I was writing MONDAY on the chalkboard in bold, bubbly letters, when he sank to the bottom of the pool. He stayed down there so long I decided to join him. He was impressed that I, too, could defy gravity and ruminate at the bottom. When I came up for air I found my friend and placed a nautilus in her hand. She asked me if I was a teacher and I said, Right. But not as a question, as a conviction.
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We were given the largest schooner. The one with billowing sails, laced and layered upon each other. Carrying us forward in the gentle wind. Gliding through the warm waters. Spraying us with salty sea.
We slowed once to greet a friendly walrus poking its silky wet nose above the water’s cusp. It was then a gust of angry winds swooped in and lifted the bow high into the air. We heard the crack of walnut wood, our boat splitting in two, casting us into the sea.
I watched my father fall. Disappear into the dark waters. Our dismembered ship lay floating, scattered, and moving with the current. A tangled mass of splintered wood.
The Islanders learned of the accident almost immediately. They arrived in masses. Diligent arm ants on the call of duty. This was their beloved ship. We had sunk their best boat.
I was rescued by the graces of an Indian fisherman. Only he helped me into a water taxi because he believed I wouldn’t like the smell of dead cod fish sloshing around in his steel dory.
Tall and lanky, he released an exaggerated stretch as he climbed into the taxi that brought me safely into town, where everyone was talking about the Americans who sunk their best boat.
Their beloved schooner.
I am dropping this stone in the lake for you.
The stone I carried back from the other side of the world.
The stone you had no use for.
So I am giving it back to the lake.
Letting it sink to the bottom, so that no other girl can pick it up and carry it back to a man on the other side of the world.
This rock (which I plucked from a glacier in New Zealand) holds layers of dreams that never were.
This dark-charcoal square-like rock, curved like a staircase to the stars
Maps our family.
Our son.
Our stone-home.
Curved like a staircase going nowhere, but to the bottom of this lake, where it will rest easy.
No longer in a holding pattern.
But nestled under soft waves, caressing its very existence.
Happy and calling to be let in.
Sinking down into its cool, deep nest at the bottom of the lake.
Back to it’s home.
The land was covered in a thick blanket of snow. I am walking and can barely lift my feet. Fat snowflakes filter my vision, so I cannot see very far ahead. But I can hear the bus coming. Barreling around the bend. I’m talking on the phone and trying to get out of the road, but I keep sinking in deeper. Until I reach a snow bank. The bus driver sees me and she lets me on. The bus is packed with people. As she rounds a sharp curve the tail-end of the bus swings up into the air, then lands back down, hard.
The bus driver confidently announces,
I’ve been doing this for years.
I feel I have to believe her.
They tried three times to stick the needle in her arm. On the fourth try, an inflatable bag filled with blood. She carried this bag around like it was a part of her. A brilliant comet of red trailed her side. Although, she walked too far and the needle slipped out of her arm, which caused her to look down at the crease in her forearm. Three bruised puncture wounds painted her skin like bullet holes left behind. She didn’t think she had been cared for properly. Situations like this didn’t normally happen to her. She had been cared for all her life.
At first only the stairs fell. Then, brick by brick the building crumbled to the ground. I watched it all happen. Slowly, as if the building was carefully laying itself to rest.
Now I am on the roof. I make poems out of skyscrapers, while they come tumbling down.
There were people inside.
I went off in search of my lamp. The one with the red rose on its base. The one from my grandmother. I found it at his house. Only one of the gold petals was missing. This upset me, but I was also happy to have retrieved my light fixture.
My parent’s friends arrived in couples. Each one was pregnant. Ashamed, I wrote on the blackboard:
Don’t travel so much. Make Rituals.
I was warning the pregnant women how to raise their babies right. With my own child, I was hiding from someone in particular. When they passed by, I held up a newspaper so they could not see us behind the pages. I am not sure why we were hiding and nothing happened.
The older gentleman had a fondness for my sister and I. When he let us drive away in his car I knew it was because one day his kids would be old, just like us. Because, in us, he saw his own children.
He spent days working on his house. I didn’t know what he was doing until I found him one day, hammering solar panels onto his roof. His entire roof was covered in solar panels. He was focused and full of pride, so I didn’t bother the progress being made. Instead, I invited the girls in. They came bolting through my house, dashing down the halls. Wild, like children. When they noticed my cat, they asked me her name. I couldn’t remember until I was reminded it changes depending on who’s in the room.
We were stuck in an elevator. It was someone’s fault. No one came to get us out. In the car I have an over-sized map. We are discussing the route. The fastest way to get from point A to point B. We are not lost, but we do not know the way, either.
I asked the waiter what was better, Swordfish or the steak? I settled on the Sunfish. While waiting for the food, the cook called me on his cell phone. I’m not sure what he wanted to ask me, but the waiter was furious that he made that call. When the food came, a ruffled fish, eyeballs and all, was placed on a large platter before me. My mother had the same dish.
And, then, the parade started. Or, the practice for the parade, rather. I stood on the sidewalk and watched the band members twist and lift their knees in preparation for their march.
Marga Pictures 