On Lines

In my dream there was a painting
of striking detail: the girl, the boat
sailing off into the distance,
the tail of a whale
pointing like a two-pronged fork
into the midday sky,
held by a hungry churning god
who didn’t die,
the canvas of golden, sparkling sand,
the beach where the girl was standing
and from which there also stood
the bodiless eyes looking at the scene
at once serene and thunderous,
as they waited for that whale’s tail
to clap down hard on the glassy waters,
sending up shards of glitter
into the air, onto the girl’s skin
and the boat, into the eyes,
the bodiless eyes, looking out.

The painter was there, too,
she said It drew itself
as she took a pen from the shelf
near the wall we were observing
and directed me, with the pen,
from the bottom left
to the top right of the canvas,
a line that did no curving
but was straight like a string
pulled taut between two posts.
This line, she said, as she tilted her head
to follow the thread
was the the beginning in time
of the painting, and from there
followed everything; from there
the world followed
in shades, lines, colors,
perspectives.

This was incentive enough
to begin a play; I borrowed
her technique of starting
with a line that would stretch
from one corner of the drama
away to the other, which I found unique.
I did not require character or plot or setting,
anything of the sort but one rough line;
that would grant the play its time,
would be the begetting of its world:
from a line straight and direct,
which would unfurl its actions,
its plot and players.
Without discovering who he or she was
I set out to find what the suffering one would say,
because they all suffer, that is sure,
but what would the suffering say
to begin and reach the end
of a world, an entire play?

What line would be perfect?
What line would protect the play,
along with the readers, viewers, hearers
from falling too quickly
into disillusionment?  What would keep
enchantment from leaving, keep
the fermentation of vision
from prematurely aging, uncaging great things
but patiently, slowly?
I pondered such racking questions
and it began to grow from me,
the line he or she would pronounce
at the play’s opening, and a line
to keep one going on to its end.
Already, when the words arrived,
there came alive the same salty mist, the sky
so blue at midday, the rocking setting
of the play.  I heard a player say:
What a glorious, yet ominous day!