It has nothing to do with you and you're walking around with the idea of
mothers again, like Brakhage, lowering himself onto his naked wife's body in
Wedlock House, her nipples glowing, his lips not quite sure where to go. He
lights her cigarette, the scene flashes to the windowpane, the alarm clock reads
midnight, or noon. Maybe he is remembering his mother, or not-remembering
the woman who abandoned him at birth, how she looked up without crying,
looked right into his face. How the voice probably never said What have I done?
How there was no turning back and she never did anyway. Mother. Mommy.
Wife. Woman. Bitch. Or as mother: scum, mold, the sediment of wine, the filmy
layer in fermenting liquors that shows itself, rising to the surface. As an adult,
Freud visited his mother every Sunday, he brought her flowers, he thought about
her naked, scar on his chin that reminds him of her--how long until you realize
you are no longer dreaming? A woman, driving her children into a lake, can't get
her story straight, forgets to factor in the traffic lights, the empty streets, the
timing of green to red, the permanency of green. She also forgets to drive
quickly, rolls the car into the water, watches it drift. Decades later and she's
lying on her back somewhere, maybe wishing she used the tub, or a baby pool,
I guess they weren't old enough to wash themselves, she'd say. There are worse
ways to go, she'd say. You are talking to your mother on the phone and you
forget where home is, you have no memory. Her voice is so high.