To the f and up and coming to the f if filling dots and dashes light on light off on ended that resolution for a long standard way mesmerized with nothing but the best of nobody's business away as the notes drop they drop and fall off those pockets that accept their stumblings their stumbledness dipped in tears shared with eyes against each other's cheeks pulled apart by the sand's abrasive sighing. It knows and it knows less than they just lowering the dust over their lids weighing them down and next step watch it careful never mind don't listen to yourself you've been told too much of the dry and the watery. They look at each other and laugh.
Fuselage rests with unapologetic carelessness. They say they are sorry and they do mean it until they hesitate to take a breath into bags of kitchen floors where they cooled their red hot spines compressed to whip up another meal and whip the sides of their tree with its branches withdrawing embraces from how they kissed for the next step down off the bridge expectantly stretching across the river where they swam together missed and tried to face what was current in the currents rejecting and splashing spit in their mouths right there it goes not right there it goes many more successive strokes astray from their in between stands for lost names. Searching within and around the re-awakening mind from sleep that pinches elbowing for the spot where to continue from left off the right way to process anything reminiscent of solid space free of details broken up and down and up into little things.
Her hair was filled with little things. She could come upon them as she passed her fingers through locks and combinations of strands tangled with associations and frankness caressed with a fondness for gritted lips that could be persuaded and yet insist on shut postures statuesque and demurring with cold eyes glaring down bullets melting down their boastfulness in the wings waiting and waiting along with the incarcerated they hold their darkened uniforms over to differentiate with moments of elusive heroism that never comes. Never comes but into their own view projected by voyeurs of the seeds crossing and falling on linoleum not too far from the body frozen before images and a tone tingling with circulation swirling an immune ignition along the maelstrom of wasted time.
Piano notes take her fingers back from sandy hair and bugs in shirts stretched across abdomens covered in what they have been fed and re-fed on been have been has you and her. Leave those wires as they are to burn the place down they will or not as the potential for disappearance lies hidden to be revealed after it is gone.
She notices her fingers in her hair as more than her own belonging to the touch of another her body shares so many similar differences to. Her words are surrounded by colors that help her feel her feet. Her toes point to the Earth through to the other side's canopy blue and white with breezes redirected by the forms of men and their forms to be filled out and weighted with murder multiplication tables. Does she rub her legs against the other reflection divorced from secrets in the opened mouths lying under what falls in from above in the forms the bloody forms of blood sustaining life and polluting legs to take their position along paths unhindered by the stains of myths and their roles wrapped in barking wrapped around trees tied up in chainsaws and filling books to embalm old currency sprinkled on stoves to perspire her and her there convincing herself and herself not as much as the other herself who left the malodorous embalming of what was current that inflates its shrinking value with every stroke of the pen with red ink. It comes off in the end they do exploding with the instability they have planted with their seed spilled outside the family's connect the dots and dashes again no channel no channels there are no channels left same channels.
They laid on towels atop one of the many dunes. Serenaded by the wind and buzzing of flies. Hesitant and persistant the bugs that bug that's what they do could fly elsewhere while there is still an elsewhere. What else is there where there is nowhere but elsewhere that drifts further away and drops off the edge of the horizon to come up against it to be behind what they have put behind them. The world shrinks as it dries into one dune while the women sweat to quench thirsts those keeping their heads above to drag ladies down bloodying their wrists even though they have had enough of blood to jerk themselves free of jerks to submerge them below where they would rather not hold their breaths.
One sits up to see the other lying on her towel face up against the blue and the white and the grey of the sky darkened by what has disappeared from the surface and transparent to what was believed to be beyond and impregnate with hot air the two who ignore the buzzing buzz words of those they have put behind them. One of the women hesitates to speak to the other who lies with her chest an echo of the dunes. The other who lies with her chest an echo of the dunes. An echo of the dunes.
They took advantage of the clouds that shielded burned shoulders where children once slept, vomited, and did no such thing. No such thing when advantages are taken and create nothing but the loss of opportunities for finding hidden objects behind the backs back there they still crouched envious of beauty that sizzled releasing its juiciness into reflections within leaking minds that tighten to preserve it.
Andrea was her middle name or her last name, but was her first and now last husband's last name that had been working to rid herself of what she had taken on been given to take care of taken for rides into the desert that had not returned hadn't panned out. She had had no brothers had not wanted any and a brother in the major rescue efforts were no longer necessary too late and emptied of middles, ends, and names and places in the desert that absorbed them all under one word for the void. Not to be known again by any of those names, but what she called her from across from her with her toes and ankles. Crescent formed out of her lips and penetrated her with what it captured in all that had eclipsed her and her returning the light that sought to shame her had not gone out, but captured it as she clung to the rim pulling herself up into the next out of the light and gravity seeking her fall. Damaris sat across from her facing her with a face that had not smiled in many a sunbathing windbathing sandbathing time, but when she had it was like Crescent tried to hold in her hands like the landscape used to be before it was used up like both of them.
Crescent: The flies are back.
Damaris: They don't understand.
Crescent: Unfortunately, I can still understand them.
Damaris: What they want.
Crescent: To annoy.
Damaris: With the same old argument.
Crescent: The one about the indeterminate spontaneity of their random flight patterns.
Damaris: Don't bring up the patterns. Remember?
Crescent: I try not to. You're right about that. The only absolute thing.
Damaris: I have it. Let's stop talking about them all together and they will move on.
Crescent: They just might feel the weight of their own ignorance falling back on their wings to bend them beyond the stressing point with the counter-argument of our own determinism and their predictable failure and they may end up having a rest on us.
Damaris: I kill my imagination a little more everyday with people's endless variations of what they want to impress upon me.
Crescent: I don't think it will rain again.
Damaris: It never rains anymore.
Crescent: Anymore. For us and our attempts to remain or escape the patterns of others.
Damaris: I told you not to bring up the patterns.
Crescent: Sorry, you're right.
Damaris: With every repetition it gets harder to rub off their dirt the dirt they pelt us with. No water to wash it off, but the sweat of our efforts to hold our own against theirs.
Crescent: No water. Salt of the vanished ocean ebbs only in our pores.
Damaris: You say we didn't, but I think we used to lie by the ocean.
Crescent: I'm pretty sure we didn't.
Damaris: You're so convinced, but it could have been a lake probably a man-made one with all the flies. Have you ever had them help you with your memory and your past?
Crescent: Who?
Damaris: Your therapist.
Crescent: There is no therapist. There has never been a therapist.
Damaris: Just like we never lied down on towels by the ocean?
Crescent: I'm getting to you. This might actually strike something down below.
Damaris: Just as dry as it is up here. I am parched all the way down.
Crescent: Even though it frustrates the hell out of me, I still like the way it makes your voice sound.
Damaris: Let's still lie still and maybe the flies will move on.
They both remain silent for a while. The flies leave and quickly come back.
Crescent: Any other ideas?
Damaris: It's possible it was a puddle we used to lay our towels next to. The last drops of an ancient and vast sea.
Crescent: Careful, you almost smiled.
Damaris: It is only a kerf above my chin.
Crescent: Is there some chiseling between the lines on the other side of your mouth the back of the mirror.
Damaris: You can look and gaze all you want and continue to see what you think you see what you want and continue to see you think is there looking at you into what you think is inside you that reflector placed there by men that crouch behind us. Back off back up.
Crescent: I have nowhere else to go.
Damaris: I was not speaking to you. How many times do we need to go over this?
Crescent: I don't know and I don't know if we'll I will well enough will it away from not going over it again I think I learn a little more.
Damaris: A little.
Crescent: Better than nothing.
Damaris: A little is less than enough to see over into the next.
Crescent: I see it or think I see it and think I see that these thoughts are different and more and new. Maybe what's next is not new not different just next and we go over it and go over it.
Damaris: Do you tell her these things?
Crescent: Tell who?
Damaris: Your therapist. Do you tell her what you just told me?
Crescent: There is no therapist. There has never been a therapist.
Damaris: And what are you trying to say now by that?
Crescent: By me by you by that by this by bye bye farewell not to you but to me and to you when to me.
Damaris: I thought I knew what you thought and when you looked away thought I had it right in here and it was you had it with others knowing and thinking your wires as they sparked and fired off at back there and there and here needed to be plugged into and plugged with connections to other connections to ascend the steps where blood ran down from their fountains that recycled only that.
Crescent: Doesn't help me finish it. It never does despite the claims of those who stand up and volunteer behind those who crouch behind us.
Damaris: Behind us without us. Things happen without us. Making plans and other plans overtake us and us and our steps ahead of their plans implications implicate us and hands wave and hold hands feet steps ahead of us and our heads thoughts not much ahead of what's behind us without plans without us and behind us.
Crescent: Besides us used to be the case as things happen as the case to make a case. Break glass in case. Cut feet on broken glass. Give us a break and in our case this is the case in our case of broken glass. Broken windshields broken eyeglasses broken windows broken bottles broken French doors broken sentences broken down broken up upbringing always bringing it up broken no breaks but broken repair each other break each other up breaking rules rules to be broken.
Damaris: Besides behind us hard to put back together the besides that this these thoughts. Broken shattered to see their faces and actually see how many eyes they really have to scare them back more space for now more distance it scares them back back off our backs broken backs back off.
Crescent: No more buzz words. Enough stings from the buzz words. Did you say something? Must be flies buzzing. Fly woman woman fly. Die die die die music can't get loud enough drown them out with brass and basses sawing their noise filled with the buzz words buzzing dung they've been sitting on. What they lie atop they lie and they top it off with what they vomit back back off not an original bone in their bodies only what clings to them fanned by wings those wings so acrobatic styling patterns in the hot air patterns identify patterns put together again together to read their patterns curves and angles sharp as a tack pinning it with patterns to the screen still getting an image start with the edges a pattern familiar rectangle angles and curves patterns.
Damaris: Patterns impressing no one but ourselves with patterns seen stereotyping behind us stereotyping us both patterns humor decays into their patterns. Can't hold your face with the wave of the hand that inadvertently deliberately involuntarily perfunctorily highlights everything all blue blue patterns of blue everything all highlighted and your face and your body scroll away up bring you down with the usual words and your body your face scrolls down below hold on hold on just more than a minute several minutes to hold you in front of me to see more all of you look at me with your expressionless face and melt it before the sun does before the sun before besides behind us scrolls you away with texts of cliches and poetry that tugs and extracts and lands you on the deck of ships returning to turnover yet more turnover.
Crescent: Hold on to your knees and part the doors passing into you without encountering what lies behind and still clings within the halls of preference and patterns the patterns curves and angles less angles more curves circling concentric circles rippling into each other into one thick circle to break the sand around us and let us drop into the lower levels of judgment falling into the plans without us made for us to downfall befall fallen and land afixed upon condemnation and fixed for them to be comforted in their dehydrated expressions chapped minds chafed attachments arms strung together around us in an atmosphere of thought to influence our air and etiolate our skin with their compassionate coercion blanching us into pallid we fade plans fade as their plans darken their plans taking up time taking up space lightening our loads and blenching our expressionless caresses carcasses to nurture nourish themselves being right and forever nibbling on our giving in not giving in not giving in for all their giving.
Damaris: Does your therapist have an agenda for forgiveness?
Crescent: There is no therapist. There has never been a therapist.
Damaris: So you say so.
Crescent: So you say I say so so that you can say what it is that some alleged someone is trying to get me to say what it is you are getting at that I'm not getting at what you're getting at.
Damaris: Alleged allegations allegedly.
Crescent: Allies against alleged allegations.
Damaris: We beat around the bush.
Crescent: Can't put my finger on it.
Damaris: Please do before another pattern draws us away as we only insinuate and internalize or externalize putting what is behind us to follow behind in the margins between our thoughts. I want to hear you sneeze after a wind blows the dust that makes you do that. You roll your eyes with an expression of surreal passion that cannot stave off the release and contortions your body goes through. Watching your chest undulate with the tremor and settle. Most of all there is the awkward look on your face making you look like I am about to find you at the end of a harrowing episode. Sounds weird weirder than the ridiculous sound you make, but it's like you said a little a little something better nothing. The wind brings the dust, but not often enough. Is there some idiosyncracy of mine that provides you with a slight satisfaction?
Crescent: I'm thinking, but all I get is this all too high definition image of my ex-husband preferring to wear his sunglasses while taking a piss. Let me see or don't let me see it's so visual there about you no not you wait has to be when you in the elevator that's someone else the man my boss when he doesn't like the smell of someone who just got on the elevator and his eyes have that look of helplessness and then anger and the scrunching of the nose both to not let other people know and to let other people know let me know how he really felt. Something about that, but that's not you no. Had nothing to do with you. This is hard. Still searching the database. Probably in a sub sub subfolder somewhere in the directory you know.
Damaris: Don't hurt your memory card.
Crescent: Saw a card at the store with a little girl and her dog and stood there holding it for several minutes and realized the dog reminded me of this dog we used to have don't remember how old and I wonder what happened to that dog it was there in the backyard my parents never interacted with it that I could remember think so and then one day it was gone after we had moved I think it was and then when I tried to talk about it my parents said "what dog?" tried to act like it didn't exist when it did exist and then I was insistent enough they said it was gone because I was allergic to animals. And I went to a pet store looking for a dog just like that one could never find it, but I never sneezed. It has always been dust the dust blown by the wind the blown dust. Life has been nothing but wind blowing things into me and away from me.
Damaris: And we run after it so we stay ahead of whatever we leave behind us. We stay a few more steps ahead.
Crescent: Don't let up they don't let up. Would very much relish their being taken away by the wind and we stay still. Look up every day to see if they are still there while we stay and the dunes shave as we shave the insect hairs be taken away take them away and the dunes shave themselves with the blade of the wind and all that is revealed is that through all our sweat and blood and awkward idiosyncracies that they get unburied. The monuments all the monuments unburied and resculpted by the shaving wind that wields it sculpting blade to cut again into the shrines to tragedy. They grow back the insect hairs to cut them again they cut again with the blade of the wind shaving and leaving cuts and monuments exhumed to remember to dismember again.
Damaris: Faint clay to put the impressions of toys that for faint moments push against the impressions that get left the deepest until the clay hardens and is permanent to put behind us impressing upon us the so-called importance of their words impressed upon our cartilage. What impressions have you processed with your therapist?
Crescent: There is no therapist. There has never been a therapist.
Damaris: Put your hands on me on my legs in our sweat and blood and press hard on my knee jerk reactions. That kick at your expressionless face waiting for it to melt or burn or darken or for the wind to blow the dust that awkward expressionless face torn in two where your pictures of me are ripped again by a memory put in mother's little blender. Half blue all blue clay permanent can't break against this surface we lie within all picture termed dust blown run after stay stay still behind us put built into the landscape dries it out to shave away and scroll up and away into a voice a whisper naming the expressionless face to give it more contour half memory blended into each other mother no picture of me or it was folded and torn carefully or hazardously carelessly blue all blue high speaking to the f l hen note worthless expressionl f l f don't bl o w m e a w a y
- Max Stoltenberg
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