Nekisse

You ever wish you were a composer? Able to put down your thoughts into sound and rhythm and vibration. Instead of words. Because sometimes my thoughts don't really have words. They're feelings. And mood. They're tribal. Instinctual. Primal reflections from the ambient, transcendent, flood of inputs and senses. They're soft, airy trumpet and deep, resonant bass and drumsticks tapping concrete and chirping, like electronic birds and something that sounds like my heart beating in my ears when I've gone too far.

Sometimes they have textures. I wish I could express myself in bristly branches of pine needles and the broad, gloss green, veiny leaf of a giant Poplar tree.

I wish I could turn conversation into the quickening pace of ceremonial drumming at I'n Lon Schka, the face paint of shirtless, beefy Osage warriors rhythmically, almost trance-inducingly, dancing, their jingling bells and sweat and concentration guiding a conversation without words.

I wish I could tell you how I feel by letting you follow the curvature of seven hand-carved, square, wooden slats stylishly supporting the back of a rounded, antique armchair, and by studying the heiroglyphs of worm-script etched under the bark of a lodgepole pine bough arcing over my mantle.

I wish I could describe my thoughts by taking you into the cold wind and rain freezing on my thighs as I climb Sugarloaf pass near the Continental Divide, freezing my ears, nose running, feet numb, not a ray of sun to be felt. Or the shock of accidentally touching a live 220v bare wire sticking out of the wall, acid taste in my mouth like putting my tongue on 9v battery terminals.

Stepping on glass with your bare feet. Not broken glass, but perfectly smooth, perfectly clean glass, slightly cold and featureless. And then it breaks. And it cuts you. And it hurts.

The crack of a big tree falling in an ice storm.

The pink and bluish hues of the sky as muddy clouds reflect the sunsetting behind trees, behind cornfields, behind the old, red barns that used to house hay bails and scraggly old country cats.

But really, the only way I have to tell you how I feel is to let you taste my coffee. And sometimes the only way I have to tell you how the coffee tastes is to tell you how I feel. Can I beg your pardon and describe the coffee with feelings instead of descriptors?

Because somebody got shot. In the head. And I don't like it.

It's a different world on the inside. And we're not there.

She was here. With her friend and mine. She was beautiful. Always smiling. She looked like an angel. She looked so innocent. I have her picture on my phone. I think a lot of people do. And then she did whatever she does and now she's dead, murdered. I hate that.

But listen, she's like candy. She was beautiful and sweet, and let's leave her that way.

And talk about coffee.

About Nekisse.

There's a girl who takes my breath away. When I see her I autonomically stand up, increase my heart rate for better blood flow and to put some color in my face, race some blood down to the legs in case I need to dash after her. Think think. Think of something to say. Brain needs blood. Lots of stuff needs blood. Faster. Blood pressure. Good. And she touches my arm. The right one. Up high, by my shoulder. Her hand is spiritual, my skin her church. That's it. That's the feeling. The bristling pin pricks that race through my body. On my neck and down my back. Even my legs must get the goose bumps. That's Nekisse. She's the angelic chanting voice behind haunting orchestration in Pan's Labyrinth, the woman singing Ave Maria at my friend Fred's Catholic funeral, the sound of Emily Swanson's voice answering the phone when I rotary dialed her house in junior high school.

Nekisse is cold Aloe cream on a sunburnt back.

It's finally getting past Denver.

It's laughing til your abs hurt.

Nekisse is a rope swing. The rope swing my ex-girlfriend wanted - the one with the wood seat I stencilled with that Banksy silhouette of a girl letting go of a balloon shaped like a heart, and then climbed up in her tree while she was at work to tie the heavy ropes that supported that board-swing seat, and the way her happiness at the discovery of her new rope swing filled my heart with joy. (Before she let go of my balloon-shaped heart and someone stole the Banksy-inspired board.)

Nekisse is chocolate-covered strawberries.

Nay, blackberries. The blackberries I spied on the dirt singletrack trails of Turkey Mountain as I ran. The blackberries I went back in search of and spent hours wading through stabbing weeds and bushes picking, so my mom could make the sweetest, most delicious blackberry cobbler.

And I'll be roasting the very limited Nekisse on Monday night. Get it while you can.

She's like Nekisse. And we're very sorry for our friend that she's gone.

(Come in and sign up for a pound $31 or half pound $16 of Nekisse, or send me an email to get on the list.)