Circle of Life

I'm full of myself.
Sometimes I wonder what would happen if someone else came in and wrote a blog post as me. What would they say? Would they project my own ideals and opinions or would they type what they perceive of me? And if I were to hack into someone Else's blog... what would I write?

Goodnight, dear void.

What's the point of forgetting if it's followed by dying?

I really am trying. I swear.

I once started filming a movie (with some friends) about a person who would start crossword puzzles but never finish them. Actually, I'm not sure he even started, he might have just thought about starting. I think that's how it was. But he was always certain that he could finish if he wanted to. The sequel to that movie might involve him actually trying to finish a crossword puzzle and failing. It would be devastating to him, but at the same time, it would only confirm all of his unspoken suspicions.

Also, keep your eyes open for Newsies 2: Life in Santa Fe. *Spoiler alert* It's actually about a teenage girl who becomes so obsessed with the movie Newsies that she believes that she must live out the rest of Jack's life by traveling to Santa Fe and fulfilling his dream. (Is that his name? Jack? I'll have to check that before I write/direct/produce the sequel.) But don't worry, I won't tell you here whether or not she succeeds. You'll have to wait 'til it hits the dollar theaters to find out. Or maybe it'll go straight to VHS.

Poems on death

I wrote this one year ago today. That's why I'm posting it now. I mention it here. I do plan on reading that talk again tomorrow. I think it'll be appropriate once again.

I

I want to talk about my dog -

In June, she was dying from cancer
and I went out to say goodbye to her
before I left on a trip.

We had carried her down the steps to the grass where she could lie in the shade
and we had covered her with a faded brown towel to keep the flies off –
we had tried to pick off the maggots that had already hatched from the eggs they were laying.

As I laid my hands gently on her
this is what I said to her:

How’re you doing, dog?
Are you alright?
I wish I could do something for you.

Dog, do you remember
how when I first got you,
when I called you puppy,
that you spent the night
in a brown cardboard box
and we would take you out
to hold you?

Do you remember that
when you grew a little
I would take you out
to the front yard and
play with you on the grass?

Do you remember that you
didn’t run away then?
Do you remember, dog,
that later we had to keep
you fenced in the back yard
but that you only jumped
that fence one time?

Do you remember how high
you would jump next to that
fence without pulling yourself
over?

Did you choose not to make
that leap out of love, or out
of fear, dog?

Do you remember winters and snow and you would jump, rabbit-like, through it while we watched from inside the house and laughed?

Do you remember thunder, dog?
Or have you chosen to forget
how it tormented you?

Do you remember the nights
when I sat with you and held
you to comfort you until
the storm had passed?
Do you remember how I would
talk to you in those early morning hours
and tell you secrets that I never
told anyone else?

Have you kept those secrets, dog?

Do you remember the nights when
you would jump and whine out
of fear of the thunder, and I would
close my door downstairs and
pretend that I couldn’t hear you?

Can you forgive me, Dog?

Then I spoke to her in Spanish,
telling her all the secrets that
I have never told to anyone.

I looked at my faded brown dog,
and watched her slow breath
and felt her shiver
and I said a prayer:

Let her die, God.
Let her die.


II


A month after my dog died,
I met you.

I told you about her,
and how she never
jumped over the fence
in our back yard.

I didn’t tell you that
one time, she did
make it over.

You said that maybe
God sees us jumping like
I saw my dog
and wishes we would
pull ourselves over.

I didn’t tell you that
I had been terrified that
my dog would clear that fence.


III


It’s been more than a year since
my grandmother died of cancer.

I was alone with her when a nurse
came with forms for her to fill out.

What should we do if your heart stops?
she asked.

Let me die was my
grandma’s answer.

If you stop breathing?
Let me die.

If you enter a coma?
If you lose consciousness?
If you can’t swallow your food?

Do not resuscitate.
Let me die.


IV


If I don’t dream of you at night,
it’s not because I’m not trying.

Wind in dry corn is an autumnal silence

That's the kind of line you write in your mind after your first few minutes biking into the wind on a gravel road when you're trying to avoid thinking about other things. And when you have to stop to take a picture of that dry corn.

Every solitary child rules the universe

So I can now add pear cheese pie to this list.

This is why I should have just skipped everything else and gone to Thomas Pynchon from the start

From Vineland:

Question was, would it be this time, or one of the next few times? Should he wait for another spin? It was like being on "Wheel of Fortune," only here there were no genial vibes from any Pat Sajak to find comfort in, no tanned and beautiful Vanna White at the corner of his vision to cheer on the Wheel, to wish him well, to flip over one by one letters of a message he knew he didn't want to read anyway.

As per your request

I want to know the trees

Powerpoint slides – a novelty
in my high school – taught me the
trees. Fifty of them: Common name,
Scientific name, Principal identifying
characteristics. Populus tremuloides, Little-
leaf Linden, Weeping White birch,
Acer negundo. Amateur pronunciations

of Latin drew snickers at times: Salix
matsudana, Catalpa bignoides. I’ve
forgotten most of what I learned. Now

I want to start again, but this
time not just fifty, this time all of
them. Starting with the leaves, and
moving down. From the trunk down,
without looking up: I know you.
Eventually, just from the roots. The

reaching I recognize, the suction I
feel unmistakably: I know you.

Then from trees to birds: Harrier,
Cooper’s hawk, blackbirds. A chasing
game? Or life and death? Mimus
polyglottis: So you know him also?

A feather, this flutter: I know you.
And from there: roads, books, oceans,
fields, Cracks, waves, flashes: I know you.

I want to sense your footstep,
hear your feeling: I know you.

July and November

So if the luckiest guy in the world ended up not being quite as lucky as he had originally thought, he might incorrectly think that he wasn't really the luckiest guy in the world, or that he was no longer the luckiest guy in the world. And it might take a few months before he again realized that his luck never really changed.