Dreams in this paper lantern mind have crept into a sleepless corner. A dandelion is the grand design, if only imagined.

The ordinary aspect is a fly buzzing up against the sliding screen door, trying to get back outside. It flew in freely. How did that happen?. It's been said that life is but a dream, eh? But for Kafka, no exit, as I patiently shoo the frightened fly ever closer towards the jamb, while cautiously pulling the door open. Nearer my god to thee, I hum. Then finally liberation, which it cannot fully appreciate. Or does it need to?

Scene Two:the kitchen

An arena of focused intent for chopping vegetables, it will not be shared. No distractions will vie for a task requiring only simple thoughts. God as exit having not the chance of a snowball in hell.

Of all the caravans to have passed by the hibiscus in my garden, I might say: “How entertaining.” Is there some port through which they are viewed? A melange of impressions is going by, flittering too much.

First of all, there is no more here of salvation than the end of this sentence. And next, there is nothing further. Whatever might have volunteered for constriction through the port has taken a vacation. The atmosphere on my street of vanished caravans is a parade of tubas, silver bell horns flashing in the sun, reviewing the hibiscus in tight formation. For all that it bears no relation to the judging stand, where a crowd has gathered at the drinking spout, people tend to misconstrue what they misunderstand. On a hot day, this certainly takes a toll. But, as I'm on no mission, they can sweat it out.

From here to eternity is a clear line of sight, yet an end never to be reached.

In a school room, kids in straight backed chairs are watching a Chinese shadow play: transparent vellum cutouts, brightly colored, illuminated by a lantern, move behind the bed sheet. A kid yells. “Look out!” The tympani rolls, trembling distant thunder. “Look out! A bee!”

The endless adventure, paused at Nagasaki, rolled out in a great fireball. Then a century of very bad weather, and the willow by the river in its ceaseless weeping. “Greenland is melting!” A sitar player settles into the orchestra pit, under Lincoln's balcony, and the forget-me-nots of a forgotten battlefield are munched by cattle, heedless, ruminating, shitting to fertilize unknown progeny. And from the ranch house comes a clattering of pot lids.

As a dream, I'm tempted to say, or perhaps as in operating a wood lathe, let the chips fall where they may. It's what's left that counts. Whether it meets the requirements of language is beside the point. As has been said, the same, of sculpting in stone, the artist simply liberates what's already there. A musician, improvising, stumbles into a fleeting theme never to be repeated. “I don't know what came over me.”

It was not a cheese sandwich.