12.11.21
It all started with the snail's wet road
up my leg, waking me every few nights.
I'm usually dreaming of being slowly torn
away from my family. Then I fade
into consciousness with a cold streak
running from my knee to my inguinal crease.
I toss over, rub my thighs together
and dive back into dreams.
It's a variation on my normal subconscious
fuckery.
My rickety house on the edge
of a churning lake splits in two.
Mom, Reid, and I on one fraction.
Dad and Morgan on the other,
screaming for us as the rapids
pull our boat house away.
The violent rocking of the floor boards
comforts me. I open the windows
to welcome sloshing water.
Reid and Mom scramble to gather
blankets and canned beans.
I sit criss cross at the window
greeting waves crashing through.
Maybe if everyone's wet I won't
feel so alienated by this transient
glue slathered up my leg.
Sometimes unremarkable, something undeniable.
Right now it's the cold burn of Neosporin.
Then I snap out of it.
I'm safe under grid sheets
and a white knitted blanket.
I still feel snails
slinking through my garden.
If it's not a slime trail to my crotch,
it's a cat tail tickle under my left arm.
I stand up on the bus to let my staggering,
drunk neighbor sit down.
Trying to remember her stop.
Ride the bumps and swerves.
I feel a cat slip between my armpit
and my chest. Quicker than my reflexive
squirm, she finds a place to hide.
The tickle returns next as we hang a sharp left.
The last whip of the cat tail
flickers over my nipple before I can look down.
My brow tightens and tongue presses my
front teeth back in my mouth.
The sneaky fucker prances again!
I swing a rigid right hand over my left shoulder,
slicing a woman with a knit beanie.
Her matching scarf falls to the floor,
slashed into pieces.
I ring the bell and promptly flee the bus
with rustling fur under arm and hissing in my ear.
I watch for pursuers in car mirrors as I walk
to Cafe Soprano.
Eartha Kitt's Santa Baby bounces from cloud
to cloud of smoke. I slide into a dark cherry
leather booth between her sultry verses
and instrumental of flute and horns.
The flute jumps in staccato then falls in legato.
With the smoke obscuring my vision,
my ears perk up for every transition,
each lick cleverly wrote.
The pitch increases as well as its proximity
to my ear. I touch the crook of my neck
below my right ear to feel cold leather.
I trace a bottle with my fingertip
and two black olives. The sounds sharpen
and expand higher and brighter.
A rubber tail snaps my neck and I'm transported
back to the seaward raft.