Letter to Sarasvati no. 1

When last we spoke, old friend, you asked “is there nothing you enjoy?” I deflected somewhat and talked about drinking. But drinking was not a thing that I intrinsically enjoyed, and speaking of it in such a way was deliberately imprecise.

I wonder if, under normal conditions, many others are able to recognize and to doubt their emotions simultaneously. Perhaps they do not feel relentlessly compelled to do so. Oh, envy. What always attracted me to alcohol was its ability to manufacture feelings of authenticity. It allowed me to believe myself in any situation— in whatever I was arguing in favor of at a particular moment, in imaginary betrayal, in the value and clarity of my feelings, in the safety of an embrace, in the necessity of violence. The freedom of this confidence drew me back repeatedly even in the face of its terrible consequences, chiefly because being sure of what I was feeling was such a delightful and foreign experience when compared to my customary paralytic existence- euphoria with a hangover of destruction and disappointment. 

So to borrow liberally from literature and answer your question in a more honest way, I like the taste of coffee, the sound of a needle as it traverses a vinyl record, and the prose of Borges. Due to my preference for self-denial I had only one of those near my room, but I thought of what you said and so a few days ago I went to a store and bought a modern Victrola, then went to another store and bought what is a called a French press for making coffee (the first patent for such a design was, of course, issued to Italians) and whole coffee beans of Colombian provenance and a reasonably priced coffee grinder.

Now I sit in the morning with precisely measured dark coffee in a mug, Rachmaninoff’s Concerto no. 2 in C minor played by Cliburn and Reiner with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (1962) on the record player, and I must confess that the morning is better with these material comforts than it would have been without them.

There is more than one path. Once I was convinced that I chose the journey that was appointed for me, and now I am sure that I was mistaken. The air of this early December is unseasonably warm and so I walked a few miles around a local pond in the hour surrounding sunrise. There is nothing in my life that satisfies my desire to exhibit expertise and brilliance- nothing I can do that someone else cannot do better. But if there was, would I find an excuse not to do it? I have been trying to get the results I want out of a broken machine, instead of attempting to fix the machine. Is it any wonder that under such a regime, my body and brain and I are on such antagonistic terms? What is to be done?

A Shelter

A flash of lightning impossibly illuminates the windowless room,
the sound of thunder lost in the deafening torrent
or eaten by the earth before it reaches my ears,
and you are here.
Is your hair the color of ebony, or is it silver now?
My wonder delays my wish.
The light fades, I lurch toward you,
your arms turn to smoke beneath my hands,
the serpent’s wreath of your hair mocks me as you flee my embrace.
I crash into walls, I scream your name, I explode through the doorway,
the rain soaks me to my skin, I shiver. You are gone.

I wake drenched in sweat
she is sitting over me
she says
“You were having a nightmare”
gets me a glass of water
dabs my forehead with a cool washcloth
acts like a good woman
looks down at my deep measured breaths
cautiously asks what the dream was about.
I tell her I do not remember.

Carmen 56

My father was a fisherman
and his father was a fisherman
and my son would have been a fisherman
but there are no more fish,
the wind makes waves of salt,
the sea has disappeared.

Autobiography no. 31

This old man at work today noticed Il Canzoniere set over to the side
and he asked if I was reading Petrarch for school, and I laughed.
Before I could stop myself I said,
"No, I don't go to college. I've got a broken heart though."
He looked moderately thoughtful for a moment,
then I counted out his change
and he got in his car and pulled away.

Autobiography no. 30

Whenever I see a chessboard,
I reflexively envision my father
as I knew him long ago,
when he was a giant and I wanted to understand him.
In those days my father and his youngest brother
kept in touch principally through the writing of letters,
each of which contained the algebraic notation of the next move
in their game of chess.
Of course the postal service works on its own time
and a game commonly ends in around forty moves,
so a year could pass
dedicated to playing a single game on dozens of pieces of paper
while they lived a thousand miles apart,
and I staring at it all enraptured, reading books about chess
and trying to guess what opening my uncle would attempt
after the current game came to an end.
Now they both have technology in their pockets
that would let them play instantly with each other from across the globe,
but I do not think they use their phones for chess,
and they no longer send the letters.
I think about this.

The First of the Line

The tree is going to die soon.
I did not have it very long.
It is the second tree of this genus and species that I have owned.
The first I killed on purpose years ago in a slow rage-
I kept it by my bedside as it withered without water.

This tree got ants early on.
The ants came for the aphids, which came for the flowers,
which came out to try to kiss the sun as it arced above.
I put poison on the windowsill but that was not enough to dissuade them
and because I was not willing to poison every inch of the room
I put the tree outside in the sweltering heat of Arkansas summer.

I watched as the days went by
and the mercury in the thermometer climbed
thirty degrees Fahrenheit above the tree’s acceptable range.
I watched my tree defy its new environment for a time,
then fail to thrive.
I watched the fresh green shoots of spring die,
I watched the dove-white flowers torn apart by a thousand insects.
I watched the leaves shrink away desiccated,
their brown bodies thinner and thinner with each passing hour,
and tonight I watched their shadows flicker on the ground
while my tree’s last chance at life
floated away in a cool breeze beneath the light of the moon.
It would have lived if I could have accepted ants inside my room.

Crawl

I could start out trying to explain the way I feel inside about working for a living, about being degraded and disrespected, about never having enough for someone else because I never had enough for myself, but that kind of thing stings like chlorinated water in my eyes so instead I’ll fall into a metaphor some silly idea like being in a swimming pool brightly lit and deeper than my feet can reach and there’s a million or a billion people in here with me but there’s room enough for everyone. When is the first moment I noticed that this pool contained a race? Was it the report of a shotgun making the grass tremble and the birds flee the trees? The tug of a fish trying to escape and knowing that he could reach cool and peaceful depths if only he had not bitten the worm first? I realize that everyone is competing and that I have been in competition all along. I size them up quickly and determine that I am swiftest, but my thought is stopped by reality just beyond the the gate. I eagerly press forward then feel sharp teeth gnaw upon my limbs. I frantically attempt to free myself but I cannot. What are these shackles upon me? Is this iron that delays me? No, it is not iron, no element alone made this chain upon my ankles, and I am suddenly sure that no one above water can see the device that holds me here. It pulls me down. Everyone else is racing but I know I am going to die, and still the people in the stands are cheering. I gasp for air. I cannot do this any longer. Surely someone will jump in to help me. They will swim to me and embrace me, breathing deep, kicking up, saving me from certain doom and letting my lungs fill once more. Before they drown they will look down and see the skulls beneath my feet.