vanishing points

i became obsessed with 
how cavernous an image could go.
i began to see lines 
trailing from every object
like strings holding a scene in place.
we learned about dimensions
in high school drawing class
where the teacher had us all draw 
the same room.
the work of rulers. 
planting the vanishing point
in the background 
like a seed. 
the room was to have 
a sofa & a bed.
simple shapes. she told us that everything
at the end of the day was 
a simple shape. 
i drew a portrait
of myself in cubes.
a vanishing portrait.
i clutched my sketch pad & a pencil--
took them everywhere
though i never drew what i saw.
i practiced drawing that same room.
scribbling to mark 
the point everything fades into. 
i started to look for that point
at the end of roads. 
i watched everyone
walk away into it 
& cars drive recklessly
into nowhere at all. 
all the while i worked to draw line after line
connecting them back to the pit.
i curled up in the road some nights
& tried to be someone else's 
vanishing point.
in drawing class we moved on to 
new topics each week. we all made 
the same pastel beach 
& the same water color sky 
& the same sketch of a thumb.
there was something wonderful 
about repetition. about replicating
an image across a dozen hands & papers.
all those other people though
they could move on from the vanishing point
while more & more i became obsessed
with plucking it-- reaching for it
like a fruit. holding its softness
in my hand. as if maybe i could outrun 
the stretch of sight & pin myself down 
to the spot. i'd run up & down
the gravel road behind my house
but could never catch it. 
over the years fell in love
with so many boys 
to make vanishing points of--
to tie strings to & draw a kind of life. 
in high school i was bent on 
knowing the source 
of my own diminishing. 
drawing the room i tell a boy
to hold still until i'm ready 
to walk into him.