In Deference
Speaking of paranoia I have felt a weight akin to it these last few days and nights (my dreams are cumbersome knots of frustration where I bark orders of reprimand at the boy driving at reckless speed as I see and hear the fence posts whizz by), and I've made my own mistakes in driving judgement which on the road have translated into women cussing me from one intersection to the next, down Broad Street, Treme and the River to my right, me on my way home from days that seem very long, but I'm not looking for shorter days so don't clock me as a complainer.
It's warm and muggy here, but cloudy and sunless, in mid February, and that is my witless guess as to why some of us are feeling a little restless, not to mention an awkwardness towards Valentine's Day that may pierce our hearts, and on the individual basis who can say exactly why many of us are out of sync but we are, and this is not just a misery loves company wishful thought but more
a wild guess based on high probabiltity.
And the ghetto, here in New Orleans, seems so much its lesser, more downtrodden self.
On this Sunday next my former lover and I are throwing away a human being, and the golden toothed gangster across the street tirades loudly (punctuating every sentence with Ya hoid me, you heard me?), and how can I not, as a careful but haphazard listener, hear it all, so that when he says to his hapless audience of fellow gangsters "come Monday we may have to go into that building," how am I not to give a moment's consideration that he may mean this building, and therein lies the seed of paranoia, and therein lies a seed of truth, in deference to which I will make or imagine I will make, some preparations.
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Speaking of paranoia I have felt a weight akin to it these last few days and nights (my dreams are cumbersome knots of frustration where I bark orders of reprimand at the boy driving at reckless speed as I see and hear the fence posts whizz by), and I've made my own mistakes in driving judgement which on the road have translated into women cussing me from one intersection to the next, down Broad Street, Treme and the River to my right, me on my way home from days that seem very long, but I'm not looking for shorter days so don't clock me as a complainer.
It's warm and muggy here, but cloudy and sunless, in mid February, and that is my witless guess as to why some of us are feeling a little restless, not to mention an awkwardness towards Valentine's Day that may pierce our hearts, and on the individual basis who can say exactly why many of us are out of sync but we are, and this is not just a misery loves company wishful thought but more a wild guess based on high probabiltity.
And the ghetto, here in New Orleans, seems so much its lesser, more downtrodden self.
On this Sunday next my former lover and I are throwing away a human being, and the golden toothed gangster across the street tirades loudly (punctuating every sentence with Ya hoid me, you heard me?), and how can I not, as a careful but haphazard listener, hear it all, so that when he says to his hapless audience of fellow gangsters "come Monday we may have to go into that building," how am I not to give a moment's consideration that he may mean this building, and therein lies the seed of paranoia, and therein lies a seed of truth, in deference to which I will make or imagine I will make, some preparations.
- jimlouis 2-14-2001 1:20 am