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extra princes goDeep down. And so many words between me and enlightenment, between me and death. I feel the pain in my heart as I write this...which is to say I feel the agony in my face - like a burgeoning shriek of disgust and appal. Something new. Something I have never felt before. The hopelessness of it. The bed calls, the cards. I roll them around, fifteen times widdershins. Finish on two hearts. Zen Tit. One ace off. More than one. Two off. More than two. Nothing. Must take a punt. One. Nothing. Start again. Hearts and clubs. Joker. More than one. Put the coins in. Fuck out on 32. Doomed. Start again. Spades and spades. Bar. Win with cheating. No good. Play again. Play the last game. Cigarette, piss. Holy Gonfalon. Move coins. Deal. Hearts and diamonds. Ethnic. Take a cheat. Fucked. One more. The very last. Spades and hearts. Zen Rough. One. Two. Play the coins. Three. Play again. Fucked.
Why not? It's all I'm good for.
Move to the desk. Get away from this god damn bed.
Whither now Mr Light?
They text.
Fuck...off. Fucking leave me alone!
One more game. Score big with all the best bonuses.
...so know, there being eight kinds of creature with power - the Wicce, the Wǣrloga, the Wyrm, the Sceadugenga, the Shaman, the Strigoi, the Grande Putto and the Lunatic. Of these the Wǣrloga is the most magical and powerful, as he commands not only the ring, the sword, the brone, the sanctum and the she-devils, he is also in league with no lesser or greater than three gross Machine Elves - of the self transmuting genus (the higher order). These elves can be anything at any time - slave, assassin, warrior, mage, bard, craftsman, midwife, monster, concoction, drug, healer, tool, oracle, orator, sage, succour, factory, sanctuary, fabric, engine, structure and element. Or any plant or creature in the universe. Or any machine. They are of unimaginable intelligence and strangeness.
The Wǣrloga himself is a master magician of every path. He commands the light and the darkness, the land and the sea and the air. He summons fire and death - and sways life with the beauty of his song. He is one with life, and yet wild in the sense only a man can be; For he shatters oaths, unseats power, and is a master of deception, war and politics. So in a sense he both betrays nature and betrays the world of men, for he abides by no law or scripture other than that of his heart, and thus he sees the world of life and the world of mind and the world of death - all worlds - as one.
Roll on darkness. Take me in your arms. Comfort me this night, make me your lover...and banish the world of men. Flow through me and reveal the mystery.
Eddies of cooler air in the room. The small window is open. It stinks of weed and tobacco, no doubt. Noises outside. Coughing. In the boscage some rustling - a rat by the sounds of it. I noticed that a few of the cigarette butts have disappeared from the tarpaulin covering the canoe. Are they eating them? Are they addicted now?
Wax falls from the candle. I was in a dream. Another cigarette. The ice is melting on the canoe. Frozen Britain. My hand is warm near the small desk lamp. It is made of steel and burns hot. I can feel the heat even from the keyboard.
And so it is 4:38, a magic time, as I open my heart on these few weeks. Look at this: I am right here.
Have I been busy at work - or am I faking it? Certainly; there is too much to do - too much for me to do. It's not sustainable. Money appeared, meetings convened, lunches occurred, electronics were bought, dodgy deals prepared. Unravel this time and you let slip a flock of crazy sheets, curling and fluttering and batting and flapping like speeded-up drunken gulls with four giant wings each made of rice paper towels tied loosely with flayed cord and painted with scenes by a pharmamaniac. I can make nothing of it. It's like walking along the bottom of a ditch.
Imagine, for example, I am with one - let us say the youthful redhead with the bandaged arm - one who self-harms - one with a good body and years of festival flight time: One that everyone fancies. Let's say I'm with her, perhaps outside Henry's Beard late one night, and I have lost three stones, gained a tan and we are both a little high and some amazing miracle has transpired where we have actually enjoyed each other's company for an hour or two...
...and she says; Will you come back to my tent with me tonight? Will you sleep with me?
In one way I am an old man, and in another way we are both children - in different ways. I would be so nervous, so hopeless, so vulnerable. You don't want me - not in that way. It may be nothing to you, but it would ruin me, however it may end.
Not in this world.
There was a moment, back in the Nineties, where I found myself in a sitting room with a woman - talking. Her partner was upstairs sleeping off a hangover, for the previous evening he had celebrated his birthday.
I had bought him a late present - a bottle of whiskey, I recall.
We sat there and the conversation unfolded. After a while, no more than 10 minutes I suppose, I began to feel tearful. I didn't recall ever sitting with a woman like this, alone, talking. She seemed comfortable and amused. I felt the tears welling up. I made excuses and left. I must have been about 35.
Silent times now. Deep in some occasional esoteric bifurcation, an obscure wormhole of sorts, one with a negative value. Magic comes in strange, unpalatable forms - in the form of dreams and sick fantasies: half-baked and puffed with a pride of uniqueness. Always away, never here, the reality hidden sometimes and the mask revealed at others. We sit in silence, waiting for a spell to manifest. There is only this madness - like a Shepard tone, in suspension. A neverending neutrality and ten billion worse ways to live.
But the sound of crickets and toads or frogs - coming from speakers either side me. I might make it to summer. Dream with me. Sleep, and dream of me with croutons.
Anything but face this page again. I am looking for something...
QueckI am dressed in bed: Combat trousers, T-shirt, hoodie, beanie hat. Sleepbot plays. Candles burn. I have everything I need, but not a voice. At this moment only Astarte herself could know how I yearn for a birth. And I need her now - to plant her love, to give me life.
Of course, she can also kill. Many of the old matriarchs were like that: Fervid and fecund, blowing warm milk from the teats and swimming in the blood of hapless men. A fifty-foot titan, a monstrous contradiction, a schizophrenic psychopath shrieking like lightning on cold black iron in a heady stink of ancient horror. To be fair, what a privilege - if she were to kill with love and sexual lust, and not hate, as one would wish of a Goddess (or any lover). For me, to be killed by a woman's hand, tenderly and with wanting, must be best...
Kill me then, and take me back inside you. I'll exist as your memory of me. I will be the thrill you experienced at the dénouement. Everything I was would be reduced to the recollection of how you felt, at that moment of passing, from between your legs.
But not now, if you may. I have a little rain to conjure. I need to cast my thoughts as if to throw a bundle of sticks on the ground like a madman in a storm... And then perhaps some neotenous glossolalia; like the gawk of a victim, one of the unenlightened believers, a naked monkey, who thinks the sun is a memory, who lives a brutal lie.
Or perhaps an apprentice of distortion; so easily misled and misleading. Then let me be; to evaporate into nothing, with nothing, from nothing. You see how it falls. You move away, even if I freeze and do not look.
Or let me come to term. A moment: A realisation: A kindle in the shadow. I do not need much. And I expect very little. To move you would be something - to stop you. Who would need more? Perhaps one day I may speak. Then a miracle would have occurred. And even if every word is lost, as it was with the Phoenicians, it would still be a miracle. I would have found my soul.
Let me dream for you, and walk by like a stranger from an old memory. Do you see? You see how it falls?
A walk to Richmond by the river. Layer of wet leaf matter on the path feels like dead skin from blisters under my boots. At first I am afraid of falling but I find that the friction is good. On the way back I sit on the bench facing Marble Hill House. Young men play football in the distance. It has been so long since I put pen to paper and I find it difficult. I find that I cannot read my own writing. What is happening to me? The sun comes out brightly. I consider myself a fat man. I resolve to shop for smoked salmon and beer. I realise I saw nothing on the way here - not even the people. I was in another world.
A girl on a pink bicycle scatters a few pigeons. Here is a man with a small black dog.
The sun buffets my eyes, brings a warmth to my form and the grass and the bench. Everything is soaked through and slick. It's akin to staring at a bright light under water, like Ophelia's last apparition.
Neat rows of leaves on a young tree nearby. They shiver in the breeze in the manner of ankle rattles at the climax of a dance. Another sapling close-by like pencil strokes - a delicate fissure directly in line with the sun. It occurs to me that the sun is a raging star - just far away. I feel uncomfortable putting this down. Surely I will die soon. I cannot live this way. No-one will come.
A flash of Home Ground, in front of the Pyramid Stage. I sleep. I dream.
They come, in a fashion, and speak to us. They are our neighbours and one of them has passed away. It is felt that I should attend the wake - a memorial - a party of sorts. Up I sense, to the rooftops, high, very high, feeling uncertain of my place - so little have I seen of these people. It is expansive there, resembling LA. Everything is whitewashed plaster, the geometry variegated, as on the set of a Spaghetti Western, some awnings and trestle tables. They are all Indians; Sikhs apparently, but mostly young and Westernised. His name was Peter. A flash of a photo. Him standing formally on his own, wearing a suit and a turban. An attractive woman hands me a bottle. Champagne, she says, very expensive. She gives it to me because she understands I am proficient at opening such bottles. They do not want to waste any and it would be an honour, as it was Peter's favourite drink. I notice that the bottle has an odd shape - more of a fat decanter, very rotund, like a Bocksbeutel, all round. As I remove the foil I notice the cork is even more unusual. It covers the broad spout like a flat-cap mushroom, and is ragged around the edges - asymmetric. The liquid inside is Rosé. It explodes out of the bottle in a geyser the breadth of a knitting needle. In a panic I realise I am losing the precious drink and at the same time making a fool of myself. With a flash of inspiration I hold the wide concave cork over the spout and direct the liquid back into the bottle. So it goes, in circular fashion; a jet of Rosé rebounding at an angle off the cork back into the bottle, which now seems enormous. It fizzes and boils - in close-up. Here I realise that the liquid is losing its effervescence. It settles and I hand the bottle to a man who pours it into flutes. He gives out the glasses, but I do not get one. I wander around the rooftop, smoking.
Here I remember a woman somehow. A brief and tenuous assignation. I cast the cigarette away but there is danger of a fire. I find myself in a white-walled bedroom, looking for the burning stub. I focus and refocus. There is some alarm - some form of communication of the circumstances - as if by radio. I am lying on the floor and my eyes are scanning the immediate area - no further away than an arms-length, like a zoom lens. Suddenly I see it; a coil of smoke rising inches from my eyes. I pick up the cigarette and immediately the scene changes. Men appear, all Anglos, all late forties or early fifties and all electrical engineers or technicians of some sort. Exactly the type of lower middle class professionals you find on production crews of big league films. They are jovial and friendly. Everyone arrives at a consensus that I had located the burning cigarette butt only because I had been inspired by a particular episode of Dr Who. One pulls a DVD of the very episode from a shelf. After meeting some of the Sikh family - all handsome young men - highly Westernised - bordering on criminal - I go down - I descend...
Down, down through hidden stairwells - far down. I find myself at ground level in pleasant surroundings.
I am in front of a quaint pen shop - reminiscent of something you would find in Cornwall. The walls are white. The awning is black and the display window dark. Both are so low I almost have to stoop to see in. In the window are displayed the pens, but they are huge, the size of plantains, and of strange, futuristic (presumably ergonomic) designs. They appear to be fountain pens. I enter the shop through a very narrow door and I am confronted with a narrow passageway partially blocked by a black pram. The counter is to my left and a man behind it offers to take my rucksack. In the back of the shop I sit at a table examining the pens. Two men approach and sit down. I explain my difficulties in writing and my belief in how a fountain pen might help me. I show them my Moleskin notebook and a picture of the interior of the shop that I had taken on my previous visit - only a week before. They read my diary therein and remark with some amusement the note from last week that a cricket team at the TUC conference had scored 137-6. They seem struck at the historical significance of this - the very fact that this was last week's news seems a poignant commentary on society and culture.
Suddenly I am outside the shop and meet with my cousin. She talks briefly of Glastonbury and introduces me to her friend - a long-haired brunette. Her friend indicates her desire to attend the festival and reveals her plan to gain access by ascending a perilous looking slide on the building next to us. It's like a water slide - leading up of course, but dry, narrow and rocky with a dry stone wall. It seems dangerous and I offer to get her into the festival myself - explaining that I know of a better way. Nearby is a stately house with wrought iron gates. This, I assure her, is a better way to gain entry, but as we approach a servant appears and a large dog and the wrought iron gate begins to close. The servant explains that if we wish to enter the festival we should try the library - just round the corner. The woman - my cousin's friend - is beginning to change. At first she seemed a little rough and brash - now she is becoming more attractive, responsive and vulnerable. The library is in a fact a US border station - manned by Rangers - with vehicle barriers and fencing. Cars are streaming out in our direction. There seems to be a bit of a jam. I notice a black cab and behind it a strange vehicle with what seems like an elongated hook protruding from the front - something like an upside-down stylus. So close it gets that the hook goes underneath the rear bumper of the cab and it causes both vehicles to slide as they turn to move round a barrier. We manage to blag our way through and find ourselves in a cavernous space like a warehouse - but embellished in a futuristic industrial dystopian fashion - like a set from an Alien movie - or a Laserquest shooting range. There are hundreds of people milling around - all with rucksacks - all trying to get into the festival. I have to crawl along a narrow ledge high up on one of the walls and reach a ladder made of elastic bands, bulldog clips and bars of steel. I now have two hats and a small backpack which I put onto a dumb waiter. I then ascend the ladder briskly, surprised at my strength. Suddenly I am with the brunette walking on a narrow lane amid a stream of people. The setting is idyllic - beautiful cottages and trees and as we turn a corner I find that there is an open-air disco. Lights have been strung in the trees and speakers for the music. At this moment I realise I am wearing my blaze orange hi-vis vest - standard kit for Oxfam Stewards - and I am wearing my Boony Hat. I am enjoying myself so much I begin to dance while I am walking - and I am chatting and jeering at other punters. I am generally acting like a Pikey - to the amusement and occasionally shock of the crowd. Again we turn a corner and reach a small glass passageway between two buildings that is acting like a gate. There are three young blokes on duty - all Oxfam Stewards - and I begin to blag them. I tell them I recognise them but they do not seem to recognise me. We discuss a gnome over the doorway. They joke about it. As I say, they are young guys - and somehow typical of their sort: Smallish, seemingly feminised, bright. They see that I am wearing a wristband and agree to let me enter, but they will not let the brunette enter. Here I begin to gain consciousness. I intercede and cast a logic bomb, shaking the structure, getting the brunette passage through the gate. For a moment I stand with her on the inside as I woke.
A dream then, and tonight - strange moments of delight. Gales and rain inside the mother. Where does this warmth come from? Falling, I feel the change - slow - a yawing. Nothing lasts - not even nothing.
Strange things have been happening, Fey...
fallA holding pattern, of course, a sudden burst of light, the craziness of finding myself here, against all the odds. Perhaps I will live, after all. Perhaps a hidden sheet of blood will dissipate, a heart will appear - some such conceit; And break it up like bread and drink it with chilled red wine. Panic sets in. I knew this place. This was a place. And four weeks is a fan of cards, if you like, on a wooden terrace over the water, and a blind boatman who sings in the night, and his lantern flickers like shorting neon in the mist.
My Jack tonight is a dark figure on the embankment lighting a cigarette. I approach cautiously. He holds out a hand in friendship. In mine a twenty layered in palm. As we turn he slips me the weed and we walk talking of the evenings and lives teetering on the edge of a fall.
To meet the same card four weeks ago I walked the dark road to a failing pub. On the way I see a Four of Clubs ahead of me, walking unbelievably slowly. My heart leaps. He has a plastic bag, a broken arm, and his hair is long and lank and thick with grease, ragged beard like dead black dune grass foaming, falling, from gaunt cheeks, and haunted eyes.
It seems incredible that he can take to the streets - almost funny. He must be moving at about 0.2mph. I am on full alert as I overtake him - in case he tumbles. I've seen them do it even when they can't see you. Perhaps it's the pheromones; or the air pressure.
Ten seconds later I pass an independent place - seems to have a following - authentic Italian - suchlike. In the window inches from me an attractive young couple, well-dressed, the woman with long and carefully kept hair, a bright and healthy face, she glances up at me as fleeting as the shadow of a Robin. I look down. He will be coming after, long after, and they will share a special pain - marked with contrasting shades of shame. As always, the edge, the interface, will be most interesting.
He arrived, eventually, while I sat outside with whiskey and ice. He bummed a cigarette. I may have put it in his mouth. When he had made a few yards the Jack appeared with another and they all talked briefly at volume. The Jack told me later of his doomed adventures, his wife and daughter. I would have bought him a pint, but what good would it do? We would never get rid of him. I told him we were talking business and I didn't want him around. Thing is, in that state he must have a bus pass. I reckon he's...(here he twists his hand palm-up round behind by his waist). He was alright a year ago. What fucked him up was this...(he holds up the joint he is smoking)...and the smack.
Nein. This is not the way, nor even the Ace of Hearts of hearing the meaning of Look Out For My Love break through the angst of petty anger, nor even the women I conjure up, all of them mad, as that can be the only way. Nor the hirings and firings, the insurance money, the fear, the pain, the swollen belly or playing the game to the point of discharge against the right temple.
What then?
Is there nothing other than waiting?
I saw him yesterday, another, in his wheelchair, with his gloves. I smiled deeply.
A kind of death then. Wish me luck.
a flowerThe time has come to tell a truth. I will attempt to speak clearly, for those who do not understand. If need be I will speak in dung...and put everything down. You can stop reading now if you like. Of course, that is permitted. Indeed, move away from me, for what follows here is my personal confession, between me and my god, which may be nothing more than a specious squawk to an emptiness. And, after all is said and done, after the revelations and definitions, after the dancing and the laughter, after the tears and the joy, who would want to listen to a fool and his primordial version of the truth? I am not joking: Here is no illusion: I am likely to fail (right here - in this very sentence!). In many senses I always fail. You do not need to forgive me. You do not need to hear me.
I care not for clearing my voice to sing. When I open my mouth out comes a wheeze and a croak. My skin is raw...coated, my blood polluted, my heart feels weak, my body and soul broken. Like the dreamed cancer on the back of my hand, I turn to dust...to disappear like a dried petal rubbed between two rough palms. It is as red rust tasting sweet and infected - a scab turning to a powder with a mythical, mechanical corruption. I am dizzy and reeling. My ears ring. I feel like the modern man, which is to say I feel like a clown trapped in a machine. I am permanently ill and I dream of my own death.
But a blossom came - to save me. A flower made of adulterated cells, turning me to red dust to be blown in the wind; obliterating me and all my lies. She was there - the Lady of the Flowers - and so I conscripted the dream into waking hours. I forced out a pattern...no: I cast a situation. Like all waking dreams it struck a false note. But it ramified as a curio in my memory forever. Therefore I will wheeze it on this page with my nicotine breath (with my bent fingers and fragile arms), and offer it up to you and the eternal Goddess who rules this world of making. It is nothing more than an exhalation of half-grown thought - the bauble of an idiot. Let me be thereupon. Leave me forsaken. I am not a beast. I am just like you...
There are blemishes on the backs of my hands, like small burns, where I tanned so heavily at Glastonbury. My hands bore the brunt of the sun. (In one photo my fingers are wrapped around the arm of a companion and look like thick rolls of caramel candy.) There seemed to be no reason for these strange contusions other than sun damage. I have been watching them for weeks, to see if they grow.
A sickness has afflicted me of late and I found myself literally losing my mind. A week ago in a restless sleep I dreamt that one of these spots turned into a flower: a mutilated tumour of fruiting skin, complete with corolla, stigma and filaments: A living thing.
She was there at one stage, examining a film of the growth. It was a film in full Technicolor...and it reminded me of the projections in the death scene in Soylent Green. She seemed to be offering her medical expertise and fighting for my cause - somewhat distantly, of course. In many ways similar to the pro nurses who looked after me in ICU when they thought I was fucked. I hung on to two of them - Irish girls. I would ask them when their next shift was and feel a wave of relief wash over me when they appeared. I counted down the hours in fear to when they would leave and the cannon fodder took over. To me The Lady was the same kind of bird - young, healthy, intelligent, friendly, relentless, disciplined, professional, knowledgeable, indomitable, brave and popular. The right level of cheerfulness and confidence - which always go hand in hand and produce the most powerful spell. God knows what it would be like to hold such a creature in your arms. I forgive myself for falling under her geis, as she was certainly such a woman, and to shed tears over the loss of never knowing her seems like a noble consequence - and not trivia, but deep and somehow dangerous and human.
The flower turned to powder, and I wondered what it would taste like on the tip of my tongue - and whether it would poison me.
The following night I dreamt I was terminally ill, and my 'friends' threw me a dying party. My GP was there, making calculations. The prognosis varied, but finally she gave me two years. There was much revelry and it seemed so real.
I can hear choral music. I am still going out of my mind. Two notes, over and over, at a high pitch. Reality has the quality of a stainless steel table. If Mick had come up with the goods I would be fine. Mick and his miraculous bar... The patch on my left hand stings like a burn. My palms are dry. My left eye is bloodshot and my stomach sick. Jesus, when will this sickness end...
Speed of horse. Use all chains. Kill the dragon. Settle the waters. Now drift into dream life. Forgive yourself and be redeemed. There must be a way out of here. There must be something...
A captain's bunk in a deserted boat, deserted but for her and her patient. I awake. I am sick. She pumps clear liquid into my cannula, gives me oxygen and pills and changes the drips. Every two hours she measures my blood pressure. When it is too low she wraps the pad around my ankle to get a another reading. I wonder why. She checks the electrocardiograph on the hour and three times a day brings a tray of food and a jug of water. In the morning I sit in a chair while she changes the sheets. She asks me if I need help washing and I decline. I have no catheter, give me that - indulge me. Let's say a pot to piss in and a trip to the head twice a day to make poo-poo. It can be done. It's achievable.
She wears Crocs. Avoids conversation tactically.
The night is still. I stand at the window to smoke and look down in defeat and exhaustion. With cigarette between my fingers I rub the base of my palm onto my forehead, transferring some grease, taking care not to knock my glasses off, and not a whisper moves the leaves, just the rustle of some animal in the wall of bushes. Drink? Not Diet Coke, she says, water. The caffeine will keep you awake. Water then. And lie and pray for the hand of god to guide me to another time.
water
of glassAn opportunity. The Goddess has blessed me with time, comfort, her product and solutions. A false start, believing an old book is resurrect. It showed me that we are not alone, in a sense. But here I stand alone, as he did. This is now. This is me.
An explosion outside - maybe on the island - big enough to shake the windows. I am alive here.
I put my head outside and hear sirens, shouting in the distance, the faint smell of burning. My mother calls. There has indeed been an explosion on the island. There is a big fire.
Judyastley says: "Massive fire on Eel Pie Island here in Twickenham, & not for first time. Huge flames and explosions. On riverbank opposite - scary."
Right fucking now.
All Hell breaks loose. Sirens, my mother calls out again. Is that a chopper I hear? One of the boatyards for sure. Who is that guy, he was in the local just yesterday - Bob Tuft, Turk? Planes going over - can they see the fire from up there? I can see nothing; I cannot leave this room and the view is blocked by the wall outside which fences me off (thank Christ). I can smell the burning even in here - or perhaps my imagination. God help them. I've been thinking about the island much of late - imagining Terence going there, even today, and this afternoon, dreamt of The Abel - an Island Man back in the day. Debt was a feature - and real ale - and I saw an island type earlier and imagined myself with her.
I must keep typing. I would stand on the windowsill as of old but if I fall out now I am doomed.
God...forgive me. It is quiet now. LBC. Nick Abbott begins to grate. He is writing his own score of reality on the fabric of chaos. I can't stand it. A chopper hovers outside...over this hive...switch off the radio...there is nothing there...people may have died at that moment...there is so much gas around here: Only a couple of weeks ago a prick blew the gasket on a big canister outside the Barmy Arms. I got up and ran like the others. Lots of boats moored up there - and the yards - pre-fabs - with no electric maybe - they used to bring them up river on barges. At first I wondered if it was a nuke - in town - probably fanatics - only a matter of time - you can make a nuke with a death wish psychosis and the right chemicals, or buy one from North Korea - it's good project work - a good hobby - a great way to go: high on hate. I lived through the Eighties - in the firing line, which was everywhere really.
Run away, zip up this suit. Roll on time to the early hours, when I am alone. This is why I cannot sleep now. Nearly all my life I have dreamt of being totally alone. Nearly all my life I have been lonely. My mother and father bought me a fantastic digger as a child, and I hid in the box: I was only interested in the box. I am fighting the good fight.
When into the womb of time everything is again withdrawn chaos will be restored...
Soft, soft...look at me. Let them depart. Settle in the water. Drift with the current. Be five-fold blazon. Please forgive this world.
I write in code.
I was just on the desktop reading The Gate. The word 'I' kept leaping out at me - over and over. The same kind of sentence always. Hugh told me I used the sentence - really used the sentence - and now it seemed like the same sentence again and again, always beginning with 'I'.
Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis breaks through. England my England, you are a dream and we dreamed you. You have a life now. I can see the same kind of visionary life with these walls of words, as here you break into the life of the world, this runaway freight train, this complexification, this Gaia, this Wyrd...a word. A world of song; penetrating, sibylline, soft...timeless, destructible and strange.
That's how wrecked I am. But it's why.
Only so much.
Dear
Joseph, God Preserve You, that you are well enough and survived the ordeal.
It is His Miracle.
I am your brother Jacob!
My heart soared when I heard of your life and heart intact - controvert to the torture and death that awaited you otherwise. It is our blessing that we both live on.
I need to tell you, that no world is without God, either a seemingly Godless one - or moreover one which would dispose a falsehood of God. God is in our hearts and with us forever, for Love is eternal, and God is Love.
My brother, I must tell you - that I am here. I am plainly here, though I faced the same ordeal at the behest of the Panegyric Elf Machines of The Dome. I am here; sending these words through the ether to you...
My brother, I played their fiendish game of Fives - and desolated them. My final score was 221.
Here, in great mathom, the sectional currencies measure an abundance of ninety-five times ten to the power of twelve. This figure being meaningless, as, according to the Eternal Book, I was offered Pan-Anamnetic Sublimation in the Cause of Multiplicity. I became - I say now - an Immortal Weredragon Thaumaturge of the 100th level. Thus changed I was offered, and accepted, a Fey army, a church, a great nation - the world, no less.
And not least: The eternal ardor of 36 Amberlabolianite She-Demons.
I have several artifacts: one being the Slavender, a form of brone, which lives inside me at the perineum. It has immortal powers over the arcane, over nature, over knowledge, but most of all over the mind and heart of all things feminine.
I also have a ring - The Ring of Carnonos - which confers many great powers of life, liberty and safety. It carries flying blades of sword-like moonlight, the very Blades of Ellender no less, whose devastating effect I hope I will never need to deploy. The Ring is the master of 36 lesser rings, each with their own amazing powers. These lesser rings are fully under the spell of their father, Carnonos, and all the bearers of the lesser rings conjunct in mind and soul with the owner of the said master. Needless to say, these 36 bands are on the hands of my new lovers.
Thus my Amberlabolianite She-Demons are ebounden to me - through undying love, worship, a lust to be near the Slavender and the mastery of The Ring.
There are other powers, lesser, as great or greater than these. God willing, one day I may find the courage to tell you of them.
141 days have passed here, at my Castle Bran (though mark that I have the ability to stop and transcend time itself). I am awake each morning in the glory of the Sun to the love and attention of the She-Demons. Dear Joseph, I tell you now, they are of such beauty, of such devotion, that I fear any lesser being may be shattered by the fearsomeness of their idolatry - intensely personable though it be. It is love, but it is more than love: It is the love of beings perfect in themselves - given in fulfillment to me, a living god. Deus misereatur!
These days unfold in relentless fashion: Always I awake at dawn in a god-like dream, with one naked in my arms, or in easy repose over me, perhaps one or two others by her side (as you testify with the Zenebilganubians - these creatures have no familiarity with shame). In the morning's distance - the sounds of gaiety and feminine chatter, wind in the treetops, which we may look down upon, and the twittering of the myriad birds which reside therein and alight brightly on my towers.
I ruminate on my powers over an effervescent breakfast brought to my chambers; a banquet of the finest fare you could conceive of. The She-Demons I made love to and lay quiescent among during the night are joined by others with a fervid hunger for my company. One or two will tease me then; sit on my lap and whisper sweet things in my ear with a faux constraint, and they touch me softly and plead to share my bed.
Thus only the mornings present themselves - and pour accordingly like golden nectar into nights of such revelry and bliss that I cannot say here at this time - in the confinements befitted by this medium. God bless you Joseph, I must go now. Keep heart, and I will transmit to you once again soon. An evening feast is being prepared and I may, with Grace, spare a thought for you and your Zenebilganubians. Keep heart, as we may still live in the light of God's Will.
Your loving brother.
I am beginning a trip now, into the maw of whatever is on me. I had all of last week off, somewhat unsteady, just coughing up clear slime; and tonight I feel my skin begin to bristle. This Kirlian effect brings me back to the body...and in some sense back to the roundhouse; back to my ancestors. This feeling is timeless. Perhaps it is as old as the pineal foramen.
No work at the gallery tomorrow. No work at the office next week. I know this now, thank God. I sense movement. I am about to sail into the mystic - the wilderness of sickness; perhaps a hospital bed again; perhaps death. It is about to get much worse. Blessed be. Come for me. I will fight them on the beaches.
I am typing to stay alive, to stay myself.
Once they sat around the fire in hooded cloaks, feeling themselves slip away. Darkness is eternal around a fire inside. The fire breathes its children into a history of nights. Faces are cast in amber, in sangria, in orange peel and gamboge, in tenné and vermilion, in persimmon and rust, and in the light of dawn for the living in peach-yellow and apricot. Wan is the fire then, and the day seems defeated - a lost battle of toil. In the light of the fire we sang the gods into being: In the light of day we scrabbled for our rations. Hence the pineal gland.
Uisge beatha, carefully measured, and poured with due reverence. I sit in my own hooded cloak, a fleece chav top; deep blue, bullshit on the screen to my left. The thermostat clicks and the electric heater comes on. Aural ruffling from the desk fan gives me the white noise I need. Music is unnecessary. I think of two She-Demons - sisters - with long slate hair and heavy tans. Their toes and nails are perfect. Their breasts athletic with button mushroom nipples.
I can smoke now, for some reason. Perhaps the episode of convulsive hacking earlier in the evening. I can smoke, but not the Draw. Tonight is a whisky song, like the old days.
The heat has clammed my skin - dampening the Kirlian hair. There is silent mouthing on the screen. A comedian, a cook, a botanist, a cheap film and a scam phone-in. I am drifting.
My heart flutters a little. I consider reaching for the whisky and stare vacantly at the screen. There is a great stillness.
...
He lays prone: She stands. She looks like a Jewish Princess; his head is out of view. They are both naked, apart from her open black heels. She pours a little oil into her hand.
"Well, is there anywhere in particular where you would like me to work?"
He points to his cock.
"Wow, really, you know, I was worried about that. Ah...so can I? Really, that would be...How would you like me to work you all over ...and give you a complete body massage. Yes..."
She runs her hands over his chest and massages his nipples with the tips of her fingers. She arranges his cock laterally and pours more oil into her hands. She strokes his tool and it grows impressively.
"Wow. It's big. Amazing...it's like a statue."
She strokes the prick with both hands, strokes his thighs and briefly works the perineum. She cocks a leg over the bunk, moving her body over him in Egyptian profile with the prick in one hand and the other hand stroking his perfect torso. She is making a lot of noise; Gasping, moaning, sighing, chuckling. She dribbles more oil from the bottle over his glans - with a sense of ruthless urgency. All the time, one hand or another is wanking him.
She twists round so her ass rubs his leg. She squeezes her boobs together and leans down and rubs his cock between them. She raises one hand, fingers splayed, to tickle both her nipples.
His scrotum is already tight; round like a tennis ball. Her right hand moves down again to his perineum. He opens his legs slightly to give her more access. You see her hand thrusting back and forth. You see his balls retract fully. She continues to work the spot with sharp thrusting movements. Of course, she has no nails.
Therefore his member lays like a bone between his legs - sans balls. She toys with him now, giggling, sighing, grinning widely. The camera is zoomed in on the piece, she squats down somewhat so she is in the shot and strikes a pose of proud power - like she had mastered a good dance move, or a feat of prestidigitation. Her face is blushed. All the time wanking him.
She strokes him more, and her fingers dance over the glans in little waves.
Then the crescendo: She lifts up his big hand. He lazily closes his fingers around hers. His muscular limb seems dead, like he is not one to impose. She places his hand between her legs, but he seems to leave it there like the tip of a flaccid branch. A few more strokes on his piece and she grabs at his fingers and thrusts two of them inside her. She works the magic spot again with a certainty to his climax - and surely he comes a thick dose of healthy-looking ectoplasm, with her writhing on the end of his arm.
"Beautiful," she says, and strokes his emerging balls.
...
A quick hit tonight, waiting for the gene swarm to pour violence through my veins. Wrap this up and move on into sleepless agony. Lights are on and people are awake. The crumpet calls me to the breach and dreams await. Salutations!
We
are jungle creatures...and dark is all around us...
And I saw that they did not exist - I saw that. None of them were real, in a sense. It made no difference. This was my death chant, my throat rubbed raw, ripe for cancer, and I leaned out of the window to smoke. In the darkness, a variety of howling. For a moment I saw the onset of winter and my own death. The new crown is a bad fit; it still aches, though a little less, and the foliage looked brooding with a black more slick and thick this night going into my own hours. It was uniform. I had looked back on the emails to her and every one seemed like a squawk. Naturally, I had failed. In some way, Justice had been done. And last night, when I read her letter, I was off my box. He had called me back and told me it was 26 or 28 on the bar, according to the Heisenberg Principal, and that the quarter was in line with the points - Bristol Fashion 98. I had no idea what he was talking about but I stressed I was up for it. He told me he didn't like to do it, but it was all there was. He called me back 20 minutes later and said he had one and he was in The Bear.
One. One what? How much was one? One ounce - an Aussie? It had sounded like good shit - expensive. I raided the account on the way. No problem: it was two days after payday.
One was a bud you could have fit into a matchbox - for £20. Probably enough for a month. It didn't take much. The unused cash is on the floor; in flakes of 20s.
Here is a brown brick building with outside communal corridors, built in the early Seventies. The corridors have kinks, bifurcations...dead-ends. The brickwork is clean, the brown seems older, but the surfaces are cool and of a rough character - not so clammy - not so easy to rub the dirt off. It lacks that particulate dirt - sullen where you came from - and soaks up your new symptomatic air. It's a dense cold, like a firm dose of reality after acid, but with this plenum of suspended youth in a psychedelic aftershock and reverie. A grey day, but you are warm. There are modern books on anthropology on his shelves - in colour. On one page a woman's face, in orgasm, and then an uncovered family in the figuration of the studio - perfect specimens. He makes you tea - and you glance at the Fang mask. Smoking is permitted, of course. There is no filter coffee, no panini, sushi, olives or hummus in the canteen, you passed young women chalking up the details of a meeting on the floor of the square, you smoked a joint at seven this morning; he has a Mohican and took shrooms at the farm. You need change to use a phone, to ring what is left of your parents.
I am certainly dying. It's all about the pace. Is my heart fluttering with the smokes, my bloat, the cold or exhaustion? If I stop right now. Stop this foolishness. If I look into the shadows, and see eternity draw near. Please forgive me. I know not what I am.
A silent night, with a grip on my throat. Steady breathing, sips of water. I mustn't start coughing again. My lungs are open. I hope you don't mind me sitting here...
I lift my self off the bed, my arms a little fragile. Muscle wastage on the left, with a mending humerus, wrist disjointed, broken three times, once in surgery, and on the right soft tissue damage from a fall a week ago - and RSI.
All broken up. Daddy is tired now. I am burning all candles to keep warm...
...and the Zenebilganubians wait for me. Cast your net. Get the world in your eye.
...
Night passes into morning, but it hardly makes a difference.
Time for another time. I'll find a voice some other time.
Self-love,
my liege, is not so vile a sin
as self-neglecting.
I am falling then, into a different world. This world is right here, before your eyes, or in your ears, or at your fingertips. Stay with me as though you are real. Allow me to look through your eyes, see with your heart. Be with me for a moment. I need that. There is nothing else, not even time to look back on. Make every letter a glyph, every word a gesture, every line a spell. I am awoken from a nightmare and accuse the Goddess.
A hole in my fingertip from the pollen last night. It's pollen all the way now; I cannot smoke it fast enough, but it burns hot and I bit the blister earlier. It went deeper than I thought. I took the surgical bandage off to facilitate typing. There is no Internet, as such, and the heating is beyond my control. There are 30 years of things in this one room...and me at 42. I moved four suits earlier. I am in massive debt. I ordered a laptop on Sunday and feared to hear from the bank.
Wrong. It's all wrong. Why can't I get stoned? Are we not swimming in skunk? Wherefore this tradesman's gear? Where are the youngsters? Racket merciful, let us pray; Let me give eighty on the half and take my soul and the heart they gave me. Give me strength, and men who want money, and let me wish them luck and Godspeed. Let me find a voice and may the curtain of the world fall away. Perhaps my heart will beat now.
Back, back to the world. Long nights of lies, easy living and rich lunches. To whom should I complain?
The game's over - over and over. I am sick with it. They are not real otherwise, whatever I do. I am Pavlov's dog. By day I move in my tawdry brown, in my frown, squint, smiling off, zipped-up by ten on skinny cappuccino and playing at diplomacy and slavery. At night it's post-apocalypse, or on the hill in St Helena, a big dome sky, where it has come, and we play the game to win or be cut to tendrils. I never win, and I never lose. The game cannot be; although I am always sitting down to play. The day never seems to end. It never stops. Nothing exists. I am not born. Summer has gone. Stay with me. Hold my hand. What is it like.
I go out, Tuesday night, needing company and drink. I meet Alex in short order. He is at The Clubhouse. It figures. He has a tab there - currently running at around a ton. Some time ago it was up to a monkey - and the same next door at The Anchor. Dave, the landlord of The Clubhouse, is facing an eviction order. He is drinking the bar dry. So is Alex. Alex's medium is Kronenburg. Previously it was heroin, and before that it was e. He seems to be running at about fifty pints a week, with the odd bananas, which send him loopy, so he says. He is dyslexic, a programmer and overweight - like me. Heavy jowls, eyes like goitered egg sacs, and topped with a bedraggled fizz-bomb of curly brown hair, like someone had stuck a giant powder-puff on the top of his head, made of enervated pubes. He doesn't drive because of blackouts, although he tells me they have stopped. As Dave is in court tomorrow facing eviction Alex may not need to pay the tab. Dave has already lost two hundred grand. Mickey Mouse tabs are the last thing on his mind. He also has to worry about the weasels from the estate round the corner - and nutters from North London. Thank Christ he has Mick, who sold me the pollen, to keep some kind of order (with the threat of extreme violence, which Mick is certainly capable of).
It is quiet inside, just two dark-skinned locals, one a younger man - modish Asian, like Dave, lean, looking like a Junglist, the other an older man - late 40s, early fifties, with greying hair in a ponytail - looking like an Spanish e-dealer. He is a local trader - always there early evening it seems. They have ordered poppadoms and are drinking Peroni. Luckily, Mick is not here. He's been working longer hours since he got out of Wandsworth a few months ago. It's scary when he sees someone he doesn't like and Alex and I can't stand his bullshit for long.
The barmaid is a gorgeous brunette - long jet-black hair, up, and not dyed. Evidently Eastern European. Tall. A body that looks hot, fast, powerful and sexually athletic. Her face bears a touch of the horse archer, somewhere a forest dark and ancient from an old tale. I've only seen her once or twice before and I'm glad to see her again. She smiled at me as I walked in and up to the bar - where Alex was sitting on a backed stool. I asked for a Fosters. Everyone is drinking lager - Peroni, Budweiser, Fosters, Krony, Stella, Carling - Dave has them all. There are probably only two beers on. I didn't know that, and still don't, but I can almost guarantee there were two beers on - which no-one ever touches. More and more like London. I would be amazed if they were anything other than shit. I didn't even look - and I might never.
The barmaid retired to a stool at the end of the bar. She was reading a book. I chatted with Alex about network cards and routers and when we came to a pause I said...
"I saw Mick on Saturday night. Hence the blister on my finger." I
held up my index finger with the dirty plaster on the end.
"What do you mean?"
I smiled to disarm him. "Ahhh, I'll tell you some other time."
The barmaid looked up from her book at us coyly.
Alex picked up his jacket. "Do you fancy a cigarette?"
"Garden?"
"Yeah."
I picked up my rucksack and beer. "Will the garden be OK?"
"Yah."
"Let's go to the garden."
It was chilly, grey, empty and run-down - like a decayed Roman ruin on the northern borders. Half-broken furniture and overrun with weeds. There seemed to be an earwig problem...and bad midges on warm nights that Alex's wife was allergic to. It backed out onto the estate. Flats overlooked us, but there was a wall all round, caked in old whitewash, and a strange sense of security.
I am warming up now. Time for a joint - a big one. I am sitting here, early hours, the alarm set for 7:30, wearing a T-shirt and hoodie (with the hood up) and fleece shorts. I switched the heater up full, which is to say I was pissing in the wind, as the main heating system is off and I have no control over that - all as I am weak. Dreams come and go; slip away from me with the passing of days. This moment, I cannot bear music; I cannot countenance the idea. It fascinates me briefly, this feeling. I know I will be listening at some stage, but to what - and how? When will the moment come when I feel a release? These dreams, I say, slide away. Just highlights, situations. There was certainly shit on the rat-run to the gallery - dogshit or human shit I cannot remember - and it was soft like cheap warm ice cream or big rolls of cigarette ash. And I was on the lam with nothing, suddenly in Egham. Finding myself there I felt a sense of relief - almost relish. I could find a room - an empty room - in Founders itself perhaps. I could steal food, perhaps steal from people's rooms. There were ways to survive here. I had a chance.
I told Alex about the blister and we chatted about work - his place and mine. I mentioned a local prick, Jeremy, a bona fide cunt and weirdo, who had of late been making a grosser asshole of himself...
"He's out of his mind. Everything the guy touches turns to shit. He keeps
sending me emails with different fonts, huge lettering - caps - in red text
and underlined. Massive emails. You can't make sense of them. The instructions
are garbled - mad. No-one can understand it. It's a total disaster...a complete
waste of money."
"Why does he do it?"
"He's fucked. In the head. That's what you've got to understand. You see,
he's genuinely whacko: Asperger's, OCD, the real thing. He's actually
mentally ill. He's like Tarquin: Spare jism."
Alex laughed. His laugh is raucous. Small herbivoral teeth, mouth open wide like he's daring you to throw something in it - like he's making fun of you. And when he laughs the subject of the joke seems to join him in his own failure. It's the laugh of a man who has fucked up and fucked himself up countless times. Spectacular stupidity especially appeals to him; uncovered perversions, ludicrous government blunders, public vomiting, shitting yourself, accidentally drinking your own piss - these things he admires the most. It is endearing.
Suddenly, as I sat there, I thought briefly, but deeply and with richness, of the time I spent at Glastonbury under the camo with Saulê and Rob - Saulê in particular. There had been, to me, a theme of falseness, not just in the sense that there were many moments where I felt uncomfortable, out of sorts, not myself, never reaching maturity, but in a deeper sense of some hidden pain or embarrassment that had brought me to this point. Once I was sitting with Saulê and he mentioned, with a grimace, that there had been a steward on his shift that day who had been crazy with suspicion - absolutely everyone was on a blag - or at least too many people. She was excessively frantic for him. I took this with a pinch of salt, as Saulê himself was in a special time zone.
As it happened she was standing close by, here for food after the shift as Saulê. Saulê indicated with a glance in her general direction: it was obvious who he was referring to. By chance she came over with her boyfriend and sat at the end of the table to eat.
For as far back as I can remember, I cannot recall meeting anyone with such
a degree of latent hysteria and repressed self-consciousness. It was like you
had handed a two-year-old a mature body, a full vocabulary and 17 years of education
on a plate - and instantly dropped them into a social situation. She hit us
with the full force of no bullshit confidence with absolutely nothing behind
it. She blushed and winced, tearing herself up inside. The relationship with
the boyfriend was clearly fucked. He was a hapless prick and what was between
them seemed bent out of shape. It was both shocking and sobering. After they
left we sat in silence for a while, for a moment at first our heads inclined
down - as though we were ashamed. Saulê brought his hand up to his face
and waved it around, like he was casting a silent spell, or communicating with
natives...
"You see how she was twitching?"
"Yah. It's bad when it gets that way."
Alex was running low. I necked half a pint and offered to buy him a drink. I walked back into the bar.
She was sitting up at the bar, her back to me, reading her book.
She was wearing tight knee-length cotton trousers with exterior pockets - like cargo shorts, in cerise - and a draped-front cream cardigan, which covered up her big breasts. Her ass seemed a little small, mannish, but it suited her, and her legs were beautifully proportioned. Her right leg was crossed over, and her bare foot rested on the stool next to her, the sole facing me. There were no blemishes or calluses; it was perfectly formed and quite large. I felt a rush to my head when I saw it. The shape was stylish and aerodynamic. It reminded me of a gull's wing - or a spinnaker. She wore toenail varnish of a rich burgundy, matched on her fingers.
When she heard my footsteps she moved behind the bar to face me, smiling again warmly.
She was beautiful, especially her eyes: Mascara-lined parallelograms, like staggered closed brackets, the eyes themselves pools of black ink, ripe for the subtle reflection of light which can seem so mysterious and ageless.
I took the drinks back to the garden.
Music plays this night. No, there is no-one here. It is 4:38am and I wonder where is my soul, and must I smoke again, and can I craft a world of desire, and will the moon come down or no - in this dawn which seems so defeated here.
I toast you then.
"Cheers mate."
"Listen, what's happening with the barmaid? What's her name?"
"Eodie."
"Edie."
"No, Eodie, like E.O.D.
"E..O..D. Where's she from?"
"Transylvania."
"You're bullshitting me."
"No."
"Bullshit."
"No, really."
"Oh my God. Transylvania."
"Why, are you impressed?"
"She's hot."
"Yah. Apparently she's a screamer as well."
"Jesus."
"Ah, she's a really nice girl. I know she works fucking hard. She's got
another job in that coffee place down the road, on the right-hand side. I met
her on the bus one day and she told me she was on her way there. She's a lovely
girl." He smiled, "She wants to go to Ibiza."
I laughed.
"Ha. I laughed too when I heard."
"She'll be popular."
"Imagine. She'll come back walking like John Wayne..."
"Fuck."
"...I can see that happening."
"She can have my blood. I'll leave my window open tonight."
"Ha."
We talked on for a while. I mentioned that I was writing something, at last, and it seemed to be turning out well, but I didn't know where it was going. I explained my idea for rigging up my digital voice recorder with a booster mike I had somewhere, to secretly record conversations. Alex thought it a great idea, given our circle of friends - Mick in particular.
"Think of the things people come out with," he said, "Like you,
a while ago - 'spare jism'. That was great."
"What?"
"'Spare jism.'"
"I never said that man."
"Yes you did, when you were talking and Jeremy and Tarquin."
"I did not say that. You must have misheard."
He stopped in his tracks. "What did you say then?"
I racked my brain. I knew I had said something, something about them being throwbacks,
mutants, but I could not think of a phrase that could possibly sound like 'spare
jism'.
"Shit, I can't think now. Shall we go inside? It's getting chilly out here
and I want to ogle the barmaid."
"The bar then." And he laughed.
We sat at the bar near Eodie. It was Alex's spot anyway.
Soon after Catalina turned up, Alex's wife.
I like Catalina and enjoy her company. I hardly get to talk to any women, ever really - not serious conversations anyway, about important things. Thinking about it, all the other women I know either work in the office or at the gallery. The last time I sat in a pub with another woman, even in company, as myself, was five or six years ago. I miss it.
Catalina is from Spain originally, from a region where the native inhabitants are small. Alex called her his Elf. She was a slim brunette, barely five feet tall, with a round face and retroussé nose. Now and then she got ID'd. Aged 36, she and Alex had a 20-year-old daughter.
We hugged and kissed, as is the good custom, and I bought her a large glass of Rosé. We all settled by the bar, near Eodie, and chatted. The conversation came easy. I find myself honest in their company. I find myself myself, as near as it can be.
With Catalina there, it seemed a good opportunity to talk to Eodie. At the next round, when we had her attention, I planned to fire the opening shot...but Alex got there before me...
"Eodie, whereabouts are you from?"
She brought her hand up, raised her head slightly and stroked her neck with
the tips of her fingers. She seemed a little nervous, as if she was not used
to people asking her questions.
"Transylvania."
I laughed and uttered loudly, with mock shock: "Why are you touching your
neck?!"
Everyone laughed. Eodie giggled shyly. It certainly seemed as though she had
done it reflexively.
"This is how most people here know Transylvania", she said; "Dracula."
We bombarded her with questions. We were genuinely keen to know: Where was Transylvania?
Shared between Hungary and Romania. Where was she from? She was Hungarian by
birth, but she had been living in the Romanian part of Transylvania. What religion
was practiced in Hungary? Orthodox: She told us that she believed in God, but
not religion. How was the myth of Vampires viewed in the region? She shrugged
her shoulders...
"It is not a big thing among people. Not many people from outside go there.
Some people go to castles."
"Didn't the legend come from Vlad the Impaler?" I asked.
"Yes, Vlad Tepes, but it is not real. He was a great hero, but outside
was hated. 'Dracula' is from 'Dracul'. 'Dracul' means 'devil'. So it become
'Dracula'."
"Isn't Hungarian supposed to be a really difficult language to learn?"
I asked.
"Maybe. It is Uralic. It is not like other European countries; it is different
from the rest - where languages come from Latin."
"Except Basque!" Catalina and Alex exclaimed simultaneously.
"Didn't Elizabeth Bathory come from that area? Lisbeth Bathory?"
I asked.
"Erzsébet. Yes. She was Hungarian. There are many legends about
her."
"Didn't Zsa Zsa Gabor come from Hungary?" Catalina asked.
"Yes."
"Isn't she famous for being famous?" Alex said.
Catalina bounced in her stool: "She married a lot of rich men, about eight
of them."
Eodie smiled: "Yes. She was a very clever woman."
"A very clever woman!" echoed Catalina.
"She is old now. No-one knows how old. She looks bad. She cannot walk."
I piped up: I wanted to be sure: "Excuse me, do you mind me asking, how
do you say your name?"
"Ildi."
"Eódie."
"E.O.D." said Alex.
"No, Ildi. I. L. D. I."
"Ildi!"
"No, Ildi."
I did a ridiculous impression of Gary Oldman from the Coppola movie, gesturing
dramatically...
"Ildi."
"No."
Later she took her cardigan off...and underneath she was wearing a white cotton top...which gave enough contrast for her areolas, dark, on the small side, but perfectly formed, to show through. The nipples themselves were prominent, perhaps stimulated by the colder air, probably only slightly - as I somehow suspected they could grow bigger. My thoughts were visual, as I sought to take in the sight as quickly and deeply as possible. She sat for much of the time at the end of the bar, often seeming to strike poses in the style of Francis Bacon: casual contortions, perhaps one arm akimbo, one leg folded, or raised, or she would cradle her breasts; with the big boobs resting on her arm like two fat coypu leaning over a thick branch.
I talked with Catalina and Alex for a long, long time; about relationships between people of different ages. The conversation grew animated and intense.., with talk of Greek plays, Shakespeare, musical tastes, film stars, songs of love, how culture lies and human freedom. The evening unfolded with liquor and smokes and laughter, my heart, I say, lifted - as we knew the truth about each other, in some order. At around 11:15 we broke up with hugs and handshakes - and promises of meeting again soon. I headed for the Ozon, tearing up the road, the lights, filled with happiness. In the restaurant I ordered expensively and the waitress at the bar gave me Tsingtao. I stared up at the bottle of Chartreuse behind the bar. It was near empty, and the light behind it seemed duller and greyer. Perhaps it was generally lighter, or rather darker in there all those months ago...all those hours. I thought, back then, looking at the luminescent green bottle, very much of Henry. It was the kind of crackpot situation he and Joey would find themselves in - maybe nothing more than a slice of bread, two packets of Bleues and half a bottle Chartreuse: Maybe a Russian dyke their hands, or two whores, as he would call them. God knows, it tastes bloody awful, but one day soon I might ask for one.
I felt a joy.
...
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