3239. SETTLEMENT

SETTLEMENT
I was reading Gerontian with my head
in a noose. At any moment, I knew, the
chair could be pulled from under me.
Feeling boxed in, encaved, enclosed
yet unprotected, my shivering premise
mixed fear and doom. Oh dear.
-
I was reading Gerontian with my
hands on the block - as if some
weird Arabic punishment, some
intrepid Muslim debauch, would
leave me limbless and lame. Better
then to just move on - please keep
the hands for the writing, if nothing
else (and, even though I hadn't, I
will never touch your daughter again).
-
I was reading Gerontian while choking
on slime - things being forced down
my gullet by a shrieking torture-master
named Tumo. Never having met before,
I hardly knew the man's purpose or
patter or poise. Oh, all for naught, all
that tendentious and social drivel.
-
Have I told you enough about what
I was doing? I had (really) no clue,
other than these evidences given,
where I was headed or what this
life was about - indeed if it is
about, really, anything at all.