Unlay’s Late Promenade

— “mu” one hundred sixteenth part — Again that closer walk, legless though they’d be. Low Insofarian sun I cut my teeth on, theirs to be better to bite with, me theirs the closer we walked. They were insisting time seeds grievance, crooned it the closer I got, Zeno and Zenette moment’s nurs- es, Nunca Anuncia’s net...    Thus it was they were there again, thus they walked legless, noses thumbed at the sun. Unlay’s avatar said to’ve become caricature, sacred clown of late’s late awakening, laughed having thought it so...    So it was I saw what I saw was too much. So it was I sewed my mouth shut, they who’d have heard me gone again, what- say’s entourage. “So it was” were the words they’d gone away muttering, unlay’s non- chalance...    Everything was leaving itself, eve- ryone himself, herself, all of them, all of it, moving. It was as though they were each an- other. Outmost urge met indrawn joust, pe- yote-pod baritone tap. They were saying they’d gotten back from this or that place. Where was the honey we’d heard about I wanted to know... In the realm of whatsay it all bore consequence. They did a slack-legged shuffle, legless though they were, quick-switch imbroglio the cost of it, rum- ble in the house of who knew. It was my own most inward step, my heart itself, closer than close could be. I had a go at it but fell, my legs were in the way, no way could legless grace come again...    I thought about walking. I had to think about walk- ing, Nunca’s pelvic sway. Though what I saw I couldn’t say, it made me say things, realm in whose wood I hung in love with her hard look, walk in whose wake I lay ________________ I was whistling when my lips fell off. Lip- less was to legless in some way I couldn’t say, the closer walk words got in the way of... What it was lay on the tip of my tongue, say to unlay already in some way, unsay’s day begun. We were of more than one mind Huff had it. Sophia said the same... I wanted rele- vance, trust, I whistled even so, wind in the gaps in my teeth • A new lady named Ahdja joined our group, slight of limb, loose tomboy body, smile so broad we blushed. The Egyptian spring was up in smoke in back of us, we trudged on, far from all that, even far from Lone Coast, a former life stalked us it seemed... We took tiny steps, unsure what lay under us, unlay’s realm the sweet precinct we sought, unsure what would get us there... To say we was too much my head told me. Not so my second head said. To say we was all I wanted my third head said, sec- ond head said to’ve lost itself, third head always at odds with itself, want wanting more of itself... It was Ahdja’s dream we were in, the we I went on about, unlay’s adumbration. When would its day begin we wondered, the we I so insisted on, the we we’d eventually be, when would lay’s day be done. It was my dream of Ahdja we were in said my third head, we the one risk I took, one wish, flat rhapsodic stitch... I walked haunted by the we she made us, Nunca’s promenade be- hind us now. We’d seen Egypt in flames and we kept walking. Huff said, “I told you so,” and we kept walking, unlay’s late promenade all there was left... I dreamt a dream of moving on, I dreamt a dream of standing pat, first head and second head and third head’s agreement, a dream I let my true self slide • Unlay was no simple stand, this or that mystic hustle, this or that bodily rebuke. In the end it will have been all there was we grew to expect, no soul’s captivity some book had called Egypt, a book we no longer read... In the realm of whatsay we tramped along, there no matter spun by the swirl of it, there no matter where we were. Moment’s notice moment’s gnosis, the moment brought bad and good. Ahdja’s ka was Layla, Itamar’s Majnun, our crew caught up in the old way, the old way’s day redone... “Madness be our name,” we chimed in unison, incensed, Majnun’s dream of a just world just dreaming, Majnun’s each and all we were. So it was and so we sang, snuffed Egyptian spring an- acrustic, uncuffed auspice there’d be. Thus it was, so it went, unlay unlike what it was we expected, sanc- tified feet where voices met water, far from cause and consequence we stumped... We were relishing being together for a time, something seen in a face peering out from inside we saw was what soul was. “This is how it is,” I was telling myself, some spectral aspect it had somehow. “This is how it is,” I said, “this is how it is,” voice eaten at by the bay we stood in front of, cold ad- vent of water, cold commiseration, ythmic arrival, salt... If not what wet our hems anointment was nothing, nothing if not what tugged our feet. “Froth be what we’ll be,” we chimed, indignant, high falsetto in- sistence, deep gubgubi thrum. There was a sense there was a core to be gotten to, cloth drawn aside or gone under, frills fallen away at the water’s edge... If not it, albeit illusory it might have been, instigation was nothing ________________ The advance I wanted lay at Ahdja’s feet, scruffy thought’s nubbly dispatch. That all bow down and be at rest, unlay’s un- soon come... Chill water, careening bus, what Egypt was... World under glass wraps, flat