The Somnambule's Crime
Vermeer Highway
At
the Smithsonian a small model of the Reversible Potomac is added to a discreet
display cage. Yesterday Vermeer and I watched six blonde handbills being blown
across a plaza by huge oscillating fans. A movie no doubt. Over in a corner we
eventually discover those infamous “flashlights of early July” which look
like small decaying storm clouds. What is their purpose. To distinguish
undistinguished butter-knives from exemplary teaspoons. Vermeer is too busy to
enjoy a cigarette while observing a crustacean whose hydraulic gestures remind
us of that invertebrate Cortez. Hey. There’s a diorama of a green and red
hummingbird drowning in a child’s tea cup. Many of the local ruins are passing
out green party hats. Toward all this this we maintain our primitive editorial
distance. We often attend performances of “Aida” and eventually we believe
sleepwalkers listen to pirate country stations. Sound men possess a non-academic
whimsy yet also become elegiac over this or that porcelain-veined peasant gal.
Across some of the smaller streets it has begun to rain lending a dangerous
patina to immigrant vendors. When they’re arrested a party is thrown.