RUDIMENTS, pt. 548
(the whole world seemed coated in ice)
All a'thwart, and arms a'kimbo!
Whatever that was, it sure caught
my attention, or my eye, or my
interest. How do you get from
something outside to something
within? At 12 years old, I figure
most things are supposed to be
seamless, but this never was. I
got to places, but only in my
head. My own major endeavor,
at that time, proved to be fairly
useless. All the seminary stuff
was just a silly joke. Boys, and
guys after boys, hiding behind
the garb of religious while they
caterwauled with crosses. Now,
what, only 50 years later, give or
take, it's all coming home to roost
and finally a lot of those creepy
bastards, if not already dead, are
going down. Nothing out of the
ordinary for them. (That's a
double-tiered joke, because there's
a part of the catholic Mass called
the 'Ordinary,' and going down,
well that's pretty apparent.
-
The trouble I had in my life, and
it was a big error, was in just that -
at an early age I took as authority
figures people I placed complete
faith and trust in - for a short time
anyway - who turned out to be
steadfast and recalcitrant oafs. Both
together. They were men (Men?)
of their own self-presumed strict
adherence to principles that, in a
few short years, could not withstand
the onslaught of society and which
gave way - they left the priesthood,
brotherhood, whatever, married, and
all the rest, included same-sex stuff
too - which is of little consequence
here, except as yet further proof of
their breaches of confidence. I had
been misled, and pretty much my
life was ruined. Tainted and
wounded. Having no one to talk
to, really, I just stumbled along,
stunned at what I'd just gone
through. Never again in my life
would I ever believe the words of
anyone professing to me what they
were, in their own eyes and from
their own points of view. I saw
that it was all a changeable fiction.
The remainder of the world is
just lucky I didn't turn out to be
a killer. I was, however, sickened
to the very weave of my being.
-
I'll need to stop now, before I
put my fist in someone's face.
I'll need to step back, compose
myself, and get real non-committal.
-
St. Augustine (probably just another
asshole, but one here to whom I'll
give a momentary benefit of doubt),
said : "Think. What is time? If no
one asks me, I know what it is. If
I wish to explain it to him who
asks, I do not know. If Space has
three dimensions, Time has only
one - the moment we are in right
now. Time is a road without any
turn-offs..." I guess that's OK. I
can finish it for him - no turn-offs
or intersections, exits or turnarounds
or rest-areas or toll-stops. Nor does
it have any means of representation
except by its passing. Presentism
says only the present is real - we
can no more travel back in time
than we can travel to a place that
doesn't exist. Yet another school
says that past and future are just
as equally real; that the brain makes
its reasons in the present, and that
is all we know.
-
Solid funerals? Precipitous declines?
Is that all that's worth our knowing?
What's worth denying? Lamp paste,
or lamb paste? Or lambaste? Hey,
buddy, can you spare a line?
-
It seems like I'm living my life in
reverse, now anyway. I'm about 12,
too, right now again. I think. I hope
that's right, because right now I can
do no other for there's no other to
do. Everything is calamitous. Yet,
I remember it all, and I re-enter
it all because it's all still here from
the first time around. That's why
I'm here : Avenel : again. to re-live
what no longer exists. I died from
the pneumonia I caught there in the
park. Mannerisms like this will
make a great dresser out of me.
Salvation comes with Salada Tea?
Is that what that fellow asked of me?
-
At the very calamitous bakery too
they serve crumpets of worry and
dread - you can order either, or
both. The Ayes have it - at that
same bakery they also serve boxes
of read, and the eyes have it. I
cycle along the road of cold. No
one ever sways me much, they
stand and they sit and they stand.
People give themselves away,
just in varying levels of what they
probably see as ease but which
appears to me as awkwardness.
It kills me. Me. I can pull nothing
off; here I should be interviewing
the Master chef and I'm interviewing
a busboy instead. I like to wear
my watch and just sit here alone.
No one does that anymore. Certainly
no watches, and they've all got
a phone : staring at the crinkly
screen everyone things they're
the President, getting important
President messages; but who
the hell wants to talk to one
of them? Overhead, the
incoming jets go by, and I
can time them, 3 or 4 minutes
apart, certain times of day. They
take their patterns; all the same.
It's truly a world of one. Sliding
over to Newark, or out across
the bay, for line-up to landing,
flaps moving slowly in a three
position way. It's amazing how
the engines change their rolling
thrusts for landing and the landing
gear come down. They drop as
low as they seem, so slow. On
Christmas Day, on Christmas
Day in the morning. As the song
has it. I'd rather hear the roar
of the jets than the alto screech
of a hundred high voices all
as one sublimating their jests
to be a Christmas pest.
-
So, isn't it sinful, the things I've
learned and the things that matter
to me. Nothing crashes anymore,
nothing; it all runs on in some
stupid and perfect harmony. I
think I'll vamp, and go home.
-
Once, when I was another fellow,
I stood in the street where it had
been snowing for what seemed like
days; wasn't really but seemed so.
It was 1961. The snow on the streets
had frozen up, and stayed there. Not
like now, when a plow comes in a
day or so and the mess starts being
cleared. This just stayed there; turning
a bit mushy in the day, cars rolling
slowly over it, and then night-freezing
and staying solid as the post-snow
temperatures sunk. I was 10. We kids
loved it. The whole world seemed
coated in ice.
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