Swimming the Length of the Next Fall

Wind chime dissonance floats into the bedroom. They grind on my sensibilities like when Dad would play Springsteen or Seeger as loudly as the system could handle. It was music I didn't ask for, which always felt arrogant. The neighbor's chimes continue to force themselves upon that invisible place, triggering what cannot be reset.

now / everyday / chimes.

Pad Thai and lemon cookies with powdered sugar nestled in perfectly baked valleys. September always begins the negotiation of that moment when nothing in the world will keep the alertness of my skin from happening. Barn jackets and scarves and earth-jeweled palettes. A copulant beauty glitters in the crisper air. I suppose that is why I have always threatened to head east in autumn; this is the time when every cell pulsates under the skin, ripening unto my fullest harvest.

her basket nestled on the hip / gather / carry / consume

At 3 a.m. acorns fall cracking dreams wide open. Shotgun entry wounds form a portal of momentary confusion. In the lengthening dark, cognizance swims the length of the next oceanic fall. How autumn is heard.

When we come from so far to get nowhere at all – September. The room of windows is cold already – so more blankets. More coffee. More tea. Lou said they sent the scat to the DNR and with a giddy glint asked me to guess from which animal it came. Bear? This far south? No! Yes! And so the animation billowed and chortled to my absolute delight. Not everyone is pleased about it, though.

The lake at night – never neutral and sometimes terrifying, and yet, always an abiding tingle of freedom and clandestine undoing. The blackened water reaches in to remove my name from its haughty throne. She takes a knee every time. Other fantasies are amusements of the distracted heart, but our clothing dropping to the dock in exchange for the weightless cloak of night is so much more than that. It is the marriage of the sacred and profane. And it is the music of our rippled wake tickling the dock as we move from two cautious bodies wading in the shallows to one shivering exchange in the unknowing depths.

Which dishonest performance is preferred the most? One doesn't need to be good to be great. This and other highways I'll ride to get to the truth. Already beyond. Already too far.