Transcript of Session #21 for patient NL-1A (6/23/20XX)

It’s too late for gum. It's too late to say you're sorry. It’s too late for gum. It’s too late too late too late for those men. Those dead men. Dead and gone and dead and gone where? Gone where they go. Cold. Eyes like buttons. And you knew, you know baby. This arbitrary darkness. Thick as coffee. Two spoons of sugar and a splash of milk. Sweet, my sweet. Pies of apple and cherry and pumpkin and rhubarb. Shoo, fly. Fly home on the country road. But don’t stop under the stars waltzing out in blue and red. That’s where she lives, the asphalt and the halogen—make a wish!—she makes her home and hearth. Her fire and her cooking pot. But don’t bother tryin’ to find her. She’ll find you like she found us. Out of the night, her voice soft and cool, her eyes clear and bright. Sung me moon-struck with her voice. Want some company? Company of strangers. Bad company. Broken dreams. I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead. Falling into her. Hot and cold, like running water. Running, skipping, jumping. He jumps me—knight takes pawn—and pulls me free. My night in shining armor, my baby. Cries and screams. Shouts. Twists. Turns. We are no longer there. But I’ve left something behind, in her. Part of her. A piece of pie—pizza pie—gone cold, dead fish. Hold the anchovies. Hold me, my baby. Let me show you her way or the highway. I’m no longer here. I’m there. There and there, touching, feeling, groping, poking, biting. Cursing and out of bed, he slipstreams—a flood of activity. Phone calls and books. He’s gone most nights, keeps me in cold iron. For my own good? My own baby is all I need, but who is it? He’s everywhere everyone I look. I think I made him up inside my head. My head aches and pains. Thirsty and hungry. No relief, no re leaf, the tress are dead here. We’re back and I can feel her close. Close the car door and walk to the middle of the road. He speaks underwater words. I can see his life through his skin. Translucid. Through the sane. It’s the same but different. There’s a hole. Some hole. Wholesome. Noxious and depraved inside. A stack of dead men—deadwood—waiting and watching. And her. Her eyes, now black like marbles. Lost. In them. Out comes the artillery. Thunderbird roars home in the spring as she springs. Leaps forward and then back. Lies still. Still me? Am I? He seems to think. But I don’t. Don’t want to be here among the corpse and gunpowder. The smells. I’m choking and don’t call me Shirley. Escape. Don’t touch me! It’s all memory of him and what he knows now and what we’ve seen and done. It hurts to know. Now. I tell him I never want to see him again and he’s gone. She’s gone? Not gone. Sleeping. Dozing. Bulldozing me. Wiping the slate clean. I am her and she is me and we both hungered. Not for the fun, like some. Found a new baby, but it doesn’t last. It never lasts. So fragile, the first and the last. Where is my old baby? He’s calling to me now. No! My baby is in the belly of the whale! With all the ghosts and dead gods and monsters. Thanks a lot, lizard. Exit seraphim and Satan's men, but I don’t know if my baby will make it out alive. Skies are gray and my sunshine is away and it’s too late for gum.

• The Belly of the Whale

Wordcount:

by Keeley

Bibliography

http://dag.wieers.com/personal/lyrics/She_s_Not_There.php(approve sites)

http://www.neuroticpoets.com/plath/madgirl.shtml(approve sites)