~44~

Opened my eyes.
I am floating in a seemingly endless lake.
(tricked myself to believe that this surrounding of water is surrounded by land)
I long to stand on my feet…and touch solid ground.
***
Dull.
There is no wind.
The water is as still as the air.
Need to wade my arms, trash my feet
in order to see waves in this otherwise clear still flat waterscape.
***
Think.
Must I swim?
To where?
Blankly I stare, flat horizon everywhere.
Or should I wait?
For what?
Something, anything that’d rescue me from this tranquil waters for a hell.
***
Should I drown in order to end this peaceful monotony for a life?
Sink or swim?
Neither.
I will float.
***
Strange.
I feel no hunger for food nor thirst for water.
I am still alive.
Here I am,
dying to satisfy the hunger, quench the thirst-
the question:
Why am I still alive?
***
Opened my eyes.
Surprised to see a wooden box floating nearby.
I smiled.
Finally, my coffin.
I swam towards the box… it is locked.
***
Where is the key?
Is there a key?
Perhaps there is…lying somewhere at the bottom which I couldn’t see.
***
I dived, dived really deep
to find the hopefully existing key.
I dived, dived really deep
the pressure kept on pounding at my chest,
still determined to find the key that’d open that mysterious wooden chest.
***
I am running out of air.
Need to surface…
to breathe.
***
Opened my eyes.
Frowning, I brood at the thought of me drowning
without finding out what’s inside that wooden box.
***
The closed wooden box still laughs, mocks me with its lock.
***
I punched the lock over and over with my right hand
-in a desperate attempt to break it-
instead it broke my right hand, my fingers.
Most specially, my middle finger.
Great.
Now I am deprived of my only source of twisted satisfaction-
the art of clenching my right hand into a fist,
extending my middle finger
-proudly
confidently straight-
pointing it at the sky that has no clouds, sun, moon nor stars.
All stolen.
All I have is an insane blue ceiling for a heaven.

Then I laughed.
I laughed at my stupidity.
Why am I lamenting over my right hand?
I still have my left left.
***
Opened my eyes.
Delighted to see a scarlet bird
-a cardinal-
defy the azure sky.
The bird circled
then perched on my disfigured, outstretched right hand.
Talons tightened their grip
my expressionless face is ripped by a painful smile.
Once again
hot-living blood flowed out of my hand,
trickled down on my arms to desecrate the sea.
Gently
I lowered my right hand to better see the cardinal’s beauty.
I noticed- something is in its beak.
Slowly
I placed my left palm under the cardinal’s proud head.
I begged.

The cardinal dropped what it was holding in its beak
and I was not surprised to see
that it is a key…
it must be that key.
***
The cardinal flew away.
I shed tears as I witness the most depressing scene-
a moving scarlet dot vanishing in the still blue horizon line.
***
Opened my chest.
Found only blank sheets of white paper.
Paper.
HA!!!
Broke my right hand just for paper!!!
I grabbed, crumpled and threw the nearest sheet.
***
So surreal ( as if my problem of existence is not surreal enough)
the sheet which I grabbed, crumpled and threw
flew back to its pack.
***
***
***
So, I am to write.
-But I have no pen.
A scarlet feather floats nearby.
-But I have no ink.
Water is all that I could see.

But I have blood.
***
Counted the blank sheets of white paper,
the treasure I found in my chest.
Forty-four.
Forty-four sheets where I could squeeze my thoughts.

Thoughts…
About what?

I looked around
my tranquil water hell
mocking blue heaven
broken right hand
broken fingers
broken middle finger.

I smiled.
Serenely.
I know what to write.

Defiance.

First, I must learn how to use my left hand
so that I may begin writing my silent crusade of screaming thoughts
of defiance…

…thoughts.
All that is left of me.
Thoughts that are, I strongly believe, right.

.
.

.

-Jonathan Maines Ramirez, circa 2003

left the playeronbacktobackrepeat,songsOrestesAndRosebyAPerfectCircle.

woke up with the idea for a poem in mind…finished in an hour.