Joel Craig

He knows how to do what he sets out to do with perfectly obvious procedure. The sea is dark and forbidding. The horizon is dark and forbidding. Even from a distance, the less said the better. The colors in some of these landscapes are perfectly desperate. In a portrait there is never anything wrong with the mouth. There is never anything wrong with anything. Machines are not choosers. The next best things are certain. Heaven knowing the next best things. The young can explain it, but who would they explain it to? More promise than performance as all sorts of things begin to interfere. An energetic hostess seated me at the counter next to a beautiful woman. It is possible the timid portion of the population unless held firmly in check will imitate the silliness of timid people of years ago. Supplication is valued. As soon as I learned the facts I gave up on the exchange. She wanted something mysterious, as if everything were the same. Life changes and so-called truth changes with it. The businesslike haste of the surgeon as he scolds the public. To look at him and the thing he can never look at shudderingly as the blood is drawn is the duty of every patriot. In a constructive age such as this I should have neglected everything for the supreme duty of aiding in the reconstruction. I took my courage, which starts everywhere and goes nowhere, and spoke to her. Here one can unquestionably infer the inside from the outside. The leaders of the free world, assembled as if by magic, seem to have the enemy at their mercy. It can be argued that Christ himself spoke to the mob. The crowd will stop to see almost anything. The crowd will stop to see something about almost everything.

Have you seen, have you seen magic shadows? — Fleetwood Mac, “Nightwatch” My fugues have no apparent relation to past trauma of any kind. When it came time to rehearse we decided to get glamorous. We get all done-up for rehearsal. Gradually, imperceptibly, things begin slipping back into their normal place. My body is slowly rotating into its proper north-south orientation. My playing is flawless as it turns out. The audience goes nuts but what was it all about? Had I longer to see the aspects and facets of the family, which as we know are not always tickety-boo but I have drifted away like a wide-winged bird over many things that are meaningless, yet my mind is clicking away quite properly on other levels. I was never in it for the money, but I see where it goes without ever touching it. It was like a honeymoon — nothing made sense, sounding utterly convincing to my own ears — selfness in training, needing a month of good sleep. When I woke I saw the sunlight streaming in across the ceiling and thought oh boy, we were awful yesterday, the obvious response being to phone the boss and tell him you’re sick and go to bed until it’s passed, except Boss is in bed too. Don’t let the lack of his spirit blind your life. You would expect me to tell you, wouldn’t you, if our positions were reversed, while I look for a suitable shirt, but you don’t have any more to accomplish, nothing at all. Did you ever love me? Could I grit my teeth and carry it all off without anyone being the wiser? Any words that have concrete meanings are fine and completely friendly. The whole history of the human race is somewhat sad, wouldn’t you say, if you look at it in a certain way? But then, if you squint a bit differently it isn’t sad at all. There were times we were all hurting really bad, thinking the bed will win. Maybe it was the beginnings of trademark — if we stayed telepathic we couldn’t do that — surprise, surprise, and that’s how we decided to do the dance and that’s how The Dance came about. There was a large, grassy clearing in the forest, the trees around it thick and tall and there was sunlight on the grass. We knew that people were worshipping and the way they did it was to gather around a place like this and allow themselves to become a part of it, greeting it and letting it greet them feeding their bodies to their souls, the pity of the tribe was how we imagined it, seeing behind closed eyelids a lovely scene, looking down from an open balcony into a central courtyard. We were in a place that appeared to consist of baskets of flowers. I could see only the top of his brown hair and his moving hands. There’s a lot of color. It’s more noticeable than usual — I mean there are little prisms, rainbows everywhere but whether it was guitar or piano I couldn’t tell you — this is pre-Lindsey. The back room was vicious, everyone on a different drug. If you turned your back you’d better keep on walking. We did this every night, playing country rock at the height of glitter, mixed-bag material. We needed theoretical problems! My back to him, I said, “You mean us poor, sad little cast-offs, wouldn’t it be nice if we could cheer each other up so our miser wouldn’t cast a pall on the happiness of the Prince and Princess?” Only I’m foreshadowing with picky surfaces. The morals are contemporary — argument of sounds, accomodation, implosion, but still the ineffable grace of seeming perishable — the ordinariness of making love and hearing music. I’m okay by myself, believe me. It’s a thought that gives rise to immense self-compassion. Okay, I’ll deal with this. I kind of went on the skids. It was just the four of us finally starting to crank it out, faster and faster, until it was too fast. Then one day, it was a Friday, always payday and I was in the bedroom beginning to sort out what I thought of as my shitpile, a collection of such things as dresses, belts, stockings, photographs, and old magazines all waiting to be put where they belong.

How do you recognize a lovely place? The rotten anthropology of superheroes hovers above the conference table, exhausted on the idea of dazzling people. A plugged organization of the moon like a turnpike undecorated by barely legal children — true stories end in the moody doctor city but I always say the wrong thing. Away from Las Vegas I spend too much time at the whale facility. I’m bored with awakening into historical X-rays of the NO MOMENT. (What showmanship!) Who does wear a cape underwater? Now Egypt is miniaturized and it may never rain again. Hurling bodies and collapsing lungs used to be honestly scripted activities — the stillness in the dream of important history. From now on your stillness will be happening. In the actual dream remember how the children were modified, the sputtering, Russel Crotty language? Friendly Calliope is no longer remedial in the crisply American landscape. Even snowy Vermont grows opaque, a diminished suggestion in the desert mirror. I feel as if I’m speaking to a dear friend but I’m saying the wrong things.I don’t like cockfights or you’d rather be my daughter, deeply, authentically factualizing our especially Southern roots.