Physiac: August 2006

Perplexis lives at three-oh-nine
West Chiltonberry way
with her seven older brothers
who do nothing everyday.

(Now, for all those unaware of
how a 'nothing' is defined,
it's really just an synonym
for life without surprise.

-and if surprise is what we use
to keep our lives intriguing,
then nothing's just a state of mind
where something's always fleeting.)

So, everyday Perplexis walks
to school and then to work,
where her mind is always busy
and her brothers do not lurk.

For, though she loves her brothers
more than anyone could know...
-with every inch they sink to waste
it tears apart her soul.

It seems each passing moment
strikes a thousand listless hours
As Lexis watches helpless as
her brothers minds go sour.

So, walking home from school one day,
consumed with riotous anger
Perplexis formulates a plan
to free them all from danger.

-and on the morn of Halloween
with jacket-bundled-tightly
She gives away her precious things
and sets upon the highway.

For waiting round with 'hopeful' thoughts
has worn away her patience
Thus lexis now has set upon
the trek to reparation.

(Before one gets to traveling
through space of-far unknown-
One first must flee the warm
familiar confines of their home.

A legend of the questing-kind
allegedly once said,
“The hardest journey of them all,
is getting out of bed.”

The masters of these tribulations
venture as they please-
Unhindered by what sloth oppressions
indolence will breed.

So when these feathered bedding binds
grow pillows round’ your face
remember: sever mind from sleep,
and beds you shall escape.)

It’s cold, you know on Halloween
Most monsters can attest,
Most children too, who trick or treat
Are always smartly dressed.

But Lexis, in her pauper clothes
-a dress not fit for comfort
-a pair of chucks spite rain and snow
and hoodie raggd asunder.

-her swollen feet beat ’neath the snow,
from high-fi arctic air
which closes frozen winter roads
bemoaning thoroughfares.

A torrid, stormy system swirls in
circles round’ the sky,
whilst’ lounging in the distance
looms another storm pariah.

While Lexis was tiny pearl
still living with her mother,
the school agreed the girl
indeed did differ from her brothers.

"A difference doesn't tell the tale"
remarked one grim instructor
on stair- fat knuckle-white on rail,
"She has no older brothers."

"It's true,' Piped in the principal
"Her mind is in upheaval.
Instinctively, it seems she sees
imaginary people."

Her worried mother rushed her fro
from hospitals to shrinks
from every known professional
on every listed street.

There are three wooden cross-sections that divide my
lawn into four separate inner pastures,each individually
irrigated through a network of perforated copper pipes
that extend from a large hydro-electric water filtration
system that fits seamlessly into the bottom of the fountain
in my yard.

When it rains, there is an underground resevoir which funnels
water into a small, obsidion exit-peice which is perched on top
of the fountain-pouring liquids back into the main basin from
a bucket which is balanced on its head.

(A heavy web of hollow coils make up the inside body
and legs of this statuette, and they run from a flood-gate
near the exiting water at the bucket.. to a bundle of polymer
tubes 6 feet beneath my mailbox.)

The few bits of mail I do receive are actually high yield nutrients
which have been compacted into the shape of envelopes by a
high tech gardening company located outside of Vancouver B.C.
When the mailman drops these envelopes into the gutter, he is
actually releasing carefully measured amounts of chemicals into a feild
of underground drainage pumps that circulate the mixture
back into the resivoir underneath the fountain.

There are times when I am lying in bed watching the ceiling fan
spin its shadows into the open doors of my bedroom- when I'll
wearily contemplate the importance of my work. And as my mind
wanders with the shades of grey and black on the walls, I am sometimes
tempted to run into the streets screaming my secrets to all of those
who would listen,hoping beyond anything that some r a n d o m
passerbyer could validate the terrible things which I have done. It's
during these times when I am most vunurable to the pressures and
influences of the outside world.

My home in this place is nothing more than a diversion for my life
below. The walls and shelves of my living room are decorated
with portraits of families that I have never seen nor spoken to, and the
kitchen pantry is stocked only with foods essential to my own survival.
The things that hold value for others, their television sets and high speed
internet connections, their cash and jewelry and precious loved ones...none
of these things reflect well in the fountain

In addition to the intricate waterways beneath my
home, there are
several
hundred yards of reinforced concrete corridors that
spiral a
considerable
distance beyond the restrictive boundaries of my
property. These
distances
are more than tripled in the bundles of gossamer thin
tubing which
furtively
occupy several of the corridors that cluster
underneath my neighboring
homes
and gardens. Much could be said of the upkeep to these
structures,
which, if
left intended could lead to an entropy of the system,
and perhaps more
importantly, to a stagnation of the chemicals which
the system so
studiously
maintains. I have little doubt that without constant
supervision, the
delicate balances of these devices would cease to
perform their
intended
functions, and begin to operate redundantly on their
own accord.
On power, there is the air-conditioning unit on the
side of my home
that
has been modified to double as a sort of solar
generator. The pumps
transferring water from the neighboring homes are run
from both the
primary
power of this unit and the secondary power of the
flowing water itself.
This
steady intake of water into the main system is
purified through a
charcoal
filter then sent directly to a solitary canal on the
opposite end of
the
fountain. It is from here that the nearby reservoir of
brewing chemicals
and
nutrients are properly diluted and measured carefully
into injectable
doses.
After this, they are quickly transfered to a
refrigerated holding tank
near
the entrance to my basement.
It is only now that the fountain is able relinquish
control of the
system
to the local plumbing of my home. This control is
frequently botched
by the
design of the primitive structures hydrarchitecture,
but any
modifications
to the upper levels of my compound would only draw
unneeded attention
from
the outside world. As it is, two feet beneath the
floor of the
basement, tap
water faucet pumps mist the cooled mixture onto a
white hot-sheet of
stainless steel, thus, evaporating the liquid formula
and leaving the
solid
impurities behind. This vapor is vacuumed into a
spiraling glass cord
which
drips the new liquid into a blue plastic cup on my
windowsill.

I will sometimes observe the contents
of that cup,
curiously holding it up to the sun- and swishing the
liquids into a
whirlpool.

And at the end of the day when I have
nothing left to do,

I
will often wonder at
what
it means-

what
the
fluid actually represents.

It seems the only things I do know anymore, are that
when I step
underground, I am proud-

that when I pour water into a glass,

I am happy,

and that when I shower in the evening with the idea of
another day
before
me,

I will think of the fountain,
and smile.

Physiac

Sunday, August 20, 2006

Perplexis

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