12) Small night. Big day. I need food, drink. But first a bath or shower. I am not clean. On the boat there were no opportunities for washing. I've had no ablutions for a week. I am unclean. Alone, I had no cares. Vanity, sans object, took a holiday. But I am now among people, however small and obscure and incomprehensible they may be. If humanity shares a common language of decency I am swearing in it now.
I am taken by my diminutive hosts to a shower which is warmed geothermaly, as if I gave a shit. Safely under, the water graciously pours down upon my dirty head. A brown sheen runs down my legs, vermin migrate. My hair is a bit knotted. Cut it off. My blackened fingers and toes hurt. They will be entertained later today.
I've lost weight. My ribs ride over one another with big breaths. I think my masculinity has retreated for good. Irregular bowel movements annoy me. It is about whether I shit in a bucket, a hole in the floor or into an endless abyss, whether into a fast stream I cannot ford or on the ice, where, freeze dried, it will remain for a hundred years. I cannot relax and let go without understanding.
My elbows, knees, ankles, wrists, all my articulated bits are grinding, mortar and pestle like, by the way. Bringing up the rear. No malady wants to be left behind.
I leave for the hospital in a tiny car. In the back seat I must appear the Christmas present too large to hide. Or an impractical family pet. The engine whines under load. I ask the driver why they bother. How much is Dr. Creep paying them and their salvation army? Of course, he talks nonsense. If there is information in what he says it is his little secret. God, drop me off. My host is fading.
In the hospital fingers jab at a manifest. I learn that my medicine will be long in coming. It seems the truck delivering supplies to this backwater crashed. Nothing to be done for me but a paring of dead flesh, then the draining of the balance, and lastly, wearing clean socks for a healthy comportment. I'm out the door.
It hardly matters that my medicine will be tardy. I have a backpack Dr. Creep has seen fit to fill. I am indulging these local do-gooders. It is part of a larger idea: To appear human, just normal folk, thence to swiftly get away. No notes, no scribbles of any kind. To hell with paperwork. No record of my having been here will persist beyond fragile, disputable memory.
A sudden ice storm drew to a close human congress for today. But I cannot end on a bad note. Yes, the hospital proved unhelpful, and yes, my tongue-tied host has grown pale, and the trucks meant to bring me help have overturned. Still, I have sleep and its promise of better sights.
I am dreaming of a cellar at the end of time. Heaven is a wine cellar. Though it is a cave, I ascend to it. Earth is its basement. It is cold. Bottles and bottles. I am dreaming. Bottles and bottles.
I am taken by my diminutive hosts to a shower which is warmed geothermaly, as if I gave a shit. Safely under, the water graciously pours down upon my dirty head. A brown sheen runs down my legs, vermin migrate. My hair is a bit knotted. Cut it off. My blackened fingers and toes hurt. They will be entertained later today.
I've lost weight. My ribs ride over one another with big breaths. I think my masculinity has retreated for good. Irregular bowel movements annoy me. It is about whether I shit in a bucket, a hole in the floor or into an endless abyss, whether into a fast stream I cannot ford or on the ice, where, freeze dried, it will remain for a hundred years. I cannot relax and let go without understanding. My elbows, knees, ankles, wrists, all my articulated bits are grinding, mortar and pestle like, by the way. Bringing up the rear. No malady wants to be left behind.
I leave for the hospital in a tiny car. In the back seat I must appear the Christmas present too large to hide. Or an impractical family pet. The engine whines under load. I ask the driver why they bother. How much is Dr. Creep paying them and their salvation army? Of course, he talks nonsense. If there is information in what he says it is his little secret. God, drop me off. My host is fading.
In the hospital fingers jab at a manifest. I learn that my medicine will be long in coming. It seems the truck delivering supplies to this backwater crashed. Nothing to be done for me but a paring of dead flesh, then the draining of the balance, and lastly, wearing clean socks for a healthy comportment. I'm out the door.
It hardly matters that my medicine will be tardy. I have a backpack Dr. Creep has seen fit to fill. I am indulging these local do-gooders. It is part of a larger idea: To appear human, just normal folk, thence to swiftly get away. No notes, no scribbles of any kind. To hell with paperwork. No record of my having been here will persist beyond fragile, disputable memory.
A sudden ice storm drew to a close human congress for today. But I cannot end on a bad note. Yes, the hospital proved unhelpful, and yes, my tongue-tied host has grown pale, and the trucks meant to bring me help have overturned. Still, I have sleep and its promise of better sights.
I am dreaming of a cellar at the end of time. Heaven is a wine cellar. Though it is a cave, I ascend to it. Earth is its basement. It is cold. Bottles and bottles. I am dreaming. Bottles and bottles.
posted by KJP at 4:30 PM
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