James Anderson's ZEBRA SKIN

JAMES ANDERSON’S

ZEBRA SKIN

© 2013 JAMES ROY BLAIR ANDERSON

CONTENTS PARIS SPLEEN I have arrived: I came to say farewell - To thee, old world…

SLOW SUMMER She grew up on the English Riviera…

MOON Oh moon you are always the best seat in the house…

VIA BRERA You were my favourite orgasm soprano…

PARIS SPLEEN I have arrived: I came to say Farewell – To thee, old world. These songs of parting love, mes chanson en anglais. Paris, homesick for my country. Though I loved you in the evenings. In your rosey light that bounced off the Seine and blushed your stone. To see the Monet, Cezzane, Renoir, van Gogh, Pissaro, Degas, Delacroix each took my breath away. That Monet painting we had in our house where I grew up, like in my childhood home, it had a wall of its own. To visit Paris and see its original; to see it was to see home. The glow of the sunlit glare on each image.

The pastel lighter tone of the French style.

Windows do not give more pleasant views from their frames. The Antique Roman painting I saw was far more Renoir than Raphael. No dramatic poses. Soft colours and a gentle leisure.

Paradise was here too.

I found Rimbaud’s poem when walking along la rue Férou by the L’eglise Sulpice carved on to the wall. Its complete one-hundred lines of “Le Bateau Ivre.” That was my favourite spectacle. That I loved, and loved most of all. I never more admired the books than on the passage by the Seine. The tattered market stalls that carried sumptuous books in old editions let out open in the fresh air.

But I was not fooled by the view. It was still a sidewalk book shop. Viewed from the promenade by the Seine, they were still dusty books. My favourite part was walking through the narrow side streets of cafe’s and decorative galleries, all nostalgia of home came flooding. Home of Bath and London once more, but it was unique to Paris; wine and espresso in the evening. View the books laid out in the sun outside the Taschen bookstore.

Sorting through tomatoes and oranges on the market stalls on Rue de Seine and the meats from the butchers. Outside on each cafe terrace, ash floats in the air like dust in an old room.

Paradise is here too.

I left a poem in a bookstore and signed it my name. The fear that my book will end up in some dusty shop in Paris beside the Seine. No more a sensation than a leaf rotating on the windy pavement. My words are claustrophobic and do not belong in small places. I was Horace’s stone that once sunken reappeared more beautiful.

There is no work station nor writing desk for a writer. He must be on his feet with the means to write. To Baudelaire, to Mallarme, to Rimbaud, to Verlaine, to Hugo, and Laforgue, I have arrived.

Reveal what you gave later to Debussy and Ravel. now, what does not belong to you. Paris you are now your limped homeless sidewalk beggar with cups of loose change, hoping to be beautiful again -you were once! I view you like had every French artiste: hallucinated, perplexed, haunted by history.

Rimbaud loved you? You loved Rimbaud the more.

You wished Verlaine had been your truer child.

But you must suffice with Baudelaire and Balzac. I was a writer here for a time, sharing the voyage with my good friend Etienne. I tied a lock to the bridge and writ J & Bath. The key was swallowed by the water’s lips. I should have held it, kept it, thrown in to my Avon stream.

Paradise is here too.

Oh these homesick notes from Paris. These days were not too short. The city is beautiful and evenings calm. There is already much I miss about my home city of Bath. To me Bath is like a lover I cannot get over. How naturally I love my city. I go to Paris and I long for Bath. I escape to London and I wish to hurl myself back to Bath. Now I am in Paris. I love and not love. I live and wish to live.

Maybe tomorrow.

Paradise is here too.

For Bath, you lack big spaces. Paris you have them. Open, wide, grand spaces for walks and recline, for stroll and for rest. Bath, a Prince’s garden. Paris, she knows palaces, she knows grand spaces. I am most comfortable and relaxed in your great spaces; your palace gardens and your grand Louvre, your fountain-sides, your Avenue des Champs-Élysée, your arc de triomphe, your bridges overlooking your expansive Seine. I enjoyed your subterranean getaway, bohemian prince, running the streets on narrow pavements, spying small galleries an artisan treasures, hidden bookshops and terraced cafe’s along Rue de Seine.

The smell of cooking; cigarettes and lemons.

Paradise is here too.

Paris was made for the evenings, Parisians walk down the beams of a sunset sun. A woman walks by who for a time borrows beauty. The lighter fabric, made for a breeze and a gentle paced walk that moves like rhythmic ribbons on twirling batons, like flowing Arab shawls in the hot desert, like Tibetan flags hung on their ropes. The light shawl, the bouffed or flowy dress, the little jacket, their figures mere bones draped in skin. Above a long flowing dress, a jacket glitters, sparkling light that bounces on the Seine waves, shaping skinny bones, hair as if sewn by couture tailors. A little black jacket and a dress shaped like a tulips.

Petals and bones, everything was petals and bones.

I caught a woman’s hat that blew away in the wind “Merci Monsieur!” Recliner’s by the fountain at Jardin des Tuileries. A collection of beauty. Like bathers by their ancient baths. Spurting mouths splash each angle of its octagonal shape. La tour Eiffel, the Louvre, the triumphal arch, the obelisk, all in view, and the gardens all around. Decorated with white statues on white stone and white sand, wide paths and wide roads. A hat blows off someone’s head in a strong wind. It flies past the

skirt of bathers and dances over the water. Before being snatched by the touch of water. Submerged.

The fountain spray keeps it under.

Paradise is here too.

The pyramid reflected light on the MusĂŠe du Louvre, the sun dial through the day, each sculpted figure on its mantle a minute in the hour.

It was lovely. It was Paris. I was a foreigner.

Everywhere at home. Everywhere anonymous. The region I am from. I have no envy. But like a love, one true, I compare to everything. And everything fails to meet the measure. I missed a lot, so much.

The girls, in my city, are as pretty. They have that country charm. They dress as dear to the petal and the flower. Their accents are as delicate; their hair in waves, left dishevelled by nature, like bathing girls, and hangs the length of waterfalls.

Demeter’s followers on this westerly Isle. That I did not forget.

Paradise is here too.

Bath is a dream from which I never wake. The rolling hills and unique Somerset sky, the blackcurrant sunset clouds, that unjuiced orange

that hangs in the sky. Rimbaud, I should have my own wall too. Somehow the South West had turned out well. This is my home. And my heart did miss it. I missed the taste of the air. The music on the street and in the bars. The quiet distant murmur. The evening hymn of dining and wine. I missed the country elegance. The sunburnt buildings in the evening sunset light. The Abby bells on a l’heure. I missed the colour of the stone.

The low topped roofs that reveal the sky. Ce n'est pas la France. C’est le Sud-Ouest. C’est l’Angleterre! I arrived home… Paradise is here too…

Still with the dust of Tuileries on my black shoes.

Paradise is here too.

SLOW SUMMER “It was an idle thought, it was pleasant to have idle thoughts, for it was summer.”

– Francoise Sagan

Prologue O route en grand reve…

There I saw everything.

La vie etait pareille a un mirage Et tout ce que je vu etait beau...

I.

The Party (Luc)

As the sequins began to be sewn on to the black sky of a clear summer night, the night remained as calm

as the day. The party had not finished in the garden and all the guests were sat on the garden steps or in the drawing room, whilst those who could not be seen had stolen their time in the shades of the tall trees that overlooked the house at the far end of the garden.

The front of the house still showcased an array of vehicles, the classic cars that were only brought out on these occasions and the newer trends that parked alongside without looking out of their setting against this early seventeenth century hall.

The lights outside would remain lit until the guests had left, and whilst they continued to talk among themselves about whatever popular topic they could direct their conversations to, I walked around the balcony, enjoying the atmosphere without being distracted by involving myself in to their conversations.

There was still a faint remembrance of the music that was no longer playing, I would hear the last bars of a song that was repeated several times during the evening, and it pleased me that it found its way to my memory’s ears.

All I could recall were the costumes of the night, their elegant dresses and the sharp tailored suits the men wore, the polished shoes and the shine of wellgroomed guests as they floated around the house, with cheerful and intelligent expressions.

Abby, a girl from the closest city to here, appeared through the doors of the drawing room and looked up, greeting me smiling, her blonde hair curled at the ends, and she appeared with a kind of ambrosia’d effect upon her face as though still taking in a moment that had occurred a while earlier. I walked down the procession of steps to meet her, and she held up her hand and placed it on my shoulder, fondly kissing both my cheeks, and looked at my eyes to say her thank you and goodbye. She would use the name “Darling” with everyone, and I had begun to understand it as a way of retaining her position.

I entered the drawing room to hear Josh on the rosewood settee strumming the guitar whilst Penny’s voice let a soft and out of tune melody in to the room of a few quietly amused guests. Josh and Penny were both introduced this evening, and as happens on these evenings, new introductions are superficially married, they bond over their aim to enjoy the party and match up with whoever assists to accomplish this. Although everybody had enjoyed the party tonight, I could never have imagined Josh and, for example, Eleanor to have spent much of tonight together, when if it were at a more formal evening dinner for one of the many occasions in life, they would seem very happily matched. Penny silently showed me the palm of her

hand and clasped her fingers to gesture a hello without stopping her singing. She looked like she was enjoying herself, and Josh was enjoying entertaining whether he was entertained or not, he was content for the time being to be found exciting and fun.

The former bars from the song reappeared to my mind as though gesturing me to walk on and I followed the warm breeze through the halls to the portafinestra where the white curtains seemed to wave and ripple. By the gentle sound of my foot as the softwood of my shoes pressed the stones of the terrace, this seemed to instantly remove me from the atmosphere of the Hall and my ears found it to be mixed with the inaudible crossing of conversations in the garden.

The lights from the Hall lit the steps and the light in the garden, half-shielded by the trees, sent a streak of light across the garden, not enough by half to light the garden fully, and the guests gathered by the steps or in view within this light.

There almost seemed to be no finale to the evening.

Where the excitement of the music had ended earlier, and the dancing and crowded rooms had generated an energetic atmosphere earlier, the party had now taken a new transition to being a much more relaxed setting

as we deepend in to the night, and the guests enjoyed the space and intimacy of this later phase.

They had arranged themselves in couples or in to circles of five. Beth was sat with her back to me pleasantly talking to Freddy. She had her spring hat on, and her spring dress, with her cream wool around her arms she had come to favour, her elbows rested in her lap and she delicately held her glass like a flower.

Frederick was sat beside her with his body gestured towards her, his eyes almost spoke for themselves to compel Beth to look in to his, but Beth looked down the garden whilst she spoke.

I turned away and returned to the house. The night never moved; I saw no expectancy for tomorrow. The sun may rise in Sevilla or in Moscow but not here. I walked to the library and stretched out on the long chair and closed my eyes. Not a second seems to pass, time was uninvited, the party never ended and the last bars of the music continued to repeat on and on in my mind.

II. The Dream (Rose) She grew up on the European Riviera where Girls in beautiful summer dresses flocked through the city.

I never forgot that first sight of her in rose tinted sunglasses, Under a summer sun, stunning with her framed eyes; The charm of a perfect face beneath her wedding veil.

White blouse, blond hair, Rose lenses, black frames, Tinted lenses, tiger frames, Collar tips, leather bag, Black skirt, bare legs.

Holding cigarettes with diamond rings, Cruising white nights in a white Ford Capri, Whilst she says “Tell me, honey, you’ll never leave.

You can be my magpie, I’ll be your shiny penny.

We can go anywhere, wherever, wherever free.”

She put on her glasses and sees the world she fantasies; Some exotic coast, with blue blue waters, and white sandy beaches, Or that city of lovers, artists, and movie shakers.

Lighting rollups on velvet sofas, Knocking vino jars next to bronze statues,

Blowing playing cards off bottle necks, The Italian plates viewing from the walls.

History never knew we’d be coming.

Breathing tastes like old cabinet glasses of malt whiskey.

“Open up those butterfly doors, baby, Didn’t you say you missed me,” It’s only us and the sun, our city’s shining patron.

I said “shall we go to the opera?”

In the evening we’d be swinging Down bars to hear the singing You made and I still Got that rattle throat of yours still ringing Through my soul.

Baby, you were an all-round hitter.

You had that voice that would send spring to summer And you put words together that I never thought could make verse.

You remember kissin’ in the pool that summer, With the garden lights dancing round us on the water.

You said you never tried this, thought it would be special, Intimacy in your room was never as pretty as our expectations told us.

Romance never came with us.

“Take off them glasses, sweetie,

Sleep here tonight.”

Kisses in your room were sweetest under moonlight.

That silver streak, stony blue, that reached through your window And was the only blanket that covered us.

Chandelier sunrise.

Dear god, baby.

You swam circles in the pool Like your living was free.

Like a child hiding a smile behind a flower And then wishing it to be seen, You’d rarely let your eyes be revealed Fantasising through your rose glasses.

“–C’etait et je voudrais ne pas m’en souvenir, c’etait au declin de la beaute.”

III. The New Life (Maria) From her youngest memories Maria had a fascination for beauty. Her life so moulded by this inclination that it felt wearily assembled of symbols of beauty, like a well-furnished room, decorated with pleasant objects. She hadn’t expected such peak of fulfilment would bring with it a melancholy. She lived for passion, passion was to be had in everything.

Passion made her life, and fire was the substance of her soul.

Maria walked beneath a palm tree skyline, blue sky, pink clouds, images of things we knew in day, now at dusk only a shapely silhouette. The evening smelt of smoking wood from afternoon fires in the hot sun. She wore her hair down, glasses in the way that made her eyes jewels. She walked on down the street that made even the wind change a little to her direction. But something in her eyes suggested she wore more than the glasses on her nose. In her outfit, flawless, everything she wore made her the creative designer she was. But there was something missing, some thing she knew and was ready for, that was not quite entering her life. It made her nervous, quiet, reflective, trying to perceive what this time in her life might demand. She awaited, a tremor, an earthquake

presence, something to shake her to new life. Her whole life had amounted to this, and all this, everything she lived was once her excitement. This, once her waking pursuit, once slept to dream of what she presently lived today. She wore her lenses like a mask, and stepped ahead as though walking through a masquerade.

Hot cars, shiny metal, passed her by; their roof tops low with boys calling and hooting for her attention.

She turned her eyes away from the cars and saw a stand of postcards propped on a rack outside a shop front. She stopped alongside, eyeing the images on cards, she would often buy postcards without necessity, but for the pleasure, that she might send a handwritten message to a friend who she could surprise with such an old fashioned gesture of intimate correspondence. She was well travelled, and never arrived without some delay. When she was in Paris, she thought of being in London, and for many places where she was, she felt in herself and her style of clothes she was somewhere else. She found a card with a sketchy illustration of one of the more prominent buildings in the city, and purchased it, having it ready for such an occasion to arise.

The city was a stark contrast to the outside silence of the morning she had seen earlier that day, when

everything is settled, like a pan of water a few minutes before it has begun to boil. The afternoons burst in to excitement and the main square was crisscrossed with passing bodies, shopping, strolling, sight-seeing. From the restaurant quarter, the sound of cutlery on evening dinner plates could be heard, the murmur of conversation, was all part of the summer orchestra that swirled along the cafe strip.

Walking along the fashionable eatery quarter. She takes a seat on one of the ratton chairs at an outside table, in the more secluded area with the plants potted on around the cafe. The summer evening smelt of burning. The heat was still strong, the humidity made the evening warm. Maria removed her glasses and wiped the lenses and the nose rest, and replaced them over her ears. Chances, how life makes them appear and we cannot call them forth, but if prudence weighs them good, we take them.

When Maria used to walk these cafe strips at night, all that would be seen was the lights of the distant side of the city. At night, it never carried the bustle of the day, and the late evenings were always decorated with embraced lovers and the glowing heads of amber streetlight, which in the evening, gave the stone a pleasant rust colour as though made with adobe brick from red Hawaiian sand.

The waitress came to the table, with a smile that was welcoming, and efficiently took Maria’s order back to the bar. There was another person in this particular cafe seating outside. There were always talented artists, writers, musicians, performers casually existing in the liberties of this city, or seen to visit on vacation. She did not recognise him, and often she would see a familiar face when walking this area. She couldn't deduce of what family or company he may have belonged to. He was perfectly a stranger. It was an unusual thing to be in this city. Forenames were little nicknames, everyone placed each other by their surname of which family they belonged to, as though a surname was itself some sizable estate. Profession, ancestry, and property, were unspoken introductions, we each assembled our understanding of each other by such significant trivialities. She overlooked that, and entered simply the occasion. He was mysterious to her.

She wanted to know nothing about him. If he had conversed with her she would have interrupted his sentences in their conversation that seemed to be verging on revealing anything which brought his background in to light.

The stranger had a single espresso and rested a selection of books on the table. His presence and words gave her image of herself in new surroundings,

she understood herself at a wholly new angle, which would not have happened had she been with someone familiar. By his presence, she was herself new. And the melancholy with which had overtaken her the past few days, was now a stranger to her present encounter and could not occupy her.

His presence gave her a body rush that pricked on her skin. She felt he was not even aware of her presence. In something he seemed caught, not troubled, at perfect peace, and his eyes held in them a second universe. Stance of perfect peace, books by his side, the smallest one was black, he held it open wide, pressed open by one hand, a pen of traveling ink swirled on the page, looping and striking, forming letters for words that became his poem. Black ink landed on dusty coloured pages, soaked in their path a stain not to be removed; a page was full of his words written to be forgotten, read to be remembered. He seemed to stare in to his own dream. His eyes blinked, then for a moment turned to Maria, their eyes caught, he blinked, and looked down. It passed in a moment.

He folded his book closed and tied it shut with its string that fastened to its cover. Checking the bookmarks in his book he put each in to his satchel.

He placed his money on the table and stood to leave.

Throwing his satchel over one shoulder and left

walking in his black shoes, sandy tipped at the toes.

Maria had no understanding why she was able to connect with this man who was a stranger, related only by their stay in this particular city, and choosing the same cafe that evening. Something was easy about everything, and she did not contemplate it further.

Maria noticed an inked napkin on his table. Knowing the waitress would clear the table, Maria reached to retrieve it before she returned. Standing over his table, maria saw it was several fragmented sentences written askew, not connected, seemingly in no order. She folded it and hurried back over to her table, taking her seat, the waitress returned from inside and placed the money and his cup and saucer on her tray. Maria sat silently with her head slightly turned to the waitress, as though she ought to feel caught out, she knew this silly little napkin was worth something to her with the ink that stained it with writing.

She wanted this moment to sting like the bees that would her prick her skin in those summers of her youth. Like a strike of lightning that tore through the humidity on summer nights. This moment, from chance alone, she wanted to preserve, to be born and culminate in itself. It mustn't linger; it was to be pivotal, and for that, it must be quick. He was the

chord in the music that changed the movement of the entire symphony.

Her head followed the waitress as she returned inside, and Maria unfolded the napkin to read the fragments. She tilted her head left and right reading one after another. Putting together the images they expressed and the tone they felt to illuminate. She could not tell you, these words, but they read like so.

No order it came, but from each an angle of its own.

"Life that in my youth I'd known Left to rust now I'm full grown.

Were I still a childish boy, who knew not of worlds beyond my home, I would stay put, unfetched by far off lands.

Living on, I have late seen the world That welcomes guests to its throne of paradise.

In youth the eye gathered so much when picking Olives from the bushes in the summer.

I do not know what becomes of my future; I do not seek to know.

That great horizon mist as night approached, I not approached her on my travels.

Have you seen the red dunes of Sahara, The blue tips of Antarctica, the roaming elephants of Africa,

The striving birds that flock the mountains, The reefs that line the coasts, the waters that fall from Angels, The tails of ocean whales, the chiselled rock that stretched out of the water, The steaming plumes from geyser crevasses, Lava that snakes the mountainside, White icing sculptures of the Alaskan range, palm trees in the wind, The white crest of surf that hits the breakers on the beach That rises in explosive spray and falls like flour!

Have you seen the sunrise over the canyon, Caves so deep there sunlight rarely steps.

Life marine, quiet submerged life, that shakes beneath?

Those turquoise waters that stretch on to white sand, Purple skies like gem stones reflecting on to the sky?

Walked through the long grass in summer to see the barging black wildebeest, Peering on to wild cats on leaping gazelle, Seen a bird larger than the bed you sleep, The dancing beams of the northern lights?

Dust that chocked my throat in the desert, I was a mere bug in that land.

As if on red Mars, you would not find me if you flew overhead,

Nor would I be known to have been there.

Earth moulded by nature's hand.

Have you been out there to see the world?

Short, falls the entertainments of the city.

Those trees I saw near riverbanks, grown taller than some cities rise.

To watch that morning light running along dawn's land of blackest shadow, Lifting off its nightly cover to reveal that canyon's rusty reddest rock.

And rocky crested waves of that dark blue ocean.

That great cloth that waved and rippled. And life beneath. And life beyond.

That great horizon mist, as night approached.

I do not know what becomes of my future, I do not seek to know."

Maria set the napkin on the table and sat for a while thinking. She remained seated, not moving. Feeling that her consciousness had already begun to raise itself and exit the cafe, her body remained, intoxicated in the comforts of the moment. The summer warmth she felt against her skin, the delicate chimes of dinner plates and cutlery, the evening clock that rang somewhere afar. She existed still. Grateful of where she was and what she felt and saw. She desired to fill her world

with the same passion that she felt inside. That same passion that crafted her life with all the symbols which had made the life she presently lived, were felt to be reinvigorated. This was her method. The nature of the season appeared to her. Blossom that had been dancing through the air in the hot afternoon, mixing with the cigarette ash, had settled. Puffy clouds crowned the horizon, a tusk of light pierced through, that was like a crescent glowing above a crown.

Everything had slowed. Those she viewed, leisure was their work. Bathers slumbered on the lawns. Everyone was there to be seen. Couples lay beside each other flirting. Girls who sat in circles, the ends of their hair was played with by a passing breeze, that made it move like a curtain on the open patio, like the summer dresses on the women who strolled the promenade.

They wore dark glasses, tinted, round or squared, beneath a beautiful sunset of low sun like an angel hovering in the air. White mist of faint clouds, hardly noticed. Everything is gold and black, like a city after a fire. Low sun floodlit the streets in bronze beams, and the sun nearly settled on the horizon like an ornament on a mantle place. Little scooters hover the wide roads and narrow streets, navigating their path through the summer bustle of crowds. There was a silence of the pace, the hum of passing cars that strolled by. The

cobbled streets slowed the cars, the rustle, like feet on snowy ground. The coconut clop-clop of horses hooves as they took visitors around the streets. Grass blades spring in the breeze like waves on a blue sea. Such was it that stillness was the movement. Rustic costly men walk through in dinner jackets and unshapely beards. She eyed the young women who walked by.

Angel Falls does not fall so pleasant as the hair of a girl native to this city that seems as if painted by subtle brushes from the hair line, dried dishevelled by the sun, it rests in waves as though even in the city they arose from an ocean’s conch shell. The wind blows, a leaf turns, and folds itself again and again across the pavement. A light wind, a tree fixed to the earth dances, swaying gently. Birds flutter overhead, a shadow of feathers against the ground, and dance circles above clusters of passers-by, shaded from the sun. The afternoon sun had turned the piazza to school yards. The boys formed a large circle kicking a football between them. Occasionally a distant boom echoes as the ball lands to the ground. A Spanish guitar plays through the street, falling on ears like little falling coins to the ground, little notes flicker through the street like winged birds, seemingly to bounce off the city walls. One could not pour water more fluid than the music being played. The doves rise

as people walk between them, clapping their wings as they lift. A lonely flute is played on some steps. Its music twists and turns like rising smoke from the afternoon fires. A butterfly flutters through the dancing light that lands on the cafe wall, glistening with light as if it were light bouncing on stones by the sea.

Maria's mind, her body, pricked by inspiration's tender voice, perked the strings of her spirit, regained to life, played by the melody that is drawn from things seen, felt, tasted, smelt. Struck. A flash of lightning struck her soul, by those gentle drops of soaked ink on paper. This, what came, and was born in her that day.

She waits not, but stands.

She felt to travel, to be like the running waters, and send her feet tapping one heel after another along the longest road she could find. She wanted new winds, cooler than her own to find her; for warmer rays of sun to land on her skin; she wanted clouds to part revealing sights she had never seen; she wanted to be in the midst of a crowd she did not know; she wanted voyages. The rhythm of her heart drove her on. It was a pulse that her feet wanted to imitate, and in their energy there was a dance. And her arms would sway to it as she walked. What was tall, silhouettes against the bronzed sky, would pass like cats eyes in the road.

Rush, rush, rush, in the mad run. She had a drumming in her soul that seemed to usher her on. She spoke within herself aloud "Hazy night, oh sky that is silk and purple. Never settle. You seem to wave and ripple, as though in love with the sea you look upon and wish to be the same!"

She tore through bookshops, narrow ally streets she had never ventured. She stared at everything, soaking everything in like the towel after she bathed in the morning that kissed off the water off her soaking skin.

She wandered in to clothes shops, watching the women as they walked towards her or alongside observing what they were wearing, how they wore their clothes. She stopped occasionally at windows of fine clothes. Sometimes entering and playfully trying on this item or that, viewing herself in the mirror with childish pleasure. She sometimes circled the same street, hoping to see a new sight that chance might have dealt on the second or third visit.

"Oh things that I had missed," she inwardly announced, "overlooked, that were always there, now happy, delighted, I am seeing them again!"

She danced along the cobbled streets, paved uneven, like greyish stones near a beach that raised higher than the blue water's edge. In her excitement she ran, to feel the energy of her legs, like horses beneath her

torso they charged on, like huskies driving a sleigh. Oh legs, they ran, her forgotten energy that longed to travel.

All time slowed, and that child running along the beach to the attention of her parents appeared to her, that winter when she ran inside from the rain, those school days running sports against her classmates, the muscles beneath her skin brought all these moments to the surface. She dreamed of those slow summers of youth as the summer breeze fluttered the ends of her dress, as the sun's beams lightened her hair and took the coolness from her body. When she would wake up lazy on a summer afternoon and watch the window without her glasses, looking at the movement the trees made, blurred and bunched up like pine cones on the tips of giant reeds that blew in the wind by a river bank. When strange light and shadow danced on her bedroom wall as the sunlight struck the garden leaves.

She liked her vision when waking, before placing her glasses on her ears, when everything was reduced to shapes and the world looked like some cubist masterpiece. She saw things for what she imagined and felt, not for as they were. And then that rich bliss when she would put her glasses on and stared through the window from where she lay waking, capturing distance clearly in her eye. That which was but a white

run against blue, is a cloud, so precise that it seems closer to her than it was like candy floss that could be reached out to and eaten. Or after showering, wiping the steam from the mirror and placing her glasses on her ears to see herself as she brushed those pearly teeth. She saw the world twice, each a fresh vision, of her sight and hers through lenses. Where was the world. Life that runs so fast, life here had become slow; now she could keep up. To run, like water loved to run, like clouds love to venture, like the wind loves to traverse, like the sun loves to rove. She was the same, she was alike. She tired joyously. Her panted breath was her only words and language. The body that was returned to her, exhausted, like playing sisters; her body and her soul. Time and mortality wait for none; They are in haste. Greet them at the gates. For now run on and live.

She raised her arm for a taxi. A car arrived, she sat in the back seat, watching lights run by her, changing colours. The sun was swallowed up by the horizon.

The trails of its dress of light was eventually pulled behind distant hills. And the sky was nothing but stars against a black gown.

Epode I wanted the boat to skim the surface of the sea, not as slowly as a boat travels, but as a convex rock that skips the surface of the water as a boy hurls it towards the sea. clap, clap, clap it bounces as it skips along the water's top. That's how I wanted my boat to row. That rhythmic nod of a speedboat as it glides, splitting water's seam, revealing its whiter lining from its blue cloth. Where to? I don't know. Until we pass that forgotten place that turns us all alive.

MOON Oh moon, you are always the best seat in the house.

If I could rest in that glow you boast And recline in to your crescent, And when the light goes out pull that black door close.

VIA BRERA You were my favourite orgasm soprano From passing neighbours in the building Our hot nights got cold looks in the morning In the via Brera district in Milano.

AMES ANDERSON’S

ZEBRA SKIN