Order this writing in the collection book we the Poets available for only $1395 |
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Order this writing in the collection book Unlocking the Mysteries available for only $1795 |
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This appears in a pre-2010 issue
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DANDELIONS&GRAFFITI
Joshua Harriman
Yeah, low self-esteem rules the street down to the corner and a couple
blocks over to the liquor store. The yellow walls with a yellow chimney in
a stained finger-tip afternoon. At high noon, if you don’t make it in
time, to reach for the surface again, we’ll let them know down the street
and around the corner. Yellow blocks, yellow corner, blue pavement-tarished
gold melting down everyday till nothing makes sense on Hollywood star
inscription. idol-worshipers coming to pay homage to their human gods
implanted on plastic stars trying to outshine the sun. These
idol-worshipers having all but forgotten of the old gods dwelling in fading
constellations, receding off into space, relieving the missed attention, the
missed support.
the crystals sitting above Pluto and Neptune, shining on Earth from the
other side of the universe, the way that human speech seeps through to the
underwater city. The way that we sing songs around a fire, leaves us
begging for novelty from the other shore. Begging for a new product to
erase this malaise, begging for a distraction from this repeating
error-message existence. In this way of life, our errors and mistakes are
seen as a waste of time and we’re chided for committing them, but the music
sounds better when there are glitches and mistakes.
My legs were tired from running, running from the sandpaper scrape. It was
getting dark enough now so that I could just barely make out the surrounding
trees. The air smelt of sap and pine combs, and distracted me for a second
from the terror of being lost. All I could do was lye down and wait for the
sun, and hope I didn’t freeze, hope that the goblins didn’t come and find
me. Their wrinkley green faces and small decrepite bodies, like little
elves gone rotten. I thought about the sunrise, and how it would save me
from my nightmares.
I was living below the crystals of Pluto and Neptune where the sky glowed
with purple and green hot coals, embers of the last survivors glowing on.
Spending their final days in the residence of space light and see-through
rainbows. Crystalline-stretching constellation webs forming through the
haze.