Driving, I See Horses
& 我爱家人

It is so unnatural to see a horse in a trailer on a highway
Weren’t they born to run? Hasn’t anyone the decency to tell them why the earth is moving without their physical consent?
It’s all unbecoming, so what will become of us…
Man was born to look directly into the eyes of the other man he is about to kill in whatever temperature of blood
Now we make buttons and push buttons and the buttons kill and the buttons don’t lose sleep afterwards and the buttons don’t sleep at all
We drive horses around in motor vehicles running on horsepower
Yeah, the engines run and the horses don’t
Maybe I was born to reminisce on simpler times
Where horses ran to their destinations
And everything changed for the better instead of into something different

I am wondering if the fish who grew legs was looking for God or running away
All I know is I am under the constant threat of drowning now
Since childhood I have been learning to swim
I don’t believe we are born as the people we are meant to die as
Otherwise there would be no need for this middle part
The part where you wake up
Yes every single day I wake up
I mourn every single person I have ever been
I burn the bodies until they’re recognizable
Replicating how I looked before and after myself
Like the kind of stuff that could grow a tree
If I was more faithful and patient maybe I could grow life out of me
But I don’t thank the wind every time it blows
Even though I have it within me

Those horses must be so grateful for the legs they stand on
In spite of watching the world slip by in slivers
There is a difference between a trip and a journey
The horse will have to grow wings
Everything must keep escaping its past

I think I understand why I was a secret
Sometimes you can’t change quick enough
No one talks about the fish that grew legs and stood at the edge of the shoreline making amends but never made it out of the water
We only remember the one that left everything else behind
Unfortunately there is a difference between love and its memories
Maybe this is why it all feels so urgently public
To prove to everyone I am attempting to grow new limbs and crawl out of the sick depths I was born to evolve from
Begging my hands not to kill or to justify
It either feels easy at first or I’m slowly getting the hang of it
At the very least there has to be evidence that I have evaded death long enough to know something

So look I need you all to understand that I am indebted to that fish that became a horse that became all I could think about on the interstate because what would become of me if I left the same way that I came in?

Still, I wish I could say thank you
I am checking all of my mirrors to change lanes
I guess the horses don’t have to run anymore
But it would be a shame on all of us if they still wanted to

so there’s an ant on the ceiling
circling around the sprinkler system
and my grandmother is talking about moving to Florida
because that’s where all of her friends live
it doesn’t mean much to her
family
unless they died down there in Florida
my mom’s face is falling
she swallows so she won’t have to pick up any tears
and my dad slammed the door twice
once as a story my grandma told me
in the silver haired dining room
she barely eats anymore
maybe she thinks she can float back
if she’s weightless
back to her fruit trees and her living friends
dead father and dead husband
I think if I was her I’d like to die closer to home
closer to the life I was born into
the place where my mother dies
but I guess she can’t buy a ticket for the past
she can’t even buy a ticket to Florida
her power of attorney is clenched in her daughters’ hands
and I am lying on the floor she is trying to float away from
wondering if she loves any of us
or if she thinks that leaving is a way to prove it
I don’t think she knows there is an ant on the ceiling
watching us say goodbye