I used to swim in this swimming pool we had, in-ground surrounded by poured concrete and then inside a blue liner with fake rocks painted in deeper blue, but the water rippled over it in miniature waves- because water seems younger in pools- where oceans crash or rivers roar we domesticate water in these pools, harness its power so we can float.
It used to be about floating- the lightness of submersion and then I stopped, probably something about feeling fat all the time, and I never ever went into water again. If I was a jogger, or played soccer more passionately maybe I'd be writing all sorts of poems in the summertime about swimming pools and floating and being in life instead of watching all the refraction on the wavy blue synthetic rocks on the plastic lining. I used to be able to do flips under water which is really an amazing thing, when you think of it slow motion, zero gravity my head goes under my feet and they swing up, splashing through the surface and back down again, hair slick and matted against my scalp. Breaking back into normal air instead of fish air and chlorine, I let out a gasp. Maybe it is too religious, too baptismal and dreary to think in these terms; but I am not submerged in God, or whatever it is that I am writing about these days, I am simply looking in. Maybe it's all the bugs. I used to have this net and I would go out to the swimming pool like all the other good little future poet kids and skim out the paranoid ants and ladybugs that would get into the water. Ants always baffled me because they had to walk there. Anything with wings I could see making the mistake but since ants are, like us, one of the few things that can't fly, they just walk until the ground is wet and then until the wet is the ground, and panic until I come in with a net and thrust them to the ground with a force designed to shake off their residue. Beetles, I fucking hate you, seriously, and I still saved them the big nasty june bugs that make horrible scratching noises. Once as a kid, I was feeling a towel and remarking to my mom about how soft it was and she gasped- panicked, this terrible gasp she does when she feels the need to over-emote [ie, constantly] and there you were, Mr. Big Fucking Horrible Bug, crawling towards my ear to crawl in and eat my brain I bet. But I show even you forgiveness at the poolside. I think if I ever swam again all the bugs would drown because I don't really want you touching me. I only want a net to do it. Maybe this is some terrible secret about myself, that I will save anything I can, so long as I can save it by way of mile long distances and synthetic fabrics tools instead of skin. What a person might I be if I would just scoop you up all of you, one by one with my bare hands to place you gently on the concrete blowing my own breath until you became dry enough to walk again, to fly again to go make horrible fucking scratching noises as you buzz against the screens on my windows or crawl into my ear to eat my brain. I think that I might be better, and this is why I do not swim. To become submerged half naked in all this stuff that so many things drown in, afraid of touching them with my bare hands to save them I think I might be a coward who can swim underwater floating without touching free from all this weight. Yeah, I think it takes courage to back flip into Godliness, to take all this beauty, close your eyes and scream: "Marco!" -e. _______________________________________________ Five7Five mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/five7five
