the radio was dead. turning the dial, all he could find was handful of dashes. the discos were dead, the ladies were kinda dead; he’d started talking to himself. he made another body for himself and and he called this body an altar, a servant of the temple. the body was in him and it had a girlish giggle. he lost two whole days; he had no call for sleep and so much to do.

he started with the word kiss and went from there. he made five smacking sounds with his lips and i try to copy him, standing alone in my room in front of the full length mirror. i have a great many pretty things to blame him for. the mirror is all smudged with skin cells and i wouldn’t mind if i just went broke. for a line or two, i speak the same as him. i’ve been accused of taking him all for myself.

as long as he can tell me as much as he can about what he does when he’s alone in his room, i wouldn’t mind. he says that an impulse calls him, a pinching hunger. he gets angry if he’s disturbed and blazes as he takes his way. i won’t be bothering him; i’ll be engulfed in the business of the house, gathering the papers i’ve strewn around in a careless, confused manner. he can please himself by being deliberate but i’m not sure what i want to do today.

he’s always catching up to me, i often can’t go back to cleaning when a song i like comes on. endeavoring to remove a stain from the stove and his softly spoken no will alter me. i’ll end up strutting through the living room, a pulse going constantly inside, dispelling the dishes.

watch the tide, i cry.

rhode signifies rose. a rose island, an island hovering over the sea like a blushing cloud, an island with flower girls washed up on the shore, forgotten baskets bobbing in the last receding waves, carapaces of ancient horseshoe crabs dismantled on the rocks by joyful gulls; a wreck of shell and sinew. there are no mermaids for miles. i’m recklessly dragging along the beach all i’ve collected of radiant gowns, the last and loveliest gloves and brooches, every little thing i’ve prepared; my gorgeous veil shines in the daylight.

i’m accustomed to practice on my own in secret, putting on lipstick without aid of a mirror, mingling perfume with salt water, saying my vows to fill up empty space. flower girls lie idle on the sand in their petticoats and torn stockings, wishing to learn to become wives, charmed by the variety of household duties. it might not be improper to sustain each pulse into a throb.

when everything has failed, i charm poison from affliction. i must submit to what i have accomplished. i yield first my wedding dress, the milky swell of satin suckling salted water, the dark-bosomed dress perverted by circumstance. the flower girls moan as fierce waves prey on silk organdy of asymmetrically draped layers. flower girls more mild retreat from the shore, sighs breaking from their lips. the rose is seldom mentioned. the dress drowns under its own weight. the road is lost to bliss.

she pulls herself together.

she carries her own mattress around with her. beautiful daughters of the woods, treading ground carpeted with downy pine needles. the deafening noise of girls passing between beauty and death. she’d flown to the river, dropped her handkerchief on a shrub near the shore. wading into the water in her heavy black dress, waves darkened with roses. the rumble of girls gossiping, while she prepares to hide herself, her hair floating on the surface of the water like weeds.

she can’t keep up. she can’t be entirely preserved from insects; they’ll stride around her, stoke her. she’d held a lantern burning on the pure spirit of sugar cane, left it perched on a rock interceding on water. the river moves her forward, away from her last light. her skirt rises up like hair, her body stripped, pendulous, dangling in the water below the deflated balloon of her woolen dress.

girls patrol the banks, hesitating at each inlet. a girl says, she must have put it somewhere i haven’t looked yet. girls need time to collect. girls need to look tenderly, with warmth and regret. they come after her and find she’s steadily shrinking, getting farther away.

they take her out of the water and dry her off. she’s shriveled up a little but will soon fill out. they put a necklace around her neck like they are choking her, as if each stone in the circlet were their fists all wrapped around. she has to let all these things happen.

she picks up her mattress and heads back to the wood, a galaxy of girls sparking around her. one says, take that thing off and come here.

her bright, hard no, afraid her voice will break. she leans into the wood, biting her lip, withdrawing into a cluster of trees. she hasn’t done enough to fulfill her hopes. she means to keep her distance.

but i cut out a doll for her, a girl says, without scissors. the doll could be a substitute for her. the girls take the doll and caress it; they comb its hair and clinically observe the weight of ink in a doll made of paper. a girl says, she has flaws, touching the doll’s knee, folding the paper so that the doll can walk. a paper doll made flexible, capable of moving. i mean to have this monster chronicled, a girl says, watching the doll follow after her into the forest.

a girl plucks another doll from a sheet and lets it fall.

hordes of disagreeable girls roam the woods, carrying lanterns mantled with candy. the cloths which should have covered their faces they leave waving from the limbs of trees. a system of constraint holds them together, corrupts their bodies. they pull themselves together, using each other to find a way. they have something; they take each one by the hand. they look up and they watch her rising on water. girls imitating each other and not succeeding; changing a little each time until the imitation is unrecognizable.

she folds into her palm a fistful of stones. perched on th edge of the wood she throws each stone into the water. she calls out names and nearly every name is wrong. she asks what they would do if she came in white and no one else was wearing white. would they say that she is wrong? she wants a kind of excess, a signal.

striking the forest floor she feels she will ignite. a wildfire, a girl that leaves a black smudge behind.

i want a prize.
a trophy.
if i won a prize i would walk up and take it.
i’ll glide up the stage, a moment dipped in silence.
i will take all the air in the room for myself. after all, it’s quite ordinary to win. i’ll be grateful. i’m here right now, walking up to the stage. in another place my mother is saying a prayer for me. she wants me to win. i’m on my way to winning. my mother has made me a promise; she has promised that i can win if i want to. my mom loves me. i’m her only darling. my mother is sending me a postcard saying congratulations.

i want to cut my hair with the kitchen scissors. a drawer full of dull knives and one pair of shears.

i can’t continue past the point of beginning. the ache of being held over: not starting.

in the morning i cross the street. the girl who lives across the street lives in a yellow house. her mother has died. i cross the street without first looking and a car stops, causing other cars to slam into it. an accordion of cars on the road in front of my house.

i need to learn to look. my mother says a prayer for me and i cross the street.

the girl in the yellow house takes a plastic grocery bag and puts it over her head. she stops breathing. death is cheap. she had bought some oranges; she took the oranges out and laid them in a row along the windowsill. she took one orange and cut it in halves with a knife of silver, tasting one portion, rinsing the sweetness from her teeth and lips.

i look first and then i make my move.

she wears a dress too short for her fastened up with a hundred pins. i’m horrified by her slim white fingers, her flabby lips. she hasn’t got into the habit of washing.

i do my best to look after her properly. i make every arrangement necessary to cleanliness and order. in this dress, with her hair let down, she wallows, taking one pose after another. she sucks her thumb, she sucks it down. i desperately want to suck her cunt, but i tell myself it’s nonsense.

she uses objects found around the house to defeat me. her dress clings to a body she’s made with wire and silk. she knows all sorts of little tricks.

i feel capable of any sort of mean behavior. a record is made of waste. the extravagance of blood seeping into a cloth. the rent will never be paid on time. she won’t do anything, claiming she’s having her period. i’d lay a towel out on the bed, but once she gets affectionate i won’t allow it.

she leans against the wall and starts crying. i used to serve water and the pitch of her tears remind me of things i have to do. it was the shiny bits clinging to her cheeks that strongly suggested an obligation.

i’m sick to death of her filthy habits.

she’s written a long letter, which i read in her presence. afterwards, i put it into the dustbin. i can see her riding barebacked a little rough-haired horse. with her hair let down, sitting with her legs spread, puffing her cigarette smoke up at the sky. behaving as outrageously as she can, sucking on her thumb, bewildered by her own intensity.

she grinds her teeth, she eats cakes. she soaks her panties in baking soda and hangs them in the window to dry, so that light streams through shear nylon.

in order to get her hair to stand up like that, she wears a hair rat and combs her hair over it. she made the hair rat by collecting the hair from her brush and clumping it together, a blurred, tangled huddle. when i go into the bathroom to brush my teeth and i find her hair rats sloughing on the bathroom counter, like a colony of lab animals all dead at once.

i spoke.

i spoke of the noise. the noise of the night. a noise in a dark room, a scramble of keratin on wood. i spoke of the noise of vermin. i described the quality of warm mammals scurrying. i prepared myself. i went to choose little adornments, and i listened.

i said i would buy arsenic to destroy the disturbers of my sleep. i spoke of the vermin brushing against my face in the dark of the night. i said caution was needful. i bought enough grains to fill a walnut shell. i would leave very soon and not return again. i would leave and go farther. i left and returned to my room, carrying a handful of arsenic. i was cautious lest i should be seen. i kept my hand curled like a walnut shell. i made myself very small. i laid aside the deadly purchase and dressed. i spoke and my lips took pleasure in speaking. i spoke of vermin and i sealed an envelope. i said hair of the elk, and speckled pheasant, and ptarmigan, and i was taken by grief.

i was cautious and consistent. i placed an envelope under my pillow and i breathed. i spoke of the vermin but with less fervor and more heaviness than before. i took the arsenic and parted my lips. i said nothing. the arsenic was the size of a walnut on my tongue. i rinsed my throat, my teeth and my lips. i lay my body cautiously on the bed. i tied a white handkerchief beneath my chin and put my head above the pillow. there was stillness about the room, and a noise. the noise of my breath departing. i sighed, and sleep came over me.

i awoke to death. i lay in my bed with a letter under my pillow, and my head upon it. i lay without effort. a noise rose again, and an eruption spread itself over the entire surface of my form. i tore the handkerchief from my face and flung the heavy mineral from my mouth. i tore death from my body. i rinsed my neck, my lips, my teeth, my tongue and i spoke. i said i was not grateful.

the soft warmth of beauty in contrast with the cold of my own bed.

i turn from the window. earnestly repeating, i turn from the window. suns and systems turn from the window. a thousand worlds i turn from the window. at a glance i turn from the window and return to the pillow lying smooth as a stone. i return from the window and kneel at the side of my bed. the cold of my bed holding a thousand distant moons. i kneel at my bed and seek death. at my bed i kneel and repeat oh take me to a farther world. i kneel and look down upon my bed. i glance at my window and the insects working to offend me. i kneel at my bed and i repeat forgiveness, i swallow this poison. i swallow this poison, i glance at the window and regard the sparrow. i lay bare and endure it. i glance at the window and the sparrow gives me strength. i swallow this poison and pronounce the word forgiveness. i repeat forgiveness, how many times. i swallow the contents of the phial and turn to the window. i swallow this poison and rinse my mouth and hands. i turn from the window and carefully dry my mouth and hands. i repeat, oh purify me. i pronounce the word purify. i rinse my mouth and spit the water into a cup. i kneel beside the bed and pass a white handkerchief over my head. i pass a handkerchief of white lawn over my head and tie it under my chin. i kneel beside my bed and pass a handkerchief over my head and tie it near my temple. i lay bare. i lay gently down with a handkerchief over my head. i’ve swallowed this poison. i do not look toward the window.

i lay bare. i lay perfectly easy. i lay against the cold of my bed and hold my hand up to my face.

i lay perfectly at ease with a white handkerchief clinging to my face. i’ve swallowed this poison and i lay bare seeking death. i lay in my bed and cold reaches through to claim me. i lay perfectly at ease seeking death but no heaviness comes. i lay on my bed and wait.

i lay in my bed and daylight comes to the window. light floods through the handkerchief tied over my face and i feel warmth on my skin. when daylight floods through the window i feel myself still alive, and i lean over the edge of the bed. daylight comes with black ejection. i feel myself still alive and pronouncing poison. i lean over the edge of the bed and emerge from the past to the present. i’d swallowed this poison, and i conceal my soiled dress.

she had to run up and down. on a clear day she could see the coastline, and on her heels a tide of water rising from the basement, a crust of salt slicked on whitewashed walls. she could hear the sound of her house rising and she really didn’t want to. she’d been put in touch with a woman she’d never heard of before. only boys had heard of such things, she said. she’d started to get frustrated with just waiting. she’d gone into the living room with a wax crayon in her hand and scrawled something across the wall. the shape she made was like a kind of map. she strained her arms up over her head and lifted up on her toes and when she was done she stepped back.

she kept her place. she reached forward, turning her cup in its saucer like the dial on a kitchen timer. what she’d wanted was to be easy and pleasant. by going upstairs she has a place to be alone. in the attic is a small room with window looking out on the street. early in the morning she sits there looking out into the tree tops, and the sky, and whatever she can find. in the yard around the topiary she’d pruned, scallops and hermit crabs and sea nettles squabble in the parched grass. this is where the flowers come through. she has to find a way of staying awake. her house shifts and sways, buffered by the buildings around it. she loves beautiful things.

between this house and any other house there is a wilderness, a vast sea of light. she’s learned to like what is around her. the sun high and deafening, the way to her house not long. she proceeds from the start and never thinks once of him.

sometimes she’ll stand at the top of the stairway, looking down.

moving through each room, hoping that nothing is missing. the furniture hunched under old bed sheets, more disordered than the address proves. she lifts a cloth from a mirror; nothing could exceed her outline. a woman’s beauty lies in a man’s desire for her. he’d lifted his glass and taken a drink; she’d watched it move down his throat and disappear. starring at herself, she finds she can’t agree. she stares in the mirror until she blushes at her own frank gaze. he only had the appearance of knowing what he was talking about. damp chasms and mouths!

the familiar assumes rightful shapes. she confides to the credenza, pulling open each drawer. of what value is beauty in a man? the dark is all within each room.

sounds come from within the house. the dull, persistent ache of busy machines. she leaves a little metal clashing shut, an arched doorway beckoning.

in an earthquake she’d let the walls break without her.

the quick, peculiar movements of her small hands. rough answers made in bottles sealed up with wax. vessel after vessel tossed into the sea, left to wander rifts of water candied with ice.

words come to her to be arranged, slips of paper erupting from her pockets, a corkscrew pressed against her thigh. she’ll claim her own scoundrels, come home loaded with armfuls of objects limpid and flowery. some sentiments she can’t answer; lips have come together to set a stamp but she won’t be struck. the stamp will not draw blood. she can’t bring herself to keep a common sense. the things she wants back rarely wash up.

to see far-off land for the last time is to feel herself sinking. she comes from leafless forests, trees hung with tinsel and china birds, rude women clothed in lawn stitched up with pine needles. turn them and they drop, softened by a little distance. she looks towards the sea and receives its call, living all day in sandcastles bricked with bottlecaps, singing songs of her own composing, smiling to taunt the shade. she must remember her path, the passage of velvet gulls gliding in the sun.

days pass upon the waves. soiling her pale lips with offerings of clotted ink; a fragment learned from forests half-dismantled, captured in a bottle. she advances from the foothills decked in pearls, pollen clinging to her curling hair.

i do things well. i do it wrong. i beg to stay where i’m clearly not wanted. i’ve plead too many intimate details, confessions too wild and intense to be endured.

i’ve been indulged by vague objects, unintended uses of doubles and duplicates.

with everything entirely out of sight, i’ll continue to fall and fall again.

to hold on, i’ll sensibly gather together all that’s not wanted. all there is of papers, clipped coupons, clusters of golden teeth - every little proof of beauty, and bring a large sheet of paper to wrap what i’ve made.

while folding the ample envelope, i see the lock of hair i’d once unconsciously curled round my finger. the lock i’d twisted the moment i firmly set upon my purpose. i’d wound this hair with no other emotion than a private and unrespectable love. a shriek almost escaped me as the curl vanishes beneath the paper i fold.

the packet i fasten with a ribbon, and a black seal bearing my impression.

i look at it and shrink back.

i finish and say, here is a parcel. will you throw it in when you pass over the mouth of the river.

she looks at it for an instant and then at me. her look can never be conceived.

i have become an inconvenience, i say.

the little home in the wood where i live is warm, and on the morning of her expected visit i dress myself in red and place a clock on a small table near shadows gathered without the window, where i’d spread a white tablecloth.

i wish you wouldn’t, she says.

there is only one red letter left, the milk taste of ink, papers melting on my tongue.

i’m not going to start telling a story. not after dragging my feet for so long, accumulating so many fragments; odds and ends, dropped stitches establishing their own inexplicable pattern. i like to see what words will do, let them slide up to one another for awhile. i force myself to get out of bed and change everything; all i’ve got is a few ladyposes and expressions to re-work and revise. why is it so yellow? what is she doing here? sometimes, all of a sudden i misplace a semi-colon or replace myself with the third person, a woman cutting tangerines from a tree with a pair of gleaming shears. or clementines: i’m not sure what the difference is.

she’ll say, hi, do you want a bite of this tangerine? and i’ll bite it, and then i’ll know. you know?

on the last days the horizon was so clear i could see routinely invisible islands striking an arresting silhouette over the sea. what keeps me from getting down into the water, a continuous wound of salt displacing every ship. no way out to sea but to swim, not sure of what i’m doing, lacking the stamina to continue. i’d like to get out there, remove the wedge of sand bracketing the bay, reverse the relationship. a woman sitting down to write, her fingers white with cold hovering over the keys.

what to say: i can’t tell much more. i can’t tell you how she sees herself. i’m not sure of what i’m doing. if i leave out all the words what is left behind. some residue, a soup of chalk and ink; women swimming laps like they can’t stop, even though the water’s cold, icy so it’d peel layers of skin right off like nailpolish. all this blank space allows for anything to happen: post, post, bump. bring up my post. anything could happen, i take all i can get. i might become a total mess. i might create this messy manuscript, an unmanageable amount of text with no discernible narrative or voice, wildly out of control - no logical order, no spoilers. a text that escapes narrative through attention and exultation of the everyday. i recognize things here from my own life which i’ve distorted in order to entertain somebody. i’d do this every day for hours on end if i could go on.

a problem she has to solve. the cat pees on the floor underneath the furniture. she collects the newspapers from the neighbor’s recycle bins on sundays and spreads them out around the house. she has the embarrassment of being responsible for what happens. the cat can’t be stopped and struts though the house as his own territory.

when the cat shits under the rocking chair he makes an effort to get away from his packages as fast as possible, his legs struggling to propel him over the shining surface of the floor. if he isn’t concentrating hard enough on getting across the room his accuracy fails; his legs sprawl out of control, cross each other; he’ll flip through the air and hurdle unwillingly towards the wall.

it’s really something to see.

afterwards she’ll have to wrap it up in newsprint and toss it into the garbage alongside the house.

he knows that if he makes a misjudged step and fouls himself he’ll get dunked into a bucket full of soapy water in the bathtub, the worst thing he can imagine.

at night the cat is left in the dark, sliding along the wall and using the room to guide him towards the door. he wants out and he wants to start but he spends all night waiting, bolting in the morning when she kicks the door open, tumbling towards the kitchen table where he can lean between chair legs, adoring the morning and the crystal bowl of kibble he shoves his whole head through, bits and pieces scattering beneath the fridge.

he has a slowness in movement, taking turns with his own shadow. he sits by the window and waits and what he’s waiting for is something to change in the yard. a bird or a squirrel might cross his vision and he’ll struggle to rise, flopping his body against the window screen, claws catching on the soft wings of moths battering towards the bedside lamp. she can hear his small cries of joy sometimes, his rough snorting.

the cat makes pauses and slips he can’t quite recover from, knocking his head against the floor or jumping for the couch and missing entirely. a cat that can walk can do anything.