Scot Siegel

Scot Siegel   

Craft Talk 3

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This is not your mother’s diary. In ten minutes we will not learn yoga or self-destruct. We will not bond and pray in positions only insects have mastered. No release of toxins to make our legs ache for weeks. But we may simulate human-powered flight and write like swifts or goldfinches until the words weep like tortured soldiers.

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I know what you’re not thinking. No shot-put. No paintball. No ball bearings. No catapult to punish the white stucco. No overripe plums. No rookery of young women. No hookery of herons. Only a harem of random fantasies. But go ahead. Undress one. Sip the lemon and jasmine kombucha!

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Now I am fading. My knees are useless. Days chatter by like race skis on bulletproof ice. The compression ahead. Economic uncertainty. I’m bloated, but light as a zeppelin tethered to earth. Someday, I’ll learn, break free: Find that great start-house called forever perched on a snow-capped peak gleaming.