i never thought i'd need so many people

being informed of earth's imminent demise (i don't remember, exactly, something space-related or the sun going nova?) we planned a party, or tried to. everyone came, and met on the street and we couldn't decide where to end up - my place, or yours? who was bringing the food and who was in charge of the music? where would the children play and how do you explain it to them, if at all? i opted to keep my trap shut, though they did ask me a few times why i kept hugging them and crying. if you've only got 12 hours, maximum, and the ending is unexplainable (will there be a big explosion? will a wave of invisible heat pass over and vaporize us? will the earth be knocked out of it's orbit and skitter away like an eightball, pinging against jupiter and pluto on it's way out into the Big Dark?) and you want to get fucked up but also make every moment bittersweet, and run and find everyone you know to tell them everything you should have before the apocolypse, how do you deal? it's a little overwhelming, i tell you. but i ran. i first ran to robyn and grabbed her hand and dragged her out to the street party and made her kiss me. then i gathered all the young famillies i know, and all their children, and i kissed them all, too, every one. and then i got my mom, and lisa and andrew, and asked them to bring everything they had to eat, because we were going to eat it all, and drink it all. stop fretting about your waistlines and bubble butts and flabby bellies, the earth is going to crumble, or sizzle, or explode. in any case, your body is no longer your concern. can you imagine letting that go, for real? could you even do it, for twelve hours? it is like in belly dancing class, when the teacher told us we weren't supposed to "suck it in". eighty percent of the women had to conciously focus their attention on their bellies to relax the muscles enough to let them jiggle. even me.

as evening descended, we gathered at a bandstand with a view of the western horizon, watching the sun sink below the ocean for the last time. the children were playing happily as if this were any day. i felt reluctant to let mine go far from arms reach because the moment anything catastrophic appeared to be happening, i wanted to be holding them, and have leon hold me. but it seemed that things were going to remain calm for a while longer. i got up on the stage and started singing at the top of my voice that old cliche REM song. everyone started laughing and crying at the same time - some of you joined in. no one could remember much of the words beyond the chorus. i started to sob at "and i feel fine." it was such a lie. i felt scared and lonely of what was to come after we all died. chances were good i'd never see any of you again. there may not even be a me, and i was especially sorry to realize i still had so much ego left, even after everything i thought i'd learned in my life. after the impromptu karaoke, we all sat down again and looked at the darkening sky. some people wondered aloud if perhaps there'd been a mistake and the earth was going to make it after all. it seemed so hard to believe - everyone and everything we've ever know, gone. no india, no ozone layer, no dalai lama, no communism, no lemurs or tasiers, no piroshki and beer. no amazon rainforest or burning piles of tires. everything - gone. most of us were philosophical about it. i sat next to abby and shane. somewhere, church bells started to ring and silence fell on us. abby was stroking my arm, and i was trying to look at everyone all at once, feeling that this was my last chance to drink it in. all your beauty and sadness and your lovely bodies and sweet breath and your tiny children with big wet eyes wondering. my children climbed into my lap, leon hugged me tight from behind and we kissed, hard, teeth pinching and drawing blood from our lips, sealing the deal we'd made years ago - if there is an afterlife, we will agree on which one: the summerlands. and we will wait for each other there, whoever goes first, or if we go together, spend eternity finding one another, and gathering our babies and animals, and making it everything we'd been too weak or lazy or tired to make of this life. it was then the rumbling started. great tremors beneath the stage we were all sitting on. people started to make moaning noises and the children looked around wildly, for cues as to how to proceed. no one could tell them. the earth began to shake and suddenly the sky, half-dark half-light, rushed past us, going over our heads at dizzying speeds, peeling back, as if the earth was launching and the clouds, the stars, the milky way were as the patchwork farmlands, the tiny cars, the ant-like people you see as you take off in an airplane. abby's had was still on my arm, only gripping much harder now, and as the breath was pulled from my lungs and never reclaimed, i closed my eyes, smelled my daughter's hair, and waited in the din for the end of days.

a slip of paper with my name on it

a scrap of paper with my name scrawled on it:
this is a treasure lost to my youth,
like the dry detritus of joyful cigarette smoking
week-long tangles with LSD
weightless flirtation,
no heavy consequences,
wings of exhaled passion lifting me
higher.

a slip of paper with my name smeared on it:
something discovered in the bottom of a purse
gritty with crumbs and sand
a summer memory bringing fresh heartbreak to cracking
surface and tears falling
the privilege of over-acting grief
no struggling for survival
just laying in self-pity
alone.

a piece of paper with my name in your handwriting on it:
one more item on a list of things i've yet to hold
and numbered among the things
i have put my palms to are your cheeks, your cats, your hair
your bed and breath, your dishes
your taste in music, your computer screen
and old time photographs,
developed shortly after your
wedding.

a girl my age went off her head

i'm standing in someone else's livingroom. he is in the door, across the way. the place is sparsely decorated in art deco whites and silvers and modern recessed lighting in the walls and ceiling. i make a move to go towards him, and notice my legs are wet and freezing cold up to the knees. i look down to see the room is flooded in water with a thin film of crystal clear ice over it. i am shivering and looking at him questioningly. he looks away, turns, walks away, legs moving up high and crunching and splashing through the ice and water in the hallway. i stand there in the cold room, trembling, clutching my elbows. this is not my beautiful house, i sing-song in a whisper, breath clouding my vision, i am not a beautiful wife.

________________________________________________________________________


it is the moment i am shot by a gun, a random and innocent bystander. i see every grain of dirt imbedded in the pavement. the sound of the shot is louder and sharper than i expect. i smell the person next to me, their fear. all the reds and yellows on the roadside signage are gaudy, brilliant, horrific. the moment is brief. i do not have my life flash before my eyes. i hardly feel anything but the sensation of being pushed, hard, down onto the ground, by an invisible concussive force, and a deep burn in my belly, and all the wind forced from my lungs. there are a lot of people around and at first there's no sound, only smells. no one grabs for me. i sit down hard and watch in fascination as the tires of a car go by. i have to tell you something, i'm trying to form words, but i can't make them come out. i refuse to cover the wound with my hands. i let the hole, the tissue, the burn marks, the blood greet the air. horrible air, horrible life, horrible world, look upon your works, and despair.

in my dream, we moved into a huge, rambling, old mansion in the middle of the city. living there was the murderous ghost of my stepfather, or at least, i thought he was a ghost. but when he came to attack me, i started to bludgeon him with the leg off of an antique sofa, and he fell, and bled, all over the moldering tile of the kitchen floor. then he vanished. that night, all of the rich elite and socialites of the city came to our mansion for a housewarming. everyone knew the history of the place except us. we were newcomers to this world and they weren't shy about letting us know that. outside it was raining violently. when i stood near a chifforobe in the third-floor library, talking to some well-heeled matrons about our plans for restoration of the house, i felt dripping and looked up just in time to see the ceiling swelling and buckling under the pressure of too much water. i stepped out the way just in time to avoid the falling plaster and enormous gush of rain water. everyone turned their eyes away from the scene, embarrassed for me. in a huff, i rushed through the house looking for leon, my skirts clenched up in my tight fists, my stepfather's blood still drying on my forehead and cheeks. leon was standing near the bar on the first floor, smoking a cigar and talking with other men in suits. i smiled at the men and asked if i could excuse leon for a moment, and when we were alone in a corner i told him about the crumbling ceiling and leaking, and he flushed and said he'd forgotten to hire an inspector to tell us the state the building was in before we bought it. we fretted for a few moments about how we could not afford to actually repair anything in the house have the roof replaced, but then the party was still raging on around us, and we had to let it go for the time being.

the house was so large, and on such a small lot, there was virtually no yard around it. the next morning, we woke up and climbed up to the top floor where, at the end of the hallway, there was a small door that opened onto a narrow staircase that led first to the attic, then beyond, to a door that opened onto the flat roof. it was here that we had our gardens and yard. the lawns were bordered at the edge of the roof by wrought iron fencing, and hedges. the sun was shining. i took my coffee there, sitting at a wrought iron table in wrought iron chairs while the children ran through the grass with a man i have never seen before but who in the dream was their uncle, throwing frisbees and balls back and forth. i got up to walk around the enormous roof and look down into the streets. below us was the flood. i wrapped my fingers around the fence, and started calling to the people hiding in doorways that i was sorry and to come here, to come inside. they either did not, or pretended to not hear me.