shift

i keep feeling this incredible urge to rush, to get things done, to go faster, to be better, to read all the most heady and difficult books i've tucked away down there on the bookcase's lowest shelf.  out of sight, out of mind.  but then i hear a voice whisper through a smile - i can HEAR the smile - "that's just your habits kicking for comfort. there's nothing to rush around about anymore."

slowly, we clean the studio.  i file away old drawings and recent photographs. we line our instruments up against the wall.  the keyboard is laid out across Brian's desk.  the guitars are out of their cases.  even my little harmonica lays, ready and eager as ever, as anyone longing to be touched, to feel a mouth's passage over its angles and openings.

there is still a bit more to do, a bit more to be wrangled, but i know the voice and its smile are correct.  there is no need to get the entire job done tonight.  and especially not RIGHT NOW.  the clock no longer means much in this house. the day before yesterday we both lost our jobs.  an entire industry has collapsed and we are no longer Waitress and Bartender. we return, however strangely, possibly benevolently, certainly and suddenly to being full-time artists.

for the past 3 nights, i've twisted yarn around a hook.  i make a flower. i make another.  a little garden spreads out across the floor off my side of the bed.  my only plan is to see how big this garden might get.  i make a flower.  i make another.  my eyes slide to the stack of sweaters i made last week, intended for the goodwill or the curb, and see their new potential.  the yearning to be coaxed and caressed and given a new form.

flowers all around.

the clock's hands have fallen out.