instead of waiting

i'm listening to Brahms and trying not to know what i'm going to do. i'm trying to pause. i'm trying to breathe. i'm trying to have faith that the solution will present itself. i'm trying to avoid the subtle seduction of certainty - or maybe i'm lying to myself.

maybe i already know what i will do. maybe the die is already cast. maybe these months meant nothing. maybe the months before meant even less. maybe i'm writing just to hear the clack clack click tap of the keys so i don't pay attention to the tocks.

maybe i'm trying to remember the smell of clocks.

Volver

Such sweet insanities:
watching ghosts and counting karmas.

I see Chinatown,
I hear the Dead Russian,
I smell the sour stench of a Sunday spent retching.

I know all these things as sure as I know myself.
They loom, mysterious and inconceivable.

What did I see last night?

As the fever passed so did the day;
the Madness did not take hold.

I sipped ginger ale and read Jack.

Big Sur recollections of delirium tremens;
I dream of Himalayan ascetics and Mardou.

I smell asparagus from the night before
and spend a lifetime in hypnagogia.

Well done, Almodóvar.

bed-ridden, not flea-bitten (yet)

it all started with a sip of apple juice. i knew something was wrong within minutes. one of my uncanny abilities is a hyper-sensitivity to things i ingest. gastrointestinal distress that should take 8-10 hours to manifest impact me within a fraction of that time. i have consulted medical professionals (in a general way) and yet my metabolism maintains its mystique. but all this is besides the point.

the point is that i have been in bed for hours, and there is a (lined) trash can full of vomit next to the bed. it all started with a sip of apple juice... but ended more like Beetle Juice.

uh... what's going on here?

something happened today.
i have no explanation, i have no theory.
and - even if i did - i cannot imagine a motive.

it wasn't so much the seeing that left me wobbly.
it was that when i mentioned it,
it was gone.

362 days ago

this time last year, in addition to standing in a puddle, i was preparing to go dancing in Miami with my sister. i hoped it would become a tradition, that each year the final weekend of September would be spent sweaty in the dark, using one another as surrogate lovers, never touching, telling lies to bachelorettes in Wynwood and waiting for the lights to come on.

but it didn't happen.

she left on Train 52 for Baltimore City on the last day of May.
we got to dance one last time before she was gone.

puddles

this time last year i was standing in a puddle. i didn't see it coming and the next thing i knew, i was in almost over my head. so i hung out for a while, checked it out, splashed around, took measurements, counted the pebbles...

it was deeper than i expected, and it took me longer to get out than i could have imagined. but this morning i got a picture from San Francisco and standing next to the Pacific Ocean that puddle seemed so small.

i saw another puddle coming a couple of weeks ago, and i think this time i'm just going to walk around it. i already learned how to swim.

i didn't sleep well and

i woke last night at 3:58am from a dream about Gertrude Stein. i am uncertain what she was doing there, probably making declarations about the nature of my generation or the like. there was a hard rain falling outside, and by the time i turned my light on the rest of the dream was gone. but this is besides the point.

the point is that she wasn't alone, and i would be better served if i didn't think about the other woman in bed with the lights off.

abominations

i learned today that there are giant rodents lurking in the Pacific Northwest, stalking Portland and chasing its residents to the (relative) safety of Southern Florida. it is called a nutria, and it is the most terrifying taxonomic encounter i've had since i once touched the dreaded agantha in Durham, North Carolina.

the year was 1994 and it was a different era, when the oracles of Franklin and 9th Streets foretold that Superchunk would take over the world. back then the only rodent in my life was Gopher, and it lived on the mysterious UNIX workstations in my high school's computer lab. but all this is besides the point.

the point is that today is the equinox, and it seems i've stumbled into some semblance of balance, finding the cadences between consonance and alliteration. i am appreciating the facility of fallacious reasoning, the allure of cunning linguistics, and the juvenile pursuit of double entendre.

because it's all in good pun.

so we meet again

this weekend - when i haven't been questioning the scruples of Bill Shakespeare, or sitting around with my eyes closed, or taking people to the airport at 5am, or eating meals in silence, or writing long letters in voices inflected , or Skyping Vancouver, or receiving emails about antibiotic suppositories from Colombians in France - i've been experimenting with very long sentences. but all this is besides the point.

the point is that last night i walked downtown, spacey as a cadet, and watched anomalous bickering. less subtle minds might place blame on the pumpkin spice ale, but i know it was not the ale...

it was my immortal, stalwart enemy - the pumpkin.

i have a hypothesis

there are two ways something can enter our lives:

some things we see out of the corner of our eye. we turn our heads and follow as it continues to whirl past in a giant circle, time and time again. but the wheel of karma never stops spinning, and we chase the things that can never be caught. these are the things we are destined to lose, and they enter our lives only that they may leave.

some things are so far down the road that we do not see them right away. one day we see a speck on the horizon, indistinguishable from all those other dots that coalesce into the mist we call the future. but there is no reason to dwell on this speck, no reason to stare into the mist, no reason to do anything. we keep on walking. gradually the speck grows clearer, little by little, day by day. we keep on walking. by the time it's close enough to see, we are no longer looking for some goal or meaning. we just keep on walking.

in our naivete - and hubris - we forget that we do not lead, we are led. we confuse the things that lie directly in our path for the things that are merely passing through our field of vision.

but the dharma can never be lost, no matter how many circles we chase. we keep on walking, eventually it is revealed:

the unfolding of a rose at midnight.

let the experiment begin.

my living room

my living room has turned into a language center on Thursday nights, populated by poets and anthropologists. usually i don't mind so much, but tomorrow morning i must rise at the unholy hour of 5am for the purposes of delivering tall blondes to airplanes bound for Denver. but all this is besides the point.

the point is that the last time i was at the Denver International Airport the towers still stood, and i was living downtown on a street named after a pyromaniacal Civil War general. one June afternoon, i picked up a dear friend at the terminal and we marveled at its famous fabric roof.

there was one stipulation for his staying.

two days later i dropped him off at the bus station for a bus headed west down Colfax to Salt Lake City and beyond. he told me he was going to San Francisco, but i never heard from him again.

i was just reminded by her husband

how i spent my Wednesday morning:

in bed, having coffee cross-continent with a married woman.

"like you do..."

i woke up 9 years ago

i woke up 9 years ago (today) in Washington Heights and walked to the subway station at 181st Street. it was the most beautiful morning i ever saw in Manhattan, and i heard De Niro's voice in my head, promising that "someday a real rain will come..."

the previous day a tremendous rain storm had shut down the MTA, and i left work early, maudlin, and manic. i saw the soiled, sopping mattress of a homeless man who lived on the steps leading up from the station, with only a lonely bottle of beer to serve as sentry against the pigeons, and their penchant for chlamydia. he was gone.

i never saw the man again, and i could not help but wonder if the rain had washed him away. but this is besides the point.

the point is that i walked into a hardware store that Thursday afternoon and purchased a pint of red latex semi-gloss. i spent the afternoon covering my wall in aluminum foil, and trying to paint away the premonition of Westchester infidelity. at night's end i was covered in paint, and i documented the artifact in 35 millimeter before collapsing in a sweaty mess.

but the infidelity came to pass.

[lapse]

last fall i saw a new wall created in paper and pastels. it tells a different story, and i never even knew what it said until the sun was rising, 6am Saturday morning. Mardou picked up a red Sharpie and wrote: [she] was here '99-'08. it all came crashing down, and the book i thought i was writing was really only Part 3.

in lieu of a summer romance

i'm making love to two women, cross-country and Californian, in a style worthy of 19th century Janes - Eyre, Austen, or otherwise. one Angelic; teenage lust in Durham dark rooms the year before Larry Clark jumped from Tulsa to the silver screen. the other Franciscan; untouched (if not chaste) in Florida waters, 30 years to the day after Robert Lowell died. but all this is besides the point.

the point is that i have a headache, the result of too much stimulation and not enough caffeine. on the way to school i stopped at the bookstore and stumbled across a bevy of beautiful books, but as i sat in class tonight, cross-legged and taking notes on Sailor Moon, i began to worry: what if the books don't mingle? i had left Hemingway and Dostoevsky alone with Rumi and Marquez ... and i feared upon my return i would find a drunken, existential, mystical Colombian mess.

[no actual books were harmed in the process of making this blog]

a change in plans (my life as post-modernism)

i was going to write about kiwi, grapes, and the joys of a sweet tooth while watching Kar Wai Wong - but then i decided to read my homework.

i came across the term "budoir slander" in an 85 year old text on stereotypes, and my mind turned to the stunning pictures my sister sent me this morning from Baltimore. she's wearing the smile that nearly made me fall in love last July, when we ate falafel and listened to morose middle-aged Manchesterites. these were the high summer days, before we knew we ran the risk of incest, before i fell for her best friend, before she rejected me on "spiritual grounds."

i came across the term "budoir slander" in an 85 year old text on stereotypes, and my mind turned to the letter i received from Mardou this afternoon. she described 16 year old bubble gum kisses in a tone that made me fall in love last August, when we picked up my sister at the airport and sat in awkward parking garage silences. these were the late summer days, before i knew i ran the risk of distraction, before i realized how far i had fallen, before we spent the next two seasons not speaking.

i came across the term "budoir slander" in an 85 year old text on stereotypes, and my mind turned to the woman from whom i first heard of Kar Wai Wong. she had a poster of 2046 in her bedroom that makes me fall in love all over again this September night, when i watch the lush of color and the rush of women pass the author's gaze. these are the end days of summer, after the departure, after le denouement, after the need to run this experiment has come to an end.

i'm sorry i asked, part deux

just as i was beginning to recover from recent revelations about the nature of eggplant, a brand new unfortunate edible fact was brought to my attention.

i was having a delicious slice of sweet bread, compliments of Yanni. i paused to ponder: what is the source of tastiness? (it's pumpkin) what? (it's pumpkin) but i don't like pumpkin. (apparently you do) i knew he was right, and so i began retracing my steps in an attempt to learn how such a thing could have happened.

1) some months ago i began an intuitive eating experiment.
2) as a result of this experiment i began purchasing cantaloupes.
3) upon opening cantaloupes, i had to remove their guts.
4) cantaloupe guts resemble pumpkin guts.

this was the beginning of the end. i have had a strong aversion to pumpkins since childhood, when i watched my aunt prepare jack-o-lanterns. the flash point for my revulsion was how the seeds and membrane looked inside. with this obstacle overcome by my new found love of melons, it wasn't long until i found myself in Vermont, gorging on pumpkin seeds at the Quechee Gorge. after that, i never even stood a chance...

Ladri di biciclette

(re: bicycles & towers, circles & thievery)

Aren't we all?

From the instant we take birth
until our last breath,
we steal one moment

after another

calling it our own,
trying to find our way home.

Wayward minds,
waiting wives,
and children's lonely eyes.

Lonely children's eyes
as they watch their fathers
abandon them on street corners
– for bicycles.

(the dharma can never be lost,
but neither can it be found)

It simply waits while
we run the Roman streets,
channeling Goths and Gauls,
watching movies on Wednesday nights
from the comfort of air-conditioned condos,
watching the rise and fall of post-war Empires
during election years.

Writing responses
to Italian neo-realism,
reminiscing about Luigi Galleani
on recommendation of beautiful Russians,
and looking for the Buddhahood in Mario Buda
seven years (to the day) since eighty-one years
after the first Wall Street attack.

i'm sorry i asked

Wikipedia what an eggplant was. it all started at two days ago at work; i heard a rumor that eggplant was, in fact, a fruit and not a vegetable. my colleagues were right, but my distress did not come until i delved a bit deeper, and checked out the definition of fruit. apparently a fruit is a "ripened ovary," and so a delicious vegetarian delicacy could now rightly be classified in the same culinary category as other exotic, reproductive organ-based treats such as ram testicles.

"define existentialism,"

the doctor said to the student.

i told her it was the last stop on the way to absurdism, that it was a Russian killing pawn broker on St. Petersburg afternoon. i told her it was question mark missing the period, with an arrow pointing at the void and sign that reads:

"you are here"

heads are aching

from the consumption (today) of tens of thousands of words and the strain of memory, as i try to imagine a bikini last worn in Newport the year before i was born. i am expecting calls and recovering from falls, sick to death of commas and gerunds. but all this is besides the point.

the point is that Iggy is singing to me again, and earlier today i read first-hand accounts of how seductive his sound. it was hard to make out the poetry through the handwriting, but i remember the romance of the dance floor. i remember the delightful dread of anticipation and the insipid musing of masochism. i remember cold nights in Gainesville, when the full-moon madness of Kerouac mixed with portraits of Oscar Wilde. i remember -

it was hard to make out the poetry through the handwriting,
because the poetry was never there.

ramshackle Saturday nights

cloistered in my room on the eve of season, on the edge of reason, reading about the Counter-Enlightenment and mourning Giambattista Vico. plagiarizing strippers and contemplating De Sica. my night is rife with dead Italians, but this is besides the point.

the point is that i spent the morning in meditation, and when i opened my eyes i thought to myself: this is not the way i left this room.

home alone on a Friday night

and i am:

bearded. reading Bukowski. not sleeping well from last night's mares. listening to j-pop. and (re)reading Patanjali: chittvikshepah te antarayah.

trying not to scratch the wound. filing taxes. watching storms. reviewing illustrations. and (re)reading Patanjali: chittvikshepah te antarayah.

the breaking of fasts. the drinking of caffeine. the chewing of tongues in lieu of biting. and (re)reading Patanjali: chittvikshepah te antarayah.

installing software (unsuccessfully). writing (hurriedly). meditating (sporadically). and (re)reading Patanjali: chittvikshepah te antarayah.

GOP+NOAA=

i am trying to learn bad things to say about Dwight D Eisenhower. his namesake is making a beeline for South Florida, and i have a strong attachment to electricity. my work week has been divided between deciphering atmospheric reports and listening to my co-workers dissect this week's RNC. but all this is besides the point.

the point is that i have been fielding questions all day from my Illustrator, and i wrote him earlier tonight:

now we are finally getting down to IT. we are getting down to the unmentionables. we are getting down to the nooks via the cranny. we are talking around the things that cannot be spoken. we are mining mythologies.

and i never really cared for Ike's doctrine.

"down in Denver I died"

this time last year, there were thunderheads to the west and omens in the shapes of the crows on the power lines. i saw a cross, left arm broken, as i sat stopped at the corner of 10th and Congress.

my muse was in Denver, and i mused of the time i spent living on Sherman in 2000. i did my best to channel Jack's doldrums but somehow never made it past Colfax. so i brushed up on my Spanish, and bought giant medical references for $2 in used bookstores on Broadway. even now i think of those as the salad days, but -

in the end?

it all reads like Bill.

grrr...

i haven't really written in weeks, there are storms bearing east, and my emergency preparedness consists primarily of wasabi almonds.

my caffeine intake has regressed from sacramental to habitual.

one cup (every morning) iced.
one cup every morning (iced).
(one cup) every morning iced.

these are the little games i play when i'm sick of the waiting for the words to come out. i channel Martha Graham and dream of Iceland. i watch each night the rise and fall of expectation, wondering when this pause will birth my next breath.

the shutters are up now, and i'm reminded of butterflies and coffins.