Thursday, January 18, 2007

The bench, otherwise known as the lake perch, just down the hill from the apartment, a.k.a. the home. Runners running. Birds doing their bird thing. Not a poem but a simple return to writing on a widening notebook. A skinny green pen. Two pairs of skinny legs moving in the dusk. Pointed away from the sun, say north or a direction resembling north, it was good to see a few of those people who have run past. Some of them look at me, some of them don't. No action, or no result other than the acknowledgement of presence. Not even a nod, but an inclusion into the park scape. Music that was bleating behind me has stopped. Stop smoking, stop blaming your problems on other people. The music has started again. Fragments of conversation. The sounds of traffic passing by, engines and motors. A mother and her teenage son. Neither nor, a thrift store coat. Social responsibility lies with the socially responsible. To see a move end call it a night. A movie with no end. The fading sunlight, a voice rising in its approach, and the sun made of light; not a burning ball but a yellow symbol, abstract as meaning. A Charlie Brown Christmas. A trip to the museum, closed on Mondays and Tuesdays. A sigh from a mother walking with her daughter. Anything but made up. Don't forget to call. Don't forget to write and bring pictures, the fading voice and the quiet entrance into a room. A memory of a video game, a half smoked cigarette. Traffic increases and the glances made apparent, to option, out-source, a conversation outward, building a relationship or looking for an answer. Making other plans, but not surprising. I'm not trying to recreate the situation, but interpret with a bias as full as weather, a wind blowing outside of the car. Headlights on, okay if you want it to, but the same pace, the pace of circling the lake. Perhaps a piece or part of it, a gap in conversation, a fraction of it overheard, and though not miscontextualized, misconstrued, no, but recorded as is. Simply and without judgment, to be lead to what is important by a narrowing of options, that importance finds you. A lake in the city's dusk. A small bird diving to the bottom of the pond. The expression on the face of sentiment, not important, but a lasting image. A short legged dog trying to keep up, in good conscious, and a heart beats rapidly, as if the words had caused the race to begin, not the gun but the intention to signal. Pick you head up. A runner's pony tail swishes. Could it be any other way? Not what we see but imagined to have been. A glance at the man sitting on a bench. Taking notes on just that, the notion of looking. Recognition and awareness. A simple meditation, and done so through practice. Not a technique. No ending.