“it is fearful, I was a mirror, an individual,”
cries the shallow rock pool, “now infinity
claims me; I am everything? But nothing”;
peace, salt, you were never as useful as all that,
peace, flower, you are one of a thousand-thousand others,
peace, shallow pool, be lost.
“And that’s your favorite poem,” John remarked, taking out a cigarette and lighting it.
“Yes,” Sully said, reaching for the cup of coffee. They were sitting in Jared’s loft, art everywhere, Judases hanging from the ceiling, and they were all in a circle, Swain sharing a beanbag with Mason.
“I don’t think I get it,” Tommy said honestly.
“But you will,” Sully said.
“What do you mean he will?” John looked at him.
“I mean he’ll understand it—”
“When you explain it to him?”
Sully looked at John with great shock and then said, “Yes. Exactly.”
“You think you can teach a poem?”
“Poems were the first language,” Sully told him. “Of course you can teach a poem. Like any other language. Except… people have forgotten how to speak it. Poems were never meant to… hide things.”
“I disagree.”
“We’ve had this discussion before. Besides, I think you want to hide things, so you think your poems should. But they shouldn’t. It’s all about communication.”
“Well, what’s it communicating?”
Jared looked at Mason and rolled his large brown eyes. John and Sullivan had forgotten anyone else was in the room.
“Not communicating like the regular words we use,” Sully said. “But communicating the way we try to communicate with the regular words we use. When we speak about… about… I don’t know—the taste of ice cream, we go on and on about how good it was. But the real poet—he puts the taste right in your mouth. He’s like the musician. He puts the emotion right inside of you. He shakes you from the inside out. Reaches right into you. That’s what communication is.”
“You make it sound like a violation.”
“Maybe it is. Or maybe there’s a violence in it. Maybe you welcome it in… that other.”
“Like fucking,” Jared said out of the blue.
Sully, long faced, blue eyed, gave Jared a strange look and then said, “Yes… a little bit.”
Balliol said, quietly, “I don’t think I want to be violated.”
“The poem,” Sully said. “That last line, Tommy…. You know how you said you didn’t get the poem. That last line is where it’s all at.”
Peace, salt, you were never as useful as all that,
Peace, flower, you are one of a thousand-thousand others,
Peace, shallow pool, be lost.
“See, that’s what religion is,” Sully said. “We want to be us, look out for us. Whatever we think us is. We don’t want to melt. We don’t want the salt to dissolve into everything else—like it’s supposed to. Like, when I’m doing real work, when I’m being a real writer all the me goes away. I becomes something….” His hand reached around to describe it. “Something more generous. I stop being a shallow pool. That’s what it’s all about. Not being a shallow pool. Letting that shallow part of you be lost.”
Tommy looked mesmerized, but really they all were. Tommy took the book up from Sully’s hands and read:
“I was salt, a substance, self contained, am I to be dissolved and lost? Lost… Lose your life…”
“To gain your soul,” Balliol finished.
“Yes,” said Tommy.
Balliol murmured, “The narrow road.”
“ARE YOU ALL RIGHT? I mean… Would you like something before you go? A glass of water? Water’s all I got.”
“No, I have to go,” he was saying as she put her purse on over her shoulder.
“We could… Watch a little TV if you want.”
“That’s all right,” she said. “Thank you for a very nice time.”
Dan didn’t say anything else. There was really nothing moderately sensible to say. Somehow he had thought this would even up the score, or make him feel better. He closed the door, and locked it behind her, still smelling the strong perfume.
He sighed, and shuffled to the little sofa because he really didn’t want to be on the bed right now.
It would take a week to get her out of the bed sheets. He hated perfume.
Sometimes he hated himself.
Sully waited by the garage, just out of the triangle of light from the apartment at the top floor. He saw the door open across the yard and the shape of Jared, and then a few minutes later Jared’s palm was pressed to his.
“How interesting things will be this year,” Jared remarked lightly. Sully could see his smile in the dark.
“Is anyone going to miss you and me?”
“Well, you’re supposed to be downstairs. And I’m supposed to be in my loft, so they might miss you and they might miss me, but I don’t think anyone’s going to miss us together. And everyone’s almost asleep anyway.”
Sully looked through the cloudy window.
“I’ve never done it in a garage before.”
Jared shrugged. “Me neither, but lots of people have.”
“This garage?”
“Probably. But the sheets are clean. I put them out today.”
“You thought ahead.”
“I try.”
“Can I ask you a question?” Sully said.
“You just did.”
“You’re a good guy,” Sully jammed his hands in his jeans pockets. “How do you go on with this? With what we’re doing?”
“Same as you. Reflect as little as possible.”
“But you had love once.”
“Yes. So did you.”
“Maybe.”
“Is love what you want?” Jared asked him.
“Right now what I want,” Sully told him, thinking of the poem, “is to dissolve…. Salt is greatly overrated.”
Beside Rick, Mark Powers watched Bonnie sitting outside with Matt and Chris.
“How… fitting,” Mark said. “I can’t describe how. But it is.”
Outside Bonnie stuck her legs out from the patio sofa and looked at the full moon. She sat between Chris and Matt, with Matt’s hand swinging unconsciously in her own.
“I used to look up at the moon and feel nothing,” Bonnie said.
“I always heard that since I was a woman we were supposed to have this great kinship and I was like… nope. And now it’s different.”
“Really?” Matt’s voice was quiet.
Bonnie put a hand to her flat stomach and looked at the round moon.
“Yes… I feel like we both have this great secret. And this secret is… a smile.
“I feel like we’re sisters.