Straight No Chaser

Correlation and Causality

i.

shannon is a major effort. everything about her, from her sporadic self-maintenance to the jerky electricity of her movements. it takes her an average of seventy-five minutes to get from the bed to the classroom, and even longer to switch modes otherwise. i wouldn't recommend marrying her; there would almost definitely come a day when you'd look at the situation and recognize how crucially the input dwarfed the return. she cries at the drop of a hat, and tries our patience to no (suitable) end.

ii.

shannon is from venus,
marcus is from mars.
together they debate the world
and snog inside parked cars.
perhaps someday they'll catch a comet,
dance among the stars--
today their union is reliant
on reception bars. fuck that.

iii.

shannon is the raw gourmet meal that tastes better eaten over dark green ruffage. accent flavor to the arugula, fennel, apple, mandarin and pomegranate salad, she leaves behind that toosweet taste that gags even the toughest of tastebuds. bite into her and goddamn if she won't bite back.

iv.

shannon is a passionate baseball fan and softball player. together, she and ernie swing by the park after work to "hit a few" (his words) and "shoot the breeze" (hers); in the hour between school's end and little league practice, the diamond is empty, and thus becomes the site of their brilliant accidental revelation, which sneaks in just before the rains start. "same time tomorrow," he yells as they run to their respective cars, each clutching a ball and mitt, protecting their hair with drenched newspapers. but they are both sensitive people, and in the end, the fear that it won't happen is what keeps them from making it happen, and the event goes down in history as their one and only attempt to find athletic common ground.

v.

shannon is a true guitar monster. twice she remembers sequestering herself in one room or another, playing her fingers raw, savoring every lick as she would its cunnilingual homonym. this is truth: she does own a guitar, and she does like to play it. but she is not a monster. when she plays, she doesn't own, rather is owned by the instrument, and comes dangerously close to smashing it when the high e string loosens itself flat (often). she appreciates harmony, and is gratified to produce it. she's heard the feeling likened to "purple skies," words that suggest color and elevation and some unique marriage of the two; not the image she'd choose but a suitable one, one that evokes the bliss of finally perfecting the chord progression to "summer breeze."

vi.

shannon is not here. she's at home, in maryland, sleeping soundly between honeysuckle-scented sheets. this is what she tells herself night after night, as the dormitory's half-assed air conditioning system chugs unhappily overhead.

vii.

shannon is the longest river in the british isles. red-haired children splash and play along its edges, bluebrown banks fringed with thick emerald grasses. erin go bragh, it whispers to the mothers who stand watch nearby. ri ra. name your daughters after me. one after another obeys. centuries later, on the other side of the atlantic, a southern baptist black woman (who has neither reason nor desire to visit ireland, ever) hears the name shouted at a train station in boston. years later, a little black girl eagerly researches the orgin of her name, and is dismayed, at best.

viii.

shannon is wooded, with the remaining acreage including good river bottom land. so, yeah, they're going to put a river bottom there. because the remaining acreage is prime real estate for a river bottom.

ix.

shannon is launching a lot-cleaning program. no she isn't. shannon doesn't give a damn about the environment. not so. actually, shannon grew up among swarms of the environmentally conscious. did you know she gets choked up every week when the recycling bins go out? you'd never know it. because, you know, you never see her cleaning lots or anything. she gives a damn, though. she has this recurring dream about cleaning the oil from a duck's feathers with ivory soap and a toothbrush. that might be a commercial. it might. anyway, on a related note, shannon thinks our current present is an unparalleled idiot. and doesn't care who knows it. save that for later. integral cog of the democratic machine and whatnot. right. anyway, shannon isn't launching a lot-cleaning program, but she doesn't litter and she saves doomed turtles from certain highway death. but she spits her gum everywhere. this is true.

x.

shannon is as sincere as she is self-absorbed. god, smite that bitch.

xi.

shannon is ice cold. lay her out flat and you'd see frigid tundra, nothing alive, none of the usual peaks and dips. she won't burn beneath your fingertips; she might not even warm to your touch, and all you'll get for your pains is a bad case of freezer burn.

this goes for you, you and you. you, though, you've had your successes. when i saw the puddles i didn't know what to think, till i realized it was me, melting.

xii.

shannon is very much an integral part of the democratic machine. see her handing out pamphlets at the polls, spilling healthy propaganda into the hands of the undecided. see her frowning mightily in the direction of pennsylvania avenue, ready and raring for 2008, determined to make a difference. see her envying the truly proactive, because couldn't she do some of the same? maybe not; her convictions, though sincere, are incomplete and contradictory, and best kept to herself. she is rigidly pro-choice but doesn't believe in abortion, culturally conservative with nothing but disdain for the corresponding administration. she votes blue but thinks red, hates capitalism but lives its perks. she will always be a lefty but couldn't always tell you why. she is, truth be told, a bit of a sociopolitical bimbo.

xiii.

shannon is scared to face the stage of puberty. she imagines it breaking upon her when it's least ideal, a crimson tsunami thickened with amorphous blobs of estrogen. she imagines drowning in it. doesn't matter that menarche happened years ago, doesn't matter that for half her life she's had the kind of hips that kokopelli toots his flute for. she's going to be a real woman someday, and though she's prepared (supplies are waiting in the medicine cabinet, under the sink and in the pockets of her many miniskirts), she is afraid of the change.

xiv.

shannon is such a character--there is no one quite like her. for example: it really rankles her to think of asymmetrical entries--fourteen bullets here, fifteen there--and so she sneaks back in, chooses the weakest, deletes without a second thought. there. fourteen even on either side of the entry divide. shannon is pathologically mathematical, and also very tired. and would like an audience with thor, so as to be granted permission to sock his daughter katrina in the face.