Savage Tales

veering him to the right, swerving him back toward the cliff.
    "Noooo..."
    The voice over the edge dopplered away, and with it the man.
    "Sir," said Joaquin Jr. "Oh, sir."
    The rocks on the beach bit into Phil, one smart blow, and bruises bubblegummed through soft bones, explosions, good night.

    So what happened. Where have I taken myself of a windy day, and why am I still here to notice it?
    Instead of entering into something new, I find myself recirculating through my former deeds and misdeeds in bewildering style insomuch as I do recall no preamble or indicative that it would ever be this way. And where are these words? Are they thought forms, thought juice, the ghost of thoughts? What are these? How can they even be when I myself should not be, must not be, cannot be, will not be, and yet am, here, this, this only moment. This. Ah, this.
    Every tubercular rampaging cell surrenders and coughs down its history, each a unique book a-rambled by an invisible hand, grafting tortured narrative forevermore, and this weedy text washed to the shore of time's oblivion has reincarnated time itself, for if it is word then it is thought, and if it is thought then it demands time for the thoughts blossoming from non-thoughts and the gentle hum as the thought settles into ground, ground and being, wave and rest.
    But we (we – you? I? What?) were talking of regression, redemption (in the sense of a grocery store coupon, not salvation), reclamation, regurgitation, resuscitation from supposed dream, supposed settling, fading, spillage into night on the rocks of shore, decimation at the gates of geology's children, her rocks, in the most literal sense, his spillage and absurd fall – absurd! absurd! And gone but somehow embedded in time for the past is there, somewhere, no, no, the past is here, right here, right now, inside the present, chthonic mirror of the present, and if it is here (if?) then he is here and if he is here then he is not gone not even referrable to as dead for what is death in this agreement, this point of view (view?) or what is it? What is it? Only a point of view? But if it makes a truth and brings a thing into being then it holds more truth than... I mean for instance a door unopened is still a door. Its possibility is there. A potential truth is a truth. Activation makes it only truer.
    Who, me? Was I speaking of me? Or him? Have I become that invisible hand? I can see the hand! Right there! It goes but I cannot accept it is my hand. For if it were I would not be surprised at the words, but I am. So is it only this hand out of control? And where comes that out of control ? Where comes it? For this is not I. Then what is it? What is it? And how can I feel any equation with anything? When everything can be observed, even this hand, where am I? Where?
    If I am, then I am here. And here in this miniscule (how did such a large word carry over into my mind) room I am encased, encoated in miniature skin, so short this body. And there on the couch another body, she lies, I crawl, she is unstirring. Here in this room. A tawdry collection of flies hovers above her and this displeases me for some reason, a chancre upon one I care for. Do I care for her? Yes, that seems to be so. There like the flies hovers a feeling for this woman who I have always known, that emotion hovers and I see it, and all that I see is within. But if I see it then how is it part of me? Yes, it is. Yes. Even outside. For if it is always with me then it is of me.
    But that gentle emotion is replaced with something else when I see the eager fly bodies squirm through pools of face sweat, hungry for something, and I know there is more life in one of these flies than in all of her body. This ringing in my ears. It had no beginning so how can it end, this raw insensitivity. I cannot breathe. Nothing stops me, but I cannot breathe. This room, this apartment, keeps me from breathing, this sauna, nothing in here will do. I must go. I must –
    And yet... this new feeling. Bubbles up. I am its witness once again. This time it's different – as if there have been many times, and that is the point, yet I am sure there has not. Two emotions in conflict, or something like emotions, telling different stories. And I am inclined to believe that which says yes this is a recurrence, but not an inevitability, chatty goblin says I get to play it again. As if such a young body could hold such an old mind. Yes there is more here than meets the eye. One or two