For Hours

Go away, kitty. Go away, living being of whom so much is known. I want to know the manticore, the unicorn, the chimera. Let me dream, please, of knowing them.

Go away, guy next door. Him with the leaf blower, him with the gate for his Jeeps. Go away, people on the street who stroll by with their indiscriminately whelped and raised big dogs. I want lions on leashes, fierce and untroubled by my eyes following them. Let me dream, please, of knowing them.

Go away, world on a puppet’s string. Go away, sterile chaos of early warning systems. Go away, dry-eyed men of steely resolve and Biblical beliefs with servile hands on buzzers, crisp in their uniforms; go away and take your hands off alarms, off of small red buttons to be pressed in unison with a partner; fingers crossed, the shape of a cross, of legs crossed, of oceans crossed by resolve and their own wishes and fears.

Let me dream, please, of knowing them all in absentia only. Better — let me dream of them not at all; let me stop dreaming and awaken only when it’s over, with the cat asking for food, the neighbor coming by with the dog, the well-dressed men sleeping as I did for hours and even days.

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onward,
T