Saturday, September 20, 2008

epic

____i.
night is an open window. 
a two-sided thing. 

footsteps, car-stereos, 
the sound of waves:
open windows. 

dreams, Descartes, orangoutangs:
ways out. 


____ii. 
in the end, 
after the confusion, 
there is no wave left. 
just a little hand that reaches out
ever so slippery
to touch your toes. 


____iii. 
on the other side of open windows, 
after the leap, fall, crash;
there is another world. (maybe)

or this same one, 
upside down. 

or this same one, 
right side up. 


____iv.
Autumn is slipping from my fingers. 
the prickly needle-tips of branches
have green buds. when i walk in the city, 
those trees have white buds. like little feathers, 
or dandelions pretending they're stars. reborn dreams, 
recounted memories, misplaced chess-pieces come home. 


____v.  
i'm alone all the time, 
that's why i see them again: 
windows. archways. cave-entrances. 
other places. 
misplaced faces. displaced spaces,

places it's hard to come back from. 


____vi.
and the other side of night
is not day. 
or granite. 
or the bottom of the Atlantic. 

it's a quietest place,
a darkness)est place;

and dreams, detached from sleep or eyelids,
walk freely, and
discourage exploration;
and that is to say:
reconciliation. 


____vii.
the sea does not tire of her own voice. 
i walk for an hour, still the same conversation. 
relieved it's not me that has to make chatter, 
i hug my books and walk on. 

on some rocks i see a beautiful girl
in black jeans, oversized sweatshirt, and barefoot- 
black curly hair, 
whose face stares at the water
____(and never notices me walk past)

a mermaid. 
(or siren)

a doorway.
(or well)

(later, i remind myself to dive into darkness, 
and determine to not crawl back out)


____(viii. EPILOGUE)
- there are no waves left to corroborate any part of this story. 
- the siren was never identified or located. 
- upon examination the sea was mute as a whalebone. 
- we have no evidence to support the existence of any such windows.
- wells have long since been filled in, or blocked off.
- the author of this story has not, to date, been found. 

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