What pains me is that I cannot say that you are a figure in my imagination,
and I cannot deny, that you are anything else. It is my turn to speak, please,
refrain from interrupting. I only wish I had an explanation, even a sad casting
of your eyes may suffice. Do not try and tell me that you’re here to prove
my strength, when there are so many finer parts of self that can be opened
like faucets, demonstrating to you and to me, just how strong my waters flow.
Let me clarify, Lena, in all seriousness, please, listen. I am a pipe maze. How
this came about, probably dates back to when I walked through the Metropolitan
Museum of Art at sixteen and wandered out of Impressionism’s heat
into the sane room of Modern Art. Maybe it was Cubism, maybe it was
Dada, luckily, I knew none of these words then; but there I was, hanging on
the wall, staircases going up down left right, faces scrambled up like morning
eggs, violins reduced to maroon lines zigzagging along white canvasses like ants at
a salsa party, machines, robots, and Pollack – that splash of black ink! There I was,
a compendium of all, a spatial, conscious, three-D, two-D, temporal Mario
and Sega pipe maze. The Three Musketeers racing through leagues
of fourteenth century France, a postmodern train ride across Calvino’s abyss
A balloon flying above the stealy people, those that dwell by the seagull,
to the bluecheese honey-moon? I’ve been there, done that. No one has
yet to see all the red. The faucet has been closed so long, it might be clogged.
Cobwebs are all over my eyes. My hands, too, so long have they been
out-of-order that I dare say are growing eyes!
I do not think it is fair that I have been turned into this machine. I do not think
that you can blame me for being the way I am. Just start turning the right knobs.
Not the diamond. That fake plastic diamond isn’t it; according to Aladdin,
the ruby probably shouldn’t be touched. Stop it. You can’t keep drinking
from my chest without replenishing me. Don’t you see? The gauge is low.
Twenty-two years have used up more than you think. I love you anyway,
but can’t you see the Steam busting outtah my ears!?