RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,230
(news from nowhere, pt. one)
I finally feel well enough,
I think, to fit this old spirit
back into the form it once
inhabited. The two no longer
meld very well but that's my
problem, not yours. While I
was drifting along the coasts
of Delirium - one 'drunken
boat' in my 'Season of Hell' -
mixing, Rimbaud's, 'Saison
en Infer.' with his own, also,
Drunken Boat, 'Le Bateau
Ivre,' I was startled each time
by the images and new-shaded
realities I saw.
-
It was a constant, and yet a
fitful, struggle to find that
comfortable state of fevered
suspension wherein the body
hangs between sleep and the
less formal restlessness in
which images, night dreams,
and strange tremors lurk; some
hallucinatory half-point in
which the most ordinary
things are seen in their new
guises. The high-deliria of
an ill human in service to
the moving outlines of his
life: In my case, over 5 days,
things became super-real
or totally transformed, to a
point I could almost not any
longer tolerate: The dresser
top, and the vanity on it,
were somehow fused together,
to form a sight-line, with the
resultant image of a large
bear- head staring at me for
4 days!; Next to that, a clothes
rack in the corner of that same
room, the rack and few clothes
over it came to life as a deer,
in-place, an immovable and
poised sentinel, viewing the
scene. Outside the winds were
howling, twisting and roaring,
freight-train like, over the high
hill, sometimes shaking even
the house. The dances of
movement from curtain and
light, and all the various
angles and irregular lines of
shade, played themselves out
mysteriously along the white
wall - as if Dionysius himself
had inhabited this remarkable
steady-play of light and form.
-
When I first moved up here,
one or two go-rounds ago, a
guy told me : 'Six months nice
enough; six months Siberia.'
That was his determinate of
the local weather scene. I've
never been to Siberia - not
even in my Stalin-chains -
but the conjecture seemed to
work, and I knew what he
meant right off. He'd never
been to Siberia either, so I
surmised his intent : cliche
in service to image; the getting
off of an idea, not a reality.
It seems that, just about the
middle of each November,
as Thanksgiving approaches,
so does this 'Siberia.' With all
the slapstick of a noodle fight
and rubber swords, somehow
the Winter-world transforms
everything - browns and grays
and raw angles and dull vistas
of bare, all enhanced by a
certain happy and singular way
of managing and being left
alone to one's own resources;
things to be done, or not, only
as one chooses. The autocrats
of the breakfast table, those
lording over others with rules
and documentation, are long
gone. Good riddance to bad
rubbish. This world is a better
place without them. I'll take
Siberia over Ft. Lauderdale
anyday.
-
What happened next was a
strange in-and-out layer of
consciousness by which the
confusion of both states of
my sick/well life were battling
each other for a predominance
over my interpretation of what
the world was (is?). It was out
of my hands, since I was weak
and moribund, and merely a
witness to what was going on
outside my resting form. Arms
too weak to reach, and all that.
Days went my, and new things
emerged: my thoughts became
words, yes, but now they were
words that terrorized me behind
closed eyes. In the darkness,
new and startling colors floated
slowly across my inner-lids -
in brilliants yellow and pulsing
reds - and these colors formed
messages, commands, words,
and entire, perfect, paragraphs
of statements and ideas which
seemed immense, but which,
if I ever tried to grab them,
dispersed, or were dispersed,
as quickly as the lightning
which brought them forth. In
what seemed large blocks of
Chinese-characters, the floating
mass of yellow would begin,
while sliding across my vision,
to form into words, with one
word taking predominance and
then disappearing. What in the
world is 'Dudham?' What in
Heaven's name does 'Carana
Vo Hooris' mean? These were
all untellable to me. END OF
PART ONE - news from
nowhere.
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