Bluets, no. 72; loneliness is solitude with a problem (she is chewing at the corners of papers peeling from my walls). I sat for Schiele as a child in a striped skirt on an upturned crate. He took me to a deserted bakery on the East side of town; gold light fell through the dusty windows and I sparkled amongst sacks of flour and satin rats. The red velvet cake case like a flattened tulip on the floor. In my room the small plastic horses trample a shelf, strung together in a line, hearts burning so bright their bodies melt. Poor creatures, unable to cope with the transatlantic voltage. Are things different across the sea? Do I detect doubt in Dorothy’s voice as she taps her heels together for the third time? Are mantras convincing? I wonder these things at night, as the peacock prays for the safe return of his tail feathers, that glimmering bundle I found in the bin out front. Yesterday, I dyed my hair orange like pine essence, to accompany the leaves in their seasonal makeover. My face is warm now; the mirror, the flame. I close my eyes and I’m back in Berlin; on my head, an old Russian hat. I dropped it once among fir trees, hibiscus. When I went back to retrieve it, the thing was half buried, ice forming on matted sections of claret fur. It reminded me of a felled rabbit, frozen in the snow. I return to my kitchen, frying fishcakes in face treatment oil.
