Thursday, July 09, 2009

Crows and Children

The Barrister and Mrs. Simms out for their morning walk came upon a party of crows besieging a cat; Mr. Simms intoning ‘--shameful, can’t they see the poor creatures down on its luck?’ Such as this these things were not uncommon, birds besieging cats, muleteers besieging mules, women besieging one another over the strangest things; out on his own morning strolls the man in the hat had seen such calamities, children besieging children and cats fighting dogs, all manner of calamity he saw walking. Counting their blessings the Barrister and Mrs.Simms went about their day, the crows having made mincemeat of the poor cat, the Barrister Simms intoning to his wife ‘--they’ll get what’s coming to ‘em, mark my words Mrs. Simms’, his wife rejoining ‘--in due time my dear, not a moment before’.

Both parties were unwilling to acknowledge the other, the other Other simply too weary to plea for forgiveness and a more timely beginning. Crows and children larking on the front lawn of the constabulary, the smallest to the biggest giving off a hoot holler ‘--fucker’s dead!’ ‘…yes indeed’. ‘--wanna know what I think?’ ‘…by all means yes’. ‘--the crows ate ‘em’, ‘…every last bit of ‘em’. ‘--down to the hide…’. ‘…every last lick…’. …all eaten up down to the hide, sad state of affairs, sadder than that fucker’d got ate by the dog, all his hair and all. …dead as dead!

The headline in the newspaper read Serial Killer Killed’, and beneath it an advert for Pimms’ Stool Softener, a picture of an off-white bed pan disappearing off the page. The man in the hat said to himself in a low whisper ‘--take before bed on a full stomach, wake up the next morning clean as a whistle’. Seated beside him, across the aisle from the Barrister and Mrs. Simms, Mrs. Simms’ bowel having prolapsed the night before leaving her fatigued and nonplussed, was a man with a gray face (worn through with Whisky and Porter) a pitted nose and eyes redder than spilt blood. He was mumbling something to himself, his voice cracking like a child looking tearfully for a lost bicycle or a dog.

The last time was the first time he felt the nausea; the thought of two dogs tail to arse while a child heaves a red and blue ball over the fence, the boy’s face ribbed with anger and contempt, was enough to bring him to his knees. He felt his shinbones give way, then a heaviness pulling him headlong into the blacktop, the smell of his da’s starched shirts and rotting fish pelting his thoughts like hailstones on sheet metal
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"Poetry is the short-circuiting of meaning between words, the impetuous regeneration of primordial myth". Bruno Schulz
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