Farther than the Western Sun

People all the time are asking me for directions.

A civic duty I find commensurate with my abilities

since I've lived here as long as I have.

I oblige: First go towards the light

and then keep going, no matter what color.

All roads are good.

This city is clutching at pills.

The lions of the street corner hustle, selling baggies of firecloud and love.

This city stands with strangers in strange waving poses.

This city is my mother, a picture framed on every wall of histories rolled and burned years ago, brushed of dust and covered in fingersmudged glass nonetheless.

The weight of dashed hopes bounces all over me like a floppy newlywed in this city, swelling and flossed. Prone to traffic and other pong-ish arterial vicissitudes. Frugal and oozing. Living, alive. This city is dying.

People all the time are asking me, "Who is the Masked Man?" in my mnemonic hours of imagination just before bed when the fantasy permeates the lie that I am a famous indie blogger with a loyal and fervent reader-base following who leave lots of witty comments and quavering linger at the cusp of my every post.

And I answer them differently every time.

Sometimes he is comic foe. Farceur of philosophies, or jigsaw fitted pastiche of romances. Disgrace. Marcid. Refugee. The man in the mask is vast, like empires or the consummate chimeras of our collective ambition. The thousand faces of the soul.

But what if the Masked Man is a Woman? This penis but prosthesis of deception, like the masque.

She hides in plain sight. The stories waiting all around us at the museum, press the button, hear the voices talk, or walk by ignorantly and laughing. She is the histories someone saw,

said

saved

and once alive, now living, which is another way of saying, almost dead.

Here she writes:

"Into the high noon sun
Watching you run"
~Wolf Parade~

People all the time are asking me. Don't know why this time I said yes but I did and she dredged herself out of the blear and murky jungle swampwraiths of our past and arrived at my door in this city awakened from a deep sleep. A bitter divorce following years of acrimonious precedent and a chip on her shoulder splitting hysterical daggers of contempt in every direction. Esp. mine.

"This is my city," I said. "This is my beginning. Those are my dumpsters and beds. These are my friends who sleep on trains. That is the pouring rain and these are our bridges. Here we cross them." We drank a glass half full until nearly satisfied but not quite. What is it that makes a person happiest? "This is the price of things," I cont. "There is the Bay. That is the ocean. Stay away from the ocean, it is scary and infinite."

May I go on? Why, thank you— I pointed out the sun stained sagging windows,

malnourished squatters

freshest produce.

A hundred years of prosperous commerce. The high financier with a wide waist, the low limping beltless cadger.

"I like it," she said to the fiery sunset, "maybe it will work. Maybe it will take me twenty years. Maybe more." And I juggled the daggers she had spewed over the course of the night. People all the time are stabbing me. Heartless, uncaring monster. Who will I be tonight? Any road is good. The Thing hiding behind the mask will do.

"That's a good idea," I spoke back by way of the last flickering rays. This fire is burning. Alive, living. This fire is dying. Take a step into the darkness. Uncertainty is part of the master plan.

"Are you sure it’s a good idea?" she asked me on the edge of the city where I live. 

People all the time are asking me for direction.

A sacred duty I find unbearably beyond my ethical facilities

since I've made as many mistakes as I have.

I advise: I'm cold let's go inside

and then watch a movie and decide

Whatever you want to watch.

Anything is good.