The Music Box: Chapter Sixty

Isabelle came to with this final vision of the laughing wolf dancing before her eyes as clearly as if he was standing there right now, making himself at home in her own kitchen. She felt as one does after swimming up from the fathomless depths of an impossible dream, but there was also the niggling sense that it was no dream at all; that she had been somewhere and seen something that although it could not be easily explained, was as real as the chair on which she still sat.

Tilting Percy’s hat back above her brow, Isabelle gazed around, hopeful of anchoring herself with the familiar. Powdered ash, a chalky dull gray, sat in the grate on the far side of the room, remnants of last night’s distant warmth, of which there was now not a trace. It reminded her that she should have relit it by now, lunch would be quite late by the time it was ready for cooking. Before it sat the table, reassuringly solid and worn, its wooden top scoured smooth by a thousand plate scrapes, arches of blunt cutlery ends leaving tiny little pocks that slowly wore each other away in greeting.

The shadows of the morning had swung around, giving Isabelle the troubling impression that things were now leaning away from her, distancing themselves from her plight. She rose unsteadily from the chair and walked to the window, three measured steps across the wooden floor – feeling how it dipped in the middle, reaching for a hold on the walls. She must think. What could it all have meant? Who was that strange little man doing coming to her like that? What danger where they all in?

Isabelle cast her mind back to her last conversation with Emily, the question about the woods left hanging in the air between them, thick with meaning. Something had already started to change, and she knew it was not for the better. She felt a little bad she had not been paying more attention to her only daughter, did not show her enough just how much she was cherished. But now was not the time to worry about such things, she had to focus on what to do from here. Isabelle wondered how long Emily and Percy had been gone, where they might have been all this time.

A creaking floorboard sent Isabelle spinning around, her left hand catching on a cup and sending it crashing to the floor. It was Emily’s favourite, bearing a picture of a rabbit and an owl in close discussion about something they both seemed to find quite mirthful. Isabelle looked up from the cup to see Emily standing before her. They both looked back at the cup, Isabelle waiting for Emily to say something about it, let out a whimper or a sob – anything. But Emily simply looked back up at her mother and shrugged.

“Not to worry mother, it’s only a cup.”

Isabelle’s hands wrung the edge of her apron, pulling it this way and that absentmindedly, her fingers suddenly feeling thick with clumsiness, little sausages with a mind all of their own.

“Yes dear, I suppose you’re right,” she said, her voice catching a little but smoothing towards the end.

“I’ll just have to sweep it up. And how was your walk?”

“Oh, it was fine,” Emily sighed. “Percy – I mean father – has just stopped in at the baker’s, so I ran ahead.”

“I see. Well then – let’s not dally. You can help me make lunch. Go wash your hands and then you can come back and help with the potatoes.”

Emily looked down at her hands, Isabelle noting she was peering at her upturned palms, rather than holding up her nails for inspection as she might have expected. Without a word she spun on her heel and disappeared back through the doorway through which Isabelle had never heard her arrive.

An unpleasant shudder ran up her back. What had that man said again?

“Trust what you know,” she mouthed to herself. She knew there was something very, very wrong.

It had worked.

Vinyl Diaries XXI: Sonic Youth

Sonic Youth (Daydream Nation)
Enmore Theatre
February 18, 2008

Twenty years after its creation, it can be a little too easy to take Daydream Nation for granted. Growing up with Pixies, Nirvana, Dinosaur Jr, Pavement et al as the rough-edged yet melodic backdrop, swapping endless mixed tapes overflowing with off-kilter indie licks and crunchy guitary goodness, it's difficult to imagine a time when all of this wasn't quite so.

But a wee back-pedal to 1988 and all this was yet to be. The mood, madness and the method was lurking, of course, spilling out of north-eastern colleges and bursting from Washington winters, but there was still little sense of a collective thrust, a yellow ribbon to tie around the ol' indie tree.

There's always the chance hindsight sweeps away too much in its quest for seamless tidiness, but one suspects Daydream Nation could well have been the penny-dropping moment - the point at which disparate and seemingly incompatible movements were drawn into an understandable and exciting singularity, a common cause still unsure exactly what it was that it was railing against, but finally able to feel a part of something, and not just apart from everything.

If all this has been easy to forget in the time since, it was impossible to ignore tonight. What it lacked in surprise or shock value - familiarity breeding not so much contempt as awestruck-respect - it made up for in its encapsulation of everything that has made Sonic Youth such a crucial part of the last quarter of a century music.

Their sixth studio album, this was the moment at which the times synched with their timeless appeal. The planets aligned to bring an eclipsing beauty to their electric chaos. Their performance tonight, in keeping with the album from which it was drawn, walked a tightrope that was the perfect blend of sonic experimentation, open ended trajectories, uncompromising density, off-kilter tuning and - let's not forget - razor-sharp melodic hooks buried deep and snagging the unwary.

Predictably but no less tinglingly, the show opened with the impossibly shimmering spirit desire of 'Teenage Riot', Kim Gordon's breathy prelude the gathering clouds to Thurston' Moore's sudden thunderclap - the urgency in stark contrast to his occasional laconic daydreaming. The punishing punk surge of 'Silver Rocket' burned brightly, chased hot on its heels by Kim's menacing 'The Sprawl' - a steel trap with lurid candy luring us into its bone-snapping jaws.





''Cross The Breeze' keeps the wick well alight, with the next major change in direction coming with Lee Ranaldo waxing near-sensically through 'Eric's Trip', as a railroad runs through the record store at night.

'Total Trash' is no misnomer, yet it's a case of pop-tinged detritus - a tangy taste of Washing Machines to come. Ranaldo takes the vocals again for 'Hey Joni', a dirty mess with moments of jangling clarity, metallic ringing like church bells pealing across the litter-strewn town square. 'Providence' breaks in disconcertingly, drawing in sampled answering machine messages that sound like Houston transmissions and all.

'Candle' was one of the evening's treasures. Tight little note clusters spilling into jagged riffs, then a chugging undertow stringing is along, the interplay between Lee, Kim and Thurston was at its best, intermingling ideas that clashed and coalesced in equal measure, creating a wonderful whole. It spilt perfectly into 'Rain King', a dark and dirgy noise-fest forced along by heavy kicking on the drums and monsoonal cymbal splashing.

'Kissability' has lashings of that, but expect a black eye to follow if you try your luck. Kim's confusing taunting, drawing you in and pushing you away, lays upon a bed of squalling licks, leaving us much in need of the release promised by 'Trilogy'. Part a) 'The Wonder' begins strangled, but finds the odd breathing place. Part b) 'Hyperstation' is another set pinnacle, an epic, cutting affair that again draws together Kim, Lee and Thurston perfectly, the drums punching in just the right places. It's like a summary of all that's gone before, a map with which to understand the Daydream Nation journey. Tiny little riffs come and go, nicking at our heels, pushing as along into 'z) Eliminator Jr', in which Kim leave us bruised and exhilarated.

One wonders, when ears finally stop ringing, exactly what the terms of Sonic Youth's Faustian deal might have included. These perpetual teenagers push musical boundaries and expectations on album after album, side project after side project, tour after tour, never seeming to lose their enthusiasm or hunger. Tonight's Daydream Nation set was, thankfully, not a note-for-note attempt to recapture whatever it was that they were seeking to say at the time. It was a revisiting but also a revision, refining and redefining as they went.

There's a risk that a venture such as this could prove to be nought but a nostalgic trip down long forgotten lanes, but in the hands of Sonic Youth it proved anything but. We, along with the band perhaps, were reminded of where much of the journey began.

Back on the road of the riot trail, we're once again ready for anything.

The Music Box: Chapter Fifty-Nine

Emily strained to hear over the din of the sea now brushing her toes. Trying to turn her mind from the rising tide, knowing there was not long before the waves would be crashing over where she stood, she leant as far forward as she dared, pleased for once of Crouch’s strong fingers as she used them to hold onto a beam overhead.

Snippets of talk rode the wind her way, handfuls of words mingling with one another in combinations she was sure had not been assembled by the speaker. The wind died a little and she was able to catch a few more snatches, coming together in more comprehensible forms.

“Mother seems a little worried about you at the moment Emily – is everything all right?”

“Oh, everything is...” Another gust of wind carried the rest of her small voice away, just out of Emily’s reach, then back again: “...tired and a funny tummy, but nothing too...”

“Well, as long as it’s nothing too serious. Now I know I’ve seemed a little preoccupied lately, but you know you can always talk to your mother and I don’t you?”

“Of course daddy, of course. It’s nothing, really. I’m all better now, back to my old self.”

“That’s the girl. Well, your mother must be wondering where we’ve gotten too, it’s probably time we got back.”

“Yes daddy, I imagine you are right. Thank you so very much for bringing me down here today.”

“That’s quite okay my dear, it’s been my pleasure. It’s good to have a chance to spend some time with you.”

Emily watched as her father’s right leg disappeared and then his left. Her own shiny, black, buckled shoes both disappeared at once as though flying, and Emily knew her father had lifted Crouch up by the arms and would have swung him around in a full circle, like the chair-o-planes at the fair, knowing it was one of her favourite things to do.

This shared intimacy was the last straw for Emily – Crouch had gone too far this time. She reached into her coat pocket to retrieve the spyroscope, in a hurry to get back onto the pier but terrified she would be spotted if she made her move too soon.

Digging around in the pocket, her fingers brushed against something she hadn’t felt there before. Closing her fingers around it, she pulled it out for a closer look. It was the little blue bag with the liquorice she had conjured inside the music box!

But she thought one of the Topkinses still had that. Unless, when Oscar hugged her farewell... But why? Puzzling over what it might mean, Emily was stumped. Putting the question to the back of her mind for now, she reached into the other pocket, the one in which the spyroscope actually was, and peered through it. She saw her father and herself heading back up the main street, the collars of their coats turned up against the cold. She turned her mind to her mother, but was confused to see what appeared to be a running river, but no sign of anybody.

With no time to lose, and a particularly swollen looking wave bearing down on her, Emily reached for the edge of the pier and pulled herself up. There was little chance she could have pulled that off usually, but with Crouch’s long limbs it was a cinch. She ached to be racing up the street and to her home, to get there ahead of her father and Crouch, but knew that only danger could follow such a path. Crouch was too unpredictable, who knew what he might do?

No, the only thing in her favour was the element of surprise. As far as Crouch was concerned, Emily was trapped away evermore in the music box, unable to have any bearing on his plans. He could bide his time – although Emily knew enough about him to know that he could only do so for so long. Such was his hunger, his insatiable need to have his way, he would make something happen sooner than later. And her father was likely to be the first victim. She knew, too, that whatever happened with her mother could not end well. If Crouch could not have her, for a second time, he would ensure that nobody could.

Emily pulled out Crouch’s book and opened to the last section. It was the only chance.

***

Today I journeyed somewhere that has long intrigued me. I sent myself into a box.

It was a dangerous step to take, for there was no guarantee I would be able to ever make my way back out. But I had thought long and hard about this and there was no choice. If I were to make the most of my discoveries, extend them to their full potential, I needed to enter the realm I had created in the boxes and unearth what could be found within.

I have made the boxes in a way that nobody could really complain about being in there. If anything, they are frightfully lucky to have the opportunity, to be in a world in which their wishes and desires are rendered flesh – a vast improvement on the sad lot of their pathetic, provincial lives.

Although I have created these boxes, it is from my own mind that their idea has been shaped, that the music has been drawn, there was one thing about which I was not entirely certain. The key! How to get in and out safely? I knew it must involve a link with the other side, a way to tap into the life that was existing in the other to which one found oneself. And then it dawned on me – what gives life, sustains one’s life?

It was food. To return to the life from which we have stepped, we need but partake of the life-giving sustenance that supports that life; that makes it what it is. Loading my pocket with a small bag of candy from the jar I keep on my bench, I set forth and took the step I knew I must take.

I spent a great deal of time in the box on my first visit, intrigued by the resemblance of its world to my own, yet by its differences. In this world I could achieve in a moment what it would have taken a lifetime to execute in the world from which I had come. All the rules had changed, and in my favour. Invention required only imagination – the usual laws of physics, of time and space and more, were no match for the power of the mind. The possible became actual, thought become action.

At first I was captivated by its near perfection, by the granting of any whim I could conjure but one – I could not make Isabelle appear. Night after night I would return to the forest in search of her, the music box forest reproducing in its entirety that which I had come to know so well, flawless similitude, but for that one element that made it what it was for me. Hope as I may, focused as I was on this single most desire, she never appeared.

Frustrated by this fatal flaw in the box, I vowed to dedicate my life to making it happen, that I would have her once more. I needed to return home, to discover why the music box would fulfil the wishes of those I sent there, yet failed to provide me with the one thing for which I asked. Carefully selecting some blueberries that I could take back with me, knowing I would be able to return any time I wished if I was to eat them, I retrieved a piece of candy from my pocket, placed it in my mouth and returned home.

Vinyl Diaries XX: PJ Harvey

by Ella Mullins

PJ Harvey
Sydney Opera House
February 15, 2008


The many masks of PJ Harvey – just who is the real Polly Jean?

The first time I saw PJ perform she was dressed to kill – long limbs fleeing her man-eating blood red dress (with lips to match), a vampiress stepping straight onto stage fresh from a fleshy feast. The set was charged with hunger and hurt and was PJ the axe-murdering guitar queen.

The last tour she was dressed not so much to the nines as the twos or maybe threes, a fluorescent mess scratching out the curled lip dirty cut-up blues trash of Uh Huh Her.

This time, in the rarefied majesty that is the Sydney Opera House Concert Hall, we were witness to yet another creature all together. With frightful paleness, dark hair piled high into a hive compiled by outré bees and a long black dress both rags and riches, dripping silver sparkles, she seemed to have stepped straight from a Tim Burton dreamscape.

It may seem a tad off the point to be discussing outfit choice rather than simply the music, but that would be to miss half the PJ experience. This is very much a show steeped in performance, in the sense that while at heart it is of course about the music, what seems to be happening overall is a working through of deeper levels, a journey of self-discovery that we relate to for we all undertake a parallel path in one way or another.

With each new PJ encounter, it’s as though she is trying all of these lives on, looking for which might fit. The angry, pained caterwauling and Doc Marten stomp from the early days of Dry and Rid of Me, the vamp sassiness of To Bring You My Love, the windswept, troubled landscapes of Is This Desire? – all were on the one hand PJ through and through, yet on the other it felt like she was also struggling to find her way; we were witnessing a ‘becoming' more than simply a reflection of a space in which she had already grown comfortable.

The same seemed to be true with Stories From the City, Stories From The Sea – the girl from the gently undulating English countryside smitten by New York City and its ceaseless promise, its vertiginous verticality, but ultimately unable to give it the name 'home'. Its follow-up Uh Huh Her read as a reaction to the polish and easy Friday night glamour of Stories, a deliberately confrontational cut and paste tantrum.

Each album serves almost a denial of the last – is certainly reactionary at the very least. But it’s not merely a flip to a flop, a busy, highly produced album giving way to a stripped back counter, then back again. Each is a progression on the last, even if it’s via denial and rejection.

In many ways this is the secret to PJ's ongoing appeal, and her continued relevance as an artist. She appears forever to be struggling against boundaries, pushing the envelope – then licking it, hopping in, closing it up and sending it off to some new place altogether.

This has all taken place over a period spanning more than 15 years, so it was intriguing to see the journey in miniature tonight. Playing handfuls of works off pretty much every album, the songs were bracketed together from each era, clusters nudging shoulders with their usurpers, but all getting along just fine, letting bygones be bygones.

Opening with the sparse menace of ‘To Bring You My Love’, the welcome mat was laid out by the guitar-wielding dominatrix in (metaphorical) shiny boots of leather. Those unmistakable six notes, the third deliciously slurred, drawing us in with ease. Each set tends to begin with one of her opening album tracks, songs that have always been perfectly selected to reel us in and not let go. This did just that, that half-pace opening, the perfectly measured distortion and a promise we couldn’t refuse.

'Send His Love To Me' let added a hint of dark folk to the mix, before PJ took to the piano stool for the first of her White Chalk pieces. The disturbing ‘When Under Ether’ was an ideal entry point, setting the mood for what was to follow. Not everyone’s taken immediately to the predominantly piano ballad driven White Chalk, missing, perhaps, the guitar, bass and drums set-up. But this adventurous leap into unchartered waters is a slow-growing delight, and the well selected pieces from it tonight were brought to life with a shiver-inducing touch.

The mood is cool and creepy, Victorian drama evocative of late 18th century London. It’s a snapshot of life hidden in sunless back alleys, mossy cobblestones and dankness, houses of ill repute and gas lanterns, unimaginable poverty and coughs that take root and never leave. The instrumentation is mostly acoustic – piano, acoustic guitar, harmonica. At certain points it’s not a long way from what Grant Lee Phillips has been doing for some time, but instead of exploring the different layers of the small town American past, it’s thoroughly, unapologetically British – Dickensianly dystopic. It may be because I’m re-reading Angela Carter’s Nights at the Circus, but it seems a perfect fit for that slightly unreal underbelly of London’s shady past, the soundtrack to the larger than life past being recounted by Fevvers.

Such leaps and projections are easily made, as with PJ there’s always a sense that these songs are inhabited by a cast of conflicted characters. Some bold some shy, some wise some naive, many seeming salvaged from a history that would have otherwise overlooked them completely. Over the course of the journey the possibly misguided suspicion dawns that these characters are all facets of the one complex, contradictory soul. But don't let her here you say so.

The sense of this is very strong with White Chalk, a return to an approach last truly developed on Is This Desire?, from which the next batch of songs were drawn. Delicate and piano driven at one end and drum-machine and synthesiser cold at the other, it’s highly unusual to have any of these songs worked into a live set. This is PJ’s most under-rated album, lost between the cracks in just the way its characters all were until PJ salvaged their memory from the far-flung corners of forgotten time. So the fragile beauty of ‘Angelene’ took us back to that moment PJ first allowed us to peer behind the curtains to a gentler, fractured side. It was a touching caress of the cheek that turned into a back-handed slap in the form of the frumpy, squelching, fuzzed up ‘My Beautiful Leah’, and the disembodied ghostly horror of 'Electric Light'.

As well as being a dab hand at just about any instrument that comes within reach, PJ can sing a little. Her voice will twist and turn on the merest whim – from witch’s cackle to banshee wail and rumbling bearded lady in the blink of an eye, soaring at times to the roof a long way above, spilling on the floor in a glorious broken mess at other.

Her ability to swing so effortlessly from style to style and persona to persona is not as unsettling or off-putting as it could be in a lesser talent. She’s not exactly a chameleon, for each change builds a layer upon the prior. She’s what she was and what she is now, an oil-painting where each stroke, even if we can only see its ghost, is as essential as the last.

Weaving through the icily clanging 'Silence' and austere 'The Mountain', watching her come up 'Mansize' and riding the horses in her dreams as we joined her 'Down By The Water' - infanticide at its catchiest - one was led to wonder. Who, then, is Polly Jean Harvey? For songs so simple in structure, so upfront about their intentions, the question is surprisingly complex. And the stream of potential answers could be endless, or could be dead simple.

After all of this, she's still just a West Country girl with a big fat cat, who brought her mum along to see her play at the Sydney Opera House – and then dropped a very, very rude word.

The Music Box: Chapter Fifty-Eight

Isabelle’s mind raced. How on earth did this strange little man, as round as we was tall and wearing the most unusual attire, know her daughter?

“It’s a very long story, and one for which we don’t have the time to truly unravel,” he smiled.

“Suffice to say, she is a courageous, intelligent, charming young girl, and from all appearances it comes from her mother’s side.”

“But, how...”

“Because you have not been where I am from, I cannot reach you in your own world, in the ordinary way. But, because this forest is a place that was opened up to Emily, and is a place that you, too, know, it is somewhere that we can meet. Although you began your travel back here via memory, you deviated from that path and have since lapsed into dream, which enables me to appear despite me not being a part of any existing memory you have. Our dreams are where our memories meet our hopes, where what we know meets what we seek to understand.

“You are seeking to understand what is happening in your life and drawing on memories of a time where you were in control, a time that you feel has something to offer up to your present circumstances, though you don’t know how.

“That’s all I really have the time to explain. I hasten not to be rude, but this is a serious matter with not a moment to lose. Your family is in grave danger. Though it pains me most grievously, I’m not able to tell you exactly how. Certain limitations have been placed on me and my appearance to you now that make it impossible to tell you what that danger is, though I would dearly love to. He who opened the door to where I come from does not know that the door has become a means of two-way travel for more than just he, that others can exit without his beckoning if they know how. When he finds out, and learns that one of us has come out without it being of his bidding, there will be hell to pay.

“Nevertheless, though he could not imagine any of us ever coming out, he has made the precaution of making it impossible for us to speak ill of him – a physical impossibility that leaves our tongues tied and unable to utter another word until he reverses it himself.

“What I can say Isabelle is this – trust what you know. What you feel. All is not necessarily as it seems, and how things seem is not necessary all. There are things that we know to be true even though they are impossible, and feelings so strong that they overwhelm the very evidence before our eyes. You have long known this, but never has it been more important to trust yourself.

“And that, I am afraid, is all I can say about the matter.”

“But...” Before Isabelle could get out another word, he was gone. It had happened in the blink of an eye – the funny little man before her, who looked more likely to roll along than walk or run, had simply vanished. The sounds of the night slowly came back to Isabelle, the rush of the river and the hushed sound of the last of the wood in the fire settling into its final resting place.

Her head echoed with his speech, snippets bouncing and clashing and making all new phrases. But there were two lines that kept recurring – her family was in danger, and she must trust what she knows.

Isabelle knew this must have something to do with Emily and the way she had been behaving. Ever since she had returned from the Tibbits’ that evening, something had felt wrong. But what was it? Isabelle still could not put her finger on what was different, what had shifted. She resolved to find out what it was that had troubled her daughter and do everything in her power to set things straight.

Staring into the fire, Isabelle crouched down to warm her hands. The chill of the night was finally catching up with her and she wasn’t yet dry. Absentmindedly her fingers swept around on the forest floor and came back to her with a handful of dry leaves. She tossed them onto the remains of the fire. A wisp of smoke arose and the deep red embers ignited the fresh fuel. Orange flames leapt from the leaves and the smoke wisp thickened, swirling into a small cloud. The cloud thickened and stretched, building in height. Isabelle tumbled backwards as it grew and she saw it take shape.

Looking back at her, watching over the edges of a heavy cloak, was a wolf standing tall on two legs – laughing she was sure.

sorry

Sorry.

What's in a word?

For our previous Government, under John Howard, being in power meant never having to say you were sorry.

This morning our new Prime Minister, Labor's Kevin Rudd, opened his first term leading Parliament by saying the word so many had so-long needed to hear.

In apologising to the Stolen Generations, those Indigenous Australians of mixed descent torn from their families by policies that lasted the better part of a century, Rudd kept a promise he had taken to the election.

Policies explicitly determined to culturally assimilate generations of Indigenous Australians, to 'breed out' their Aboriginality, resulted in the removal of at least 100,000 children. Not one Indigenous family has been untouched by this forcible removal. Not one.

Howard could bask in the reflected glory of the ANZAC spirit, the triumphs of his boorish yet cherished cricket team. But the petty, mean-spirited, ideologically driven and empathy-stunted man could see no link between the actions taken by Parliament through most of the 1900s and the Parliament he led - a Parliament he came into a scant five years after forcible removal programs were still in effect.

His idea of 'practical reconciliation' - a new paternalism with frightening echoes of such damaging past policies - was a cynical smokescreen perfectly in keeping with his government's insistence on blaming the victim. But now he has gone, and we can thankfully move on, regain some of the lost ground and missed opportunities of the last 12 years.

The fragmentation and sense of dislocation and isolation inflicted by this deliberate and systemic cultural genocide cannot even begin to be understood. This morning, Mr Rudd said the Parliament apologised for laws and policies which had "inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians."

"For the pain, suffering and hurt of these Stolen Generations, their descendants and for their families left behind, we say sorry."

The words themselves can of course make no difference in and of themselves. So much more must now be done if any improvements are to be made to lessen the disgraceful gaps in health, literacy, mortality rates and life expectancy that exist between the Indigenous and non-Indigenous populations.

But there is hope that the apology will at least be a step towards closure, a move towards redressing the atrocities of the past, stemming the pain and healing the deep emotional wounds.

Postcard from an absent muse III

B,

Fill up the kettle and put out my slippers, I have a feeling I'm on my way home.

-M

postcard from an absent muse II

Dear Benjamin,

When I left, I was unsure how long I would be gone. All I knew was that it was time. My wings, previously proud and lustrous, had grown dull with disuse. My mind, once running clear as a stream of crystal droplets, pure as angel tears, had silted with the detritus of the everyday.

The winds brought me here, Jukkasjärvi. The River Torne has iced over, yet I am swept up by the ceaseless passage beneath the surface, the long journey from Torneträsk into the Gulf of Bothnia. The cold is really helping. The bracing invigoration promises to dispel any last vestige of sluggishness. I'm remembering things. To breath. To want. To feel.

To live.


-M

postcard from an absent muse

Dear Benjamin,

Sorry to leave without saying anything. I didn't want to interrupt, you seemed so busy, preoccupied. I came to say farewell, but looking in the window, seeing the dry creek bed furrow of your brow, the way your fingers twitched as though hoping to pull from the very air answers as to what it was you had forgotten was next to do, I paused before knocking. I thought after some time you might see me there, thought you might turn for a second and remember who I was, invite me in.

You left the room.

I'll be in touch soon,

M