LOUIS ARMAND from THE GARDEN above all, do not mistake me for someone else --Nietzsche eyes lips dreams & then night goes first night & then day & she must open her eyes & confront that other that intractable real of light & solid objects but eyes need not be open for this to be real eyes could be shut one could still be able to sense to listen to recall impressions this body this bed this room the words speak themselves from somewhere further on some external voice insisting upon the unquestionable existence of things a voice by itself spilling out of nowhere but who is speaking she thought shaking off the sleep haze of unconsciousness who or what & she felt her body lying tense & silent hopeless & beside her an other body she was listening to its breathing there in the distance like wind coursing through the street broken into an echo of an echo only which hung now suspended in silence & now called back aloud to something forgotten during the night a voice drawing her into the present time of its own cadence but what was it saying with its heavy consonants drifting one into another like waves against a shoreline something meaningless the same thing repeated over & over terminating in a restless & frustrated monotony obscuring her thoughts confusing them she opened her mouth & tried to speak a dull empty sound a knot in her throat in her lungs she shuddered slightly & stiff- ened against the ceiling a pale light flickered on & off casting a broken shadow across the side of her face her mouth was in darkness a dark cavity be-neath the black rings of her eyes outside the sound of footsteps passing below the window the ticking of a clock obstinate murmur of language strangely entangled like hair after sleep on a passive face as someone watches but what could have happened for every-thing to be & remain incomprehensible forever be-ginning with a line & then the line faltering panic arc of a seabird the futile beating of imaginary wings there where the eye breaks off suddenly & falls to-wards the water the smell of leaves & wet earth mingling with the sharp smell of salt & she felt her-self listening far off to an echo of an echo listening for the first disconnected syllables of day just before dawn actually breaks & strained to recall what it looked like when the sun rose on the blue lines of rooftops to imagine what type of sound it would make dragging itself over the dark cut of earth the ringing of granite in the desert the sudden intonations of morning prayer or whether or not the blind could believe in such a difference night & day day she murmured night as if either could mean something after all something real the way she tried to believe in a body her body this body she felt a narrow band of perspiration about her wrist when one of these hands touches the other is it true that the things in question are my own these hands touch the same things because they are the hands of the one same body the things themselves the lived presence hearing oneself understanding speaking the sound of a typewriter entering from a different room the dissonance of keys struck at irregular intervals & each sound in fluid symphony persisting obscurely like a palimpsest of notes vibrating in air like a sheet of paper deeply indented & in places cut through the barely legible traces of other texts whose characters seem to branch off in unexpected directions spreading & overflowing punctuating her thoughts confusing them one instant opening to another suddenly & with no apparent connection  Copyright © Louis Armand, 2000