Island

It's snowing - finally.

The sky is pale and soft as a fetal pig. The heaters clank. I've taken out my winter sweater. I've salted the sidewalks and my pillow. The snow hides things. The cold hides things. I know they're there, but the surface is so damn pretty. I fly over islands in my dreams - green and blue and hot white sand. I am a crane. Schools of red-yellow fish burst like fireworks across the shorelines. Clouds moisten my eyes. The sun bakes my skin and the soles of my feet. Bronzed, hardened by the heat, softened by the hanging fruits. Fat waves curl and fizz and throw themselves at the devouring shore like Buddha from a cliff to feed a starving lion. What more could I want here?

This island is deserted.

I wake and so is my bed... Something's gone missing. Something's fading out and uncovering an artifact that I am terrified of. A beautiful carsophogus opens. I can barely see what's inside...romance, drama, acrobatics - one, two three. One, two, three, like a dance back and forth over thousands of miles. But it all melts away. It's a movie. I'm in a theater and the film has gotten stuck on one frame that just burns through and melts away right there in the middle of the scene.

Illusions are made by artists and magicians and a certain desperation.