glass of cranberry juice in a heavy glass tumbler, dim reggae in the background,
____________in front of the heater i stand to warm my legs (up to my knees), but stare at
____________my bookshelf, swaying and bopping lightly to the music, delighted to see
____________them all in once place- a reconciled family. hey, come dance with me.
what?
____________come dance with me.
now?
____________yeah [smiles]
[laughs softly] are you trying to win me with that silly smile of yours?
____________worked once.
(once upon a time!)
____________whatever, come here
Q, ! i'm in my PJs, I'm tired, my feet are cold, let's go to bed
____________we will! we will, come here
you're not even dancing, you're just standing there... bopping
____________like something floating off in the ocean at sunset?
save the poetry for your girlfriends.
____________you're my girlfriend
[reluctantly she walks towards him. he hands her his glass, she takes it and lifts it to her lips. He puts his arms around her- both arms around her neck, pulling her head into his chest. Having finished the last sip she makes a few muffled noises. He releases partially so she can put the glass down on the shelf. He closes her in again. He moves slowly left to right. She goes with it. She pretends to sulk. He pretends not to know she secretly won't go to bed without such a gesture. He kisses her forehead, feels her tremble. She has her arms around his waist. She lifts her head up, her chin still on his chest]
____________up for air?
sshhh.
____________[nod]
[she puckers her lips. It means kiss me. He looks at her a little while first. then does. Some music is heard, it's dark.
____it's perfect]

i have glimpsed it... (a life other than this one. This same one- but a better one. kinder. softer.
_____________ _quieter. and since i have glimpsed it... i'll just have to find it again.

(Amelia, if you read this, the answers to your questions are:

1. yes
2. older. he has lines on his face. he has a calm way about him. he likes to touch his son on the back of the head (on his neck). he pretends not to notice all eyes on him. he has short hair. he's not so tall. )

Goodnight Wednesday. you have been wonderful.


________Come, my friends,
________'Tis not too late to seek a newer world.
____________Tennyson (Ulysses)