Setting fence posts in concrete is a bit like the process of dying. I’m not speaking to the fully awful physicality of punching holes into the earth, but more to the fact that as the concrete fills the hole, mixes with water, and the post becomes more and more rigid, attention has to be paid more and more closely in order to make sure that as rigidity fully takes on, the post is where you meant it to be. There’s no fussing with the position once the hole is topped off, and what is left is a monument to a moment’s time of work; a reflection on a life. The metaphor can run on with the hanging of boards and whatnot, but I think I’ll leave it right there. The fact is that everything is in everything else. There is no boredom, only a failure to see a new relationship or shell that an action or moment is wrapped in.
I have recently been thinking of standing on a shore and watching something in the ocean with another person and wondering about the shared experience. How do you create depth when there is no eye contact? Or is there depth in the same way? Maybe staring into an ocean can make one blurry eyed, and see mountains in their filmy eyes; thick with something like spit or contacts left in overnight.
Or maybe oceans are just as good as mountains, because what are waves if not geologically sped up mountains; forming and dissolving in seconds, showcasing a theatre piece titled “50 million years”.
I was in the grocery store a couple days ago, buying yogurt, and Katy Perry was on. For some reason it transported me to driving down the California cost, listening to Firework with a friend of mine, windows down, both of us looking out at the ocean and I think, *I think*, we were thinking the same thing:
You just gotta ignite the light
The last step off the porch is a longer drop when you are off the side near the yard. “Be careful” is the words of whoever is leading the way, headlamp held above their head; lighting the way mostly for themselves, but giving scraps of light to some soggy shoes behind them.
I can hear toes making out in wet socks, or maybe making the sounds of dogs tongues lapping up wet dog food.
The windows of the house are all shapes that end in sides divided by 2. Maybe because some windows are meant to be gazed out by a couple at a time, or 4 people or an army of twins. People that look out at the same ocean, sand familiar between them, but not knowing each other's faces as they are forever waiting for a sunset that never comes. Or was it a sunrise?
Inside an airstream a short distance away nails steal hats from heads and there is the feeling that a spiritual process is captured in clay. It’s good to remember at times like this that objects can repel evil or be an attractor for love, but rarely do they do both.
The sky is clear with a cloud grumbling over a small hill, speaking of the cold front of water being dragged in on the backs of jellyfish.
Pop. There goes the memory of baggies in couches and the smell of plastic on fire.
Pop. There goes rolled ankles on cobblestone.
Pop. There goes.
What are we all waiting for in this cafe during spring with too many scarves on the coat rack? All the stop lights work in the city, and the seat belts are brand new in every car. The sky never turns that dangerous orange black, but sets with intention that hints at a meditation practice that informs the breath.
When did the sun learn to breathe? To whisper intentions and mantras, instead of look to the constellations strung on its neck like a bear learning to make fish heads into jewelry; paws smashing into rivers on beat, jewelry flung towards gaping maws with their gills and mouths fluttering in 1/4 and 1/2 beats.
Now and then we cover the setting sun with coins or perfectly align them behind new geometries. It’s rare. But we do it.
Sometimes that coin is one you gave to me.