& it was a good feeling
for a little while.
For a half hour or so I understood
why people look up
into the trees, slow down at intersections,
buy scented candles.
I think I figured out
why they laugh at stuff,
why they peel their lips back
& smile at each other.
I tried it myself. I felt like a grinning
skull but people grinned
like skulls right back.
I felt uplifted.
I felt like they were giving me a chance.
Encouraged, I told some lady pushing a stroller
out of the Food Mart "Hey, ma'am,
that's a great looking baby
you've got there, a really top shelf
baby" & she smiled back
a little nervously.
I can't blame her. I probably
went too far. I wasn't ready.
I felt like a bear in a top hat.
Evolution takes time, maybe millions
of years. I didn't think I had that much time.
Because it was damn hard
to get the hang of it, this being
human thing,
it was a Wifi connection
I kept losing
& I wasn't sure it was worth
crossing the street to get back.
So I went home & put on a nature show.
I watched one animal eat another,
one animal mount another & a large peaceful
bucolic feeling came over me & I imagined
human faces grafted onto the crocodiles & ocelots,
onto the gazelles & hippos all the human
faces I'd seen today & I felt so good again
that I ordered a pizza from Dominos
& with a slice in one hand & a black Sharpie
in the other, I ate my pizza standing up for a
change & started drawing a kind of
fucked-up peaceable kingdom all over
the first of my many white walls.
About Meeah Williams:
Meeah Williams (is a writer & graphic artist who lives in Seattle. Links to some of her recent work can be found here: neutralspaces.co/meeah_williams/
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