by Henry Miller
In the street everything appeared gray and normal again. A most depressing normality. People trundled along like spindled vegetables. They resembled the things they ate. And what they ate made shit. Nothing more. Phew!
In the light of that previous experience on the elevated train I realized that a new element was manifesting itself, one which had portentous significance. This element was awareness. I knew now what was happening to me, and in a measure I could control the explosion. Something lost, something gained. If there was no longer the same intensity as in that early attack neither was there the helplessness which had accompanied it. It was like being in an aeroplane racing through the clouds at phenomenal speed and, though unable to shut off the motor, discovering with joyous surprise that you could at any rate manage the controls.
Swung out of my accustomed orbit, I nevertheless had sufficient balance to observe my bearings. The way I now saw things was the way I would write about them one day. Immediately questions assailed me, like slings and darts from angry gods. Would I remember? Would I be able, on a sheet of paper, to exfoliate in all directions at once? Was it the purpose of art to stagger from fit to fit, leaving a bloody haemorrhage in one's wake? Was one merely to report the dictation—like a faithful chela obeying the telepathic behest of his Master? Did creation begin, as with the earth itself, in the fiery bubble of inchoate magma, or was it necessary that the crust first cool?
Rather frantically I excluded all but the question of remembrance. It was hopeless to think of reproducing a mental cloud-burst. I could merely try to retain certain definite clues, transform them into mnemonic touch-stones. To find the vein again was the all-important—not how much gold I could mine. My task was to develop a mnemonic index to my inspirational atlas. Even the hardiest adventurer scarcely deludes himself that he will be able to cover every square foot of earth on this mysterious globe. Indeed, the true adventurer must come to realize, long before he has come to the end of his wanderings, that there is something stupid about the mere accumulation of wonderful experiences.
I thought of Melanie whom normally, were I planning a book of my life, I would never have bothered to include. How had she managed to inject herself when ordinarily I scarcely gave her a thought? What was the significance of this intrusion? What had she to contribute? Two touchstones fell immediately into my lap. Melanie? Why yes, remember always beauty and insanity. And why should I remember beauty and insanity? Then there came to mind these words: varieties of flesh. This was followed by the most subtle divagations on the relation between flesh, beauty and insanity. What was beautiful in Melanie derived from her angelic nature; what was insane in her derived from the flesh. The fleshly and the angelic had parted ways, and Melanie, as inexplicably beautiful as a crumbling statue, was slowly expiring on the frontier. (There were hysterical types who also succeeded in isolating the flesh, giving it thereby a peculiar life of its own. But with them it was always possible to plug in the fuse, to restore the current, to put the mind in control again. They kept a shutter in the mind which, like the asbestos curtain in the theatre, could be unrolled in case of fire or as indication that another act had come to an end.) Melanie was like some strange naked creature, half-human, half-divine, whose whole time was spent in vainly trying to climb from the orchestra pit to the stage. In her case it made little difference whether the show was on or off, whether it was a rehearsal, an entr'acte, or a silent empty house. She clambered about with the repulsive seductiveness of the insane in their nakedness. The angels may wear tiaras or brown derbies, according to their whims, if we are to believe the vagaries of certain visionaries, but they have never been described as insane. Neither has their nakedness ever been a provocation to lust. But Melanie could be as ridiculous as a Swedenborgian angel and as provocative as a ewe in heat to the sight of a lonely shepherd. Her white hair served only to enhance the rippling allure of her flesh; her eyes were jet black, her bosom firm and full, her haunch like a magnetic field. But the more one reflected on her beauty the more obscene her insanity appeared. She gave the illusion of moving about naked, of inviting you to finger her so that she might laugh in that low, eerie way which the demented have of registering their unpredictable reactions. She haunted me like a danger signal glimpsed from a train window at night when one suddenly wonders if the engineer is awake or asleep. Just as one wonders in such moments, too paralyzed with fear to move or speak, what the precise nature of the catastrophe will be, so in thinking of Melanie's insane beauty I often gave myself up to ecstatic dreams of flesh, the varieties I had known and explored and the varieties yet to be discovered. To embark unrestrainedly on carnal adventures awakens the sense of danger. I had experienced more than once the terror and the fascination which the pervert knows when in the crowded subway he submits to the compulsion of stroking a tempting ass or squeezing the seductive teat which lies within reach of his fingers.
The element of awareness acted not only as a partial control, enabling me to move with imaginative feet from one escalator to another, but it served a more important purpose still—it stimulated the desire to commence the work of creation. That Melanie whom I had heretofore ignored, whom I had regarded as a mere cipher in the complicated sum of experiences, could prove such a rich vein, opened my eyes. It was not Melanie at all, as a matter of fact, but those word-clots (beauty, insanity, varieties of flesh) which I felt the need to explore and clothe in sumptuous style. Even if it took years to do so, I would remember this train of fabulation, capture its secret, expose it on paper. How many hundred women had I pursued, followed like a lost dog, in order to study some mysterious trait—a pair of eyes set far apart, a head hewn out of quartz, a haunch that seemed to live its own life, a voice as melodious as the warble of a bird, a cataract of hair falling like spun-glass, a torso invested with the flexibility of rubber.... Whenever the beauty of the female becomes irresistible it is traceable to a single quality. This quality, often a physical defect, can assume such unreal proportions that in the mind of the possessor her staggering beauty is nil. The excessively attractive bust can become a double-headed maggot that bores into the brain and becomes a mysterious watery tumor; the tempting overfull lips can grow in the depths of the skull like a double vagina, bringing on that most difficult of all diseases to cure: melancholia. (There are beautiful women who almost never stand before the mirror nude, women who, when they think of the magnetic power which the body wields, become terrified and shrink into themselves, fearful that even the odor which they give off will betray them. There are others who, standing before the mirror, can scarcely restrain themselves from rushing outdoors stark naked and offering themselves to the first comer.)
Varieties of flesh.... Before sleep, just as the eyelids close down over the retina and the unbidden images begin their nocturnal parade ... That woman in the subway whom you followed into the street: a nameless phantom now suddenly reappearing, advancing towards you with lithe, vigorous loins. Reminds you of someone, someone just like that, only with a different face. (But the face was never important!) You have the memory of the ripple and flash of loins just as strong as you have somewhere in your brain the image of the bull you saw when a child: the bull in the act of mounting a cow. Images come and go, and always it is some particular part of the body which stands out, some identification mark. Names—names fade out. The endearing phrases—they too fade out. Even the voice, that which was so potent, so undoing, so altogether personal—that too has a way of vanishing, of becoming lost in all the other voices. But the body lives on, and the eyes, and the fingers of the eyes, remember. They come and go, the unknown, unnamed, mingling as freely with the others as if they were an integral part of one's life. With the unknown ones comes the remembrance of certain days, certain hours, the voluptuous way they eased into a blank moment of lassitude. You remember just how the tall one in a mauve silk dress stood that afternoon, when the sun beat down with smouldering warmth, and gazed entranced at the play of water in the fountain. You remember exactly the way your hunger
expressed itself at the time—sharp, quick, like a knife-blade between the shoulders, then dying away almost as quickly, but in such pleasurable smoke, like a deep nostalgic whiff. And then another one rises up, heavy, stolid, with the porous skin of sand-stone; with her everything is centered in the head, the head which does not fit the body, the head which is volcanic, still filled with eruption. They come and go like that, clear, precise, trailing the ambiance of the collision, radiating their instantaneous effects. All kinds, all tempered by texture, weather, mood: metallic ones, marble figurines, translucent shadowy ones, flowerlike ones, svelte animals covered with pelts of suede, trapeze artists, silver sheets of water rising in human form and bending like Venetian glass. Leisurely you undress them, examine them under the microscope, bid them sway, bend, flex the knees, roll over, spread their legs. You talk to them, now that your lips are unsealed. What were you doing that day? Do you always wear your hair like that? What were you going to tell me when you stared at me that way? Could I ask you to turn around? That's it. Now cup your breasts with two hands. Yes, I could have thrown myself on you that day. I could have fucked you right on the sidewalk, and people stepping all over us. I could have fucked you into the ground, buried you there near the lake where you were sitting with legs crossed. You knew I was watching you. Tell me ... tell me because nobody will ever know ... what were you thinking then, that very moment? Why did you keep your legs crossed? You knew I was waiting for you to open them. You wanted to open them, didn't you? Tell me the truth! It was warm and you had nothing on under your dress. You had come down from your perch to get a. bit of air, hoping that something would happen. You didn't much care what happened, did you? You wandered around by the lake, waiting for it to get dark. You wanted some one to look at you, some one whose eyes would undress you, some one who would rivet his gaze on that warm, moist spot between your legs...
You spool it off like that, a million feet to the roll. And all the time, shifting the eyes from one to another with kaleidoscopic fury, what gets under your skin is the inexplicable nature of attraction. The mysterious law of attraction! A secret buried as deep in the isolated parts as in the mysterious whole.
The irresistible creature of the other sex is a monster in process of becoming a flower. Feminine beauty is a ceaseless creation, a ceaseless revolution about a defect (often imaginary) which causes the whole being to gyrate heavenward.
11
She tried to poison herself!
Those were the words that greeted me on opening the door of Dr. Onirifick's establishment. It was Curley who made the announcement, smothering his words under the rattle of the door-knob.
A glance over his shoulder told me that she was asleep. Kronski had taken care of her. He had requested that nothing be said to Dr. Onirifick about it.
I smelled the chloroform as soon as I came in, Curley explained. She was seated in the chair, huddled up, as if she had had a stroke.
I thought maybe it was an abortion ... he added, looking a little sheepish.
Why did she do it, did she say?
Curley hemmed and hawed.
Come on, don't be silly. What was it—jealousy?
He wasn't sure. All he knew was what she blabbed on coming to. She had repeated over and over that she couldn't stand it any longer.
Stand what? I asked.
Your seeing your wife, I suppose. She said she had picked the receiver up to telephone you. She felt that something was wrong.
How did she put it exactly, do you remember?
Yes, she talked a lot of nonsense about being betrayed. She said it wasn't the child you went to see but your wife. She said you were weak, that when she was not with you you were capable of doing anything...
I looked at him in astonishment. She really said that? You're not putting it on, are you?
Curley pretended not to hear. He went on to speak of Kronski, how well he had behaved.
I didn't think he could lie so cleverly, said Curley.
Lie? How do you mean?
The way he talked about you. You should have heard it. God, it was almost as if he were making love to her. He said such wonderful things about you that she began to weep and sob like a child.
Imagine, he continued, telling her that you were the most loyal, faithful fellow in the world! Saying that you had changed completely since you knew her—that no woman could tempt you!
Here Curley couldn't restrain a sickly grin.
Well it's true, I said, almost angrily. Kronski was telling the truth.
That you love her so much you...
And what makes you think I don't?
Because I know you. You'll never change. I sat down near the bed and looked at her. Curley moved about restlessly. I could feel the anger in him smouldering. I knew what was at the bottom of it.
She's quite all right now, I suppose? I inquired after a time.
How do I know, she's not my wife. The words flashed back like the gleam of a knife.
What's the matter with you, Curley? Are you jealous of Kronski? Or are you jealous of me? You can hold her hand and pet her when she wakes up. You know me...
Damned right I do! came Curley's sullen reply. You should have been here holding her hand yourself. You're never there when any one wants you. I suppose you were holding Maude's hand—now that she doesn't want you any more. I remember how you treated her. I thought it funny then—I was too young to know better. And I remember Dolores too...
Easy! I whispered, motioning with my head towards the prostrate figure.
She won't wake up so soon, don't worry. All right ... now what about Dolores? I said, lowering my voice. Just what did I do to Dolores that hurt you so?
He could say nothing for a moment. He was simply bursting with scorn and contempt. Finally he blurted it out.
You ruin them! You destroy something in them, that's all I can say.
You mean that after we broke up you tried to hook Dolores and she wouldn't have you?
Before or after—what difference does it make, he snarled. I know how she felt—she used to spill it out to me. Even when she hated you she couldn't see me. She used me for a pillow. She wept all over me, as if I were made of Christ knows what ... You used to sail out after those sessions in the back room beaming all over. Little Curley was left to lick up the crumbs. Little Curley would tidy things up for you. You never thought what happened when the door closed on you, did you?
No-o-o, I drawled, smiling at him tauntingly. What did happen? You tell me.
It's always interesting to learn what does really happen when the door closes behind you. I was ready to sit back and listen with ears cocked.
Of course, I ventured, to stimulate him further, you tried to make the most of the situation.
If you want to know, he replied with brutal frankness, yes, I did. Even if it was a wet deck! I encouraged her to weep, because then I could put my arms around her. And finally I managed it. I didn't do so bad either, considering the disadvantage I was under. I can tell you a few things about your beautiful Dolores...
I nodded. Let's hear everything. It sounds exciting.
What you probably don't know is the way she acts when she gets a weeping spell. You missed something.
I tried to give him free rein, concealing my emotions behind a mask of disinterested tolerance. Curiously enough, in spite of his desire to wound me, he found it difficult to tell his story coherently, or even to take advantage of the opportunity I had given him. The more he talked the more sorry he became for himself. He couldn't get away from his own sense of frustration. He wanted to besmirch her, and being able to obtain my approval added spice to the procedure. He thought I too would enjoy this profanation of an old idol.
So you never really did get your end in? I threw him a consoling glance. Too bad, because she certainly was a good piece of hump ... If I had only known about it I might have helped you. You should have said something. I thought you were too callow to, feel that way about her. Naturally I suspected that you put y
our arms around her when my back was turned. I didn't give you credit, though, for taking your cock out and trying to shove it in. No, I thought you were too worshipful for that. Jesus, you were only a kid then. How old were you—sixteen, seventeen? I should have remembered about your aunt. But that was different. She raped
you, wasn't that it?
I lit a cigarette and settled back in the arm chair.
You know, Curley, this makes me wonder a bit...
You mean about Maude? I never tried anything...
No, I don't mean that I don't give a damn what you tried or didn't try...
I think you ought to be going soon, I added. When she comes to I'll want to talk to her. It's lucky you came when you did. H'm! I suppose I ought to thank you.
Curley gathered up his things. By the way, he said, her heart's not so good. And there's something else wrong with her too ... Kronski will tell you.
I went to the door with him. We shook hands. I felt impelled to say something.
Listen, I don't hold it against you about Dolores, but ... but don't be dropping in here when I'm away, see! You can worship her all you want—from a distance. I don't want any of this damned monkey business, do you understand?
He gave me a murderous look and strode sullenly off. I had never spoken that way to him before and I regretted it, not because I had wounded him but because I suddenly realized that I had put an idea into his head. Now he would think himself dangerous; he wouldn't be happy until he had tested his powers.
