Be So Nice

A hundred pounds of lead melt slowly into my legs, the thick liquid heavies my spine, my eyelids, everything is treacle, I cannot speak. I arrive back at the apartment and collapse, my to-do list long and the day so short. Vacation seems an obscene word when it drains the body so; the days merely pass, get cold again, it is fall and we won't know what happened. We sit at the bar and don't know where we left off; I don't even try to find out.

I wash the island wear, fill up another suitcase, brace myself for the task ahead. The train leaves a sunny station and heads into monsoon country out west. Weekends are booked well into october, I know it will end in a puddle of inertia. The rain turns to hail along the railroad tracks.

Symbolism is a slap in the face.