waiting
for an old phone to ring
like
an old science fiction television show
in
computer binary code punch card arcade language
I
wake up beneath an outcropping of rock
along
a fierce river lined with jagged shores
this
river is a deep and fast water and very clear
despite
the speed of its flow around the small island it surrounds
it
is dusk and I walk along a small path by a tiny marina
I
step back onto the street level
it
is across from an old cemetery amphitheater
I
see a marquee with dusty glass doors beneath it
there
are just a few people inside
there
are old games scattered, mostly pinball
but
I can here space invaders in the background
it
all seems so familiar as the odd symmetry of fear
grips
down along the outside parts of my sanity
why
are the streets emptying near night
why
does it seem like holographic stone age facades are covering the town
in the aimless brushstrokes of long extinct broad leaf gymnosperms
and
strange rough carved rock meant to provide basic shelter
there
is no one around and I find tall grass and mud to dig into
I
bury myself until morning comes and I go back to the amphitheater
that
seems part of a school I remember going to when it was 1982
I
try to blend in, my gray beard isn't helping
I
find a friend I had back then, I tell them I have aged
that
I am from an alternate future
I
ask them what is going on
high
school isn’t how I remembered it
they
look at me incredulously
as
if this reality were always part of the continuum
it
seems like life is the movies all the time here
and
that the theater ushers are time keepers
and
they can spot anyone out of place
and
as all the locals now know
a
backwards time jumper is in their ranks
they
instinctively know I am dangerous
to
the way things are currently and that the people in charge
of
this manufactured time will not want me wandering around
my
friend tells me to hide at all times and to stay still at night
that
escape from the island is impossible
that
the marina is also a mirage as well
that
geothermal wells keep the island warm
as
it is surrounded by a desolate frozen desert, they say
the keepers feed insurgents and any insurrection to monsters of the id
I am
told by their eyes, that these monsters are always waiting
that
they are just behind any thought that dares beyond this
that
they are just behind the excitement of a world caught
in
an endless game cycle with an infinite number of lives
I
am spotted in the back of the theater smoking pot
with
someone I once knew but has long since died
the
ushers are rain jacketed intermediaries
and
they see my mouth agape with my humanity lost
they
come quickly, they are carrying uno cards
they
tell me to shuffle them and to spirograph orbital patterns
with
one hand while writing down the sequence of the shuffles
with
the other and to wait until the oldest phone in town rings
it
is an old black ma bell, near the desk
where the trinket key chains are kept
and
that if it does ring I get to go back to where I came from
with
no memory of this but if doesn’t ring I never get to sleep again
knowing
where I am and that I am to be incarcerated
with
others like me who accidentally or purposely jumped
through
squeezed elliptical geometric blooms to smell a way
back
through any time where the future is stolen
with
magnets, grainy images, bad lighting and intentions
they
say, right then and there, that I can choose
to
stay asleep in this world, fitting in like fingers in a glove
never
needing love for comfort when iron bars
mimic
wombs that I never have to leave to feel born again
outside the jaws of an ass inside wonderland
EJR
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