By Jason Hardung
Yesterday I read that a person at rest generates as much heat as a 100 watt light bulb. We are all lamps. We are all easy bake ovens. It takes us hours to bake a cake by heart beat and blood alone. I wanted to be a something more, a god, a million watt deity, at least. Maybe a bolt of lightning, lazy but powerful, exposing the horizon in half-seconds across a Blood Meridian sky. Unlike my dad who after working sixteen hours a day on the railroad just wanted to nap on the couch in his underwear. At a certain point providing food is more important than illuminating the world with unsolicited wisdom. One time while playing Madden 95 he said, “It’s harder to get in the NFL than to be a god.” I took him up on his challenge but I could never break eight seconds in the 40 yard dash, I wasn’t coordinated enough to run through old tires on a green field in autumn. I took up poetry instead. I want people to feel my heat before it escapes my corpse on summer day, the room vibrating of flies, sun shining through the window like nothing is wrong. All this thinking has turned me into a small candle. It’s dark outside and the wind blows, but I am warm and I understand metaphors. I’m not really made of wax, my head really isn’t on fire.
Clutching at Straws 