The Birthday Of The Moon

My eyes look backward into the encyclopedia of my head. It’s raining in Kauai. I feel ethical, like a jurisdiction of submarines. It’s a new way of feeling. There are no ceremonies or fists involved, no flags, no swords, no salutes. There is only a pool of stunningly clear water at the base of a statue and the geology of a loan set in a locket. Writing often feels like this, like a quorum, or an aquarium. This illustrates nothing, except the folklore of my anxieties. Picture a room full of bats and a man in a top hat juggling words on a long red tongue. There are no pirates in the placenta, but we do sometimes find pleading, cardboard perimeters and static. When the radar failed, we substituted rapture, and yo-yos. This is when the deer emerged from the forest. It was the afternoon of our evolution, when innocence isn’t so innocent and the air breathes freely. I don’t know what to say about the light, except that it smelled like spider lilies. Cause and effect aren’t as obvious as one might believe. Sometimes a door opens and a man walks out blazing with truth. Nobody knows what to say. What can you say? What can anybody say? The truth is a former sugar plantation. Just keep talking. Pretend not to notice. Those women are naked. That man removed his head. Rhinestones swing from a silver chest, and it’s the birthday of the moon.