PHANTOM LIMBO
what to say, really, when you're thinking about what to say
as someone enters, forcing the question:
«what to say»
i say i am happy, but don't know that i am happy
i say i understand, but don't know if i understand
i say i am puzzled, and i know i am puzzled, because no one who is not puzzled would be able to write:
«i say i am puzzled»
there must be a dungeon in my body, or a dungeon in what i claim to be my body
i know little of my heart
I know little of the mythology to which it belongs, physical or metaphysical
from the hands of a ten year old with a crayon it looks a certain way
from the hands of a coroner, carefully placing it in a plastic container filled with ice, it looks a certain way
i have learned to accept both
my heart has two dimensions
my brain invariably looks the same
never sketched or aesthetically mutilated on the walls of a red bike shed, where some unclassifiable characters are ceaselessly drawing blood, kissing, or finding individual ways of accepting the torment of not being able to not be able to smoke cigarettes, correctly
«now i smoke cigarettes correctly»
can i say that
you make me think of a time when i knew i was beautiful, like flowers are beautiful, and also handsome, but not like flowers are handsome
i want to write you something beautiful, but i barely know you
how can you write something beautiful to someone you barely know
should i base it on how i feel
i write
«i feel heavenly»
does that make you feel beautiful
the way i want you to feel beautiful
does my effort in making you feel beautiful, make me beautiful, like handsome men are beautiful, before they turn into flowers by their own design, corporeal confusion wrapped in delicate paper
would you say
«you are beautiful»
the same way i would say
«you are beautiful»
and, it being said, will we turn beautiful, as in
«we are beautiful»
the pair of us, wondering what to say next, thinking we must already have said it
all
not being able, or willing, to bring it outside this immanent vortex of brilliantly timeless unification
we proceed to write on ourselves, with rainbow-colored fingertips, writing multitudes of stories, newly ancient scrolls that go splendidly unnoticed
only later observed as typhoonic shots of joy on an amazingly changing sky
within each freckle, tales of dynasties
south of a scar, the intimacy of a hundred years of togetherness
then drawing
carefully crafted lines with paleolithic efficency, cumbersome, yet classy curves, filling every single unoccupied stretch of skin with spellbinding marvels, proudly showcasing the improbability of a lover and a lover, and their love, looking something like a tablet found on a holy mountain
over and over
and surprisingly
on the wall of an inhabited or uninhabited cave
us then
depicted as two buffalos asleep on a hot stone
