BIOGRAPHY OF A PAINTER IN NINE DEGREES
Jackson Pollock's first name was Paul. All I remember from my first funeral is the plaid dress I wore, sitting in a chair, thinking, Please don't make me look inside that box. I could write a much better story about a chair than about anyone who might ever sit in it. There's got to be a better way to move forward than one foot after the other. I'm terrified of anything that makes a move I deem sudden: bees, birds, the wind, your hands, my heartbeat. The first time I remember feeling my pulse around my navel, I thought my heart was falling as a precursor to the sky. If an airplane falls from the sky and no one is around to see it, does Amelia's ghost make a sound? The first person I knew to die was a man but all my ghosts are female. The space under my bed is filled with letters I'll never mail, letters to people I've seen at the side of the road. When Pollock's car ran off the road, his last thought was, All my paintings are cracked windshields.
BIOGRAPHY OF A CARPENTER IN NINE DEGREES
Jesus Christ never used power tools. "Jesus" was the first bad word I couldn't get enough of: Jesus I hate you. Jesus don't stop. There's a stop sign down the street with "WAR" scrawled on it in black paint. I blacked out in September, fell through the front door, because my heart wanted to lie down. When George Washington said he couldn't tell a lie, his father should have taught him how. Our father, who art in heaven, shallow be thy name. I used to drag your name through the mud, only to end up watering a bed of flowers with blooms shaped like your mouth. I will always be sad that the moon doesn't change shape, that what we see is determined by shadow, interference, light. When the light tells you to cross the street, run the other way. The cross they built for Jesus was hollow and should have fallen down.