Without Eyes or Force

my king, my god

barely recognizable in the wind

shining in the moonlight

my king, my god

its shape incomprehensible

in the swirling phenomena

of a myriad structures and forms

that surround it.

It devours all true memory

all sense of the past

is torn away

from underneath me

leaving me cold and alone

hesitant and uncertain.

Here, in this place,

I see

it is thinking that began time,

and language that gave it shape.

And now time stirs

revealing the hidden treasures

of entropy and death.

Certain questions will

forever remain

suspended in space

without answers

without conclusions

vibrant in their

refusal to fall.

Meanwhile

behind the black curtain

the night envelops me

and a body

without eyes or force

forever becomes

movement

a sound

vibrating air

somehow shining

in the moonlight.

Howl

Wolf, she swallows a small chunk of blackened meat left in the fire’s ashes.  There are small embers aglow beneath a blanket of gray and black and a tiny mountain of white flecks light as snow. 
She looks up as the first of the pack begins to howl. It begins with an itch on the consciousness of one and then instinctively they are called to join, a reflex that snaps with the first yip.  She turns her head up to the sky and lets out a long, high-pitched call.
The night above is dark blue with an undertone of brightness that seems to hold promise in its colored grasp.  The sky is alive, not yet awakened by stars, but aware and vibrant and glowing with a richness that washes over the landscape like a heavy rain, bringing a softness with it that echoes the cacophony of the pack. 
Her mouth is open and her eyes are closed. All her concentration, the very breath moving through her, the essential quality of her nature comes out in that long extended howl. 
The pack of twelve send their signal to the moon, which is not yet present above the thick line of pine trees.  They call to others like them divided by swaths of jagged mountains and forests so dense and moist that sunlight has given up its desire to penetrate the lush darkness. The pack sings out in a momentary unison of collective song.
Perhaps the wind will take their unbridled spirits and push it up and over to the other side of the living mountains, across the sea and mermaid bones, over to the deserts and ranges unfamiliar to wolves, where the people there have never heard the call or seen the craned necks and mouths reaching to the twilight sky.
This is when the circles begin, the moon has risen and its white glowing light resonates in their throats.  The wind becomes rain. Water and fire turn to earth. Stone warms its face against the fallen sun and the howling continues. 
Their eyes are squinted shut, their heads upturned to the deep blue approaching night.  The first of the stars has begun to sparkle low in the sky.
Their sound creates the anvil of construction. Used to create and forge, to fuse light and melt forever with the burning flames high up above.

Poem Of The Dragon

We were all sitting around in a circle in the living room when the doorbell rang.  Bright and clear.  Like Isabel’s voice on green hills. It rang again as I day dreamed. I jolted awake, eager to see what lay on the other side.
Standing illuminated in the glow from our weak porch light was a green dragon. He was not the giant lizard of old fairy tales, larger than ten buildings, but he was taller, thicker, and more scaly than me. Standing at least seven feet tall, I craned my neck backwards, feeling the back of my head touch my back as I stared up at him. I could see my own stunned reflection staring back at me in his glassy eyes. 
I thought that I detected green and scales, smelt burning embers that somehow reminded me of clean wind just above the clouds, but I was most entranced by these smooth yellow eyes.  I sunk into them, for as I said, I could see myself as he saw me, a nervous woman stunned by a creature she had only read about, but I could also see my form as the world he came from would see me.
I was blue and purple, a nebulous shape that was held together only by the tiniest strings, like blowing scarves stuck to a clothesline in spring.  In his world, my flesh had already fallen, my colors were already singing. 
Seeing the mixture of confusion and wonder in my eyes, sensing that perhaps the neighbors would begin to feel that something was amiss, somehow telepathically as nosy neighbors can, he cleared his throat and a few fiery embers escaped his jaws as he opened his mouth.
I shifted attention from his eyes to the tiny bits of flame that rose into the night like orange fairies. 
“Excuse me for that.  I am here for the writer’s meeting.  I am Maurice.  I brought some of my work.  I hope I am not to late.”
For a moment my mouth would not move, I must have lost control as I voyaged into his world. Coming back into mine, I could feel my tongue was stuck somewhere behind my teeth. Pursing my mouth together, I found the little bit of moisture that remained. 
The underlying sweetness of his voice echoed between us, as clear and bright as the doorbell had been.  Like Isabel’s voice on a green hillside. 
We met eyes once again, “Oh yes, come in,” I managed to say, using my best hostess voice.  Opening the door wider and stepping aside, he crossed the threshold, forever entering our tiny world within a world. 
As he passed, coming from the night into the daylight we created, I looked down at his hands, where hands would have been if he were human.  What he had were scaly green arms that ended in long yellowish-white claws that doubled as hands. Using both claws he held onto a thin manila folder, the kind used in offices around the world, which I assumed contained his written words.
It was only a few steps from the door to the living room.  As I followed his thin trail of smoky air, I saw the stunned looks waiting in their chairs, looking the same as I must have.
“This is Maurice,” I announced.  “He’s a writer here for the meeting.” 
Several people nodded obediently, taking the information in, the lifelong schooling in American social politeness not failing them yet. 
“Maurice, I’m going to get another chair from the kitchen for you.” 
Stepping away I could hear the awkward silence beginning, though just as that void opened, it was filled with the steady voice of Chester, perfectly timed to avoid any crash in energy.
“What do you write Maurice?”
“Mostly poetry.  I just started writing really.”
“That’s ok. Everyone is welcome here.”
I walked back into the room with a slightly worn metal folding chair in my hands, seeing polite nods from the gathered writers as the encouraging statement reverberated around the room. 
“Here’s a chair for you.  Let’s kind of... rearrange the chairs so there’s still a clear circle.” 
We took a moment to do this.
I could feel slight tension in the room, more palpable than just the usual bit of nerves that seemed to accompany all the writers that came to our house.  Jen slipped me a nervous look, her eyes were questioning, perhaps looking at me like I understood something that she didn’t, wondering, most likely, what a dragon was doing in our house.  I had no answer, I looked away.
Chester began:
“Ok, thanks for coming everyone.  For those of you that haven’t been here before, we take turns reading our work, or someone else can read it for you if you like.  Afterwards, we discuss it.  When you make a comment, try to give your impression and reactions. Talk about the way it made you feel or if there were any parts that were confusing. In general, try to avoid saying if it was good or not. Stick to how it made you feel.  Ok Jen, do you want to go first?”
“Sure.  This is the second half of the story I read last week.”
She looked down at her lap, to the story that was already sitting there on neatly typed pages, and began to read. Her words went into me.  The same flowing, evocatively descriptive work I was used to. 
Interested in reactions, I looked around the room.  Maurice sat with his eyes closed. The scales between his eyes were ruffled as though listening intently.  Small bursts of steam shot out from his nose in intervals, growing more steady and thick as the tension in her story mounted. 
I looked up and noticed Scott was not watching Jen reading either. His attention was on Maurice, watching his recurring bouts of steam and hiss, entranced as I was. Scott’s eyes were wider than usual as he watched steam evaporate delicately into the middle of the room. Looking up suddenly he caught me watching him, his eyes full of questions. I was as surprised as he was.
When Jen was done reading, I snapped back into writer’s meeting mode, listening as each person gave their reactions.  We went around the circle, taking turns.  Maurice opened his mouth to speak and more orange embers escaped.
“I felt like crying when the baby was drowned by the crashing waves.  It was beautifully described.  I could really feel the emotional pain.” 
There were nods from those around the circle. 
Chester went next, reading in his barely accented voice the short story of one sunny afternoon in his childhood.  Maurice did not close his eyes this time, he stared at Chester, his yellow eyes growing wider as the dialogue unfolded like a sweet smelling flower.  Smoldering smoke came from his ears, slithering up into the air in quiet movement.  Jen coughed, reacting to the extra smoke in the room.  Chester coughed every once in a while, giving Maurice a curious look every time he did so.
When it was Maurice’s turn, all eyes turned towards him. 
“Ok, this is a short poem I wrote a few months ago. I have it memorized.” 
There were nods all around the room.  I felt my heart begin to pound as he readied himself, that uncomfortable feeling in my chest when the energy has mounted and soon we will be at the cliff’s edge.
He closed his eyes, his wide bulging lids seemed to be made of a thin green skin, though I thought I could detect the yellow of his eyes glowing beneath them like little lamps. 
The room was quiet.  The skin around his mouth began to move, twitching as though out of his control.  It went on like this for half a minute and we exchanged nervous glances, for we were not used to silence among us. 
Then the scaly skin on his nose began to twitch as well, joining he erratic bursts of his closed mouth.  A grumble came from deep within him, somewhere in his gut, though it sounded like a call from another world.  He opened his mouth and several deep and extended syllables emerged, through none of them sounded like the English he had spoken to us all night. 
I craned by neck towards him, hoping the gesture would bring me closer to understanding. Just as I did, I was met by a wall of pure fire.  I could smell singed carpet, I saw the black spots of melted nylon. 
I looked at Sophie who sat across from Maurice, her long blond hair now singed to the ears.  Maurice opened his eyes. One final burst of steam rose from his ears. 
He looked around the room.
“The fire comes out involuntarily when I get into a sort of trance state.  I am so sorry.”
“No. No,” said Mike, “I could see that you were really into it.  Must be very emotional work. I have to say though, I didn’t really understand it.”
“Yes, it is not really meant to be understood, just shared.  Perhaps you know what I mean.”
There were nods once again all around the room.  We held another moment of shared silence, taking in the truth of what he had said.
Chester coughed once and then cleared his throat.
“Well, thank you everyone for coming. We’ll be meeting here again in a few weeks. Everyone is most welcome to come,” he looked right at the dragon.
We rose, stretching our limbs.  We all shook hands and I grabbed Maurice’s cold claw as we said goodbye.
“Thanks for coming, hope we see you again.” 
He nodded with a smile,  “Yes, possibly.”
The door closed, everyone was gone. The smell of smoke still remained.

The Sound of The Engine

The metallic rumble of a twin propeller plane went by overhead, the sound streaking across the sky like a single silver streamer.  It reverberated inside as I instantly remembered that far off place, saw a far off me who no longer exists, a memory almost forgotten that still has the power to twist visions into experience.
Hearing it was like looking through an old album, ‘Remember when I used to live there?  Remember when I used to do that?’ The bright sunshine of southern California ignited and I needed my sunglasses.  The water of a crystal clear swimming pool colored me all blue and shiny.  I could jump in naked if I wanted, no one was home. It was me and the sun, with only a furry puppy napping in the sunlight by my side.
The sound of that engine was the tone of another Lydia who lay on a plastic chaise lounge on the wooden deck my father built.  I would be out there for hours, letting the heat melt my skin and turn me brown and freckly.  The girl who closed her eyes and drank in the heat, eventually smelling salty and sweet, for that wind liked to lick away the sweat. 
A moment passed and I remembered that girl in silence. There was no one here to explain it to, no one who could really listen and feel that distant chamber with me, not here- the market was bustling and even I would soon need to forget. I tucked it away until later, when a door would open and the chamber could then be explored.

‘I worship the sun’ I used to say.

The palm trees in the backyard swayed back and forth gently.  They were thick trunks that provided a wide canopy, beneath which we would sometimes eat in the summer. My mom would carry out a skillet of fish my dad made, I would bring out a wide salad bowl and Blackstar would sit at our feet looking for crumbs. In August the coyotes would run down from the hills and howl in the fields behind our fence, the puppy would run to howl at the fence and call back to them.
Mostly I would be out there in the sun, alone.  The sound of the plane’s engines was always there, streaking by every hour.  A small airport was just a few miles away on Benson Avenue, if I opened my eyes and looked up I could see their little metal bodies in the sky.  They left trails of white across the blue canvas which soon the wind would muddle and shift and eventually erase.

That girl laying in the sun never thought things would change, she never thought that she would turn from a sun-worshipper into the sweater-garbed woman who now walks through eternal fog. 
But everything does change. I do not miss that girl. She is a curiosity, forever warm, forever surrounded by golden light, Blackstar at her side.  Now the heat burns my skin from the inside out, like a chicken in a microwave. I retreat into the shade, seeking shelter like so many other vampires.
But when I hear that sound, familiarity attached to a past so distant, it is blue and bright, it is the quiet noise of a girl basking under the sun.

Singing With Babies

Pale sunlight streamed in through the glass windows on either side of the narrow room. It was almost 7pm and soon she would have to put the babies to bed. She would somehow convince their little bodies that it was time for sleep even though it was still light outside. But before she tucked them away for dream time she sat each one on the padded dinning room chairs that surrounded the oversized antique wooden table and turned on her black laptop. Jonas sat closest to her and Noah on the chair beside him. She pushed the computer to a center point on the table between them.
Noah started to clap his chubby hands as he saw the LCD screen come to life. Jonas, looking so small in the straight-backed chair, waited patiently, watching curiously and quietly as the Windows sound and screen prompts popped up one by one. Noah let out a small excited wail as she plugged in the computer’s mouse and then found the right folder and file and pressed play.
“Meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow!” It was part of her daily vocal training and she sang the syllables loudly going up the musical scale. The wooden floor and furnishings bounced her voice right back and the sound was crisp and resonant.
Jonas seemed stunned and looked at her excitedly with a big bright toothless smile that puffed out his fatty cheeks, a smile that showed he was not quite sure what he was hearing, but he liked it. For him, it was all new. His experience was fresh and his eyes widened when she sang. He laughed too, with every meow meow phrase he erupted into tiny giggles of delight.
“Meow meow meow meow meow meaow meow meow meow!”
She sang along with the prompts of the recording. Jonas looked back and forth from the psychedelic screen saver that accompanied the music to her, mesmerized by the combination of what he saw and heard. She wondered if music and those transforming colors of never ending possibilities would always be linked in his mind, she hoped so.
Jonas started clapping his tiny hands, bobbing his head up and down rhythmically to his own beat. Noah sang a little under his breath, a sound that seemed sort of like speech, but was flavored by melody. She looked at them as she sang, opening her eyes wide, raising her eyebrows, sending her energy towards them in pure unabashed delight.

At The Lake

The lake was glimmering in the sparkles of a late afternoon sun. An airplane coming out of San Francisco airport soundlessly rose towards the clouds above, the sounds of its engines drowned by the distance and the ceaseless flow of cars that surrounded all sides of the lake like a metallic river of spasms, noise and velocity that came and went endlessly. She parked her car on the small parking lot just on the banks of the lake, only a small path of pine trees and wood chips separated her from the water. Stepping out of the car, she entered the small liquid island of flora in the city of asphalt and endless motion. There was the warm aroma of softly baked pine needles that had dropped and mingled with the wood chips on the ground. A cement bench, donated in loving memory of Rick, was warm from a day in the sun, un-corroded by the elements of wind and rain and heat and fog that was thick and unrelenting in this part of the city. She watched an Asian man approach from the bottom of a small hill in short black running shorts. His hair was short and black and buzzed and reminded her of a military man. He had just finished an intense run around the lake, his shirt was wet, only small patches of light gray insinuated the original color of the dry garment. The length of the shorts struck her, it was not a length most American men were comfortable with, they showed too much thigh. He looked around the lake, his hands on his hips. He watched the other people still running, in lycra and baseball hats and thick sneakers. None of them had yet broken a sweat. He had the look of a relaxed man, a man who had earned his moment of rest and reflection. He saw the girl taking pictures, sometimes he turned his head spontaneously and her black camera lens pointed at him. He would then turn around and look at the water and then turn and watch other runners passing by. There was the camera again. He ducked behind a 15ft high marble statue of a penguin, a thick and modernist interpretation of the animal. He hid from her line of sight. The girl began to walk slowly, peering around the statue to see him only a couple feet off the ground, using the incline of the statue as a place to put his hands while the rest of him went up and down in a series of pushups. His back was perfectly straight, a perfectly executed exercise. She watched his as she walked, wanting a photo but passing by without clicking the button. She had enough for one day.

The Tunnel And The Light

Most of all, he didn’t like the edge because of the loud noises, the thumping, the screeching, the banging, the tremors that made it seem as if the whole tunnel he had just dug out would come crashing down upon him, something which very rarely happened, but every once in a while it did.
Back in the heart of the world, things were simpler. There were more people, and they all crossed paths so often that it was easy to forget which tunnel you had dug and which tunnel had been made by someone else and it really didn’t matter, because they were all about the same size and they could trade tunnels any day, any hour, and all tunnels ended the same place anyway, or very similar, and there was food in all directions, plentiful and available. But all the food was known and safe, and he wanted something else, even if it meant enduring the loud noises.
Because here at the edge, there were hardly any people at all. Every once in a while, he would run into an old tunnel left behind by some other loner that had come before him, maybe one that came back with treasure or maybe one that never came back. Out here, he was on his own and he had to mostly dig his own tunnels, and the soil itself was harder and darker, and he didn’t really mind any of that but he did mind the noises, because, after careful consideration, it had become clear to him that the noise could only come from the great Demons that lived above the earth and the thought of it made him tremble and his nose got cold and still and he looked down at the dark soil and tried to think of other things.
When the thought of the Demons came upon him, then he momentarily accepted that maybe it was better to stay where the family was, where the known world was, maybe it was better to stay where there were plenty of people and plenty of tunnels and no loud noises and maybe that’s where he should go and all he would have to do is to follow his own tunnel back to its source, and pretty soon the noises would fade away into memory, and, all of a sudden, there would be another one like him and then another, and there would be more tunnels and the only noises would be the little scratching that he recognized as the scratching of other people, digging away and eating and digging some more.
The vision of resting there made him think that maybe he was crazy to be out here, that he should never have come out all the way to the edge, but as much as these thoughts crowded into each other and as much as it was tempting to be back where it was safe and familiar, he still kept on digging, he still kept on going, and the noises kept on getting louder. He ran into a big white rock and then another and he noticed that the roots were shorter here, as they trailed down knotty and hard from the top of his improvised passageway, and there were areas where the soil was very thin, thinner than he expected, so thin that it was almost impossible to make a tunnel through it because everything would just crumble back into place, and then he would run into soil that was almost as hard as a rock, and he made his way around these obstacles the best way he could, for he had many tricks at his disposal, and many different ways to face the hardships that were present here at the edge of the world.
But he knew it would soon be time to come out, for it was no good to have come all the way out here and then not see the light, for time was composed of periods of darkness and periods of light, and you could stretch the darkness for a while and you could wait until you felt tired or until you felt like eating something different or simply until you wanted to be warm, but, sooner or later, you had to rip up through the soil and push your nose up and face the light, and then, bask in its magnificence, and know, for a single clear moment, that you had gone somewhere, and you were now there, and your nose was warmer, and your eyes would grow wide with the momentary understanding.
There was no use putting it off for too long, he would have to do it sooner or later. He found a place where the dirt was not too thin and not too hard and he started to dig up, up towards the surface, and the noises got even louder, and it sounded like a hundred people dying all at once, like rumbling explosions that threatened to break the world in two and leave him naked in the midst of thin soil that flew in all directions, with no roots or rocks to grab onto, and no dirt floor on which to land. But he kept on digging up, inch by inch, while great waves of fear made the effort even harder. Eventually, the roots shifted aside and he pulled on some of them and pushed up, and dug some more and then the light hit him, hard and blue and bright and his eyes got wide and teary and his heart beat hard and the noise was deafening but he didn’t care, he had come all this way, and he wanted to see what was here even if it meant the end of him.
It took some time for his eyes to adjust but then he saw them, the big Demons staring down at him from an inconceivable height. They were hideous and gigantic and they were made of light in many different shades and they moved slower than he did but with a significance and a power that he found terrifying. He slid back down the way he came, shaking with terror, and he waited there, maybe they would go away soon and then he could look outside again. He pushed his nose out for a bit and looked up and he saw the gigantic forms of light once again and he pulled back further and waited once again. They had to go soon, if they wanted to kill him he would already be dead, although he knew that he had no way of knowing what their true purposes were, he just had to wait and wait and wait.
After a long while, he pushed his nose out again and there was single demon there, glowing above him like a tower of rainbow light bathed in blue and yellow, and the strange being was just standing there and he looked up at it and he couldn’t tell what was his face and what were his eyes and what was his nose, but he was sure that it was looking down at him from the great heights that he inhabited. He looked up at the Demon and the Demon shifted slightly and moved just a little closer and he ran away once again.
In the comfortable cover of cool darkness he waited some more, hoping the strange Demon would go away like the others had. As he waited, the noise was becoming deafening, more terrible than ever, and it came in great waves that made his tunnel shake and little rivulets of dirt would come pouring down upon him, threatening to end his adventure suddenly with a single explosive fade out made of root and soil. There was very little buffer of soil to hide him from the terrible noise, so it washed through his tunnel like dark clouds of poison gas and his whole body was shaking and he knew he had to escape soon or he would go mad.
But he had to look outside, at least one more time, and so he did and the Demon was still there, still looking down, and he thought he knew then what were his eyes and they were staring right at him, and he was going to pull away again but the Demon didn’t move and it was so still and he could almost imagine that the Demon was like him, maybe a bit like him, maybe not so different, maybe somewhere behind the Demon face, there truly was something that was not so bad, not so evil, not so terrifying… but then a new wave of noise came and he ran down the tunnel because that had been too much, he had gone too far. The noise was still making the tunnel tremble as he ran and all he could see in the darkness before him were the Demon’s eyes and all he could remember was the moment when he thought, as he looked into that giant strange being, just for a second, that maybe he was a Demon himself.
The others would think he was crazy, and maybe he was. At least now he knew why the people never ventured so far out to the edge of the world. More than death, more than pain, more than hunger, it was terrible knowledge that waited here, in the fiery eyes of a Demon, in the crushing noise of its giant black wings.

The Hidden Group

She sat with two long metal poles in her hands, knitting on the subway. As the emerald green yarn glided effortlessly through her fingers and the needles, she occasionally raised her eyes and surveyed the semi-full car. It was just past rush hour and there were enough orange plastic seats available for everyone, although a single man in a black leather jacket stood by the doors, waiting for the next stop. Sometimes she looked up at just the right moment and could see through the window another speeding train. It was illuminated in the dark underground, full of people like her, moving at the same velocity, though the same territory. They were so close in those moments, she could almost make out the title of a book that a young man was reading, she could feel the sadness with which a middle aged woman looked out the window into the tunneling darkness. They were so near, yet, they were on a slightly altered path, just a hair’s difference than her own at that moment, but within a matter of minutes, the trains would curve and they, all of them, would arrive at completely different destinations.
Her knitting needles moved quickly along, moving more out of habit than intellectual direction. Her mind wandered as her slender fingers moved… what neighborhood was she under at this moment? What moved in the night? She imagined a young black woman crying as her lover turned and walked in the other direction. She imaged a man holding onto the leash of a large white dog, walking slowly as the animal stopped every couple of feet to smell a bush or wall. Maybe there were couples walking arm and arm down the city streets, watching for the taxis that rounded corners without mercy. She imagined it all as her body was transported further by the second.
The high rents of the city prevented her from living there. Her destination, her home, was in the industrial wasteland that clung to the edges of the city like a lingering cough. The void, as it was called, stretched for miles. Warehouse after warehouse stood like lifeless block soldiers, one after the other in dutiful formation. Their shapes were the only remains of a once thriving port…that, and the air of ghosts that sometimes moved between the buildings on cold, quiet nights. She lived there, in a huge warehouse with thirty other people. They had come together like an army of grateful rats fleeing the city, happy to have a place to call home. There were other communities of squatters in the other buildings, little communities of young artists and travelers and hobos. All of them kept a low profile, keeping up the appearances of decay from the outside; they let the plaster fall, they let the weeds continue to grow, they let the scattered trash mount and add needed color to the land.
But once, she had defied the normal code and she had taken a midnight stroll. A mile from her home, she saw the white lettering of a banner flapping along the side of a warehouse and the constant thumping of drums. She remembered that travelling shows and groups would occasionally rent the warehouses from the city. She had her explanation, but she still walked towards the building. The resonant beat matched the time of her steps. There was a glimmer of yellow light coming from the huge sliding metal doors, someone had not shut it all the way, or perhaps had not known to close the latch. She came closer and curiosity compelled her to look, she approached soundlessly and put an eye to the slit with a faint tinge of guilt that excited her even further.
Inside, she saw a long line of drummers forty feet away. They were topless and sweating, each man’s firm chest glimmered like moonlight on a dark pond and she beheld them in awe. A dozen arms raised in unison, then came down, beating the taught skin of their drums with such delicate precision that it seemed as if the earth would open with the sound of their demand. A cold, icy wind brushed past her back. The night covered her in its dark wings, its hard kiss stayed firmly planted on her shoulders as it pressed in on her heart without mercy. She stood, barely breathing. Her hands were numb and her nose was stinging in the wind, her lips were nearly frozen in an inbreed expression of ecstasy, awe, and fear.
The women were naked, save for the black lines and dots that decorated their skin. There were at least twenty in a large circle. Their arms were free and they swung wildly with grace, creating long streams of golden light with the flaming poi. Their faces were alive with flickering shadows and their hips moved like spiraling snakes on an ecstatic journey though time. And although their arms moved unhindered through the air, their ankles were tightly bound in thick silver cuffs. There was three feet of thick metal chain that separated each leg and each woman was connected to the others at her sides by another six feet of chains. They moved in slowly together, closing the circle with each careful step, each foot moving in precise time with their men who watched attentively from behind. Each drummer seemed intimately connected with a dancer, each dancer was held firmly to the woman beside her. As a whole, they seemed bound beyond matter and the surrounding walls, held tightly beyond the flesh of their bodies or the fictitious borders of their minds. Their eyes were half-closed, almost droopy, but their bodies appeared fully alive, moving with a knowledge that seeped from a deeper brain, from the hidden consciousness that flowers while the machine clocks off. They moved with the force of moving planets aligned with many suns.
She watched through the crack, wondering what they would do if she was caught. Maybe she would be cuffed by the ankles and forced to serve them. Would she be kept in the lion’s cage, a mistress to all, licking the beads of sweat off their skin through the black of night? Would they paint her in stripes and teach her to move like a serpent with legs? Would this group become her village? Her tribe? Would she take on their scent and comb their black hair? Surely they came from a place of pure blackness, a world were sounds take the shape of colors and movements light the night with their brilliant vibration. She watched them, knowing that this was the dominant force in the world, that everything else was a shadow, a long distant relative that perhaps had a memory of where it had deviated, but had no idea how to retrace its steps, to find itself once more. She heard the clang of metal on asphalt and turned to see a single sardine can tumbling in the wind. Above her, the lights of the second-floor came on. There was a silhouette in the window, a slim man with a long head of black hair piled in a bun atop his head. The man looked out into the night, to the small group of stars that flickered softy though the sky. A rock came towards her, a small pebble landed at her feet. She looked up to find its source, the man in the window was watching her, the tables had been turned.

Under The Sun

A young woman leaned on a towel on one of the wide lawns of the city park. She had taken the day off from work and she had decided to walk a few blocks and spend a few hours under the hot rays of the sun. Bright sunlight was rare in this city of fog, so the few days that were sunny had to be treasured like golden nuggets in a mountain stream. Laying out on her white towel, she wore only a white cowboy hat, a gift from an old boyfriend whose name she had already forgotten, and a light green bikini which covered her breasts, her crotch and most of her buttocks. The rest of her white skin was bare and covered in a thin layer of suntan oil and sweat.
When the young woman looked down at her own body, in full display in a public setting, every detail amplified by the unforgiving light of the afternoon sun, she couldn’t help being critical. Through her own eyes, her skin was too white, all from month after month of living and working indoors, and it would take more than one afternoon of sunbathing to change her pale coloring. Her breasts were too small and, even at her young age, she could tell that they were already starting to droop. She knew in the back of her mind that sooner or later she would have to get surgery, she would have to get bags of silicone implanted under her skin to give her an appearance of robust abundance. Her smooth belly showed signs of slight wrinkling and she perceived the wrinkles as fat, and so she worried that she had been eating too much. She made quick ephemeral decisions about eating much less, eating better, doing more exercise, doing whatever needed to be done, all decisions that would quickly be forgotten and put away like old clothes.
She poured some more suntan oil on her hands and started to rub it over her shoulders and her arms. She wished that her boyfriend was here, the one whose name she could remember, the one that she had met only a couple of weeks ago. She wished that he could be the one pouring the oil over her body. It would be easier that way and much more pleasurable. Her body ached for the touch of his firm rough hands. It had only been two days but it had already been too long. She already needed the silk of his lips on hers, for his finger through her hair, for his arms around her shoulders once again. Just as her hands were covered in greasy oil, steaming hot under the sun, her cell phone rang. She hesitated for a second to answer it, she didn’t want to get the device all greasy, but she quickly realized she had no choice. She grabbed the phone and flicked it open with a practiced move of her right hand. She brought it to her face and said a simple: "Hello?"
Two men rode their bicycles down the sidewalk, about twenty feet away from her. A group of teenage girls were laying all together in a circle to her right, sunbathing like she was. A couple was laying on a large brown towel near the trees behind her. Cars drove by in quick succession and a pickup truck was parallel parking across the street. The young woman’s eyes grew wide, digesting all this movement with her eyes, perceiving it all as a strange background to the words that the tiny metal device whispered into her ear, a movie with a strange voiceover that was sliding unexpectedly into slow motion and distress.
"I don’t understand… why today? Why right now?"
There were more words and more whispering. Two women in flowing light brown dresses walked by, talking excitedly as they moved in the direction of the tall brown building a few blocks away. A tall woman in loose gray shorts ran by on the sidewalk, gasping for breath, grunting with effort. Two more men rode by in thin stylish bicycles. The pickup truck finished parking and a large man with colorful tattoos on his forearms stepped out of the cabin.
"Shouldn’t we get together… it would be better if…I would really like to talk in person… it’s just that…"
A family of four walked by, a teenage girl in black walking ahead of them, a little boy in shorts running in circles around their feet. A tall bearded man walked by with a camera. A slim Asian girl rode by on a small bicycle. The teenage girls on her right were now laughing loudly and turning over onto their backs.
"I would rather that… but listen… I…"
The laughter of the girls seemed like an offensive intrusion. Two little boys ran ahead of their father in the direction of the restrooms in the northeastern corner of the lawn. The man with the tattoos was taking out a large bicycle from the back of the truck. He put a cap on his head with the figure of a colorful eagle and closed the bed of the pickup truck with a loud bang.
"Ok then… yeah, later we’ll… sure… ok… bye."
She closed the phone with a soft click and stared at the clouds and the sky. The landscape seemed to shift slightly each time one of the teenage girls laughed. The little boys screamed to their father from the door of the bathroom. A car honked in the distance and a motor rumbled as it started. She put the phone away and looked down at herself. The sun was no longer as warm. The park was no longer as inviting. The rough hands would not be touching her again, there would be need to find new ones. Everything she had ever thought about herself was true. She was getting old and ugly. There was no other reason for him to do what he had done. She would have to go home soon. She had to take steps. She would call around for prices on breast surgery. She would call around for diet programs and gyms. She would face up to her problems and solve them, just like she always did. She would look at time in the eyes and emerge victorious. And she would soon forget another name, another gift, another night of passion, another day of sunlight and warmth. Many more had already been forgotten.