Mónica de la Torre

A half-view of greenery, cut off by blinds. Pinecones hanging in pairs, like testicles. Brain balls, someone once said at a pool. We were in it, looking up at a guy getting out. This angle replicates that one, but the view is more animated, less peopled. The sky’s changeups are reminders that this will not drag on forever, despite the ergonomic ease afforded by the seat first devised for geriatric care, then stripped down. It’d seem rational: if the elderly spent their days in recliners, so could others, dot-commers, say, properly incentivized. And at least there is no symbolic logic, with eliminands and retinends. No lasting premises either; we will be priced out of any area. No sooner than the conclusion is accepted as consequent and part and parcel of this universe of discourse, we’ll come to realize the sense in having new places to leave. This is the chair’s democracy. Particularly this one, with its form-fitting mesh forsaking foam and padding, which cause overheating and cloud the sitter’s judgment. It’s recyclable, and that matters. Still, the office chair’s revolution is an oxymoron.

A mutable shape stating that downtime hasn’t gone the way of the dodo. Yet the days of sitting around seem extinct. Now it’s all go-go. No need to go into it; who doesn’t know the feeling? The dodo, maybe? Its temporality is other. Its inability to adapt rendered it obsolete. And so this prop here is adaptable as if to right evolutionary wrongs. It encourages a certain flight, of the sitter’s focus inward, when tilting back, and when sitting straight, to one’s surroundings, an outrospection. English? Both ways must be had, or else ... All hinging on a lever and a handle, not as foolproof as the nod to Alice might lead you to believe. Some groping under the seatback and trial and error is required. And there’s no how-to either. “The best way to explain it is to do it.” Feet on the ground, it’s the drama of everyday living. Feet up, it’s the island of the mind, the dwelling place for other dodos whose existence only pictures and written accounts 
corroborate. Change or die. Who wants to go back to zero again?

The grave has more power than the eyes of the beloved. An open grave with all its magnets. This weight on the wings. The sky is waiting for an airship. I have the feeling that I haven’t got much life left. Three hours after the celestial attack. Why don’t I respond when I’m being offended? Because my religion doesn’t allow me to. Exterior maps: geography. Interior maps: psychography. And in your hard cathedral I kneel. Mountains pass camels pass like the history of wars in antiquity. Of all the men I am, I can’t find any of them without the control of the intruding eye. Problems. Mysteries that fasten themselves to my chest. All I want is not to see businesses nor gardens nor markets nor eyeglasses nor elevators. In order to serve all radio listeners, without discriminating between social classes, I speak a tongue that fills hearts with the law of communicating clouds. I have my brain or whatever it is full of skull moths. For the world to go on being what it is it must —per force—take another form. True poems are fires. When something cherished burns instead of the fireman I call, rushes forth the incendiary. It says: live, live, live! It is Death.

Victor gets a real sense of power from making his own raisins. He buys pounds and pounds of grapes and leaves them to dry on the kitchen table. Theresa doesn’t want to hear about her ex-husband’s cancer. Not on Father’s Day. She takes a train all night to have breakfast with her cousin. All Sunday she rides the train back. Once Martin’s wife had left, he decided to take advantage of her space. He built a sauna where her closet was, and now sits there every morning to read the paper and Buddha. One night Helga wore her prettiest dress, thought she knew he wouldn’t be there. She drank white wine, got drunk (she was on a diet), and fell down. Later he saw the holes in her pantyhose. María was usually bumping into furniture. Each time she got closer to what she wanted. “What do you want from me?” “Nothing,” he replied, so she took off and felt like migrating birds. But many.

1. You are not going anywhere. 1.1. No one is waiting for you. 1.2. In case someone is waiting for you, you can always explain the delay later. 1.3. Blame it on the traffic, no one else knows that you chose to walk. 2. Don’t look at the pavement, look at the things that you don’t see when you’re indoors. 2.1. Water towers. 2.2. Cables. 2.2.1. Cables bringing other people’s voices and faces onto TV monitors. 2.2.2. Cables bringing electricity to light bulbs and refrigerators. 2.3. Laundry on clotheslines. 2.4. Empty cans of food. 2.4.1. With flowers growing out of them. 2.4.2. With cactuses growing out of them. 3. Feel the waves surrounding you. 3.1. Waves bringing other people’s voices to the speakers of your sound system. 3.2. Waves of street sounds. 4. Measure how fast you can run up and down staircases; compare that to the speed of the cars driving by. 5. When you tire, stand in the middle of the overpass. 5.1. Look down. 5.2. Try to look ahead, attempt to delineate the city’s skyline. 5.2.1. If there’s too much pollution, look down again. 5.2.2. Hold on tighter to the rail. 5.2.3. Stay there a bit longer; remember no one is waiting for you. 5.2.4. You’re not going anywhere. 6. Through the rails you will see stories unfolding on the street. 6.1. Pay attention. 6.2. You are not they. 6.3. They are not they. 6.3.1. They are one plus one plus one, indefinitely. 7. You’re surrounded by monads going somewhere. 8. There is a purpose to their movement. 9. Desire is a Federacy.

My economy is circular: I earn money from an institution that owns most of the businesses where I tend to spend most of my money. My economy is quasi-medieval, trade-centered, and guild-like. My economy is not canonical. My economy is a misfortune that recently befell me. My economy admits foundational narratives. My economy is language. My economy is the executioner’s reversal of fortune. My economy has no essential features. My economy admits parallax critiques of ideology. My economy owes something to over 4,136 dead soldiers. My economy does not intimate and would rather not split hairs about what belongs to whom. My economy can’t stay out of things, but can’t make it into the thick of things either. My economy has questionable purchasing power. My economy has no surrogate. My economy has no interpretative skills but is rife with interpretative communi- ties. My economy is of trees chopped down in Brooklyn, and the gradual encir- cling of brick. My economy is the new red. My economy thrives on shades of gray. My economy is an unremarkable tuna sandwich that is missing the slices of tomato that I had asked for. My economy is a liter bottle of Poland Spring water coming not from Poland but from Maine and bought at a university cafeteria in Uptown Manhattan where there are quite a number of water foundations that deliver water with a funky metallic aftertaste. My economy is a poem called “First Purchase of the Month” consisting of two stanzas with six eight-word lines each within a larger poem that could be endless but won’t be: Could’ve been an outfit for the Whitney Biennial Couldn’t afford one, nor did I need it. Who cares how you look at the zoo; it’s about the animals, stupid. Which reminds me, could’ve been the trail mix I snacked on & which I managed not to purchase myself. It was tuna on whole wheat, lettuce, jalapeños; a one liter bottle of water (Poland Spring.) Asked for tomato too, which the lady forgot. You Puerto Rican, she asked? Don’t think so, said another one in Spanish. Let me answer. No, what made you think so? The peppers? My economy needs contractions and abbreviations. My economy is not fixed. My economy is broken, mispronounced. My economy has cold feet, even if there are plenty of socks at home. My economy would like to be wholesome and sound. My economy is a gift certificate that is not enough for what I’d like to have, so I end up spending money at a store that I dislike in the first place and will never visit again. My economy is a business lunch where I end up paying the bill instead of the person who’d like me to work with her. My economy consists of performing tasks for which I receive no quantifi- able pay. My economy grows when it’s enough to buy someone else a drink, or a meal. My economy does not allow me to say no. My economy pretends to be booming, but instead, is shaky and imploding. It doesn’t matter, because my economy is predicated on virtue, and it posits that it’s purer than yours. My economy has no exchange value. I’d like to think of my economy as one of resistance and tactical difference. My economy is not a disposable good. There are no surpluses in my economy. I already owe what I just wrote. My economy is derivative, parasitical, and residual. My economy is a hand-me-down. My economy is not environmentally friendly, although it’s not ravaging non-renewable resources either. My economy doesn’t force me to put my money where my mouth is. Were I to pay for what I say, it would be a different story. Thirteen cents a word is not fair trade. My economy mistakes what it means to trade in futures. In theory my economy is not the result of deliberate choice, it is makeshift and a tag-along. My economy has double standards. My economy has attention deficit disorder. My economy is the symptom of an incurable disease. My economy is not even mine. Word count: 682