(Orange Dots On Electronic Maps) a Geography of Reliving

After a month
it is the sifting through old boxes, wiping dust, the coastal outline he draws on large white sheets of 32 point, a titanium band upon which he intends to fasten a compass

when in the course of automobiles
the grease of fingers on side and rear view mirrors form the ridges of two converging mountain ranges, above the treeline appears uniform and rigid from this height, but upon closer examination we find a pile of rubble, still jagged as tongues are often jagged, but he will clear his mind in order to plot his path to the inland city

where the skin makes a crust
they were thought to be the coagulating platelets near the corner of the mouth, peeling whenever he would speak a name, but they were small orange representations of a destination, she would sit quietly in bed, rocking with the ocean, receding

among the questions posed by a mirror
the interior landscapes are varied, the north bearing freckles about the nose, the southern regions were the beginnings of callouses, a lip upon the eastern shoulder, that city, we hear its pulsing, but are not meant to enter, if he was intended to hide from such thoughts, it was not made clear to him in the academy


that recalled places are neither living nor ghost
walk up the street and face in the direction of the italian restaurant, you will see a marquis on your left, a university to your right, the ocean is behind you, breaking on the rocks of Norman coasts, it is obvious that you have been here before, you are supposed to grieve for it, but it has been too long, and so you take photos of seals, bloated and beached, and grieve for them instead, it is an incessant narrative, and so you are less sad than annoyed

it is all right, there is nothing even here
she spends the morning sitting in the lagoon collecting smooth stones to line up on the towel, and afterward vanishes, at first it seems we are meant to hate her, next that we must mourn her, and finally that we must pretend to have forgotten her, now it seems fitting to admit that she was loved, and that he had played an assistant's role in the disappearing act,

and lamps are dim beneath hotels
he tips a martini glass in the cuban club, spilling a line of shattered ice onto the table, of course it is these familiar surroundings that have caught him looking elsewhere, if he is lost, then the best thing to do is to admit it,