7:06
bringing a new weight to the words "high and dry,"
she crushes ten 0.5 milligram pills of xanax with the **** end of a spoon,
puts half of it up her nose, mixes the rest into a bottle of water along with a koolaid packet.

8:47
bringing a new weight to the words "high and dry,"
she pulls three more pills from an empty lipstick tube in her bag,
chases them with her koolaid xanax cocktail and checks her email:
for every day that she doesn't change her underwear, she makes twenty dollars,
mrsympatico@gmail.com tells her.

9:32
bringing a new weight to the words "high and dry,"
she snorts three more fat discolored lines in a public bathroom with her best friend.
her friend crushed the pills with a pen that clicked every time she pressed down;
breathe in fast and hold your ******* breath.

10:15
bringing a new weight to the words "high and dry,"
she takes her last pill of the day.
today has cost her at least thirty dollars
as she makes a career out of killing herself.

There are sketches on the walls of men and women and ducks,
and outside a large green bus swerves through traffic like
insanity sprung from a waving line; Turgenev, Turgenev,
says the radio, and Jane Austin, Jane Austin, too.
"I am going to do her portrait on the 28th, while you are
at work."
He is just this edge of fat and he walks constantly, he
fritters; they have him; they are eating him hollow like
a webbed fly, and his eyes are red-suckled with anger-fear.
He feels hatred and discard of the world, sharper than
his razor, and his gut-feel hangs like a wet polyp; and he
self-decisions himself defeated trying to shake his
hung beard from razor in water (like life), not warm enough.
Daumier. Rue Transonian, le 15 Avril, 1843. (lithograph.)
Paris, Bibliotheque Nationale.
"She has a face unlike that of any woman I have ever known."
"What is it? A love affair?"
"Silly. I can't love a woman. Besides, she's pregnant."
I can paint- a flower eaten by a snake; that sunlight is a
lie; and that markets smell of shoes and naked boys clothed,
and that under everything some river, some beat, some twist that
clambers along the edge of my temple and bites nip-dizzy. . .
men drive cars and paint their houses,
but they are mad; men sit in barber chairs; buy hats.
Corot. Recollection of Mortefontaine.
Paris, Louvre.
"I must write Kaiser, though I think he's a homosexual."
"Are you still reading Freud?"
"Page 299."
She made a little hat and he fastened two snaps under one
arm, reaching up from the bed like a long feeler from the
snail, and she went to church, and he thought now I h've
time and the dog.
About church: the trouble with a mask is it
never changes.
So rude the flowers that grow and do not grow beautiful.
So magic the chair on the patio that does not hold legs
and belly and arm and neck and mouth that bites into the
wind like the ned of a tunnel.
He turned in bed and thought: I am searching for some
segment in the air. It floats about the peoples heads.
When it rains on the trees it sits between the branches
warmer and more blood-real than the dove.
Orozco. Christ Destroying the Cross.
Hanover, Dartmouth College, Baker Library.
He burned away in his sleep.

(Vers écrits au-dessous d'une tête de femme dessinée sur le mur.)


Qui que tu sois, je t'en conjure,
Mets ton lit de l'autre côté.
Ne traîne pas ta couverture
Sur le sein déjà maltraité
De cette douce créature.
Un crayon plein d'habileté
Créa son aimable figure,
Qui respire la volupté.
Elle est belle, laisse-la pure.

I had a dream about you. Gentle grunts pushed out of your lips as my hands wrapped a compress around your aged skin. Bullet wounds had become a mundane part our days, as did new spaces.  We were assassins, on the run from any type of law. Evasion and hiding were all we knew at this point. That and each other , and frankly that’s all we really needed. Eventually we ensconced ourselves in a little flat in Marrakesh. Haunted by the beams of sunrise, we spoke about everything from simple quandaries to wistful thoughts of our past life together . Recurrent remnants that only revealed them selves when I saw you look out coldly into the distance. You told me about how much you used to have a crush on me. I told you how I struggled to learn Russian. “Это не простой язык.” You smile , the little things always make you smile. As we kiss ,a bang on our fortified door happens. The sûreté nationale had us cornered. I panic, pondering. How did the find us so quickly !? A swan like movement was all it took and in a moment I was ready with an Ak-47 in hand  and duffle bag of cash on my back. To my surprise I looked over and saw you lounging on the chair drinking the last of your scotch-whiskey, head seemingly clouded. I was confused. The door was on the verge of being breached and with an  accent originating from south Staraya (acquired from years of missions in the motherland ) you speak. “ I’m tired of running, Isaiah.I’ve spent my whole life running, Ive spent it hiding and repressing….thinking and crying. I’m tired of that.” I grieved for those words as they left the solace of your thoughts “ When I was a child all I ever wanted to do was play, but they wouldn’t let me. All I ever wanted to do was be free!” , a cold silence fills the air “…but they wouldn’t let me.” Your pain reminiscent of time long ago in place very far away

A séance ensuded in my mind as I recalled a version of you and I that had retained some, if any innocence. Tears cascading down your tawny skin, you wept to me just before dawn had set. Life to you became unbearable as you reveal all the things that brought pain. Telling me stories of ****, neglect and so much more in your youth. Not to mention the trifecta of abuse by your parents, leaving menatal, physical, and emotional scars for many day, months, and years to come.” I just want to  leave” you whispered into my chest. In a calm reflective tone I asked” where would you go?”  You whispered “Far away.” Dawn had just begun and rays of sun snuck through the blinds of my apartment in Fullerton. “ What would you do?” Without thinking you unborrowed your head and gave a stare of passionate indiffernece to the world and eveything encompassed in it. ”Anything I want”. We shared a silence.

The thought of loving someone with all my being used to scare me. I used to have mild fits of terror, shocked by how it can destroy a man from the inside out. It just seems like a black hole. So it holds good logic that by the time I realzied what my heart held dearest was you, I couldnt do much about. It was malignant. Seeing your face that morning and knowing how you felt brought me to a place of desperation. I knew then and there that I’d do anything for you. So I made promises, I told you that we could go, that I’d run with you, and we’d never look back… and thats exactly what we did.

 That is to say, I wasnt proud of what we did. We went from average citizens to killers for hire. But I was happy with what we accomplished, for we had captured paradise on earth. We didnt answer to anyone.We didnt need to worry about relatively anything and most importantly we didnt have to do anything we didnt want to do. We were free, or at the very least, as close as one could get to it.

Snapping out of my momentary trance, I see you move and hear the breaking of the door. Berreta in hand you took to your feet and aimed at the door. “They’ll NEVER let us be free, so-” I aim my AK at the remains of our door way and reply “ We must take our freedom .” In one final solemn moment we shared two sets of final words “je t'aime —–.” “ я люблю тебя, Isaiah.” Instantly the room was raided, Shell casings rained down , cleansing all impurities.



We died. We were free.

C'était grande assemblée des Fées, pour procéder à la répartition des dons parmi tous les nouveau-nés, arrivés à la vie depuis vingt-quatre heures.

Toutes ces antiques et capricieuses Sœurs du Destin, toutes ces Mères bizarres de la joie et de la douleur, étaient fort diverses : les unes avaient l'air sombre et rechigné, les autres, un air folâtre et malin ; les unes, jeunes, qui avaient toujours été jeunes ; les autres, vieilles, qui avaient toujours été vieilles.

Tous les pères qui ont foi dans les Fées étaient venus, chacun apportant son nouveau-né dans ses bras.

Les Dons, les Facultés, les bons Hasards, les Circonstances invincibles, étaient accumulés à côté du tribunal, comme les prix sur l'estrade, dans une distribution de prix. Ce qu'il y avait ici de particulier, c'est que les Dons n'étaient pas la récompense d'un effort, mais tout au contraire une grâce accordée à celui qui n'avait pas encore vécu, une grâce pouvant déterminer sa destinée et devenir aussi bien la source de son malheur que de son bonheur.

Les pauvres Fées étaient très-affairées ; car la foule des solliciteurs était grande, et le monde intermédiaire, placé entre l'homme et Dieu, est soumis comme nous à la terrible loi du Temps et de son infinie postérité, les Jours, les Heures, les Minutes, les Secondes.

En vérité, elles étaient aussi ahuries que des ministres un jour d'audience, ou des employés du Mont-de-Piété quand une fête nationale autorise les dégagements gratuits. Je crois même qu'elles regardaient de temps à autre l'aiguille de l'horloge avec autant d'impatience que des juges humains qui, siégeant depuis le matin, ne peuvent s'empêcher de rêver au dîner, à la famille et à leurs chères pantoufles. Si, dans la justice surnaturelle, il y a un peu de précipitation et de hasard, ne nous étonnons pas qu'il en soit de même quelquefois dans la justice humaine. Nous serions nous-mêmes, en ce cas, des juges injustes.

Aussi furent commises ce jour-là quelques bourdes qu'on pourrait considérer comme bizarres, si la prudence, plutôt que le caprice, était le caractère distinctif, éternel des Fées.

Ainsi la puissance d'attirer magnétiquement la fortune fut adjugée à l'héritier unique d'une famille très-riche, qui, n'étant doué d'aucun sens de charité, non plus que d'aucune convoitise pour les biens les plus visibles de la vie, devait se trouver plus **** prodigieusement embarrassé de ses millions.

Ainsi furent donnés l'amour du Beau et la Puissance poétique au fils d'un sombre gueux, carrier de son état, qui ne pouvait, en aucune façon, aider les facultés, ni soulager les besoins de sa déplorable progéniture.

J'ai oublié de vous dire que la distribution, en ces cas solennels, est sans appel, et qu'aucun don ne peut être refusé.

Toutes les Fées se levaient, croyant leur corvée accomplie ; car il ne restait plus aucun cadeau, aucune largesse à jeter à tout ce fretin humain, quand un brave homme, un pauvre petit commerçant, je crois, se leva, et empoignant par sa robe de vapeurs multicolores la Fée qui était le plus à sa portée, s'écria :

« Eh ! madame ! vous nous oubliez ! Il y a encore mon petit ! Je ne veux pas être venu pour rien. »

La Fée pouvait être embarrassée ; car il ne restait plus rien. Cependant elle se souvint à temps d'une loi bien connue, quoique rarement appliquée, dans le monde surnaturel, habité par ces déités impalpables, amies de l'homme, et souvent contraintes de s'adapter à ses passions, telles que les Fées, les Gnomes, les Salamandres, les Sylphides, les Sylphes, les Nixes, les Ondins et les Ondines, - je veux parler de la loi qui concède aux Fées, dans un cas semblable à celui-ci, c'est-à-dire le cas d'épuisement des lots, la faculté d'en donner encore un, supplémentaire et exceptionnel, pourvu toutefois qu'elle ait l'imagination suffisante pour le créer immédiatement.

Donc la bonne Fée répondit, avec un aplomb digne de son rang : « Je donne à ton fils... je lui donne... le Don de plaire ! »

« Mais plaire comment ? plaire... ? plaire pourquoi ? » demanda opiniâtrément le petit boutiquier, qui était sans doute un de ces raisonneurs si communs, incapable de s'élever jusqu'à la logique de l'Absurde.

« Parce que ! parce que ! » répliqua la Fée courroucée, en lui tournant le dos ; et rejoignant le cortège de ses compagnes, elle leur disait : « Comment trouvez-vous ce petit Français vaniteux, qui veut tout comprendre, et qui ayant obtenu pour son fils le meilleur des lots, ose encore interroger et discuter l'indiscutable ? »