ManicDDaily

Happy Belated Bloomsday!

I missed it yes I did an important day I don’t know where my mind was under the bed or out the window or most likely in a screen where real life and even book life can pass you by it’s not really an important day not like a birthday they made a lemon cake this year orange really out of lemons and didn’t want to drive to town moist as anything the zest of orange so sweet if anything a book holiday not bank those manicured sons of bitches O and now its too late to even talk about it much less write but Ive always been on the late side running for the train my suitcases better have strong wheels

I actually did go to Dublin years ago so grey and blue and gusty the Irish Sea like that scarf that’s been lost and found all crinkled not with huge waves but on every single inch of it pressing me to the railing the whole night long freezing over the side I was and sick as a dog while the natives kept to the warmth in the saloon of course like a parody of Irish drink and song I could hardly stand and neither they staggering out red faced morning with cheap black pants legs clumping over stuttering shoes it was so long ago and poorer then though now is not great either what with the crash me as green as sea ice even on land I was pale back then O not like now maybe get some special cream for redness wrinkles too real soda breads on the shelves lined up like little school kids I tore the pieces that’s how hungry I was when I finally got over it no knife and my fingers scrabbling among the caraway and crumbs Martello Tower what I most wanted to see the Joyce stuff most were grey toned streets but it with all its grey stones was blue that morning out by the sky and sea and Im standing there on the pavement admiring tea I can’t help thinking of tea with Martello Tower in front of me thick brown irish tea with the thick slabs of bread and butter Stephen Dedalus and Kinch his sort of friend  the milk in that chapter so thick and sweet as well the whole breakfast one I dream of porridge sometimes too humble not French toast or pancakes or what do they call them crepes but those thick sweet slabs of tea in sun and cold and tower though its not all sweetness Joyce not exactly generous to his past not is the word forgiving?  Art like a knife the wind then too December not June when I got closer to the tower and a woman all bare and white her flesh as creamy as the milk only with pink folds where she rubbed she had a little towel and then just undies bra and panties overflowing robust that’s what you had to call her her flesh so white and pink and flowing like the wave crests maybe a nice bit of pork I hate the way they hang those sides up in the window no not like pork everything about her lived fresh from the sea she had been swimming and her curls the only thing that didn’t glisten curly hair don’t with its frizz I wish I had it mine straight as a stick my whole life long but what I really wished for then was that glow smiling at me towel rubbing the nape of her neck below the curls.

In the movie she has curls too her dark hair spread upon the grass in Andalusia some place south and is kissed and saying yes though I’m not sure about the grass in the book itself and how do you make a movie of a book like that or any book to tell the truth I do know that she says yes though I’m sure of that even though I missed the date that’s the one thing I won’t ever miss that she says yes.