or a piece...
of some sort
I'd spend hours coloring -
Inhaling the smell of crayons
and pursing my lips together as if controlling my mouth would somehow better help me control my hands.
There were several things I would draw - over & over
1. A dog.
This was no ordinary dog. No -
Someone, somewhere, someday -
Taught me how to draw a dog starting with only the #5 on the page.
You'd write the number 5 and then use the pieces of that 5 to draw the dog.
You'd use the curve of the 5 as the snout
And, well, the dog would have to be wearing a baseball cap because the top of the 5 would serve as the brim.
It would look something like this:
This stupid perfect house
With it's dumb window
sometimes round, sometimes square
a window far too large to be proportional to the house
This stupid perfect imperfect house
And it always purple or blue
with it's stupid picket fence
and it's stupid stone walkway that leads you to the door
with it's stupid green grass
and it's stupid 2-dimensional birds -
that are really just lowercase "m's" or "w's" hiding in the skies amongst the cotton candy clouds that only truly exist in Texas
And that stupid chimney that I always drew far too realistically for that stupid stupid house -
the house equivalent of "stick figures" with it's simple lines and it's disfigured cartoon shape
And perhaps something in the window
or someone
and that door
that stupid stupid door
how I dreamed of going through.
and thunder
and a sky
the rain & grass
& the smell of crayons
& five-pointed stars
shamrocks
and rainbows
turkeys that looked like hands
and macaroni that wasn't supposed to be eaten
popsicle sticks used as bricks
and tiny photos cut out and pasted in the center of a ceramic wreath that made grown women cry
and every day it would hang on the tree
or the fridge
or they'd pin it right into the wall
and they'd collect the stains of the kitchen splatter
or they'd hide in an attic waiting to be revealed
in a manila envelope never sealed