November 2014 Words + Art Reading + Poems

when i sleep,
i always travel far.
i float + i float.

first, i visit mr. fox.
he tells me i must be clever
+ quick + learn to observe.

next, i visit my favorite,
the wellump,
who wears the sun upon his head.
he tells me to seek my own sun within,
says one day i will look like him.

next, i visit the snake queen.
she tells me knowledge is good but can be dangerous
+ wisdom is the safety key.
“what is wisdom?”, ask i.
she says, “you will know it when you meet it
+ you will meet it when your sun begins to shine.”

then it’s on to the green places,
the minerally-mossy things i love.
they tell me to fling myself to my universe wide for all the colors to love.

then it’s on to the aardvark
who tells me i must sing a unique tune –
i’m so small – he says it’s easy to confuse me with an ant
unless he hears me sing my song.

last stop, the good wormlets near the Hands of Harboring.
they play in the currents with me, but remind me to not go too far,
avoid their dark cousins, the cousins near The Watching Eyes,
the cousins who want to cover the colors with the dark of night…

shift scene…stage right…in a laboratory

“Doctor, Doctor, come quickly! We’ve found it!
Look here. You might have to adjust the magnification.
See there? Near that strange pattern that looks like eyes?
Those strange, black, squiggling worm-like things?
That’s it. That’s the virus. We’ve found it!
It’s in the water.”

Yusuke, what do you think of
when you are making your art?
Your grain of dirt that rolls away.
Your curl that blows like a milkweed seed
away in the wind.
Your dream that dissolves with the drop of a tear.
Laying down the lines,
so microscopic
with your chopstick
even as they waver away.
Are you so in touch with your divinity
that you need not be remembered?
Need not leave a mark
like so many desperate yearn?
Are you so in touch with your continuity
your humanity
that your massive work
needs rise eternal
only in memory?