flew in, perched on a shelf, a plant, the dish rack, and then flew out, decent and calm as a bird can be. There was no drama, no righteous desperation.
I’m stuck at thirteen only when I think of the baby, and when I think of the baby, I’m stuck at thirteen. It’s not right, because there’s a lot more to me, I’m sure. In any case, the suspense is killing me.
Go to the mountain.There’s a sagging cabin with its mortar falling out in chunks. In it live some people.They’re up on the mountain, making a living. Ask at the door, Did you make a call from a pay phone on this date? Do you remember a man wearing yellow boots? Were you eating coleslaw at the diner?
Did you tell this woman you were in a hurry? Do you or did you ever own a parakeet? Did this tumble from your pocket? Did you break this omelet pan? Have you traveled to Ecuador? And what about your family? And what about your friends? Have you buried a baby?
Did you bury this baby?
I dried my hair and then I crawled under my fluffy covers. Under the covers there is heat and air. As I was falling asleep, one of my friends called, and it could have been any one of them, they are all so fine and lovely. I spoke with her on the phone, bringing the phone with me under the covers. I told her about the bird in my kitchen, and then about this one time in junior high when we did a Christmas show at a nursing home. We made reindeer horns out of coat hangers and our fathers’ socks. We sang and gave out peppermints. We used the peppermints as the reason to go up to the old people and say, “Merry Christmas, how’d you like the show?”
I thought, Who told us to do that? Who said give peppermints to people with dentures? Who said do role reversal on the candy dish on gramma’s coffee table? Who said bad singing is good singing if it’s volunteer? I gave a peppermint to a woman who held an aluminum mixing bowl in her lap and spat great translucent globes of mucus that fell, like action heroes, in slow motion. I said, “Merry Christmas, how’d you like the show?” and she said, “It was stupid,” and I regret with might the indignation I felt, and how such simplicity stumped me.
Under the covers, we talked for hours, and I didn’t have to tell her how the thing I meant about the peppermints was I think you lose more if you lose so much you start living
for convention. Instead, I told her all sorts of things, dumb little things that happened one time, and dumb little things I was thinking about now and then. We swapped off. I told her something and then she told me something back. We were on the phone for enough time that I got unsleepy and then sleepy again several times. She said, “I’m so sleepy,” and I said, “But now I’m awake,” and I said, “I’m so sleepy,” and she said, “But now I’m awake.” Finally, we were both sleepy at the same moment, and I hardly remember most of what we talked about, which is much of why it felt so lovely. There was some justice, I thought, later. A sweet, naked little bully, with scarves around her feet.
Some Machines
CLOCK
Started off I felt afraid of any electric cord. Could get disrupted, go back to twelve, never wake me. I could sleep and sleep, miss work, seem dead. So it was batteries, little fold-out clocks I liked. I got one and it took the place of a watch. I carried it around and it felt at once antiquated and unpretentious, a pocketwatch but practical, digital, black and plastic. Not masculine (chunky, leather) or feminine (slender, jeweled) and somehow, in my pocket, anti-time.
Countless people have solved their problems with clocks.
But I crushed mine, sitting on it too much. The numbers flickered and faded, washed into the pale khaki of dead electronic screen space. Meant I had to go shopping, a terrible, terrible thing. I rejected a flip-bottom silver-colored plastic one because its imitation alloy finish was so deadly cheap and lightweight, and then I rejected a simple black version
I’m stuck at thirteen only when I think of the baby, and when I think of the baby, I’m stuck at thirteen. It’s not right, because there’s a lot more to me, I’m sure. In any case, the suspense is killing me.
Go to the mountain.There’s a sagging cabin with its mortar falling out in chunks. In it live some people.They’re up on the mountain, making a living. Ask at the door, Did you make a call from a pay phone on this date? Do you remember a man wearing yellow boots? Were you eating coleslaw at the diner?
Did you tell this woman you were in a hurry? Do you or did you ever own a parakeet? Did this tumble from your pocket? Did you break this omelet pan? Have you traveled to Ecuador? And what about your family? And what about your friends? Have you buried a baby?
Did you bury this baby?
I dried my hair and then I crawled under my fluffy covers. Under the covers there is heat and air. As I was falling asleep, one of my friends called, and it could have been any one of them, they are all so fine and lovely. I spoke with her on the phone, bringing the phone with me under the covers. I told her about the bird in my kitchen, and then about this one time in junior high when we did a Christmas show at a nursing home. We made reindeer horns out of coat hangers and our fathers’ socks. We sang and gave out peppermints. We used the peppermints as the reason to go up to the old people and say, “Merry Christmas, how’d you like the show?”
I thought, Who told us to do that? Who said give peppermints to people with dentures? Who said do role reversal on the candy dish on gramma’s coffee table? Who said bad singing is good singing if it’s volunteer? I gave a peppermint to a woman who held an aluminum mixing bowl in her lap and spat great translucent globes of mucus that fell, like action heroes, in slow motion. I said, “Merry Christmas, how’d you like the show?” and she said, “It was stupid,” and I regret with might the indignation I felt, and how such simplicity stumped me.
Under the covers, we talked for hours, and I didn’t have to tell her how the thing I meant about the peppermints was I think you lose more if you lose so much you start living
for convention. Instead, I told her all sorts of things, dumb little things that happened one time, and dumb little things I was thinking about now and then. We swapped off. I told her something and then she told me something back. We were on the phone for enough time that I got unsleepy and then sleepy again several times. She said, “I’m so sleepy,” and I said, “But now I’m awake,” and I said, “I’m so sleepy,” and she said, “But now I’m awake.” Finally, we were both sleepy at the same moment, and I hardly remember most of what we talked about, which is much of why it felt so lovely. There was some justice, I thought, later. A sweet, naked little bully, with scarves around her feet.
Some Machines
CLOCK
Started off I felt afraid of any electric cord. Could get disrupted, go back to twelve, never wake me. I could sleep and sleep, miss work, seem dead. So it was batteries, little fold-out clocks I liked. I got one and it took the place of a watch. I carried it around and it felt at once antiquated and unpretentious, a pocketwatch but practical, digital, black and plastic. Not masculine (chunky, leather) or feminine (slender, jeweled) and somehow, in my pocket, anti-time.
Countless people have solved their problems with clocks.
But I crushed mine, sitting on it too much. The numbers flickered and faded, washed into the pale khaki of dead electronic screen space. Meant I had to go shopping, a terrible, terrible thing. I rejected a flip-bottom silver-colored plastic one because its imitation alloy finish was so deadly cheap and lightweight, and then I rejected a simple black version
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