Tuesday, December 31, 2019

Moments

We do not remember days, we remember moments.
          - Cesare Pavese

In Room 401, a woman takes her last breath.

Elsewhere a surgeon positions a square of mesh to repair
a patient's hernia.

A maintenance man in a supermarket scrubs the walls
of a restroom.

Cows' breaths fill the air as a farmer brushes snow
off a trough . . .

and fills it with feed.

A young girl inserts a DVD of Wuthering Heights
into a Blu-Ray player, puzzling over the author's
pen name, Ellis Bell.

A tiger cat scratches litter in a litter box.

Kittens squeeze into a cardboard box that contained
12 bottles of Pinot Noir.

A homeless person arranges a cardboard box over a
heating grate.

Snow continues to fill the gray morning as cars
chance slick roadways.

In a dream a pinstriped mannequin enters a fun house.

A short-order cook whisks two dozen eggs.

A cellist works through Bach's Prelude.

Construction workers seated at a counter remove
their winter headgear.

A waitress refills cups of coffee, mentally reviewing
the material for tonight's mid term.

A children's book author enters rehab.

A shooter racks his handgun . . .

and fires into a crowd of shoppers at a mall.

At 4 AM a snowplow driver gets behind the wheel
of a snowplow.

A politician delivers a speech written by his staffer.

An actor rehearses lines.

An addict snorts lines.

An ER nurse worries her son's DWI.

A pregnant woman brews tea.

A pregnant woman is hurried into an emergency room.

A college president applies Anbesol to a painful tooth.

A nursing home resident cleans his dentures.

A platoon leader opens a Kindle.

A painter sits in front of a blank canvas.

A personal trainer leads a group of elderly trainees
through several aerobic exercises.

Hikers pitch a tent in a heavily wooded area.

The sun sets.

The sun rises.

A crash slows traffic to a crawl.

Someone dies.

Someone else dies.

A pediatrician delivers a baby.

Kids take turns sliding down a slide.

A couple enters a restaurant.

A man and a woman play chess.

A skier begins a descent.

An elderly person thinks back.

A potter throws a pot.

A pitcher throws a slider.

A batter swings.

A line cook preps vegetables.

A vegan orders off the menu.

A conductor raises her baton.

A drum majorette twirls her baton.

A motorist falls asleep at the wheel.

transit by Korner

Wednesday, December 18, 2019

Screen Dump 483

The barking that began four years ago has moved
into supportive housing . . .

declaiming the Fine Art of the Tin Can which came
and went and is back again

at your back door in leotard and pointe shoes . . .
The Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in

a French Foreign Legion film has gone missing . . .
along with Teshigahara's Woman in the Dunes

reshot on the moors of Ellis Bell's Wuthering Heights
with Roger Ebert's 4/4 rating . . .

European River Cruises are again flooded with
escapees . . . and deservedly so, yes? . . .

the day-to-day has gotten crazier . . . and crazier
and everyone's packing . . .

Did I say that or are you quoting the cereal box's
morning diatribe on fiber optics? . . .

YouTube'd beyond the glacial evergreens of your latest
inscrutable ruminations . . .

Give it a shot . . . nothing to lose . . .
How did the audition go? . . .

Trying to finish the book
before the culvert gets your goat . . .

We both saw that in the cards
last summer on Commercial Street . . .

Kyoko Kishida in Woman in the Dunes (1964)

Tuesday, December 10, 2019

Screen Dump 482

This morning's bowl of Instant Quaker Oats
tried to warn you but you were busy Photoshopping
the crepey-skinned blue-penciled up-close-
and-personals shadowing you in the mirror . . .
You continue to pine for present participles . . .
the -i-n-g forms . . . the phantom-limbed future
participle . . . parsing the past . . . reviewing
rejected scripts submitted for your approval
by lesser-known wannabes from your old
neighborhood . . . To reject out of hand is a ploy
you use at last calls . . . trying to retrace your steps
to Utopia . . . pinned with a Rolodex of past players
who want to be friended - and more - on Facebook . . .
their arthritic lines as out-of-sync
as their costumes . . . You thought you'd enjoy
a respite but interlopers have begun bullying
noodles with chopsticks . . . demanding
takeaways . . . imagining the seven levels
of Golden Books . . . as if eating spaghetti
with a spoon . . . Ring Around the Rosie
soundtracks this latest craziness . . . boardwalk
castaways . . . nailing lines . . . adjusting camera
angles to entice the forgotten . . .

Paolo Roversi