Anvilmen and Philologists

She thought of plums and reddish radishes and celery root and the smell of coke fuel and petrol. She ate and ate and ate, not once stopping to see what it was she was eating, reddish red radishes, pale green celery stalks and bean curd boiled in cumin and clacker’s oil. She smoked Camel cigarettes, inhaling and exhaling at the same time. The cooper tamped bungholes shut tight with a wooden mallet he swung from the top of his shoulder to the waders of his hips, stopping only to readjust the spigot with the heel of his hand. These are handmade things, ways of being with the world while being outside of it. Without or with, so paltry and bothersome, like a nervous tic or a gamey leg, or a punch in the chops, a loose denture-plate and a bloodied lipsmack. Camel filter-tips and bolt-driven ankles, totted in place with screws and washers, a twist to the left and a crank to the right, just the right tock to get the driven, driven home. She rode side-saddle on a cushion that smelt like ox sweat and chaff, the landau man pulling hard on the reins, horses’ hooves neighing and braying, railheads and brads strewn about like mouse droppings. The anvil-man hammered tacks into braided hair, just big enough to slip through clip and yowl. The first time he saw her she was reading the National Geographic. He thought this rather odd, as most people, miscreants and philologists, simply read the captions under the photos.