NEEDLING

What to do? Listening to the repetitive instrument. Solo Piano, by Philip Glass.

Ric said many things. Among other words, he said:

"Leave it alone after this
It is fine”



III       Unheard song
from Vacuum Dance

            1

We rolled along
ascended the coastline
to this place on the map
top right of my mind.

We found black pebbles
on the beach
our bodies bending
at our waist
at our knees
picking pebbles like small petunias.

The waves are dogs crazed
friendly but don't touch
don't carelessly jump
and don't caress the wind
a mad woman blowing nubiferous songs in your face.

Over the waves the rocks are silent
comfortably cold
overlooking the water at a hundred feet.

Steeped strephonades I sing.

The clouds, the way
they move through the sky
like big floppy bellies
going in separate directions
listening
to the sea beating the bottom of the cliff.

I was the earth moving
a great big ship going nowhere.

            2

Pale blues barely
blue
just almost gray with sand.

Rivulets crawling
laughing tickles of water
through the beach towards the sea
like an arousal
a cry
endlessly coming back
through the sand
into the bay
where the waves are cold
I know
I was wadding my feet.

I was looking at a dead
black-backed sea gull
its carcass halfway gone already
eaten by fish and other gulls.

I ventured further into the waves
rolling up my pants
the carcass floated out of my reach
I had a long stick
to help me prod.

                         Let it go, what'you gonna do with a dead bird?
                         I don't know. I want to see.
                         Let it go, what'you gonna do with a dead bird?
                         I don't know. I want to see.
                         Let it go, what'you gonna do with a dead bird?
                         I don't know. I went to sea ...

            3

An unpaved road
into the woods
into the hinterlands
the backwoods
with an old wooden shack
at the end
burnt down to the muddy ground
and a rotten mattress
eaten by mites and the cold
with springs sticking out
rusted.

She stopped the car.
She had to piss.

Steam came up
from the frozen leaves.
I watched.
She had a hot ass
or she was full of hot piss
or both.

Back in her car
in the backseat
I had her knees
cupped in my hands
pushing them apart.

...

She had to piss again.
Me too.

Nothing like pissing
after sex in the backseat of her car
on a freezing afternoon
and her just one tree over
also pissing.

Tickling a subtle melody
of happy thoughts and frozen squirrels
we laughed as we pissed
we laughed
we pissed as we laughed.

There was laughter all around us.

She was the earth moving
a great big nubiferous ship
going somewhere
or possibly nowhere in the lactic skies.