Sixty Seconds Left
Start counting backwards from 60. You no longer have a choice (about anything actually.) Lie down, if that helps. Be kind to yourself, even if you never have before. This may not be the best time to wonder why you never joined the SLA with Patty Hearst or why you didn’t say anything to Bob Dylan when he passed you on the street once in New York, caught your stare directly and said ‘It’s me.’ Or why you never said I’m sorry to Laura after that New Years Eve in Joshua Tree when you both got drunk and argued in the same motel room that Gram Parsons overdosed in years before. She called you several times after that. You never picked up. How about the time you insulted that guy in a bar in Chicago after he called you a dyke? He followed you outside and kicked your car doors in. It was the 70’s. You were all dykes. The revolution is over. Let it go. Remember the night you threw Martha’s house keys in the freezing creek when you thought that the two of you were over? You weren’t then but you were later. Don’t recall how you loved her so much that just looking at her made you want to wrestle her to the ground. It was like drinking too much of something you didn’t understand. What about that cross country trip with your first lover who became a Jesus freak? You rode her Kawasaki to L.A. to see The Doors. And the affair with her 30 years later that nearly ended in a brawl with a group of evangelicals in front of a church in Indiana but stopped just before. Mostly because you were outnumbered. Just try and block out the years of aggression, parceled out like crumbs for beggars, in that job that nearly mangled the kid in you. You swore you’d get out of it before it killed you. And you did. That’s something to hoot about in your last 10 seconds. Don’t think of anything actually that might break your heart, the sound of a train whistle, your baby brother, California, the whole state, and all of life for that matter with everyone in it lined up at some kind of departure kiosk waving goodbye. No. Settle into that soft spot in the middle of your chest right between your ribs, and then when the time comes, wave back.
Start counting backwards from 60. You no longer have a choice (about anything actually.) Lie down, if that helps. Be kind to yourself, even if you never have before. This may not be the best time to wonder why you never joined the SLA with Patty Hearst or why you didn’t say anything to Bob Dylan when he passed you on the street once in New York, caught your stare directly and said ‘It’s me.’ Or why you never said I’m sorry to Laura after that New Years Eve in Joshua Tree when you both got drunk and argued in the same motel room that Gram Parsons overdosed in years before. She called you several times after that. You never picked up. How about the time you insulted that guy in a bar in Chicago after he called you a dyke? He followed you outside and kicked your car doors in. It was the 70’s. You were all dykes. The revolution is over. Let it go. Remember the night you threw Martha’s house keys in the freezing creek when you thought that the two of you were over? You weren’t then but you were later. Don’t recall how you loved her so much that just looking at her made you want to wrestle her to the ground. It was like drinking too much of something you didn’t understand. What about that cross country trip with your first lover who became a Jesus freak? You rode her Kawasaki to L.A. to see The Doors. And the affair with her 30 years later that nearly ended in a brawl with a group of evangelicals in front of a church in Indiana but stopped just before. Mostly because you were outnumbered. Just try and block out the years of aggression, parceled out like crumbs for beggars, in that job that nearly mangled the kid in you. You swore you’d get out of it before it killed you. And you did. That’s something to hoot about in your last 10 seconds. Don’t think of anything actually that might break your heart, the sound of a train whistle, your baby brother, California, the whole state, and all of life for that matter with everyone in it lined up at some kind of departure kiosk waving goodbye. No. Settle into that soft spot in the middle of your chest right between your ribs, and then when the time comes, wave back.