substack
(p.s. drag me!!!!!)
Mindfulness
Stationed
there at midnight, and far-flung
toward end-time. I can hear it breathe. The seam
of my jeans, pulsing on the left side of the mattress,
metronome’d to my heaving—steady, reliable, there.
What I know: the American Robins perched
at bedside, night chill that puts me to sleep, fox
racing alongside car. What serenity is gathered
in perching, and I’ve never been able to spend
quite so much time on it. Lucent mornings
shift gears. I’m really only prepared for the rain,
for the drizzling of it all; I do not anticipate
clarity. I’m bound to the same white comforter
for months. And it’s ironically white. I can give you
five different stories for each blood stain. I’ll eat
in the spur of the moment. Let me Grecian coast
this downpour. Sometimes, rainwater can be wine.
It’s a matter of mind over matter. If you believe it,
it most definitely won't be. I’m afraid that my nail polish
will run out. It’s a bottle of black, and I apply a coat
every day. And then smudge. It’s all about
the painting and the smudging, about how flat
the set-up is. No, I don’t want to buy press-ons
at the store. No, I don’t want a day where there isn’t
even a bit of black chip left on the sheets. I want
anticipated clarity and forthcoming stock market boosts
but I’m really not trying to ask for much. Give me
black nails, give me them at midnight. I’ll bear them
to the blackness as witness of cruelty, as spectator
to atrocity, and then maybe you’ll all understand
what I’ve been through.
toward end-time. I can hear it breathe. The seam
of my jeans, pulsing on the left side of the mattress,
metronome’d to my heaving—steady, reliable, there.
What I know: the American Robins perched
at bedside, night chill that puts me to sleep, fox
racing alongside car. What serenity is gathered
in perching, and I’ve never been able to spend
quite so much time on it. Lucent mornings
shift gears. I’m really only prepared for the rain,
for the drizzling of it all; I do not anticipate
clarity. I’m bound to the same white comforter
for months. And it’s ironically white. I can give you
five different stories for each blood stain. I’ll eat
in the spur of the moment. Let me Grecian coast
this downpour. Sometimes, rainwater can be wine.
It’s a matter of mind over matter. If you believe it,
it most definitely won't be. I’m afraid that my nail polish
will run out. It’s a bottle of black, and I apply a coat
every day. And then smudge. It’s all about
the painting and the smudging, about how flat
the set-up is. No, I don’t want to buy press-ons
at the store. No, I don’t want a day where there isn’t
even a bit of black chip left on the sheets. I want
anticipated clarity and forthcoming stock market boosts
but I’m really not trying to ask for much. Give me
black nails, give me them at midnight. I’ll bear them
to the blackness as witness of cruelty, as spectator
to atrocity, and then maybe you’ll all understand
what I’ve been through.