Ceyx And Alcione lV

Poor Alcione was sick with grief and couldn't sleep or eat, which was partly ok because she felt she was getting fat. But the insomnia was tough. Night after night she lay awake, praying. She fasted, lit candles and burned certain leaves that she bought off a witch. In those days they didn't have email or even telephones, which was fine in many ways. The queen of the Gods, Juno, heard her. Unable to bear it any longer (Ceyx being dead) she said to her secretary:

'Iris, this has got to stop. The poor girl. Quick, a dream. Tell her the truth-her husband sleeps with the fishes. And be quick, please.'

'Yes, M'am, ' replied Iris, sulkily. She was young and very pretty and had better things to do with her time than run messages for Juno, but she didn't complain and started off for the house of Alcione with a starfish-shaped dream in her pocketbook.

'Why me, ' she sighed, under her breath, as she left. On the way she stopped in Arizona to pick up Sleep, who having spent the last ten years dozing on his right side, had recently shifted to his left.

That night Alcione had-what else-a dream. She dreamed she was lying on the dark sea floor, the weight of all the waves oppressing her chest. When she woke she spotted Sleep at the foot of the bed. He had taken the shape of her drowned husband. He didn't look so good. Seawater oozed from every pore, like a sponge. Algaes and sea-lilies tangled in his hair. An eel coiled its heavy lenghs around his shoulders and neck. He was completely naked, having shed his clothes when the ship began to sink. He stood in a rapidly growing puddle of brine and when he first opened his mouth to speak, out came a stream of minnows. Her heart was seized with pity and terror. Over her prostrate form he leaned and said:

'My dearest Alcione, my own, I am dead and beyond your unavailing tears. I will never come back. In my triall I thought only of you. The last word of my lips was your name.

With that she knew he was dead. The next day....

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The Peanut-Butter Cookie 2

-How old was he?
-About my age.
-Tell me about him, again.
-There's not much to tell. I was standing on the curb. I didn't see him coming. Suddenly, there he was. I found myself looking into his eyes. They were gray, I think.
-And?
-He stopped. He opened the paper bag he was carrying and held it out. Obviously, I was supposed to help myself. The bag was jaded and looked like it had seen alot of action, that particular morning.
-The cookies!
-Yep, the cookies. It wouldn't be nice to refuse. In those days, people still worried about such things.
-Courtesy is the most efficient form of coercion. Everybody wins.
-Be that as it may, I reached into the bag and took out-surprise-a peanut-butter cookie. I knew it was a peanut-butter cookie. It was sandy blond and had hatch marks from a fork on top.
-So you ate the cookie?
-Unh-unh.His hands were filthy, the little urchin, my doppelganger. But I waved the cookie around as if I was delighted to have it, and wanted, at that moment, nothing more. It seemed the nice thing.
-So what happened to him?
-How should I know? Suddenly he was gone.
Awful! Is consciousness just circular memory? Is reality?
-Gone. He moved on. Rejoined the parade.
-But he wormed his way into your menagerie of long-term memories-
-I guess.
-It's sad, you know.
-Why do you say that?

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Passaggieta

The great evening passaggieta was upon us.
Crowds of pedestrians thronged the esplanade,
many pushing baby strollers of the indestructible late type.
The sky was filled with pink and gold clouds.
We talked softly, reminiscing. There was alot to reminisce.
'The Past is different, ' I continued. 'It has color. Meaning. Why? '
We were sitting on a park bench after the bake of the day
talking and watching the sunset and watching the river go by;
watching blunt-nosed tugs trail wakes of gold upstream All very Glackens.
'You were young, ' she explained, with a sigh. 'That's why. Everything is better when you're young. The essence of romance, unfortunately,
is wanting what you can't have. And romance is a great colorist.
You know what GBS said-'
'It's wasted on the young. Yes, I know. But if you can't take it for granted, it isn't youth. So, no, it can't be just that. Life was better, then. Absolutely. The city was better, then. It wasn't filled up with....'
'Never mind, ' she said, quickly, reading my mind and fearing the worst.
...baby strollers, ' I finished, a little spitefully, hoping it would make the point.
'You can't blame people for being people, ' she laughed, ruefully.
'But we created it. Everything. And what do we get? Prices! Over-crowding!
Gaucherie! And bourgeois thinking.
'Gaucherie? Why, I'm not even sure what that is, ' she said, bravely.
But I knew she did.

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from Marian

There she stood-but how changed!
Her shallow back toward me, behind my tree
Draped by the pleats of her pink housedress
A sallow crescent of chest showing
Her sandstone-colored arms hanging
Limp at her sides from pinkish sleeves
Bulky as expired beach-balls
Her face the color of pasta, cooked and drained
Cancre strewn, her
Carefully rinsed (not that I ever knew) pale blonde hair
Grown shockingly gray
Around those miraculous cheek bones
Her thin hand moved to her face
As if she were thinking of something.

Mom had sent me over to check on her
And learn if she was alright or needed anything,
That was the sort of thing women did, I knew.
Men got up, shrugged, shaved, disappeared,
Women stayed home and checked up on things-

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A Visit From Voltaire l

(bedroom)

MM Voltaire! What are you doing here?
V Rummaging your drawers.
MM What for?
V Je cherche un manuscrit. Something I'm working on. Have you seen it?
MM What makes you think it's here, cher Monsieur?
V No particular reason. It's called 'Candide'.
MM It's already been published. To great acclaim. Reprinted
countless times. But that was long ago.
V What? Oh, good. Pardon, my memory's not what it used to be. It used
to be prodigious.I used to know the entire Bible by heart. However,
there is no such thing as 'a long time ago'. The best human thought
is beyond time, and therefore, always new. Only the dull and
disinterested-or worse-believe otherwise.You select out what you
agree with, and call it memorable.
MM Well, excuse me! It's a master-piece, anyway. But, was it useful,
knowing the Bible by heart?
V I can honestly say it was. Are you sure it's not here, the manuscrit?
MM Very.

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poem by Morgan Michaels
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