Of a horse and a dog and the Cavern of Death

I am in the old house. There is a horse there. It is a friend, and it is an enemy. It is in love, and it is insane. He chases me across the yard, across the corridor, across the room. I lock myself in a metal cabinet, and I am trapped. He menaces me through the holes in its walls.

I am walking, walking through the old neighbourhood. I can feel the presence of the horse, but he does not come after me here. I make my way to the Cavern of Death, though I shall fear no evil, for my friends are with me, their presence and their comfort a soft source of peace.

The close walls of the cavern are grey, the low roof is grey, the steps leading downward into its very bowels are grey. Death walks deferentially behind me. I never thought of it before as being polite. I am to be locked in a chamber, a cavity, a cell, with no food and no water, no companionship or stimulation. It is penitence and atonement. I must dwell on what I have done.

After some while, I am brought a platter of food, of creamed potatoes and cooked meats and corn without the cob. I am brought a cup of sour sop punch. I have paid my penance. I am free to leave and to live. Death will not leave its cavern for me. It will not follow me wherever I go.

I feel the encouragement and support of my friends, the well-wishes of those whom I love, leaving that place with me. I make my way back to the neighbourhood, wending through its myriad, multitudinous roads. A little dog named Sally is at my heels and by my side. Presently, happily I return to the old house.

The horse is there, laying in waiting for me. This time he cannot touch me, he cannot menace my soul, and I feel no fear. This time I am the one who chases him, for I am strength and he is fear, my will is stronger, and without worry. He runs and he leaves, scattering throughout the neighborhood about us, for I am no longer a place in which he can hide.

Sally stays on his heels to keep him going. No one shall look for him there. And he shall have no friends in the Cavern of Death, where he now goes. His penitence shall be long, and so too shall his suffering. There will be no platter or cup to signal the end.

I awake.

Beauty and Death

The boy Logan (Seek and Ye Will Never Find)

I am in the old house. I am a tiny, electromagnetic human computer, programmed to seek and ye shall find. Rivenis is my brother. He too is a tiny humanoid machine. We are looking for the boy Logan. I do not know what he is, or what he is programmed to do, but it smells of love, and is written in feeling and reeks of the unrequited.

Two men arrive to take me away. They shut me down and turn me off that I may be unconscious. There is a place, a person, a light far away, and we are moving farther from it. Our orders come from there. It sends Rivenis with us. He is assigned to protect me and to inform me of my own assignment. There is something I must do. Find the boy Logan. I drift. I accept. I submit. I give in.

The two men drive us down the Spring Garden highway to Bridgetown. One is driving. The other is receiving orders from The Light. My feet are in Rivenis’ lap. He has his orders too. The man in the passenger seat presently takes note of my hairy android legs, and unable to help himself, proceeds to start scenting my feet and kissing my toes and biting my heels; he is plucking the hair of my legs with his teeth. I drift.

Now he climbs into the backseat, and in positions impossible in that slightest of spaces, proceeds to take me. It does not feel like rape, because this is all from his perspective, and so it feels like pleasure. It is neither my pain nor my perspective, and so it feels like love. Like I have no will for it to be against. Rivenis does not protect me. I feel revulsion, for this is not my assignment, and he has failed his own. Find the boy Logan. I accept it.

When it is over and finished and done, we stop at the traffic lights at the Esso gas station at the bottom of the highway, at the beginning of town, and we take the left. The Dreaming lurches and I suddenly find myself thrown into a pool with African Maidens. A lone warrior is there. I know him not though he is reminiscent of my father. I must place the soggy, dilapidated sandals of the maidens onto their feet beneath the facade and the movement of the waters. It is a ritual. I submit.

There is fire and darkness in some distant part of the Dreaming. Perhaps the car we were driving crashed. Perhaps the gas station at the bottom and the beginning of the road, blew up. I am sad for I did not find the boy Logan. I did not seek and find. Now I am surrounded by waters, above and below, within and without, around and away. There is a bar. Alcohol is the blood and sweat and tears of the Morningstar. Do not touch. Do not give in.

Surrounded by African Maidens and a lone warrior, I step out of a television, for I no longer desire to participate in the Ritual of Sandals. They are disappointed. They wanted me to stay, and to want to stay. I however, depart. There are several tapes of several African movies my father has left behind him in his wake to return. Several more he has taken with him wherever he now wanders. I pack a suitcase. My mother cries alcohol. Now I can give in. Now I can give into it.

The Dreaming dies to reality and I return.

Aspidistra