Lagging ahead dust piles up inside the lines shapes of the contemporary tomorrow blurring into the old passed out on a slug's slime trail next to the fractured portraiture hung over riding a dune that's not right riding a wave a wave of the dune that's not right held over for some period of time
"How insightful."
Lagging ahead dust piles up inside
"Same thing coming around the bend once more."
"Didn't notice a bend."
Lagging ahead dust piles up inside the lines shapes of the contemporary tomorrow blurring
"Hold on. My turn with that."
"That should be no problem with being held over and waves of dunes of waves overriding periods."
"Overriding periods?"
"Periods of time that is."
"Periods of time lagging ahead."
Bloody punctuation marks skidding across as it all elapses lagging ahead dust piles up inside the lines shapes of the contemporary tomorrow blurring into the old passed out on a slug's slime trail next to the fractured portraiture hung over riding a dune that's not right riding a wave a wave of the dune that's not right held over for some
"For some . . . go on."
"For some time."
"Is that how you're consolidating it now?"
"Consolidating?"
"Another one of your reductionisms."
"Reductionisms. I used to have those when I had a small opinion on a subject or when I could manage to find an unfinished cigar and my lighter before it ran out of fluid my efforts were reduced to ashes."
"That pretty much sums up your life."
"And that would be one of your reductionisms."
"And I would be correct."
"Ashes are for building reductionisms."
"That wouldn't necessarily knock off that interviewer's fishing hat."
"Who's fishing hat?"
"The interviewer's. We've been over this."
"I don't doubt we've been over this, but what interviewer are you referring to?"
"The guy who stepped out from behind the bushes when we descended into the wash."
"We came into this world descending and it hasn't let up since."
"You know which bushes I'm talking about. We both commented regarding how many there were and how thick they were even with so little rain no rain in fact and this guy kind of tall comes out from behind those thick bushes and he pulls out a microphone from under his fishing hat and starts interviewing us."
"I know which bushes you're talking about and you don't know what bushes I'm thinking of."
"I couldn't give him any satisfactory answers because during most of the interview I was distracted by whether or not his microphone cord was attached to anything."
"Just when I start identifying her patterns her themes only then she fades out of my memory and her smell was the first aspect to disappear so quickly it disappeared without a trace."
"I thought I'd catch a glimpse of the end of his microphone cord plugged into nothing lying on the naked dirt but no I was sidetracked by his questions trying to follow the microphone cord as it wrapped around one of the larger weeds moving myself to get a better angle not finding where it plugged in not finding the end of it."
"That's why many times I'd fall behind when we walked and until she'd realize I wasn't beside her my falling behind allowed the wind if there was one to blow the smell of her into me and her dress when she wore one she had a lot of pants would flap like I was on the deck of on the top of over a surface below that's not right below surface that's not right never been imagined it sometimes."
"Imagined what?"
"Imagined it sometimes. You imagined it. The interviewer and his microphone and his questions."
"I did not imagine it."
"The Sun. It's been getting to you."
"Sure, blame it on the Sun."
"Sooner or later the Sun gets to you gets to all of us. Its story its narrative is so absorbing. Gives us life. Warms our stone cold core until it burns us away and prolongs this deep fried thin existence until a couple billion years later it'll eventually engulf us all so much for trying to make sure books are kept from the flames."
"I didn't imagine it."
"You didn't imagine what?"
"The guy who stepped out."
"The only guy you saw stepping out was me after I took a shit."
"I didn't know you had it in you."
"That was a long time ago now. I don't have it in me anymore."
"And there we have it. Any hint of a road is far behind us. The wash continues on like the microphone cord not finding the end of it until the impression it makes in the terrain disappears as the paths we took erased still I thought I'd catch a glimpse of it moving myself to get a better angle not finding where it plugged in not finding the end of it."
Come at it with a blade already dripping with medicine rupturing on a steaming tongue searching for an elusive swallow of water applauding only to try to smash a gnat and watch it ascend away from spectacles following now following for now patterns of alternating cracks and fingerprint smudges all before eyes eyes roll in a pool of fog and chlorine what the hell is that in the overturned cup all for naughtiness dominoes in burned pasta come at it with a blade already dripping with medicine rupturing on a steaming tongue searching for an elusive swallow of water applauding only to try to smash a gnat and watch it ascend away from spectacles following now following for now.
- Max Stoltenberg
