Lampasas Curtains Collage

36x40 inches Requires framing to be properly displayed. Extending from left to right (like this text) a rod penetrates a sewn seam (seemingly). "The divided states of America" she whispers to the TV (it's blue glow desaturated to dove gray by the period in which I'm placing her). Circa 48. The gate has carved out an arced trough of mud from the dull scrape of its unplaned (no not “unplanned" spellczech keep reading and stop second guessing. If I had meant “unplanned" I would have worked it into my (and yes there is one) strategy) under carriage. Smaller than life a dollhouse sits on a plush plot of carpet in the center of the drawing room (within which conclusions are redrawn and subsequently gerrymandered). Inside ‘this' house within ’the' house there is a tiny picture on the wall of the mudroom but, here it gets weird, the picture is of a mirror reflecting nothing. Q: How do you know its a picture then and not an actual mirror? A: Just because you put your boots in the oven doesn't mean you can call them biscuits. The oven is a lidded box. It's made mostly of metal with the exception of the Bakelite knobs and 2 glass windows; a large one to see inside the box the other much smaller one to read the time and temperature. The lid I mentioned (and I’m thinking outside the box now) isn't a lid actually (fyi this is all fake) but rather a hinged hatch opening in a 90 degree arch. Like a ramp (plus 2 side-chains and a pulley) over a mote between the castle and the whatever or wherever (it’ll be both whenever we get there). The box heats up to 500 degrees. One degree describes spatial geometry the other describes temperature. The windows are transparent but the rest of the apparatus is opaque (you see where I'm going with this or you don't I can't tell because I can’t see your expression). The box is in the kitchen. The kitchen is in the house. The house is in Peoria or Manchester or receivership depending if the mortgage has been payed or not. When the drapes are parted the street can be viewed in parentheses. Closed the street is a sequence of soft gossamer blurs and subtle changes in tone read (rhymes with bed) in vertical bands of folding fabric (let's say chiffon). The fall of the cloth is arrested at full length by the the rod I started talking about before I got sidetracked. The drapes can also be sidetracked by pulling the panels separately from the center to the, er, sides. The soft brackets look like a butterfly torn asunder (I'm not suggesting you do this) and letting the little caterpillar body fall behind the sofa. Other things that can be found behind the couch; -a mint (not a fortune(although there is money there too) but a candy which tastes refreshing if not furred in lint) -some cat hair (looks like a tabby but hard to tell from here I’m not in the house I’m detailing I'm at my house in Sheboygan) -a receipt (for hand sanitizer, Gatorade, lip gloss, hair gel, Jiffy Pop, toy war set, compact mirror (like the "Silver Clam Shell Mystery" its and open shut case) thermometer and mints. -2 popcorn kernels on top of each other (exactly the same shape, color and texture) I now realize it’s only one kernel sitting in a puddle of mercury -a broken thermometer -the shards of a shattered mirror (still reflecting the last thing they saw; Aunt Alice's dreams of togetherness for the train wreck of a family she left to go West) -a guitar string (from your Fender bender phase) -a hand saw (don't ax) -a TV guide (with Orson Welles on the cover) -the Bible (with the words of Jesus in red (rhymes with bleed) -several sap green toy soldiers -an olive (also sap green with age) -a length of silky thread (ultramarine blue one side, Alizarian crimson on another side with chartreuse edging; but this in black and white so picture a a length of silky thread in different shades of gray) -the hands to a clock (one of which is clapping) and -a jigger half full of something disgusting (probably absinthe given the arcane thread upon which the author seems to hellbent on us following) Otherwise the room is full of music. You can't see it and you don't have to side step it but, use your imagination, it's there. Take my word for it. I'm (true story) not making this up. You drink until you are sideways listening to the symphonically engorged (like your sister) room. Part of the family enjoys the music the others grimace and poke index fingers deep into mouths to connote (through silent sign language instead of cantankerous asides) they can't stand the soundtrack. The lisping narrator refuses to choose sides (but I encourage you to because I love a good brawl). More fiction. I actually hate friction, fighting, bickering, voiced contention and the prosaic clammer of heated quarreling. Your father is distracted by smoke exhaling from the tiny chimney of the dollhouse. He strokes his bushy sideburns as if to say, I may need to phone the tiny firemen at their tiny firehouse in a momentito (!su padre es Latino muy cauteloso!). Your sister has sidled up to the window to gaze at the unmowed lawn. She wonders if there's a sawbuck to be gleaned in cutting the front and back while covertly leaving the sides for her chore challenged hermano Checho (the left and right wings of the yard are too narrow for her considerable breadth and width). The roof points out, "the space above the house hardly ever gets mentioned" (there's hardly anything there, roof). In a black and white film the sky is neither.