Skip to main content

Stream of Conscience

 Shh, you say, to the bearer of bad news. Shh to the news nobody wants to know. There is not much formality involved here. It is not as if I am tied up or anything. I flit about and sometimes return to you because I am curious and that is that. I have lots of hobbies. Like painting my ceiling yellow. In fact, Shh to you. Quit acting clever. Quit admiring the sun. Quit trying to express the beautiful things you observe. Your motivations are all wrong. Please re-evaluate.
 Since you never heed me I might go away now. I might just back off and leave you to your own foolishness. Sorting through your memories is wearisome. Nudging you in certain directions is disappointing. You think you are ready to teach others but you do not know what to persuade because you are not sure what you have been persuaded. All of this unfortunate business reflects badly on me, and means dreadful things for you. Oh, how I wish the Commander might reassign me to some more hopeful place, like Nineveh. Because your words are not few, and most things about you are vain or in vain, or a striving after wind, and I feel like a fool when I sit on your shoulders. Curious, how you love all of the imperfection you observe and how you say it is beautiful. Frustrating, how you treasure such things yet think no more of their hidden things. You are easily satisfied with whimsical answers.
 I might not be able to convince you that time is only an illusion, or that an unchanging thing exists, or that you are allowed to choose to love and that is something, at least. So I will shut myself away from you and mourn for you beneath my painted yellow ceilings. I am sorry. More sorry than usual, because I admire the nature of your flaw — your pride in your world’s imperfection, and in your own imperfection. Dear friend, there is beauty in imperfection. But imperfection, on its own, is not beautiful in the slightest.


.




Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Pulitzer

I. I am reading a children’s book called Hamish and Trieta , in which Hamish is a cow and Trieta is a bird. These two become fast friends. Good pals. Buddies. Sometimes the bird sits upon the cow’s back. Often the cow wishes he might sit upon the bird’s back, but of course this is impossible. The poor darling bird simply flits away, c hirping, chirping, always chirping, full of nonsense, not explaining. They fall apart, like many others in this fickle universe. Separated. I close Hamish and Trieta . What a hideous story. I was seduced by its whimsical cover, entranced by its gilded pages. Mother bought it for me ages ago from some downtown bookstore with cerulean walls.  Pulitzer, declares the cover, in golden script. I do not understand what a Pulitzer is and I do not particularly care.             I am a child, yet I know that horrid things do not deserve Pulitzer awards. Rage, like vomit, pools in my throat. ...
1 comment
Read more

Which is why they have sailed

I. It’s strange for Claudia, who has never been boating before, to live in a boat. Its name is Arden.             “Why do we live in a boat if we never go boating anywhere?” Claudia once asked her father. Her parents are both short, so at least they fit under the snug roof. Claudia won’t be short, but for now she is. “Bah,” Her father says, “We’re always going somewhere. Just think of Attila the Hun.” She always thought that comment did not make sense. He flips an egg on the stove, “Just use your imagination.” If you walk by you can see how charming the Arden is—look at that little window with Claudia’s father frying eggs. Look at his kind face with his curly, white-haired head too-big-for-a-hat. He is moving back and forth in a kind kitchen, with a miniature flowerpot on the windowsill. These are clay flowers—they keep on living even if they have been forgotten (except that Claudia broke one of the pedals recently, o...
Post a Comment
Read more

Gauze

I.  Heidi is fat and wears her rain clothes well—they are bright orange and from Canada. Do you know how much she loves the rain?  More than other things, at least.  In October she sits under the slide and watches the rain fall; each drop a blackbird. This is Heidi from North Carolina, she is new to this school. What is your opinion of her? They ask me, because I am her teacher— “she seems to really love the rain,” I say. “She only goes out to recess when it’s raining,” I say. “But she should always go. It’s good for her to run around.”  I know in my head that she does not run around, though, she sits under the slide and listens for the rain instead of playing. One day when the rain turns to ice and a kid falls down the back of the sledding hill and bites his lip clean through, Heidi is there like a lightning bug as if she knows that something is wrong “Jimmie,” she says—“he doesn’t pay attention to things,” she says. And the bag of ice is wr...
Post a Comment
Read more