They will forget these and remember the many dazzling performances met with expressions of moonlight, of unveiled desire, of something perhaps nearing adoration.
She collapses in the side wing. Unseen. He carries her with unquestioning love.
The day after the phenomenon, my companion awakens sewn into a shroud nature had never before imagined. Overloaded secular clairvoyance, tarnished pagan mysteries of union, deeper than mundane supposition.
The so-called Great, replied of temperance: obey your gospel. Smile under sovereign dimensions, aided by the fabric, silent virtuoso. Sad humanity can never control the atmosphere; disorder touches all living things, a sharp knife, a glint of rose gold. Beautiful monsters whisper, of women who sleep in strings, float with the rustle of opportunities, wonder. Veiled accounts of a scientific era.
Silence became the law, was carving a space for future proclamations, the sleeper going at full speed.
Memory.
The man who captured the veiled accuracy of one apparent summer afternoon, seemed to be the center of gravity. I handed him my red guitar. A white couch appeared on the rooftop.
Noise. Heavy applause. Knowledge of ways to make a fortune. Troubled, irresistible, undeniable.
Superstition struggled luminously with the problem, mathematically guaranteed to disturb so many charms. Deviations from a standard: miraculous perfection.
A film crew arrives and carries the couch away.
Back and Forth.
The taste of a thousand pardons, you kicked gravely the engineer of the eyelids. Hidden reason, hands strained, puzzle fingerprint.
He strives to shine. Purple wool, moth-eaten, jaunty around his neck. He raised his blue eyes, whose appearance reflected mysterious creatures, the fire in the taste of woman, self, species emanating, heedless.
She asked him of monsters. He spoke of money, an edge no word can define.
Sexes shall breathe unfamiliar things of the heart, until the process succeeds. Dazzled, I will speak of a cure.
She is eye. She is I.
The Red House, and Onward.
Some guests fired up liquid extensions, blended colors, while others lolled about engaging in myriad glinting perversities. Absorbing mental courage, held knotted behind your vision, we proclaimed to all of unnecessary physics and overall suggestion.
Later that night, before sunrise, we jumped out of the frame, all inflamed. Powerfully redeemed, where light imbues the vastness of energy.
No sarcasm. Nothing bitter.
We knew it was time to go.
This secret, realizing the dream of homogenous delight, unimagined flowers crossing the threshold, put us lifted.We landed on the wax-splotched mantle, unfazed. Immutable even. Safer than all roses.
Tumbling onto the floor made entirely of bedding. Each other. Home.
Time passed unnoticed, humid and gardenia scented, until again we knew. It was time to go.
Destination.
But, Oh! Why? Why did we bring him here, his brain and his shoulders and his pale blue eyes and all the rest of it? Why here, distancing, to Paris of all places? Those arms to embrace remained a great delicacy. The parts of him. We swear to betray their secret ideal.
Some days later I can only despise the crackling acid in his brain. The pale eyes submit now, for us alone.
Rewind.
I did not know, at first, the cause of her fascination with me, nor from whence she had come.
She was nowhere and then, all at once, everywhere. The café, the stoop, the walkway along the river, or our favorite abandoned hideouts along the wharves.
(You were reported missing, we read in the Picayune. It was the day after she and I disrobed and pressed every silken pore of our skins together.)
We continued, she and I. Nights of bicycles and bars and dark chocolate kisses were infinite, but only in the imploding manner.
We lived in silk kimonos.
“We” then equalled: she and I.
Still radiant, we were once young girls, whose rare fruits lied, pitching such charming lines in the cockpit of the last 747.
Once, “we” had equalled: he and I.
What is there to say?
The three of us: Inevitable.
Of Him. (To Her.)
That first night, as I chose to summon him in your presence, we were shaking. We waited, your insane beauty emanating.
And he, retrieved at long last, entered spewing his fiery venom. Nothing new as a reverie. Then unconsciousness.
Transported, innocent, sand-foam speech. His voice, between moon rays and clouds, impossible. Powerful, fantastic, and true.
Your presence handles the decision.
And he, just sitting, those wild eyes lifted and clinging. I watch him watch you, helplessly, as your essential talent, your notes ringing out, a shadow moving atop the temporary but beautiful winding staircase. You descend one step, slowly, and then another. Violin at your shoulder, bow sliding, impossible notes sounding out. Even the red walls and black-painted floor were quivering. Your faded violet dress left behind as though you had never known even a single stitch of clothing. Your nudity, as tremendous as moonlight, led my friend to all your instruments. To you.
On the spot. Spot on. Creation.
The outcome he despairs consists of your cheeks, your breath. A subtle flare of your nostrils, not artificial.
One remembers standing in the kitchen, confronted with old possibilities: I would not suffer this time. Zero humiliation. No prisoner of love, whatsoever his investigator divided, and holding that box in his hand despite. Person. The incomparable creature peering out.
You both will leave me. Wounded. But not mortally.
Interlude.
The perpetual slenderness of vocabulary suffered similarly, in reverie. Restless from the masterpiece, you played all imaginable hunches.
The last accident, fast and tangible, left us nothing but lips, and the illusion of a grave.
Since now found, asleep, beautiful and demolished, we have seen eyes floating in the sky like a torn away and flapping billboard.
The depth of the underground, pure and weak, was far too subtle to hold you.
Two adventurers contemplated shadows. One dressed in flowers, eyes radiant and motionless.
We dance on the newly packed earth as petals fall.
Sublime Conundrum.
The shrieks first, and then the smile.
Know that divas are invisible tonight. Garter belt grips. The angle of a straight-backed velvet chair.
Dramatic talent assured him many accents. Conditioned by illusion, spectacle, sudden magic.
And you, princess of feathers and steel.
The Tragedy.
They had contented themselves. Then, one autumn evening is turned on its head in astonishment. The afore believed impossibility, the numbing and bitter reality which cannot be.
We all search for that one Irish grandparent, search Caribbean islands that welcome, that allow dual citizenship, or more. We contemplate the weather in Canada.
It is necessary to avoid all screens in this so-called presence in which we have, temporarily, landed. The creature on the screens! We turn away, holding one another from falling. Horrific: Head so large, hands so small, heart withered to nonexistence. Inexplicable failure of the system. In entirety. Perhaps explicable in myriad long-ignored ways, but feels inexplicable in situ.
Digression.
Women, intelligence, freedom, seeing what remained of work from the centuries.
The years and decades had sufficed to overcome some or many obstacles, and now. Calling all Goddesses. Eve, even, don’t give up. We call your Lilith. The temples and sanctuaries; they are yours, hers, ours. Let myth be myth, understood as such. Essence confused with their monotonous moral nothingness, their futile attempt to tarnish, to extinguish, to deny.
We shall put back in place enchantment, charms, personal approaches worth seeing. Rebuilding our temples, regrowing our forests. And good men, not tarnis
hed by the idea of the sword as violence. Not insensitive. Not unmoved. And completely without the desire to see us desecrated.
With these, our magnets, theirs and ours and nothing less than shared desire.
Feel their presence, on to disastrous, even in those who approach presence adapted. Reinstated. Bringing with them equal electricity, whilst mutually attending to ours. As we attend to theirs now. It shall be worth seeing, worth living; strange rapture, this affirmative [affirmation?] which lacks, whatsoever, a system. Which lacks any manipulated sense of shame.
It was time to go.
Powerfully redeemed, with sarcasm bitter, we jumped all inflamed out of frame, where light imbues the vastness of energy. This secret, realizing the dream of homogeneous delight. Unimagined flowers crossed the threshold, landed on the mantle, unfazed. Immutable.
Safer than all roses.
(We put the horror we have left behind where it belongs. At the center of an imaginary black hole.)
Post-Digression.
Us. Again. We are three. Running through the Louvre even though the act has been done and overdone. One of us, we chant together, shrieking and laughing, echoing and dissipating. Security has changed over the decades, and yet we are out, down the stairs, turning the sharpest corner into the smallest alley. It is day one.
But Oh! Why did we bring him here, his brain and his shoulders and his pale blue eyes and all the rest of it? Why here, distancing, to the actual Paris? Those arms to embrace remained a great delicacy. The parts of him. We swear to betray their secret ideal.
Some weeks later I can only despise the crackling acid in his brain. The pale eyes submit now, for us alone.
Wherein I Speak To Her Again. Before.
I did not know, at first, the cause of your fascination with me, nor from where you had come.
Nowhere, and then, all at once, everywhere.
The café, the stoop, the walkway along the river, or our favorite abandoned places along the wharves.
Your insane beauty emanating. Always. Your espresso eyes touching me, your dark curls hiding your secrets no more. Our conversations.
(They meet.)
And him, at last, spewing his fiery venom, nothing new as a reverie unconsciousness and transported. Innocent sand-foam speech, his voice between moon rays and clouds, impossible, powerful, fantastic, and true.
Your presence handled the decision.
And he, just sitting, those wild eyes lifted and clinging. I watch him watch you, helplessly, as your essential talent, your notes ringing out, a shadow moving atop the temporary but beautiful winding staircase. You descend one step, slowly, and then another. Violin on your shoulder, bow sliding, impossible notes sounding. Even the red walls and black-painted floor were quivering. Your faded violet dress left behind as though you had never even known a stitch of clothing. Your nudity, as tremendous as moonlight, led my friend to all your instruments. To you.
On the spot. Spot on. Creation.
The outcome he despairs consists of your cheeks, your breath, a subtle flare of your nostrils, not artificial.
One remembers standing in the kitchen, confronted with old possibilities: I would not suffer this time. Zero humiliation. No prisoner of love, whatsoever his investigator divided, and holding that box in his hand despite. Person.
The incomparable creature peering out.
You both leave me wounded. But not mortally.
Fast Forward; Fast Down.
Back in Paris we lie flat on the round top of a tall tower. An outer arrondissement. Difficulty swallowing human indifference tonight as we kiss. Sublime pleasures hindering. Sacrilege. There is wine, carried in backpacks as we climbed. My knee and his cheek bleed, scratches from razor-wire. She and I admire one another’s bruises from the straight up metal ladder. They will change many colors before leaving us.
The metal we have climbed on, that we lie on, is rusting in spots and all faded a pale mermaid blue. As the sun rises, so does he. We share.
He dances a tarantella in the center of the tower, then, laughing, guzzling wine from the bottle, he closes his eyes and dances faster, outward, taunting the edge.We crawl on our bellies, but we cannot catch him.
Addendum.
Magnetized poles have been challenged. We adore the equator, but also love our seasons, after all.
To Sing
Tristan Foster
The wardrobe offered by the club could have been inherited from a wealthy old aunt. Dresses and coats and robes from a forgotten era in excellent condition. Kept in plastic in a darkened room, smelling of fragrant soap. She meant to ask where they had all come from, who had brought them here and why, but then she got used to them, made the outfits her own. Thought it was luxurious to wear a different old gown every night. Because this is what we do.
She wants to glow. Actually. This is what she thinks as she waits in the dawn for sleep. Pulls the sheet back and reaches for her phone to check the time. Watches the light cutting in from outside but not for too long. Decides to escape to the seaside soon, and the slow march into the waves. This city is hostile to the sea, she can feel it in her blood.
Midday waking. The noise of the city outside, not enough rest, conscious of edges. She stays in bed till her feet start to sweat, then throws the sheet off to begin the day. A ticket to the Picasso Museum and she winds her way through, eventually getting stuck in the stuffy, wood-panelled room with a sculpture of a man holding a sheep. Bronze but looks like it’s made of mud. Like it formed here with time. She feels tears welling in her eyes and wonders if crying is OK. Hides in a corner, back against the wood, out of the light.
I can feel you
drifting away
drifting drifting
away
In the room the women come and go because what else is there to do.
*
Came to sing. That’s why.
To sing all night in clubs and come home in the cold dawn. The walk slow, head clear by the time she unlocks the door. Returning like a cat. Maybe saw it in an old movie. Old actresses wearing old outfits, necklaces sparkling in black and white. Knew well the lies that Hollywood tells but still wanted to believe. Because that’s what it is to be human, wanting to believe. Saw it, probably, as a little little girl. But here now. Saw, too, Pont Neuf in the Snow at the gallery back home. Stopped in, passing through, regretted it later. More aware of the tension in the air than the art on the wall and thought she should have spent the time lying in the grass outside. Anyway, stopped at the painting. Tempted more by its name than what it depicted: barely in the snow but it was the in the that mattered, as if it had a choice, as if it could slip in and out of snow like a jacket or dress.
Had a local teach her manners. A girl who waitressed at the club. Learnt from her the things you do, the things you don’t. Laughed and smoked together on days off, leaning out of windows. Tried on expensive dresses together in perfumed boutiques and thought that she had finally arrived in Paris. Visited the Catacombs again, this time not a tourist. Dislodged a skull and threw it to each other like it was a toy then played chasings down the rows and rows of bones. Told in French by the guards to behave. Hell is very boring.
Sang lullabies of monkeys and jungles to baby brothers when young. In their room pool-water blue. Held one to her chest, usually. Taking turns from night to night like good boys, accepting their warmth and their weight as they drifted away to sleep.
Heads in the crowd. Each a galaxy of its own. Each filled with needs, wants, longings. With ideas of themselves. Here to escape them or maybe sink into them more deeply. Whispering and ice tinkling in glasses after she has finished singing and the applause fades. The clink of cutlery on china plates. She’s seen more than a few tears running down cheeks. Knows the demons that dance around each head as, after the show, these people lie in the dark staring up at the ceiling.
The things she thinks about now that she never had to think of before. Words for things, street names, everything. Repeating them as she walks home l
ike prayers. The discovery of new niches in the brain, like the cavities in Byzantine churches for the worship of some melancholy saint. The patron saints of new notions.
The ways we find comfort in things, in places, in time, in a particular moment of the day.
In the room the women come and go and maybe steal a kiss because what else is there to do.
*
Came here expecting angels and got devils. The same ones she left behind. Expected sleepy cherubs from the fluffy clouds of Renaissance paintings. Expected to be welcomed by them, almost as if they would be reclining on the linoleum at Charles de Gaulle when she walked through the gates, chubby and rosy-cheeked. Voice like an angel she was told all her childhood. How silly.
Hasn’t visited the Pont Neuf. That she’s aware of. Dated an architect who wailed in his sleep, night terrors. They lived on reverse hours so sometimes she was there for it, able to hear his calls from the other room. She asked him about the bridge, expressed a desire to go, but then his midnight screaming became too funny. She began to imagine what a building would look like in ruins. Thinks of the Tower as the skeleton of Christ the Redeemer, the colossal statue on a Rio hillside she has seen only in photos. Of the two men who made these things on opposite poles. Their profound unhappiness and the monuments they have left behind to mark it.
She wants to glow. Actually. So perfect that when she sings they could turn the lights off and there would be a candlelight flicker. If the lights were cut, the audience would mumble first their frustration, then their concern, all but ignoring the glowing, singing girl.
That’s what she wants. But she wants many things.
Not even in a way that is impassive. Because what else is there to do.
Catacombs
Sophie Mackintosh
We queued for three hours in January to get into the Catacombs, chill wind, crisp, no rain. We knew that passersby were laughing at us waiting in the temperature, revealing ourselves as bad tourists, and we could have avoided the queue if we had paid extra but we were too cheap, our money was going on bread and small glasses of jewel-dark wine. The winter sun flickered and moved position. My phone was running out of battery but I wasted some watching videos and images of lakes under the ground, of people feeling their way through the maze of tunnels and writing graffiti on the stone walls. We moved from foot to numb foot. All day we had been walking around the city. The rain would not begin until the next day, when it would hit us in the cemetery, when it would fill our shoes and we would have to search for any shelter before our train. We did not yet have knowledge of the rain. The rain would leak into the earth of the city and the lakes, the oceans, filling the tunnels. Underneath us, the ghost of the city like a photographic negative. I was ashamed to be queuing but I wanted to be in that city below us, the secret version, where the air was hard to breathe, and the skulls were tight as teeth in a mouth. We would walk down into the ground together. Nothing here but the cold at the end of my fingers and my nose. I had decided I would not wear gloves in Paris for it was not chic, but then I had queued for three hours anyway which is the least chic thing you can do. We were in love, and it felt good and unfamiliar. And yet the dark was coming up like a wave. The skulls would shine out towards us like beacons. I was waiting for them. I strained to hear the noise of the subterranean bodies of water and the people feeling their way, people making chipped marks against the stone, people with ropes and breadcrumbs to create their own intricate ways back. I wondered how long you could survive in the tunnels, how long you could stay pressed up against the bones, and in the queue I had read also about the collapsing cemeteries, the overcrowding, the necessity of putting your dead underground. Please don’t ask me to marry you in Paris, I had said when we were drunk, Please don’t, I need to know that you won’t ask me or anything, and that felt good and unfamiliar too, and the weight of being drunk pushed on my chest and on my limbs like a warm and heavy blanket. On my dying phone I read everything I could find about the Catacombs, as if it could stop the sun where it moved, the people openly laughing at me as we queued, to who I could then say: I know about this, I know history! I know! My legs were so heavy and cold by the time we walked down, my lungs were tight and I was afraid, but I thought of the swimming man I had seen on a video, in the subterranean lake, how he had slipped through the blue with his head above like a seal, and a light strapped to his forehead, and it had been beautiful, and how nothing had dragged him down.
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