Thursday Mar 28

YauJohn John Yau is a poet, fiction writer, critic, curator, and publisher of Black Square Editions. He is one of the editors of the webmagazine, Hyperallergic Weekend, and regularly posts articles there. His forthcoming book, Further Adventures in Monochrome, is due out in June 2012 from Copper Canyon Press.
---------



The Rise and Fall of The Blanket

 
Updates and rumors -- unlikely combinations of the two overrun the colonies of kiosks migrating toward the sinkhole. And yet, the downfall of our economy isn’t as widespread as many commentators have construed.  It’s true that the official guidebooks have shifted their emphasis, while other measuring poles have dissolved in the sunlight. But this is not the final word on the subject, even if the last ship builders have turned to rust in the interim. A few other principals may still demur.
 
The Kingdom of Golden Muskrats might never have wanted any part of this, but the best parts of what we are likely to inherit have remained frozen, right in the crevices where they were first deposited, like petrified dinosaur eggs. And contrary to all predictions, that reprehensible series of actions hasn’t introduced any noticeable ruptures along the Silk Road. So just keep driving—we have to spy land sooner or later.
 
As you can see, the poem accepts all manner of invasions and surfeits of undirected animosity, which is why it is a perfect landscape in which to make your latest low budget film.
 
This is the door and this is the key. Things should always be so simple, and for some people they are. Will you and your devoted entourage be staying in the bungalows above the automated waterfall or in the titanium skyscraper surrounded by a necklace of stratus cumulus? For the moment, this is the most pressing question, but others are to follow. Notice the nicely appointed flotilla of crème de menthe streaks
 
moving in from the tangerine-coated east. It’s a nice touch, don’t you think? The management thought you might enjoy it, given your recent color preferences.
 
My mother told me that I was born to drive dynamite across the border, but then I learned that she wasn’t my mother, but a body double, a surrogate, a stand-in, or understudy; that the original cipher had been lost during the last transference, the diode age when all storehouses of knowledge were downloaded from the remaining libraries to a central warehouse known for its cheap credit and easy to use bargaining chips.
 
I joined the navy, the merchant marines, and the dregs of a small fishing boat. I rose quickly in rank. I began wearing epaulets whenever I walked on land. I drowned at sea. I scurried away and married a mermaid. I owned and operated a restaurant famous for its golden fish sticks. In the end, I left the way I came. I don’t think I ever got used to my new life, even though the contours of my old one were rapidly receding in the rear view mirror.