Ten Autumn Tankas by Princess Shikishi (c. 1150-1201)


I sleep light toward morning: different on my sleeves, my old fan stirs autumn's first wind.


As I watch, through leaves moves the evening moon, giving some hint of the autumnal sky.


Cicadas' voices exhausted on the hillside, when, again, the sunset bell startles.


In my deserted garden, wrapped in sedge, in the depth of dew, a pine cricket's voice.


At my gate, startled by the wind across rice fields: there beyond the mist, the first voices of geese?


The autumn night, quiet, dark; rain beats the window griefstricken until it turns white.


Dew, yes; as I part the field, bamboo grass field, the voices of insects shatter on my sleeves.


Under the blown and settled dead leaves, a cricket: here at least, autumn still flickers.


Autumn is late, and my thoughts are desolate. Do not add tears, moonlight in my sleeves.


Is it to tell the geese of the autumn wind? Fireflies rising close to the evening clouds.

Disconcerting Things


It is highly disconcerting when the plumbing in one's apartment, which is undoubtedly old and a bit peevish, makes ominous gurgling and clunking noises -- when soapy water and bits of lettuce come bubbling up in one's sink every time the neighbor washes his dishes, and one hears a thumping glug glug in the bathroom drain each time one flushes one's toilet. Furthermore, it is heartstoppingly disconcerting to have to watch the toilet bowl swirl higher and higher . . . and higher . . . everytime one makes Number Two and wonder if it's going to overflow -- particularly when one is notorious for having poor coping skills when it comes to overflowing toilets -- frequently going into full-blown emotional meltdown while plotting to break one's lease and move into a different apartment in the middle of the night.


It is also decidedly disconcerting when one's cat ensconces himself in an aerial perch, leans over, and then deliberately vomits on the floor from a height. Not only is the amplified resonance of splattering cat puke hitting the floor disconcerting, but one must also wonder, What is he thinking? He contemplates his handiwork as if he were terrifically pleased with himself and one can't help but feel that maybe he's just not right.


When one finds a fuzzy, jet-black spider with a pretty crimson triangle on its back in one's kitchen it is entirely disconcerting because one can't ever remember if Black Widow Spiders have red triangles on their bellies or their backs. One considers hopping onto the internet to check and see, but doesn't necessarily want to lose track of said spider in the meantime and have a Black Widow Spider, ersatz or otherwise, meandering about unchecked in the house. As one is very fond of spiders, though, killing it is not a viable option, so one gingerly slides a piece of paper under it . . . at which point, it begins to jump about in a spry, unpredictable fashion . . . and one has to hustle it out the front door and into the garden foliage with a distinct sense of unease.


Forgetting to take one's Wellbutrin for several days is bound to produce disconcerting results sooner or later.


A cat with a dingleberry appended to its bunghole, who then deduces that the best solution is to try and outrun the dingleberry, makes a disconcerting spectacle of itself.


When one's ex happens to be in town and decides to drop by unannounced (How the fuck did she find out one's new address?!?!), and then proceeds to (1) grill one relentlessly for a solid half-hour about the person one's currently seeing; (2) describe everyone she's been sleeping with that she wasn't really attracted to (adding that she's now realized all her recent relationship problems (we would presume this would also include nightmarish relationship with Yours Truly) are caused by the fact that she always ends up sleeping with people she's not at all attracted to, but hey, she's really working on trying not to do that anymore); (3) confess that she was actually in love with her ex the entire time one was involved with her; and then (4) suggest that maybe one would like to sleep with her while she's town. So okay . . . she's just rather awful and immature, and pretty much appallingly unbearable, but that's not even the part that one finds particularly disconcerting at this point in time . . . it's the fact that one was ever involved with her in the first place that is now, retrospectively -- and disconcertingly -- humiliating. Doh! one wants to yelp, smacking self in forehead with palm of hand, a la the V-8 commercial. What was I thinking?! one wants to yell into the cold night air.


It is disconcerting when the head of one's favorite mounted Yellow Stag Beetle (Odontolabis Femoralis) falls off and has to be glued back on with Super Glue.


And finally, one finds it disconcerting to learn that when emotionally upset, octopi will cannibalize themselves . . . chewing off an entire leg or parts of a leg sometimes. Autophagy, it's called. Perhaps they're off their Wellbutrin too.

On Roller Derby Queens


When I was seven, my overwhelming ambition in life was to become a Roller Derby Queen. It was 1973, I'd just seen The Kansas City Bomber (starring Raquel Welch) on T.V., and at that moment my future destiny suddenly became stunningly apparent. This, despite the fact that I'd already racked up a pretty hefty eyeglass prescription and was clearly a cut-and-dried personification of the nerdy bookworm type, really didn't seem to pose a conceptual dilemma for me in terms of incongruities, I don't think. At least not at the time. Roller Derby Fever had bit me bad and I wanted to be a trash-talking, body-slamming, cat-fighting, bad-ass Roller Derby Mama. I wanted to experience bruised and bloody victories and bone-crushing defeats in seedy, sleazy roller derby arenas, and be locked in ongoing grudge matches with vicious arch-nemeses who had names like Honey Sanchez, Patti "Moo Moo" Cavin, or "Horrible Hog-Hank" Hopkins. After considerable lobbying, I managed to extricate a pair of roller skates from my parents for Christmas that year (although they were the "strap-on" kind that were belted on over one's tennis shoes, and in this sense, highly unsatisfactory), and began my self-imposed training sessions in the basement, skating round and round -- practicing my killer elbow jabs and body-slamming techniques along the way to vanquish my imaginary competitors. So . . . okay . . . in the end I became a poet, and an English professor, of all things, and not a Roller Derby Queen, but still, nonetheless . . . in my heart of hearts, lurks the indefatigable pulse of a Kansas City Bomber.

Wishful Raccoons and Trampolines


It's pitiful when one has to hole up in the office all Sunday afternoon, attending to niggling bits of administrivia, when one would much rather have spent the afternoon being a SlackerDyke -- sitting on the front porch swilling Rolling Rock (an ideal swill beer, really . . . one can pound down a goodly amount without becoming too inebriated), listening compulsively to Patti Smith's "Horses," squinting into the lazy, thick incense-like curls of sweet, spicy smoke curlicuing up from a Djarum Clove cigarette, eating cinnamon ice cream, and watching the leaves come skittering down from the trees one by one (spin and twirl), then splash the sidewalk with decisive brittle splats. (Well, perhaps Rolling Rock AND cinnamon ice cream both at the same time is rather ill-conceived, but then again, fuck it, since I'm reconstructing the afternoon I wish I'd had, I should be able to consume any combination of food and libation I choose, no matter how potentially revolting.) It's quieter on the street than on weekdays . . . a few bike-riders, dog-walkers, the neighbor's ill-tempered cat who clearly wishes to usurp my porch. (But not the skinny, eccentric bearded man who parks on my block Monday-Friday and returns to his car over the lunch hour, approaching at a dead run in dress shoes and a dress shirt. He then, inexplicably, eats his lunch in the driver's seat of his car, and takes a little nap afterwards before heading back to his office -- once again, at a dead run). Catty corner from me, neighbor kids jump up and down, up and down, on their trampoline. One thinks it might be nice to have a trampoline so one could jump up and down, up and down, all afternoon too. One wonders if, as B. suggested, raccoons come and jump on trampolines, in the moonlight, at night. One thinks (even though perhaps this is just the Rolling Rock one wishes one had swilled talking) that this would be a delightful way to spend a night . . . jumping up and down, up and down, in the moonlight, the wind in one's hair, leaves spilling down in a yellow clatter, on the trampoline . . . with raccoons.