Shel Graves' Sensorium

Taste: black pepper Touch: silky hair Sight: a drenched sea of salmon-colored leaves beneath red spires of trees; a single, oval (lanceolate) red leaf, leaf shapes include: oblong, elliptical, obovate, ovoid, spatulate Smell: overpowering floral sanitizer; pumpkin gut Sound: rain splashes into the overflowing fountain; "...a certain hybrid vigor, a fresh extravagance..." Tracy Kidder's description of a non-native speaker's English in Strength in What Remains Extra: loss of consumption, stolen consumer products, leaving valuables blithely behind, in carefree trust, only to regret their theft: a wallet, a laptop, books; scrabbling in a sandy shore, pale, red fish leaping over shoulder on to a mound of sand, grey fish flop up from the sand pit; Samuel Taylor Coleridge born Oct. 21, 1772 - interested in the Utopian idea of social organization — Pantisocracy, from the Greek isokratia, 'equality of power'

Taste: dust salt: peanuts, chunk salt: pretzels, mist salt: sea; nutmeg in banana bread, tumeric and chiles in pakoras Touch: a loose flap Sight: broken dance shoes; a flame-red row of burning bushes Smell: stale fast food in an enclosed space: processed chicken sandwich with ranch dressing Sound: Gatekeeper ; the whine of airplane wings manuvering for landing; a child's muffled cries Extra: happycow.net ; a maternity t-shirt: loading ; an empty downtown, an empty house

Taste: spicy, hot, cool salsas: black bean, mango, and fresh tomato; jackass bitters Touch: windblown staggering; gritty guava Sight: a rock jaguar; a window in a cave looking out to rock teeth, to rainforest; a flock of white birds hanging over black ocean, white bats; fruit bats, insect bats Smell: dankness Sound: Bananarama Beach; "Dragonfly," "Winterborn," (This Sacrifice), Cruxshadows Extra: Jaguar Gods; xibalba (shebalba) — place of fright

Taste: sea salt; melon Touch: rocking, humid sweat Sight: Mayan ruins overlooking the ocean; slim silver: flying fish; spherical rainbows, a mist of sea spray in slow motion; stingrays, reefs, cerulean sea Smell: cologne Sound: music that matches the ocean; Playa del Carmen; "Revolution," Detonation , Modulate ; "Sugarbomb," Cruciform Injection Extra: Ah Puch, God of Death; Ixchel, the midwife; when everything was/is animated: temples and trees

Taste: red peppers in tortilla soup Touch: soft stuffed: a full suitcase Sight: Painwater Rd Smell: garlic salt air Sound: a ship's horn Extra: a librarian drives her bookmobile to Amish country; a taxi driver puts his daughter through medical school

Taste: salt, soy, oil Touch: crisp, crackly, random: popcorn cities, popcorn sculptures Sight: one yellow squash, two yellow bananas, three industrial yellow bathroom doors; an arc of silver light, an undulating jelly blue, a red and green tree, reddish autumnal evening light Smell: Russian Tea: lemon, orange, cloves, and black tea Sound: Shelmerdine; ice music Extra: October: Vegan Month of Food, VeganMoFo, October 1 World Vegetarian Day and the first day of Vegetarian Awareness Month. World Vegan Day is November 1 , the beginning of World Vegan Month.; shooting up out of a forest clearing, beyond the mountains into a blue sky looking down at a castle it becomes golden, bursts into music; sinking into a reddish pheromone-laden sponge flecked by glittering gold