fell into heaven

the TV looks like a window
and the ceiling looks like a door
and the wall looks like a feeling
that i never wanted before
and the floor looks like a border
that is holding me from knowing
that the window looks like a wall
with a mural that's always showing
a world that looks so dead
but lights up with life and lies
painted on the passing cars
speeding by...breaking ties
and the door looks like a hole
calling me to go outside
running after all my chances
to break and not abide
to all the rules and traffic laws
that try to guide me through the street
through molecules  and perfect flaws
refusing to admit defeat
the street looks like a movie still
a film noir love affair
the corner store looks like a girl
a femme fatale with bleeding hair
her lips look like a flute of wine
crashing to the floor
her neck tastes like a tremor
of a lions final roar
her line that curves to the ground
looks like an open heart
that shadows me so i can bare
the light that breaks apart
all the lies that let me be
a hero and a dreamer
making love to empty air
that looks like i believe her
when she tells me that i look like
every second that she dreamt
when she was just a girl
and shook herself
with the tempt
of the fantasy
that some man would be
the answer to her dreams
and for a night
i may be
every truth
she ever deems
to be what she wanted
before i disappear
and look just like a wall
that's sprayed and tagged with fear
and though i look like i am hiding
i am only standing still
in the middle of a world
that is out for the kill
and though i walk away
i never really left
I'm still lying on the couch
holding tight to a theft
that occurred the night before
when she stole what i believed
and turned it on it's head
with no chance to be relieved
forcing me to face
everything that i see
as being something different
then what i thought was me
the TV looks like a window
and the ceiling looks like a door
and as i trip and fall
through a vacant floor
i see that she is watching
and leaps into the air
we blow up like independence
without a single care
of what anyone is seeing
or what we seem to be
just see that we're alive
and maybe even free
and as we come together
she tastes just like the sky
breaking open crashing planes
that just won't say goodbye
and maybe I'll keep dreaming
and maybe she was real
and maybe I'm a homeless man
just looking for a meal
but maybe pixilated
liquid courage
is so true
and maybe I'm hallucinating
metaphors
of you
and maybe I don't know
who i am anymore
because TV looks like a window
and the ceiling looks like a door
but maybe that's the way it is
the way it's meant to be
that nothing's what i thought it was
and I'm not really me
and maybe that's just what you meant
when i tasted all your tears
your mouth became a window
and ceilings disappeared
and all the worlds came to an end
and all illusions were true
in that hour of hell
i fell into heaven
and she looked
like
only
you

remembering the dancer

he woke one relentless summer morning
sleep walking in a flashback dream sequence
facing a photograph of a distant dancer
and fantasies of galaxies
far far away taped to his teenaged walls
that he once put his fist through
in hopes of breaking through
to an understanding between himself
and his broken family.

at the time he wanted to know
if he cried when he was told
about the coming divorce,
because at 18 he no longer
remembered what happened to the
color and temperature of his eyes
when he was told at 5, 6, or 7?
and so he now wanted to feel
what he thought he never felt.

then after being told to clean up
the crumbling hole and dust that clouded
the scene like some semi-artsy yet
very commercial british film
director would have staged
to make this bloody dirty rebel
moment pretty and moody and palatable,
he absolutely left the moment behind
unclean, and walked to the mall
to catch a bus to catch a train...
to catch another train,
and they would all be his cohorts
in this runaway story.

he didn't call
to tell them where he was.
he didn't call to warn
his destination.
he just ran.
and held onto his
pulsating hand
that now only had this
in mind...
to touch that dancer in the photograph
who moved with the only
truth he really wanted on that day.
a giving up of the past that only offered walls
for him to test his reluctant man-hood on
and enter into her modern world that
could set his past aflame and start new
like that bird did once...the fiery one?
enter inside her and let her teach him
how to dance as he never knew before.
he only danced in visions of posters of
starlets that he didn't even have the courage
to put on his wall.

but the dancer was real
and running to her,
and entering her for the first time,
and finding himself for the first time
far far away from a life of them knowing
where he was, who he was, even when he was,
was all he wanted.
he was at last starting his life,
and running to her
and away from the definition
of himself though the eyes
of his parents past.

he and the dancer
drenched and lying together
in the end of one world
and the beginning of another,
sid vicious crooning MY WAY
through the humidity
that thankfully
wouldn't let the moment
dissipate....
he reached over
and found a pencil and paper
and sketched a self-portait
with a cool hat and beard.
neither of which he had...
but he knew it was a picture
of a man he wanted to be
one day.
then as he reached over
to enter the dancer again
and remind himself
of this new world
and the freedom
of running away from
selves to other selves
who have a right to start over,
he woke alone
24 years later
to other walls
that were empty,
and he leaned over and
sketched another picture
of himself
and taped it on the new empty wall
then blasted sid vicious screaming MY WAY,
and thrashed, and danced, and punched new holes
in walls that he didn't want anymore...
and he rested on the floor quiet and wet
and remembering
and letting go...
and remembering

did i say that already?

hey you.
though i don't know who you are
as i watch outside my picture window
and you walk your fifth mile
starting your new year's resolution a few days early
pay no mind to me
because I have to write something down
as I promised myself I would
and for this moment
you will be my muse.
you are everything I could dream
want desire love and expect
with no expectations of course.
excuse me while i walk in your path
following, hoping to step outside myself
and say hello.
it's a simple thing really.
I will jog for a moment to
catch up with your journey
and try to smile and ask you
who you are.
and you will say you are very busy right now
but here's your card
and I will spend all day and night
wondering what any of that meant
and the next day I will
find inspiration from free songs
on the internet
that i will pretend
is a record player...
and feel the need to write a thing
that may almost resemble a poem
and I will write it
even if it doesn't seem like a poem
I will just write to write to write to
maybe discover a new version of
a new split second of a thing called
me...and maybe a thing called you
and then I will suddenly
remember that when I saw that muse
walking past my picture window
she was not really there
it was not even yesterday
that i imagined it..but today
right now...just so I could write
one more thing
that might be a poem
that might open me up
that might encourage me
to enter the outside
world today
and find a
real muse.
a woman
a moon
a morning star
a perfect cup
of coffee
or even
just a fortunate
run of green lights
on the boulevard
telling me it is now time to go.
or maybe a woman.
did i say that already?

a beginning #2 (the record store)

Once upon a time 
there was a woman who...no wait...
there was a girl 
(we will call her that because that's how 
this woman liked to describe herself, despite 
her 48 years of life) 
who walked into Jack's 
record store 
on broad street. 
Even though the record store 
was now filled with compact discs, 
this girl found her way to 
a secret corner where Jack still 
sold actual record albums. 
As the girl flipped through the albums 
she seemed to come to life. 
Not that she was dead...
but maybe dead-ish...
and as she held The Clash's Combat Rock 
in her hands and turned around 
to approach the cashier it was as if she traveled in time. 
For one glint of a moment 
she had the chance 
for a do-over. 
Then she walked out of the store 
onto broad street, 
and i followed...
oh
yes,
i forgot to mention 
i was there. 
This is not 
a third person story, 
it is a first person story...
and my name is Jack.

a beginning #1 (that night)

it was dark. 
the man held 
on to the tree 
for dear life. 
Holding on 
for survival. Or that's 
what it seemed like as I watched 
him...or tried not to watch him, I should say...
on that one summer night
that I always wish never happened...
always wish i could forget.
A night that showed no signs of the
impending storm that already existed,
but only in the man's mind...for the moment.
I wanted to speak to him, and let him know that everything 
was going to be okay, but as the 
moments quivered past me, i found 
myself walking, and then running away. 
Running home...because i began to believe 
his reality more than mine.
I hoped i would never see him again, 
but that proved not to be the case at all...
as even that very night, as i slept in my 
one room apartment overlooking the ocean 
in which i spent my youth baptizing myself 
in it's waves, there was a rapping on my window...
and it was not a raven 
or a dream.

christmas eve in california

someone asked me to send them a picture
of what christmas looked like in california
and all i could do is say it looks the
same as everywhere else...
a woman on the corner
with a sign
asking for
milk
for
her
children
and car after car
driving by
in a hurry
to not miss
that last
sale
for
that
last
stocking
stuffer
that
is
bound
to
make
all
the
difference.
each
one
moving
along
blinded
by
a
rationalization
called
distrust
and
watching
out
for
their
own
and
what
i chose to do
is between me and the sky and the street that guides me
back to wait for santa claus, alone, with a glass of
cheap wine, and the hopes of at least getting
a note that will say...maybe next year.
and that will be ok for now.

april may money love prayer

many many years ago in
a far away land
a man named
jesus
was
born
in april or may
or so
and
i really
wish
that
one guy
who ruled an empire
didn't feel he had the right
to move that birthday
just so the celebration
of light returning
with drunken heathen howls
would be saved...
if he had left it alone
maybe i could have been ready by april or may
this coming year.
but as it is
i am in a far away land
myself, alone
in a large cold house
that is not mine
watching and feeding
a cat
that i was told
might very well
die on my watch
and
dreaming once again
as i'm prone to do
of falling deep
and dancing
with records spinning
scratching classic versions
of some word that i think
is pronounced love
and then  i see a shadow
leaning
on the wall across
the epic room
that i sit still in
and remember i was
told that shadow
would be mine
when i found
a job
a home
a love
i think that's it
no
that's not needed
in this world
just money and a roof
then the shadow and the furniture
that caused it
would come with me
and i could send for you
my petit princess
that i left behind
a few months ago
in another far away land
and we would dance
and parade
down the street
searching for treasures
and conquering pirates ghosts and other monsters
singing carols we can't remember the words to
and meeting hello kitty spiderman and a charlie chaplin
on the boulevard
who hears voices and speaks to them all as we would
just watch and i would tell you he has invisible friends
and you would laugh and say so do you...
but for now I will just miss you
and be sometimes furious
that his birthday was moved
to here where i sit with no lights
or trees anyway, and know I could
have been ready by april or may
as i attempt to rest and try to
believe in a jesus
that could
prove to me that
love is more
important than
money and
roofs
and then put
his damn
birthday
back
where
it
belongs
amen

photograph of a lover (an unsung song)

waiting on the north end shore
for summertime to die
see you taking photographs
of an empty sky
yet a glare of something more
comes alive in your eyes
angels falling begging you
to show them how to fly
let me in your photograph
killing all my lies
let me in your photograph tonight
 
I turn away to face my plan
and taste the salty mist
submerge my mind and say goodbye
to hardened emptiness
drift away to hurricanes
whose eyes condemn all this
but underneath i lose myself
deep inside your kiss
let me in your photograph
dear stranger dont ask why
let me in your photograph tonight
 
a ghost of me will follow you
stealing rings from carousels
let me carress your camera lense
I'll live again and kill my hell
to be inside your photograph
i'll keep your secrets..never tell
did you take my photograph
as i silently began to yell
let me in your photograph
so i might never die
let me in your photograph tonight
 
let me in your memories
when someday you'll look back and see
a photograph of a lover
that was almost meant to be
 
let me in your photograph
with angels as they cry
let me in your photograph tonight

new name

I long to live in a land where the language is not my own.  

Where I find myself back at birth, 

searching for words to express my heart’s personal truth.  

I am an expatriate from the adult I have let myself become…

an adult I choose to leave behind.

I’ll become the foreign land around me, digging my soul 

into the virgin soil…or more likely I am the virgin, 

digging into love and life growing out of the same 

ground as the prickly flowers that have been calling 

to me from the background of my so-called nightmares.

I am talking to strangers…to God…and a wild lonely 

creature with scales and wings that crawls onto my 

chest and breathes a new world that tingles and 

dreams in and around my lips and tongue, letting 

me taste a future that may even be my own.

Looking around me I see a desert filled with 

the ghosts of passions that are just waiting 

for me to say the word that will let them be 

born into this ugly world where they long 

to feel the pain…but maybe they will also feel 

the thrill of “we shall overcome”.

Looking around me I am overcome with nothing…

and by nothing I mean that from this day I crawl 

forward into my new land with no name, 

only tattooed with a path that fell before me 

to attain peace in my spirit.

I will learn the new language in my new land, 

where soon I may be given a new name 

that is not so new.  It has been branded on me 

since valleys slept in native manifestations 

of vision quests where the future was as clear as 

mountaintops dusted with clean crisp snow, and 

rivers flowed forward; never dreaming, always moving. 

And moving, always moving, I will reach the majesty 

of a waterfall, where behind I will find my true name 

carved on the wall of an ancient cave…and echoed 

in a whisper through drops of water, a word 

I have never heard, 

in a language 

born of destiny.

searching for christopher zoë (one version of me)

My Name is Brian Richard Gaskill.  When I was in High School…maybe junior year, I changed my name to Christopher Zoë.  This was something that was born in creative writing class.  It was a “pen name” I guess.  Eventually though, I started to sign all my papers in all my classes this way.  This practice didn’t go over too well, yet some of the teachers actually went along with it…for a little while.

The name Christopher Zoë had the meaning, as I read it in some baby name book, “whimsical and humorous with flight and freedom”.  I was a moody son of a bitch who was terrified of people and living in general (I have only now almost 20 years later just started to change…I stress “just started”).  The name was a goal.  A goal of returning to the spirit that I just knew had to be inside me.

Later I found out Zoë is a feminine name…but I didn’t care.  Besides when I Told my mother about the whole thing, she looked at me semi-shocked/confused/amazed, and went on to tell me that if I had been born a girl, she was going to name me Zoë.

I was Born Brian Richard Bernotas.  Bernotas is a Lithuanian name.  But since my father is half Sicilian and my mother is mostly Swedish, I usually leave the Lithuanian out when asked about my heritage.  I suppose I enjoy the dramatic dichotomy of Sicilian/Swedish…the fire and passion mixed with the cold and lonely.  Granted these are probably only cliché’s formed by my limited uninformed pop-culture attacked American mind...Still I think it represents me well…for better or worse.

When I was about seven years old, my parents divorced, both of them re-married, and my mother’s husband adopted me.  I think because my father couldn’t afford to send child-support, though I have since been told it was more complicated than that (isn’t everything?).  Anyway, then I was Brian Richard Gaskill.  The weird part is, when you are adopted, they change your father’s name on your birth certificate…like your real, or first, or biological, or whatever father never was.  But he was.

I saw him on every Sunday, and then eventually for full weekends, but only once, maybe twice a month.  One day, on any given weekend, I was in the park with him playing basketball or softball or football…or any one of those sports that I gradually grew to not really care about (though for some reason I still LOVE sports movies), and he was standing about fifty feet away from me with his back to me.  I wanted to get his attention.  I was about to call out to him, when something happened.  The word “Dad” just would not come out of my mouth.  Eventually I just decided that I didn’t want to see him or his side of my family at all…I was about thirteen or fourteen, and it was all too much for me.  By the way, I didn’t call my mother’s new husband “Dad” either.  He told me I didn’t have to, so I didn’t.  So, final tally?  Two fathers…no dads.

By the way, my middle name?  Richard?  It comes from my biological father’s brother, who I think died after only being alive for a few months.  I’m not sure what that has to do with anything…I just don’t like it.  It can’t be good karma, assuming I believed in such a thing…which starting today I just might.

Look the thing is, I don’t really know who I am.  I mean who really does?  But anyway, my past, my name, the meaning of it all, the connections it all has…none of it is really helping.

I do know that for a few months, a long time ago, I was Christopher Zoe.  I gave myself that name.  I was knighted by a king that lived inside my own heart.  This Knight was meant to go on many adventures and quests…searching for pleasures, and answers, and the inevitable pains…and so on.   But instead he was told by the world around him, even by me, that he must hide away in my heart.  He was told he was nothing but a figment of a weird boy’s imagination.

I’m not sure where this knight is today.  I’m not sure I can travel far enough, or dig deep enough to find him, but I do know that’s what I should be doing.  From this day on I will be searching for Christopher Zoë.  He may even go by a different name by now, so I will have to remember to keep my heart open wider than my eyes on this quest

He May even travel by the name of “Donavan Mungo”…In honor of a lion that came to school with me my entire senior year.  Most tried to tell me Donavan was a puppet…but I knew better.  And I know in my heart that Christopher knows the truth too…for he had the heart of a lion.  

my half of improvisations with an old friend

I’m drowning in the rapids of your neo-classical flesh.  (why do you lie?)

My soul caresses your chapped lips

Like a hippopotamus on a lily pad.  (why do you ask why?)

Your eyes

Electrify my being

In the deepest moments of the new moon.

When I kiss your…(Stop!)

Toes…(oh)

Your controversial tongue rips through and licks my

Pounding…lone…heart

With a deceitful passion that leaves my carcass

Lying  (why do you lie?)

In the dust.

My eyes

Bleed 

With the hidden desire of Byron,

To touch your hair…

To wander in lonely spirals 

Leading nowhere,

But into the depths

Of your hall of mirrors soul, only

To finally find myself alone.

Emaciated in self-crucifixion, only

Wanting to touch your hair…(touch me.

Let me know that You are I, and I is now, and…)

god i wasted so many years

God, I wasted so many years

Walking the city of earth

Like a dead man pretending

To be alive in philosophical meanderings

Searching for meaning and truth 

That I knew all along was following me 

Like a lost puppy dog,

Yet I refused to turn around

And recognize I was the lost one 

And this dog was filled with ruby slipper magic

That always had the power to bring me back to life

That always had the power to bring me home

God, I wasted so many years

But maybe that was part of your plan

So when I was at last brought to life

And found my way home

I would come alive like a cyclone

Never stopping but to inhale the breath

Of fresh lilies that dance with Busby Berkley

Precision to greet her every time she wakes

To the smell of coffee and cinnamon.

God, I wasted so many years

But now I am going GaGa over

A sweet old country song

That lights up an outlaw’s eyes

With electric sunshine

That comes alive like a broken transformer

Raining down wild blaring blue waves

That ride themselves into my nights and days

And keep me awake…as I gently

Learn how to play

God, I wasted so many years

But now we are dancing in our underwear

Under the rising harvest moon

In the chilly-willy autumn air

Playing catch with raining stars

That we then swallow like pop-rocks

And laugh as we glow like an ecstatic kaleidoscope

Of who knows what…

Freeing you and me to become we and us

God, I wasted so many years

But now that I found her

A family is born that lives where the wind resides

Even flying underwater to unheard of worlds

That once only existed in books 

That were never never written

And never even sparked 

In the eyes of the greatest dreamers

God, I wasted so many years

But now I catch the tears of a punk-rock mermaid…

(For lack of a greater invention to describe her breed)

A native to a universe that swarms with every
thought and dream in the ocean deep

Right outside our door

Where I have a game of hopscotch with sea-glass

That she has left for me like ancient prayers

Worn down, yet more beautiful 

And alive than before…prayers that lead me

Back to her each night for lessons 

On how to breathe under the sea

So we can swim-sprint down that secret path

That leads to the next stage of Now,

Where we will never perform behind lying masks

But sing out the truth 

For all who come to the show

Of dead magicians making beauty disappear

But reappears back into your soul

God, I wasted so many years

But when I reach a time of passing

If she is the only one who heard me

And my out-of-tune re-hashed dreams and needs

To reach out to whoever will listen to

My broken-ego that had an unoriginal idea

That maybe just maybe I could inspire 

With the power of dead gods…

That will be enough

God…I no longer waste my years

And now I can taste the future

Like a chocolate chip mint ice-cream cone

Re-born as a sun that was once our hearts

That someday together will warm the seas

And set the clouds ablaze with flashing signs

Calling everyone home to a place 

Where breathing underwater 

Is as simple as self-doubt

And believing in talking streetlamps and

Walking palm-trees and pigs

That swim deep under the sea

Will be as easy as me and you

Becoming us and we…

last day in the city

Livin in a city
a cesspool of so-called creativity

Searchin’ skyscrapers,
for the one and only me

Then leap thru the air...falling 

Past the selfish giants who pretend to care...

Did you come here to be an artist?

Cuz that’s the farthest

Thing from the truth

And the hardest

Thing for you to see

Is the time has come to start brand new

Cuz there is no art here

In this culture clash ghost of a dream

Excuse for a city that only pretends to believe

In the revolution that it started generations ago

And now hangs on by the ghost of a prayer...

But no on one prays any mo’

And no one gets paid any mo’

If you wanna not get paid

To create and make art

Please, don’t get paid someplace else

And give birth to the start of a new revolution

Where you dare to preach

But not to the converted 

Liars and dreamers

Who make a concerted

Effort to fake death

Shooting blanks

Strait to their heads

They think they’re alive

As they cry out on hot city streets

For someone to listen

To their ghost of a dream…

Buy you…you are still alive

So get out while you still gotta chance

Start a new revolution in a new genesis

Start over with a dance

With the stars and moon

And give birth to the sun

With a primal beat

On an ancient drum

That calls all seekers

Looking to escape

The lies that were forced

Down their throats like a rape...

Now we all will heal slowly

Kept cool by the dawn

Of our new city

That lives in the light

Of a new kinda truth

Well, it’s been here forever...

But it’s a new kinda you

gypsy sunrise

EXT. NEW JERSEY BOARDWALK. SUNRISE.

It is a cool late spring morning.  A lone figure sits on a
bench overlooking the beach and ocean.  A man of forty-one
to be exact.  His dress and appearance is in a manner that is
close to appropriate for a homeless man.  Ripped jeans, t-
shirt, no shoes, beard.  He reaches over to find a book, and
opens it to blank pages.  Clipped onto his t-shirt he has a
pen which he grabs and places on the first blank page...ready
to write.

Just as he is about to write he is distracted by the sun
popping up in it’s trademark style of an orange sherbert ice
cream cone teasing the morning with a gentle beauty before
going on to burn another day away.

He reaches down to his boom box and presses PLAY.  The
instrumental “Cathedral” by Van Halen blares out peacefully
across the empty shore.  And as it does, the music seems to
inspire a ballet of waves, sun, sand, and seagulls... An old
couple walking by on a morning stroll...and even a middle-aged
woman, a peer to him though he can't think of himself as "middle-aged",
who stares at him for a time before running over to a friend
to point and smile, as if they are saying, "no, that can't be him".  The
Man does not notice this.

He is busy setting the scene, soundtrack and all, to inspire greatness on the
blank pages in front of him.  Every nook and cranny of what surrounds
him aches with the possibility of inspiration, but no use...His pen still does
not budge.

And his eyes appear so lost that they may as well be dead...but
then they shift slightly to see something new...and they come
to life slowly like a man waking from a twenty year coma.
He reaches over and re-starts the music called “Cathedral”,
crosses his legs, and readies to write...he writes.

Her name was Gypsy Sunrise.  Every
dream that every man ever had.  But
today she was his dream. 

Down on the beach there is a woman that is every bit the
dream he has begun to describe.  She stands next to her surf
board, wearing boy surf shorts and a bikini top. She watches
the sunrise, and as it does...the morning light sets her
aglow...

An angel, sent here to save... 

She grabs her board and leaps into the water...paddles out
past the waves...

"Or no, maybe"...

he restarts the "Cathedral" music to re-set the scene from the top.
then continues to write.

...a mermaid sent here by Posieden
himself...to make him believe that
a dream can be more than a
dream...and...

"Wow.  that sucks. How about..."

Her name was Gypsy  Sunrise.  
She was every dream that
every man ever had...but today she
was his...

"No, let’s do first  person, more personal, not gonna
hide."

today she was MY dream... 

He starts the "Cathedral" music again as “Gypsy” paddles out
to catch a wave and rides one in with the rising sun.

As if she walked straight down from
the silver screen where she was the
love interest in a buddy-cop-super
spy movie starring James Bond and
Elvis. As if Ann-Margaret gave
birth to the lesbian love-child of
Pussy Galore and Brigitte
Bardot...


He ponders this.

"Wow."

"Gypsy" comes up onto the beach from the water.

there!...she emerges from the deep
blue with the strength of an
ancient princess warrior, and the
grace of... 

She trips.

"Chevy Chase?"


He watches for a moment while “Gypsy” just lies there in the
sand by her board.  Contemplating for a second whether or not
he should go see if she is ok.  He then rises to jump over
the railing to rescue this new found dream of inspiration,
but sees a sign which reads

DO NOT WALK ON THE DUNES

so he sits back down and watches...she still just lies there.

Then he can’t take it anymore.  He runs over to the stairs half a
block down. Stops to decide if he should go down to the
beach. Then he does.  He runs to the part of the
beach where “Gypsy” lies.  As he reaches just ten feet away
from her, she starts to rise.  So he turns around to flee when...


"Hey", a voice says from behind him.

The man freezes in his tracks, and awkwardly does nothing...does
not turn back around...does not even budge.

"Hello?" says the voice, once again reaching out to the man who
still remains frozen. Then the girl makes her way around to the way the man
is facing, and to make things even more awkward and strange, his eyes are closed.

"Are you ok?" asks the girl.

The man ever so slowly opens his eyes to discover her inches away. He then,
so so slightly moves his head up and down in a subtle nod to sort of say
yes, he is fine.

Walking back to her board she confirms what is already quite obvious, "Well,
so am I."

"Hmmm?" asks the still frozen man, cracking and creaking his way to turning
and seeing her again, and attempting to be brave and normal.

"I'm ok too", she confirms once again.

He just stares, unsure of what to say or do.

"I mean that is why you came running after me isn't it?" she asks, so knowingly
it forces him to wake and rebel.

"wait a minute, I didn't come..."

She stops him with a hand wave and a staccato utterance of, "uh uh uh."

" What?"

"It's just a bad way to start off a relationship."  She says this as she wipes off sand and
water from her perfection that, it is clear, she has no awareness of.

The man attempts to break in for a second. "What..." but she cuts him off.

"With lies."

"wait a moment, what i was going to say, or actually ask was, what..."

"relationship?"  She finishes for him.

"Umm...yeah that", he stammers.

The girl stares at him for a moment with kind eyes, smiles
and lets out a little laugh...the man is dumbfounded.  She
grabs her surfboard and heads towards the boardwalk.

"Wait", he calls out to stop her.

She takes her board and places it back on the sand.  She sits
on the board and looks at him. "Yes?" she asks with a look in her eye
that says she thinks she may have to wait awhile for any follow up
from the man, yet also a look that reveals that she may in truth be
willing to wait. As long as it takes.

But it does not take so long after all as he replies with the repeated
question. "What relationship?"

"Ok...if you are going to make me sit here and discuss this silly
subject you are going to have to at least keep me warm."

"Ummm", he continues with his confused utterances, as if he is now
learning how to speak for the first time.

"Sit", she tries to make it clear.

He then sits where he stands.

"Over here?" she asks, gently pleading for him to not be as slow as he
seems, because she knows better.

He starts to rise, and then stumbles as his ankle gives out on him. She laughs.
Then he, crawling, humbly makes his way to her side.

"There, that's better." she says as she leans her body into his, innocently searching
for warmth.

They sit and watch the sun finish it's rising. The
music on his boom box finishes “Cathedral”, and then a shocking
pounding beat of heavy metal begins, and definitely sort of
disturbs the serene mood.

"mixed tape", the man clarifies.

"cool", the girl says, but only with ambiguous intent, so the man dosn't know
what to do, but go with his own feelings about it.

He starts to rise, but then explains," I mean really it’s a CD...It’s just
I still have the whole concept of mixed tape on the tip of my
tounge...I mean in my ready access vocabulary...anyway...remember
mixed tapes?"

"Yeah", she says, only slightly starting to reveal a sense of getting annoyed
at the increasing volume disturbing this moment, as the man seems caught between
a memory, and not knowing what to do.  Just then, an extremely loud guitar
lick plays that knocks the man out of his daze.

"Oh yeah," he says as he runs toward the music, and then sees the dunes which he can
not walk on...stops, turns, and runs to the stairs. Then up to the
boardwalk and back down to the stereo box blaring out and disturbing this
out of the blue moment of intimacy.  By the time he gets
there though the crashing loud heavy metal is over and the force you to breathe deeper
relaxing trip of “Today” by Jefferson Airplane begins...The girl sighs out "nice...",
and gently smiles with relief.

"Like I said, mixed tape."

"CD", she corrects.

"Right." He walks towards the railing stops and turns back to the
stairs, and then back down on the sand and over to the girl.  He
sits back down by her side with the music still playing...

"So...", he says by itself, nudging his way into conversation seemingly
one word at a time.

"What?" She plays along, attempting to inspire the next words as simply
as possible.  And it seems to work as he asks...

"Do you have a name?"

"Yes."

"Well?"

At that she just stares out to the ocean that is starting to now reflect the
blueness of the coming day.

"May I ask what it is?" he pushes forward.

"Yes", she says simply, attempting to not do the work for him.

"Ummm...so"

Then giving up, and taking on the role of the coach, she softly demands, "just ask."

"I thought I did."

"Not really. You really have to learn to get to the point." She continues as if
they have known each other forever.  "That’s the thing about you,
you sit there and you watch, and you dream...and you dream so deep
that your dreams have dreams."

"Wait a minute." He says, trying to at last get involved in the moment, but
she barrels on.

"I mean your forty blah blah years old, and you’ve had a million great
ideas that just sat there growing old inside a world you created in
your mind..."

He just stares semi-blankly...caught red handed, but still not admitting it,
as he keeps said proverbial red hands in some proverbial pockets, as she continues.

"And i guess i understand because that world is safe...love is all
that matters but there are no broken hearts there, and magic is as
common as dancing in the rain on the mgm backlot..."

"You mean singing", he corrects.

"What?"

"You mean singing."

"No, I meant dancing."

"Singing in the rain?" he says, as a question, looking to lead her to what she
must have really meant.

"I know the reference", she announces, and now stares him down pointedly, to make
herself perfectly clear. "But I meant dancing. And yes, I suppose some
singing may be involved.  I wouldn’t rule it out...But if you learn one thing about me,
learn this...when I say something, I mean it."

She now turns back to the ocean. As does he, so he does not see her eyes as they begin
to, like the ocean, reflect back the blueness of the coming day with rising salt water.

He starts again,"The thing is...I really should get back."

"Back to what?" she asks.

"I was writing."

"Why bother?"

"What is that supposed to mean?" He now finally looks and sees her and her tears, that prevent him from attacking back outright in the full bodied defensiveness he has grown accustomed too in
his life.

"you're not gonna finish." she simply says, as if it is an undeniable fact.

"Now wait a minute, you have no idea what..."

"No, you wait a minute."

He thinks on this for a very short time, before realizing he should quit while he's ahead,
even though he is no where near "ahead"...then he turns to leave.

He hears her voice from behind. "No really, wait a minute." a small vunerable voice of that girl maybe
asking him to stay.

He stops.

Then not turning back he continues to walk away, back down to the stairs and up
and around back to his bench and the stereo box...he reaches down and stops the music that had continued on in eclectic fashion through this scene he had played out with a stranger.
When he looks up, the stranger...the girl...is gone.

He gently sits back down on his bench and picks up the book of blank pages
in which he had begun his “magnum opus”.
He starts to write again...

She was there, and then she was
gone, and I was left with not even
a memory, but the faint scent of a
memory...of what could only have
been a dream...

He looks up and searches the shore for her or any clue or hint of her presence. Finding
nothing, he continues on.

A dream that I can already feel
emerging in my once “safe
world”...as she called it...as a
nightmare that will haunt me for
the rest of my days...until I can
find her again...until I know who
she is ...what is her name? 

He has made his way back to the stairs, considering going back down to the sand.  Knowing damn good and well that he will continue to write through inner monologue and though it may not be remembered later, he somehow dosn't care. What were his words worth anyway.  All that feels of any worth is this moment.  He takes one step down and then another and then wanders the shoreline with a secret goal, that is not so secret since it is just between himself and no one, of finding her again.

Is she crazy? Was she even there?
Am I crazy?...as I walked down the
lonely shore...No...as I ran 

He sprints. He can almost imagine running on the water as the waves reach up to flirt
with his stride...as they did many years ago.


Yeah, as I ran down the shore that
I once called home as a boy, I
became overwhelmed with a rush of
my past years, not coming back to
me, but vanishing completely..a
Rush of nothingness that only a
yoga master... or a heroin addict
might be acquainted with. So if you
thought this was gonna be some
memoir of the truth of some
hollywood has-been slash never was
past, and how he came home to sort
it all out and finally find
redemption or some crap like that,
I guess you were mistaken, even in
telling you that, I have told you
way more than I really ever
intended...so i guess i have to
kill you...or me.

Falling down, exhausted, lying flat, face to where waves are pulling the sand back home
and maybe even hoping to pull the man away.

She was right...my dreams have
dreams, and I am lost somewhere in
the middle.  I don’t want to give
you my dreams so you can crush them
and me with them, as if we were
yours to crush.  I don’t want to
write this semi-autobiographical
anti-memoir novella prose poetry
whatever, just so I can get
praise..or not...My dreams rest in
peace, so to speak, in my
mind...and that is exactly where i
want them to stay. 

I wish I would die right now, so
you would never be able to learn
any more about me... 

And then a voice comes from outside himself and his own private inner monolouge.

"Wait a minute."

The man slowly looks up to see her again.

and he asks...again,"What is your name?"

"What do you want it to be?"

And as his face falls back to the impression in the sand it had just risen from, he
lets out a muffled growl of almost final frustration. Then she speaks again.

"I'm glad you came back."

Not even bothering to lift up from the sand he continues his muffled communication. "Your'e
kidding me right?"

"No, I really am glad."

"No, I mean about you're name."

"Well...no I'm not kidding", she says openly and without pause, clearly quite certain of herself and her answers.

He sits up finally, since it seems the waves are not strong enough to wash him away, and faces this girl and this challenge strait ahead, or at least as strait as he can right now. And he repeats her, to be clear on her certainty, "You're not kidding?"

"No, I'm not"

"Are you a hooker?"

She immediately slaps him across the face, again responding with certainty and without pause. but then she says, "I'm sorry" as he returns his eyes to hers, and he looks carefully for any sign of insanity
including the possibility of any wrist band or name tag that proves she may be escaped from somewhere with doctors and bars. again she says, "I'm sorry..."

Then following her pattern of communication by not pausing and going with the gut,
he shoots, "No I guess I can understand why you did that, except for this...I can’t
understand why you did that, because I can’t understand why you
wouldn’t expect me to say something like that after you give me a “what
do you want it to be” as an answer to the question that you made such
a monumental deal of me asking...so I find you.."

"I found you", she retorts.

"So ok, you find me"

"But I couldn't have unless you came back"

"And I go ahead and ask you, what is your name"

"And I'm very glad you came back"

"And you give me.."

"what do you want it to be", she finishes for him.

"Yes, why would you do that?", he asks, tired of the game but not willing to give up.

And she answers, "Because I mean it."

"I don't understand."

"You try too hard to understand"

At this the man rises and starts to leave again, truly uncertain that any of this is worth it, he mumbles,
"I've got to go."

"Wait a minute", she whispers, and he stops, but does not turn to face her as she continues,"
I said “what do you want it to be”, beacuse I meant it. I mean what I say, and I say what I mean."

The man turns back to her slowly and then even slower and ever so carefully, once again repeats
a variation on the question, against his better judgement, "Do. you. have. a. name?'

"I imagine so"

He carefully plays along, "What do you imagine it may be?"

At this she still has no answer, but a question, "can we talk?"

"I was hoping", he says, thinking maybe an answer is coming soon.

"Oh wait, I mean walk", she corrects herself as she stands and begins to step down the shore. She passes by him and he watches her walk, and unable to say no to her or himself he catches up and
continues by her side.

"I get those two confused sometimes...walking, talking" she admits.

"Right"

"But I much prefer walking"

"I see", he says patiently, still thinking that this might get easier and an answer is inevitable.

She continues," Then if talking comes, it’s organic, and not only that but by the time
you are done, you have reached some sort of destination...even if you had no idea where you were going."

"What if you don't want to go anyplace?", he asks, letting himself fall into her philosophical banter
that may or may not have anything to do with what he wants to know, or as she might say, what he THINKS he wants to know.

"What if the world was flat?" again she returns with a question.

"What if the world..."

"Was flat?", she finishes for him.

Fighting every ounce of doubt inside himself he continues to walk with her, but is only able to grumble
a non distinct answer...so she takes this as a cue to continue on...

"Once upon a time there were people...most people assumed the world was flat."

"Yeah, I know."

"I know, you know everything."

"No I don't know every...", he stops himself from arguing, and takes a deep breathe as he starts to succumb to whatever this conversation, this relationship, this thing, is. "Ok, I'm sorry, go on."

she does, asking,"Is the world flat?"

"I don't know" he quickly answers.

"Don't be silly."

"I don't know anything."

"Oh I get it", she smiles,"You are trying to prove to me that you are open to the possibility of
not knowing everything...that's cute"

"It's not cute." he says, perfectly willing to begin to enter into her "world", but not willing to then be
patted on the head like a puppy who learned to pee outside the house.

"a little bit." she continues in the same direction of possible patronizing that he might only be misunderstanding.

"ok, fine", he gives in.

"Ahh, so you agree it's a little cute."

"No, I agree and KNOW that the world is not flat"

"ya think?"

"and no matter what you think or believe, or what anyone ever thought, it is round...it can only be round."

She just smiles, getting a kick out of his exasperation and confusion that is trying so hard to masquerade as knowledge and certainty.

He continues, "Actually it's more like a spherical mass hurling though space in a perfect pattern, creating time and all semblance of reality...at least as we know it...or pretend to know it."

"Are you done", she asks. He shrugs, and that is all. Then she says, "I was gonna say take it easy
with the specifics, but you are proving my point even more."

"I'm so lost," he says only once, though he has a look on his face that seems to continue to say it in silence.

"Good."

"Why good?"

"Why not? If you are never lost, you can never be found."

The man takes this in then asks the next question that seems to follow logically, "did you find me?"

"Yes," she responds," on this big flat world full of billions of people."

"haven't we established that the world is round?"

"Haven't you gotten the point yet?"

"The point of what?", he begs,"Where are we going with this?"

"Somewhere," she offers.

"That tells me nothing!"

"That tells you everything."

Now completely fed up and no longer willing to play into these mind games that promise answers and only deliver deeper questions; questions that feel like cakes with hidden razorblades, the man walks away announcing to anyone close enough to hear, "I'm done!  Goodbye Gypsy!"

"That's it!" she giddily yells as if they were a team on a TV game show from the 1970's, and he finally picked the right word. He turns back, waiting for an explanation. "My name", she says, "that's it."

The man should probably walk away at this, but he has quickly become accustomed to their push and pull and hopes that maybe if he sticks around it won't all be for nothing.  Still he must explain, "Ok...stop...your name is not Gypsy...I just called you that because I saw you and started to
write about a girl named Gypsy...and since you refuse to tell me your name, I just called you what i knew i needed to get back to...what i needed to finish."

"Gypsy Sunrise", she completes.

The man stares at her. "Why do you know that?"

"Because that's my name."

"Then why didn't you tell me?"

"Why did I need to tell you what you already knew?"

The man is pacing back and forth trying to calm himself from the closest he has ever felt to a murderous state.  He stops.  He breathes deep.  Then, "Wait...no...so what, you're not really here? I'm crazy and that...that, blah blah blah kinda sorta stuff?", as he get's right up in her face he can only end with a final,"hmm?"

"Don't be silly."

"OK."

"Of course I'm here."

"Ok, good." he is almost believing, but only because the alternative in not an option.

But then she says, "Just as much as you're here." forcing the man to fall into contemplation that he was hoping he was done with, once he knew her name.

"What if I don't want to be here?" he says in a way that that resembles someone verging on seeing them self for the first time in years.

"What if the world is flat?'

"What if...please stop...I just want..."

"I have to go", says Gypsy as she looks to the sky seeming to be communing with secret spirits that only she can see.

"Why?"

"That's for you to know, and me to find out."

The man puzzles at this but then finally says,"I don't wanna know."

"But you have no choice."

"I don't want to be here", he says as his true emotion builds and Gypsy starts to walk into the ocean, as if walking that direction makes as much sense as walking down the street.

She calls back," You have no choice."

"what if i did?" he questions.  Not wanting this to end.

"What if the world was flat?"

"Then you would fall over the side, and i would never see you again."...At that she goes under water and the man with tears now flowing freely looks to the now risen morning sun and welcomes the blinding kaleidoscope visions of seagulls and other passing strangers that are all related to others he grew up with many years ago before vanishing into other lives on other coasts where dreams were built and broken down into stones that created jagged paths leading him all the way to this moment.  Then among those visions he hears her voice once more...

"The world is not flat...you are here, whether you like it or not...and you are going someplace
whether you think so or not."

"I'm scared."

"You are supposed to be."

"I am lost."

"Good?"

"Why Good?"

"Because then you are exactly where you are supposed to be."

"I'm Back where I started."

"Yeah."

"In the town I grew up in."

"Sounds like a perfect place to start over."

Then Gypsy pops up from the water once more and yells out, "See you again!...Maybe next time you will understand....Just jump in!"  and under again she goes.

The man is tempted to dive in the water himself.  Jump in, she said.  But he walks away towards the boardwalk instead...

then all of a sudden he turns and runs to the water.  Giving up, giving in...baptizing himself in
the new day...While he is under he almost can see Gypsy as he can almost see himself and begins to understand so deeply that he does everything he can to just breathe in this water world and never go back...but he hears a muffled sound of music...

Van Halen “Cathedral”...he comes up to the air...looks up to the boardwalk and sees himself
sitting down to write...

He walks out of the water, deciding that this time he will not play games.  He walks directly towards himself, writing.

 Her name was Gypsy Sunrise. Every
dream that every man ever had...but
today she was his dream... 


The Man who walked out of the water like a new born wild gypsy, steps up to yesterday's reflection sitting on the boardwalk, looking for himself, and interrupts with a simple,"Hello".

His yesterday self answer's back, "Hello"

"you ok?"

"I think so, I'm not really sure."

The tomorrow him, still on the beach laughs like a happy buddha, who knows what is coming and can't contain his joy.

On the boardwalk the man who in one version of his life questioned every single little thing, now is staring at himself and says with no question, "I want to know you better."

"Good, cause ya know I'm not that bad."

"It's not you, i'm worried about."

"You'll be ok."

They stand there reflecting on themselves and each other for a moment.  Then a nearby payphone rings.  The man on the boardwalk looks to it confused.  The man on the beach smiles and runs down to
the stairs and up to the boardwalk, so he does not step on the dunes.  He then runs to get the phone.

and answers, "Hello?'

The man who was writing just watches, confused, but willing to go where he needs to go, because now he was facing himself, and not a self hiding in visions of loving fantasy women that he used to think were more real and gave him more life than whatever else he himself had to offer, but a self that was truly present and alive and confident...standing alone.

That self who came from the beach still talks on the phone.  "Hey, long time...How are you?...You know what? I’m Ok actually...go figure right?...really?...wow that sounds great...so they want me on the show?...am I interested?" Repeating back the question for the sake of the man on the
boardwalk...who slowly shakes his head yes...

On the phone the other man, the other self, continues, "Yeah yeah that sounds great...so
when do they need me?...ok good...no it’s just i’m doin a little soul searchin’...gettin to
know my self a little better..blah blah blah...yeah you know...oh and check this out...I think I gotta screenplay outta this whole thing..yeah ya know semi true story crap about a hollywood has been who
goes home yadda yadda...i know been a done a million times...but you know what this is My story...and...and never mind..I’ll let ya read it when I get back...listen I gotta go, so i
gotta a few weeks right?...alright I’ll call ya later...bye. " He goes and sits next to himself on the bench over looking the ocean and rising sun, that they both now realize will rise again no matter where they are.

The Man from yesterday says, "So how come you didn’t just walk over the dunes?...I mean isn’t that
thinking too much...shouldn’t you of all people have just gone for it?"

"come on dude, let's walk"

They both rise and walk down the boardwalk

The man who came from the beach continues, "Ok first of all you are the one
thinking too much...see it’s cool that you don’t walk on the dunes...that’s not being
anal...that’s respecting the environment and all that stuff."

"Oh", replied the man from yesterday, just walking and taking in the moment.

"So where do you want to go?"

"Everywhere."

"Alright! now we're talking"

And then the man who was writing on the boardwalk, the man from yesterday, the man who was so lost, replies with the wisdom of his new friend, his new self..."No just walking.  One step at a time." As if each step was a blank page and he was at last ready to really write...to really live.

Then the  woman who thought she recognized him earlier watches as one single shining man walks alone down the boardwalk. One man rising again like a gypsy sunrise...at last finding a home.

                                                                                                                               FADE OUT...for now