Dilemma. Sounds like a nineteenth century word, to describe a feeling you might have, at the prospect of tea with the wrong person, wearing the wrong kind of hat, whose gloves are slightly soiled at the tips, after picking up greasy crumbs from their impoverished table.
Dilemma is simply sheer Dismay, and that is how I felt this morning leaving the house, 9/27, after the bitter news of yesterday, hearing the devil speak and no one understanding…. on this bright sunny autumn day, but the wind starting to whip at me like furious horse tails.
That carp I saw the other day trying to swim in the River– not enough water, again. It had to float sideways in order to breathe. I could see it trying to get some water breath. It tried again and again and I watched it helplessly until the bus came.
The leaves are falling down like golden flowers, like tired ballerinas. Thousands of pods like green watermelon seeds cover the top of the water, like an old woman’s glittering hairnet.
Today there are two carp– the water is a bit higher. Both burrowing in the riverbed digging up clams or insects or oysters as though they exist. There are abalone shells lying down at the bottom of the river like open shutters….
One carp is in a pool of water lit up by the Aztec sun and the other is hiding under the bridge in the dark shadows. Both are eating, oblivious to one another.
I watch the carp the golden flowers and the ballerinas falling into the river, and I am afraid.
whennothingworks 