for Jackson Mac Low
                                                         My religion is to live—and die—without regret
                                                                                                Tibetan poet saint Milarepa                                     

 					I. Introduction
I do the dishes
I double-click
I stand clear of the closing doors
Bottom-dollar gorgonzola
Bigelow jumping gigolo bump
                     An adventure.
The ganglionated arch of Johann Gottlieb von 
Goodgirl, who is really a very bad girl, an angry girl, whose almond-cake seduction via her bocca, her thumbsucking bocca,
such a furious, pissed-off girl.
Her sibilant juicy sister, left alone amid all the senseless debris, contemplates the schmerz of her lorgnette, her
effortlessly lovelorn fairy-tale suicide as she is pedaling in the darkness that amplifies her task.
                       “Has she not made a scene?”
                       “No, she is not scenic.”
Filial duties, artery cloggers.
You’re right        I’m wrong        Whatever








 

Are you sure you’re warm enough? 
Try this visor if that one’s too loose.
Please let me read my book in peace. 
No, I’m not hungry today. I’ll never be hungry again.
What’s that smell? Is it food? 
How come your feet are so big?
I can’t stand it anymore. 
Poor lonesome loon out on the lake, singing that 
mournful tune. All this rain is making me crazy. 
I would much prefer being lazy in the sun. 
Motorists see more tourists see more hair
A certain pride   a certain dignity
A certain above-it-all that is genuine
Above the bickering the petty dusty petty lowly nasty 
little small-minded little beneath and little beneath
The agriculture of it all!
And the interactiveness of it all!
Topographically speaking a genuine representation of a 
human sentiment
The universe I inhabit versus the one that inhabits me
    The voice in the morning
    The first one to speak
Down a precipice
Off course
We need oblivion to escape oblivion
We need plants around us, and large pockets of time 
wherein nothing much happens
    
Then maybe something can happen
 

II. Now That You’re Gone

     Now that you’re gone
I can’t read what I’ve written
I can’t see it
I lost the ability to write
I can barely say my own name
     What happens now
What happens now can only be the result of everything 
that has preceded this moment
This moment, the present, can only be seen as something 
that’s very close to what has just been happening 
The immediate memory of the just elapsed moment     
is the closest we come to experiencing the elusive present 
Immediate memory allows us to notice what our mental 
processes have just been, and thus, becoming includes being
     Now that you’re gone
Unrelenting-yearning-and-grief-consistently-benefitting-
evidence-of-mental-reality-theorizing-small-pedestals-with-a-
growing-and-grueling-exertion-facilitated-briefly
     Now that you’re gone
Libertine gigolo vis-à-vis
Have a madeleine, it’s good for the memory
Sedimentation fiber organism bedrock intensity lingo 
formidable network realization flipside stratification data 
delinquency meditation
     Gotta be careful              always
We’re in the midst of an explosion and think it’s just 
everyday life





III. Intermezzo by a Lake


We were headed for a cabin by a lake in a pine forest that 
I had found on the Internet 
All around us clockwork resolution happiness and conflict
We were headed for a cabin by the Internet of the lake 
without a key to our consciousness
Headed as we were into an organizing notion of conflict and 
happiness 
We are sitting by a lake along the Internet, holding hands 
and playing cards without a key
We are sitting at the window of a pine forest
Sitting in the lake of our happiness
Playing cards that we were given 
holding keys in our hands
sitting on the notion of our minds within the years of 
consciousness without a card 
Holding hands 
Headed to a cabin by a lake in a pine forest where we find 
each other’s happiness









IV: Going Away


My life takes time. 
I realize that my life takes up a certain amount of time, which is the only reason I can refer to this particular state of
being, as life. 

He may go away.

Without the concept of time, I’d be like the animal that does not concern itself with labeling its life ‘life.’ It concerns
itself with food and shelter and survival. This is good, it feels good, that, on the other paw, is bad. Not good. Don’t go
there. 

He may be going away.

Temporal organization is of no conscious concern to the animal, although a cat will follow a very strict routine during the
day, by preference. 

He is going away.

But without a hierarchical agreement on temporal units and their applications, we could not have assembled here today. 

He avoids going away.

Temporary eunuchs are an impossibility. The operation that produces a eunuch is irreversible. Did Greer, when coining the
phrase “the female eunuch” imply that women’s situation was hopeless?


He wants to go away.

From temporal units to temporary eunuchs. Sorry.

He may have gone away.

One question in writing could be: when do you hit the Enter key and when do you not? When do you open a new document? What do
you call your file when you save it? One option is to leave it Untitled1, Untitled2, etc., as in emailing, when nothing is
entered into the Subject field, and the program volunteers the theme: “No Subject.” But such evasiveness has no virtue. When
given an opportunity to say something, say something!

He may be going away.

The difficulty can lie in integrating oneself into the surrounding environment, for fear of losing one’s identity or
individuality. And yet, of such a non-assimilation, of a failure to accept being an integral and vital part of the entire
universe, nothing good will come. 

He may avoid going away.

As usual, I return to myself with a sigh of relief. 

He may want to go away.

My face needs to be animated by expression. My gaze should be colorful, my smile defiant. I need to take a bath. What am I
waiting for? I’m used to my life. I talk to myself out of a need to formulate my thoughts. A woman presses her forehead
against a mirror. 

He has been going away.


To write. To face the blank page. Une feuille blanche, where blanc does not equal blank. A white page, or a blank document
page on a screen, staring back at you blankly. 

He has avoided going away.

The periodic need to note, to paint . . . to find that flexible, glistening, and fleeting adjective. It’s an urge.

He has wanted to go away.

To be hungry and see oranges flung about. 


He is avoiding going away.


We’re OK together here, aren’t we? Nothing to think about for years, just let life take care of everything. To think of
nothing. 

He is wanting to go away.

I recognize his impeccable looks and perfect pronunciation. Where will they lead me to? No one knows anything. I might as well
be sitting on the moon.  

He avoided wanting to go away.

To suffer, to regret, to prolong the night by insomnia, by solitary wanderings into the deepest, darkest hours of the night. I
see it coming, yet I march bravely toward it. I hide my fears and tears with a dark eyeliner. 


He may have been going away.


Nobody is waiting for me. I have no glory, no love, no money. No birds sing in the deep forest. How puzzling. 

He may have avoided going away.

Years of marriage. A good chunk of my existence spent with a man who paints portraits of women, specializing in showing their
velvety flesh. A scoundrel of the worst kind. 

He may have wanted to go away.

My friends would say: well what did you expect, dear child, what did you expect? 

He may be avoiding going away.

I had enough. The next day I didn’t return and neither did I the next, or the one after that. And this is where my story ends,
or rather begins. 

He may be wanting to go away.

I won’t dwell on the brief and morose period of transition that followed.  There were consolations and felicitations. In any
case I cut myself off and chose complete isolation, give or take a few close friends. My solitude is my freedom, which allows
me to work hard. 

He has been avoiding going away.

Sunday again. And how cold it is. My dog and I took our constitutional in the park after lunch. This animal will be my ruin. I
spend more on her than on myself. But it’s worth it just to be near her shiny coat glistening in the sun. 

He has been wanting to go away.

Beautiful Sunday in a beautiful park. My dog and I think of this park as our own forest. She runs faster than I do, but then I
walk faster than she does. A thin, pink haze filters the sun, a defanged sun you can actually look at. Flowers and mushrooms
and violets in the grass on a bright winter day. I surge forward, feeling an elastic exhilaration and animalistic joy.




He is avoiding wanting to go away.

She is a born theatrical dog. She loves to run up on stage. I’m telling you all this so you understand her better. This is a
dog who doesn’t care about money, and who’s been living in the garden—and in my heart—for a long time. 

He may have been avoiding going away.

Extensive success and artistic ambition lead to silence, as does failure. 

He may have been wanting to go away.

Nellie, a performing dog, drops by my dressing room. She seems to say to me, yes I know, you love me, you pet me, yes, you
have a box of cookies waiting for me, but tomorrow or the day after, we’re leaving and I probably won’t see you again. So
don’t ask anything of me. The luxury of tenderness, peace, and security, is not available to the likes of me.    Adieu then
Nellie, adieu.

He may have been avoiding to go away.

 Gertrude Stein: A vegetable garden in the beginning looks so promising and then after all little by little it grows nothing
but vegetables, nothing, nothing but vegetables.

He may have wanted to go away.

So many things could go wrong, I’m afraid to ask.    But a good day can sneak up on you as unexpectedly as a bad one.
Silence in the garden. 

He may go away.

My friends, the real ones, the faithful ones, are tied to me by their solidarity. But I can hardly believe it. Friendship
should not be a ring through anyone’s nose. Stripped by some, hit on by others, you might want to imprison yourself inside a
gloomy serenity, made of incurable goodness and silent contempt. Do not form that habit.  


He has gone away.