Practicing her new monologue
from a Steve Martin play,
it becomes impossible to forget
some lines.
Some lines
slap the face, others rattle the cage
just between the ears,
and linger in the room
like cooking dinner.
She recites the lines in front of her closet,
and in front of my closet,
in the sliding glass door
when its dark outside
as I put away the dishes,
listening to her practice,
again.
Distracted by the shutters that keep slapping,
I await my favorite lines
about the shutters that could never be-
come forest blue,
because forest blue is no color,
and denying this existence,
makes it true, naturally.
I try to picture a hole in the forest,
the sky peeking through the canopy,
but my eyelids flutter at the steam
rising and swirling on the stovetop.
Shutters do not occur in Nature, the lines note,
and I wonder about Pi, naturally.
I like Pi,
Newtons apples are the juiciest.
And these occupations
keep our lips moving along,
fingers fiddling with locks
and minds simply wandering off,
it takes time, an open mind, a window
and practice.
Look at the face, the hands, the clock,
she knows all the words Mr. Martin wrote.
Now, I can open the kitchen window,
letting the forest fly out with the green.
Artwork By Juan Gris (José Victoriano González Pérez), Spanish, 1887 - 1927 (1887 - 1927) – Artist/Maker (Spanish) Born in Madrid, Spain. Dead in Boulogne-Billancourt, France. Details of artist on Google Art Project [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
