They are logs at my feet.

The cats are logs at my feet.
Throats twitch. Necks sputter.
Eyes half open.
Dreaming easy race track dreams.
Chasing cheese or sand.
Reminding me from the inside of their cotton avalanche that the hardest thing about writing is writing.

You decide to create an hour and a half of art.
You commit a project to your year.
And then three days before the people come you have something.
Not sure if it is at all what it set out to do.
Don't mind.
Really.
Don't mind entirely what exactly they say.
As long as they wait at least an hour.
Just please don't talk while I'm talking.

One draped over the record player like it's his job.
The other coiled on the mattress edge as though it's crowded up here.

You decide to try to be a master.
And you commit your life to two and a half years.
And it starts out rough.
But now gleams back at you like a wet penny.
Even the hard days are nice.

Wake early.
Skip church for a cut and a color.
It was her only free slot.
And anyway I think it was Jesus who said, when you look good you feel good.
Get the bangs blunt.
Feel like a winner.
Check reflection in every store window on Damen between Lawrence and Winnamac.
Check on life raft.
Not in the bed.
See light.
Pages cover the bathroom floor.
Pages of the script that we wrote with our friends.
Up to his chin in mustard bath.
Hot mustard bath.
Good job.
Looks nice.

Switch bags.
Go back out.
To talk and work.
In a Sunday apartment.
Sunday friend apartment.
Two friends.
Three if you count the skinny man watering dead plants.


All the changes are made.
Now memorize it in a day.
Keep running those baths.

Don't forget about all the homework.
I wont.
It's fun.
Read a book of poems.
By Sommer Browning.
Really
Really
Really
Really
Like it a lot.
The words we read for this teacher
all of them
feel connected
as though she has a very large point
a really pretty point
not pretty like pink
pretty like you want to live there.

Get a little nervous about everything that is supposed to happen between now and the next seven days.
It is a long list.
Get a little exhausted wondering where the last five weeks went.
Vanished like mustard powder on top of hot steam.

Search the kitty dander for suggestions.
They tell me the Oscars are good this year.
Turn them on and garlic the toast.

Life raft jets to be with Tim.
Living here for six weeks from LA.
To do the show.
He looks the same.
He lives the same.
To be the same.
Good old.

Back to the avalanche to write the hardest thing about writing is writing.

Always enjoy the dead montage. Place bets on who will be the last slide in the show.

Final on Final,
Skin & Toast