The Light Bulb You Left ON

The Light Bulb You Left ON

Pink and red and red and pink and white. White and chocolate and heart shaped boxes under Ronnie’s pillow. I miss that. Dancing in the balcony of the Biermann Center. Where white tablecloths on white tables drip into and onto the floor, wax. Too many candle makers, in general.   

At the banquet. Moist cake and her bright pink frosting. Bright. Your scattered veins in your eyes when you’re angry. I must gnaw on raw frosting . . . lick the pink away from my subtle spoon. 

“Your teeth are pink now,” says you. “Your teeth are white now,” says I. Too true. Good for you. Toodaloo.  

The library should be empty but here am I, holding down the fort because empty libraries have always been . . . such a danger. Here – here’s a flute fantasy hot off the press, hot against my forehead, all smearing and a smudge of ink. Because I haven’t quite figured out music yet. What a bother. What a burden. 

What am I doing tonight? You ask. Oh, shut your hole. That’s what I have to say with genuine animosity dripping from my taste buds. Sometimes animosity is not completely genuine.  Understandable, I suppose. But you deserve the real thing. 

See, I have just gotten a new job, where I do important things with my time. Unlike yourself. You sit around and twiddle your thumbs, which would normally be acceptable. But your thumbs invite the adjective “stubby.” And after a bit of research, I discovered that your feet are Greek. How incredibly snobbish of you.

So there. There’s my pathos for you. And that’s all you get of my pathos. I don’t pass around pathos much at all. 

I used to sit by a particular lamp in the library, and I’ll have you know I straightened that lamp shade. And dusted that lamp stand.     And now look what you did. You sat beside my lamp and left the light bulb on overnight. 

The poor dear does not work today, that’s how I know about your treachery. I touched the inside of the lamp shade and came away with waxy fingertips, as if the poor dear had been weeping . . . .    

You asked what I’m doing tonight. Important things, that’s what. I have a job you know. A new job, I mean. I have been recently employed. I replace light bulbs on campus. Inside, and outside, and in between two sides of the bitter cold. 

So that’s what I’m doing tonight, with my valuable time. I’m out in the bitter cold, because the noun “cold” practically begs to be bitter. I try to keep an open mind during night shifts. I wonder, what other adjectives ever had a chance to describe cold. Fragrant, purple, desperate, sour, squinting. 

Here’s a light bulb I admire. She won’t come out because she’s frozen. Not letting go, holding on. And here I am, having to break her will because it’s my job. 

I’m an odious creature. Odious. Odious. Odious. Odious.

Funny how words break down when I say them over and over again. Odious should be a name, I think. Do you like that name? I think Odious is a grand name for someone of your stature and reputation. In fact, let’s think of other Odious creature. Sinister sheets of black ice. Detached earlobes. Your tongue in the morning, with a shining film of saliva. 

I consumed an apple today and entirely forgot that apples have seeds. So I swallowed the seeds. So I must have apple trees growing in my stomach, in the acid rain. Where else might apple trees grow? In orchards? With pink, flowing leaves? You must be deceived. 

Granted, Narnia is a special place, and all of that growing took place during a special occasion.  

Granted, today is, as much as I hate to admit it, a special occasion. Today is today and that’s something I suppose. Because you left the lamp on in the library. You are not acceptable in the slightest. Now she’s dead, the lamp, I mean. Who else. And all that time she was burning overnight she was lonely. You could have at least stayed with her. I would have stayed with her. 

     Tonight I stay with dead, and the dying, and the yet still alive light bulbs. What did they ever do wrong? They have served us, each and every odious creature, and served us well. I will not toss them away mindlessly. I stand against convention.

A light bulb accomplishes a whole lot of good in their thin, flimsy lifetime. A lot more good than some of you accomplish. Light bulbs stand their ground in bitter cold, casting shadows for pretentious people like you. Your shadow abhors your scent. You shadow despises ever being assigned to you. Your shadow desires to be torn away from you and cast into the nearest snow drift. Desires to be cleansed. Oh, how I wish I could help your shadow. 

I never was conventional, but at least my shadow stays close by. At least my feet follow in backward footsteps, going forward, and a knapsack clicks with the clattering and chattering of loose glass bulbs. 

I wish you could see them lined up on my windowsill. They look so gloomy. I would leave them on your doorstep but you are never to be trusted again. I hope your path drowns in dire murk and your eyes strain to see light.