Nothing Prepares

The real world is a mystery, what the crows speak, the darting chameleons, spiders spinning webs, an unknown thing, just beyond our imagining. You'd never suspect I knew what you were talking about, what was meant by any particular thing. I merely watch, nothing more. The future. Thoreau saw something, a world denuded, still, I hold my ridge. Just before dark tonight, the fox came to the compost pile. I'm in the throes of rotating stock in the pantry, cleaning the fridge, I hate to throw away food, but there comes a time. Sling-bladed a path to the outhouse and out to where I park the truck, what passes as yard-work. I'm green from head to toe, the sap still rises. Try to fight it, but I fail in almost every particular. Skink and mouse shit mocks me. Betty Crocker I'm not. Something bit me but it doesn't seem to be serious, a welt, nothing more. What you can live with. A sliding scale. The fox does her dog-like digging to recover some moldy beets which she seems to enjoy, I'm curious about digestive systems but have no one to ask. An older couple came into the museum, they'd bought an old building in town and there was a painting on the wall, vaguely like a Bierstadt or a Francis Church, that school, the romanticized west, probably a copy, but we have to go see. I'm amazed how quickly I see what it might be, the schools we fall into. How Picasso was taken with Chauvet, the way the line changed. A quick stroke then away to the hunt. It's never over, you claim the ridge, and immediately there's discussion of drainage rights. There's a limo waiting for you. Do you want to take it or not? The ghetto or China Town. The sound track shifts, a samba, whoever you're with moves her hips in a certain way, something takes you attention. I cry at the drop of a hat, one reason I live alone, I wouldn't want anyone to see my misery, but did you see that, the way I cried out in the night? Elvis Costello. Emmy Lou. I could never be a lawyer but I'd be a good judge. Okay, Tennessee Jed. Drink all day and rock all night. No place I'd rather be. I want to sit right down, make a pallet on the floor. Set this heart on fire. Nothing but sugar cane. Wrap you up in cellophane, no place like home, are those handcuffs or are you just happy to see me? It's not very far, sugarcane. I'd like to be more removed but I find myself in the thick of it. Tell me, darling, is it true? In the gloaming a shaft of light. What do you believe? Why? There's an ambiguity between what's seen and what might be seen. I don't have the time to go back in time, but memory is everything, a cover of a Grateful Dead song, where I come from, I'd know you.