termini

i went down, as i often did on tuesdays, to stare at the straight lines of the loading and unloading trains. i liked the structure of it- those metal almost cylinders, static and silent and the cables of human movement that morphed from constrained pulsing order to chaotic absurd throngs in a moment, then back again. i had been in rome for months, languished in the august heat in sync with the whole city that seemed to capitulate to the weight of the weather and the oppressive invasion of tourists. but the cobblestones, and the baroque facades had become common place, just the week before i had been walking down via napoleone III turned left unto via gioberti cut through a heard of hissing and wailing stagnated cars and passed as disinterested as a spring stream right past the santa maria maggiore. termini was my wistful port, a cliff from which i could stare out at leaving made manifest.

the suddenly peeling away from a view of disembarking I saw a woman who looked like, exactly, a girl i had once known. i remembered that moment we shared, as she unwound her ḥijāb, how her the pristine cream neck revealed itself like one of solomon’s towers. it was a frozen moment for me, that never seemed to fray with the passing of time, the act of her unwinding the surprising lengths of her dark curly hair. and all the skin and the shed sanctity less revealing than her eyes, and the tremble in her voice as she asked me a question.  it was her, i was sure of it, though i knew it was not. the heart shape of her face, and the fierce aura that exuded from her seemed exact. and so my mind and heart could not reconcile, and as i called out her name, in a choked voice, she didn’t bother to turn to it. it wasn’t her name, it was august in rome and I was imagining things.

mem or ee

the fall is for brooding, open highways, and the ghosts of the ever lingering lovers so far gone the memory cant recall, cant conjure them on command, like the known sign no longer visible in his for reflecting rearview mirror. beyond the hills infront, just like those heinous empty nebraska plains, recently passed through, what exists i can not know or remember only imagine. i sat on my front bumper at an all too familiar gas station - as he had so many times been - between my past and the unpossessed future. only the past is mine.
'how can you do that - walk backwards through life?'
he, or i, the subjects - life or story? the direction you view, i look, everything is twisted fact or fiction, twisted and ravelled and ravelling around each other, around themselves. 'theres nothing back there for you,'  he thinks she is disgusted, she hides it well, but i could see it, coiling behind the veil of her eyes.
in his head or out loud i say, 'theres nothing back there at all.'
'what?'
'things imply substance, and theres not, theres no past beyond the stories and the corner crouching ghosts,' she has been sick of this, is and was, and will be even later when they, we, have stopped talking. i know she isnt here, thats just a memastory, this is just the haunt, the milemarker. 357 where the light swung left to right no matter which direction one faces, for the light was always just remembered even when he was living in it. i thought it looked like silent blonde streamers, fragile and resolved.
white washed blue eyes and her fingers at his wrist, checking for his resting pulse. 'i cant feel it' from beneaht the shest she says, '.....
he remembered it as a confused sleepy wandering question, childish but then i remembered it differently something about the sound of the highway- maybe more a mocking tone. and it all seems to blur, the bedroom or a gas station in limon, colorado. was it her voice or the old mans that mocked me like pearl mocked dimsdale, 'thou wast not bold, thou wast not....'
it was a carved grey beard and the frayed cowboy hat then he recalled asking him
'where you headed?'
and before i could answer he rambled on about some place in texas, about a job or a girl or whatever it is spectres on the great american highway always find themselves crawling towards. the old man was headed some where, for there was nothing the old man told him, for him or i or he or them in this place. there was and is nothing ever here, something is always elsewhere, over there beyond the ridge, beyond the hills, the horizon until there are no more horizons - for that is what death is, the end of horizons. and living the movement through the nothings of this place, ever real, and not, he or i thought, to be confused with the nothings of the past which were not even real, to the place where one no longer look into, and through what was not towards what might be.
i think i grunted, i am sure i didn't speak.
'what about you? you headed home?' the old man couldnt have seen my licence plate.
i said no, or i dont know, or 'i dont know where home is'
most places are like most other places, from the over hang of a gas station florida isnt much different from east colorado, or alabama from virgina. go to enough places, see enough of the spectrum and the gaps between the majesty of st marks and the mundanity of your average road side diner falls away, or into itself, a place is everyplace, is no place. and like all the memories of summer days become one day of bright summer, or one bar of golden light so do all places become a, or any, gas station.
and too the voices and the people and the old man and the girl are there, saying in both voices, unique and uniform, choral and monotone the words, the question
'... where is your heart?'

Calypso (to 'nýja lagiδ')

they had been laying on the floor of her living room for hours.
suspended, inclosed by the screaming white walls and carpet.
everything was still, unadorned- except for the massively oversized mirror
that hung above her couch, framed by roughly cut cardboard.
the world had stopped for them, nothing moved.
there was only music
they spoke at times, and then went unimaginable expanses without words
he traced lines, shapes, words, sentences, secrets
with his fingers into her arms and legs
when he asked how long they had laid there
her heavily lidded eyes pulled open
draconic  and lovely and green
she answered 'always'

later like a shock.
the sun breaks. pouring in through the gossmer drapes that hang
over the rarelly openned double french doors.
the illusion of their forever trembles
in the adamant light of celestial physics.
'it's almost tomorrow' he says
'no, no' her soft pleas, 'make it stop.'
he pulls his hand through her thick hair,
newly illuminated it is a cascade of garnet and copper.
'i dont know how'
'if you just put this song on repeat.
and we dont ever go to sleep
it will stop.'
he could not help his smile, at the sleepy laze of her voice
'will it?'
'yes, just stay here with me,
in this room,
in this song,'
she says softly,
'if we dont go to sleep, it will be today forever.'

Jessica

you werent recalled
the feeling of remembering you was evoked
it was the sky, its moody sullen grey
hanging as it so often does in the fall, so close
to the awaiting earth, and the turning grass
more like escaping air from an exhumed tomb
than an actual memory
your large ovular eyes, so dark
the line was not decernable
between
pupils and your irises
peering over your freckles
and your cocktail glass brace

i couldn't shake you, and stood
there in the nearly empty parking lot
at least as long as our last red light
embrace
and i thought then i was too damn old
to be haunted by the ghost
of some other man's wife.

The Ardah

The highway gives way.
and out of the tangled tentacles of asphalt and cement the city rises.
shuddering to a standstill the panting six cylinder
and we pour out the doors and on to the sidewalk
pressed collars and matte hair paste and loan shark smiles
in doors at the bar we bang fists and cheer to the tv screen
choral waves of temporary fanaticism fueled by booze, from the low rack.
predatory glance from the blonde on the corner.
keys in the nose in the bathroom.
they take my cousin's id at the front gate and we mull around the crowd on wall street for a while moving in and out of the unnecessarily strange themed bars the circus freak joint opens to the urban mexican cantina past a few groups of people of color to wink and flash disingenuous smiles at the pack of girl who don’t know where they are they're drinking twelve dollar martinis in silly cocktail glasses admist a sea of waist high held clear plastic cups into the steam punk bar and out into the pavement to assault the street vender with fists of ones and home remedy whitened teeth.
manifest destiny.
hot dogs for everybody.

'fille dans la ville' or scrying strange skyscrapers

from the garden on the patio of the 17th floor, she's almost sure she can feel it - the city is alive.
its breath sings up, off the street, blows back her hair, fills her lungs.
cars pump through its veins, vibrating the railing, and her hands long and slender.
somewhere behind her the sun is going down, crawling up the cooling glass of the tower is the click and hum of some street musician. she peers down at him, watching the disinterested  moving past, on.
later she's on the pavement, in movement, apart and a part of the great urban beast.
stopping and starting, beating the pathways and moving in sync with the strange physics of the street. she stands adrift of the crown fountain, in the descending dark, catching the kiss of its mist, like a vespers upon her face.
she stands there, like a rod, eyes closed amongst the maelstrom trying to feel, know the secrets she thinks are carried there in the fragile consistency of the monumental.
a stroll down michigan, others are pulling on light jackets and around her the cool off the lake clings to her like a companion. at the light at randolph a boy tells her she has beautiful eyes, she smiles because she knows it is true and leaves him there confused by the look, in the wake of her hair.
just a block north she sees something different, peering along the line of the river she sees lower wacker and realizes the city is not what she thought. growing out, off of its own bones- the city seeming lovely, is too a monster perverse. the heart is on the outside, its spine is a dead husk, and the colour and wonder is grown on its detritus, its decay. oh, there's a serenity to city lights, their looming consistency. but looking at their reflection in the chicago river, she found it all very jarring. all the towers, arias of steel and glass and cement, were undeniably absolute, resounding. but she thought then that they were not the representatives of the real city, not the secret that had propelled her eager exploration.
the wind was kicking up, and off to her right the dingy yellow noise of the bar, where her friends were waiting, wept. she knew then that the light broken and trapped in the black wake of the river was the real reflection of the city. cutting quietly through the city, bringing in and pulling out. she found it disconcerting, was alarmed and felt herself recoil from the waterline. she wondered how people managed to live in, with the presence of such a truth.
she bundled herself again the wind for the first time, and drug herself into the bar and the choral warmth of hellos and hugs. a few drinks, a few stories. a song, a dance, a hand at the waist. a distraction, a flutter. words at the balcony. as he left to get drinks she immediately forgot him, as she did all boys and in the night turned again to look on the city.
amidst the unsystematic movement, lights from the cars, the churn on the lakeshore- she could see the disk of the navy pier, the ferris wheel drawing her in. she found it instantly soothing. it illuminates. a pulse. turning at measured pace. looking on it she was able to sigh, and again believe that all was as it should be, and as it will be, forever and ever.

Saturday in Chicago

it was sunny on 18th and i had not expected it, worn jeans and boots and found myself with the premonition of sweat forming on my skin. turned then onto state street, heading north, and ducked into the shade of the buildings, enjoying the instant cool and the push of wind off the lake, some blocks off. i smelled him before i saw him, and expected to and did find him, for i had smelled that smell before, dead. he wasnt much of a man, little and worn. set in mismatched blues, sweatshirt and jeans too big and too old, eyes rolled up into his head, mouth open, bereft of breadth. i squatted next to him, put my fingers to his neck and found the absence of pulse i had anticipated.
i stood, taken aback by the vulgar indifference of the cement corner in which he filled, and the buildings so erect that they seemed too to loom over him. i thought then that street noise was a poor eulogy for a life, any life. i did not really know what to do, it was not so much a feeling of helplessness but a sort of stunted confusion. after a moment i went to my pocket for my phone, but almost simultaneously an ambulance turned the corner. the noise of it seemed so disingenuine, the wail of its care so falsetto. the emts tumbled out, within two questions they realized i had nothing to give them, when i asked who called, one kneeling turned back and over his shoulder informed me someone from the building across the street.
having nothing to add or do, i left. continuing down my path on state, turning left onto 16th, changing sides of the road to avoid the sidewalked roped off for repair. two blocks later i came upon a girl, standing as i was to join in doing, to wait for the crosswalk to become available, the light to consent.
she was very pretty i thought, wearing oversized stylish sunglasses, and black leggings that did well on her legs. i was again in the bight morning september light, and she turned to me, looked me up and down, which i caught out of the corner of my eye, and then said ever so casually.
'isn't it a beautiful day?'
i was unable to disagree, but could not bring myself to say anything.

Placeholder

The girl across the aisle from me in row two was reading love letters.
Love letters, are the sort of thing you can identify with ease if you've written enough of them.
The stack of them, at least two dozen were written on matching 'Naval Training Station' letterhead, the edges stained in the devotion of frequent hands. She was a waif of a thing, or gave off the feeling of being so, something in the fragility of the way she held them. She had that careless, flawless beautiful skin that only black girls ever seem to have. Her hair sprung out, a wonderful chaotic burst of tight curls. Her playful blue sperrys seemed a quirky contrast to the plain, but ever eye catching off the shoulder brown top that exposed lithe but perfect shoulders.
There was an anxiousness about her, something I attributed at first glance to the contents or the history of her collection of letters. We waited in taxi, seats belted for take off and the letters filed in hand and her head on a swivel, she was continuously trying to look for something.
'Scared of flying?' I asked.
'Not the flying, just the taking off.'  she admitted and then shared , 'looking out the window, it sort of soothes me.' A quick look around and I could see, every shade was pulled down.
'Want to hold and squeeze my hand?' I offered, extending it into the no-man'so land of the empty aisle.
She giggled and said that she might take me up on it but I was left with the impression she wouldn't. So we sat, waiting our turn, me watching the enticing flitting movements of her anxiety and her doing her best to maintain her control.
When we rolled round the turn, picked up the first bit of pace, the cabin rattled with it's tale tell horizontal shake.
She turned suddenly to look at me, her eyes brown with rims of green and I knew instantly what she wanted and she took my hand with an endearing ferocity.
And then she smiled at me, and I knew in that moment exactly why all those love letters had been written.

'late summer 2013'

the white light. the separation of space. the canyons of down comforter and exposed skin. the tumbling laughter, the hissing water, the hours of wasted time. he was tracing shapes, spans of her flesh, drinking alone in the morning. the teeth of expectation, side step of obligation, the bar with all her friends. their quiet doubt, her vocal disappointment, the stretch and gasp of her fulfillment. her strange blue bathroom tiles, him reading marquez, her dreaming of his voice filling her house. tequila shots, weekend plots, and the maze of his silent heart- the walls translucent and carved with words. one hundred and thirty seven miles, those iron wrought chairs on the front lawn, his parade of old lovers, and the wounds he didnt watch himself make. mumford and sons in her speakers, questions she wouldnt ask him, the look on his face as she told of former fists. the song of trembling pianos, the orange streetlight blur, waking to a room strewn with the casualties of their clothes. whispers in the sand, gleam on the tiles, scent of bourbon on the winds of the tide. clothes drying on railing, beach stranded parasols, her wet hair hanging down her bare back. he is assailed by the pillows, she is putting on earrings someone else gave her, she is standing naked on the oceanview porch. she is thinking of cities, tracing out teeth marks, he knows it is their last sunset. red residue light, the howl of pianos, the raging of the brass, the symphony kungfu necktie. their procession of rocks glasses, him working the pool table, her drinking him through the bars haze. he is memorizing her constellations, of laughs and nervous ticks, of freckles and unsaid confessions. she is writing their name on hidden kitchen paper napkins, hes outside in the dusk. theres a kiss and a hand at the back, a poem written on the mirror, theres the lingering scent of his absence. he has her stranded on battered sheets, he has her laughing in the morning lull, he has her in his arms.
he has her in his arms.
he has her.  in his arms.

 he loved her
too late did he realize,
too late did she recall her heart.