Thu, 19 May 2005

Parables
I once knew a woman who fucked up her legs mountain climbing (well, more precisely, a woman who got drunk at a grad party and said “hey! let’s go climb the rocks!”) and has since learned to walk again and can cover short spaces fairly easily but cannot dance. One weekend, all wigged out, she installed a series of ring-ended ropes into the ceiling of her apartment (to her landlord’s displeasure, but fuck, what’s he gonna say?) and has learned how to dance, hanging and swinging from ring to ring like a little kid. It’s actually quite nice, once you get used to the notion of your partner’s arms being straight up instead of around you, the muscles in her arms growing more defined each time you dance.

I once knew a kid who gave me money for milk on a day I had lost mine, a kid I had never really known outside of hallway-nods and shared laughs at class-jokes, no reason to be kind at all. The next day he had moved away. Where did you go?

I once knew a man who could fake his own death. He moved into an apartment across the street from the hospital and instead of calling a cab home he’d just call a 911 on himself. He’s a millionaire now.

I once knew a baby who smelled like amethyst and blackberries. This was no dietary fluke, no scneted diapers, it was just a natural smell, just as I once knew a boy who smelled of chocolate and feces, just as I once knew a girl whose cunt smelled of chicken soup. As the baby grew out of babydom, the scent faded but remained, like a polio scar or an infantile shame, and the children tried to find nicknames for the scented kid, but nothing ever came to mind, all aukward and apologetic, and the kid grew older, until the scent was just barely detectable, the nose against damp skin, the tongue in all the sour places, and no one would ever truly believe, confused, so certain it was a soap, so afraid to believe in small things.

I once knew a woman who spent a year in a containment camp. This camp aspired to all the trappings of culture and thus needed a symphony. Members of the camp who had musical training were auditioned and assigned instruments, the finest instruments available in wartime conditions. The symphony was allowed to stay in special barracks and eat better food to insure their health: dignitaries and high-ranking military brass regularly visited the camp and half the symphony out with dysentery simply wouldn’t be acceptable. Over time, the members of the symphony were allowed to play pieces they had written themselves, so as to further show off the abilities inherent in the lesser peoples once exposed to a true culture. These pieces were lullabies, and were honed over time to a narcotic efficiency. The members of the camp fell asleep midway through the performances, sleeping longer and longer as the band’s talents improved, until whole days passed in a stupor. Other prisoners began using these lulls as escape potentials, and by the time the camp was “liberated” at war’s end, half the population of the camp had vanished into the surrounding area, coming out and laughing with the freed prisoners as a shared joke the liberating army couldn’t understand.

I once knew a man who went out into the woods and dug himself a grave in the soft earth by the lake. On days when the notion of dying came to him, gathered at his door, he’d get in his car and drive out along the abandoned highway, walk through the fields and lay for a while in his grave, staring at the light-patterns in the trees.

I once knew two theives who did not know they were theives. I didn’t have a place to stay after everything had gone wrong up north, so for a while i slept in my friend Yusef’s van while he was at work, during the day, eating quarter-loaves of bread and rice i’d make in the Quik Trip microwave (I think the girl who was working there had a thing for me, or (more likely) just didn’t care). While I was sleeping in Yusef’s van the van was broken into. Two young men started removing the stereo. I kept thinking I shouldn’t move, but I was scooting on my back down closer to them, legs first. I kicked one in the back of the head, which fractured the windshield, while grabbing the other, who began screaming, dropping tools. “The fuck is wrong with you, man?” said the first, dabbing blood from his forehead with his shirt sleeve. “You’re stealing the radio! Fucking theives!” “Stealing? No, no, we’re recall technicians. You know how when you go in tunnels or under bridges the reciever goes out? That’s our fault. And the company won’t spring for replacements, so we’ve been going around ourselves and fixing it. Doesn’t take more than five minutes.” “So why you breaking in, then? Crook! Claimer of false integrity!” “Because we don’t want anyone to know, right?” said the other, after I let go of his throat. “Like maybe it was a fluke or something like that. We take pride in our work. I mean, if you’re dead-set on not getting it done, we’ll just go.” Figuring Yusef would want such a thing done, I let them finish up, watching them closely, until after a couple minutes they were done and left. I told Yusef, but he didn’t believe me. Nobody ever believes me.

I once knew the scavengers who lived at the far end of the field of abandoned carriages, who often died suddenly, before old age could claim them. Those closest to the corpse at the moment of death were obligated to strip and clean the corpse, getting first claim on pieces of the body, which they would cut and pull from their own bodies, replacing the corpse’s parts with root-grafts and mud, until the scars were barely visible. Thus, the loved ones of the corpse could see pieces of them continue on, see the hands on other arms, hear the heart beat beneath someone else’s skin, stare into swirling and confused eyes shoved in someone else’s skull.

I once knew the weaving-machines which had been liberated from the automated assembly station out by the radio towers, up in the trees, binding strands of plastic-wrap and newspaper to the leafless branches. Sometimes two of the weaving-machines would come across each other, grasping at each other with servo-arms, falling from the trees, stripping parts from each other to weave packaging out of ribbon-wire and insulation.

I once knew a woman who served as an assistant baker in a bakery where I used to work. I am certain that she has a story, but I have yet to figure out what it is.
(12:10.05.19.2005) [/alpha] #