Standing on the mustard red deck festooned with dry strings of lights. Beneath the moon birds ring music into the air. A bowl of air spills through the branches of the trees. Two trails lead away into the darkened forest, one left into the wood and one right, each cobbled with ferns and grass, over-sentried by trees with mail of lichen. Yellow a butterfly goes over the dappled shade of blue, and off to a craggy stump whose lignin has been sucked to redrot.
White masses of air encroach upon the seablue sky. Changing form, the margins curl and spiral, decay and dissolve.
From behind the sun illumines. The margins glow hot blinding yellow light. The mass slowly drifts from left to right.
The blazing yellow white sun burns out from veil of cloud. Pure yellow, white, orange, spikes of fire dance through sky to earth.
The air warmens to touch. All turns light. Surfaces brighten, the pill-shaped flies out with green skin, a saw chews wood.
Morning cracked out the torpor of dawn: the cicadas chime up; the tiles heat; clouds burn and dissolve.
Woodshadows net the tiles. The last shadows cast of morning.
The green of the lawn: the bell chimes sounding, groaning pug.
Da-ding, donng. Da dong, dring dong dong.
Sighways of cars. Ahhhhh.
Above all the ruthless summer sky: blue flecked with shards of yellow. Milky with burning white light.
Picture: the sky melting pink, seen from the inside of an air-conditioned train.
Off the Florida Keys, There’s a place called Kokomo.
That’s where you want to go to get away from it all.
Bodies in the sand; tropical drink melting in your hand,
We’ll be falling in love to the rhythm of a steeldrum band.
The leaves of this jade tree, dark green, spatulate-orbicular. They’re odorless rubber, some have spots of decay.
Aw man the sun’s burnt my arm again.
The line of the water, a membrane, takes me in. Air: water; water: air. More than half-up to my neck. Walk across the cement like Godzilla now:
A samara copters down. All this time green. What a shame I torched myself.
The fronds of a palm tree, stroked by the wind, rake the strings of a guitar. La’ding sings the guitar, la’da in minor to the beach. Clouds as big as cruise ships pull across the sky, shading the sea a darker blue.
LUNCH. Plastic lobster pagers.
—We can just go here.
The light shone through the redwhiteblue banner. My sister’s face glowed red.
Relax and unwind as you feel the stress melt away at the hands of our massage gurus. Imagine soothing ministrations…
Melts?
—How is it?
—The Hawaiian? It’s–
—What grades did you end up getting?
Tried to sleep on the beach tonight. Couldn’t hear anything natural over the AC. Haaaaaaaaa, went outside. Some notion got into me… Are those oil rigs out on the bay? Glowing like fireflies above the water. Milky Way Bay, 3AM, dumb bright. Too hot and humid to catch a wink. The sand on the rubber panels of the chair just cut into my arms. Thought I could hear the engines pulsing over the water. Still air. Now who’s this approaching?
Grinning, his screen previewed a leg.
––Da ge, wo zhi shi lai kankan xing bei…
It’s hot tonight.
Umbellifer. Real parsley. Taste.
Midnight sun across islands of fire and water
Anthony Lemon, my action hero, was bred from years of violent videogames and soccer.
Warning: Violence.
Download: The Trials of Anthony Lemon Episode I
“He launched the blade like a javelin.”
A porter slid the gate open a crack.
—Yes? he asked.
—I came to sell you my socks, answered a gruff voice.
—State your name.
—Anthony Lemon.
—Come, Mr. Lemon.
Anthony Lemon and the porter walked up a stone staircase. They crossed a courtyard in which boys played kickball, then walked through a triangular doorframe.
Inside, the porter took from the wall a sconce. A plump round flame guided them through the hall. Anthony Lemon saw shadows move and thought:
‘Anything is possible here.’
Anthony Lemon debouched with the porter into a room of braziers. At the room’s center lay a dirt ring.
—Whooo comes here? asked a voice in the gloom.
—I am Anthony Lemon, said Anthony Lemon.
A bead of sweat trickled from the back of Anthony Lemon’s neck into his spotless collar.
One is all.
—And what is Anthony Lemon’s business here?
—I came to sell you my socks, said Anthony Lemon.
From the darkness a fast angry fist flew at Anthony Lemon’s face. Anthony Lemon blocked with the palm of his hand.
Arm and fist retreated to the gloom.
Anthony Lemon stood a moment in silence. Then he muttered: “Someone’s always trying to kick my ass.”
From the gloom a tusked brawler stepped forward. He had a wide flat face like a pancake and, unshod, wore pants of black leather.
—State your price, Mr. Lemon, said the tusked brawler.
Anthony Lemon inhaled and exhaled. Then he said:
—Five thousand dollars for my socks.
The tusked brawler laughed.
—Is Mr. Lemon open to negotiations? asked the tusked brawler.
—No, said Anthony Lemon.
Now he will try to kill me.
A blade darted out the man’s palms towards Anthony Lemon’s right eyeball. Anthony Lemon finessed the blade out of the air. Then tucked it into his pocket.
Amanita ocreata: toxic. Beneath the pines.
The tusked brawler traversed the ring in a second.
Anthony Lemon stepped deftly to one side and swept out his right leg. The tusked brawler tripped, lost balance, placed two arms out in front of him and pulled a somersault. Then he jetted back to the gloom.
—Is he all? thought Anthony Lemon.
Monkeys screeched.
Howlers.
Anthony Lemon drew the blade from his pocket. He launched the blade like a javelin into the dark.
A high pitched choke sounded; the monkeys went silent.
They will not try me now.
Anthony Lemon spun and redirected the tusked brawler’s fist.
—Goodness gracious, the tusked brawler said before retreating into the gloom.
‘Where did that scumbag porter go?’ wondered Anthony Lemon.
He heard shuffling.
‘Step deftly aside left, send a fist up, then fall as a comet. Finish with a kick.’
The ring flooded with purple light.
Now!
Anthony Lemon stepped deftly left then raised his fist into the dark and brought it down like a comet. The brawler’s tusks cracked under his fist, spurting a rope of blood onto his palms.
Anthony Lemon kicked fondly, remembering p.k. shots.
Never missed.
Anthony Lemon’s boot collided with soft warm flesh.
—Ohhhhhh.
The brawler collapsed.
Out.
Anthony Lemon.
Anthony Lemon stooped to the wreck of the brawler:
—Tell me where the cocaine is, he said.
The wrecked brawler vomited on the floor.
—Worthless piece of shit, said Anthony Lemon.
Anthony Lemon took from his pocket a leaf and tossed it to the wreck.
—What a fucking mess.
The porter emerged.
Right this way, Mr. Lemon. The Master will want your socks now. How much did you say?
Mr. Lemon grinned.
END
The fruit of a collaboration between L’Ammonite and T; lines switched on and off to the crashing of waves.
A green wave, curls
Inward as it crashes against
The hollow of her ribs.
How fitting that envy had begun to well up inside,
Where it appended grit, foam, and leftovers of the sea,
And brought forth remnants of a forgotten self, lost desires:
Such as a blue wave contains:
Desire husked from shape.
I have expressed myself by the mouthful
And yet all of my words lip a single voice
I love you, all of you, and always have
And desire no subtler variations.
To this theme my heart will beat forever
Even long after you tire of my words
The initial bloom of their lipping spent —
The melody you once savored, left on.
What it lacks in freshness it gains in truth,
No more direct a music played to you;
What it stales by repeating it shows true
What was never fit for love or what love broke.
So to this rhythm I’ll adhere
Until the world calls out;
That love, spoken plainly in truth,
Snuffs the flame of words out.
The lamps of the fireflies, lemon yellow, sting the darkened blades whence they rise. A moment, a flash, a wink, yellow on black wings. To the sound of windchimes clattering, to the flash of heat lightning in a bank of periwinkle cloud.
Flash. The deck illumines. A heavy breeze gasps. The windchimes clang; the cars wipe their sighs across the street. Timidly, behind the curtain of oaks and maple trees, glows amber lamplight, the eyelash-blades thin with navy blue outlines.
Above the line of the trees light fades as the clouds go southeast. A pop of thunder knocks once, twice and dwindles.
Blue-white flash. The air tastes of rain and the gray deck. The tang of flowers hovers. Through an open window comes the tones of a fight. A man’s voice, red and round, murmurs angrily; the knives of her voice slice through the gloom he issues. White flash. The fireflies cover their lamps.
A greenblack hiss goes through the pine tree. Flash of lightning. A gust sweeps down and hits the deck. Her voice peaks in anger.
The last periwinkle of evening fades from the sky. The clouds, bruised: patches of purple and dark blue. Flash. The light goes grayly through the bruise. Then a bolt: sideways across the sky. Now rumbles fill the area, the train horn cries, and fades away blue. Click-click. Bloooh. A cough. Lightning.
Heavy brooding night settles in, thick with clouds, choked with rain.
Rumpled bushy clusters of green leaves, one drooped over the other like tags hanging off clothing; and sparse pine needles prickling the sky; and the honest stars of maple leaves with syrup in their phloem. Past the screen of trees lies the road, sighing and morning gray, while distantly a lawnmower cuts up blades of grass. Facing each these hedges and trees are balconies of the condos: gray fading planks. Each gets an eye full of green. White clusters burst atop some of the trees: the crown a bloom of flowers. And the air gray and rainy, tastes of the sea.
The Ammonite 