calico

a friend called to tell me what the weatherman said:

80 degrees and a good day for swimming

but i was already sleeping in my chair by the window

with the curtains drawn shut.

the television, i think i left it on

talking heads

talking with walls

about wars, and the price of oil

but more importantly perhaps

the folly of a film goddess

whose name escapes me

but i was sleeping, already

in my chair by the window.

and i faintly recall my mother at the door

and my sister, and a salesperson

tossing pamphlets into the wind

like an autumn tree

and each afternoon, right around two

a truck delivered brown boxes to me

full of things i’d never need

and he built an igloo.

but i was still sleeping, in my chair by the window

though i hear there were whirlwinds

and sirens

and someone begging me to crawl into my bathtub

but i was still dreaming

in the chair by the window, with my hair

growing longer.

i dreamt in new colors, at the bottom of the sea

but also that that none of my socks matched any other

and everyone walked around, clothes backwards

greeting one another

and my mom baked a cherry pie

using only the pits

yes, life’s the pits!

but they were all awake, outside of my window

raising hell and shimmer buildings

made of aluminum foil

and the jobs went to foreign soil.

the grass combed over the sidewalks

and sunflowers grew taller than the fences

and somewhere mom was baking cherry pies

using only the pits.

but i was still sleeping in the chair by the window

when some shy neglected calico came in from the cold

came slinking into my lap, licked my eyelids and my nose

and i rose from my chair by the window.