Written over her face on an old photograph, in blue ink:

it’s not “tuning in” if you can’t “tune” back  “out” and also the word “tune” suggests an ability to adjust, which is misleading  

Blocking and burying are two activities that take a lot out of a person. Ask any video game character. Or crypt keeper. 

Don’t talk to anyone who says they’re a crypt keeper, actually. I don’t think that’s a real job anymore. 

(She had kind of a big face.)

The past week has felt tremendously, violently boring. I say “felt” because nothing has actually BEEN boring, not even me. Especially not me. I’VE been as delightful as ever. But that’s how everything feels in a fallow period, which I never realize is what I am in until I start to come out of it. My brain refuses to even feign interest in anything I need to do, and all the things I usually WANT to do get put off because the only brainpower I have left after a day of holding back the guttural noises I want to make at every. single. task. is juuuust enough to pay a marginal amount of attention to shows like “The Client List” until it’s an almost appropriate time for me to crawl into bed with a book. This is not depression I’m describing. It’s more like closing up shop for renovations. You know?

Anyway, I'm excited now because FERTILE follows FALLOW, so get ready for all the fruit I'm about to bear. Or like, I guess you don't have to get ready because I like to keep my fruit to myself. Just keep it and hold it and eventually use it to make hooch. (Sometimes muses feel like burrs at first, I'm realizing.)

I’m after a feeling, like incense and the blinds down and the air conditioner on. The chemical reaction of her shampoo and her hair. Shots in the distance – breath on my mouth. Grass in the half-light. Piano, flutes, the voice of a woman in her mother’s mother’s rings. Love spells sent through windows of wood-framed houses. My childhood attic, your secret faces through a screen. WANTED: One mapmaker, skilled in the topography of dreamscapes. Specifically, mine. Must be willing to work odd hours.