It was the season in which the paparazzi lie fallow in the field and insects beat against the
low rice walls. The lovemaking of which I have spoken with some bitterness was finally
concluded, its face full of buttons. At the close of their exertions, the Mercedes family
owned everything you can see from here, every imaginary house. If you do not believe me,

ask the imported paisley swatch. Ask the shapely dark leg of the water-strider. They were
angered by your insistence. They had wanted a share of the flax particulates, and now were
forced to acknowledge that your understanding did not include them and that they would
suffer for this omission. A bird flew overhead in the shape of a bucket of water.

You formed in your mind a kind of protest and circled the campus looking for the rest of
your peers, but there was no parking to be had on account of the funeral. We’ll have to
return to you later, as you returned to us that summer, a river of your former self. Euclid
never had it so good, was our undeniable but unprofitable conclusion at that time, though

we were forced to revise it over grilled coffee beans during the week we were still alive.
I’ve never seen a falcon tear the roof off a service in quite that way. They say that only
when the sun is mishandled does it begin to speak of God, yet the midtown Holiday Inn
was the scene of much revelry. I can only guess at what made the rest of it vanish.