long time comin' / we're buried in the hull

I had some rather unimaginative fodder to entice the hungry teeth of the otherwise uninterested last night but inevitably it left me just as the alcohol did. During this time and throughout the course of The Virgin Spring I half-wittedly contemplated the importance of dogma and further questioned why it is so vital for those to whom it is actually important. On the eve of the Fool's Banquet, I lie as crooked as the hind leg on a mangy dog, realizing the pointlessness of permitting my mind to wander these grand ventures that countless peace seekers, artists, partisans, monarchs, magicians, elective officials, palm readers, beast tamers, clergymen, the mentally deficient and malnourished, and half-wits alike have painstakingly trekked before me. Nothing I can say now hasn't been said before and the folds are obvious and previously discovered.

My ideas are as fruitful as the cheap beer I've accidentally sprayed across the floor of the houseboat, idling on the sunken docks of Lake Lanier, bound tightly with rope and surely dreaming of a better resting place. The harsh wooden walls pack us tightly together like the balmy leaves that we're huddled around are delicately fingered into a glass fixture or dark vanilla flavored rolling papers. Through the thickening smoke, my eyes fixate on a dark-skinned girl that I recognize from grade school. Under different conditions she probably wouldn't catch my attention unless I found her entirely unnecessary. She's sitting across the small room and through the seemingly gelatinous clouds that occupy a solid three-fourths of it, it seems like an extraordinary length between us. Behind the dim light that barely touches the outermost surfaces of my body I feel entirely confident in my estimate. I find my eyes stupidly dancing around her as if to avoid her occasionally returned but only briefly reassuring gaze, although it's probably clear that I'm just pretending I wasn't looking in the first place. My eyes are barely open so they barely find a way to undress her without their methods constituting as forceful sexual advances. I imagine her body disrobed and entirely natural in its state; her imperfections crudely decorating an honest physique in the poorly lit confines between the heavy sky and the gentle swells of the small sea beneath us. She slowly strikes an uncertain pose, with her dainty hands resting on her hips, inexplicably coercing me into a deep state of sickening arousal. Her bored stare certainly gives the impression that she's tired and unamused, yet I'm still enamored with the simplest indecent thoughts. But before long the fog wears thin and my once dull mind regains its sharpness. Still, the newly lit cigarette pressed between her lips begs my attention, though I'm thankful because had it done so fifteen minutes ago it would've been intensified tenfold. My eyes begin to droop like the shrinking, smoke emitting stick that's jutting out of her mouth. The cherry grows anemic, the smoldering ashtray is awarded more company, and she eventually pulls herself out from the sleepy vessel's hold through the cracked glass panel door. A barely conscious boy falls out after her and they make off up the shady walkway. Oh well. I stumble uphill, find a couple of trees making a fork in the sky of the dark lining woods and immediately relieve myself between its generous thin stretches of light. Later, all is restored as I find myself in the heart of Old Winder Hwy. fumbling through my keys, only for my efforts to reveal that the door was already unlocked anyway.

I forgot my dreams but I still think they were great.

May the festive golden cans of inexpensive alcohol litter your yards, bedrooms, and houseboats.
Happy Easter.

Love,
MLK

PS: Does anyone else pick up on the overtly cannibalistic vibes and themes of vampirism in the Bible?