day_number_12156 ever dumbening The screaming of the woman who lives directly across the street brings first consciousness; jackhammers and cement cutters fall in right behind. Oatmeal cooked in vanilla soy milk with fresh-ground cinnamon and cardamon, topped with pine nuts, perfectly ripe banana slices, a spot of ghee, and drizzled with pure maple syrup from near the boundary waters of Minnesota fills the empty spaces. Jasmine tea adds to the growing warmth. I journey to the Albany "bulb," a chunk of landfill built with broken cement and snaggled knots of rebar that has slowly been reclaimed by nature and ad hoc artists. It's so close to my house, yet I've never been. A maze of small paths allows me to bounce around, a particle buffeted by Brownian motion. Ambling, I flush three garter snakes and a handful of small lizards, one now immortalized in ink. I happen upon a smokehouse, a kiva made entirely of fennel reeds. Further explorations reveal painted cement slabs and driftwood constructions, a rusty stool with the words "IMAGINE LOVE AGAIN" painted on the seat, and yet again at a pivotal point in my life--Whitman. A piece of paper covered in plastic, with words blurred by sun-drawn condensation, reads: "This is what you shall do: love the earth and the Sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, stand up for the stupid and the crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence towards the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown, or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and mothers of families, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great poem ...." I clamber down to the lagoon and walk along the low breakwater stones, my eyes nearly level with the bay. Surrounded by coots, grebes, herons, cormorants, and a sunken boat slurping and coughing slowly in the placid water's push, I am overwhelmed by the sense that I'm witnessing my own birth. What a rare gift. The vastness--I never imagined possible. A few hours later I make my way with my aging father to the symphony. City hall is dreamlike cast against the deepening blue. Brass chorales of unyielding force and seamless liquid strings travel from Prokofiev's long-dead hand to my exploding heart. The day, and the tracing thereof, wind down. Thirty-three years, and you can bet I fucking earned this one. 030307 ... frAnk and we who are now made privy to this lifting of the veil look, eyes wet with clarity, witness to the wonder. thanksjames. 030307 ... x meanwhile, with blurry eyes, in another place, i tried to perform magic 030307 ... ever dumbening was this time in my life just a myth? did i watch it on tv? it feels fake now, but it didn't then--it felt open and expansive and alive. i can't keep waiting for it to return, and i've done everything i can to restore some of the sensation. limp, lifeless, closed off. surgical rakes pulling the wrong way draw everything in, tightening towards the rotting center. no light, no air, no water, no ground to stand or root. these are hardly conditions for growth, yet the resources are out of reach, and everyone agrees There Are No Answers. i crave your hand in mine; take my wrist, you'll feel the thin, thready pulse. you'll know what to do, i'm certain. fuck you, day number 15132, for reminding me just how far i've drifted. 110430 ... jane though it is of little consolation to the lost, try to remember you are _always_ drifting towards something. magnets, j. xo 110505 ... unhinged maybe drifting isn't as bad as our parents want us to think groundlessness it's the human condition 110505 ... ever dumbening day number 16974, and i just want there to be no more days. tired of counting, tired of trying, tired of failing, tired of being wrong, tired of constant stress/crisis/discomfort/dissonance, tired of being told the microscopic victories are enough. 160515 ... ever dumbening five more years of days, bleak days, with no light or path or hope or desire. forced into yet another "decision" to be made entirely from a place of purest desperation. 210302 what's it to you? who go blather from