DOORSTEP

NOTE:
I've decided to sync up with the folks at objectwriting.com by using their word of the day. this way i don'thave to think of a word, and i have something to compare to, other thoughts to chew on. i don't know how they choose their words, but i'm grateful to them! i'm too sleepy to come up with my own in the morning...

The hard wooden tread of the doorstep is numbing my backside. I'm sitting, legs drawn up so my chin is resting in the space between my knees, the light of day giving way to the watery fog of twilight. This is my favorite time of day—when all begins to quieten as if the scene in a movie were fading out, sound and sight becoming dim, the moment before death or sleep. I hear the rushing of cars like a whining surf washing over everything and wiping away thought. I lift the warm smooth mug of tea to my lips, the steam ticlkes my nostrils with its flowery aroma like a field in spring, taking me far from here for just a moment, leaving the soft taste of honey in my mouth. the warmth of the tea makes me realize my ass is getting cold and its certainly sore. but i stay, shifting to find a more comfortable position.

CLASSROOM

children lined up in their rows and columns, fidgeting, fighting the urge to explode, run, scream. Desks in a grid like a cage, control, order. each one bears the marks of the prisoner that came before, scratched into is worn and flaking wooden surface. this room, this...box in which the children sit for far far too long, these walls, splattered with information, numbers, letters, moral codes--still—these chaotic walls are solid. these windows are solid and the light they let in is attractive and bright but there is no breaking through that way either. that woman who looms tall at the front of the room, miss so-and-so, who smells of flowers or spice or something else that makes your nose itch—she's the mother here. she's the large voice that fills the room and you do what she says, not knowing that you can refuse. i had a teacher once—my mother said she was a sister. i told all the kids that she was my mom's sister, misunderstanding. things taught, told, shown, but sometimes not explained, in this room. other children, like you, unlike you. that like you, that don't like you. difficulty fitting in, for some, is the blanket under which they hide, in this room. the blank or unhappy face in the class photo. or half-hidden by someone in front.

the broad colorful flag and the songs that we sang as we stare at it blankly with our hands on our hearts, the scattered pictures, the dark dusty chalkboard. the sound of the chalk tap-scraping itssyncopated rhythm across the surface, like jazz drumming. language, writing, music—all one, i learn here, then i am taught to forget at home. for that is another classroom altogether.

MOUNTAIN

standing at the bottom of a mountain, any mountain, and looking up, or looking at the trail head, is among the most enjoyable moments possible. yes—reaching the top is like an orgasm, and the minutes spent panting afterwards are blissful relief like no other, save sex, perhaps, but really—think about it: you love climbing, you love the forest, the rocks, the wildlife, the streams, the mud—you love experiencing every detail as you walk steadily upward. you love looking to the side and seeing that special “woods perspective'” where you see trees layered in front of and behind other trees until you can see nothing else-- a wall of trees, all moving past as you walk, like a cartoon background, only real. choosing where to place each footfall, for balance, for propelling yourself to the next footfall, heaving your weight up a boulder. getting those occasional amazing and surprising views as you turn a corner and the trees open up like a stage curtain to show you an amazing vista. and the smell of the woods—leaves and pine needles crunching underfoot, each step releasing earthy aromas. mud, dirt, dust all over your legs, unless you're careful to stay clean, which you shouldn't be if you want the full mountain experience. and the summit is the goal. so they say. the summit—where, they also say, you stand when you have “conquered” the mountain. uh uh. i say you've made friends with it the whole way up—gotten to know it intimately, and finally—you climax. weird, i know, but hey—i love climbing mountains!

DOOR

closed, open. what's behind door number 3?!?! when the door is closed, is anything behind it really there anymore? Doors of possibility. Open one door and another closes. Knock and the door shall be opened for you. the mystery of what is behind the door. Front door. If i knock on your door, will you answer? I can see you peering stealthily through the translucent curtain at the window just next to the door, i see your shadow obscure the peep hole—spy! voyeur! why do you hide behind the door? I only want to talk. I only want to talk, to not be nervous, to connect with you. It's not like i'mI'm

There are many doors, each one has its own purpose and personality. The back door is for sneaking in and out of, the front door is for official, public concerns, sometimes just for show. The side door is, well, I'm not sure. The trap door, is for hiding, or, trapping? keeping something below, a prisoner, a jar of pickles.

Doors are the size of people, portal, passage, gate, entry, exit. Border between in and out, the thin line between accepted and rejected, included and excluded, guarded tightly, left unattended. the last obstacle to gaining entry. I remember whenever someone came to the door at my grandparent's house, grandpa's little dirty-eyed poodle would sprint hyper little circles on the carpet, yapping and panting wetly. never figured out why she would get so wound up—i imagine her little brain all twisted up in a messy corkscrew, all wrung out like a little wet sponge, inside her pathetically small skull cavity. that door. i knew it like a person, it had a voice. every time it opened and closed you heard the same thing, or slightly different for each person, so you could kinda tell who was coming in depending on how ti sounded.

LUNG 2

lungs come in pairs, right? so why wouldn't writings about lungs, eh? here's what i wrote at lunchtime today--giving myself exactly 10 minutes to write, just like i did this morning. i also used a pencil instead of the computer--i think that makes a difference--it's more, i dunno, natural--a better connection between my ideas and the outside world, maybe. have fun comparing this to the first LUNG post! (anything in parentheses has been added at the time of this posting)

iron lung. aqua lung. hold your breath. a tide of air, the rythm of nature, life--a cycle behind your mind. involuntarily (conscripted) enslaved to breathing.

breath, take a breath, breath of life, with one breath, with one lung. lung is breath tool.

tool for breathing, chest heaving rising falling---->essence of lung is air------->balloon pink and meaty.

or tortured by smoking, object and target of self loathing (suicidal activity on a geologic schedule) hidden and forgotten it blackens too slowly for notice--only after death and in cross sections does it show the damage (these x-sections look like art) when it rebells it does so audibly--it speaks, it screams, it wheezes and protests.

i noticed when the skinn is peeled back...

bodies surround the visitors at the Body Worlds exhibition. (bodies in various lifelike poses as if frozen in time doing ordinary things--only theses bodies are naked down to the muscle and organs--oh, shame!) people once, these plasticised cadavers look more like thanksgiving leftovers now. the living mingle casually with the dead--or not so casually--some show visible (and audible) signs of being disturbed to various degrees. tiny bits of people are displayed in plexiglass covered cases--dust thickening on their vast clear tops (as skin is the main component of dust--i wonder if this is where the cadaver's skin has gone...) lungs once nestled behind the protective safety of their ribcages now lay exposed and tender-looking (vulnerable)--or were they prisoners in their chests, enslaved to the cycle of breathing in and out (but not endlessly, as now they have been freed by death.) now all they exhale is the plastic stench that permeates this place (their final breath, it seems) oh the lovely lung--enslaved, abused, forgotten--until it protests...

they come in pairs (i forgot!) monogomous for life--one larger and one smaller, like the male and female of the species.

LUNG

he shovels air into the body, because oh he burns. burning but now filling, he heaves himself up larger, into a passageway, wind blowing through like a storm. he grows large, small, he rocks with the need. like wet meat he peels his insides apart to let it all in, as waves of air flood in as if filling a tidal cave. lung. lung. in. out. tension. release. filling. emptying. up. down. rising. falling. empires crawling and spreading like disease in a petridish.. cultures cultured, then, starved, they eat their young. tongues rising and falling, words clashing like swords. time's up. wow, didn't get much out.

i seriously think this sucks, and that writing in the morning, though i want to, is NOT the right time for me to be writing. maybe i'll write about LUNG later as an experiment and see if it goes any better. it really sucks because i used to be such a morning person, now i'm kinda dead in the morning. pity.

BRAIN

it smells like semen—like semen it tastes. it rises to the top and congeals, like cold fat. moving the head, displacing the bit above the neck, twisting, tilting, zenith, azimuth, jiggling jello momentum makes to move. cavity. liquid sloshing about in a spherical pool, but a sponge holding water floating in the midst. sometimes: flashing lights at the edges, curtain draws tight from the sides like a tilted eye closing, darkness, mist, a mirror melting like mercury running down glass and darkly the world looks back. peeling layers and digging trying to get out. brain, fog. some days are confusing like that. a corrugated landscape, a planet where impulses travel over hills and through valleys to grandmother's musty house, or a salty day at the beach, or a finger being cut by a piece of paper leaving a sting like fire that burns too too long. all roads lead to memory. brain is a metal suitcase stacked with crisp green bills, swimming in meninges. a fish in a bowl, a parrot in a cage, a trophy in a case, gleaming, precious, needing to be fed, repeating what is said.

BUNK

i'm thinking that this morning thing is bunk--that, like any form of excercise, everyone has an ideal time FOR THEM to do these sorts of things. in other words--the best time for me to do this is NOT inthe morning, AFAIK, it seems i can get my mind wound up a little tighter in the afternoon, say, around lunch time. worth a bit of experimentation, i should think.

i'm also feeling my metaphors are weak, and i tend to anthrpomorphise a bit too much. i'm obviously not a trained writer, and certainly my creative writing skills are much weaker than my expository writing skills, which is saying very little on behalf of my future as a creative writer. maybe i could write cheesy country songs, or songs for the washed-up entertainer circuit in Vegas...?

HOUSE

Changing. solid but shifting, something new for everyone. a sense of belonging, like a magnet turned the right way, or a puzzle piece that just fits. the shape of your foot imprinted on your shoe. the longer you stay the more invisible it becomes, the walls transparent around you, your mind filling in the spaces behind them, and beyond—it's place in the neighborhood, the world. morning brings light and silence gradually gives way to groans, sizzling, mumbled greetings, life. the walls start listening, and watching, remembering. the smell of food drifting through like weather patterns as the day spins on, as the light sketches arcing patterns on the wall with the pencil of time.* you feel the roof over your head like a hat you never leave without. you wear the walls like a favorite t-shirt. you stand on the floor, trusting it like a ... the windows are your eyes. you are a brain cell and this creature is your house.

first meeting, i tentatively explore the borders, the corners, the closets, looking for an interesting place to be, sniffing around to accelerate my familiarity....(time's up...)

*light extruding through weightless dust, reaching to touch the wall

SIDEWALK

Hot summer day, pressing down on my head. shorts, shirt, sneakers. nothing else to do. down to the cul-de-sac-turn-around thing where cracks in the asphalt spell out the passing of many unbearably hot days like this one. don't walk barefoot on the sidewalk. it'll take off a layer of your skin. me sitting down on the curb, thighs feeling the rough burning concrete, sweat leaving dark marks on the edge. there's a smell like the road is on fire. the air above it bends the view beyond, waves of distortion rising in sheets. idly i finger the crack between perfect concrete squares, black and gooey, like frosting. unable to stop myself, i pull finger full after fingerfull out, stretch it like toffee along the canvas of the walk. my first Pollack. the smell is sweet and putrid at the same time. I'm tempted to put a greasy morsel into my mouth...almost. now I'm realizing what I've done as i try to scrape the crap off my fingers onto the sidewalk.

POOL

you can smell it even before you see it. even if theres one in the neighborhood, as opposed to, say, the one at the fitness center. your nostrils contract with the super slippery smell of the chlorine, and you know theres a pool nearby. water bound by structure and forced to drink chemicals. otherwise it would be a big, sloppy petri dish experiment.

standing on the diving board, the rough fiberglass under my feet, wet from the last diver, i look down into the water as the instructors words filters into my awareness. dive. it's ok, just go ahead, don't be afraid, sounding muffled through the pulse rushing like a throbbing wind through my ears. the water is too deep, I'm thinking. i can't do this. panic, i want to turn and go back because I'm not so sure about this. the smell of the pool, the half-naked bodies of my schoolmates, and mine—I'm sure everyone's looking right at me now. but i can't move—the waters going to swallow me up and I'm sure I'll end up on the silent bottom with the water crushing my ears, my chest, my lungs. suddenly i feel a push from behind. my head jerks back slightly as my body is propelled forward. i fall heavily for what seems like 10 minutes and finally feel the sting of the surface as it rushes me. ow. an explosion of wet sound, then silence. I'm falling, slowly, but floating too, like going two directions at once. the dry chemical flavor of the water fills my mouth, my eyes bulge, fear pushing to be seen from behind them. eternities trickle away as i thrash, seeking the opposite of down. in an awkward arc i make my violent way back to the brighter light, and when i reach it and plow my way through the surface its like a second birth. i suck a huge, needy, painful breath.

GUITAR

...bent over the instrument like a lover, he ran his hands over it, almost hiding. his lips were inches away from the strings, as if warming them, blowing them into motion, lubricating them with his spit, sharing voices, whispering...

He was about at tall as the odd and intricate thing in the corner. looks like a person almost, standing there, round hips and flat belly, long neck and alien head with six jutting peg-like features—eyes? looking? he went to introduce himself, as his mother was busy with her biker friend. his eyes were at about the level of the face of this odd creature. he saw that there were strings running almost the entire length of the stranger, so, by way of handshake, he plucked at one. The sound that came wrapped him like a womb. He waited for the note to fade. He plucked again, a different string this time, a different note. Then 2 at once. A whole different feeling. Something solid and soft, not cold not hot. He added rhythm, and played the strings in order, plucking each 4 times, slowly. Charmed, I'm sure.

BOAT

boats are a big part of his life—if he's not skimming along the surface of Upper Saranac lake in one with his brother and dad, he's crawling under the old rotten wooden one that's leaning up against the side of the garage in the yard. that one's retired, he imagines. he wonders if it ever COULD float, its so crappy looking. paint peeling off in sheets, soft rot where it touches the ground. the only thing it's good for is a bit of shade on hot summer days—makes a great hiding place-except for the wood-boring bees that have turned it into swiss cheese. AND they kinda don't seem so hospitable. you know there there even when you can't see them. he can feel them watching him and he just know they're waiting for him to come close enough. that's when they start buzzing around him like they're gonna make swiss cheese out of HIM!

the better boat was the one that floats—dad's aluminum with the outboard. dad takes him and his brother fishing on the weekends. they hook the trailer up to the car and zoom down to lake flower to put it in. the boat rings like a bell behind the car on the way. at the boat launch, he can smell the lake water and the “seaweed” that washes up with the dead fish and foam. not too appetizing. getting into the boat is another thing—its like trying to stand on a dodge ball! but once he's in, he feels secure enough. he likes the rocking, and the pounding of the boat on the waves as it tears through the surface of the water, leaving its own waves in its wake.

BOILER

at the back of the kitchen, tucked away in a dark corner was a door. behind the door was a steep, dusty, rickety wooden stairway down into a pool of musty shadow—the cellar. my favorite place in the house. down the narrow passage i would go, most days, to the vast concrete chamber—my private universe where the sounds and smells were like an alien world. i could have been in the belly of a ship, though i didn't really know what that was like. i knew it was at the bottom of the house, so it felt secure, to know that the rest of my world was right there above me. i enjoyed exploring the perimeter of my alien world like some frontier adventurer seeking new vistas of beauty. the angles where the walls met and the places where pipes penetrated were of particular interest to my young, abstract mind. but the lord of the cellar was not me, no—i was just a visitor. the true master, the mysterious and unpredictable regent who's will flowed like invisible tendrils of magnetism through every dusty, smelly, darkened corner of the cellar, was his royal highness—the Boiler. every now and then he would make some unintelligible pronouncement—hissing suddenly, clacking metalically. he had a vent cover that moved like a hand casually dismissing a servant.

SNOW

drifting down, the snow swirled in my wake. looking up, i felt a rush of fast motion—i was in hyperspace! tiny pinpricks of cold pierced my face. all is silent. people had been forewarned of the “terrible” weather we were due to get—8-10 inches of snow. so the streets were relatively empty, save for the snow carefully layering itself from the ground up, patiently and indiscriminately coating the landscape. muting sound like a warm blanket pulled over your head on a cold night. my feet carved canyons as i walked, each footstep kicking up dust that distributed itself in front of me. i thought about other times i had walked alone—in rain, in snow, at night. it seemed to me that these things are like another person who is with you. the weather's boring anyway, when nothing is happening. when it snows, its an event! something to go see. something to experience. that was why this night had pulled me out of my warm house into the cold company of the snow.

WINE

easy as juice to drink. the smell alone intoxicates. in college i liked nothing better than the “bag in a box” to have for an evening. big cardboard billboard of a box, smooth and tastefully decorated, with the sloshing inebriate within. a cardboard fruit to be juiced. but the color there was hidden until poured—not poured—more like dispensed. through a tap like out of which you'd imagine thick army coffee pouring in some army mess tent. but instead you'd get Bacchus' nectar. the fist sip is sharp, awakening your lazy tongue, which promptly becomes numb from the sensory overload. eventually, your brain soaks up relaxation like a soggy sponge in a bucket, less and less engaged in caring every moment. the troubles of the day, of school, of life lie outside this box. you are the bag in the box. you have become what you've imbibed. you smell like sticky rotten fruit and you move with the grace of a sac filled with liquid—softened bones and heavy sponge head. a numbness creeping up the spine from the stomach to the head. that's the way we liked it.

AN EMPTY ROOM

restless and lazy at once. an empty room is a prison and a womb. a poisoned atmosphere where dust motes drift suspended in shafts of light. a clock ticks rhythmically. removing the battery won't stop time. the second hand's steady arc can't make it start again, inside this room. the weight of gravity pulls everything more strongly here, the pressure on the walls outside like the bottom of the ocean. furniture waits idly for a purpose—the feel of a body, of use. the hard floor is a stage waiting for action, emotion, cues. the ceiling hovers over all. this place tastes like aspirin. like charred street vendor sausages. and like beer. nothing glows with the intention of action, nothing receives the focus of sight. all is dragged like drowning to the bottom, with the room, with the world shut out, with the stage set. she comes home. sound springs from every corner, bouncing excitedly off walls—a puppy eager for play. light and lightness rush in like air at the click of the switch, the casual flick of the wrist.

LIGHTBULB

glassy and smooth, like a sack of light that hangs lightly from the ceiling, or upside-down defying gravity in the lamp. magically illuminating the night. does the switch pump the light into it? each time i hear the satisfying clickof the switch the moment of expectancy is so quick i don't even notice it—but it is there.

cold and smooth when sleeping, impossibly hot, searing skin, blinding heat and the tight skin that lingers to remind you never, ever to touch a lightbulb that's on. even when its off, you hesitate before touching, testing, expecting the sharp sting.

a boy of 7, still swimming in a world of possibilities and unrealities, sits on the edge of his bed in a room illuminated warmly by one lamp. the bulb within suddenly and silently extinguishes itself, as if putting itself to bed. light from the hall allows the boy to find a flashlight. questioningly he pooints the flashlight at the bulb and turns it on. light like water flows and fills the bulb for a moment. but as the boy suspected it would, it stays! the light works again!

FRIEND

i knocked on the door to see if AJ was home. he was. “wanna ride bikes?” i asked, expectantly. ok. riding around the neighborhood was one of the most fun things..the wind rushing in my ears, the bumpy road beating up my spine through my seat. rocking back and forth as i pedaled as fas as i could, all the while feeling my friend right behind me, or seeing him hop over potholes or swerve around them in front of me. i enjoyed it while i could. eventually the friendships would, for reasons beyond my little child knowledge, become boring to the other, as if i were a toy that had lost its appeal, or a bit of bread left to harden too long on the counter—no longer useful or appetizing.

...desperate for something to do, skin crawling with it, he roamed the neighborhood, stick in hand, smacking the sides of those big green electrical boxes just to make that deep metallic clang. as if to announce “I AM HERE! COME PLAY WITH ME!” finding friendship in the dust on the ground, finding comfort in the place where two walls met. finding something to say to a shadow. following demons on their underground paths. playing catch with a rubber ball, feeling the frustration of not being able to catch it everytime. picking up the biggest rock he could handle, grey cold and rough, and taking his revenge on the precocious ball by throwing the rock at its soft bruiseable surface. but no, the ball was more resilient and the rock bounced directly back to hit him in the teeth, gritty, bloody, salty, metallic. lesson learned—your agression only comes back to hurt you.