I cannot remember the last time I slept twelve hours in a night. Under four blankets, waking up freezing every few hours, because I was running a hundred-and-two-degree fever. There are several reasons I am not particularly fond of this body, but the way it really sleeps only when too physically hammered to stay awake—and sleep deprivation doesn't do it, believe me—is one of them. And today I feel like someone has scooped my brain out of my head, which I also hate. What I'd like to be doing is writing about Mississippi Masala (1992), which I rented from the library this weekend and watched on Tuesday night. What I should be doing is constructing the lecture on Greek lyric poetry I am supposed to give to schreibergasse's students on Monday. What I seem to be doing is drinking tea and listening to music. If I can't engage with text, I'm not in good shape.

I don't think my fever dreams are any stranger than my ordinary dreams. A contemporary, university-based dueling culture with ritual cannibalism: in order to yield, a participant must sacrifice a body part to their opponent; casualties are eaten entire by the victor and the holmgang-circle of bystanders. I want a copy of the picture book in the style of Steven Kellogg with a mermaid whose hair trailed like luminescent sargasso for miles, the skeleton of a selkie with which a seal fell in love. There was some actual kind of mermaid in the dream, too, but not so that I remember anymore how she was involved, except that she rose up out of a pool in the art department and the bright, acid color wept off her body, leaving a lime-skinned slick on the water when she submerged again.

I don't appreciate getting two poems rejected, either.