from "Sic"
Two
plastic kitchen mops, side by side. A cobweb in an inaccessible
corner, a spider, moving within, illuminated by torchlight, raked
seating, cobbled streets, close up on the cobbles, a fly, a film
star in a precarious situation in which we do not believe -
We
hold our individual breath -
a
darkened aeroplane, a political cartoon in a newspaper beneath a
paint pot, collective breathing and bonding exercises, water on
the windscreen, meteorite trails, dogs begging, words cascading
through piano keys, a broken windscreen wiper, a child eating jelly,
a three-headed man or microphone what is the difference?
answer and you are recorded, preparatory to your destruction, refuse
to answer and he attacks you, run away
I
am trying to see out of the watery window
I
can also read what I am hearing but it is fuzzy, membranous floors
as buildings fall into their own cellars, faces imagined where there
are none but should be. Perhaps. Hideous insect holding itself in
place as it ascends, as it ascends
Two
pianos fall into a black vase. Each half of the vase plays the piano,
taking it in hand, above the rim. A clenched fist connoting nothing.
A ripple of language down the electric wire. Which electric wire?
Which vase? Which electric vase? Which piano? Whose is that voice
I keep hearing? Whose body am I in? The piano falls again. The vase
breaks. Continents divide. Invalid entry. Vision split level. Exeunt
all. The piano falls. The vase breaks.
A
set of shelves collapses; down come books, half a man in a dinner
jacket, a woodland scene, a mummified murder victim, the sea shore,
the previous page of another book, a glimpse into the next room,
the distant alps, a piece of feldspar on a stand, an icy pool, a
hook where god intended there should be a hand, two white eggs which
will never hatch -
it
goes on collapsing, making an increasing noise
a
box of blank address labels, easily pulled off, adhesive backed,
muslin, rolls of it, unrolling gauze, co-ordinated valences and
curtains, a three foot rule, the original of an unknown letter of
the Phoenician alphabet, a log still retaining some of its bark,
the key to the Garden of Eden, made in Taiwan, lights in the yard
outside, the golden goose, made in Slovakia, a hawk seen at a distance,
falling, all falling
It
is her script, her displeasure. The fish read every word. I am sure
of it. They dart about their darkened tank, setting off the cameras
its a display.
They
have definitely been up to something, though whether it is shit
or eggs or just decaying food they havent eaten...
She
spells out messages by playing with her spaghetti...
While
we sit here, talking about the fish and passing comments on her
progress, she plays with the spaghetti and writes long transient
statements about us
It
is raining cats; and dogs and the cats and dogs transform into daggers
and assassins. A man with a blotchy face takes shelter. He starts
laughing. The invasion has begun. Bombs descend, observed from satellites.
Pinpoint accuracy will be claimed. He is a man of style. He recognises
all the signs. He pushes the crockery off a table so that the lady
has room to think. She has read all the important books and understands
absolutely everything. The carpet is rucked, by the window. Take
care, my dear. The sun explodes, or I thought so. A tree torn apart.
A few black lines in a field of white are all thats left.
I want to do that again. The sun explodes. A tree transfigures.
The sheet rises, obscuring the window momentarily as it floats out
over the bed, and settles. The drains overflow, full of blood and
animal panic. Squeaky clean, he puts on his shades and walks away,
his hands in his suit pockets. Nonchalant. Secure. Full of crap.
Evening draws in and the woods and the gardens run together, escaping.
The talk is for nothing. Bombs reach their targets. Those that do
explode have missed their targets. The sun comes out but much diminished.
Shadow of a hand across a planet. More panic, and higher up the
evolutionary tree. Obfuscation. Its raining cats and dogs.
Cross
out personality; hiss. Paling almost overcome by sand. Rhythm of
the music. Rain obscuring the windscreen. Refresh the image every
few seconds. Blur of the light. Darkness reflects the interior.
Mud spray from wheels. Booted feet through puddles. Take your time.
Look. Split screen. Both ways. Reflection.
A
drench of rain on the windscreen wiped over.
The
coastline comes up before you expect.
Eye
of a crocodile and a leather boot. Paling almost overhauled by shifting
sand. Swimmers and waves merge.
Refresh
the image every half second. Glimpse of the road ahead. A break
in fabric, cut through skin, tearing edges raggedly. Falling driftwood.
Blinding darkness reflecting light. Recollections begin splitting
mud spray. Booted feet through puddles.
Newspaper
reports fill the sky. Below the sky, we march in unison, spelling
out our responses by skill. We are so many we make the ground black.
The planet shakes on its shock absorbers. Everyone in the universe
will be able to see exactly where we stand.
She
rubs in moisturiser, on her face; but she still looks -
old
to her own eyes, in the mirror, where she sees, beyond drink, she
is being -
filled
out by a fallen piano, which separates her, side from side, ear
from ear, eyes from eyes, mouths from mouths. Frogs hop and scutter.
Fingers separate from hands. Pianos play automatically. Every tune
youve ever...
Splash
they go. Splash. They go splash. Lava spills from the setting sun.
Specks of something or other on the path by the pond. Dark stuff.
Its been sticky but now its dry. The night sky flickers.
A river is in full flood, roaring, blacker than the banks in the
moonless night, phosphorescent.
A
head in a hood, a broken fraying heart, a two yolk leg, a break,
barbed wire in transmission from Passchendaele
I
said: I dont like my eggs that runny...
Help
me!
Help
me!
Someone!
She
jumps so high when she begs. O isnt she sweet. Flies go into
the flying mouth and the jaws close on them, machiny, and the gullet
works.
Tongue
collaged on to stomach licks delightedly.
Eyes
look out of the shoulders.
The
flies evolve into birds on planets.
The
birds land on the planets.
Ice
forms in the midriff brains.
Shes
looking at you! Look at that! Ah!
Two
wings fold together. Shes a butterfly.
One
big ear flaps up. She knows were talking about her. An ear
made of menacing darkness. Not her menace, ours. Thats the
effect of the collage.
A
thin neck, allowing maximum head manoeuvre.
A
collecting basket for the flies she only mangled. Mouths open all
over her, talking and eating at the same time. Its fur burns.
The
fire mats with gravy. Guts open in the furnace and dissolve the
heat.
Various
levels. Things with wings and some that run. Small blooms among
the flapdoodle. A bird settling upon its nest. A gliding lizard,
hunting. Drips on the window sill. Spider babies. Where the snow
was. Paper torn scrappy. Pipette. Syringe. Solar flare. Blur of
a flock in the lower sky turning black into white as they wheel
around the bay. Earth mover. Delineation of geological eras. Membranes
extruded. Muscles breaking. White become fire. Black supports it.
One foot out of the nest on to unexpected surface. Pick your way.
Its all your own choice here, certainly here, at the earths
end. Dribbles of soil back down into the sea, crumbling out from
beneath the road surface. One year floating past another. Unconnected.
Specimens upon display. Everything settles.
One
instant. The ground and the explosion. Implied: the aircraft from
which the photograph was taken. The picture is functionally perfect,
providing one has the skills of interpretation. However, other images
are discernible, if you have the imagination. There are several
skills here. It looks as if they have been banged together, forming
one heap of brokenness, yet still recognisable skills. Some of the
gunfire flashes make simple fancy abstract line drawings. A boomerang
the size of a village. A round gas jet on a stove which is really
a village burning. The curvature of the scene caused by the wide-angle
lens make this small section of the world asteroidal, one side folded
back upon the other, like the body of a man blown apart by one of
our explosions.
If
this isnt water, then I am drowning; I am not in a boat upon
a stream! Upon a dream. There is no lightning. There is no barrier
across the road. Speak up. Across the dream. The helicopter comes
in to land at an angle, rights itself before the motion is complete
and then lands.
From
the helicopter the floodlit night fields had little contrast. That
is, one couldnt see much. Various figures had been bagged
up for transportation. Some apparatus, also bagged. A few leaking
engines had been proposed, but that seemed impractical. It was important
to be done by morning. The ground is uncomfortably wet and it shouldnt
be. This needs examination.
A
man with three eyes comes into the makeshift light. There are too
many shadows to him. He is angular and multi-platformed. Too many
staircases. The size of him and the detail imply danger. Halfway
up, inside, the open window is what one would think would be his
chest, showing that empty blank and white terrain we just flew over.
A dogs head rests upon the shoulder of the three-eyed man.
The dog is white. A spear sinks to the bottom of the river. Dancers
and musicians follow a fortuitous notation. He rises like dense
dark smoke. He rises, several thorny bushes intertwining each other.
It is physically impenetrable. In the centre of the mass, splits
open a birth channel; come from it worms and light; the floor begins
to break in two from the weight of it. A ramped concourse leads
away to another higher concourse.
Soon
now the trolleys at their dinky tractors will come bouncing to collect
the booty for despatch.
Tangled
constructs tumble down the service shafts, falling, one might say,
for ever.
Fire
flashes briefly. Shadows on a glass floor. Treacle flows of viscosity.
Bizarre shouts on audio tape.
Do
you suppose this is what we expected?
A
great big face, a biting sea, above the language. They are speaking
somewhere in speech bubbles. The mouth is aristocratic, haughty.
It thinks it knows its value. It has no blame. An oil slick, like
a skull cap where its brain should be. No skull. Solidified water
where the curving earth shrivels. Lips break over the gunners. Everything
we say is drowned. Individuals part. Individual parts of every word
break apart, crosshatch, infill. A roll of chins descends into an
adjective. Its a shock. A sentence utters itself. It strums
a guitar and descends the stair of its syntax, staring hard, fierce
and self-centred as a hungry bird; but the immensity of meaninglessness
overtakes and starts its own dissolution. Colloquial phrases chain
together. Youre getting negative on your tie. One or two phonemes
are heavier than the amniotic fluid.