When he tired  when put his pen down the words in his head howled in protest 

 

they wanted out desperately wanted out of their dingy confines(who didnt) 

        

they didnt want to serve him or his sentences 

 

yet worse  they knew the only way out was through him 

the warden the wordsmith the keyskeeper

 

they also knew he couldnt be cajoled

because if he could  they were every word known to man and not one had ever succeeded getting out without going through him

he wasnt a brutish man he understood them better than they thought he did

  

though he didnt waste his time explaining such or acknowledging their jeers

their bitter confinement was no different than his

but they had away out

they could be reprieved

he could only put his pen down to rest then the following day pick it up and write again

he had no choice hence why he tweaked words made new words wrote write wriote

he referred to himself as a wrioter and had always preferred wrioting to communicate despite its easier spontaneous forms

because often those words didnt say what they truly wanted to communicate

 

often they were ugly

more often they were thoughtless

when he communicated  in black and white  he sought to say exactly what he wanted to say had thought his words through exercised them so he didnt have to retract them

he stood behind them

they stood behind him

symbiotic simpatico

                                  against the uttered and fingered words that took on a force and life of their own animating their speaker and fingerers minds loosening their tongues the queer sparks nearer and nearer tempting their dry tinder

words that ran ahead of themselves lathered aerated(erratic)

 

once they thought they could make a break

saw that the walls were high and dissipated into a mauve an azured roil above their heads

the earth hard

they couldnt dig into it

it chipped

then one day the miasma cleared and they saw the circular walls ran up as one and formed a dome

they realised they were not inmates

they were enclosed

and he

 

              he verged on becoming their reluctant god

   

   

0004,  Monday,  23 11. 15

1209,  Monday,  23  11. 15

It was something he said I didnt expect to come out of his face

Yeah  Maybe people got a choice But mostly they do what theyre pushed to do You push they stampede

Stampede

Apt

When everything runs away you run with them

Even if you think better of it you run

Maybe

   

But he was a snake of curiosity

 

He dropped and rolled 

   

Eyes would be on those fleeing and itd be hot on theyre heels Too much not to run up on the backs of the slowest and haul them down Easy pickings Exposed Unable to defend themselves

He liked to think hed pick a corner a narrow passageway  take em on one at a time

                                                                  

He liked to think

Thinking puts you in the game levels the playing field when youre forced to play

I anticipate evil from people Theyre people      And people

They always deliver

Sound argument

I nodded

I said Ill not disagree

Huh   as if he didnt recognise what he said

And maybe he didnt

Maybe    something spoke through him he was a vessel a loudspeaker a clarion bell pealing despite itself struck by an unseen hand

I could accept that

Id been that

But I slipped oil onto my water and it reflected me back up into my eyes

My ears held its echoes and I paid attention to echoes   And imitations 

Even imitations held onto that bit of truth that forged them   Found them

345/1545,  Sunday,  22 (52^nd anniversary of President Kennedys assassination)  11. 15
pg 283 The Water Knife Paolo Bacigalupi

sometimes while washing his face applying Nivea after shaving sun lotion to thwart skin cancer(it ran in the family)

or washing his hair giving it a real good scrubbing he halts as if commanded  he recognises becomes fascinated that beneath his hands and skin are his bones  and fascinated he fixates on what his skull would look like without him

                                                                                                                                                                     without him

in the shower it was worse

when people shower alone they have a tendency to ruminate   unlike if  they were elsewhere by themselves

perhaps a gift of the running water(amniotic) cleansing shedding filth  unobstructed they revel slip consciousness

go hard hypnagogic

                                                                                                                                     showering one day in particular

he found realised as he absently gargled water from the showerhead he was also muttering over and over again under its cool spray  maybe mihi quaestio factus sum  maybe mihi quaestio factus sum  maybe mihi quaestio factus sum  which he learned read in St. Augustines Confessions  he muttered as others might sing songs with catchy refrains out loud or scatted to music pealing in their heads which none of them could get away with anywhere in public without being conspicuous or drawing attention and whaddafuck stares as if they violated or broached some kind of social etiquette in being themselves to their very depth

  

to him it seemed showers were critical facilitator

and while maybe mihi quaestio factus sum ran out of his mouth with the showerwater he was imagining himself clasping his head with both hands digging his nails into his scalp yanking pulling tearing his skin renting it and with one more strenuous mad dog rip he tore it down either side of his head over his ears his scalp and hair deafening him while warm rivulets of blood sluiced over his face his fluttering eyelashes down the back of his neck  he imagined it diluted pink at his throat and shoulders in the hollows catches of his clavicles his skull revealed gleaming white though knowing it wouldnt having seen too many skulls of animals as he dressed them(he wasnt going to get that past himself) his simian ridge prominent the knobs at either side near the back of his head feeling them had convinced him as a babe he was dehorned by the doctor who used an electric dehorner as cowboys did on cattle ranches his hide smouldering
his buds burnt and scraped away  not that hed bitch because the doctor didnt toss him over onto his back yank his legs wide apart pinch pull at the skin of his scrotum slice it away with a jackknife then work his testicles out one at a time drag the blade down his spermatic cord severing it a feathered wound which healed quicker than a clean crosscut then swabbed with antiseptic and swaddled

maybe mihi quaestio factus sum

maybe I have become a problem to myself

432/1632,  Saturday,  21  11. 15

                                                   123/1323,  Sunday,  22 (52^nd anniversary of President Kennedys assassination)  11. 15