Derailer
Fig lore & loss of control
I need to stay out of top gear. Stop the chain slipping off. When I get home I’ll put on my socks and look at pictures of someone who, I probably would not recognise now. Visually or intellectually. Someone who I wouldn’t know what to say to. Then I write sentences from the end backwards. And when I realise the soft soap smell hit the pillow derailed.
He’ll be above me. Kilometers away, thinking of something else. Asleep at the end of the world. Cresting the horizon. Some will wish there were still miles ahead, but I’m comfy here on the eve, heaven scent. Dried out, cured, cut into strips, boiled and fried. Pizza on the lawn at midnight, I’ll yawn and arch my back to the moon. Eyelids magnetic . heavy . draw close . derailed.
I’m looking for the toothpaste with the most technologies. Wind down, fire up, denote us less effective. The inorganic whirr and hum makes life a little easier, makes teeth a little whiter, keeps breath fresher longer. I’m held back by clunky old mechanics, and the chain is, ch, it’s br, its sl- it’s coming off okay, maybe its the way I’m hesitating, feet enjoying an idle ride.
The fig tree talks to me about temptation, the wasps that die inside. She tells me of sole survivors and pioneers and that I cannot forget things if I know exactly where to look to remember them. She tells me not to bother . indulge. There is a limited vocabulary in expressing a self.
I need a lesson in loudness. The world says “speak.” Unite left and right brain again, tie them together like tangled shoelaces, learn something that makes more noise - I’ve never made enough. You cannot learn this from writing and I am frustrated in my silence, like a hand helium’d with the answer, never chosen to vocalise.
There are plenty of pictures to look at; pictures of familiar places taken by people who aren’t me, published somewhere that I’m not, pictures of people who I will never meet, wearing clothes that I will never wear, pictures of three headed dogs, different kinds of tomatoes, and more.
The pictures talk to me about oversaturation - say it’s okay to covet totally unreasonable things, like a perfectly ripe fruit, with another to chase. Biblically good, underpinned by desire and guilt-free baby - we did that part already, bore it into the lacerated ground when we got sick of saying sorry. Lovers touch toes and face half the world each in shoulder-gripped embrace; the fig tree forgives me for swallowing that which has flown too close. We’re over that now.
At 35 degrees on no sleep is when I begin to melt. The weather is no longer in control, England is feverish in summer, cold sweating through cloudy weeks on end then fainting heat, promoting hands tasked with tedium to unfocused pursuits. I try to imagine the effect of the fan in an archers trajectory towards me, but all I get is a directionless hum which makes my head ache. When I make noise it will be pointed. It will be there, and then it will not.
I’ll pick my moments for losing control, let the juice drip, click into top gear aware of the risk. Scream and be satisfied.
