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Notes to Amy

by Richard Garni

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This is how my life has changed since I met you:

a) I own two toothbrushes.

I asked you: what is your favorite color and you answered black or red
is nice and I said what about green and you said green is nice

One of my toothbrushes is green, the other, black and red

for your small mouth with which you are able to furnish me
with kisses. It's like furniture. Comfortable pieces of furniture;
a little crowded. Many kisses are here; they're anywhere you look.

b) I look at English Romantic Poets.

They're not fuddy duddies to me.

c) Tropical Rain Bubble Bath

non-toxic

d) I remember the line "all that remains of Clementis is the cap on
Gottwald's head" from Kundera's Laughter & Forgetting.

But I don't remember most of the nouns.

So I remember "All that remains of ________is the hat on _________'s
head."

e) I show off. I showed you a jar of honey and my saw.

Doesn't it smell like _______? I asked. No, you said, I think that it
smells like ________.

________love ________ is what mmost important thing to say becomes.

My nouns return when I smell _________(chocolate) on your skin.

(I love you, it becomes. The honey smells like pipe tobacco.)

f) I buy flowers.

Gerberia daisies make me think of kitchens. Funeral wreaths make me
think of funerals. The prettiest flowers you can buy are for funerals
but I don't think about funerals now

g) I don't think about funerals

hardly ever

h) I just think about flowers

the carnations would not open, you said, because they are
store-bought; but they did. They wanted to see you. Then they closed.

"Mommy will be back," I said, "Friday." They closed until Friday.
It was a good Friday.

"I'm the easiest person in the world to please," you said

i) "just give me carnations."

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