Portrait of the Horse

Sometimes the horse is simply a horse. Sometimes the horse is a stalwart bearer of bodies. Sometimes the horse is stubborn, refusing to ford the river, or the horse is a mistake in the vapor, what looks like a horse emerging out of a thrust of fog on Telegraph Avenue. There’s the perpetual feeling of being overdressed for summer and underdressed for spring. I’m variously sweat or shudder. I mistake the strange bodies for those I owe apologies to, oversleep and open my eyes on the clock radio, the time a typo, the apartment a disaster. Sometimes the horse is a disaster or the horse is time in a trot or a canter. Sometimes the horse is a boy growing in time into a man who often laments, A horse, a horse, my kingdom, etc. But there is no horse. There are two days good and one day bad without any hint of a horse. Sometimes speaking about the horse is a means of avoiding speaking about myself which is lousy. Late last night myself regarding another carelessly. Late last night my body with a temporary body. The horse is the taut metaphor for sex, but sometimes the horse is the taut silence after. Sometimes the horse is the silence after her body rises in the embarrassment of morning and leaves, and this silence is filled with less than remorse but with more than indifference. This is a feeling there is no word for. What I decided in place of what I needed. I should eat better. I should vacuum more often. I should settle down and raise a young horse. Sometimes the horse is unspoken, the horse is this feeling that will be forgotten, is the self unable to alter its ineffable horse. Late last night, a pervasive clopping of the horse on the hill. Late last night, the horse as a foghorn over the Bay. I should be rained on. I should not be forgiven.