miranda's cellar

rising from the cellar of miranda!
the spaces between the wooden slat steps, a void!
effecting
tendrils of contraband smoke willowing out the door strip
not foiled by the threadbare towel stuffings,
not foiled!
trailing up behind, sweet scented, food scented
the spaces between the wooden slat steps, a void!
miranda laughing
quietly below
you never know
would her mother and father be home up there?
would they know?
what we'd been doing?
what we'd been into?
eyes rimmed red and throats clasping for moisture?
and the spaces between the wooden slat steps, a void!
cricking!
cricking door at the summit
you know it opens on a hallway's olive green carpeting
and a sideboard made of 70's panelling
eyes rimmed red, and mouth dry like grit
cricking! cricking door at the summit!
and it opens as you approach
miranda!
laughing quietly at you,
she's done this every day for 18 years.

he's still there, affixed
"what is that, fiber glass? what?"
miranda, laughing quietly behind you
he's still there, you're transfixed
his visage so tortured and gory on prominent display
his eyes rolled back so far in his shining head
waxed head!
only whites show!
his skin white like snow!
his arms out wide in a "t"
only white shows
the red trickling of his pain
and the cricking door at the summit
and the spaces between the wooden slat steps, a void!
and the phantom parents who lurk, or not
and miranda!
miranda!
laughing quietly with you!
at the shame of her family's fervor
and the fiber glass reminder each morning she rises
when a man is left to die for days
with bolted hands and feet to wood in a "t"
white only shows
white only shows the red and the rimmed eyes, more brightly
as you rise from miranda's cellar.

my dream last night was so weird. i can only remember pieces of it. first, we were living in this huge, old, deserted ballroom with luscious thick red carpet and drapes and all the furniture (scores of empty tables and elegant chairs) were gold filigree. but it was cold and dark and weird. we just sort of kept to one end of the ballroom with our sleeping bags and propane stoves.

i had somehow managed to fundraise by offering to hold a fancy dance in the ballroom and the dance was all over and i was tallying up my profits, and my mom demanded a cut (even though she hadn't really done anything) and i was really mad at her and resentfully handed over the lion's share of the money and she left with her boyfriend.

and my daughter, all through the dream, kept choking on everything she tried to eat. (this isn't that far from the truth, my daughter DOES gag and choke a lot, which makes me crazy!)

and finally, our cat was wandering around all SLICED UP, like a loaf of bread, only not cut all the way through to the bottom, so that every time he jumped or walked the slices would spread apart and you could see the gooey pink and red of blood and flesh and the severed sections of spine. it freaked me out and i kept insisting we had to take him to the vet but no one else seemed worried and my husband told me we didn't have money for it anyway. and people were still holding the cat and petting the cat even though he was so injured. their hands were all covered in blood and ick and they didn't even care.

barely there

in my dream last night, leon and i were in this thrift shop looking at used sofas and armchairs and bookshelves. we found a pair of pristine overstuffed armchairs that matched. they were both off-white, tweedy material, with bright, colourful threads spattered throughout, almost like confetti. i loved them and asked him to find out how much they were. the lady at the counter said, "$1.50 a piece or $2.00 for both!" i was like, "OKAY! LEON GET THE ROOF RACKS OUT!" we gave her the money and leon ran outside to get the car all ready to transport them home on the roof, but he came back in a minute later saying that he'd forgotten the roof racks at home and that he'd be back shortly with them. he instructed me to stay behind so that no one else would take our precious arm chairs. i sat down in one of them and waited.

after a few minutes, my first love walked into the store. he took one look at me and knelt beside me. "i've been wandering around for TWO YEARS looking for you, lynn," he said, taking my hand in his, "and now i've found you and i'm not going to lose you again." and he pulled me up out of the chair and led me to a day bed that was also for sale. he stripped me down and we started making love in the middle of the store. after the first "round", he wanted to go again, and i was willing, except suddenly i remembered my husband! filled with guilt and anguish and mixed emotions i told first love that there was no way we could do that again, even though i wanted to, and that i was horrified i'd done it at all because i knew it would break leon's heart to find out. first love was crying, begging me to stay with him in this bed in the thrift shop, begging and pleading, but i knew i had to go. as i got dressed i saw that the whole shop full of people had been watching us. i was mortified and wished that i could disappear. then i noticed that as i put on each article of clothing, that part of my body would vanish. first my breasts, as i clipped on my bra. then my hips and crotch as i slipped on my panties. then my chest and belly and arms as i pulled a shirt on over my head, and then my legs and feet as i put on my skirt and shoes. finally i was just a disembodied head floating through the shop to the front door to wait for leon outside. first love yelled at me as i stepped out, "how can you be with him? how? you're barely there at all!"

a bathroom brawl while on a date with steve martin

i was dressed up swank. a long, tapered-fit, slinky, silk-type skirt in a deep orange-y red, with a matching high-collared, short-sleeved top in an asian sort of fashion. i held a cream coloured lightweight button up sweater folded against the crook of one arm, and in my other hand, a small, black vinyl pocketbook. we were standing in line, waiting for a train that would take us to a special, intimate performance of some modern existentialist play in downtown los angeles. i chatted with my friends (none of whom i recognize) in a very sophisticated way. i was first in line at the turnstile, but we were stuck waiting to get through for quite a while. at some point i turned and surveyed the crowd and was very surprised to see steve martin standing just a few people behind me. he looked dashing in a cream coloured linen suit and black shirt with no tie; and was smiling his big doofy smile and laughing with his date. she was small, short, with huge soft blonde curly hair and big blue doe eyes. i suddenly felt exceedingly self concious and when he made eye contact with me, i looked down and turned away rapidly.

finally the train arrived and we all stepped in and i lost sight of him. i sat very primly on the edge of my seat but was all too aware of my fat body. i felt i could not look dignified or beautiful no matter how hard i tried. i felt slouchy and ashamed.

when we arrived at the playhouse, we were all immediately seated because the train had been running late and the performers were anxious to get on with the show. you can imagine my surprise when i found myself in a seat with the aisle to my left and steve martin to my right. his date was next to him. i smiled self-conciously at him and he smiled back and i felt this instant warm rapport with him. the show started and the theatre fell silent while the actors began speaking and moving on the stage.

there were some very funny moments during the show, and i was laughing heartily, and so was steve martin, but no one else around us was. at one point when i giggled, a middle aged woman turned around and hissed at me! steve and i apologized quietly and gave each other a look, like we were in cahoots. his date was not impressed either and wouldn't look at him. i could feel the air between them shift and his affections were now focused on me. i felt suddenly flirty and happy and beautiful. until the stool i was sitting on began to bend and buckle under my weight. i started to topple backwards and grabbed steve martin's knee to try and remain upright. he was a little surpised at how forward i was being but did not try to remove my hand, he just smiled sideways at me. i tried to support most of my weight with my legs and sort of hover my ass over the stool, but that didn't work, i wasn't strong enough. to avoid the embarassment of the stool completely crumbling under my large ass, i gathered up my things, whispered to steve martin that i wasn't feeling well and i'd be back, and then found my way out of the theater to the bathroom.

somehow, my elegant sweater with the tiny pearlized buttons and shiny vinyl handbag had multiplied and i found myself carrying an armload of dirty laundry into the bathroom. i locked myself into a stall and dropped the stinky pile of clothes onto the floor while i squatted down onto the toilet. there were a few other people in there, and i peered out through the crack between the door and stall wall to see that two young men had come in, dressed like hippies, obviously stoned and laughing. for a moment, they paused in front of the mirrors and had a giggle. then one of them turned and noticed some of my dirty laundry on the floor. he bent over, picked up a pair of my underwear, and made an ugly face. "ew," he said. "oh fuckin' gross," the other one said.

"hey!" i shouted from behind the closed door, "put that down!"

"ewwww," the first one said, picking up a second pair of my panties, "ewww, lady, are these yours? your pussy stinks!"

"shut the fuck up!" i screamed, "put those down, you fucks!"

they continued laughing and mocking my dirty underwear and i was gripped with this blind rage. rage over the stool bending under my weight, rage over my shame and it's ability to make me abandon exciting prospects, rage over these boys mocking me. i burst out of the bathroom stall and tackled one of them. we fell to the floor and i began punching him in the face repeatedly. he didn't fight back very hard and was knocked out in just a few blows. the second one tried to run past us to get out the door but i tripped him by grabbing one of his legs and he fell and hit the tile hard. that wasn't enough for me, though. i picked him up by his ankles and swung him around and cracked his head against the line of mirrors. he fell silent against the floor next to his friend. two women who had been adjusting their make up in the mirrors just looked at me in shocked silence. i gathered up my dirty laundry, my purse, and my sweater, and went back into the theater to talk to steve martin.

"hey," he whispered as i approached him, "an usher came and replaced your stool...the top part was broken and the casters on the legs were faulty. he apologized profusely. have a seat." he patted the stool and helped me place my things on the floor. so the stool hadn't been bending under my weight. it had been broken to begin with. steve martin grabbed my hand and squeezed it tight. "sharon left," he whispered into my ear, cocking his head at the empty seat next to him, "she wasn't having a good time."

"oh," i whispered back, thinking about my dirty laundry and the bleeding boys in the bathroom, "well. i'm having a great time." we smiled at one another and he left a kiss near my temple.

last night in my dreams i recieved a big box of brand new stuff in the mail. a set of beautiful blue ceramic dishes. brand new blue bedding. a pair of knee-high vinyl lace-up blue boots without much of a heel. i sat on my freshly made bed and did up the boots slowly, pulling the laces taut, making the vinyl creak and running my hands up and down their slick sides. i went downstairs naked but for the boots, and served myself a huge pile of vietnamese salad rolls stuffed with vermicelli and tofu and vegetables and dipped in hoison sauce, all off my thick blue plates.

it was such a good dream.

had one of those dreams, funny dreams, that don't feel important or symbolic but that are entertaining and just a smidge stressful. it started out that i was a part of some kind of ambassador team to north america, for a trip that the dali lama was making here. i had to fly to new york city to attend to him. we stayed in a very swanky hotel. the whole time i was there i was anxious to get away from the ambassador job because i wanted to explore the city and we were only going to be there two days and one night. i also had steve burns' phone number and wanted to hook up with him to grab a drink or something. but my duties kept me busy the entire time. the dali lama was nothing like i expected. he was a magician and would put people into a trance and force them to do his bidding. i tried to lay low, i was afraid of him. he seemed like a petulant, vengeful boy.

on the last day, the whole entourage went to the airport. i was supposed to get on the plane back home with them, but in an impulsive fit, while standing in line to check our baggage, i just started backing away from everyone. people were like, "er, lynn, where are you going?" and i said, "um, i'm not going home yet. i'll call you in a day or two." and they all stood there looking dumbfounded at me as i walked slowly away. we all knew i did not have the money to fly home at a later date, on my own. in fact, i had no money and only the clothes on my back.

i found myself standing on the shore of a big river, with a group of strange women. they had all finished a jog. it was nighttime. they were stretching and cooling down. i knew one of them from an internet bulletin board. i asked her if she knew how to get to brooklyn because i had to see my friend steve. she said yes and told me to follow her. we all started jogging. it was a strange feeling. i had a different body, i guess. i was leaping and running, feeling super free and light and running didn't wind me at all. i was convinced it was the shoes i was wearing. when we got to brooklyn all the jogging women left me standing alone in the street. a car pulled up beside me and inside were steve burns and paul ford. "jump in, lynn!" they cried, laughing and scootching over to make room for me. i climbed in the car and it carried us to steve's apartment. paul ford had some sort of medical emergency and had to go into steve's bedroom to use the phone to call the ER and ask for advice. he asked me if i had any personal lubricant he could use. i pointed at the huge tub of intime sitting on steve's dresser. he thanked me and shooed me out of the room.

i went into steve's living room where he was pouring us drinks and had the t.v. on. he was chatting incessantly about his upcoming tour. i asked him when he had to leave and he said, "oh man, just five days. or...maybe ten days? no! twenty days!" and handed me my drink. we watched t.v. and chatted for a while. he asked me why i was still in new york even though all my friends had left. i didn't want to tell him that i'd stayed behind, with no money or anywhere to stay or any clothes simply because i wanted to hang out with him. i just said, "oh, i have friends i want to visit before i go home again," and he nodded amicably. inside i was thinking, i have two hours or less to convince him to let me stay in his apartment, or else i'm on the streets in a huge, strange city. his phone rang and it was my mom. he put me on and my mom said, "lynn! what are you doing! your husband and kids need you! do you have one thousand dollars to pay your way home? do you? i am NOT paying for this! i am NOT bailing you out of this one!" and i was all quiet and said, "you don't have to, mom. i'm not asking you to." and she was silent for a long time and i could tell she was waiting for me to offer and explanation and when i didn't, (even though i considered lying and saying i had been too sick to get on the plane) she simply hung up on me.

so there i was, hanging out in steve burns' apartment and getting drunk and trying to think of a way to bring up the fact that i now wanted to be his charge, his ward, his friend that he was going to put up with for a few days and perhaps even pay for to go home again. but i couldn't find a way to bring it up. i was embarrassed and shy and i wanted him to think everything was cool and that i had all my ducks in a row. he showed me his set list and packed a suitcase in front of me. then, after a while, he said, "okay, well, i'm beat so i should head to bed. do you need me to call you a cab?"

i stood up, taking a breath, ready to spill my guts, and then deflated. "no," i said, "i can walk from here."

"okay then! it was great meeting you and hanging out. maybe i'll make it to vancouver some day!"

"yeah," i said, fake-cheerful, feeling a sick dread in my stomach, thinking about the long night i had ahead of me, "that'd be cool."

and then i was on the street.

i huddled in an alley and dumpster-dived for food. some homeless people stood a distance away from me, just staring at me while i scarfed down half-chewed cobs of corn and some kind of nearly-moldy curried chickpea dish. they were hungry, but i knew i was in this for the long haul, and i didn't want to share.

it starts as a family meeting in grandmother's house. she has passed on. we are solemn but know that her suffering is over. uncle carl offers to take us out to dinner, he is rich -- a lawyer -- he can afford it. we all go out. dinner is uneventful and afterwards i invite my entire family back to my home. i am unmarried with no children. i live in a mobile home in a mobile home park that is treeless and graveled. small, thin patches of grass grow there. i feel ashamed a little of my home. i buy two varieties of fritos to take back to the wake with me.

we arrive at the mobile home park. it is dark outside. no one wants to go in because there will not be enough space for us all. we sit at a picnic table in the blackness. no one is talking, but the chips are opened and eaten. one of my friends says to me, "come to the hotel, tonight, lynn. don't sleep here alone." i agree.

at the the hotel i lose my friend. the dream also becomes confusing. i am in a hotel room with strangers and friends. some of the strangers don't talk, they just watch, like policemen or prison guards. i am uncomfortable and my friends tell me to play it cool. my mother is in the room with me but she is drunk and incoherent. i am embarrassed by her behaviour, i don't like that it is drawing attention to us. my uncle waves me away from her and says she is allowed to mourn anyway she likes. i leave the room in frustration and decide to go back home. i see no one following me but i know that i am still being watched.

i get in the elevator. i cannot understand the buttons. the numbers seem to appear in random order. there is no "1" or "L" (for lobby). there is a "C", a "P" (which is where the 3rd floor should be), a "Q", and the name "Ann" printed on the lower buttons. since "Ann" is the lowest level button i push it. the elevator doors close and it goes up. i feel dizzy and get vertigo. the elevator is not going where i want it to. the doors open on a floor that looks exactly like the one i left but there is no one there. i stab a different number and the doors close. to my relief it goes down. the doors open on what looks to be a basement. i am about to climb off when a large man appears. he has straight white hair, is only an inch or two taller than me, and is barrel-chested. he looks friendly, an older man to give me advice about how to get out of the hotel, but he is flustered and seems afraid of me.

"how do i get to the lobby?" i ask politely, "i have been trying to understand the buttons..."

"you'll get to the lobby when they decide it's time for you to leave," he says, looking at me sadly.

"who's they?" i reply, feeling suddnely sick as the elevator shoots straight up again. it seems to hum for a long time.

"i'm not clear on that," he replies, not looking at me anymore, "but i've been here for months. i think i'm starting to get it. i wish i could help you. i'm lost, too." the elevator starts descending again. i notice for the first time that the elevator walls are alternately mirrors and then painted scarlet. the light above us is sickly and flourescent.

"what are you talking about?" i asked, incredulously, "i just want to go home. how do i get to the lobby?"

"the first time i figured out that something strange was happening, it was too late for me, just like it is for you," he said, looking down at his feet. "i was in my room and a girl appeared. she pressed me into the red. i never knew what it was like to move through complete silence. silence is red. we were stuck there a long time, like taffy. she can come back any time now. she has a line of sight into my heart. we were enveloped in red silence. like construction paper."

i felt a strange wave of fear move up my throat from my stomach. the elevator doors opened on yet another floor of rooms. "thank you," i said to him, walking out of the doors, "i will take the stairs, i think." he looked up at me as the doors shut and waved slowly.

it was the first time i noticed that the entire hotel was decorated in lurid reds and deep oranges and mirrors. it was a very disturbing theme of colours and textures. everything was so quiet. i still felt as though i were being watched, or worse, pursued by someone or something. i made my way towards what i thought to be the center of the building, where there would be stairs, i was sure. and i was right. there was a long, wide, carpeted set of spiral stairs leading down and out of sight. i could not tell how high up i was, but it had to have been high because i could not see the bottom floor from where i peeked over the thin iron railing.

a door opened across the way from me and another man appeared. he was tall and lanky and had on only a bathrobe. his had was completely bald on top and he had poofs of black curly hair springing out from the sides and back of his head. he wore a black moustache. "miss!" he said, "stop right there!"

something told me i must not stop. the story the man in the elevator has related to me made me convinced that this hotel, and it's inhabitants, were intent on trapping me within it's walls forever. the man in the bathrobe contined to shout at me but did not move from his spot outside his door. i stared at him for a full minute before i climbed onto the iron railing for the staircase -- straddled it --, and began to slowly slide down. when he saw what i was doing, he paused a moment, shouted, "hey there!" and then made a dash towards me. i let my grip loosen on the railing and began coasting more quickly. he was running fast on the stairs, just barely keeping a few steps behind me. i slid down, and round and round, faster and faster, the identical floors of the hotel swimming up past my vision. i lost sight of him, finally, but he appeared again suddenly on a floor i was just skimming past by leaping out of the one of the hotel room doors. "go away!" i shouted at him, "stop chasing me!" he was no longer speaking, only grunting in his effort to catch me. i slid and slid. i must have past 20 or 30 floors and still there was no lobby in sight. the air was rushing past my ears in a whisper. my hands were sweaty and squeaking on the railing. i tried to just barely touch the metal because i wanted to slide down as quickly as possible. it was while i was focusing intently on my grip that i realized he was no longer chasing me.

i slowed down. the hotel was completely silent. i climbed off the railing and began walking, at a good pace, down the stairs, ears perked for any sound at all. i finally made it to the bottom, where the lobby lay spread out before me in the same mirrored golds and reds and oranges as the rest of the hotel. it was completely deserted. there was no one at the front desk. i walked out the revolving doors, and was shocked to find that beyond the hotel's borders lay the mobile home park i lived in.

i turned around and looked back. the hotel loomed above me, 200 stories high or more. all the lights were on and it beamed in the blackness like a spaceship. it was so incongruous with it's landscape. i walked away from it, never turning my back on it, until i bumped into a trailer.

i turned around and looked at the fiberglass hobbithole i'd thumped against. it was dark inside, but a glowing white curtain flurried in one of the windows and a woman's small moon-like face appeared. she looked angry. i looked away quickly and started to crunch across the gravel. it was then i noticed that the light was coming, that dawn was coming, the sky was turning a pale grey. the bright electric lights from the hotel still cast a golden, ominous glow across the gravel and thin grass of the mobile home park and i still felt ill in my stomach. the woman that had peered out at me suddenly burst from her trailer. "HEY YOU!" she screamed at the top of her lungs, "HEY YOU GET BACK HERE!" i looked back and saw her standing on the metal steps of her trailer in a business suit, carrying a small gun and a notepad. i turned and began to run across the gravel. stones spit out from under my feet. i was using my arms to pull me through the air, that felt as though it had turned to water, it was slowing me down so much. the woman in the suit was pursuing me, shrieking at me. i could see an old house just beyond the next few trailers. it was something that had been built in the 1800s. there were no trees around it, no grass, it stood silent as if empty. i saw that i might be able to hide in some of it's corners if i could just get there before the woman caught me. i pushed myself as hard as i could and dashed between trailers and RVs. the sky was becoming more and more light, and rain began to fall, gentle at first, and then it turned to downpour. grey dawn downpour. i reach the big old house and move along it's exteriour, like a rat. my hair is plastered against my head and forehead. the woman, i can see, has dashed into a huge, expensive and modern looking RV. i see her inside it's sleek grey and white panels and windows. she is shouting at someone and motioning towards the house i am hiding outside of. i swallow hard and stay pressed against the walls. i don't know how i am going to get away from all this. there are no trees, there is nowhere to hid, really. the moment i decided to make a break for it, i will be spotted and captured. i don't know what they want from me, but i know it isn't good.

while thinking all of this, a girl appears, out of nowhere, in front of me. she is 18 or 19. she is slender and has pale red hair and freckled skin. she is smiling benignly at me. "do you want to get away from here?" she asks me. i nod silently at her. "you have to trust me," she says, and i watch as she raises a sheet of red construction paper up over my face. "you have to breathe right onto this, lynn," she says, pressing it into my face so that it covers my nose and mouth and eyes, "it will seem strange and hard at first but you can do it if you don't think about it too hard." i cannot see anything but red, and i hear the rain pattering down around the two of us. i feel her press her own face against the paper, too, so that we would be kissing if it wasn't there, and i suddenly remember the story the man in the elevator told me. about falling into complete silence. silence is red. red construction paper. i feel her breath pass through the paper and suddenly i get my breathing just right. magic breathing. we are breathing with one set of lungs. a hot, long, numbing tingle passes from her mouth on the one side of the paper into mine, and the tingle spreads from my mouth to my brain to my heart to my lungs, and i lose conciousness, and fall down into the gravel beside the house, while the rain continues to fall around me. the girl is gone. i don't know where i go, either, but i am gone a long time. a day? a week? a month? the man was right. complete silence is red. red construction paper.

there was more. but threads of it slipped away from me before i had even completely woken up.

i never knew what a bloodbath would look like. at first i wasn't entirely convinced i was dreaming. floating up to the surface of the swimming pool, long, wide ribbons of red viscous fluid drifting over my eyes and nose, my hands swirling through the lifeblood of the people that had been swimming there before me. and my children, unconcious, their limp bodies surfacing with me, and me not sure if they are still living, either.

it began as a normal afternoon, me taking my children, and mother, and old highschool friend, shaminder, to an indoor swimming pool. it was almost unbearably crowded. i felt panicked from the start, trying to keep an eye on my kids in seething mass of people. but everything soon took on a very disturbing tone. the light changed from bright, shiny sunlight beaming in on us through the skylights above the water to something sickly. the colour of dying flourescents. the colour of seeping urine. it became night instantaneously. my heart froze in my chest and although the rest of the pool's patrons continued to splash and play, i felt evil coming and knew there was only one way to escape it. i gathered my children to my damp chest, my heart thudding within, and told them to take deep breaths, because we had to hide under the water until whatever evil was coming, had passed. they both looked terrified. i cannot forget the look in their bright blue eyes as i swam down to the bottom of the deep end of the pool with them. we sank. i waited. i tried to convey calm and rationality to them but they quickly became panicked for air. it was heartbreaking, holding them down there as they struggled against me, as they tried to climb up through the suffocation to the surface. but i could look up and see how the water was roiling. i could look up and see body parts flying and sinking and spinning through the pool. great gouts of blood sprayed across my field of vision. i could not imagine what thing it was that had attacked the pool-goers. and soon my children were still in my arms, and soon i had lost conciousness as well.

i came to as we nearly broke the surface. my children would not wake and i shook them and screamed. the gore was painted evenly across the cement landscape that surrounded us. people lay, dead, across every inch of dry surface, and pieces of them floated around us. i screamed and shook my babies and tried to breathe life back into them. they began to stir. their faces were blue and smeared with other people's blood. i cried and cried and tried to pick our way out of the pool without touching too many pieces of corpses. on the stairs lay my friend, shaminder, her face nearly chewed off and her hands missing. she was awake and in shock. "help me," she said, pitifully. "i cannot lift your mother." she motioned to the side of the pool where my mother lay on her stomach. at first i thought she was half in the water because i could not see her legs. then it came to me: i could not see her legs because she no longer had legs. the stumps that once were her thighs were ripped and raw. blood was pumping from arteries into the pool. i did not scream out loud but my mind was reeling and i rushed to her. she did not move when i touched her and spoke to her. shaminder tried to pull herself up to a standing position, but she fell. my children were coughing up pool water tinged pink with the blood of a hundred strangers. i was ready to give up. too many loved ones needed me to save them.

cut to several days later. still there is no understanding on my behalf of what exactly happened at the pool, but all the survivors had been moved into an abandoned high school. i was wandering the halls, looking for the room where my mother and shaminder were being cared for. i found shaminder first. she was reclining on a couch. she would not speak to me. she was angry that i had not forced her to the bottom of the pool with the children and that she had ended up with a mutilated face and no hands as a result. i wept, kneeling at her feet, begging her forgiveness. she would not look at me. i was dead to her. i crawled out of the room on all fours, wishing i could go back in time. in the next room my mother reclined on a sofa. a blanket covered up her lack of legs. she was pale but not angry. i tried to curl up against her but the lack of form beneath the blanket horrified me and i ended up in the same position i had been in with shaminder, on the floor, kneeling. i grasped my mother's hands and poured tears onto it. she did not ignore me. she placed her hand on my head and said that she forgave me for not warning everyone. that it was understandable that i was focused on saving my babies. that she would never blame her loss of limbs on me. that i could not be held responsible for the actions of demons. none of this consoled me. i sobbed until i thought i would throw up.

night time swimming with a whale

be pacific beat specifics cold salt up between your breasts
you float naked in symbiosis with her
great white muzzle great cold nuzzle bumps you up into the air
gooseflesh forms as mother storms
all around you
she could pull you down to be pacific cold salt up between your nostrils
but you're nudged instead by a behemoth head into the sky
a tiny eye as mother blinks
all around you
orchestra to be pacific rushing roar of waves specific cold salt bath floods your eyes
they call her gentle giant: a willing client in the blubber trade
but the nuzzle of her wide rubber muzzle
resignation as mother rages
all around you

we were talking about the distances between things

we were talking about the distances between things:
god and buddha
(next door as the crow flies)
paper and wind
(eleven stories high)
bedsheets and the gloaming
(this remains undetermined)
monet and joey skaggs
(something like ochre and naked rats)


new york and la
(4500 kilometers)
my breath and the stars
(more than a million heartbeats)
your heart and the canadian shield
(eons of evolution)
our voices and electricity
(14 steps to the telephone)
we were talking about the distances between things.