{"id":18289,"date":"2018-02-09T08:35:39","date_gmt":"2018-02-09T16:35:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/monkeymind\/?p=18289"},"modified":"2018-02-09T10:16:32","modified_gmt":"2018-02-09T18:16:32","slug":"going-spotty-bit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/monkeymind\/2018\/02\/going-spotty-bit.html","title":{"rendered":"Going to Be Spotty for a Bit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"<\/a>
\nI appear to have come down with the dreaded man cold.<\/p>\n

I start with a groan, swelling to a moan,<\/em>
\n rising to a keen, ascending<\/em>
\n to a shriek that tapers off in a thin wail.<\/em>
\n I hug myself and, whimpering,<\/em>
\n rock back and forth on my heels.<\/em>
\n No one has ever known such sadness.<\/em>
\n No one can grasp how I feel.<\/em><\/p>\n

I smash an egg over each eye.<\/em>
\n I smear my face with coal and pepper.<\/em>
\n I wear a paper bag soaked through<\/em>
\n with spoiled watermelon and pork grease.<\/em>
\n I shred my happy past \u2013 my books,<\/em>
\n pictures, and poems, published or not.<\/em>
\n I\u2019ll never fly fish again.<\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019ll never make love again.<\/em>
\n I\u2019ll never sit outside and watch night<\/em>
\n stretch its starry tent over the sky.<\/em>
\n There will be no more metaphors.<\/em>
\n I am more sorrowful than a sorrowing man.<\/em>
\n Life has no more meaning to me<\/em>
\n than a life without meaning.<\/em><\/p>\n

My heart slows. My blood congeals<\/em>
\n to brown, vein-clogging mush.<\/em>
\n My stomach goes on strike; my colon<\/em>
\n bars its door. People assume<\/em>
\n I\u2019m terminal. They imagine what<\/em>
\n would make them feel the way I look,<\/em>
\n and project their paltry problems onto me.<\/em><\/p>\n

As if they could fathom my misery<\/em>
\n by waterwinging over its abyss!<\/em>
\n My pain is too heavy to lift,<\/em>
\n too vast to measure, too ineffable to name,<\/em>
\n and incalculably too precious to share.<\/em>
\n I dig my grave in a landfill, and topple in.<\/em>
\n I rub dirt and dog droppings in my hair.<\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve sunk so low its funny; so I start to giggle.<\/em>
\n Then to chortle. Then to roar. Mothers<\/em>
\n clutch their bleating kids, and rush away.<\/em>
\n Gangbangers dash to the far side of the street.<\/em>
\n I crawl out of my grave, strip, and shower<\/em>
\n with a gunk-filled water hose.<\/em>
\n I shake and shiver, grinning, in the filthy air.<\/em><\/p>\n

Charles Harper Webb<\/a>
\n(From \u2013 Tulip farms and leper colonies: poems)<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n