8/15/12 – 3/25/13 10:58pm
living conditions
“two spoonfuls! that’s it for me.”, she yelled from across the room.
the pot could not have been finished brewing more
than a couple seconds & already she was conducting.
i never liked how short she was mornings,
but i knew my part & began to play it anyway.
the chime for the now finished pot started to fade & i picked up where it left off.
i pulled two mugs that were still wet from their last wash out of a cabinet
& poured us both a TALL cup.
partly because we could use it, but also to hide stains i’d left behind from yesterdays batch.
while i swept the stains under the rug my toaster did it’s best to walk it’s
usual thin line between edible to charred toast.
harmonies i didn’t know i was capable of were produced between the appliance
& myself at the raise of her wand.
the only thing left to do was the first thing she asked me to.
the hand i owned, but she now possessed made it’s way for the lid of the jar.
like a claw-machine’s arm, patiently aimed before release, my hand moved in & clasped the lid.
“success!”, i thought.
“& on her first try too.”, i said aloud.
confused she asked, “what’d you say?”
“oh..nothing”
“how’s that coffee coming along?”
“christ”, i thought.
“about done”, i said.
i removed a half-heartedly sealed lid & at the time was, but should not have been
surprised by what greeted me.
what filled the jar was not only the sugar she desired to twice fill my spoon,
but also insects that shared a similar pallet.
specks of black pepper appeared to travel sporadically over those sweetened white hills.
each seemed to move as if it had it’s own randomized objective rather than working
towards any greater goal.
i expected nothing less really.
especially when i considered the living conditions i’d gradually become comfortable existing in.
“it’s the kind of thing” i told myself, “that just happens.”
i can’t say i didn’t enjoy the company, but i can say for sure the conductor
would not share my sentiments.
if i had had a fresh bag i would have gladly surrendered this jars-worth,
but it just wasn’t the case.
the spoon fell with my hand’s weight.
invading the white hills that for who knows how long had been called theirs.
this time with much less patience & grace than my claw impersonation .
i filled the spoon & brought it to about eye-level.
watching as grains of sugar bobbed back & forth from the insects making waves below.
i combed the spoons concave surface with a finger anywhere i spotted movement.
dropping as much sugar as “black pepper” while i felt my way around it’s surface.
i didn’t enjoy it, but i repeated this until i finally finished her first scoop.
based on the time it took alone to make sure she would not find caffeinated ants in the first scoop
i knew it wouldn’t be wise to shoot for a second.
i told myself, “as far as she knows there are two spoonfuls of sugar that definitely had no previous owners.”
“coffee’s ready!”, i yelled.
“finally..”, she said as she took her first anxiously awaited sip.
as she drank her lips puckered in tandem with a furling brow,
“this isn’t sweet at all!”, she said while spitting bitter coffee.
“you may be the only person iv’e ever met that could fuck up measuring two spoonfuls of sugar.”
i couldn’t be bothered to respond.
i could only keep my eyes on her mug as i watched specks struggling to stay afloat.
“the ants don’t seem to mind”, i thought.