And now..
I could be out here
flying a kite
over foggy fields
the pungent pines
the verdant vales
the vapid vines
and the thousand purple cups of wine..

I could find myself on a rainy night
in a beautiful stranger’s house,
wooed and tempered by the
relative luxury of a warm clawfoot,
of silken pillows scented with white ginger
and white cats swoon under my hands..
Soft light, bird’s nests and Beethoven.
A little piece of peace.

Instead I am here,
slowly stabilizing,
waking stiff from the nightmares
that have become an intricate
system of chinese boxes,
opening one into another-
and becoming commonplace reality.
A case of troubled friends,
seriously troubled indeed..
And if you know me, you know
that this is worse than any personal
ailment or tragedy. I’d rather have my
legs hacked off than see the creatures
I love in pain. And be helpless to fix them.
I’ve spent too many days in hospitals,
in sickrooms, at the veterinarian..
The late-night death watch
and the early morning panacea.
The waiting and the worrying.
I have to just keep going until
there is no more.

So tonight I eat mangos and drink sake.
I wear orchids in my hair and carry tendrils
of jasmine seeping luminescent milk blood
from ripped stems dripping white
sticky and fragrant on my wrists.
I will dance and sit still and pretend to be
this and this.

I will listen to my sister sing lilac wine.
And so should you:
Tonight, Dragon’s Den
Monin Insane
(Raising Nina Simone from the dead)
A Particularly Vicious Rumor
Ratty Scurvics
2 for 1 Sake.

The time is nigh.