# 100 and 2

everybody shouting context! context! screwing up their faces. bringing
down the hammer. you held a safety match over the gasburner not knowing
the gas had been leaking incessantly . . . eight forty five. six. sunlight
explodes against a Japanese maple. scarlet bright as any bloodjet. cheerful
but without affect (the burned face would suffer most. shriveling into itself.
wizened-looking) warmlit. having nothing to say. surrounding the word,
weaving into it, defining it (sense of imminent. . . ) leafsmoke. linnets.
last-of-the-season rosebuds yellow fringed with carmine at the brink of
December in a surfeit of gooddays. the tawdriest month. because of roserot.
because of irony for stargazers. the anti-individualism of the heavens.
deprogression: star, comet, dust. dust storming from nowhere to nowhere.
everlastingly. without a sigh. without ideology. a perfect waste of time.
but having to do with spatial awe. the feeling of floating in (immanent)
a lot of--stick to the context! the gasjet. countdown . . . between rains.
the dark of solstitial rains. a sunny day. adequate breakfast. a long night's sleep.
ten to ten. by one you'll be famishing. by five fatigued. it's simple-
minded. mind-less. all night you maneuvered to evade the police.--the
terrified who want obedience. tyranny. immutable context:

Phyllis Stowell

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