Exile

Well, back to the drawing boards. I turned my back on the warmth of my cocoon for only a few days. The big, bad, crooked-toothed, shifty-eyed earth is back once again. Quick sand. A dead bird on my front porch. The Los Angeles TImes is an accordion-cut-mass grave of paper soldiers lying head-to-foot and vice-versa. I'm speaking to fewer and fewer people every day. Characters in books are closer, feel warmer. More real. I guess I got away from myself. When the church is empty even the faintest noise reverberates for hours.

Why did your empty gaze and anonymous mouth hypnotize me so? I turned you into a heavenly ghost and then followed you around the city like a red balloon. The truth is more likely that you are only a mammal, but it's nature's cruel indifference that excites me. Hair. Lips. Skin. Fingers. Fuck, it's the eyes. It's like they hold a secret that is unrevealed even to their possessor. My mind can protect me, but probably not for long.