No doubt the dead, if they could
speak,
Would say that death is the
ultimate rush.
That like a cold martini it
delivers both
A certain numbness and a
clarified perception.
That like an orgasm it is best
enjoyed
As a surrendering to the
inevitable.
Surely, it can be the only
satisfaction left
For those for whom life has
become
The daily rehearsal of a
difficult play whose
Successful public performance
seems increasingly unlikely.
Life saves death for last, I
imagine they
Would say, because, it is the
only thing strong
Enough to take away the bitter
taste
Of everything else.
Chiefly this:
That we have, finally, full
responsibility
Over who we are, but little
power.
That the government within our
psyches
Is no better than what's in
Washington or
In many cases, Teheran or Lagos
or Bejing.
That what we are has been chosen
and frozen --
By us, the gods, heredity,
culture, chance:
Pick your favorite flavor.
That time itself is frozen,
forcing life into a
Death march when it should have
been a dance,
Even if it were only the dance of
death.
To thaw out time so it flows
again
Is to give up your possessions
And lay them out on the sidewalk.
It is to jump naked into the cold
river
And feel your life leaking out
Into the strange otherness of the
water.
It is to empty yourself and fill
it back up
With the love of strangers.
Children play there, saints toil,
And everyone else stay away from
it
As a pit of emptiness.
Yet for some of those who seek
it,
And for some of those who don't,
Every now and then they find it.
Those moments never last for
long.
Their fluid inevitability
inevitably freezes.
Time breaks up again into chunks
and slabs
And slivers that stab you if you
try to move.
And when you're locked back in
your cage again,
Trapped in was or will be, should
have been,
May become, your memory will hold
up to you
Those liquid moments like a
sponge
Dripping with vinegar and say,
"Then there was a mighty now
But now there is only then."
Or, you can spend years crouching
into the current so
It doesn't knock you over, so you
can think
More clearly about steering your
own course someday.
Years later, when you try to
move, you can't.
Look down.
You're up to your ankles in
cement.
Look back.
Can you guess why the stream is
red?
Taste it.
Zeal has turned the water into
wine,
And time has turned it into
vinegar.
I think this river has its source
in the womb.
Women know. I'm sure of that.
They get to go back there, most
of them,
And wear the same delirium turned
inside out.
Men get to stand up straight
When they need to urinate.
Happy or not, a conclusion is
what we crave,
Even if the only place to find it
is the grave.
He sat down in front of the fire
that night
in the one chair of the empty
house,
and stared into the furnace of his
thoughts
while the lights and shadows
danced together on the walls.
Which is the more disturbing
thought?
That all of this has been
cunningly wrought? Or not?
That nothing you do lasts,
Or that everything you do lasts?
Is life simply an elaborate joke
Whose punchline is death?
And, if so, is the joke making
some subtle point?
And, if so, what is the point?
I understand now that everything
In my life is hopelessly
scattered,
That nothing matters unless I
decide it matters,
Which is to say that nothing
really matters.
I understand that, far from being
poor, I've become
A millionaire whose fortune
consists entirely of pennies,
A mystic manqué whose lust
for the one is matched only
By his nostalgia for failed
ventures and affairs.
I like white noise when I'm
trying to sleep.
I like white paper when I'm not.
Writing is like holding bats in
the beam of a flashlight
Long enough to read what's
written on their wings.
An image comes to me sometimes in
the midst of these efforts.
I find myself in the middle of a
barren landscape
Stretching off in every
direction.
I am getting closer to some
secret.
What is it? I can hear nothing,
feel nothing.
Is this the snow on some high
plateau?
Is there a summit up ahead from
which
I will finally be able to see
everything vividly?
Or is this only the bleached sand
On the floor of the valley of the
shadow of death?
All I know is that there are no
shadows
In this place except my own.
The sun throws javelins in my
eyes, bites
my skin, hammers me into the
ground like a tent peg,
then stretches the sky over me as
tight
as a drum and hammers on it. I
long for clouds.
The moon was sailing over the
mountains, spearing
leaves like fish with light, fish
like leaves.
When I turned around, I found
that someone had pinned
the clouds to the sky like rare
insects, six-limbed
like Hindu gods, venerable and
remote,
as lost as paradise. I long for
night.
The moon was sailing over the
mountains.
When I looked down, I saw that
the shadows
had stolen my silver tongue,
leaving behind
an iron rasp, turning everything
around me
into blocks of stone. I long for
sleep.
The moon was sailing.
In my dream the blocks of stone
came to life --
Something to do with the night
sky in the woods.
But when I woke, the memory was
just
another foreign shibboleth. I
long for death.
The moon.
Longings lengthen and shrink like
shadows. There are three
things I don't know. The source
of the light; whether
the thing that blocks it is me;
and how to pick up
these shadow-spears and throw
them back at the sun.
