Journal 17 – Greasy Reflections

My heart has turned against me and now
pants while beating to a ditty of Schoenberg.
I taste metal in my mouth and my breath
stinks when I yawn; waves of heat and
dizziness proceed across my oxygen-thirsty
veins while my arteries cry for a little more
thickness and air. My eyes are either tired
or bleary like someone just punched in the nose
for laughing at his girlfriend's scabby haircut. In
each day is enough time to do all the things that
uplift the soul – produce a painting, wander a
museum or a few acres of trees in autumn with
living creeks and pregnant ponds – write a poem
or catch a fish – read Shakespeare or track a
buffalo over green plains in Wyoming – stand
at the head of the Grand Canyon or Niagara Falls
and try with all your strength to not raise
your arms to your side, smile the smile of a
martyr in plain sight of heaven and jump into
the beauty. Death by Beauty isn't the worst way
to enter the kingdom of death's dream kingdom. I
often think I am ready for death to visit me
when I can no longer see the beauty in a
rainy day, though children ameliorate the tendency,
as the poet says, My three year old's red coat hangs
on her door screaming No. But still the threat is
there – you're either that person or not; maybe the
categories are the same, populated the same, as Weak
and Strong. When I do see death out of the corner
of my eye glaring with elongated white eyes I
shudder in cold fear – suddenly the blinking cursor
on my monitor or my boss's blather or my
life's waste doesn't weigh so heavily. The greasy
reflection of the pine tree in the puddle of water
behind the benches at the park looks like a portal
to a world I don't want to leave behind. My
daughter's hair, out-stretched while swinging pulls me in,
while my son's laughing teeth in his sweet mother's
cuddling arms set me down like a duck on the feeding pond.


3.7.09