"it is so dark," Tim Prior
you go along and the little house disappears in the side mirrors, a vibrating image, indistinct; you go along because hidden in the earth somewhere, there is a path, and the path takes you, though it never reveals itself to you. john kennedy is dead and bobbie is dead and martin luther king is dead because anger that expresses itself through violent change is part of the world of men--they look at you impatiently, and then they turn and kill one another for good reasons, apparently; and they are up there on that moon playing golf and my new baby lies on his back in the shade of the crab apple tree and he makes a noise that is still attached to my womb; the bathroom we put in has a carpeted floor; his study has floor to ceiling book shelves for the books we share and the sound of our rca victrola is rich, a whole afternoon of jazz suspended over the turntable; he is head of his department; we have cable television, but he wants to move back to the country. why? it is a bad idea that sounds like a good idea. do hippies know something new? pastoral is an urban conceit; when adam and eve were kicked out of paradise, they peopled the prosperous new cities of north america and forgot hot to bake bread (i know how to bake bread; i know how to prepare a simple dinner quickly for unexpected guests); but he knows that sex is a rhetoric and he woos me in the vortex of fucking when the sound of the mayor's dinner parties is coming from across the street; he says, think of it and think of it and his outdoor mind charms my home to an impossible smallness and i think of it because there are too many chemicals and bombs for us to ignore; and a little bit of hard work on a small farm will ease our souls. and my mother taught me to be patient ("look at what it got me"): "submit yourself to your husband," so i live among my children all day long, for nine years now, my decision, and this farm will be good for them, they will stretch their legs in these endless fields; and he will find the contentment he seeks without rest, going through life as through a room of unfamiliar things, finding a flaw in each one, some irritation slipped from perfection (and this stony place the least perfect thing i've ever seen, and him telling me, it's perfect) now this first night of unbearable darkness and silence so profound my eardrums bow outwards, throbbing in an absence of signals; i can hear him not sleeping; feel him staring into the dark of this room where my eyes have disappeared and i press against him because if i did not i would slip away; but if i were to ask him what he was thinking, i would not understand; i cleave to him because where he believes he is is all the bearings i have