Other Lives

We have the potential to become fully perfected Buddhas. We have only to strip back the skin of our unenlightened selves to the banana of our Buddha-nature. Electric fan cools my right ear, smoothly spinning the air like candyfloss. Inside it must be dark. This way you get to surprise yourself. Meeting you after all these years is pleasurable. Imagine, all of this time turning a blind eye on myself; the best I could do was to let it go. You wouldn’t treat a dog that way, would you? How long, exactly? All of it, I guess, minus maybe a few hours, max. Go in far enough you come out the other side. Office furniture. Brown filing cabinet. Unsettling materials I suddenly feel compelled to describe as though my life depended on it. The former occupant painted the walls toothpaste green. Worked for them. Grey and white marble lino. Grimy accretions around the edges. Up close everything is scratched or has in some way deteriorated from its original pristine condition. Look as though doing somet...

I love taking off but want flying to be over. When I close my eyes and look into my heart I see the jagged rocks of fear. I also see a lion. Yellow buoys across the bay like rows of continuation dots. Hey, why aren’t they passing the ball to that girl? Three blind mice. Stars between pine trees, the sound of the sea breathing in and out. I accept suffering because I don’t want desire to ever cease. My wife notes how some young women are both slim and big-breasted. See how they run. The rocks like old elephant skin. I wonder if anyone else is looking at the clouds, the vivid purple flower I can’t name spilling down the hillside. Whatever the philosophers say, things will not go away. I like this because it is exactly how I want to do it. Cicadas like a fridge on the blink. Money makes me nervous. Waiting in line to buy something almost makes me shit myself. Hexagons of wobbly light on the sea floor – Jane’s observation. Italian women in bikinis talking, hands on hips, on the shore. Hus...