Field Notes, #36, It's still August)

Aug 31st. there is some sort of orbit in my body, that senses the coming rotation. i tell outrageous nontruths about where i am or was,

This is a long note that begins with August, Again, which i wrote in maybe 2019 or 2018 or something, and the rest is from this August 

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August, Again   ...       

there is some sort of orbit in my body,

that senses the coming rotation.

i tell outrageous nontruths

about where i am or was,

they are too strangely cryptic

and ridiculous

to question.

like telling someone i am late

Because

i was watching a dog crossing the street

and then my shoes filled with ants

and i had to spend some time emptying them,

It is a lie that tells you it is a lie,

it is an agreement.

Orbiting that space again,

the hands on my clock point inward,

the time is axis,

centrifugal,

but i sense something,

a year,

getting ready to brush past me,

i notice it like looking closely at the floor,

and seeing it is all moving ants.

…

Hey,

I died,

I think,

When the sun melted into August,

Waxed the grass into green

Long sunsets,

That was when you died, I think too,

Lots of unwashed laundry then, probably,

Now too,

Nearing winter,

Now too, the shine of you

Blinds me for a moment,   patch of you,

In the air now,

crawl of you,     sweat of you,

…

Who are you? And who were you?

And who was it that I knew?

And who was it that you knew,

In me?

I have tried my best

To document what you said to me,

And to remember it for how it was,

And to not fall into my fantasy

That life was real then, with you,

And not as much now-

…

I don’t feel you on the planet

Anymore, and as much as I

Would like to hear from you,

It comforts me that you are

Not involved in the affairs here,

They are often difficult

…

It’s not all about you (1),

And I’ve become self-conscious,

Can you (2) take what i say

As from a third person?

The one from the back room,

Near my spine ?

Not me, just someone

Who has been watching

?

…

Who are you!

Who were you!

And who was i!

I have stood along

To be pulled through

Into this myself, now-

…

I am worried I

Cannot confess

Because I do not

Know how,

What is this to tell you?

We need not confess

To one another any longer,

Attempt to shame ourselves,

It isn’t about this,

It is about how to know

What it is to tell,

What the real word is,

The word that i have been

Trying to get to,

The one that will

Upon finding it

make all the others

Lie down.

…

On lunch break above me

I saw a huge machine

And men on wires,

Floating slowly

they tied up branches,

dismantled the tree,

One did the tying and the other

Produced a chainsaw,

He cut a bough,

The branch lifted up slowly,

Hovered over the tree,

Ascended like a holy arm,

I have never been this high,

I had never thought I could,

The oldest sycamore in Philadelphia,

They unbuilt it, slowly,

But within a few hours.

…

I have great joy!

I have great joy!

I have great joy!

I have developed

A sense for being

So interested

In the shadow of

A plant at night!

…

Moon over water,

Moon over water,

Two hands,

Slowly, over

That water,

That pale spot tunnel

…

August opens into

Some rained in belly,

Some warm green hole

Where the grass quiets the voice,

And the dirt is red.

…

My love!

My love!

My love!

My love!

Why did I stand

In the yard so long

In the cold?

Why did I wait

To be brought in?

Skin an animal

Already! At least

Cover yourself

With dirt!

Well,

…

July bled onto

The year

With uneasy

Apology,

I’m sorry,

I will keep

Bleeding.

…

Near death,

And convinced of evil,

You stilled long enough

To hear the ocean,

Not just taste its salt.

There, you began

To crawl back, not

Because of my calling,

Just because it had

Been long enough

Idling near death.

…

Does being near a body

Warm you to other bodies?

Does it make you colder?

…

It’s colder out again,

today is a clone of yesterday,

I am building a room,

A room inside a room.

…

let not our hearts

cast doubt upon

the gore of living,

It's true !

all the wrath !

and every facet wherein !

those small

kissing booths

Fitted with sheets of glass !

we flame our arrows

and set our aim,

to winds we

cannot fathom

…

visiting the house i grew up in turns me into a feverish journalist, documenting and recording, The butter dish, the pink porcelain tub.

Isn’t it amazing?

The tree is gone, and the deck railing is older.

Doesn’t anyone understand the breaking news?

Only, it isn’t news to anyone but the reporter.

It’s that same painting, look, it’s been in the hallway the whole time, can you believe it?

…

August treading,

The last heat,

The bottom of the

Foot scraping that cold

Pocket, September

Sitting in the roots

Of the magnolia,

I want to answer

All your worries

About death,

Yours, and mine,

I read in a book,

It’s all going to be fine,

Maybe even better than fine,

I’m serious,

This is the hardest part,

…

The word that i have been

Trying to get to,

The one that will

Upon finding it

make all the others

Lie down,

It is not a word at all

…

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Hi. x

This past week I have been building a room. A small room, for someone to go inside. I made it out of wood and some other things. It will be at Vox Populi in Philadelphia you could see it  Friday, September 5 at 6pm- 10pm,  it will be there till Sunday, October 12. 

This past week someone I love has been dying faster than normal. I have been building the room and visiting her, trying not to embarrass her by caring so much about the dying. The back mud room at the house, adjacent to the room where we have both been sleeping, was filled with bees last week. My uncle said he vacuumed them all up, at least 200 bees (wasps actually?), but I still have been eyeing the door a little wary. I’m on the couch right now typing this, eyeing the door and the back of the recliner where she is sleeping. I just started hearing a cricket and I think it is in the corner of the room.

August was when my mother died,  8 years and 16 days ago. 2,938 days since then. This month often feels anticlimactic to me now, only it also doesn’t. August feels like a circle that sometimes is a sphere, or sometimes a diamond, where I am at the narrow end in the corner wishing there was more room, or in the wide part in the middle, wondering where the corner is, feeling unsure about the space. Does any of that make sense? August is where we drag our summer bodies to, anticipating. 

(When I typed in howlongago.com I realized I hadn’t been to the website in awhile. There was a time when I frequented the website very often.)

I feel very serious about a lot of things, I take things seriously. But I also think things are so funny, I like to laugh. My boss is often confused by me and asks me why I'm smiling, it’s usually hard to explain. At work I do a lot of watering plants, I think a lot about all the different settings on the hose, and I encounter new hose heads with new settings. I delight in the settings. My boss told me to use “cone” setting the other day, and I smiled. Why are you smiling? /  I just like the cone setting. Sometimes I think the trivial delight I can have for things is interpreted as stupidness, which is fine.

i think sometimes i can see every bead of the planet shaking and suffering to exist, undergoing pain, twisting, being stressed, but… also… like a bridge being walked on, where we are lucky to pass over it before it one day snaps into a canyon… 
that sounds scary but i meant it not to be actually. 

 i think this is a hurting planet that is very very special and beautiful.  i work on my translating, calling like a bat to find walls- attempting to trace the shape of a room into someone's open palm
 hoses, bees, watering,       thinking about    you  (you)((you)) ,        the bonsai garden,  , looking at the newspaper in the wawa, my shoes soaking wet every day,   is it a cricket,
is it a bee,     the car,   

Someone I love keeps having a dream where she drops a cigarette,
 and in the half sleep she reaches out to pick it up. 
I say are you okay? It’s just a dream, rest                 
                                                            she says  Stop worrying about me

Fine but the bees are going to break in and then we’ll have real trouble
								Okay
Okay 							

august.

Homework:

build something big or very small, bring something inside from outside, call someone on the phone

if able, help your friend over the phone build something, or vice versa

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if you have a letter to the editor please leave a comment or try to contact me via payphone. or you can put it HERE hello?

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