my sister, lisa (ridgemont st, 1973)
i look at her and i forget she is my sister, or even someone i know. i am struck by how beautiful she is, of how impossible it is for her to pretend or perform herself. i wander about the house, lost to others, lost to myself and she sees and waits always for the right moment, and says some small idea or suggestion or advice or wisdom or points out the humor in my blind-to-selfness or brings me something to eat or drink and i am released or soon on the way to release from the grip of some lethal obsession. i was in a state tonight because i seemed to have lost a stupid demo cassette. i overturned every pouch and pocket and shelf twenty times until i gave up. got mad. had an hysterical faux fever. lisa, curled in the green chair says don’t worry, go out, i’ll find it, i have time. she begins probing with her heavy hands, hands disproportionately out-sized, with magic slow-motion deliberation and in minutes she finds the tape, stuffed away in a box of my envelopes. later, this note:
“Dear Rick, The thing I am going to miss the most, leaving the band (Orchestra Luna), is singing your songs, although, while performing them, they seemed to pass right through me. I love singing your songs. I can’t listen to or enjoy as much any other music. I realized this too late that night Tommy (Dickie) played his tape for me. Not the same. All I felt was a desire to shut it off and play your stuff and become excited and amused and nostalgic. But anyway, those tunes of yours moved my heart, still move my heart. And that must be why I stuck with it for so long. That’s the truest thing about it for me. I know that now. I wish I could put something in here, into Dear Diary, so that when you opened the book you would open to the most beautiful place in the world and we could all just walk in. Lis”
This is an excerpt from my book, The Paragraphs — Cutlass Press
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