as my soul, in its trouble, dissatisfied, sank, as where you, sad orb, concluded, dropt in the night, and was gone

cutting with my sketchbook down elm street in the vanilla dusk, passing -- look, the houselights flickering on -- passing the pubs along the avenue, each one inviting with temerity and sinister pomp. i dodged every one and landed (comfortably) into the coffeeshop. it was just another night for work, another night to revel in my fame and genius, my staggering and brilliantly marketed book sales in copenhagen, my own fraud and delusion, or perhaps this night was just a dream and we're together in tangiers or on some star, you and i.

i advanced to the counter, and you've gotta imagine the scene:

-- her hair curved coyly 'round her face. the way her lips were glossy and a bit chapped at the corners, and when i made a half-hearted attempt at humor, the way her eyes widened, quick with pleasure, as she looked up shybrightly. (oh, but these are only footnotes, forget-me-nots.) i paid her for the coffee and went to sit down. whence i opened the sketchbook, the coffee spilled a big, black tear on the page, and i scribbled some notes about being wounded, broken, like... but it was only second-rate inspiration, and i was soon at a loss.

i gazed outside and snow began to fall. it fell like soft, mad cherubs, disturbing the philosophy of untrammeled skies, strange gods shaking the world...

"hey," someone said, "how's it going, man?"

i looked up and recognized monica in this not-too-big city.

"hi."

"i read your review of les savy fav," she said. "is that our review? ...nevermind. i'm so presumptuous."

"sort of," i said. "it's a novella."

she laughed politely and told me her and keith were going back to hang at their place if i felt like joining.

being uninspired and easily led astray from my work, i said i did. keith was smoking just outside the doorway. snowflakes landed gently all around.

"we have a show in new york next weekend. maybe you'd like to call violet and invite her over before we all head out," keith said.

"that's probably a good idea," i said, suppressing my eagerness.

so i called her, feeling confident with her bandmates around, and she said she'd walk over.

at their flat, monica moved and dusted, dreamily showing her photographs, when i noticed sooty lashes shading high colored irises and hot cheeks. violet had arrived. we sat around exchanging photographs and small pieces of dingy poetry keith wrote for songs.

"oscar tells me you're writing a book," violet prodded.

"sort of. it's not going especially well," i said.

"well, i'd love to read it sometime, when you're finished."

"that'd be fine. but right now i'd better be going. i could walk you home..."

we said goodbye, left, and walked away, two exotic birds in the snowdrift city.

on the corner you could hear tunes from the jazz joint where two crazy saints were smoking in their pajamas.

"call me before i leave."

the light went out.

a brief journey into the heart of contemporary shamanism

"i went to this last year. the ambiance sets you adrift..."

a group of bicyclists rode by, their wheels, larger than usual, propped the cyclists high above the cars, and they pedaled by, lights flashing, a radio on one bike playing toto's "africa," as everyone on the streets smiled and waved.

i felt violet shiver a little, as oscar and i walked on either side of her. my heart thumped against my chest like the dull thud of a hooked carcass pounding against a butcher shop's window on a particularly windy day. the beginning of the night glittered clear with hope, and on the winter streets, excitement, phones ringing, scarves, hats, metropolitan brightness beneath the chaos of swirling black and gray, as we walked in our own dark city, where the neons in the distance throbbed, and the moonlight's silent sparks reflected in tangents like small magazine poetry. the cinema across the square was bright and humming with mingling people. two doves hung in the window of a chinese restaurant.

"this was a great call, man," i said to oscar.

"everything's awfully pretty," violet said.

we walked up to the cinema's ticket window and purchased our tickets to the zombie movie marathon. it had started a couple hours ago, and people were coming and going.

"should we get popcorn?"

"we won't consider not getting popcorn."

we bought some popcorn and went to take our seats. violet sat between oscar and i. the theatre was filled with all the hip angels of enormous libraries, beer-tingled and wondrous. we settled in, and oscar began talking with violet about film. i sat there sheepishly and watched the screen and the brain-hungry zombies, all the while feeling violet's womanness, her quick eyes, every detail - the sombre freckle on her chin. i was quieter than the first time we met, and i was sure she thought me mad, or possibly just another dull, drunken poet, mimicking rimbaud at midnight, sipping whiskey soaked coffee.

i placed my elbow next to hers, and she turned.

"do you remember holding hands briefly the last time we met?" she asked quietly.

"i do," i said, "there's something breathless about small gestures like that."

"what is it do you think?"

"um, it's the way a concavity blends with a convexity that electrifies skin."

i smiled, she smiled, we felt close.

oscar asked if we wanted to stay for "shaun of the dead." violet said she had to be getting home, so we left, walking back into the swirling night. oscar flirted with violet in the street, and i watched half-heartedly. we talked about future plans, and i asked for her number.

"you already have it," she laughed.

i smiled. "must've misplaced it."

"well, you were quite merry."

she gave it to me again, and we said goodbye. oscar nudged violet playfully in the street, and i walked in the opposite direction. she turned in her unseasonal espadrilles, eyes shining, and waved. our glances married, bedded, rolled and laughed.

think of how somewhere inside me, there will always be the person you see tonight.

i exhaled a frosty mist and was left holding a small bird.

divest yourself of yourself

in the morning, the late november sun had melted much of the snow. and i was craving solitude. it's important to be alone with the world, alone but not lonely, sometimes, to stare back into the eyes of the vertiginous sky, pale blue, frosted with dust, pair on pair, consuming each other silently, hungrily, peacefully.

i called my old professor from the university to borrow her tent. we chatted briefly, and she told me she'd drop it off. everyone was still asleep in the apartment when i stuffed the tent and some supplies into my car.

alone, i drove north, hoping to just... be. to be amidst the open, crisp air and clean flowing streams, to sip tea by the fire, and to admire the jurassic upheaval and jutting buddhas of endless and beginningless time. i drove, letting whatever songs the radio decided to unfurl, elevate my sardonic humour.

smashing pumpkins? yeah, man.
some shit i don't know? yeah, man.

the landscape whipped by, bony with the death of impending winter. there were some leaves barely hanging, creating a sparse mosaic against the highway. i reached new hampshire, and the terrain became rockier. an hour later, i passed a train depot to the right, and suddenly six inches of snow plumed the landscape. it was as if i was dropped into the quick cut of a film along the zurichsee, the gastro tram ascending the snowcapped mountains of a foreign land, dusted white. i drove up into the mountains, about 3,000 feet high, until i found a spot suitable to set up camp. i backed my car into an enclave on the side of the mountain. it was necessary to clear the snow off a plot of land for the tent. i got to work, set up the tent, and then went to look for firewood. i had to get the fire started before the sun set. i found some partially charred logs in an abandoned fire pit up a ways and brought them back. it took a while to get the fire going with the wet snow all around. but as the fire began to blaze, i lit a smoke, and admired the earth, the native earth of thousands of years ago, feeling devoted to it all like john muir.

a hawk swooped overhead. angels' wings flapped, and the adagio began, cross, recross, conifers shook in the fluffy tempest. the wind was picking up.

i hurriedly chopped an onion and put it in the pot with water, rice, beans, and some cheese. it cooked nicely and i ate it as the sun set. the crescent moon veiled the snow in a dull turquoise... beneath the starry veil of far-off africa... the temperature was well below freezing, and i had no idea how i'd get to sleep. i had three sleeping bags and three layers of clothing on when i climbed into the tent as darkness ascended. it was still early, and i thought of everything that was happening in the city, and everything before, all the technicolored streamers i'd hung over the gaping black, all the crazy adventures, mad loves, soft-bound books, and now a new a cosmic brightness, if only i could unlock her and peer...

the wind howled. i tossed and turned all night, not getting much sleep. i was covered ten times over... my feet were numb. the wind billowed. it was maniacal. i wondered how the indians did it.

at the blush of dawn, i rose to a raven ca caing in cold, cold morning. i started the fire, and boiled instant coffee. the sun illuminated the frosty azure. i let myself thaw a bit, and then snuffed the fire and found a trail. lighthearted, i trudged, something other than what they called me...