Live and Direct

FADE IN

"We got lights?"
"Yeah."
"Hair? Straight?"
"Yeah, Yeah. In 
Five, Four, Three, Two..."
(Point of the index finger, 
thumb toward heaven.
Thumb drops.
Click, whir.)


Live and direct,
We come at you 
From the scene of the 
Crime,
As it were, 
And
	(crash)
	i heard that, right? and then 
	tumble, tumble, and sound like 
	mewling Siamese 
	(but this was an infant's cry!)
	made its way through walls,
	this was what i heard

Though there was no one to make comment,
We feel it apropos to speculate
That the person responsible was


	in the old house,
	running down concrete steps
	bright comical red, 
	a river of timeless crimson,
	but it wasn't me, 
	you see,
	i am not to blame
	(but i am).


		I was Writing you a Letter once, 
		like on this special Paper, 
		bonded-something-or-other
		and I had this Perfect- gray 
		for the ink and the paper, 
		to say in Images exactly 
		what I wanted to, but
		I never sent it Out, you Know?

Not in a fully coherent state of mind.
This person, name withheld, did
Suicide on these steps which you can see
Over to the left of me, and it was

	not my fault, damn you,
	not my fucking fault.
	so you can lay blame 
	on the steps
	(on the steps! my God, 
	all over the steps!)
	of someone else's door.
	i can remember his face 
	as a baby, so sweet, so gentle.

		I said some sort of Shite like 
		I Love you, and I Miss you, 
		and things like I Need to See you.
		But since I never really got Around to Sending it,
		I figure you won't Miss me much Anyway. 

Apparently something had broken in his mind.
The victim eventually succumbed
To the despair 

	which i told him was a figment of
	his imagination ---where self-convinced emotion
	was the sound of a distant siren,
	troubling only if you wanted it to be---
	and that none of us were interested
	in his self-pity

		which crept In, like through the Cracks
		in the Windows at night,
		like the Snow, small tiny
		perfect flakes of frozen Sadness
		and I can fall Asleep now,
		on sheets like Forever, as I lie on
		planes of pure simple White,
		silent among the drifts of Oblivion.		

			i can see your face, here.
			i remember in my last letter
			to you i said k.i.t.
			(how do i keep in touch 
			when you're out of touch?) 
			they shouldn't have had 
			an open casket, y'know,
			your head's not quite shaped right,
			that hair's not quite the right color.

Which was a specter
He could no longer elude.
Now back to the studio, 
This is

	and i didn't even get to 
	say anything to him, 
	not even something like

		I am the one here,
		a Perfect example of a 
		Huge fucking Failure,
		(the Closest near Success)
		and there's Nothing more to Say but

			don't look at those eyes,
			its like you're still here,
			i gotta go,

Good bye.
	good by.
		Good Bye.
			bye.


FADE OUT

"Good shot?"
"Yeah."

Timothy A. Clark
1997