Читать книгу They Don't Kill You Because They're Hungry, They Kill You Because They're Full - Mark Bibbins - Страница 6

Breakout Session

Before we say anything else I’d like

to point out that this coverage

is favorable to the user. I mean

I’m already a fan so I trust

the instructions, which seem

to tell us to reject a strutting self.

I’m able to choose that too.

*

Am I wrong or did the user leave

us lots of little choices. If we’re

being led in wrong directions

in service of larger truths,

so be it: I will happily call a whole

school of red herrings my family.

*

Soon enough something pulls

me back to a photo of myself.

I don’t remember who took it,

but it implies a phantom twin,

the kind of presence you reach

out to when you die.

Autobiography is still

the sincerest form of flattery.

*

There were things I couldn’t say

before because I knew the group

would agree, one of which is that

I’m quite sure I’ve uncovered

the source of this terrible light,

not quite lethal, but the user

has given us a permission again,

and no matter how compelling

the light might be it has some

serious potential to degrade us.

*

In the end it’s one of the user’s

favorite solutions—water to water

to water to sex—but I don’t mind

in the way I never do. He’s drawn

a bath for everyone, and it’s almost

as though I’m no longer afraid

there won’t be enough room.