Grotesque Purplish Landscape
     It looked like a landscape, but there were no trees--her cheeks' expression. I admired her earrings, heard in return the story of their gifting, but then in the end there was nothing but one color between us, and it was not my favorite shade.

The Farewell at the Window
     This is not the final farewell; there will not be one. The woman picks up stones on the beach and paves them along the windowsill. The man can tell thereby she is angry and yet he feels superior for this hurt. They will say hello again but slowly.

The Bear Cub (Lady's Body)
     The Bare Club Lady's Body. The Bear-Cub Lady's Body. The bladey ladey. The cubby boddy. Baby cub baby. Bare up the bear. Club the lady.

The Man with the Blue Hat
     I don't wish I had known him better when I was young; we were acquainted, it's true, but not well. This man, silently called "Q," was a friend of a friend of my father's, a man who raised trout. The blue hat, cornflower blue. The trout, rainbow. I sat in what he gave me: a raving green car.

Head with Blisters
     Indeed an unfortunate cross to bear, to bear blisters. Even if only from staying in sun too long. I found a red blister on the floor of my room just yesterday, and couldn't decide who might have dropped it. I have it still, a small red plasticky petal, the size of a toenail.

Time Presses
     Up against you, doesn't it. Lying there doesn't help, the backache (bach-ake) with music doesn't let up, time presses and he presses time. There is no help for it, only silence. Rake through the water with a wooden rake solely for the pleasure of its feeling.

Botany and Geography (Lady's Body)
     I don't know if he should bring more flowers. They always seem to come when there is very little hope for both of them. They arrange themselves in judgmental clusters.

Lady's Body Gaudy Bunch of Flowers
     Gaudi's Barcelona, where we may be going.

Landscape with Troubled Sky, Swan Flying Overhead
     This is exactly the one; how did you know? The rain makes the inlet rise higher and higher. Swans here yesterday cannot decide. One, large as a Great Dane, forced me back into the cabin, where I sat down to regard his gorgeousness from the screened-in porch.

Landscaped Table
     Forgot to mention the swan's two feet, as huge as luncheon platters.

Table with Leaning Bottle
     You can't presume to wait for an understanding. You would wait, but you would not be satisfied, or those who waited with you would not be either. Just one jostle by your elbow and the bottle would roll down.

Landscape of the Formless
     Ah, with the storm promising to dissipate, with the gulls suggesting they head away from the rain, with breakfast digesting sesame seeds and coffee, with the dream you forced upon me and the dream I refused to tell. But it was all rather worthless. Tell it.

Carrot Nose
     Don't want to talk about it.