I Am God

by Giacomo Sartori

  Instead, without any preamble, she turns on her miner’s lamp and, taking plumpish stilt-walker’s long strides, heads down the hill to where the wee zoologist is standing. Young Apollo is gobsmacked (and truth be told, I didn’t expect this either). He was primed to enjoy the plunge, or at least the solipsistic treat of a blow job, (what a term). Now he’s worried that this nutcase is off to snitch on him to his girlfriend. He fluffs his dreamy aerodynamic forelock and watches as she becomes a band of light bobbing in the dark. Had he moved too fast? Had he done something wrong? His rock-hard erection is now just a memory.

  And so, without being too obvious about it, he begins to move toward them, keeping his ears cocked. His stomach is aching and he badly needs to take a dump.* The geneticist isn’t ratting on him, though, just standing by the tiny zoologist picking up toads and putting them down on the valley side of the road with motherly delicacy, giving each one a gentle pat with the backs of her fingers. Her voice is softer and more cheerful, she looks happy there above the lake, its leaden depths streaked white by the moon. He breathes a sigh of relief and glancing at his phone thinks what luck (luck, such a detestable concept!) because everything seems to be under control. At that very instant he steps on a toad that’s been flattened on the asphalt and slips. As he falls, he hits his elbow violently—I mean very, very violently—and we hear a sound like the neat snapping of a branch.

  * If there’s something that bothers me about men, I mean males, it’s their cowardice. They brag and boast, they convince others and themselves they’re brave as lions, they go out and blow their entire wages in one night, they show off, pontificate. And then at the first obstacle they revert to being an infant in a diaper: they whine, moan about their fate, beg for some compassionate wing to hide under. From the Get-Go they’ve all been that way, the only difference is that in the Upper Paleolithic there were no cell phones and social networks to multiply their foolishness.

  ‌The Repose of the Galaxies

  This business, so tedious from every point of view, is extremely concerning, to employ a lame expression from the small sample I have at my disposal. I’m thinking about it—the italics are unavoidable—much too much. That’s why I decided on a change of scene today. I decided to wander where my divine feet (atomic reactors?) take me, enjoying the clean air (let’s call it that) of intergalactic space, listening from afar to the eternal whirring of elliptical, spiral, and even globular galaxies, the last being the most crowded, that is the most metropolitan. Humans have a somewhat nineteenth-century notion of the cosmos, they imagine a post-Romantic soundscape, with screaming violins and Wagnerian bellowing; in fact the music of the spheres is more like repeated limpid tinkling interrupted by sharp rustling and the odd explosion, as well as sudden and slightly irritable metallic lacerations.

  The few heavenly bodies visible from that modest globelet called Earth are all very well—Sun, Moon—and they’ve inspired some earnest, dulcet tunes. Fact is, though, you can see interesting stuff just by looking through a keyhole. People make do with what they have. However, there’s nothing remotely like the heartrending immensity of the universe, gleaming with iridescent lights and palpitating cascades of stars. Not to mention that it’s utterly uncontaminated; God willing no intruder’s ever going to set foot in it, apart from a few ramshackle earthly space probes with meager range capabilities.

  Without meaning to—you may think that’s irony, but it’s not—I found myself next to two galaxies, one large, one small, that were approaching each other. The deformed shape of the little one, slight but perceptible even to a non-divine eye, like a woman’s belly in the fourth or fifth month of pregnancy, made it evident there was an attraction between the two. Later, they would draw closer together and the short, plump galaxy would be sucked in by the large, long one, giving up some of its mass or even being obliterated altogether—always an unsettling event. Now this is instructive to watch, I said to myself, these are cosmic events worth following. Faced with the—I want to say choreography—of the universe, I was recovering the serenity that permeates my heart, call it a heart. No superfluous sentiments, no cloying romanticism, no pointless description needed: what was before me was monumental in its austere abstraction. I have all the time in the world, I can stay here right to the end, I thought, positioning myself to obtain the optimal viewing angle and trying to get comfortable, as they say. The way you stretch out your legs to watch one of those long, long art films in which very little happens, indeed nothing at all happens, but which (wo)men of good taste find stylistically perfect.

  If anything cheers me up and makes me feel especially divine, it’s the interactions between galaxies. It’s the elegance of their trajectories, the gorgeous dance numbers executed in perfect detail, their infinite slowness, the sensation of heartbreaking melancholy, but also peace, almost mirth, a tragic mirth that emanates from them, whatever it is, I forget all the rest and feel joyous. Of course, a god is always joyous—what god’s a malcontent, a whiner?—but in this case I’m feeling slightly more joyous, because when by definition one is perfect, differences are measured in microscopic gradations.

  To tell the truth, though, there was also a sour aftertaste in my mouth that wasn’t entirely pleasant (for the purposes of metaphor, let us posit I have a mouth, taste buds). And it was only getting worse. Watching the two galaxies converge, I couldn’t help thinking that the beanpole geneticist, too, was heading for a crash, with a body far denser than her own and equipped with much greater gravitational pull. It was a question of mere days and not millions of years, but the highly predictable outcome, as has happened hundreds of billions of times in the cosmos, was that Casanova would either appropriate some of her matter and continue merrily on his way, or he would mercilessly swallow her whole, celebrating with a loud belch.

  The very thought astonished me, for never before had the meeting of two galaxies seemed to me a symbol of anything, and it completely spoiled the show. I left the two lovely ladies to their destiny, and headed home. By that I mean the place where I tend to stay, not so much a place as a nexus of the mind, the spirit. What made me move my butt, to use a slovenly expression, was the thought that if I stayed there watching to the bitter end, there wouldn’t be a trace of the beanpole left. In a few million years, not even a tooth out of the poor thing’s mouth would remain. I’d find ranks of crocodiles and other hideous beasties typical of warmer climes, jaws unsheathed. Maybe even iguanas. Thousands of iguanas roaming the industrial plain once inhabited by bipeds, now a swamp, the bipeds extinct. Iguanas with absolutely no sense of humor, iguanas that bite.*

  * It’s pointless to discuss crocodiles, they bite and have always bitten. I made them that way, and I take full responsibility. If I’d done it any other way, we’d have a madly overcrowded animal shelter instead of a food chain, and all of nature would be in chaos. The only proper choice was to have the larger animals eat the small. I couldn’t afford to get sentimental about it.

  ‌Beauty Contest

  A new job is opening up in her lab, and Ms. Einstein has made the many photocopies and done the never-ending paperwork to apply for it. Not that she expects to get it, and anyway she’s otherwise preoccupied with various mind-bending algorithms. Still, something in her knows she’s far better qualified than the others, and she allows herself to think that if she does get it, she won’t have the dreadful worry every year that she might be tossed out like old Kleenex. She might count for something, maybe she’ll even be able to work openly on her microbe-battery. If she gets it.

  But she’s not going to get it. I could have told her it was pointless to waste her time filling out all those forms and collecting those notarized statements to confirm she has blood-colored blood and fingernails at the end of her fingers. You didn’t need divine insight to figure it out, logic would suffice: the job will go to the new PhD (female) in the lab, who’s only been around for a few months but has already earned the protection of the lab director. She hasn’t gone to bed with him; rather, her
winning move has been to plant a glimmer of hope while not having sex with him.* It’s also true that she resembles a hot young showgirl seen on TV, a fact that has given her a distinct edge in the grueling job selection process—while Ms. Einstein brings to mind a horse that’s grown weary of grazing the same pastures.

  * It’s a solution that works for everyone, for in fact even he doesn’t want an affair. Or rather he wouldn’t mind the pluses but he wants to avoid the minuses, the danger, first of all, that he’ll be found out by his German spouse, who heads a fierce volunteer association protecting battered wives.

  But all these goings-on behind the scenes are invisible to her, taken as she is by her clandestine research. She’s getting excellent, convincing results now, and many distinguished international scientists have shown interest—that fact alone would disqualify her in the eyes of her roving-eyed boss, if he knew. She’s on her way to becoming a sort of Joan of Arc, agog in mystical adoration of Science, ready to wade into battle with her superiors and put herself in danger. She seems to have forgotten all about Casanova and his nighttime kiss. Or rather, every once in a while she does think of him, the way a TV viewer will summon up a few faded memories of a show that didn’t leave much of an impression. But you know and I know that little by little she’ll soon decide she is attracted to him, then in love, then truly in love for the first time. (To use the accepted rhetorical formula, although it seems to have no correlative in human physiology.)

  He, meanwhile, thinks about her day and night. This time it’s not just a genital thing, it’s more than that, he’s certain. The more he thinks about her, the more inebriated he becomes, the more she seems desirable. By conventional standards she’s not beautiful, but in fact, she is, he thinks. His catastrophic take on climate change has grown less aggressive, more joyful, even slightly ardent. Despite that multiple fracture of the elbow. Unfortunately, the first time they set his bone, the gods of the operating theater were fooling around, and the lad had quite a bit of pain afterward. Human beings are so delicate physically, there’s not much you can do about it.

  Not that their wandering hands affect me one way or another, although I can’t avoid knowing everything they get up to. If they want to marry, have fourteen children, commit joint suicide: it’s all the same to me. There are billions of other humans I have to keep an eye on, billions and billions of every type of animal, billions and billions and billions of fascinating stars. Not to mention numerous wars, ruthless terrorist acts, famines and other natural catastrophes whether connected or not to climate change, malaria and cholera hot spots, refugee odysseys, and so forth. It astonishes me that such an intelligent person—so far as intelligence goes, she’s smart, no doubt about that—simply does not realize that young Casanova will quickly grow tired of her after he’s gotten what he wants, he’ll begin paging through his cell phone address book again. And she will be royally screwed, to put it crudely. No job and no boyfriend either.

  Casanova meanwhile thinks it’s time to split from short stuff. The more he thinks about it, the more he finds her ecological fetishes and her dreams of playing the medieval peasant intolerable. But it’s a delicate situation; he’ll have to move carefully. If he does everything properly, he thinks, she won’t cause him problems.

  Truth is, she’s already smelled a rat, because when it comes to this type of thing, the antennae of a human being can out-sense those of a cricket. She saw the games he was playing to stay close to the tall one on the night of the toads, she noticed his testosteronic turmoil when he reappeared, she concluded he’d probably kissed the other, just as he’d kissed her a couple of years ago, as he’s kissed many others even while they were together, swearing when found out, never again. She ought to be jealous, maybe she is even a little jealous, but much, much less than she had expected. She has to admit she’s the first to be surprised.

  ‌My Immense Esthetic Sense

  If you think God has no esthetic sense, you couldn’t be more mistaken. Nope, if there’s someone who appreciates beautiful things and will do anything to preserve and promote them, that’s me.* You know, if I didn’t have this passion for nice things I would have put my energy into function, not form: trees of shapeless gelatin broth, made of a revolting goo like industrial waste. Neon lights that suddenly flick off, instead of sunsets. Bundles of rusty tubes instead of waterfalls; hideous traps baited with smelly hormones to attract insects instead of flowers. Pardon me if this sounds like vanity, but I think I can say I’ve made a ton of wonders.

  * Primitive man knew this: they used to make me touching likenesses and nice votive objects. They thought I was a fat lady with abundant thighs and Fellinian breasts and couldn’t be persuaded otherwise, although they worshiped me as best they could. When they got a bit closer to the mark, they began to turn out altars carved in the rock, temples, churches, cathedrals, statues in all kinds of materials, frescoes, paintings with sumptuous virgins and bearded saints, rosaries, ostensoria. It’s always a pleasure to receive nice presents.

  Not one tiresome philosopher (there have been many) has ever maintained that the earth is repulsive and nature dreadful, not one scowling naturalist ever argued that the animal or vegetable kingdom needs to be redone. No twisted poet ever hailed the ocean, or his beloved, as nauseating. All the great men (I might as well say, all the great ants, or all the great lice) have insisted upon the unbelievable perfection and magnificence of creation, turning out shelf upon shelf of verse and orotund metaphors. I count it this a great success, considering how fussy the humans are.

  Frankly, it all stunned me, too. I created and created, unable to stop, and what blew me away, even more than the enormous quantity of species and their crazy variety of shapes and sizes, was the splendor of every single component. Sleek panthers, enchanting palms, hieratic giraffes, proud plovers, gorgeous orchids, the softest, greenest moss, shiny ladybugs, adorable daisies. Was it really me who created all this magnificence from nothing? It’s all very well being God, but it’s one thing to turn out cheesy stuff even if it’s perfectly technically sound; it’s another to produce pieces that belong in the best art galleries.

  Here, it would be nice to be able to calmly view every single element, as people do in a science museum. Keep in mind, though, that it’s one thing to come across a lion when you’ve seen busloads of them on television, another to encounter one at close range when you still know nothing of lions. Will it bite? Lay an egg? Hibernate? Of course if I were to think about it I would know the answer, because I know everything, but in the frenzy of creation, I’m no longer sure. When you’re creating, there are no cigarette breaks, no union hours. You have to keep turning it out.

  Contemporary so-called artists display washing machine parts, driftwood, bodies that have been run through, scrap iron, stones, photographs of genital organs and aged corpses, polystyrene chips, medicine bottles, naked women, even just their own excrement, and the public pretends to be mildly interested. In this age of screens and globalized idiocy, nobody seems to know how to hold a brush. I like paintings where the harmony reminds us that the universe has order, and behind that order, Me. Now if the Architect were someone else (crazy idea) I’d step right up and recognize his/her merits—this isn’t vanity. They mesmerize me, the electrons whirling like tireless dervishes around the nuclei of certain minuscule atoms. They send me into raptures, the transparent molecules of water, the perky, stubborn X–rays, the warrens of neat tree trunk cells, the vortices of white hot magma in the heart of the planet. I adore making myself very, very small to zoom around among the quarks as if they were great, majestic weather balloons.

  But it’s the cosmos that holds the most unforgettable beauties. Lysergic acid, perhaps, might give a human being a pale idea of the glorious sparklings and phosphorescences, the shimmering, kaleidoscopic, ephemeral geometric patterns; the savage smells, some far too strong, others tenuous and vaguely mineral, just slightly more lingering than the faint memories to which they’re attached. Who could deny my grandeur befo
re such pageantry? Certainly not the astrophysicists, who insist on peering at the universe from their ridiculous observatories and those spyglasses they think are enormous, who try to get the picture with radar and other feeble instruments.† At times I think I should take them for a spin around the terrifying, fascinating mouth of Sagittarius A*, no need to go much further. They would understand that their sterile sums and calculations are no more illuminating than knowing the number of atoms in a rosebud, they would surrender to beauty, which always comes with its ballast of mystery.

  † They’re like those who think you can appreciate a beautiful woman from a series of X-rays and sonograms, never sampling the warm fine-grained, elastic skin, the sweet harmony of her curves, the minute but heartrending crevassing of her lips, and so on, all of it made more lovely by her delightful clothes and pleasing trinkets.

  Recently, though, I find myself wrestling with strange questions. What is beauty? I ask, for example. From my point of view, is a beautiful girl (what men think of as a beautiful girl) really beautiful? Obviously not, I tell myself, because when the concept bella is applied to a girl, there’s a component of trivial carnal desire that offers insight, for anyone who needs it, into the instinctual slums of the human psyche. And I’m not referring to politically incorrect, though frequently employed, expressions like bella gnocca, “a nice piece” you might say, to avoid saying something more vulgar. Now if I were to say to someone (although it’s absurd to think I might say anything to anyone) that I’d seen a beautiful girl, it would represent an absolute guarantee of integrity; my pretty one wouldn’t be just pretty, she’d be morally certified. A virgin, a saint. However, a nice body remains a nice body. How to be sure every element gets its proper weight? How to pay tribute to the moral gifts without denigrating the physical side? How to avoid being poisoned by the moral side, which in the blink of an eye turns to moralism, bigotry?