This time it’s my fault. The entire city wants to kill me. My family loves me but they are angry, too, and will not hide me. Will not keep me safe. The clouds are enormous. They cover the entire sky from horizon to horizon. And they are low. It seems like I can put my hand up and touch them. I can’t, they just look that low. They are black and a gray that is almost black and they are roiling and rolling, folding on themselves. Everyone everywhere is trying to find their “Right Place.” It is very important we be in the Right Place before they get here and see us out of order. We don’t know how we know about this order. It feels new. People are panicking terrified they might not get it right. It is nighttime. People look at the sky and run around trying to fit where they are supposed to. In the sky we can see one, then two, then three sets of bright red and blue and greens lights, and yellow, too, way high up, moving at incredible speed away from us. It feels like relief all over the world for a moment. I walk down streets that are dark but it is not quite nighttime. There is no one else around. Just me and the streets and the wind that pushes at me from the side. I see a bar that is empty and a library that is empty. I am utterly alone.
A huge spaceship with indefinable features, excepting it is circular, slowly dips itself from inside the clouds. It is right over me, but I think that no matter where I stood on earth it would be right over me, that’s how big it is. People break cover in a crazy full tilt panic: running, screaming, not seeing with their eyes wide, wide open. I want to run, my heart bounding, but the air becomes heavy and still and I become heavy and still with it. Suddenly everything that moves is zapped out of existence. The spaceship makes no noise at all. It is the very essence of silence. The lights that dart out from it and strike the moving people and animals are quiet too, and somehow not flashy. I stay very still. Eventually a light fingers over me, it is warm. It moves on. After a very short time this huge circle in the sky goes up and up, tucks back into the clouds.
I don’t mind going down the alleyway to make the deliveries. I hate the restaurant I deliver from. I love the restaurant I’m delivering to. He picks up the packages over a closed half-door. He smiles at me. He is thick bodied and his apron has sauce on it. I can sense she is in there. I take off running, with flowers, to give them to her. I am back at the first restaurant. The lady with the broom glares at me. I get the package. I know it is the wrong order but I don’t bother arguing. I run down the dark alleyways: left, straight, left. The walls on the alleys are close together. I go to the half-door, hand him the food. I have the flowers. I run off into the night. There are rows of backyards. They are jumbled.I hear some bad-talkers coming and I hide behind a car. They stay there a while talking and swinging branches at fences. I stay crouched low in the gravel.
Monday, August 31, 2009
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Dream Two: Cars. Michael Keaton
Michael Keaton. We're sitting in the little cozy room next to his little kitchen. We are across from one another but almost next to one another. Our knees almost touch. He is in love with me but he doesn't want me to know. He thinks I won't love him back and his worry is all over his face. He plays it off by being funny and silly. He is nonchalant and flippant but pleasant to be around. I do not know how I feel about him, other than liking him.
I notice that his clothes are smudged in dirt around his collar, on his sleeves, and other places. They weren't noticeable to me at first but now I wonder how I could not have seen. Something must be wrong. He sees me looking and tells me some story about how the dirt got there. He's lying and I know it. And he knows I know it. The evening becomes awkward because I don't like being lied to and I can't fake not being angry. He is anxious and is no longer silly. We sit there in the little room for a while in silence.
Finally he says in a low, soft voice, "I am a fireman."
Something in my heart rolls over with a soft thud. I see that he is not covered in dirt but in ash, and I know he has been saving lives and lying to protect me.
I fall in love with him in that second. He can see that I love him but he can't believe it. Still, he leans close to me and says "We're so past this" and kisses me. It is neither the best nor worst kiss. I'm still in shock to find that he's a fireman. I think he mistakes my shock for disinterest because he leans back and looks bemused and resigned to my maybe not loving him after all.
He writes something down on a small square of paper and says I can call him if I like.
At home everyone is in a frenzy for some reason. Everyone is yelling and fighting. We spill out onto the front porch and suddenly everyone stops fighting and everyone is smiling at me. They all look at the curb where some cars are parked and look at me. I get it - one of those cars is mine! I say, "You didn't have to do this," and my mother tells me it's to make up for one thing or another. I see a little dull, red car with yellow writing on its side. I think this is the one meant for me. But someone else gets into it. So I look back at my family and ask which one and they point to the biggest car ever made. It is pale metallic winter green, but sometimes it is darker. It looks like a station wagon and a hatch-back combined, and it seats eleven people besides the driver.
Suddenly a skateboarder zooms in and graffitis on the lower right hand corner of the back bumper. I can't read what it says. I chase this boy on my in-line skates but he is much faster. I chase him down the street and when he goes into the hospital parking lot I give up. My family looks sullen - they wanted me to beat him down. "It's alright," I tell them. "He'll be back. I'll be waiting for him." We get in the car and we get out but we don't go anywhere.
The room is dark. The bathroom is pitch dark. There are three lamps in there, each with many light bulbs. I try them all and none of them work. I notice the side of a cardboard box has been cut out in the shape of a toilet seat and laid on top of the actual toilet seat. I don't want to sit on the cardboard so I peel it of. It comes off like old duct tape in the heat. Beneath is inches of inky black sticky filth. There is a smell. I try to put the cardboard back but it won't fit.
I discover that I am missing Michael. I become distraught. How can I find him? How can I find him? I walk shaking my head and clenching my fists. Then I remember the paper he gave me when I saw him last. The relief is indescribable. It shifts me to another place, one not so dark and dirty. I reach into my breast pocket and pull out the paper. I see it is his phone-number. I am so happy! There are two rings on the paper made of sticky cake. Sticky and wet and mossy. They look like coffee rings left on a napkin only they are made of this cake. I put the paper to my mouth and suck on the cake. It couldn't be better. I decide I will take my new car on the road and go to his house - the address is under the cake. It takes a long time for everyone to get in my new huge car. I wait patiently.
Sucking on cake rings.
I notice that his clothes are smudged in dirt around his collar, on his sleeves, and other places. They weren't noticeable to me at first but now I wonder how I could not have seen. Something must be wrong. He sees me looking and tells me some story about how the dirt got there. He's lying and I know it. And he knows I know it. The evening becomes awkward because I don't like being lied to and I can't fake not being angry. He is anxious and is no longer silly. We sit there in the little room for a while in silence.
Finally he says in a low, soft voice, "I am a fireman."
Something in my heart rolls over with a soft thud. I see that he is not covered in dirt but in ash, and I know he has been saving lives and lying to protect me.
I fall in love with him in that second. He can see that I love him but he can't believe it. Still, he leans close to me and says "We're so past this" and kisses me. It is neither the best nor worst kiss. I'm still in shock to find that he's a fireman. I think he mistakes my shock for disinterest because he leans back and looks bemused and resigned to my maybe not loving him after all.
He writes something down on a small square of paper and says I can call him if I like.
At home everyone is in a frenzy for some reason. Everyone is yelling and fighting. We spill out onto the front porch and suddenly everyone stops fighting and everyone is smiling at me. They all look at the curb where some cars are parked and look at me. I get it - one of those cars is mine! I say, "You didn't have to do this," and my mother tells me it's to make up for one thing or another. I see a little dull, red car with yellow writing on its side. I think this is the one meant for me. But someone else gets into it. So I look back at my family and ask which one and they point to the biggest car ever made. It is pale metallic winter green, but sometimes it is darker. It looks like a station wagon and a hatch-back combined, and it seats eleven people besides the driver.
Suddenly a skateboarder zooms in and graffitis on the lower right hand corner of the back bumper. I can't read what it says. I chase this boy on my in-line skates but he is much faster. I chase him down the street and when he goes into the hospital parking lot I give up. My family looks sullen - they wanted me to beat him down. "It's alright," I tell them. "He'll be back. I'll be waiting for him." We get in the car and we get out but we don't go anywhere.
The room is dark. The bathroom is pitch dark. There are three lamps in there, each with many light bulbs. I try them all and none of them work. I notice the side of a cardboard box has been cut out in the shape of a toilet seat and laid on top of the actual toilet seat. I don't want to sit on the cardboard so I peel it of. It comes off like old duct tape in the heat. Beneath is inches of inky black sticky filth. There is a smell. I try to put the cardboard back but it won't fit.
I discover that I am missing Michael. I become distraught. How can I find him? How can I find him? I walk shaking my head and clenching my fists. Then I remember the paper he gave me when I saw him last. The relief is indescribable. It shifts me to another place, one not so dark and dirty. I reach into my breast pocket and pull out the paper. I see it is his phone-number. I am so happy! There are two rings on the paper made of sticky cake. Sticky and wet and mossy. They look like coffee rings left on a napkin only they are made of this cake. I put the paper to my mouth and suck on the cake. It couldn't be better. I decide I will take my new car on the road and go to his house - the address is under the cake. It takes a long time for everyone to get in my new huge car. I wait patiently.
Sucking on cake rings.
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Dream One: Kitten. Sack.
Pressure. I have to make sure this thing is done right. Something is coming. Much like The Nothing but much, much worse.
There is a kitten in my hand. He is white and black and spunky. His little tail tick tocks. He gambols around my hand, biting the thumb and kicking my wrist. His eyes are kitten-crazy, ready to attack and play at once. I think I love him.
There is a sack in my other hand. It is burlap. Looking at it hurts me. I turn my head away from it, try not to feel its rough weight in my hand. I look all about me. Anywhere but the kitten and the sack. I put my head back as far as it will go and look at the sky. Sometimes a storm is coming, almost here. Sometimes the sky is blue, and a bird chirps to one side. Looking up this way makes me very dizzy. Still, I do it for a while.
Finally my hands move on their own. My right hand puts the kitten into my left hand's sack. I see the water, always moving. It is a tub. It is a sink. It is a stream. My hands put the sack in the water. What is about to happen is horrible. I do it anyway to save us from what is coming. I don't think about it. My eyes look of their own accord. The burlap is suddenly see-through like a pale nylon stocking. The kitten struggles hard, but not so hard that I know that he knows his life is ending. I watch and my stomach fills with something so wretched I cannot throw it up and I cannot keep it down. Choking and sweating and swaying I watch the kitten. His lips are pink and lovely. His eyes are hazel. The pads of his toes are pink and black. His fur swirls around him swaying in the current. Finally, he takes a deep breath of cold water. I feel the water in my lungs. It is fire and ice and daggers. I cannot breathe. The kitten's body goes slack. His eyes still. His neck and head and limbs move ever so slightly with the gentle motion of the water. I am so sick. I slump. I sit and look and look and look.
Upon waking: I keep my eyes closed and try to settle my stomach with deep breaths. I can feel the tears sliding over my ears and down my neck. I think, "Are my cats okay?" and open my eyes to start a house-wide search. But they are near me: one next to my hip and one by my feet. They looked at me, quietly.
There is a kitten in my hand. He is white and black and spunky. His little tail tick tocks. He gambols around my hand, biting the thumb and kicking my wrist. His eyes are kitten-crazy, ready to attack and play at once. I think I love him.
There is a sack in my other hand. It is burlap. Looking at it hurts me. I turn my head away from it, try not to feel its rough weight in my hand. I look all about me. Anywhere but the kitten and the sack. I put my head back as far as it will go and look at the sky. Sometimes a storm is coming, almost here. Sometimes the sky is blue, and a bird chirps to one side. Looking up this way makes me very dizzy. Still, I do it for a while.
Finally my hands move on their own. My right hand puts the kitten into my left hand's sack. I see the water, always moving. It is a tub. It is a sink. It is a stream. My hands put the sack in the water. What is about to happen is horrible. I do it anyway to save us from what is coming. I don't think about it. My eyes look of their own accord. The burlap is suddenly see-through like a pale nylon stocking. The kitten struggles hard, but not so hard that I know that he knows his life is ending. I watch and my stomach fills with something so wretched I cannot throw it up and I cannot keep it down. Choking and sweating and swaying I watch the kitten. His lips are pink and lovely. His eyes are hazel. The pads of his toes are pink and black. His fur swirls around him swaying in the current. Finally, he takes a deep breath of cold water. I feel the water in my lungs. It is fire and ice and daggers. I cannot breathe. The kitten's body goes slack. His eyes still. His neck and head and limbs move ever so slightly with the gentle motion of the water. I am so sick. I slump. I sit and look and look and look.
Upon waking: I keep my eyes closed and try to settle my stomach with deep breaths. I can feel the tears sliding over my ears and down my neck. I think, "Are my cats okay?" and open my eyes to start a house-wide search. But they are near me: one next to my hip and one by my feet. They looked at me, quietly.
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