falling asleep while reading

see note for reviewers.

the process begins & though you

understand where it will end up

as you have certainly been there

before you let yourself drift the

whole while the characters that

were once so vibrant in your head

now slowly leaving the situation

altogether drifting seething in the

air thinning like smoke from a

candle growing distant and curving

twisting itself right up to the

ceiling where it may very well

completely dissipate---a moment

ago you were sitting in that very

same denny’s in japan that main

character “mary asai” had been

sitting quietly behind glasses

puffing away at her cigs & drinking

java at before the nameless jazz

trombonist walked through the door

sitting down with her before asking

politely to do so---you were at that

booth, you were sitting beside the

both of them listening to him banter

on in the attempt to flirt with the

younger cuter sister of the beauty

queen whom we will learn more about

as the tale carries on (you know this

because this is the 2^nd time reading

murakami’s after dark, just one of the

many many marvels that he has so

graciously woven for our perusal in

his lifetime---reading such a perfectly

orchestrated tale can’t be done only

once)---yet you feel your eyes falling,

the lids are doing ab crunches for the

eyes, you know they must have been

paying attention during the late late

night channel flicking & pausing at

whatever moronic exercise scheme was

being shot out at you prior to the birds

awaking & chirping---you let your eyes

get lazy however & the crunches started

to waver, leaving a final slump where

the lashes of the top kissed the lashes on

the bottom for a little too long, certainly

if they had been in a library, a grocery store

or another public place someone might have

shouted “get a room!”---then you begin to

take note of the extremities that you can no

longer define now that your eyes are shut

tight---the hands the arms the legs they seem

to have begun evaporating themselves,

meshing with the whole outside & knowing

full well that you are not fully asleep yet &

still a new feeling maybe a numbness, for

lack of a better term---it begins to wash

over you---now you ponder is this what

people speak of when they are meditating?

but it can’t be because people who do so

brag of focus & you are clearly not there yet,

as your mind remembers david blaine

speaking about a quick trick he learned when

he was a kid where in knowing already that

smoke itself is flammable, you can put a candle

out then hold a new match in the drifting

smoke which will thus ignite it & the flame

will follow that smoke trail right back down to

the candle itself, re-lighting it---this new

energy flowing in your brain can’t add itself

to the tired sleeping feeling so instead it now

contributes to this new awakeness as the writer

who was reading & was invested in this

wondrous story, sitting at the denny’s, walking

through the conversation with these two

young people comes to a close---he gets up

from his chair, eyes wide & alert---he sits down

at his PC and his fingers begin to tip-toe over

the keys.  voila!

 

Author's Note

“You don’t remember me, do you?”
Mari inclines her head slightly. This could mean either yes or no. She takes off her glasses and sets them down beside her coffee cup.

-from After Dark, by Haruki Murakami