Times of Perilous Discovery (Excerpt)

FESTIVAL DAYS


Times of Perilous Discovery. Watch Out! These fields will be forever darkened. To happier times. I come home to this same sense of distress and disregard for the future. How you mediate time is what it comes down to: we have to look out for each other. She did it on purpose. She did it to get rid of me. I was too much of a burden. Escape—for freedom’s sake! Now that they separated—the real battle begins. Foolish Motives—kept half in reality and half in fantasy. The truth—when will I cross it again? Placed in such a stale room waiting for the hour to come. She wanted to stub a cigarette out but none was lit. The best she could come up with was to grind her heel in the dust. She wanted to be a futurist but couldn’t keep up with herself. So many loose ends—broken by the fear of absolute desire. Act at once or leave it all alone. What you do shouldn’t be done. Stay clever like this and you’ll never leave the house.
“It didn’t work out but it was fun while it lasted.” J-F said about his last girlfriend.
Turmoil ‘hidden’ beneath an open surface.
“I never lied to you. She said—do you know that? She actually felt like telling me that!” J-F continued, wallowing in his pint. I hoped it wasn’t to make me comfortable. I had too much else on my mind. I hoped my progeny wouldn’t go through this same mess. Perhaps the next time it won’t be so apparent. You’ve seen it all before—what good are my words when they delete the possibility? How good are these clichéd moments? I don’t think of you very often.
Past the white porcelain banisters and onto the marble floor below. Teasing out the warm strain. The difficulties of an unrecognized half age. I call to you like a child once more. I home and dream of exits—different passages from this shallow plane. It will work out. I see her now in that lovely blue gown crossing the floor, approaching the arches that led to the sea. Perhaps then, then it will make sense. The island, the sorcerer, the girl—other frozen traps of belonging—breaking away from the sequences. I layer this fiction with blood and violence. The words examine all I could ever love—shaking away on a night such as this. Back into it—drifting after the planned excursion. You see all these tortured words—look at my skin; the absence of marks—try to live this way for a second and you may understand. I am pushed and realize there is nothing left alive.
Her eyes blinked for a second. I witnessed it all in close-up, the relaxed facial muscles, the absence of thought, the pale skin.
Work in a new form—stop bothering us all with recycled trash. Oh, but we can’t move—a likely forum for interruption. My teeth came down hard at the thought. I nearly bit my tongue. The blood came rushing into her cheeks.
We colored outside and over the lines—didn’t we?
“I confided in you and you abused my trust.”
I didn’t believe any of it anymore—the language is gone. Its rubbish for the Silent Cinema. The images do justice to the text. Our relation is strained, I sense that—you don’t feel as much as you should and I—my desire is wrapped in so many secluded gems. The connection is too forced. She lets out the sigh I’m waiting for: now the adrenalin kicks in. I’m not allowed to smile yet. The sky turns from pale blue to ultramarine—her dress shimmers in the wind. I want to raise a glass but put my arm around her waist instead. Should it start now? Yes. It is time. Simplify things. My dreams overlap and envelop each other until I can’t read them any more. It arrives now, I suppose it was always there—only now, it’s prominent—I sense her smell. Things aren’t collapsing now—its difficult to describe, the disparate origins have formed a tapestry of sorts—a coherent goal: yes, it’s starting to gel.
Ask what color this scene is—I cannot tell you: my eyes are shut. I don’t want this sensation to end.
We are together on the bed, covered in flowers locked in a suitcase moving from stations to the all-consuming end. Like the liquid that issued from between her thighs. I wondered what was inherent in the middle. The minute hand hadn’t moved very far—twenty minutes passed at most. She joined me on the terrace. I smiled finally as she approached. Her arm extended, I kissed her hand. People, other couples were out there dancing to our left. The square was filled with as many people—lovers, scoundrels, foreigners, and children, all lost in the crowd.
One can still find a legitimate reason for sending a postcard.
Pick a cut and I show you the wealth of the ages. I’ve set it up and off before. Along these white walls with blue trim. “That’s the empty room—it’ll be our nursery when the time arrives.” I said with a smile, my eyes bursting with happiness to look at her.
“Why do you think its over? It’s barely even begun—you must understand that.” J-F told Jurgen in all sincerity. To escalate their fraudulent works. One day, I’ll tell you how it all should be—domestic rupture, life in the cities, a suicide of morals.
Past the dilapidated apartment complexes, into the cleanlier city center.
The beautiful parts of the city are home to students, foreigners, and the well-off. When did I sell what I loved—no, I don’t think I profited from that, I gave it all away freely. Letting it clog my own worthless sense of sunshine. I don’t like paying for the abuses the misconceptions of others. “Let them drown in their own confusion.” What is the range of this distraction? You—the charm is gone: you’ve worn it out.
Questionable displays of anatomy: My eyes: your skin. The predictable misery of it all: Description? Another sweet conceit: The rooms, the color of the lights, the people present, the smell of the air and her perfume, the cut of the dress she wore and how long before our tempers gave way. It’s a lying sense of collared shame. As I listen to songs of forgiveness and passion. The sickness burns my lungs apart.
I don’t want her to see me like this. I know it will pass. Reissue it with different packaging. It’s inevitable. Another section of this fiendish plot. I can feel the presence of another directing us toward destruction.
“She was here. You’ve missed her apparently.” I was left with the salty residue of her tears on these sheets. Isn’t culture so much more refined these days? Yeah, but in the end it only makes matters worse. Crime’s become just as sophisticated by half. Inquires? Domestic tension—as they say. Quickened journeys. What’s the point of travel? Real experience? Guilt? Such travesties—cutting apart examples every day. The process starts over—I cannot help it. Do you recall the sound of such things?
Festival Time. The streets are lit, the arches filled with streamers, long paper chains covering all the main shopping districts. Each restaurant has added its own special touches to the traditional Festival Menu. The performers from out of town have arrived. They’ve taken up residency in the various hotels near the theater district, while some have camped out on the park’s grounds. One can see the vendors with their carts setting up—selling useless gifts or food—each with its own specialty or gimmick. I knew better than to give in. After a few drinks however, it seemed like a good idea—as my stiff judgment waned.
“You’re too young to be disillusioned.” I remember telling her—she wasn’t jaded, she just had no trouble recognizing all the symptoms.
Perfection—let’s be progressive. Your rationale seems insignificant when put into perspective. Too much decay. Disturbing compression. I wish it would all subside. I can’t be any clearer. Take out the filter and clean it!
“Isn’t there some kind of detergent I can use?”
Why do these stories persist? Forward all kinds of subjects related to the project at once. Odes of love or fetish objects. Clouded eyes—perpetrating the dismal presence of misguided wants. Other pockets of shame. The shifting of words. I’ve been off to a slow start. I expected to accomplish more. Writing here—in this dry heat on this white table.