Tonight, Again

by Clive Barker

  I think the truth is dicks like the air. They don’t like to be cooped up. Left in the dark. They get claustrophobic, don’t they? So you say to the owner, hey do you want to let the Big Boy out and play and he comes. Course you do get some of the owners who get a bit embarrassed.

  Especially if they’ve got one that’s a bit too quick to stand up. And then they think. I’m thinking they’re queer or whatever you say now days. Homo. Shit-lifter. But they get over it when I tell ’em this is for posterity. I say usually, you know, I’m not interested in anything more than having yours in my collections. It’s important work.

  See, I read somewhere that the sexes are getting more alike. As we evolve we’re less manly. So I think dicks are going to be like something nobody has anymore, in the future. We’re going to look back and say: So, that’s what they looked like? And me, I’ll be dead and forgotten, we’ll all be dead and forgotten, but my pictures, they’re going to be like fossils you know. They’re going to be something valuable.

  Altogether, at the last count, I have seventeen thousand three hundred different dicks in the collection. And of course I’ve got pictures taken from all sorts of angles, of really interesting ones. I didn’t take all those photographs myself. I don’t know how many are mine. I suppose I could do a count. A head count; ha, ha! Because I always know which one I took. They bear a certain…I don’t know, I just always know. But I never bothered. I suppose I might, one of these days.

  Now what about you? You going to join the collection? Don’t be shy now. It’s really easy. I’ve done it so many times. Come on. All right, so it isn’t as big as the really big ones, but you know what? There’s always somebody with a bigger one, and there’s always someone with a littler one. Me, I’ve got a little one. I don’t care. There’s littler still. I’ve seen ’em. Really, really little ones. Micro penis. I got pictures of those too. And you know, sometimes they can be really…pretty. Like flowers. Like little flowers.

  What May

  Not Be Shown

  It's always what may not be shown that shows the most. Forbidden words are always the most eloquent.

  On the shores of Lake Turkana, to go out in public with your foreskin peeled back is an obscenity. In certain cities of the East, a woman may not show her face. Take a picture of your three-year-old in the bath, and people look at you oddly these days.

  It changes all the time. In one age, the breast may be shown, but nothing below the navel. In another, the cunt but not the cock. Or the cock, as long as it’s not hard. Or hard, but not fully hard. Or fully hard, but not seeping.

  In Pompeii, the guide, for a few extra lire, will show you the whore houses, with their peeling frescoes. A man weighs his enormous meat on a scale; a woman seeks refuge on the lap of another, as a whip is laid on her bare back. In the Reading Room of the British Library, you may order up the pornography of an earlier age, as long as you prove your intentions towards it are honorable; that is, you agree that it will mean nothing to you. In any American city, if you know where to look, who to ask, you can always buy the sight of somebody else’s intercourse. But none of this must be public. It must be done in whispers. It must be locked away where the women and children will not see it. We must pretend, as we go about the daily streets, that we know nothing about it, nor do we care to know. If any of this comes up in conversation, we will change the subject, or—in more sophisticated circles—we’ll greet it with a weary sigh: as if to say, how passé, to be aroused; how adolescent.

  Only the slaughterhouse and the mortuary have any approximate power: we do not care to know how we came to be on the plate, or how we will look when we are removed from it. But of course the forbidden sight here shows both. The lovers, sapped by the agonies of desire, lie like felled animals on the slimy bed, their eyes glassy. It has raw, red shape, this ecstasy. It brings blood and tears.

  Is it any wonder it’s put out of sight? Where’s the dignity in that? The stench of a lover’s room is pleasant only to those who carried it. To the rest of us, it’s too close to flatulence. And look at those who make an occupation of it! Look at how they end up, the whores and the hustlers. Gutter and dumpster; that’s where they end up. The Devil doesn’t take them anymore. They kill themselves, with drink or pills to keep themselves from seeing their holes seeping.

  Two Views

  from a Window

  There she is! Oh God, there she is! My angel. Why me.”

  “Shut up, for God’s sake! You don’t even know her name.”

  “She’s perfection.”

  “Come away from the window.”

  “I wish she’d look this way.”

  “And see us spying on her?”

  “Oh she’d be very happy about that.”

  “She’s going to have company. She’s washing her armpits.”

  “Why do you people hate your own stink so much? It’s perfectly—”

  “Here he comes! Oh God, here he comes!”

  “Oh it’s him again. The one with the greasy hair.”

  “What does she see in him?”

  “Speaking of stink…he’s been handling meat.”

  “He’s a common butcher!”

  “Lamb’s liver. Kidneys. Oh my Lord. What I wouldn’t give to have a bowl of raw kidneys.”

  “He doesn’t know how to treat a woman like her.”

  “Swimming in blood. Perfect.”

  “If I were in his shoes I’d write poems to her. I’d uncover the secrets of my soul.”

  “He’s undressing her…”

  “Oh God! Why doesn’t she protest, at least a little?”

  “It’s hot. She’s feeling horny. And she’s not the only one.”

  “Look at those breasts.”

  “I’m looking.”

  “I’d give anything to be over there, touching those breasts! Rolling those nipples between my fingers! It breaks my heart—”

  “So come away—”

  “—to see that brute with his fat, red fingers, pawing at her.”

  “I wonder if they’ll do it doggie fashion, like they did on Monday?”

  “He’s sucking on her titties!”

  “I can see.”

  “He’s lifting her skirt.”

  “Oh my Lord, smell that cunt! Thank God she didn’t wash down there! Ruff!”

  “Hush!”

  “I said be quiet, boy! Oh no, he’s looking this way!”

  “Don’t panic. Just stay still.”

  “Maybe if I just stay absolutely still…”

  “Sometimes I think you don’t listen to a word I say.”

  “Anyway, what does he care? Just a dog and a cripple sitting in a dark room.”

  “He’s looking away.”

  “He’s got better things to do, the lucky bastard.”

  “And down goes the skirt! No underwear. Does her husband know she doesn’t wear underwear?”

  “She’s unbuttoning his pants. She’s getting out his meat—”

  “It is impressive, you’ve got to give him that. God was generous with him in the dick department. There’s a whiff of cheese from under the foreskin.”

  “She’s going down on her knees—”

  “Brave girl.”

  “I can’t look at this. I can’t. Seeing her abase herself this way, it’s more than a man can take!”

  “If it’s so terrible why have you got a lump in your pants?”

  “She’s skinning it back. Oh God!”

  “I thought you couldn’t look at this.”

  “She doesn’t like it very much.”

  “You could have fooled me. Look at her titties standing on end.”

  “She’s revolted.”

  “In your dreams. She loves every stinky inch of him. And you know I don’t blame her. I think he’s rather fine, in a sluggish sort of way. It’s not that I’m a homo—”

  “She’s gagging on him.”

  “—but you learn to take pleasure where you can find it. I could be quite happy licking out her arse
-hole or cleaning up his balls. A good stink is a good stink. I don’t give a damn. As a pup I used to get hard when the wind came from the brewery.”

  “Maybe he’ll just spunk down her throat and get it over with.”

  “That’d be a waste.”

  “I’d like to see him ashamed of himself. Skulking away with his cheeks burning.”

  “Speaking of burning cheeks…”

  “Oh no. Not that.”

  “I love this part. The little yelps she makes when he spanks her. There he goes. Throwing her over his knee.”

  “Oh that’s a nice view. Look at that! The sun on her buttocks. And that tight brown arse-hole of hers. You know you were right; from this angle she is perfection.”

  “That was hard! Look at the mark he’s made. Oh, and again! And again! That’s it. Beat her, the bitch! The whore!”

  “They can hear this in the street surely.”

  “And again! And again! Now in the cleft! Oh, that’s cruel.”

  “She’s awash. Look at her snatch dripping.”

  “That’s enough now. You’ll make her weep.”

  “He’s stopping. He’s stroking her hair. Oh lovely. I know how that feels. Right behind the ears.”

  “Finally, he kisses her. God, I would have treated her better than that. I would have covered her in kisses by now.”

  “You’re a strange old coot, you know. One minute you want her beaten black and blue, the next—”

  “Look at how she trembles. She’s like a frightened bird.”

  “Bird? With an arse like that?”

  “That’s it. Kiss her. Tenderly.”

  “You don’t know whether you love her or hate her, do you? You sit here at the window day after day wondering if she’s going to appear; wondering if you’re going to get to see her titties. Doting on her. But for being so beautiful. You know what she’d do if she knew we were watching? She’s have you locked up and me put down. We’re dirty old dogs, both of us…”

  “Oh, he’s putting it in her.”

  “Finally…”

  “Slowly, boy…very, very slowly. Give her a little time to get used to it.”

  “I’m bored with this. Rub my belly.”

  “Get down, boy!”

  “Oh come on.”

  “I’m concentrating. Get down!”

  “Mean bastard.”

  “Oh, it’s in her all the way. I wonder how that feels. To have your balls banging against her arse. Wonderful. Wonderful.”

  “Now you be careful. You’re getting too excited.”

  “To feel a cunt gripping your—oh Jesus! Oh, Oh, I’m going to make a mess of myself! Oh…no…”

  “I warned you.”

  “Damn…”

  “Still, it’s impressive. Seventy-four years old and he can still come without touching himself.”

  “…damn…damn…”

  “Now comes the guilt.”

  “What was I thinking? Spying like this.”

  “He’ll go wash himself and tell God he’ll try harder next time. Say a prayer. Then tomorrow, he’ll be back, sitting here in his wheelchair—”

  “Come away, boy! Did you hear me?”

  “Yes, I heard you. And yes, I’m coming. So’s she, by the sound of it. Oh yes, there she goes! One of these days her husband’s going to walk in on her and somebody’s going to go out of the window…”

  “Lord, forgive me I beseech you, for my weakness…”

  “Now that’s something to look forward to. The butcher going arse over elbow into the street, stark naked.”

  “I’ll try harder to resist, Lord…”

  “What a fucking life. Still, I mustn’t complain. At least I’ll have his soiled underwear to sleep on tonight. Ah, bliss!”

  Men in the aisles of supermarkets,

  Looking for fresh vegetables suitable for insertion;

  Men in the aisles of hardware stores,

  Looking for innocent household objects to use to clamp their nipples, or bind their balls;

  Men in pews of churches,

  Too hard to get up for their prayers,

  For fear that the result of enumerating their sins be all too visible;

  Men on the street, walking up and down,

  Up and down;

  Catching one another’s eyes,

  Holding the stares of men holding the hands of their wives, their girlfriends, their children;

  Men in the stalls of public toilets

  Hurriedly unzipping one another,

  Desperate for the touch of a foreign hand upon their bellies, their thighs,

  And all that stands in between;

  Men in the corridors of their dreams,

  On all fours in the supermarket,

  Howling like dogs,

  Bound to the door of the hardware store, being touched by every other man who enters,

  In the church pressing their faces through the screen of the confessional,

  Kissing the sobbing father;

  Men in the street, looking for others who are dreaming the same dream,

  Hoping for a breath of forbidden love,

  Before their lives wake them,

  And they must go on without the rough kisses of other lonely conformists.

  A Blessing

  Hardy hadn't always been interested in what he laughingly called ‘sexual archeology.’ His early discipline had been medieval researches, his focus on the influence of Moorish designs on Northern European churches. But he’d had a revelation, every bit as extraordinary as Paul’s on the road to Damascus, and after it he did not look back.

  It had happened in Ireland, eight years ago. He’d been making a tour of the churches in County Cork—doing what was rather mechanical work (measurements, calculations) when, one summer day, he’d given himself permission to relax his work schedule and enjoy the place a little. Never a man without a hip-flask (a tradition instigated by his father), he sat back under the old sycamore that shaded one corner of the churchyard, sipped a draw of Irish whiskey and thought to doze awhile. But as the whiskey took effect, he found his gaze going up the gutters and saw something around the base of the roof: carved stubby, crabbed figures designed so that the rainwater would pass through them. But, oh, they were obscene. Each figure was carved so that he or she presented their genitals in the most graphic manner, legs spread. The women had fat, voluptuous breasts and vast, gaping vaginas, the lips of which they pulled apart so that the hole was large enough to contain their hands. The men were being equally brutal with their penises, holding them with both hands as though in some last onanistic spasm. Centuries of erosion had removed any sculptural sophistication from these pieces—if they’d ever possessed any, which Hardy doubted—but there was no doubting the humorous crudity of the work.

  He walked around the church. There were seventeen gutter pieces. And right above the front door of the church, under the shadow of the eaves, the most extraordinary piece of all. A carved representation of the coital act, permanently rendered as some kind of Edenic scene. In the middle of the design a tree, in which a serpentine form was draped. To the left of the tree a woman, carved as unflattering as the pieces on the gutter: a cartoon of a female, in truth, with balloon breasts, a vestigial face and a gaping cunt. Into that cunt, the Adam to this Eve, who was so burdened by the immensity of his cock he seemed almost withered by the effort of his erection, was pressing the head of his member.

  Hardy was astonished. Right there, three feet above the heads of the good Christian folk who assembled here for mass every Sunday, who brought their babies to be baptized, their unions to be blessed, and their dead to be commended to Heaven, was an unashamedly graphic rendering of the sexual act. ‘Did the congregation even see it?’ he wondered, as they entered, Sunday after Sunday. He assumed not. Or if they saw it, they assumed their interpretation of the crude forms on the wall were incorrect, and that if they pointed out what they were seeing they’d be told in no uncertain fashion that they had dirty minds.

&n
bsp; He drank a little more whiskey, and then he sat under the sycamore tree and did something he hadn’t done for a very long time. There, under the open sky, he masturbated.

  Any form of sex is wonderful in the open air; the presence of sky and wind and the smell of the earth or the sea, reminds us of how primal the act actually is. In the confines of a bedroom, the act becomes artificial, rehearsed. Outside, it is raw.

  This is particularly true of masturbation, which is the secret vice, the deed we are ashamed to confess as adults, because it seems to admit a childish delight in pleasure for its own sake, without connection to the deeper calls of union with another. (This is a crock of shit, of course. All sex is childish, at its best. All delights in pleasure for its own sake. The call to union is mere religion.)

  But to the many-fingered pleasure, as enacted outside: for the male it has many simple virtues. The hint of exhibitionism (if the only witnesses are birds and worms, it’s still evidence); the sensual delights of the breeze against the flesh of the penis-head, on the topography of the scrotum; the lack of confinement, of fear the bed will creak or the semen stain the sofa.

  This is not even the stuff of pornography. It has no stigma; it does not violate taboo; it has no dramatic value; it tells no tale. That, too, of course, is a virtue. But it means the act and its joys are often left uncelebrated.

  There in the churchyard of St. Mary’s in Cannon, under a tree that had been growing since America was still wilderness, Chuck Hardy unzipped his pants and toyed with himself like a thirteen-year-old who’d just got hold of a copy of an erotic magazine; and while he toyed he thought about the images in the gutters—the erotic excesses that gaped and pranced and stood engorged around the eaves of St. Mary’s. And there in his arousal, as men can sometimes be, he realized that he had a subject, a labour of love that would give him purpose, that would make sense in the senseless academic world. He would not have to let his studies go to hell. He would be that luckiest of men: someone whose private obsessions and public life intersected.