What is it? Questions. Answers. Paralysis. This is a point. This is a letter. This is a word. This is a story.

She is sad and discouraged, head resting in her hand. Head in hands. Objectionable behavior. Pressed into a diagram.

This is the geometry. This is the measurement of her. This is the slippery slope, the slide. This is the choppiness of commas. This is the desire to relax. This is hunting. Hunting for badgers. Hunting in puddles. Hunting under the microscope.

This is looking. This is devising. This is an insult. This is non-allusiveness. Allusion, illusion. Protrusion, contusion. This is desperate. Separate. Disparate. Apparent. This is desparent. This is disappearance.

Misconceptions. A tension from upper back through neck and into head.

A sick daring causing stomachache

a slight—what sort of slight

naming what is “hard” obscuring what is “soft” or “easy”

Some problem with the order—where are the 30—were there 30 or not?

honking, rapid, repetitive

see ya later and I got the door

salad for here

sometimes best to disappear

april 14, 2007

Just three pages, all boiled down to just three pages. My granola stomachache, the dryness in my nose and mouth. Heater ticking next to me, cold air drafting from behind my shoulder. Grayness out the window, brownness out the window, sign saying “wetland preserve” names that small anonymous swampy spot. My relationship with suffering is changing, trying to change. Or is this all in my head anyway?