2009 Omnibus I
2009 Omnibus I
2009 Omnibus I
Jonathan Bowden
First Edition
Published April 2009
Printed in Great Britain
Copyright Jonathan Bowden
All Rights Reserved
Cover design by Una Rice | Layout by Daniel Smalley
Cover sketch Kratos I by Jonathan Bowden
ISBN 978-0-9557402-7-5
Jonathan Bowden
circa. 1980
CONTENTS
Biography
Kratos
160
Al-Qaeda Moth
342
A Ballet of Wasps
486
Biography
Jonathan Bowden was born in Kent in 1962. He is the author of
over thirty books such as Our Name is Legion, A Bullet
through Bone, Spiders are not Insects, Apocalypse TV and
Kratos. A painter of distinction, Jonathan Bowden has produced
over 200 full-size oil paintings many of which can be viewed in
the gallery section of his web-site. An orator of great power, JB
is a regular speaker at various events around the United
Kingdom, and he has also enjoyed two leading roles in the art
films Grand Guignol and Venus Fly-trap. Can such a card, in
Alexander Popes depiction of ombre, be cut in half? Now we
shall find out
KRATOS
and other weird tales
An introduction
Kratos deals with the subject of psychopathia and is the authors
treatment of this theme. It involves dream sequences,
monologue, phantasy and the elaboration of a wolfish purpose.
Could it turn out to be a rendering of Lombrosos theories about
crime? The second tale, Origami Bluebeard, concerns love
across the generations which freezes into gelignite. One youthful
adventurer pursues the heiress to a rag fortune. This Pax
Geriatricus is an anti-feminist piece that explores the inner
workings of the pit. Grimaldis Leo has to be an altogether
lighter work which evaluates the doctrine of animal liberation
from the perspective of a travelling circus. Its destiny will always
be that of a luciferian clown. Napalm Blonde, the final tale in our
quartet, must be considered as an attempted return to Greek
tragedy. A vamp, Scaramouch Ruby, flirts dangerously with her
husbands manager. Both of them are unaware of the vengeance
which could be enacted against them by her protector, a
disfigured wrestler called Runter Bog.
KRATOS
a power documentary
Three semblances battle in an ascendancy or non-gulf. These
were Basildon Lancaster, his wife Fervent Dominique and a
madman/caretaker. He was called Odd Billy-o (a.k.a. Dungbeetle).
BIAS BATTY (1)
I live out its penetrative essence or defeat even after a
phantasms surcease. Will its filter never leave me till dawns
break? O my brother, I walk in these streets bereft of care
despite the fact that a fog clings to my lungs. Old London town is
seen to fillet up a curvature of day; desiring, as it did so, to
release its temperature. Does one detect its needs? Certainly now,
Basildon Lancaster --- thats me --- foundered on a new
consciousness or deliverance, and this was irrespective of being
rapt by lusts. On I walked in a day-time of our nights partiality
and ever askew of hidden truculence. It bartered before a brides
magnificence (you see); thereby leavening up a hoods majesty.
Alack [!], each streak of pale pink chimes with a grate it looks
down from above amid green. It led towards a fortitude of the
inner curve. But still and all, my slanted bill and hooks stare out
on puissance; it prefigured identity. An Arno Breker form lay
before me it totalled up so many griefs, as I staggered from
pillar to post. Truly, guilt lies in an abundant breakdown before
grovelling.
KRATOS AS DIVINE POWER (2)
Each night-mote oppressed me as I walked. For London
appeared to be bereft or pitilessly encircled with mist. My
footfalls reverberated in dismal or dripping streets. Detect its
presence please since I lay frightened of sleep behind these
whitened eyes. Each orb stared blankly at once home to a new
tyranny against reason. A brief roof-line away Big Ben tolled in
darkness, the sound of its gongs clashing on stagnant waters.
8
14
Harms way
gentle skull
out of all moss libidinity
<foreshortened>
what drivel!
when a mottled badger flees its bait
+
As heck as like!
WE ARE BEHOLDEN TO FOUR ZEROES (15)
I immediately noticed how pert Dominiques breasts were, but
rejected this thought as unworthy. She alternately heralded
various raptures. All it requires, darling, has to be a mother of
all make-overs. You wait upon my innocence or indulgence. For
all I wish to do is transform such chthonian fastnesses with a
feminine touch or a piquancy in pink. What did Marie
Antoinette have occasion to say at least in answer to Nesta H.
Websters pressing question? Dont let them eat bread merely
allow them to quaff cake or brioche thats bread cake! Ha! Ha!
Ha! Ha! Hee; Hee! Meanwhile, Old Billy-o glowered at an
inward sentinel or gates guardian; what with his pipe puffing on
between clenched teeth. Indeed, he seemed to register a dolt or
troglodyte quality the more I spied on him; being half-formed
and misdirected at its heart. He came aborted from a maternal
cervix like Piltdown Man, only to be trampled on thereafter by
imaginary elephants. Doesnt it codify that Victoriana
melodrama starring Anthony Hopkins? Such a broadcast
articulated a defeat or an O without a figure a formulation
which uses the language of Lears itinerant Fool.
GRASP LIGHTNINGS MANTLE, O SCARECROW! (16)
We presently began debating a price for the property. Dungbeetle drove a hard bargain. He sat opposite me with his massive
or navvy-like forearms in front of him. These were crossed over.
Touch! A new esprit lifted from my brow! All of a sudden our
northern reprobate started to talk and this was after a fashion
16
harbinger of a doxy
our Billy-o slides into lard;
hes wild, untamed and swears like a trooper,
this genetic blooper!
Well take the house Fervents right, his slinking shadow will
be company for her when Im away on business in the Capitol.
DECAPITATIONS FIRST RUMOURS (18)
Avaunt thee, I have been pitched back into nightmare and
phantasmagoria. Oh my, I continue to lie on my sordid hotels
pallet and Im drenched in sweat. Could it be one of those
nondescript Georgian edifices around Euston station once
having caught a train down from the north country? I know
nothing; I merely comprehend a desire to avoid dreaming. Listen:
I understand that having reshaped my body a la Arnold
Schwarznegger, Californias governor, I ride out into etheric
mists. Various fumes or mephitic gases surround me now, as I
mount a skeletal horse with see-through ribs. Strangely enough,
Ive inadvertently changed into a von Hagens Plastinate albeit
by wearing a magenta cloak plus a tripod hat. I also possess two
staves above my head. Are they electronic?
NORMAN O. BROWNS APOSTASY (19)
Wasnt Taken Care Of the title of Edith Sitwells
autobiography? Never mind since my brain wanders within
Reasons apocalypse. Heretofore, the dawn rose emptily over a
vacant sky if only to fill up the panes of a deluded eye. Yes
indeed, I tottered uneasily from my unkempt slumbers, but my
exhausted or sleep-deprived state meant that I failed to attend to
things. What task was mine? Why had I come down to London
from Yorkshire? Truly, a dazzling luminance hurt my orbs when
I succeeded in wrestling from my sack. Yet withal, I came to
build on an asylums breathing. Multi-dimensionally, I
approached the chief warder with searching questions. Has my
wifes incarceration altered her approach, O loony doctor?
19
hundred
slogans
about
health
find
themselves
compartmentalised: the following are the most legible ones.
These include: sin-bin, narrow narrative, believe your rodent
yearnings, rats-in-mazes a la Konrad Lorenz, infinitude: drop the
donkeys head, plain crazy; Loon: moon-staring gibberer,
Psycho. My happenstances intrigue means that Ive defeated
Geoffrey Households Rogue Male. Believe me: no behavioural
chant captures this plainsong effectively.
VARESES POLYPHONY OUTSTRIPS HATRED (31)
It all begins to point to a reinvigorated weariness these days. In
the beginning, then, I was bereft of those cigarettes which burnt
down my fortune. They refuse to work towards a palms surfeit
and doesnt one of these cancer-sticks frazzle across me before I
crush it out? With every fibre of my Being I know that I must
stay awake, avoid sleep, avoid every moment of sleep, and
plunge into new vistas on the morrow. Let it all come down I
retreat abreast of myself or in a forwards direction only to let
out a paw over a clearing scream. Do you notice its echo
reverberating among so many Chapmanworld dolls? Similarly, I
grimace when beholden to a magnetic north even though I
notice that Mister Hydes military jacket links to misshapen
hands. I blunder forward avec hairy mittens in order to seek out
bravery. No longer --- since my gestures are bereft of a negative
ballet. A heckle, yelp or cry reaches out to me across a darkened
parchment; a template within which multiple doors fall away
or even tracing-paper versions of them. I do everything not to
submit to sleep or procrastinate to slumber. For --- in phantasms
reaches --- this room becomes syncopated or telescopic. It
mushrooms aft; being presently seen from a reverse tubes end or
a telescope. It effectively limits a caterwauls collapse all of it
at a perspectival distance but one.
+
Fading to such a bounty, therefore, my parallel sequence intrudes
into this spiral or eddy. It mounts against the distaffs register.
Cant you recognise its peel? Anyway, my masked alter ego
29
head on the wall. Yet here the screaming is lost within an oasis of
red and black; even as it strives to offer sundry resolution or
attack. Fervent declares herself to be a screaming puppet; the like
of which folds over in a blinding glare. It creams or sibilates over
a stroboscopes fancy just wincing or circling under a scintilla
of day. Watch it now: her hands are up, the breasts exposed amid
a diaphanous material, and her negligee is cast aslant of a
bloodied vortex. We observe all this (albeit from a distance) and
the last element we grasp has to be an expressionist tableau. It
weakens any sovereignty which we expect from silver it also
causes Dominiques eyes to bulge and pop, while the mouth lets
out a Furys cry. Dont the forearms also limber across these
circling or vulvic slip-streams? Let it pass because the lower
part of her anatomy draws down the eye; it articulates a cone of
penetrative arches when dashed with red
+
Given such a sinister cradling, one hears Fervents cry fading
from view. It ultimately becomes a dissidents bat call --- even its
echo. Dont these mammals screech sub-sonically in order to
see? Anyway, a filament of the lachrymose palls over this
concrete. Heaven and a day (!), a beam of autumns light cracks
the darkness of a moral winter. What comes up out of these
nethermost deeps (?); why, it happens to be a coffin that stands
revealed on an antique table. Might it be an example of
Chippendale furniture with fluted legs beneath a level or baize
surface? Fervent kneels next to the coffer in this subdued glow
she has a manicured head in her hands. She appears to be
sobbing her heart outSOBsobsob; it breaks on gravels
silence in a heart-rending manner. Its rather like the outer
epidermis or shell of a beetle which grinds against cardboard. All
of a sudden I REALISE that I am stood alongside her --- I look
across the bier. May I be adjacent to her point of call? Its a
definite possibility. Half disclosed in an enabling shadow I crane
my neck, primarily in order to peer into the casket. I wish to
inspect what shes sobbing about; I want to know whos in there.
41
away move farther off from my torso now, do you hear?, she
all but screams. Tut-tut its most distressing to hear. Moreover,
as she repeatedly backs away I become more and more apprised
of the BODY Ive always desired The breasts are virtually out
from the flowing bed-side robes and her blonde coif hangs over
an articulated cry. It embodies a discarnate circle or the letter O!
May it be an extended Story of O by Pauline Reage, perchance?
Anyway, her dressing-gown falls off or rises up over her
perfectly formed legs. Each one has been waxed in order to cater
to oblivions occasion and her strapless or high-heeled shoes
become more observable than ever.
+
IT FINALLY HITS ME WITH THE FORCE OF A
REVELATION Fervent Dominique continues to caterwaul
and her husband, Basildon Lancaster, lies dead on his bier. Its
distended alright Its only now that I realise what has
happened. I have contrived to dream a maniacs fancy. I AM
OBVIOUSLY ODD BILLY-O OR DUNG-BEETLE! I consider
myself to be a gibbering retard, biological relic or wreck. Dost
thou know that criminals are born and not made by society? I
luxuriate in my psychopathia; I blubber incontinently like the
spastic I was born to be. Ay, thee wait on owt pretty, me chuck;
Is coming for thee ta seek dalliance with thy head. I know that I
cant stop myself from now on. I salivate and leer with my orbs
reeling and turning in their sockets. My hair seems dishevelled
and my chin unshaved both the result of days refusing to wash
in a southern hotel. I grab hold of Fervents auburn tresses in a
grizzly or gnarled maw. She cries out YAAAEEEEEEEE(!); as
the axe-head becomes discernible. Can you ken it, brethren? Ive
come back to my caretakers cottage to murder Fervent
Dominique just like I slew her mate presumably because she
wouldnt go with a malformed cretin like me. Blame it on a
Quasimodos loins --- we should be castrated at birth in order to
prevent us breeding spawn! Eeeee(!), Ill cut off her head afore I
hang myself from a bough on the moors. Ay, it goes on until a
nights ending
45
46
ORIGAMI BLUEBEARD
a phantasm
Characters devised: Trevelyan Bostock, a bland, good-looking
adventurer; Candice Leper, an aged crone or geriatric artiste, and
Man-Cloth: a tatterdemalion.
PART ONE
I sat on a plush and purple sofa which was taffeta rinsed to its
loss of intrigue. It lay abreast of me or outside any witness
statement whatsoever. Its corners also seemed to be bowed down
under wood or solitary abutments: the latter being residual or
unfinished. A brief or blue curlicue of some species o resin
lay off to the side and even by way of a cushion. How I loathed
and detested the whole caboodle! Immediately in front of me
and coming adjacent to my toe loomed another Magdalenes
mercy seat. This time it came to my gaze hollowed out in green
light and it looked to be manufactured from plaid the character
of which took on an emerald sward. Examine the carpet beneath
our feet, will you? It consisted of a dull or brown mud that listed
to a ready significance: and its bordered at the edges with greys
abandonment whether headless or otherwise. How I wish
shed been decapitated, but there lies another point weve got to
get onto! Anyway, a dim sweep of wall crossed against our
backs; it almost reared up sheer in its spareness (concrete like).
Jesus Christ, I want to pluck out my eye-balls and play marbles
with them, but wait awhile LET US FACE UP TO NOT
ONLY THIS! Calm; calmness now keep still and serene, you
wretch! She might suspect something; leastways before I get my
hands on the money What did I momentarily witter on about?
Yes, I remember now, it had to do with a kaleidoscopic backing
behind us. It appears to be reminiscent of one of le Corbusiers
offerings, perchance. Where under the guise of Cathar
spirituality or some such this pure one treated us to
unadulterated concrete by way of interior design. Was he alone in
his simpering enlightenment, I ask you? Its reminiscent of Art
47
Whereas the folds on the other side of this settle seem scrimped,
crumpled, let-go and thoroughly devilled. Several bottles were
observable nestling on the far side or counter, and they reflected
back in a night-times window. What really worried Trevelyan
Bostock was failure or a fatal mischance: namely, one that had
led him into a fundamental error. He dwelt on the money or its
legacy precious little of it has come to his attention so far.
Already now, his anxiety is beginning to consume him. Surely
the man whod let him into her secret hadnt lied to him?
Definitively speaking, T.B.s condition indicated what Martin
Heidegger called dread or inauthenticity.
PART EIGHT
Two or three weeks of marital intimacy passed without comment,
at least before Trevelyan Bostock decided to let rip. After a latenight drinking binge he moved towards the stair-well determined
to have it out. A bright yellow hiatus covered his tracks as he
stumbled up the wooden steps which led to the bed room.
Moreover, a slip-stream of pure magenta curved behind him or
aslant, and this was just like a magic cameras slide. Although
when everything has been considered he possibly found
himself wading knee-deep through a dream. No source of
memory can be relied on leastwise by a cripple in his moving
chair. Visually speaking, no opaque gestures are possible when
given so much dun-coloured mint especially now a trellis or
leveraged beam lay to one side. It took the form of a doorway
which existed off to a quarter or its side, and this was gesturally
aft. Its expanse cast a dim luminescence and yet this distance
seemed unsound in that a long, measured hand could stretch
out to open it.
PART NINE
Upstairs in bed, Mrs. Bostock (nee Leper) kept watch on her
husband. He exhaled a definite whiff of liquor. Perhaps she
noticed how much he staggered about? What was he searching
for (?) why, his valise of course. Worried now, Candice
54
leaned forward or aslant, and she came dressed in a green nightgown. Her hair is done up in a bun rather like an amateur beehive; its also oer circled by hair-clips, pins and curlers. Whilst
the rooms recesses were filled with heavy Edwardian furniture.
It betokened a brown fixative when placed next to greasy and
peeling wall-paper. (Note: not everything seems to be completely
decrepit, but a general mildewed quality suffuses all. It partakes
of degeneration theory in the nineteenth century as is
witnessed by Max Nordaus exemplum). A weighty two-way
mirror plus its lateral reflectors then dominates the bed-space.
+
In his own mind such adventures stretched out to Hells gates.
May it happen also that the underworld spoken of recalled Hel in
the Nordic pantheon? A plateau which enlivened shadow dancing
rather than punishment, therefore. What could he utter? Because
this black box held itself aloft. It disclosed more of an
antechamber to Caligulas workshop to be sure rather than a
Malign Fiesta or pains forcing house as articulated by
Wyndham Lewis. (This latter is quintessentially a modern
version of Hades). Nevertheless, our cranial image gingerly
opened the door or golden key, and it pertained to the man with
no name. He proceeded down a passage afterwards. Could he be
Trevelyan Bostocks alter ego, or alternately might he be called
Mastodon X? (Even though the light subsisted to a deep and dark
ochre in this tabernacle). Assuredly, Peppers Ghost refused to
give up its trickery or tom-foolery, and this was despite one
collapses latent intent. Didnt Albert Camus envisage such a
moment in his novella called The Fall?
PART TEN
Candice Leper refused to misjudge her step now. Because
when she realised that Bostock was threatening to leave her the
bed-linen came to be thrown aside. She locked her arms around
his unappreciative neck; they were like adjacent mandibles or
sticks. Dont desert me, she shrieked. I cant bear rejections
pain certainly not at my age. Youre too old to start again, you
55
see? All her errant husband could offer by way of reply was: It
were better if you forgot me, Candice. Learn to disremember,
why dont you?
+
But all this time startling images cascaded in his mind. They
inundated the back of ones brain; the contextual area wherein a
mortals emotions are situated. Yet a ready gloom appeared to be
eldritch or it dealt in reverse splendour what with orange tints
turning into gold. Oh my yes; these molecules just littered the
ground. They crossed over or inundated rival gestures even
while melting into a backgrounds haze. Gingerly Trevelyans
dream creature came forward on its steel pegs or what passed
for delusional legs here. It trailed its own folly or absence behind
it with each locution or special pleading just adding a diction
in the light. Could it indicate a sepulchral plumage? Even though
this chairs revolving wheels lost their bearings at one instant
in a situation where a metal armature turned aloft. It twisted to
silence. All of this subsisted in blue light; the nature of which
traversed inexistence. Was there a partiality or a cross-beam here
at once listing to an end, if not quite possibly a fragmentation
thereby? A hand finally emerged, though, in order to push the
invalid down a flight of steps. Despite the fact that a wisp o
spirit or a halo then spiralled up from the cripples body. It bore
on itself a redundant breath or locution. During a moment where
what has been gave up the residual ghost. Or accordingly and
within this ashen mask an artificial rage can commence
could it be a nimbus of some kind? Isnt it thus reminiscent of
scenes drawn from Mel Gibsons The Passion of the Christ? This
was not only in a colour-fields depth, but also as regards ones
satanic nerve.
PART ELEVEN
Still, Candice clung onto her man rather like a leech on its
poltergeist. Her scrawny hands encircled his neck and clawed
avidly without purport. Behind him different tones of brown
swirled around his lair; they made up a stair-top together with
56
60
PART FIFTEEN
A curlicue to the side took place amongst everything else with
Man-Cloth looking agape at a silences beam. Behind him and
attuned to silvers plenitude lay an over-green sward; it
altogether filled up ones rapture in emerald. Look upon it in this
way: chez Bostock had no time for topiary and this was
especially when each root fed on weeds primarily in terms of
humanity. (But, to quote or paraphrase William Gayley
Simpsons Which Way Western Man?, such an abstraction feeds
on its insecticide). To whit, Man-Cloth ignored Trevelyans
recognition or appeal, and he didnt obviate it through misuse.
Nonetheless, he ploughed on regardless of all this. In such a
respect, then, his floppy hat shadowed his face or mask, and its
penumbra revealed it to be long + thin. He masticated on a straw
but it doesnt happen to be one of those elaborate corn dollies.
They are immaculate and over-extended or otherwise bound to
find themselves set alight under an Anglo-Saxon sky. Each burnt
like a regular wicker man, albeit through a plenitude of clean fire
in Robinson Jeffers Tamar. Yes, pondered Man-Cloth, your
wife presents nacreous tribute to us. She beds down before a
storm truly enough. Her bounteous gifts fill up Alices
cornucopia or jetty, and such cups run over with Karelian wine.
Forever and a day now, her patched concessions wax to ones
livery. Because rather like one of those Red Quill Girls of
yesteryear a charitable nature always leavens its bounty. By
dint of what splendour? Why, she repeatedly sells me her
untold linen, curtains, blouses, dresses, trousers, coats, duvets
and bedding. Ill have you know that it scales an excellent price.
Yet, in a sotto voce manner, Trevelyan Bostock still kept to his
ready aside. Man-Cloths visage worries me vaguely. I cannot
be sure about it thereby recalling the salemans uneasiness in
Basil Coppers horror story, The Spider. Im certain that I met
him during a night when I was deep in Bacchus toils. You know,
it all had to do with an ol Coger telling me about loneliness' fate
or a rickety widows bullion. During this interview, Man61
Cloths face had appeared stark blue, electric, comatose, overshadowed and even cerulean.
PART SIXTEEN
Candice had emerged by this juncture with a pile of laundry.
It looked to her new husband no more than a prior civilisations
leavings. It consisted of fabric, old lace, cast down curtains,
squares of rug, cloaks, diaphanous material and unused bedsheets. In turn, these scrapings came wound around and around
her fists rather like that phantom in an M.R. James story. A
situation wherein a poltergeist seeks a semblance or a given form
through a cloths texture, extension or false mouth. Might it be a
frieze around the lips? Regardless of any of this, though, ManCloth grinned like an idiot when this rag-bag was produced. His
nut-cracker jaw leered inanely or madly, and it arched like a
chameleon. Whilst his profiled features limned towards sapphire,
or they turned and twisted like a character in a Mummers drama.
(Didnt they wear tassels of cloth about their persons?) Fine
marvellous, Mrs. Bostock. A silver sovereign will liberate this
lotus dust for you. For historians of yore remember that John
Cass, a Knight and City Alderman, left infants a request via St.
Botolphs, Aldgate. It turned on bloodied quills which were
stained with partridge and tied to February the twenty-fifth.
Hence those Red Quill Girls, I suppose? Quite so How
much?, ejaculated Trevelyan suddenly. Youd pay a Queens
ransom over mildewed parchment like that?
+
Again and all, figments from rival dimensions clouded his mind.
Werent her legs treacly, viscid and underdone or alternately
over-cooked with a sharks ripeness? Simultaneously, she wore a
Hecate necklace or a mistress advent around her throat. Perhaps
and in spite of her solitude we can invoke mesmerism here
after Frank Herberts imaginative foray in Dune. But still, these
lips have cracked to indifferences paw marks even though
black lip-stick continued to forestall these glands a Gothic
touch this. Nor may one see it too clearly. Because no advanced
62
PART NINETEEN
A few hours passed by or were spent, and this was before our
aged trout touches her husbands shoulder lightly. She proved to
be wearing a yellow dress which couldnt conceal her skeletal
beam. An unfinished tea lay on the kitchen table behind them
whereas some cylindrical object or metallic device has piled up
leftwards. Pursuant to all of this, Candice apportioned no blame
whatsoever. Dont be too lonely while Im gone, butter cup. A
due providence of silence milks its delay. I go abroad over any
arrested triumph, but one that doesnt expect a laurel wreath
around its temples. Uh-huh, shuddered Bostock slightly, no
echo of chafed wheels shall expectorate on an ant. Cant you
recall L.S.Lowrys paintings on Salford Quays? Eh? They all
frequented humilitys barrier so as to concentrate on beggarcripples and frauds. Yes indeed, all of these canvases find
themselves whitened out on a blank ground Yet dont mind me
whatsoever When we consider that isolation suppurates a toad,
particularly while Artemis walks amid swastikas or gammadions.
I wont play solitaire alone.
+
Despite the fact that fantasy cant sustain our gait throughout
since, in an alternative dimension, Mrs. Bostock spoke
plaintively enough. Truly, she incarnated a pantomime dame or
one that had been cast forth from Gilbert & Sullivans wit. (Or
alternatively, might she unburden Cruella dEvil, especially as it
pertains to wearing a fur coat without impeachment?) Listen to
this, then, she probably fixed Lewis Carrolls Queen of Hearts in
aspic or mercury, and all of it occurred outside Alice in
Wonderlands pages. Never mind for any repulsiveness
betokened Macbeths witches or other sisters of the weird.
Furthermore, can an undercurrent of eroticism or Black Lace
actually cling to these skirts?
PART TWENTY
Trevelyan Bostock found himself left alone in the house
afterwards. He suspected that his wife had gone rag-picking, but
65
all he could hear was the blood susurrating in each ear. Needless
to say, he decided to invade this partiality with some action.
Relatively soon, then, he found himself in an attic or loft. Ill
commence at the houses apex, he mused, it will serve as a
crucifixion of an unlikely metre. Candice may have gone
aroaming or is determined to play at Steptoe & Son yet I still
find myself here looking over this detritus for buried treasure.
Somewhere roundabout and under this unbelievable mess
must lie her fortune. It was definitely a candidate for Forbes rich
list per se, and her stash had probably been left her by an
eponymous Leper: namely her first husband. Trevelyan also
continued to survey this L-shaped room: it consisted of reduced
boilers, oil lamps, record players or gramophones for 78s as
well as endless trunks, caskets and boxes of spent jewels. He
virtually expected a hairy-legged spider to emerge from one of
them. A pink glow then came to suffuse this gloomy scene
moment to moment.
PART TWENTY-ONE
He rearranged this bay considerably and cast around with planks
of wood while fastidiously upsetting old mattresses. Nothing
doing and, if truth be told, such a residuum or after-care
proved to be more ruinous than abject. Whereupon and situated
at its heart this Mayor of Casterbridge looked forlorn. At its
core it consisted of ancient mirrors, bed-steads, gold wires,
manikins, various left-over watering-colouring boxes, decrepit
Leyden jars, outdated books on zoology and rejected glovepuppets. Cooiiee! went the sound. What catered to its
disturbance? Cooiiee! that detestable dossier yet again. How
does it perform within a Circus Flavius indent? Surely a
recomposition like this indicated that Candice Leper was calling
to him from below?
+
Most certainly, an eroticism which manifests neediness is
exhausting even if it happens to be replete. May it speak of
Mottrams proem in The Algebra of Need; a text that hints at
66
+
Whilst he continued to work at his digging and prying previous
marital conversations entered into his mind. Cant you pretend
to love me, o grieved one? Leastwise, try to do so in your heart
of hearts, cautioned Candice. Given wines rapture we must
plot a path through indifference. Personal infractions are envious
or thereby indicate mystagoguery. Come to me across a nighttimes breeding, drear one. Because loves asylum wears a mask
and it closes off variously resultant dens. Do any of these encode
a prior fortune or riches?
PART TWENTY-SIX
So intent was Trevelyan about his task that he didnt hear a
stairs creak. Immediately after this, though, Candice Leper
mushroomed behind him and held a scrawny arm posted to the
door. Bostock whirled around as if hed been discovered
inflagrante delicto. He let out various onomatopoeic sounds
which were all astumble. Why, a errrr, Candy. What fine
mettle goes about it, eh? Huh and no mistake. Her response
evinced a liquid coolness between times. She enunciated thus:
Trevelyan, my husband, whichever progress goes abroad now?
Doesnt due process claim its lionisation; and this is no matter
how disregarded? Similarly, ones answer to a search (sic) was to
play Cluedo with whatever element of anatomy remains. But Im
pleased that youve decided to tidy up at last
PART TWENTY-SEVEN
May the ancient Roman Vegetius have once declared that if you
want peace prepare for war? Yet within her connubial dreams
Candice Bostock (nee Leper) intoned: Cannot you see the black
square within which my features are consumed? It consists of
darksome felt. Do they breathe a sense of justice abreast of Fates
rectangular markings? At a time when a dark heliotrope assaulted
our usage in terms of its visage. It wounds a bleeding self a la
Gibson or Grunewald. Are you to be my soul-food, darling?
Surely Im not careless or witless before these Norns? Because
70
while displaced its pokers by throwing tin cans over his shoulder.
Would it bring on a Fools luck? Still no fortune revealed its
lustre to him.
+
To one side of a past travail, however, Trevelyan and Candice sat
playing draughts with one another. Do you realise that we gnaw,
knot and reflexively twitch at the Tree of Lifes roots? Whilst
farther on from this a silhouette looms up or on, and it cast an
icy vision before ones affection. Candice Leper has been
speaking only to have her husband respond at a later date. Can
you detect such a deliverance? Sanctify the reason for your
unreason, my child of the hour. Are you ready to receive gifts or
like provender? Anyway, this jig-saws theorem came polecapped (regardless). A trajectory gathered now so as to blunt any
escape and this was primarily by virtue of the moon. Let us
look above us (again) and recognise that consciousness sliver
comes tempered by steel. It seems to be in some way transparent
or pellucid, and otherwise listing over foggy bounds. Moreover,
it offered nothing other than a surfeit and a gesture next to a
windows expanse. Although no-one really knows what occurs
here since a moons spheroid curves away by dint of a
dwindling ray. Might it stare down at a sapphire-hardened earth
or its available confines? A swirl of light vapour or fog blossom
then surrounds it. Whereupon it evaporates into the numinous or
it definitely seeks to stave off sunlights resolution. Such remains
our remedy for a spent fortune: in that we cant see those answers
which lie beyond the pain of a white line.
PART THIRTY-TWO
Each dawning day-sprite, though, Candice returned with her
swag-bag intact. Necessarily so because relations between
these spouses had hit an all-time low or a basement fixture.
Trevelyan Bostock even forgot to regard her every time he
limned a red mist. Oh yes; his face became a white mask of hate
throughout. It betokened a Doric imprimatur; at once fierce,
Hellenic, impenetrable and as hard as stone at least in Homers
74
PART THIRTY-SIX
Their two heads finally came to a close on an essential aperture.
Each one then watered a rivers spout after the form of white
water rafting in John Boormans Deliverance. (Wasnt it an
example of Jim Deweys quill or word processor?) Any road, a
wall or mural of cement stood or shone behind them; it lay flat
between a tincture of naples yellow and bleached titanium. Yet
Candice Leper raised her pulse in order to meet his all of a
sudden. She lofted a cold slant likewise and stared at him
sarcastically. Did she approximate to one of those artists
figurines with broken limbs albeit all pinned together and
skeletally askew? Leper whispered in reply: I know your game,
husband. Youre delving down into an Anglo-Saxon barrow like
the one at Sutton Hoo. Do you hope to bring forth helmets,
bedizened breast-plates, nacreous pearls, rare pewter dishes,
onyx, ormolu-burnished mirrors and ornate ringlets? These in a
Peter Ackroyd allotment apportion beryl, amethyst, zirconium,
topaz, lapis lazuli, carnelian and magnesium lustre. Who told you
all about it? Was it Man-Cloth, perchance? Well! Lets see
have you in mind a treasury of 100,000 ducats, groats, florins,
shekels, dinar, sovereigns, pound sterling, euros, punts and even
cistophori? Its a capital sum in any tongue regardless of aught
else. Wrong again, my luv. Admittedly, you may have evinced
a quivering arrow once or twice. But our game of draughts now
proceeds across vacant squares. You see, I happen to be digging
a grave its yours!
PART THIRTY-SEVEN
For a moment or two Candice Leper let out a little squeal, before
she tried to get away with all her strength. Quite clearly things
were taking a turn which shed never expected. Whilst Candices
skeletal frame went down beneath Trevelyans flailing pick it
resembled a fumbling scarecrow thereby. It lurched away
suddenly and thence circumvented all reticence even as it sat
astride a plunging Pluto. Denoting an unfit ballet dancer (sic) she
twirled like a rag-doll who was apportioned to its fate, albeit after
78
84
PART FORTY-FIVE
He snorted with derision and began to disembark from a crowded
stair-well. Do you detect its rite of passage, anthropologically
speaking? Soon after this a stolid post-Victorian dresser and its
glass minus a misanthrope came to nought. He easily
determined where such creaks originate from by scouting around
chez Bostock and they were in the basement. Obviously an
armed Trevelyan Bostock careered downhill on a toboggan; in a
scene where he caromed like a pin-ball in Jerzy Kosinskis
pastiche. Having arrived at the bottom who should he spy at a
rickety ladders surcease? Why, it happened to be Man-Cloth. He
stood motionlessly staring at Candice Lepers (nee Bostocks)
grave.
+
What perturbed Trevelyan most, though, was his sentinel quality
even its aloof starkness and sense of judgement. He towered
like a pillar of salt whilst giving the adjudication of Solon way
back in ancient Athens. Although Bostock decreed: Ive
imparted a thousand gobbets to you, havent I? Literally man, no
more vestments apportion blame or guilt, and they are spendthrift
in Santas grotto. Touch. Lets abandon Iraq to its own
misgovernance By this time Trevelyan Bostock had climbed
down his rope-ladder domestically voicing it. He chose to
ignore their flapping creases particularly when dressed in
striped pyjamas. Man-Cloth pointed towards the floor with an
Olympian assurance albeit before a flagged wall. It measured
up-turned earth to its very limit or extent and it echoed four by
four. Cloth then uttered a terrible soliloquy, primarily by virtue
of extending a Colossus of Rhodes finger. Its repentance gave
rise to a monologue all of which indicated Patrick Magees or
Max Walls imprint. Most especially when they referred to
Samuel Becketts oeuvre. I loved her most definitely, Mister
Bostock. It waxed unrequited this passion, to be sure. Yet she
required more than my acquittal at least in terms of votaic
offerings. Thats why I informed you about a 100,000 fortune.
Redolent of Forbes magazine or the Sunday Times rich list, it
85
89
GRIMALDIS LEO
a circus prism
ONE TOT (1)
Perhaps we had better categorise our Dramatis Personae first of
all. These consist of denizens who are destined for prior oblivion.
Variously then, they embody a motif from The Woman in Green;
a melodrama starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce. They
include Winged Rhea, a high-wire artiste, Sol Rasputin, a big-top
proprietor, Agent Naxos, an animal trainer: as well as
Scaramouch or Clown Joey. Leonine Half or King Leo a
performing lion also stars throughout. Whereas certain circus
extras in this John Aspinall passion move on and off the
board continuously.
A SECOND GINS TINCTURE (2)
A lion is foregrounded in our drama after having escaped from
its cage. Indeed, the latter bemoans a belated structure, at once
longitudinal to its squares and fatal in its depth. What a
misalliance! Given that it growled apiece in heavens gate
together with a starred stand which was conical in fashion and
next to its leaflet. These ribbed up concerning steel when
wandering abroad of a circus show-tents. Speaking of them, a
small white marquee shaped like a T lay along laterally and
in accordance with moon-shine. Further afield, though, a
sideways-on tent lifted off to the left and it aimed to complete a
rectangle. Whilst somewhat redundantly a number of circus
humans stood before our Kings cage --- primarily because Leo
has escaped. Momentarily then, three men sprang before him
with raised chair-legs; items which were themselves attached to
small circular white-stools. Two of them were meandering extras
just left in Afrikaner hats; in a scenario where a daddy long-legs
intruded across their screens. One particular wrestler, Agent
Naxos, carried a whip in his hand. Do you notice a resulting
tension?
90
its own pit, you see. Dearie me, may there be no obfuscation over
Moriartys drift as it concerns a B-movie like A Woman in
Green? No severed fingers can walk adrift of a player-piano here.
Surely a neutral observer speaks of Greigs Nocturn Opus 54
No.4?
+
All of a sudden some fair-ground, carny or fun-fair music starts
up. Mightnt it embody a piano-roll or hurdy-gurdy tunes
themselves possibly spliced by Sir Harrison Birtwhistle? Truly,
The Second Mrs. Kong has been digitally remastered.
A SEVENTH LAUGH OVER TREMORS (7)
In terms of a final conflict, we can see this gesturing dervish
severing contact with anxiety. Whereupon he looked out through
a bay-window towards Armageddon or a forgotten sun. Its rays
refracted through a bay-windows portcullis, leastwise when
pursuant to one lost memory. Or is it mastery? You see, a
creature in an iron-mask lumbered up and it happened to be the
shows proprietor. He wore a white roll-neck sweater or perhaps
a polo shirt. How will our friends capture reduce animal cruelty,
in that an arachnid possesses eight limbs not six? Thats a
canard. Moreover, Peter Singer extends a lore of rights to
primates in order to delay things, since this increases the
likelihood of a vegan supper. More pertinently, the avoidance of
harm needles a rejection like this primarily because it must
base such privileges on sentiences boon. Cant you reverse a
pronounced sentimentality here at least over and above
Landseers Victorian portraits? It goes very far without slaying
the messenger, dove-tailed Glock II. Against which authority, I
have to talk about Mans superiority within the animal kingdom.
A BERSERK EIGHTH TRESPASS (8)
Winged Rhea talks all night and this is presumably in order to
provide Leo with a disused mirror. Above all else, she assists his
return to the cage by saying: All right, leprechaun, go back into
this fastness of steel glasses why dont you? Try to rest easy in
93
can this Man of Games necessarily place the negro and the Jew
outside of humanity whether we are speaking of ludo, bridge,
chess or Snakes & Ladders. His misanthropy relates to a different
cast of mind, therefore. Lets choose to articulate such a vision in
another way, in that no reverse speciesism can be called upon in
order to deflect his utilitarian bias. It merely resiles before a
parallax view in an unquestioning way. But, to be certain of our
facts, Benthams utility theory always had the taste of death in its
mouth. It enjoined what we might choose to call futilitarianism
if were to effectively invent a term or a neologism after Thomas
Carlyles diction. Im afraid that I dont follow any of this,
manoeuvred our clown of choice.
TWENTY-FOUR MAGPIES ROLL GLASS PEAS (24)
Or could our false sense of certainty really be enacting a
Jacobean days Parliament of Bees; a privately printed edition of
which turned up in the nineteenth century? Nonetheless, Winged
Rhea moved laterally in order to placate her lion a creature who
lay beyond necessary platitudes in a wicker-cage. Most certainly,
our Rhea shifted up close to these parallel bars; the like of which
narrowed in on a lions paw and thus illustrated a chess boards
architecture. Whereas King Leo himself had travelled so far as to
let out a yawn but it couldnt help bellowing forth as a growl.
RRRRROOOAAAR!, he enunciated without self-reflection or
shyness. Dont fret, my prince, murmured mistress Rhea rather
plaintively. No-one shall touch a scintilla on your scalp --- at
least by way of harming a hair thereon. All relevant matters will
be handled to your satisfaction just like a platter of meat that
has been left out before your cage. Even Sol himself wouldnt be
party to a deceit which could see you setting out on a voyage
down a yellow-brick road. Come on, little un, possess yourself
without fear and ignore the words of those men who presently
surround you listen only to my judgements. I swear to protect
and empower you against the world. From behind a veritable
iron curtain came a mighty or further RRRRROOOAAAR!
103
not virtually extant a vegetarian can still eat rare birds eggs
with impunity! Most definitely, the logic of Professor Singers
thinking must foreshadow some dysgenic slaughter. Its a postfoeticide (all in all) that will inevitably fall on sub-humans with a
downward blade. At last, we may discern a vista where the
professors Peter Singer and Eugene Shockley link hands across
our compass moral or otherwise. Bravo! Especially when we
recognise that this philosophe enacts his vision of a Kolyma with
almost mathematical precision. Might his co-religionist, the
chemist and writer Primo Levi, have justly christened it as a
periodic table?
TWENTY-EIGHT: WILL YOU EAT THIS GINGER-BREAD
MANS HEAD OFF? (28)
Please missus an untroubled suffering now has occasion to
crease a lion tamers brow. For if we gaze at it aright Agent
Naxos incarnates a salutary principle: namely, a Noel Coward
vintage which swans abroad without inversions taint. (In other
words, no ditty lurks here which pertains to Otto Weiningers
fugue in Sex and Character). He wore a resultant cravat around
his neck and a black Ukrainian cigarette continuously puffed in
its holder. Similarly, his hair came to be regarded as sleek and
dark all of it after the fashion of Humphrey Bogart in
Casablanca or The Treasure of the Sierre Madre. A brief
moustache customarily melded with a cut-away brown suit it
happened to be unstained by tobacco. Didnt such earth tones
delineate something of a relaxed nature? As hitherto, then, a
white tent or festival marquee rose adjacent to his proffered
scalp; it profited nothing at all by sloping off to the right. He readdressed his proprietors tones with an element of clipped
contrition. I dont know what eventuated outside John Bratbys
kitchen sink, old boy. By deuce, one moment Id turned my back
in order to spy a toy; the next Leo had struck clean off by
vacating its cage. A cigar-chomping Sol Rasputin glowered
lugubriously in response to this competition.
106
to various brain functions which cover the scalp? Its all got to do
with the early Victorian proto-science of Phrenology; as it came
to be outlined in hemps mist.
FORTY-SECOND STREET: A HARPOONING THROUGH
THE OTHERS VITALS (42)
How dare you call yourself an animal trainer!, expostulated
Winged Rhea through a scarlet mist. Youve obviously got no
idea of how to handle a grown-up alley cat especially when
this creature of the night is wide awake. Now listen to the
affidavit or barristers statement which I place before you For
such a mission in its sightlessness accords a witness to these
scenes in a tableau wherein a lion rampant buries the hatchet
otherwise hidden in a serpents tail. It rears up in mocksolemnity and looked like a dinosaur that had been crossed with
a horse. Or by possible inference could it really embroider a
hippogriff in terms of heraldic design; never mind a creature of
mouth and sky? Also, a vertebra languishes inside a taped
square: it finds some accompaniment within stretched leather and
to one side. You transfix the pelt-like with inadequacy. Whilst
we find that Agent Naxos at whom this particular Aunt Sally
was directed refused to utter a decibel. (Do we have occasion to
navigate around those ferocious and Catholic paintings, in
impasto, by Roualt? They referred to Aunt Sallies!) In accord
with a knockabout, like the one decried, Naxos profile etched an
entry in a fun-fairs shy. A process within which his Ziganov
cigarette poked downwards in a holder; it indicates defeat when
positioned on a Bishops diagonal.
FORTY-THREE FEEDS SEVEN NUMEROLOGICALLY: A
SIGIL FOR CREATIVE EXCELLENCE (43)
Our female artiste doubtlessly continues to swoon within the
rigours of her own mind. Furthermore, such an attitude
necessarily debases itself before a group of armed men or over a
SWAT team; but only in relation to a bodys blue
kaleidoscope a scenario where each one sweats on its
117
of any previous postures perhaps even in spite of them. Noone can dispense with our leonine monarchs services now,
beamed Rasputins sole survivor. Doesnt he recollect that, inter
alia, a Strong Mans boards always find themselves etched
around by painted gilt on a trellis? It habituates us to a London
fair, carnival or folkish amusement which is similar to the one
that Hogarth depicted in Southwark in 1733. Or quite possibly
its more reminiscent of Chas & Dave? Anyway, Leonine
Halfs well and truly earnt his pewter mug (or cup) on this
particular sideboard. No-one will insult your memory ever again.
Youve definitely spun some testimony as a Circus Hero and no
mistake! Do you hear its rain-dance?, lilted Artemis to her
astrological alter ego, namesake and companion. In one stroke
you have effectively undone Savitri Devis impeachment, (sic),
and none shall fear our future together now. Its unique to us,
growled the lion.
END
123
NAPALM BLONDE
a tragedy
FIRST DEBENTURE (1)
Our impresario straightened up his jacket and tie if only to
place two fists upon cuffs which mocked greens latitude. Again,
either hand wrestled with the red tie that moved like a bishop,
diagonally, across a black-shirts front. Abel Cummings certainly
liked the look of himself in this mirror, in that his visage
betokened a mixture which wrestled with distaste. Mentally
speaking, he thought that he detected Rudolf Valentino in Blood
and Sand; but, in actuality, the twitching moustache and all-ebon
hair looked alive before indifference. A crimson wall patterned
an atmosphere which led away from these participants, with a
doorway revealing an orange semblance. A row of metal cases
resembling a gymnasium locker-room slid along one wall, in
such a way as that they were ignored. In the foreground,
however, a beautiful woman powdered her face by dint of a
compact. Its colour mushrooms to a complacent grey in lieu of
purple; the internal mirror of which doubtless helped to afford a
response. In appearance, her blonde visage lit up this template
at once according to a new Artemis spiral, and primarily so as to
collect all vestiges of passion and reallocate them in one spot.
Dont certain astronomers believe that a powerful glass can
refract the suns rays to a sacred point there to char the earth?
+
Anyway, her face sloped away towards a latitudinarian dome
can it be true? Quod each eye-brow arched up like a dolls
stillness at least in terms of one chiselled magnificence. She
was definitely prepared to play games with her husbands
manager a character whose straight-jacketed form stood
behind her. The womans auburn hair came parted over to the
left; and it acknowledged the impediment of flame that caroused
down her back. Any illumination which she encountered,
however, could always be reflected away by those blue headlamps. Because her eyes came to resemble azure discs that
124
looked like marbles each one contained in its slot. Her lips, on
the other hand, sucked up peaches so as to leave their gloss
and each parted indent understood its yearning. Do you see? (A
million vamps have already died in order to cross over from this
carriage-way). Any road up, she wore a low-cut dress which
amply showed off her bosom and shoulders before it swept
away like evening attire. Lets see now: her name has to be
Scaramouch Ruby --- but some prefer to call this diva by an
original suffix, namely Lupin.
A SECONDARY OR PERFUMED LOTUS (2)
How can you stick to the affidavit of his witness?, chortled
Abel Cummings gleefully. Your mugwumps fingers rot before
the attention of their wrath, particularly when they are given
leave to transpose themselves. Hows that achieved, my
chickadee? Why, its simply unchecked leastways in terms of
an iron-maiden which closes upon a replica. Can one really find
oneself consumed by that red velvet, so as to cancel one
existence before transporting onto a next stop? NOOOO!, a
Gustav Thorak lineament may rise abreast of a glass-case, nearly
always contained in the Royal College of Surgeons, south
Kensington. But who cares, my duck? Our witness goes on to
taste other fruit from this unripe tree! Moreover, the front of this
engine bears a mausoleums tincture. It presumes to invest only
in the bad primarily to reveal a mask. This grins on skeletally;
basically so as to chomp on in terms of an ossuarys
encrustations. Likewise, our sarcophagus face glimmers from
beneath a shimmer of loadstar.
+
What rubbish you talk!, interrupted the woman sharply. My
mans strength lies in the reptilian curdle of so much speed,
essentially so as to perfect entry into a space as confined as this.
For despite those masques of envy which uncover our rapture
no-one wants to recognise such matters. All that concerns a
femme fatale like me, Abel, are the muscles, tendons and
appended glands of a He-man. Let his remaining protuberances
125
leads directly to The Boys from Brazil. Sufficient unto the day
that a cosmic foetus is born under Ligetis signature for I
crouch in the shadows before raising a wilting axe-head. It comes
out somewhat magisterially ahead of ones spore albeit if only
to mount a ventriloquists scaffolding in the background.
Especially if it mantles off towards a spectral pumice or blue
after the example of Goethes colour theory. I mount the
bludgeon in its starkness and it repeats its coinage ad infinitum. It
comes as an exclusive or bell-weather rejoinder to Rene
Magrittes painting about a stopped reproduction.
RUN, RATS & MICE: YOU CANNOT HIDE IN THESE
MAZES (9)
Meanwhile, a transfigured Abel Cummings spirits himself down
secluded corridors such as the ones described. In this reliable
foretaste or disclosure, his feet rebound and echo on steel-shod
floors. Do they reverberate towards a returned definition of
concrete? Might skeletal and bony hands grasp at his ankles as
they pass? Lets throw a dice to find out! In any event,
Cummings launches himself into space amid floating motes of
light and dust all of which constellate around his starboard
entry. From a distance away he appears to be stripped to the
waist, but this need not necessarily be the case. Around his
temples, though, a laurel wreath was found to garland its supply:
it sort of institutionalises him as a Roman emperor. May he be
one of the later ones who happened to dwell in Gibbons
chronicle? He certainly slid aft in a serpentine manner. Never
mind about all that, though: since in mid-sentence (or via a full
pelt) he spells out a necessary grievance.
+
The homunculus known as Runter Bog has gotten free in order
to plague us. It runs in and out of those traps ahead of us and
amid shifting iron. We must post a witness to our treatment by it;
one which radiates outwards against these particular bath-tiles.
They must have occasion to splinter over a sapphires reluctant
entrance even though his revenge stalks abroad as clear as the
133
of a Tarot pack a latticed blue-strip of window indicates an oldfashioned abode. The moon gleams on as a white dot through its
Rubik aspect or Rothkos patterning to ribena.
+
Listen up, hated mice, jeers and steers Runter Bog. Adultery
will be punished by death in a culture that disprivileges
divorce and rests on masculine honour! Dost thou comprehend it
clearly? Hee! Hee! Hee!
A REVENGERS TRAGIC PRIAPUS (11)
You see, the glowering nature of Runter Bogs eyes betray an
absence of fear no matter how knowingly. In demeanour, hes
a giant-sized professional wrestler and his manager can only hold
down the title of Abel Cummings while his vampirella wife
must be Scaramouch Ruby. Perhaps our version of Big Daddy or
Giant Haystacks has successfully caught them together, but there
is no clear evidence of an actual adultery. Now read on, Children
of Absalom: His face convulses like the grip of a savage Pict,
laments a running impresario who flees from his own act. He
grits his teeth after a titanic fashion of coals. A curdled
annihilation (this) which will not allow another to breathe in his
vicinity. Could he be compared to one of those Aztec totems or
icons atop a funeral pyre? Truly, an actual rendezvous with such
a Ka-Tiki expedition may prove to be necessary after all.
Observe this transaction, sister of mayhem for one of those
fierce dolls out of Oceania leads the way through a thicket it
privileges nought save a chosen primitivism in the sky. Surely
hes mistaken, you are thinking? Because the strength to grieve
without tears articulates a behemoths rapture and, although
dwindling to a small compass, it packs a ripe punch. This
endeavour contrives to loose the piece of rag otherwise known as
a Cambridge tie an embroidered black-and-red sheet which
exists by way of sluices, slits and cubicles for bodily apertures.
Also, such a truculent spasm carefully avoids a mute fist: in that
it comes to be placed ahead of Tikis corse (in other words).
Blame the Marquesas islands, if you want more action!
135
+
Nevertheless, the two fists of Runter Bog continue to raise
themselves up beyond these necessary latitudes so says a
twisted fate. He (Runter Bog excelsior) then aligns himself to a
spendthrift expulsion of blood; one which inevitably leads to a
manoeuvre where various specks end up on Warhols screens.
Dont you recollect the silk-screen print of an electric-chair?
Likewise, this debenture occurs in cerulean shading; a curtainraiser that challenges its own denouement thereby Could it
draw attention to one cliff-hanger too far? Now then: these
muscular arms help to bring down a basic travesty in steel in a
situation where armageddon chunters through Runters veins. He
follows up each consequent swipe with a gesture of brigandage
only to then bring down a pillar and its post around Samsons
shoulders. Truly, he has to be characterised by a savage lust or a
mordant introspection: the pullulating life of which knows no
reason or restraint. Do you remember the Latin tag from
grammar school Homo lupus hominem? It declares Man to be a
wolf to his kindred.
WOLVERINES BRING DOWN HEAD-LICE; NO GLOVES
ARE WORN (12)
She ran screaming from a husbands purple orifice; while her
spouses shadow indicated a troglodytes witness. Nor can his
penumbra effectively crowd out a golden light it exists beyond
any greenish tinge to the contrary. Meanwhile, one lamp
transfixes a swinging plenitude of desire: it casts one witness
before the others and thence lists over to a tarnished emerald.
Whereupon and irrespective of these running figures a black
impediment rustles around these forms. Make a run for it,
chickee!, pleads our Abel from on the front foot. He was always
liable to kick up his heels before her solvent witness. Moreover
and amidst the castaway of her golden hair Scaramouchs flesh
proved to be pale pink, red-nailed and lipped even scarlettinted: in terms of an eyes distillate quality. Let it be broadcast
aloud to everybody (now) and this is irrespective of a furrowed
136
138
knife quivers over a pantaloon most rare; nor can my nubile form
be grasped by these conspirators. Such a shapely shadow comes
to betoken pornographys absence; it subsequently leaves off
from the nursery of its estranged intelligence. Do a series of
interconnected triangles fail to festoon these walls each of them
baying before a pink mantra? Havent geneticists already proved
that girls prefer pink and boys are attracted to blue --- its all in
the genes, you see? Socio-biology stands confirmed. It all
depends on whether such structures shall be brought down --- or
not. Stop it, desist in your murderous quatrain, wench, fulfill
these guardians of desire. Each one of them wears the esplanade
of a Dominican at once hooded in their mastery and waiting for
braverys assistance. Is the child or babe a hybrid of its parents -- namely, Scaramouch Ruby and Runter Bog? Or, mayhap and
all, a reverse nemesis contrives to lift the lid on a broth which
indicates Abels esprit. Surely neither of them has taken one trug
too many into the garden?
A COWBOY HAT CANNOT BE WORN IN A DUNGEON
(17)
Avaunt thee lets consider this conundrum: a reverse plane or
an aberrant perspective registers our course. It deviates from no
other rectitude, in terms of ones primary colours. Yes indeed;
our two collaborators --- Abel Cummings and Scaramouch Ruby
--- have occasion to run within an orange box. A brief or
minimalist slant hangs around them throughout it serves to
cater for one shadow-play too far and this is independent of
Keneth Robesons or Orson Welles involvement. Within this
sprightly entertainment, however, a magenta stair-well looms up
in the half-light it transposes an immateriality, even a curdling
space. No more than this: especially when we are forced to
consider a block of shading next to our procedure. It liberates
itself with a jet-black tint at least as regards a necessary craft.
Hang loose, brethren for our two expellees choose to launch
themselves full tilt at the stairs. They are best seen as speeded-up
runners or labradors who come loping after each other with
143
146
Dracula?) Nonetheless, beauteous Scaramouch stood there barefooted, replete, uncongealed and expectantly innocent having
all but foregone the pleasures of terror. Let it be discussed
thoughtfully by aficionados of Stephen King forevermore
Around and about her, though, Abel continued to tap away in a
manner which proved to be beholden to a vegetoid moment.
These clarion-calls struck up the blue touch-paper at such a time,
whether it had been prescripted by Powell and Pressburger (or
not). Can Will Eisners story-boards also get a look in here?
Never mind: since, having donned a perverse rubber-mask o
fortune with a snout cleaving to its trough, Abel slobbered on.
Spittle cascaded from his under-mouth even though it felt
contained by some lycra. Alone now, it has to know a vista of
apartness all too well --- being lurid, enervated, beady-eyed,
trussed, gnarled and rubicund. Nor shall the sunlight pass
through this latex; in order to provide a scorbutic tincture to the
skin. All the time he continues to beat out a message TAPTAP-TAP it mushrooms roundabout. Dont such noises echo
and reverberate? They are brought about using nothing more than
an old-fashioned tea mug. He causes it to jig a tattoo or provide a
back-beat for this slam dance. Although some believe that he is
trying to contact Ruby using a message laden in morse code. She
occupies a neighbouring cell in this imaginary Iraqi prison, you
see? What would those analysts of yesteryear at Bletchley Park
have made of his communications? I LOVE YOU; I LOVE
YOU, Abel repeated via his snorkel, grip, tackle, adjustments
and deep-sea diving surplus. Hed made sure that he inhabited
one of those old-fashioned suits a la Jules Verne; the ones with a
bell-shaped/conic tower or helmet. Isnt it so?
WE AWAIT A CANNIBALS APPETITE (23)
The room lurks ahead of their advent into it, but already they are
through its egress. Both of them have plunged into this inner
fastness higgledy-piggledy and one after the other. Abreast of
these developments (now) Scaramouch Ruby virtually falls over
--- after all, those stilettos were not exactly made to run in
148
deeds even though his arms are out and aloft in relation to a
wrap-around sound without end. Do you muster this legerdemain
when it dimples to orange?
+
By contrast, Scaramouch Ruby behaves in a totally different way
or over a delimiting measure. Grabbing up a piece of wood from
the cells floor, she batters her estranged husbands exposed arm.
I know how to make him let go!, she expostulates with glee.
Oh my yes it is only after retracing such a step that Ruby Red
remembers one salient thing: namely, a nail has become attached
to this shafts underside. Mightnt it have been able to draw
blood, perchance? In truth, she waxes exultant about it all.
Runter Bog with a belaboured howl or groan withdraws his
mitten in double quick-time. AAAAGGGHHH!, he enjoins
startlingly. Immediately this fist is drawn back and the portcullis
shuts with a snap. CLICK-Clickping: silence then reigns
again in these cellars or entombed trails beneath the stadium.
(Wasnt there an avant-garde writer called Roger Pinget?) A
masterfulness has intruded into the Blondes gestures
hereabouts how can she have changed so suddenly or in an
eyes blink, you ask? Certainly a backwards glance at her staples,
corset, bodice and rear sequins delivers a blow. It looks forward
to nothing in particular, but still betrays a renewed endeavour.
Has our victim or Justine become a Cruella dEvil?
A VINDICATION OF INTOLERANCE (26)
A mauve or turquoise impress now sweeps clear of its abiding Xaxis; it refuses to ask why it might otherwise be there. Strangely
enough, the perspectives engaged in by a casual observer appear
to be altered perchance. Now the blue door happens to be on
the left-side with its doubled hinges going up the wall. They defy
all understanding of place and interpret one of L.S. Lowrys
details in his naf paintings of yesteryear. Abel Cummings looks
to be carrying himself a little straighter in his green jacket now
that the relative defeat of a foe like Runter Bog has raised his
mana, you see. No disturbance can intrude on Abels brow
152
without hindrance --- after all. Because the Cain who would have
destroyed him, along the lines of Durers draughtsmanship,
lingers on His sweating gradually removes itself and he
circumnavigates this space with renewed vigour. A close shave,
honey bunch, he burbles. I wouldve faced evisceration --- like
a Gunter von Hagens plastinate --- if Bogs talons had fixed me
down. It proved to be quick thinking on your part, dearie,
otherwise you might have lost me forever --- now were as safe
as houses! Moreover, here in this projected room or cube we can
spend a bit of time becoming acquainted all over again He
allowed this sentence to hang in the air almost like it was in
suspended animation; it illustrated a moth that repeatedly beat its
wings against a glass case. Surely the example of the pigeon
asphyxiating as the oxygen is removed in Wright of Derbys
painting comes to mind? (Didnt Herbert Selby Jnr. write an
angry and scatological novel called The Room?)
+
To be true to our prior illumination, however: Scaramouch Ruby
has actually turned away from her partners actions now.
Momentarily and by way of contrast Abel fails to recognise
her face. Like a twenties diva or femme fatale, her off the
shoulder party dress smoulders in such a bunkers cool. Always
hot or unmeasured in her conduct inter alia Ruby knows little
of balance, duty or proportion. She also recognises Abels
penchant for flirting leastwise as soon as all danger removes
its indent. Why dont you take off the pressure and release the
mountebank within (in other words?) No doubt it cleaves to a
cads escutcheon Still, Scaramouch Ruby helps to delineate
the sleaze of a pulp magazine cover from an age gone by. Her
eyes come across as tilted, slit-like, reddish in tint and allperceiving. Even such a death-mask as this smiles silently to
itself it happens to be a lonesome rictus or a nethermost
character. Are we finally alone?, she simpers almost
continuously and enticingly. Yet although sultry these words
refuse any prospect of gentleness; they rather exhibit a
Dungeness or metallic harshness. Its tantamount to the Kelvin
153
157
159
160
Dramatis Personae:
Heathcote Dervish
Phosphorous Cool
Bounteous Elsa Hapgood
Butler James
Mastodon Helix or Spyros/Skyros
Warlock Splendour Thomas
Tumble-weed or Hermaphrodite X
Moustachio Brave Herring
+
Ms. Igor
Baron von Frankenstein (MD)
An epigraph:
And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the
Devil, and old Satan, and bound him a thousand years.
Revelation 20:2 The King James Bible, (1611)
161
162
166
worn over the face. Yes: our patience has worn thin because
the bulbous nose, red-letter day, rouge, thick lips (abreast of
silence) and paint-wheels all speak of chaos. Or to put it
another way they indicate nought but an anarchic potential in
tom-foolery. It happened to be a feast of fools which ventilates
the aperture of a new beginning. What goes on here? Nothing
really; our scenario just understands that a mountebank engages
in assault and sexual ragging: it all proceeds darkly under glass
nay, even smoothly betimes. Like all relics that die in a childs
arms it contrives to induce an innocent fording, possibly a rind
stone amid a darkling glass.
UNDER A SMILE, A MECHANISM BETRAYS ITS GREASEPAINT: (12)
Our warlock, Heathcote Dervish, walks to a brocaded car through
some indifferent mist. It all speaks of unhallowed offerings
before various bull gods and others. Somewhat reluctantly, his
wife steps out with him, although already his mind happens to be
elsewhere. One experience before all others risks its temperature
across from his brows. It seems to encompass the following: in
this programme a lonely waif, Heathcote in another life, wanders
Whitechapels streets bereft of care. Isnt this where those
sexist mutilations and slayings took place all between the 31st
of August 1888 and November the 8th of that year? Watch
Heathcote Dervish, though for hes attired in a triangular dome
independently of any trespass. An old great coat of the sort
worn by a Boer war veteran surrounds his lower appurtenances.
But any mask (hitherto mentioned) comes surrounded by a
further infraction. This enables one to breathe under a muslin
extremity; it seeks to whisper against its own claret. Needless to
say, a great swathe of bandages hides the cusp within or could
it be a Pinocchio whos been shorn of all his lies? In any event,
the mummified rictus swirls apace if only to bury a scarabs
entombment. It rightly decides to go on before the draft; at once
disabled, frigid, falsely congealed, sarcophagus-like and
ameliorated. In this advent, you see, ones verso or the sinister
174
176
178
183
193
smaller boulders or chips off the old block lay about its
epicentre in a confused consort. Up above the sky deposited a
lavender effulgence, even though the orange streaks of a
breaking dawn were seen at its periphery. These cantilevered up
to an ochre streak at daybreak one which filled half the sky
with rectilinear fissures. All of them waxed lyrical via a very
deep blue or cerulean at its depths. Above all else, Heathcote
Dervishs limousine cut through the dimness with a yellow
sword-thrust. One naked tree rendered savage by its innocence
stood barren and without leaves on it. A mighty oak from
Englands past, it laid about matters from the left bearing
witness to those wooden tendrils that scraped the loam beneath.
Can you see it, strange witness? Observe this as well from one
side of the roadway a lighter pall lifted --- one which casts a
negative shadow that betokens warmth. What was a pulp
magazines moniker from the nineteen thirties (?) why, it had
to be the Shadow knows Anyway, we mustnt interrupt
Heathcotes talk. It be a mystic sign from beyond our ken, wife.
Let us look at it from the depths of one of John Dees mirrors
therein to read the future on a piece of darkened metal or glass.
An appurtenance of disorder this be, although many would mix it
up by calling one a diving/divining pane. Such a blast as this has
rent the curtain from beyond it roils and writhes aslant us here.
We must go to it and those who are untroubled can lead the
way. It has to involve a deliverance in relation to Dublins pale
one which we must follow so as to reckon what it portends. His
words are followed by silence in the vehicle.
SAMMAELS VICTORY WEARS A CONE-SHAPED HEAD:
(42)
Isabelle of Bavaria had guests this afternoon Now then, Elsa
Bounteous Hapgood seemed convulsed with a near rage; in that
her features were rapt, arcane, liberated and feminine in their
fury. Each affidavit rose to a crucial witness almost after one of
Rodins forgotten orgasmic studies. (These have to be works that
exist prior to a sculptors object. Certainly, no indication of relief
196
205
208
ONE
WOOD-PECKER
BLINDS
A
BLAST-GUNS
RAPTURE: (58)
Back in our public house Jack the Ripper all hell finds
itself breaking out. It definitely issues forth as an example or
illustration of Armageddons village. Then again, there is a
mysterious cachet here if we were to be honest about it. For
example, why does Heathcoats alter ego attack these revellers?
Well, it must have to do with a mixture of alienation,
mystification and respect. Surely, you can understand now the
inner meaning of Hermann Rauschnings The Revolution in
Nihilism? To be sure: they reject Heathcote Dervish because of
his zombie-like status; while he, on the other hand, finds himself
enraged by Kronos dreams. All of which necessitates a casual
disregard, even a delinquency. Because one element alone
suffices and it revolves around a modernist bias possibly a
refusal to dream. Maybe in this context Heathcote Dervishs
phantasm might make a puppet-theatre too real, too threedimensional (so to say)? In real life, therefore, Herges Tintin
wouldnt care for being humanised by c.s.i or computer software
imaging.
+
In spite of all else, a ground-breaking out take to Lucius Annaeus
Senecas Thysetes comes about at this time. For Heathcote
Dervish fires repeatedly at the pub crew gathered roundabout
and we also see a dum-dum/perforated bullet pass through a
miscreant. This exploding slug took off the mans back in a
scarlet welter. Likewise, a character in a fluted hat endured a
multiple smash-up. His head rocked back when splintered to
smithereens and illuminating Peckinpahs slow motion (thereby).
Against this, a trained hussar reared up in the twilight. He
manifested the livery, braid and sabretache of Sir Nigel or
Brigadier Gerard as contained in Conan Doyles now forgotten
historical novels. Meanwhile, a subdued frenzy curdles the air; it
sets the seal on upturned tables, desks and splattered gore. Could
this abattoir interpret one of Felix Labisses paintings back onto
itself? Although perhaps this charnel house indicates Rouault
209
self-interest and war-like ardour. All else comes close to poppycock and lavender; it rejoices at a dogs wheedling.
RUN, RUN HAVOC BEFORE THESE PRINCES: (64)
By the by, Heathcote Dervish moved out through the pubs
swinging doors and into a London pea-souper. It swirled all
around him when concentric to a centrifuge; while gusts of wind
blew newspaper about. Doubtless though, none of this meant
much under a swinging pub board or arch could it be an
awning which spoke of Jack the Ripper with a question mark
appended? Likewise, a flaring gas-mask lay above our heads in a
crown or a fluted overhead jar. Heathcote Dervish then burst
forth from the pub with a bandaged surplice in tow; whereupon a
great-coat and scraggy scarf made up his accoutrements. Our
anti-hero stopped quite short in the available light particularly
when he spied Phosphorous Cool standing before him. Our latter
presence also looked magisterial in a flowing cape; the like of
such a garment closed around his mid-riff and lower extremities.
Click, a broadsword or switchblade (even a cutlass) shot forth in
his hand; it all helped to add a javelin or bean-pole to a silvern
grasp. Whilst behind both of them our robot gazed on blankly
each one of his eyes comes to filter out beneath a breasted
torment Whereby the machine-mans orbs look rather
longingly over a zig-zagging circuit board. Certainly, our
Tumble-weed or Hermaphrodite X has noted down better days,
whether in or out of a new cybernetics ring. Adopt this fiction,
Phosphorous snarled in Heathcotes direction but our other
custodian proved to be too wily altogether. Adumbrate the
contrary to Abel Gances magisterial film Napoleon, hissed
Heathcote Dervish. An eagle who stoops to devour his prey in
sunlight or on the stump of a tree (somewhat inevitably) knows
nothing but perfection. Doesnt he collaborate with a Robinson
Jeffers stanza retrospectively speaking? No mercy subsists in
Nature nor should you feel free to consult its witness. It all
goes to show rather predictably that only one of us can
survive this incident. Our meeting in a sunken or dripping
214
218
matters are truly alike, you see? For a start, one is almost driven
to see a circus barkers cry despite its reversal. Will a
spendthrift bill not obtain to this likelihood, in a scenario where it
can only obviate the case of the Elephant Man and other freaks?
(His skeleton to this very day speaks legions about a jar in the
Royal College of Surgeons, in south Kensington, where it
happened to be situated. Iain Sinclair makes use of it in his postmodern redoubt, Whitechapel Scarlet Tracings). Almost as an
aside to the main business, mlud, Heathcote Dervish tip-toes
towards a collection of Victorian bobbies. All of whom are busy
standing around three Eminent Victorians in Asa Briggs use
of the term. These were Phosphorous Cool, Elsa Bounteous
Hapgood and Butler James. Our wilderness finds itself travelled
across by Heathcote Dervish a creature who definitely supports
a stack hat within some unfolding mist. A few scratches or tears
from the yellow press pass in the wind. Whereupon and
underneath a flaring gas-lamp a motley crew of Peelers make
their case. Bestride of any magnificence, though, a Watsonian
figure gruffly approaches the prey: it manifests one frock-coat
short of respect and mantles in the Derbys direction. A heavy
and woven moustache also travels around an upper casement.
Does our enjoined butler stoop to hear Bow Bells reverberating
in the background?
A LIZARD SEEKS ITS TISSUE IN A SLIT-EYE: (83)
A saurian raised by Heathcotes spume had already started to
speak; and rather like a monster in an H.P. Lovecraft story
his accents were guttural. Any dedication to stage fright (you
see) has long since gone west, in a scene where mortal sounds
welled up atonally. Resembling Arthur Schoenbergs musical
diction (in short), each couplet drained a muddy silence. Every
word --- therefore --- took lustre from Samuel Becketts antinovel Comment Cest or How It Is. Wherein shambolic denizens
drag themselves across upturned earth without benefit. None
knows any surcease (effectively so); yet they recognise a
sibilation due to speech. It preserves the characteristics of Bim
232
and Bom, both of whom drag their bodies aslant the loam. In a
drama drawn from George Speaights toy-theatres, however,
Mastodon Helix begins to speak:
Harken to me, drivelling poltroons! My estimation of your
blood is as the thickest of lemon juice, do you hear? Now that my
fury renders everything serviceable in terms of yonder matrix
since none but I can stand on the basis of its longitude. Do the
mathematical formulae which lie beneath me visit a new
Gorgons sight --- to make use of a courtiers cry in Macbeth?
But never mind Fuselis romance; my carrion teaches the
abomination of a new witness. It always supports no-one other
than a curlicue or such wonderment. Indeed, the name Mastodon
X ill-serves my massive frame, mlud, and its one that passes
across the horizon like a twilights beacon. These rough edges
can often be planed down by unreason all acting in accord with
the subterranean codex of Goyas dark. Hitherto, I knew your
solvent imagery and burning face masks. Yet now and all, I am
well aware of George Bernard Shaws insistence on locking
himself into a shed or writers cabin in order to compose.
Whereas in my case a parallel with Greek legend causes us to
catch our collective breath. It indicates the fact that Poseidon fell
asleep on a rock in Attic Colonus from which sprouted the first
horse, named Skyphios, when his seed accidentally fell on the
ground. Thus, one of those crooked limestones reached for the
stars in its musculature, but it actually recalled a steroid husk
under grey lights. Truly, a monstrous heap such as myself shall
reach its closure under lightning only then to see a man torched
in a cage of wicker. After all, no druid has ever captured my
amphibian tonsure.
BEHOLD THE MASONIC DRIFT OF A RED COFFIN; IT
LIES AFT: (84)
Back in our period devoted to High Victoriana, the multiple
blades of our two protagonists continue to clash. Each tungsten
fillet pounds on anothers indifference if only to surmount the
233
Yet still, my fatalism came across the universe like a bolt from
Zeus finger. All of it gave me unparalleled strength in terms of
bringing a city to its knees. Didnt the federal authorities in
Louisiana, when a hurricane struck, call it Katrina? Yes for
devilment these escapades must wreck the future of such a
frothing doll; it only twitches on the end of Hecates string. But
what of us marionettes? We barely delve into the fortune of Eric
Bramalls Puppet Plays & Playwriting wherein the dream
phantasms of a thousand-and-one nights takes place. All told
many withering happenings break free now they line up
behind a balustrade of engagement, as was foretold by a Hulton
radio picture library. Here an all-father or puppet-master left our
legs dangling, and these were signed up for some nomenclature
avaunt the stage. Outside the sandy mists of Colwyn Bay it found
itself to be; and in its confines mahogany stretches away as far as
the eye can see. It also travels towards oblivion by way of a
cascade: the chandeliers of which mellow into candle-light hours
later. It figures already for a tabernacle upon the wall called to
pipes aplenty. These limited a disturbance to the gothic image of
a puppet-master. His name went by the following soubriquet:
Moustachio Brave Herring.
A POLICE ACTION ON ALL FOURS REMINDS ME OF THE
BOER WAR: (88)
The Metropolitan police have gathered around the two parties to
this dispute without knowing why. A lamp-light glows fitfully in
subdued ochre; and it floats like a bubble upon a fractured
horizon. Listen to the following: Butler James is still
expostulating and thiss irrespective of a leftwards tending scar
upon the face. Officers, I entreat your goodness and solitude
like one of those Gilbert & Sullivan policemen so beloved of
Howard Brenton. For, in his marxist plays, Robert Peels men
fail to apprehend a notorious psychopath who was mentioned
before as Christie, the Notting Hill murderer. Did not the latter
lie covered in newsprint and old ashes albeit before he rises
aslant of a wandering finger? Likewise, his masked otherness
237
are off and to the side, but no-one interferes with an exchange
between a husband and his wife in another dimension.
Heathcote?, she whispered semi-abstractedly, and with a slight
quaver in her voice. The very same, my darling, he insisted on
avec a greedy billowing. Meanwhile and to the right Butler
James stood beside them imperturbably, and with utter calm.
Cabbie, he called out abruptly to a waiting atrocity. Let us
leave this spot as quickly as possible maybe on a rare penny
farthing, insisted HD. His voice etched a muffled tambourine
even as he spoke.
TANGERINES GO PURPLE IN THE BLOOD[!]: (91)
Theres always been room for one more, my friends, intoned
Mastodon Helixs guttural voice. Yes indeedy, since a star-burst
or gateway exploded before a lively portal. The semblance of a
meteorite was now seen; and it risked the peak of a disabled
overture namely, one that took on a distracted element even in
terms of its ransom. Such a scimitar levelled off towards the skyline instead of plummeting down in a rage of all witness. A
brief gaze aslant this rapture saw the earths crust peel away; it
thence depicted continents and lakes beneath a misty firmament.
A spume-like elemental dances under the stars; whilst a darkened
backdrop of our milky way gravitated yonder. It continuously
bespoke of a galaxy well beyond a satrap of nothingness that
is: a substratum which led the way to a thousand faery lights. A
dispensation, this, that belabours an unsubtle point concerning
Spensers diction. One Milky Way does not a million flowers
make, in other words. What could this flashing comet signify?
Why, it had to do with Mastodon Helix in that the merest
thought of the puppet-master, Moustachio Brave Herring, lifted
him off his feet and onto another plane. Altogether now, an
artiste who governs his charges can whisk them away
uppermost; and to various points in another direction such as one
knows. Further to this, he raised up Mastodons musculature at
once carrying him to a trope and fixing on a possibility yet to be.
Might it mean salvation for one who skims the galaxy like a
240
deluded star maybe so? For one carven idol can be moved to
the Fourth Dimension just by thought; primarily so as to allow
you to exist in parallel outside Time.
GUARDIANS OF SKYROS GATE: (92)
Immediately our cab moved up from a neo-Victorian abode, and
it circled London town looking for future egress. Above all
though, the vehicle betokened a will-o-the-wisp which sailed
above houses and out into a dark azure. Truly, the minaret or
spire of a Baptist church hoved into view: and it all bespoke one
tension too many for this aftertaste. Face the facts, will you (?)
because this churchs pyre extolled a secondary virtue. Analysts
came to consider it as green in colour. Do you take its message
forward in some way? An electronic whip cracked from above;
and it was the coachman directing his flying vehicle. Especially
now that an autogyro --- patented by the toy manufacturer
Britons --- soared into the ether. Giddy up, Pontefract, yelled
the hansom cabbie. Didnt Wyndham Lewis posit a Taxi driver
test for literature in his intellectual autobiography, Rude
Assignment? In any event, our three co-conspirators swap
anecdotes. They are Heathcote Dervish, Elsa Bounteous
Hapgood and Butler James. None save them may effectively
register such an affidavit or molecule. Phosphorous Cool shant
be able to use legerdemain to much purport one feels.
Extravagantly so, allow him to escape into the paradise of trying
to lessen ones impact through mesmerism! Let it alone, my
cousins: Phosphorous will find it impossible to sweet-talk
Inspector Lestrade over those Phantom slayings in the east,
remarked their butler.
WILL EISNERS GRAPH LACKS SPIRIT: (93)
Each conundrum opens up the way to a new awakening, hereby.
For many moon-times previous to this Mastodon Helix found
himself to be trapped in his Masters vortex. In a scenario where
Armageddon comes to deliver its offering every Thursday
afternoon. In such an advent as this, Mastodons steroid hammer
241
tale; even though his fables set in Edinburgh not London. True
again, his visage looked seedy, disarmed, mummified and bereft
of moral candour. A cocoon of bandages left his skulls remit
at once waxing illicit in relation to Bram Stokers guild. Wherein
various editions of his Egyptian novel, The Jewel of the Seven
Stars, hid the extremity of its end in order to avoid nausea. (Nota
Bene: the real edition happened to be the William Heinemann
one of 1903, whilst later variants by Rider, Jarrolds & Arrow
proved to be abridged. Such amendments seemed to be anaemic,
weak and foreshortened). Nonetheless, Heathcotes ear is
misshapen next to his greatcoat; the luxuriant wove of which
completes a Victorian day. Heathcote Dervish mumbles
something in reply to Butler James former assertion namely,
one that had to do with his unreliability; or could it be described
as his proclivity for violence? Who knows? As to any reckless
plenitude, asserted Heathcote Dervish, you can rest assured.
My intelligence relies on other things. It luridly examines the
matter. Youd better, pursued Elsa Bounteous Hapgood with a
made-up or oval mouth. Her face divided itself truculently as she
spoke and the womans features denoted a Royal Flush.
(Whether it was flaccid, purged, enflamed, bloated or all over
with passion). In the far corner sat ones butler who kept
swabbing his wound with a silken rag. A steely if determined
look played about his mask albeit one which seemed to say
impress me. Go on
A BRIDGE TOO FAR OVER ONE PARTICULAR MEADOW:
(97)
We left our drama in a situation where Mastodon Helixs
massive hands reached out towards the wizards cowl. Were the
aforementioned Mastodon Xs mittens rough, chapped and illhewn while stopping short of any perfection? Yes indeed! For
Mastodon has moved from the base of the dais; thence grasping
Heathcotes cloak in a giants maw. Intemperate basalt exists
beneath them and it becomes lined with the blue tissue of so
much clay. It serves as the cement for a new abstraction. Mayhap
245
the line of talent which traverses a plane of skin from one side
tother. Reinvigorate Great Granny Webster, why dont you?
TOO MANY SEVEN INCH NAILS CURE THIS BREEZE:
(104)
Our two desperadoes are still seen to be running in the direction
of so many tomb stones, multi-dimensionally. A colourful
advent, this: given that none of them can bring to mind the
modernist mausoleum in northern Paris one which is devoted
to Oscar Wildes after-grief. Still and all, men of iron,
Phosphorous and his Robocop scour the entrance to many
passages, and they are actually lost in a maze of lanes between
Whitechapel-cum-Spitalfields. A gust of blue dust fills the air; it
trespasses all around them so as to discuss one particular
imprint or ring. Could it exist in such a Tartarus? Against this
favouritism, a number of walls fly indifferences flag. They
incarnate --- if only at one remove --- the reality of Iain Sinclairs
poesy (or proem) entitled Suicide Bridge. Perhaps a deep green
advertisement for Cocoa, drinking chocolate or ovaltine can be
prepared? Despite the fact that Phosphorous Cool quizzes
Hermaphrodite X on the direction they might take. Theseus
shall not entertain his minotaur to a game of cribbage on the way
out, Phosphorous evinced. We may go in circles (round and
round again) yet no Ha!Ha! exists to create a fall in a pitch of
Englands pasture. Do we speak of a Green Man or a Man of
Kent? Yet again: will you reminisce about a female novelist who
wrote a book called The Ha!Ha! (?): meaning a sudden dip or
gap in an English garden often at a labyrinths heart, and one
allowing a guest or a surprised visitor to fall. Didnt Albert
Camus compose a novella known as The Fall? You speak
truthfully, master, averred Tumble-weed, yet examine it this
way. Perhaps we should investigate the sewers or an inner
parallelism of ducts, in order to elude governance? Or, quite
possibly, do you pity the steel of one who leads an entrapment
too far whether naked of each moon-time?
252
over till the fat lady sings. A death before its time cannot suit
Ombres finality, after all. Nor can it liberate the climax of a
Patience game played by three hands. Still backing away or
seen in profile (mlud) Elsa Bounteous Hapgood acknowledges:
Yet let us undo the fastness of a lost keep. What can you do? A
principle which imprisons nought loosens no molecules. Neither
may a hungry man salvage steak from some run-of-the-mill soya
beans. I dont understand, my vainglorious marionette cease to
offer false hopes offshore. Again I repeat, whatever shall you
accomplish?
SELF-PORTRAITS IN OCHRE HINT AT A SHADOW
WORLD: (114)
Back in the late nineteenth century, our three emigres from east
London have made their way northwards: and they circle an
arctic doorway. Might it embolden some sort of honey trap?
Lets see: now that ones distracted trio have effectively
surrounded their wasps nest! A vague feeling of triumph seems
to glow in our three musketeers loins. Elsa Bounteous, in
particular, stands adjacent to a doorway, and the ramp + panel by
which its reached. She wears a fur travelling hood or wrap; the
likelihood of this excludes a provocative ball-room dancing dress
underneath. Moreover, a silhouette covers half her face and it
exists under one tent pole too far. Does one see its configuration
of fives? Anyway, a series of interchanges or wooden blinds lay
to one side; and they came louvered up to a sinister point a
medley that harkened back to Angel alley in Whitechapel in the
east end. (Truthfully speaking, this is where they had just
originated from). Certain barred windows also slandered or
occluded their path; and these all strove to achieve an effect
halfway between Gilbert & Sullivan and Edgar Allan Poe. Most
noticeably, however, we have to treat of the masterful impress
left by Heathcote Dervish especially given his genuine
reduction to a phantom this time around. An event the secret
consequences of which prove to enforce a Rippers surreal
quality! No wonder that the journalist Patrick Lavelles study of
260
happened to be situated under the town hall. Didnt she allow the
author to enjoy adult books from the age of nine? A factor which
seemed contrary to all known rules. A notice that itself existed
irrespective of those numismatics namely, the enshrined
Roman coins existing in so many cases. Still, in keeping with the
early years of silent cinema, our matriarch has yet to vouchsafe a
word. No sound passes from between her lips.
A DRAGONS BREATH MELTS BEOWULFS GOLD: (117)
Furthermore, bolts of liquid flame passed from Phosphorous
Cools distended palms; and each palm-print contained within it
the witness of one blast. (Could the desideratum of Wyndham
Lewis cultural magazine from early in the twentieth century not
come into the frame now?) In this tableau, the manikin known as
Phosphorous C. arches his back, primarily so as to launch
blistering bursts of lightning upon his prey. These are coordinated downwards in parallel beams: and they have occasion
to meet in Heathcotes corse. A body or lamentable object (this
is); the likelihood of which almost sports a mummified air as if
it existed in Luxor under a night-shrouded mystery or deeply
buried in various sands. Crackling electrical energy inundates
Dervish; it provides a coursing vanguard so as to fill the air with
swarming fire-flies. An agency that susurrates to a witness, this
if only to divide a realm between Heaven & Hell with pinkish
sparks. Let the power cosmic bask in my plenitude, declared
Phosphorous Cool. If any existence or under-nourished life
exists here, inter alia, let it be summoned forth at the flick of this
giddy switch.
+
Silence then billows asunder, in order to reign after a few brief
instants of action may it drown.
CYRIL H. LOVEGROVE; A VICTORIAN MORTUARY: (118)
The crippled nurse gestures with her index-finger against a
yellow background; and this is one which transmutes light blue
into gold. Her other hand, however, upholds a flickering oil263
264
scar tissue down his visages left side. Seal and paste wise (now)
it travels down one aspect of the face whilst being active on a
physiognomys sinister tracing paper. A feeling of vague
uneasiness (this is) that becomes even more pronounced,
especially when the mortuarys guardian was introduced. He
happens to be such an ossuarys lord and master --- officiously
so. A brick kiln exists to one side of him, and a deeper recess
continues to exalt its shadows. Nor can we understand so sweetly
why blood flows over those unwhetted blades
+
In front of us, a mans vista becomes apparent. He wears a silken
waistcoat taken together with a large cravat; and it sports a tiepin by way of lustre. If we consider it movie-star wise, the skull
is long and thin and it evinces a prognathous jaw or a coif of
hair over the forehead. His non-wig proves to be brown in
colour. All in all, his cast of character --- even reminiscent of
vaudeville or puppeteering --- seems to be familiar. Butler James
deems it necessary to do the honours. My brethren, he remarks
with a flourish. Mark on your calendars the following treatise, at
least in terms of Germanys forgotten art concerning the Ph.d.
Yes sir and above: since I would ask you to put your hands
together for Baron von Frankenstein the scientist, mortician
and brain-digger of this establishment. (In fact, our particular
physician harkens back to Brian Aldiss thesis in his book,
Frankenstein Unbound. A tribute, ceteris paribus, which
preceded the post-modern or electronic folly of William Gibson).
Never mind: all of this subsists due to the fact that our
Frankenstein looks back to the example of Moustachio Brave
Herring. Surely, the existence of one precedes the others tirade?
BREAK THE EGG-SHELLS OF A DELUDED YOKE: (121)
Elsa Bounteous Hapgood lets rip once she becomes animated
by concern for her spouse. Certainly, my beloved husband rises
in the air like a subaltern of non-identity not that a sleeping
prince necessarily mirrors its absence. He floats off the ground
etherically; or in relation to one of Albert Loudens obese
266
women. These cry havoc in an untroubled mien over their bedsheets especially when compared to the pseudo-intellectualism
of a Tom Stoppard play. I actually prefer Ron Hutchinsons Rats
in the Skull about Ulster loyalist paramilitarism. Avaunt thee to
my side, gentlemen of the coven, this silvery puppet happens to
be killing my husband. To my help --- attack him; devour him:
prevent him from doing harm. In saying this, Elsa throws out
her hands and her capacious robes then billow behind her. What
of other gestures, though? Because a fellow mage, Warlock
Splendour Thomas, looms nearby with his cowl having fallen
away amid flame. He looks both animated and ill at ease. We
dare not creep upon him out of Nosferatus bidding, Elsa. No
penumbra may shield us from his wrath. Given the strength of
such a silvery titan one false mood or move could destroy us
all! In such a labyrinth, an English Ha!Ha! spots a macabre bend.
Likewise, a seventeenth century text like Vondels Lucifer hints
at a magic camera or a purple wine stain too far.
GREET THE LONGITUDE OF A GRENADE WITH
APLOMB: (122)
Heathcote Dervish and Baron von Frankenstein are found to be
conversing with each other way back in the nineteenth century.
For irrespective of Audrey Beardsleys artichoke any blackand-white drawing must hint at Heathcotes spectre. Given that a
graphic impress lies upon us here; and it imprisons purport and
hints at a hidden trajectory. This is artistic or happens to be a
tendency which moves via Beresford Egan towards one that
signifies Ralph Steadman. Doesnt the line stretch back to
Rowlandson or Gillray? Didnt it also satisfy the savage or
monstrous, thereby?
+
By virtue of such a panel, Heathcote Dervish undergoes a
spiritual tide and this was one which cleaves to a ghost at
Banquos feast. His triangular head waxes pyramidal now
whilst an impress of these stalks continues to surround his limbs.
It all denoted a thick bracket or a lock of hair behind a portal,
267
neath blue lids. Face the facts now: because Heathcotes jagged
talons caressed the side of this deaths-head; and it seemed to be
pregnant with awe albeit primarily in spirit. A rough wooden
work-bench existed underneath this Frankensteins monster. He
looked altogether alien aslant some frightful intent, and appeared
to be dressed top-to-toe in a mauve jump-suit. (Could it be one of
David Ickes notorious shell-suits?) Surely, every recognised
catholic school-boy knows that purple amounts to deaths colour
or tint?
+
This one, thinkest me thou, pronounced Heathcote Dervish in a
stentorian voice.
AN ENGLISH HOBBY-HORSE APPROVES ITS KLAVERN:
(133)
We are only concerned with a planned observation, affirmed
Elsas husband on a rival plane. His wife now hangs back to the
side and her features gather up a latent uncertainty. Let it all
rise above you as a spent carrion of Self Her husband by this
adventures mist finds his aspect to be convulsed: and it then
comes across as galvanised, unknown to quicksand or beckoning
over any prospect. It also offers little by way of a sandy relief.
Listen to this announcement from a forgotten Leyden jar An
eventuality such as the one you are determined to dispose of
could occasion yonder puppets death. The massive thews of
Mastodon Helix could well do for him particularly if they
came to blows or even fist-to-fist. These were the words of Elsa
Bounteous Hapgood. No matter, my dear death is life as the
sages of an unknown Nemedian chronicle beg leave to say.
Occasionally now, we are wont to witness a world wide
wrestling or cage-fighting bout. Do you bother to repossess one
memory; namely, the one of Dickie Davis introducing Saturday
afternoon wrestling on independent television?
276
looked for all the world like an alternative iPod. One large
buckle might also be observed at the nethermost extremity of this
Frankensteins monster!
+
Girding his loins, then, Heathcote Dervishs spirit passed into the
inanimate corse; and it did so through an ectoplasmic transfer
skin to skin. Yes, Heathcote slipped in like a divine vapour or
gas: one which may osmotically filter through any partition.
What is Heathcotes astral body thinking during this triumphal
moment? Nothing but the following assists me over wraths
plenitude, he mused. In the offering of my new kingdom, I
shall visit any new understandings with a sword these must
remain unfocused forevermore in such avenues. It depicts a grief
deep down in ones well of suffering but by no means at all
congruent with Radclyffe Halls The Well of Loneliness. Since
the truth is that this magnificent new body shall bequeath to me
conquests unheard of! Hitherto, all I lacked was a stalker to my
prey. Forgive me, great Odin, a cup of bitterness runneth over
into a murder of crows.
A DEEP SIX HEIGHTENS RAGNORAK: (143)
A century farther on, Phosphorous Cool jigged away from
Salisbury Plains scaffolding. In the background his wires trailed
over the trestle of such a puppeteers hand; and these were
tendons (in turn) which levelled off down the back of the stage. It
took the residual form of Eric Bramalls ornate stage-set in
Colwyn Bay wherein the twentieth centurys dark and baroque
prince adopted his motif. Phosphorous flew up a screen at once
cadenced with azo and cadmium; and it shook at this gesture of a
prior engineering. Look at you, O my brothers Phosphorous
identikit picture co-existed with an orange sun. These factors
certainly couldnt help but listen to its process of awakening.
May one hear a trident being scraped across a floor (?); itself
carpeted with the retrieval of so many lost souls. Phosphorous is
still liable to turn when startled by such a sound, even if he
285
brother was led to the scaffold after his more infamous cohort.
Maximiliens jaw had already been shattered into many pieces
and held in a silk handkerchief, irrespective of the Thermidorean
reaction setting a seal on revolutionary leftism. It arrested or cut
him off by dint of the guillotine, and this is even though the
chairman of the Committee of Public Safety had begun his career
by inveighing against it. He later chose to become its very
personification. All around Phosphorous Cool, though, a Comus
Rout circled its cause at the heart of oblivion especially when
no loyalty can be bought without a bullet in the gut! Such masses
are illustrative of Gustav le Bons conservative metaphysic, as
attested to in works like The Psychology of Crowds. Truly, this
assemblage ranted and raved like Ensors masks or possibly,
those pencil-works of his whereby a skull looks at itself in a
fording river. Whats ours comes entombed in a golden casket
within a white rhinos tower. It may be translucent, limpid or up
in the air. Xenephon no longer needs to avail himself of his
electorate and any forays up-country could be limitlessly
exposed. Arent such creatures nearing the end of all sorts of
tethers? Might one detect an Ollendorffian beggarhood one
which dances on the tip of a diamond-headed needle? They were
like pin-balls in a slot machine. But what must be the cause of so
much riot, distress and folly?, asked our silvery captive. A
moment later Phosphorous Cool spied the genesis; and it was a
rampaging Mastodon Helix!
A FACE REFLECTED IN A WELLS STRANGENESS: (152)
What treachery is this?, expostulated Heathcote Dervish from
well within the body of a Frankensteins monster. Are we not
really given over to considering James Whales film of 1931,
Frankenstein, at such a moment as this? It starred Boris Karloff
as the monster but now a subtle difference cloaks such an
affair. For Frankensteins monster lies prone on his dais and is
incapable of any movement; when taken together with a pair of
electrical ear-plugs that give witness to his prison. Like a man
who has been lauded as Scaramouch but whos been tied to
293
some rags of straw and a mask one factotum waits for the blaze
thatll set it alight! A strangulated sense of arson --- after all --acts as the basis for Guy Fawkes drama. Above this exultation,
though, we can see an exhilaration in all the other characters:
whether Baron von Frankenstein, Butler James and the female
nurse/Igor. She exists to one side of this special tournament.
James holds Elsa aloft now (and interestingly) she can be
described as wearing Victorian underwear, such as bloomers,
serviceable or robust shoes, a bodice and one make-shift bra.
Most noticeably, an old-fashioned military revolver lies aslant
her left hip; and it finds itself within a sabretache or suchlike
contrivance. The nurse an ectoplasmic relief of Elsa Bounteous
Hapgood just smiles on. Her lips certainly betray an oft-slanted
leer, and its a sort of biped smirk. Whereupon Baron von
Frankenstein, a eugenicist or dysgenicist who is certainly part of
his time, speaks first. Tis no betrayal at all, my monstrous
bevy. We have merely captured and made use of you here in
such a way as suits your necessary ambition. Dont you
recognise the circumstance where a wheel-chair enters a tombed
gulf, and it closes down the path of a concrete corridor? Namely
one which has been revived by an ancient patterning of pipes
that exists above it. Such a tableau seems to trespass on a dank or
dismal tomb, a rival which contrives to forever betray the
prospect of le Corbusiers unfinished dream. Brutalism or
whatever else now, eh (?); given that these ducts will draw down
such a chair to a new oblivion under glass. All of it goes to show
the sepulchral darkness of a pit: when light plays its relief on raw
concrete, itself untreated and painted white in accord with
Albigensian brightness.
WRESTLE, WRESTLE ON THE GROUND AMID
ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONIST PAINT: (153)
Down below and amidst a maelstrom of frenzy or smashed cars
Mastodon Helix hurls his imprecations against the world. What
can really be going on here? Might this amount to a puppettheatre played in the mind for laughs wherein a Strongman
294
+
Now then, a grubby T-shirt festoons an absence of electrocuted
hair; and a medley stands up from the scalp like a mohicans
shock. Its delusional, dont you know? Yet our movie director
moves onwards continuously towards answers in dun-coloured
rooms possibly then intoning other jails within the mind.
Again, in terms of a bell-weather, a thin hand delivers its
consciousness aslant one more vista of sand. The sound is also
deafening while the wheel-chair slides, and it definitely has to do
with an echo occasioned by rubber on concrete. Yes, such an
offering causes our mummy to reach out in the direction of
silence, even within the perspective of her own grave. Listen to
me awhile
TERROR ANTHRAX STALKS ITS GOLDEN FRAMES: (157)
Mastodon Helix and Phosphorous Cool are now engaged in
mortal combat in a situation where these two puppets wires
become intertwined. Each one engages in ferocious wrestling,
neck to neck, only to discover that the other one has beaten them
to it. Must you disseminate its witness? In a conundrum where
one large reptile holds with trespassing against a glow: a factor
which causes him to slope down corridors of yesteryear.
Seemingly though, one question mounts another in terms of a
scaly hide since this checkerboard suits the grievances of so
many doves, let alone those squares existing on your average
chess board. It eclipses all other shames, you see despite the
fact that a reptilian eye opens to an enclosed windrush. Its a
speck on the old pin-hole camera of yesteryear: and it certainly
registers one complaint above Peppers Ghost. Most particularly
given that a saurian orb fancies its chances, if not necessarily
when tied to a post during the day-time. A scenario in which a
retina flecks in the direction of a scarlet livery; whereas its pupil
happens to be a dark strip, longitudinally speaking. A matter of
scales --- thereafter --- surrounds the blinding susurration of this
Eye. It knows no other pineal orb save one that hangs over a
transparent tomb primarily during an instant where
298
centuries, purred the doctor whod achieved this feat. You will
recognise the truth of our demands when we put them to you. It
certainly wont help if you forbid our manikins their customary
pleasure. First, lets control the outcome of one of Moreaus
experiments so otherwise facilitated by Peter Singers
advocacy of animal rights. No you remain completely within
our power: and it doubtless indicates a foray into grave-time
which pensions ease. Do you detect its worth? Anyway, a brief
injection of a mind-control serum shall soon place you entirely
under our sway. Nurse Igor (he addressed her directly) get
Heathcote Dervish dressed as speedily as possible then place
him in his wheel-chair for onwards travel.
+
Look you: our metaphor holds as good as before. Leastwise we
now find a situation where the wheel-chair squeaked its way
forward. All and everything happened to be closed off in
somnolence and gloom. Also, ever since his entrance into this
Hilton, one scarecrow illumined a way towards an unlit
pavement. He admittedly crossed the threshold in order to remain
in the game squeak; squeak. Yet the mobile chair carried on
across one gifted mansion too many; and it basically charged out
in an ochre bestrewn haze. A playlet wherein a movement
occurred over dank concrete --- the former echoing to a sensory
deprivation chambers distaff.
A BLACK ENVELOPE CARRIES A SINISTER MESSAGE
WITHIN: (161)
Truly and again, these monsters clashed when theyre juxtaposed
against the paste-board of a toy-theatre. A minor boardgame
(this) upon which the festivities of London town find themselves
washed up. One factor necessarily elides into another here,
particularly given that the painted fun of a peekaboo knows its
place within folk culture. Yes and yes some more because
Mastodons massive thews now stand in victory over a crumpled
Phosphorous Cool. He lies smartly to the left and definitely
under the thumb; by virtue of the fact that his silver-toed body
302
305
never mind the fact that they resembled the minor spokes of a
wheel twisting to gold, on rind stone, amid a vehicle of burnished
pumice. Each and every ormolu abstract, then, sign-posted a
certainty which said that within a peroxide mop she wore
bullets in her hair. Lets sign off for a Mary Rose, in terms of a
spectators apparel(!)
ENDURE THE END OF CASTOR AND POLLUX:
BETRAYED TO A PONIARD[!]: (165)
In any event, Phosphorous Cool staggered from pillar-to-post in a
reluctant fit of strength, and at a time where St. Pauls loomed in
the background. Surely, one can see Wrens dome limned against
a bright yellow sky namely, one that illuminated one of those
grand city buildings set up roundabout. True enough, the
mausoleums of these city banks struck us as real; while
Phosphorous clutched at a wall avec trembling white fingers.
Such silvery ducts as these stroked some chalk, even though the
masonry had more to do with classical bias than anything else. Its
brickwork became chipped by kindred mortals et al save alone
for the grief of one alleyway too far.
+
Related passions come to radiate sulphur, though, in a playlet
where a boot levels off against a cripples back. It gives a
rejoinder by means of some faint praise i.e.: one which
condescends to spin its own tail, insufferably so. For rather like
one of Edward Muybridges moving photographs this sequence
depresses a spinning diatribe o wheels. Do you reckon on it?
Most definitely, such a doleful ardour moved its sparkling tracks
forward and each link in this daisy-chain chose to dun its
mixture. Against a dulcet grey drop, then, some transparent
concrete planed itself off against granite. It spun the embrasure of
distant watercolours if only to sweep across this particular
wash. Nor can such a cripple stop himself screaming when the
blow comes. The boot of either Phosphorous Cool or Heathcote
Dervish follows through on its own aftermath (now); at least as
regards a livery of electrocuted hair!
307
310
avoids these hurtling bricks. They and their attendant brickdust shift by at a fast rate of knots. Momentarily, it appears to
be a house on the move after an effect created by William Hope
Hodgson in his House on the Borderland. Again, when
witnessing a violent calm, Phosphorous comes to realise the
closeness of such javelins. Each one essentially passes by virtue
of a millimetre in either chest; nor can the hurt occasioned by
Carl Andres bricks intrigue any change here. It definitely looped
the loop and turned back, if only to hurl Davids sling-shot in
Goliaths way. Look you: Phosphorous at the behest of his
invisible puppet-master zooms down towards such boards. A
structure of balsa parchments (these were) the likelihood of
which backed away from a midgets theatre. Anyway, no
Euripides of the minor stair proved available, so Phosphorous
Cool dives down to the final act. A curtain, then, goes up on
Restorationist drama in order to indicate Montague Summers
staging. The playwrights in question happened to be Rochester,
Shadwell, Congreve, Wycherley, Aphra Behn & so forth. Let
the final drama begin, mutters Phos(.) Cool, in an aeon like this
fighting waxes immortal. It overshadows the grief of Achilles
over Patrochlus in his tent. No sir what avails us now has to be
the strongest vision possible of one mans going too far. It
occasions a knock-about with ones fists before the greatest care,
and it likewise strikes down those craving the knife. Dysgenics
rules (in other words); it carries no other valency. In the whole of
the world lets prepare for some English Martial Arts by Terry
Brown. May the fire-fight commence
TRUTH IS A KNIFE PASSING THROUGH MEAT: (174)
Heathcote Dervish lay alone in one of Peter Cushings sepulchral
chambers; the former having much to do with the English
atmosphere of a Hammer House of Horror. Yes indeed for
within its confines Frankensteins monster (or the new
Prometheus) lies abed together with a clutch of also-rans who
gathered around like vultures. During this moment, the impish
nurse replete with a hunch-back brings up a holding chair.
314
Does it signify --- even in memory --- the fate of the wheel-chair
user with whom weve been dealing? Herein, our character or
freak-show artiste had plunged to the bottom of an abyss and
inside this a lone hand reached up into an upright posture. It (the
MS sufferer) felt beholden to the reality of a splotched and
blood-flecked sponge. These events, in turn, sprawled adrift of le
Corbusiers concrete panels. Our mystery play also had
something to do with an exercise in misprisionment, whereby a
swirl of imagined paint susurrates from below. It travels via the
conspectus of Michauxs art without really suggesting anything
substantial. A violent impasto of such paint likewise hints at de
Koonings work, if little else. Above this fetish swirl two
spiritual essences in blue mist. Could they incarnate the principle
of a good and bad guardian angel? Yet most evidently one
shape on the right suggested a half-naked Edwardian gentleman.
Whereas on the left of our plate a daemon appeared in its
vortex; at once horned, beast-like, unsacrificial and reminiscent
of one of Aickmans wraiths. Didnt the London poet Iain
Sinclair once call it Suicide Bridge?
A NOBLE AFFIDAVIT OUTWITS A PURPLE HEART: (175)
Battle has well and truly been joined (now) between
Phosphorous Cool and Mastodon Helix on a puppets stage.
Surely, this happens to be a scenario where any puppet-board
theatre, such as Eric Bramalls, must face demolition under these
weighty blows? To surrender to them remains the thing
Whereas Phosphorous drops directly like a gymnast or wrestler
into Mastodon Helixs mind. Or more pertinently does he fly
like a speeding dart or arrow right into the heart of its trajectory,
thereby? Our phosphorescent one merely slows down now in
order to navigate one plot too many (per se), and once there he
glows like a sword quivering at a dart-boards centre. He squirms
beyond recourse to available duty; and all of this subsists in a
way which causes Mastodon to reach up by flexing his enormous
muscles. A manoeuvre thats calculated (quite evidently) to hurl
his assailant from him with all speed. In all of this violent
315
Its not bad for tyros and upstarts, eh? But Baron von
Frankenstein, his hunch-backed nurse Ms. Igor, Butler James and
another Elsa Bounteous theyd all forgotten this surgerys
object. Over-confidence, in such circumstances, can prove
inefficacious over purgatorys results most especially. It
happened to be that our caged waif sought manumission. Surely,
his detractors must focus in on a mage without compare?
SHOOT A CYBORG IN THE FOOT WITH A CROSS-BOW:
(181)
Phosphorous Cool then brought his palms up in order to slap
Mastodons face; and a terrific clap or wallop is thereby
administered. In this instance, Mastodon Helixs head hurtles
backwards with a snarl if only to border on near insanity.
Paradoxically, Helix seems to stultify and weaken under this
onslaught whereupon our silvern one goes from strength to
strength. Or alternately, he incarnates a forgotten spirit of
yesteryear one thats embodied by those pearly Kings and
Queens from the east end. Further and amidst a blaze of blue
Phosphorous Cool grasps this hulk in a vice-like grip. --- A three
minute bout or cage fight (per se) in which his adversary goes
down under magnesium oxide... He wilts over cosmic radiation
drawn up to this particular. Whereas his frame even when
demarcated from a puppeteers strings slumps down to a music
halls boards. For Mastodon Helixs irretrievably broken now!
+
Likewise, in a tunnel of cerulean or agate, Phosphorous Cool
tilted against a lurking reptile. It all caused one stanchion to
break down, limit its toxicity and fold-over (thereby). Such a
development also occurs in front of an abstract paw namely,
one thats outstretched after a Pre-Raphaelite painting of St.
George and the Dragon. This recoiled suddenly oer a sound
temperature: in a situation where a limb pulsated with its
execution even on granite. Pebbles were then always shovelled
up to the side, and they often made up the numbers over nacreous
discharges --- at least as pertained to a thrown-out or put upon
321
AGAINST
APPROXIMATE
ZEROES
I will show you the future in a handful of dust. --- T.S. Eliot,
The Wasteland
Does one care. Given that our imp of the reverse screams like a
goodun. Have we not made use of a title by Edgar Allan Poe in
the nineteenth century, here? Especially when we consider that
the nurse about whom we are speaking wears a starched apron
and cap. These happen to be the accoutrements of Igors
feminine regard --- much after the example set by Terence Fisher
in a Hammer House of Horror. Examine this her face remains
open to a sleeping grave, and this occurs at a time when a series
of liquid dials brooks no reprieve. They adumbrate an oldfashioned radio study or possibly a modern cars internal
design. Dont we forget how she incarnates the principle of Elsa
Bounteous Hapgood(?) a woman whose spirituality exists on
several different planes at once. We face an enormous powersource; yielding to nonesuch above us. Observe these Babbage
pre-computers --- my masters: and must they communicate
anything other than a dancing demon whos minus its electronic
nimbus? These were exact words which soared above the
available terra firma. (Irrespective of any enabling light, you
wouldnt even know of the girls disfigurement. A factor found
to be reminiscent of the nurse on the Odessa steps in Battleship
Potemkin, that is. On many occasions Francis Bacon, the painter,
tried to capture this as exemplifying the modern cry).
324
Only one thing can obviously save it and this must involve the
opening of an eye. It spectres to crimson against a loss of identity
what with those oval shields that have an amphibians impress
laid across them. Given such a future, this eye blinks amidst
leather --- at once scarlet to its core --- and comes over all
mulcted, unblinking, shiny or laminated, et cetera. It possesses,
again and again, a pupil or inner iris of a stretched black
pointillism. Who belabours the serpent folks cruelty now then,
eh?
A DIRIGIBLE RELEASES ITS ELECTROSTATIC CARGO
OF LEAVES: (186)
Those who dwell in Hell are not dead! the Tallis scholars
Above Baron von Frankensteins mortuary and witnessing the
heavy artillery of so much lightning an advertising balloon
hovers in the celestial aftermath. It glows with the spectacular
core of its messages (abundantly so). Could it be piloted up
above by a distinct variant on Warlock Splendour Thomas?
Never mind for like a First World War airship, it traverses the
green air beyond our template. But the point here is that a
massive surge of power flashes down to an aerial on the
buildings roof. This fluted stack delimits a grief pole, if only to
soar astride the sort of appurtenance which features in an old
episode of Doctor Who. Can any present recapture the BBC
serial albeit mesmerically? Nevertheless, Frankensteins slate
roof encoded many turrets and flowering rifles, and these then
apportioned blame between planes at least in relation to gabled
windows. Such sheets of glass are brilliantly illumined and they
trespass on yellow against the dark. No-one fears this resolution
again, you see, because our impish dwarf correctly calls this
particular shout. It electronically shimmers down from the
heavens, and thereby animates the rictus of Frankensteins dead
hero. Surely everyone can configure, contrary to Mary Shelleys
statement in The Last Man, that galvanic action animates a
corse? It runs contrary to Vesalius and Galen, after all --- but
326
341
AL-QAEDA MOTH
a novel
An introduction
Al-Qaeda MOTH is a Western which finds itself divided into a
three-pronged attack upon the senses. The first section or
spearing deals with a nineteenth century narrative that typifies
the many films of John Wayne --- one thinks (in particular) of
Stagecoach (1939), Tall in the Saddle (1944), Fort Apache
(1948), The Searchers (1956) and The Alamo (1960). The second
strand --- by way of contrast --- involves a twentieth century
version of the same story line. It relates to on-rushing chronicles
such as The Wild, Wild West, Australian efforts like Romper
Stomper and David Carradine in a B-movie named Alien X. The
third progression on our chess board, however, intellectualises
this process and provides a template for dreaming. It could be
described as the collective unconscious of the novels leading
characters. Using William Gayley Simpsons Which Way
Western Man? as a briefing or sounding board --- Harlequin
Thoomey, Toblerone Harpie, Old Man Smithers, Blackbird Leys
Dingo et al speculate on Western culture and its future. Can such
a debate contribute to what Maurice Bardeche called the defence
of the Occident? Our interweaving stories then combine in order
to hint at a new Titans creation.
342
Al-Qaeda MOTH
A Western without horizons
Cast of characters:
Harlequin Thoomey
Toblerone Harpie
Old Man Smithers
Blackbird Leys Dingo
Axon Tree
Lift Spenser Wingate
Pond Granite
Egghead Morgan
Rapacious Quicksilver
Low Termagant
Porcupine Jones
Sheriff Eugene
Geronimo, a Red Indian
+
Various Old Western archetypes or placebos
Dingo, a child
PROLOGUE: <<<This work consists of three interconnected
narratives. Parts One, Four and Seven et cetera take place in the
nineteenth century. Parts Two, Five + Eight et al subsist a
hundred years further on. Whereas Parts Three, Six & Nine and
so on exist in dream-time. It has to be these Dramatis Personaes
unconscious. Not even Roy Rogers in Westerns like Colorado,
Robin Hood of the Pecos and Cowboy & the Senorita can
outface this. Alls clear now, yes?>>>
Everything has a remedy save Death. old Proverb
343
ONE: (1)
Didnt a distinct poster motivate the breeze? It doubled up its
tragic absence as if straining it against the wooden posts
adornment. In substance, then, this rough brown-paper was hewn
from many leaves what with a single anvil beckoning to the
stars. On this template a Colt 45. waxed visible or evident; and it
happens to be the worlds most powerful hand-gun, after all!
Nicely put, it could blow a fellows head clean off at a hundred
paces! In summation therefore our print depicted a cold-eyed
wanderer; together with a slouch hat which neatly spliced a face
in two. Behind it a turquoise sky limited some reindeer, but it
also let out vultures from their keep. They circled a white sun
while moving in tandem. Definitely so, our figure now held a
right-angles pistol; at once merely aft to a face or perpendicular
to its future. No teleology then inhibited this regard, particularly
given a steel-barrels glimmer resultantly so. We also find that
an orange beard mantles a face in terms of its scrub. It took noone really by surprise; at least when it occurred underneath those
ice-blue marbles. A serge jacket gifted a tailors way or task
especially when out of Wichitas haberdashery: and the latter was
surmounted by a red neckerchief. Violently so, because it
claimed its offerant if only presumably to die. For Louis
LAmour has left a vacant star here by a hillside and this was
not even to speak of Clark Gables performance in High Noon.
While our Avengers hand held a six-gun within it a gesture
which presumed to come on blind, foursquare, undelivered,
Rodin-like and super-masculine. It remained steady if devoid of
four pins; and each of them derived from a chaste metal or held a
vista up. The name or signature at a posters bottom reads:
Harlequin Thoomey.
TWO: (2)
In one rival dimension to our own a Harlequin stood aghast.
Moreover, his form came green-garbed or russet, if set against a
skeletal faces effrontery. A large machine-gun stuck out laterally
from his belt, in terms of a bluish hint it was possibly an Uzi.
344
Various threads of snow and ice tumbled around him; being fit to
be thrown over or themselves reddish specks. Yes didnt a
steaming barrel add to these woes peregrinations? Furthermore,
what arrests our attention has to be a skull one which howls or
is fit to curdle a cranium --- presumably after Grays Anatomy. It
bewails a wound and screeches to a Banshees status or it
chooses to mulct a severed heads revenge. Might it combine
Elisabethan tragedy and an early Iris Murdoch novel? Similarly,
this deaths-head cries dolefully what with brazen sockets
carrying an orb: when taken together with flaring nostrils that
were chiselled out of bone. Alack(!), the mouth fell open bitterly
as a Head caromed and skimmed within a moon-beam. You
see, its alerted to its task while blood-red light hurtles about
after Rothkos intervention. It comes laced with snowy storm; at
least when traversing a gambit from cadmium to violet via
alizarin. Now none but Thoomey really knows this film-posters
violence!
THREE: (3)
In Harlequin Thoomeys unconscious a vision swirls about. It
transposes on nought save immaterialism even though the first,
second and third story segments represent a thrice-storeyed mind.
Perhaps it embodies a multiple play by Samuel Beckett like his
early work Eleutheria? Regardless of this one character with a
clown-nose stood in a grey-tinted space; albeit abreast of a
blanched face. He mouthed words which were presently
misheard even amid these lambs silences. Furthermore, another
mountebank was dressed in harlequinade or as Punchs Clown
Joey, and he came forward merely to lop off a noses
frustrations. These puppets outface one another after silent
cinemas fashion or in mime. What better, therefore, than a
nightmare to examine Oswald Spenglers thesis The Decline of
the West? Especially when it is set within a Westerns
architecture, even a spaghetti one
345
FOUR: (4)
To be true to our tale, though, our vigilante (who basically went
under the name of Harlequin Thoomey) pursued a gang of bankrobbers up into some northern hills. This troupe was led by a
father-n-son team called Old Man Smithers and Blackbird Leys
Dingo why, theyve confiscated the assets of Standard High in
Eugene, Oregon. After which they all moved up into the
mountains. As insurance they took a kidnapped bank teller with
them. Her names Toblerone Harpie. What they hadnt reckoned
on is a small family detail namely, she happened to be
Thoomeys wife. By purloining one; theyd outraged the other!
FIVE: (5)
Whereupon in another direction or dimension Eugenes
Oregon spreads out before us in the nineteenth century. It existed
as a small town of hopeless assurance. Surely now, a dull greenlight affected its listlessness what with several oil-lamps
flickering in niches? Theyd abandoned glory over an emerald
head at least when seen from the side and with a cheroot
sticking out aslant. Wooden boards lay up between twin
gamblers who were playing pokers dance albeit with one
trusting to a short trilby; the other relying on conical ware. This
came fluted off to a grave; together with a bow-tie situated
underneath and neither of these grappled avec skeletons. A
sequined enclosure lay off sideways-on and it belaboured a cardbacks design. It tapered away to a left-end in view. Similarly, a
youth or stripling in a buck-skin jacket made his way over to one
offerant; and it was reddish in its bloody hue. He faced Harlequin
Thoomeys face full on; the latter being sequestered in a booth
near the saloons door. The lawman wore a brown slouch hat of
padded felt high up on his crown.
SIX: (6)
The robbers had infiltrated the bank at three-thirty p.m., and this
took place just before a cash reckoning up. The stained-glass
floor reflected indebtedness if only to usurys bounty. Needless
346
347
EIGHT: (8)
One figure stood afore another in a hushed silence. Altogether
now, a dim silhouette sought solace essentially by virtue of a
recess in this bars dwindling astral. A post of a brackish purple
if lit divided the two participants. One came seated behind a
horizontal plane made of brownish wood. Isnt this the good,
clean timber of which Aston was oft to speak in Pinters The
Caretaker? Light streamed in through a sequined avenue it
flooded in over both champions. But its impact resiled to an
optical illusion which was possibly kept out of sight in that the
window frontage had been taped over by a design. Primarily, it
resembles the back of a sequence of Waddingtons playing cards.
You know, these are those squares on which a mans shirt can be
lost whether it be over stud poker, whist, cribbage, gin rummy,
bridge or whatever? While our other protagonist stood with his
legs apart and avec his booted heels braced on running boards.
Each foot carried a spur at its rear. His hat on a brief net of
twine lay halfway down his back. Yet by the lights trickery
he seems to be inundated with claret, Ribena, rubicund flow and
all such glows. They sprouted up when lit by imaginary pulsars
and came to surround him with a roseate effulgence. This blood
epiphany happened to be a pink portrait melding into cadmium
as limned in napthol. It also stood out with quinacridone by way
of crimson; at least before sprouting as permanent rose. All of
this refused to permit alizarin from becoming violets Quin
especially when limiting its permutations What about
magentas fate, I hear you cry?
+
You Harlequin Thoomey?, spat out yesterdays youth. (He
clearly remained unapprised of Tony Blairs respect agenda).
Who wants to know?, replied our stalker. He was looking if
he but knew it at Blackbird Leys Dingo.
NINE: (9)
The vigilante filled our screen in a world which had become
devoid of aught save snow. Its icy fondue unhinged one bracket
348
351
FOURTEEN: (14)
Our Western vintage has returned in no matter how limited a
way. Deep inside it, ceteris paribus, two characters drawn from
folklore face off against each other. One sits far from torpor; the
other stands with a glinting gaze. Resultantly then, a sequence of
squares in lieu of windows balk clear --- they also transpose
playing cards onto a widows face! In comparison to this,
Harlequin Thoomeys features wax dark-blue in a bushy tumult
while his companion flexes both gun-arms further out. Blackbird
Leys Dingo still wears his tasselled jacket, though. I dont
reckon much to bounty hunters, mister. Specially those who are
pursuin() the Republics war heroes, you get me? The freedom
of Jackson Pollacks canvases way back in Wyoming; why, they
entreat fears semblance or ghost. Do you recall his early vehicle
in the Tate, Naked Man with Knife? Yessum Your
broadsheet or abstract expressionist ditty avoids me, stripling.
Yet our thoughts concurr through deviance, since tracking a
mans illegal in Oregon. Its a statute of state law,
gubernatorially enforced. If you run into any Union troopers or
bailiffs doing so, immediately report them to the governor. For
my part, I seek no reward. Harlequin Thoomeys doppelganger
has been speaking way back in the nineteenth century. Youre
looking into the wrong mirror, brother! Why propose a joke glass
whereby the body comes to be distorted like in yesterdays funfair? Im calling yuz OUT!
FIFTEEN: (15)
Our snow pursuit continued apace but an avenging asteroid
has touched the earth only to leave a trace. Perhaps it intoned a
momentary thawing of these banks? Nevertheless, young Dingo
had seen this persuader through a rifles scope. Daddy o mine,
he yelled, some sort of lawman keeps on our corns trail.
Yeah You can spy him over an ice-rise; thence blowing aside
vengeances spume. He harrows our course without respite. You
ask about his rig? Why, hes gutted about the gills. Do you see
that long coat of azure (?); it hangs down from the shoulders to
352
pertinently, hes been thrown out head-first into a dirt-track --his hat becoming dislodged from a hooligans head in the
process. Doesnt his body hazard to a blizzard; at least in terms
of a magentas dye? Furthermore, the doors wooden-boards
clatter as he passes through them only for Blackbird Leys
Dingo to lie in the street! Again, Harlequins fully-hatted figure
casts the miscreant aloft with a hand gesture; at once held in a
shadows panoply. Hes dismissive in the extreme. Feckless
rabble, are his scant words. Perhaps Harlequin Thoomey has
perused Gustav le Bon over items as contagious as socialism
not to mention crowd or mass psychology? Behind him ochre
glows tightly in order to be fit for purpose.
TWENTY-ONE: (21)
Old Man Smithers then becomes a zig-zagging visage. His face
as he regards his son looks menacing or given over to finality.
The nose looms bulbous amid pallid cheeks; whereas each eye
squints like a false marble on either side of a revolving trap-door.
In black-and-white light (so to say) every iris aligns to a distinct
colour by way of misprisionment or is it a parallax view?
Indubitably, the forehead tilts sheer and this was less with brains
than H.J. Eysencks foreboding over criminality. Yes, Cesare
Lombroso was right over villainys gallery in Criminal Man
the latter photogravures are on loan in New Scotland Yards
Black Museum (as the case maybe). Ask William Roughead for
an entrance key, why dont you? Yet Smithers parting lies to the
left or possibly perpendicularly as befits a slice through the
hirsute which levers itself up. His hair-strands, though, were
stingy, dormant, rat-like or otherwise miserable. Each one
necessitated a disused brush although primarily by way of its
minstrel.
+
The Old Mans ears stuck up like mud guards, each one tailgating to a silhouette further off. An ear-ring looks forward
brightly to such a resolution. Whereas the mouth sags down
imponderably, so as to draw the face towards nemesis or a
356
Smithers, O Smithers
what do you do?
there are so few
<unlike you>
who smash up a pew.
THIRTY-TWO: (32)
The nameless lawmans question still reverberates about the bar.
Should I know these two miscreants?, he sneered. To which
and by way of response Harlequin Thoomey adopted a stoical
mien. I imagine so, constable, since they left a trail across snowbitten wastes all of which led me here. Eugene in Oregons the
place, you infer? For, when on a journey hereabouts I interred
one of them in an icy tundra or barrow; and it peeled away with
Kelvin temperatures for all the world to see. Even as I buried him
pelt-deep some specks of drying ice flecked about me. Wasnt it
freakish? Because the one known as Egghead Morgan is left
beneath the loam or moss, and he was frozen to the touch of a
blizzards ice-queen. I had to place two copper coins whether
cents or bits over his deluded orbs and these were outstretched
in the sunlights direction (as they are wont to do). I closed those
lids myself what with two brown gloves that were taken from a
distracted hand. Nor did my Christian conscience and puritanism
forsake me for you know that Im a Mormon, sheriff? Uhhuh, murmured his colleague. Well, I did my duty to a
cadaver about to be devoured by eagles. Howd he perish?,
rumbled the tin-star. I stabbed him through the skull and into the
brain with an ice-pick. On an occasion where hed attacked me
with a Columbus Marine fighting knife, do you take my drift?
Like a revolting Jew or Trotsky of future years and with or
without Isaac Deutschers exemplification I played Louis
Mercadors role. A finality of history has to be its causation
and one neednt consult leftwing revisionists like Eric Hobsbawn
or E.P. Thompson to realise that. Indeed, I walked away from the
graveside which was effectively stuck on an incline albeit with
a wooden cross attached to its meat. Those who dont walk with
364
grain of sand in the stomach of a bear. Both are long gone into
the woods with red coats as accompanied by Charon the
ferryman in accord with Caspar David Friedrichs example. Yes
sir: their faces were mirrored by gigantic teeth like raptors, with
each molar pulled back from the gums in apoplexy. The sinews
around the neck also held fast --- being muscular in terms of a
prior pulsation. Whereby each eye maximised a scintilla of
scarlet; especially in its detached livery of orbs. What of the hair,
though (?) particularly when viewed as one entity, and it
creamed to rats-tails while slanting from the head in a
Mohicans drift. Neither of them remain in this vicinity?,
enquired Thoomey almost casually. As he essayed these words,
however, his visage looked craggy, grim, crenellated and
silhouetted via paste. His hat slanted down right-to-left from 45
degrees with his half mask penumbral or otherwise bleeding to
perfume in an outraged garden. May a text like The Garden of
the Supplicants --- by Octave Mirbeau --- come to mind? By
means of which sapphire collides with ruby; so as to contrast hot
and cold, even a dance of the brave, and a Stonehenges
configuration made from old cars. A trail of black cigarette
smoke wafts upwards throughout this ordeal. No, replied
Eugenes tepid saviour, these siamese twins have left Doctor
Caligaris cabinet. What are their infractions, Pinkerton? List
each crime an invisible audience begs you to!
THIRTY-SIX: (36)
Out in the arctic wastes a gang stands about listlessly. A thick
mushroom of snow pelts down; with each and every snowflake
coming to resemble a grenade. This Murder of Crows continues
to await its orders, primarily because Old Man Smithers barks
like a drum major. You now, listen up: Ill skin a votary who
doesnt abide by my concept of leisure. What to do if we find
some braggart whos skulking on the ice out there? Ill tell ye,
my family and its familiars. Why, Im going to remove his flesh
from its hide and this was basically by severing spleen from
fondue in order to cake a name-plate with blood. Comprehenez
367
vous? It works like this: Ill cut this hydras multiple heads off
so as to mount them like plaques upon a wall. Might they
embody moose-heads, a bears maw or the coverlets of foxes so
adorned? I see it all now: each and every one of their skulls is
essentially clothed in its pericarp, and bids up masonry thereby!
But when merely registered what will I put under a trophy? The
answer comes to me: an ormolu template with the wording
Here lies a Droog(!); Old Man Smithers. Yet never forget the
final scene: it depicts me hammering away at a work-bench or
drenched in gore, and covered by an apron & with a hatchet.
Above me the torsos of those slain sway on pulleys rather like
a butchery store or an abattoir containing much meat. Yesssss
it evinces zoologys Kolyma. A scenario wherein bloodied six
packs oscillate on wires, and are thus winched to safety or
oblivion. Each one being eventually pulled down to the surgeon
beneath havent I gone beyond even von Hagens in this grand
guignol?
+
YEEEAHHH! Pappy, ne plus ultra, the way you talk I want to
play with myself, snickered Blackbird Leys Dingo. To which
his father replied by grabbing hold of a sons throat. Theres no
dirty-mindedness allowed here, boy, mark it! At the first sign of
onanism I reach for castrations steel. You see, masturbation is
weakness and degeneracy in a man. Avoid the eunuch, I beg you
for how else do you think they reached Mozarts top notes?
THIRTY-SEVEN: (37)
In phantasms last sequence our supreme leaders alter ego
approaches this wooden trestle. It illustrates a shadow kingdom
or an exercise in puppeteering wherein Thoomeys actual
incarnation stands revealed in life. (All of which contrasts with
his fictive mask and goes under the title of Harlequin). Can this
tarot indicate number one or the Fools reign? Yes or no?
Whereas underneath a Victorian work-bench Old Man
Smithers briefly draws a playing card from Solitaires pack.
Moreover, the template picked recalls a Seven of Diamonds and
368
371
FORTY-ONE: (41)
So what price on their head, Pinkerton? What did they do?
Having said this, then, the sheriffs voice trailed away like sand
through a shoot or an aperture. On the basis of their war-record
town after town opened its arms. Yet they were to be sorely
disabused. Medals are just tin simulacra, after all. A moments
quiet then follows this peroration. You ask after their criminal
follies, officer. Well, inscribed Harlequin Thoomey, they
proffer an exponential ease. The growing of monstrous heads,
Hydra achievement, a riot of Comus, cannibalism, poisoning
wakes, guillotining without Thermidor, involuntary euthanasia
and homunculus cultivation: these were among their sins.
Harlequin fell silent after this, so as to punctuate his grammars
imprecision. Meanwhile, Eugene merely looks on. Perhaps he
realises that vermilion horses ride dawn-wards and they nearly
always do so amid a shoal of coins. These latter cisterci fall from
above or they meld into the dust. While a third horseman (whose
Apocalypse is blue) turns within some smoke. But
superintending all of this a Wanted Poster for Old Man
Smithers wafts up and its dexterity is yellow whilst passing to
silver. When all the time Smithers wears a battered Grand
Army hat plus a tiger neckerchief n braces. He fires a sixshooter repeatedly at a pylon on which this promotion has been
affixed. Do you see? Maybe, possibly not: since this conscious
stream passes through Thoomeys brain-pan no matter how
surreally.
+
In contrast to the above, though, Eugenes rolled cigarette
caracoles in its breeziness.
FORTY-TWO: (42)
Silence bids golden in its completion, luxuriates the Oldun
after the womans plaint. In this regard however his finger
points in a broken canals direction or course. Despite the reality
of continuing snowfall a sunken anger begins to rise. Does it
convulse such a wrecking crew? After all, who can read such
372
non-humanist minds? Especially when one is speaking of fireflies who gather over a disused marsh or mossy stream. Each
now stands around the girl with a Head-in-ones hands after
the fashion of a decapitated rind. Is it aslant the vision of
Maximilien Robespierre? No doubt: but surely creatures with
stroboscopic eyes which exist on lively stalks lie abreast of this
moon. An ochre disc it is or happens to be: one that rises within a
sky that represents grey mixed with green! In this mental
dungeon or esplanade, then, Old Man Smithers has a toad
throne while a suppurating liquid mass lay before him. It
bubbles, hisses, pops and crackles within a vat. To one side,
however, there forms up a cavernous interlude and its made up
of skulls no matter how compacted. These are base about apex
to the nineteenth century Anatomy Act whereupon Axon
Trees jaws fall open continuously. Adjacent to such a ruler, per
se, Lift Spenser Wingate slides up and hes merely replete with a
conical nose, golden streaks, bright lapis lazuli orbs and
Tyrannosaurus Rex teeth. The molars of which are nothing but
incisors with all of them fondly looking at the saurian tail
beneath. Moreover, none of this even goes on to mention his cap,
feather, nose-band and cranial bone-arch. In a family like this (so
to say) such crepitations amount to indifferences sweat.
FORTY-THREE: (43)
Toblerone Harpie now talks on progressively for any who
wish to hear. Do you detect a deliquescence in Western art, my
husband? For Old Man Smithers face was half-cadenced and
brimming; or it happened to be flattened out mask-wise. One
quadrant reveals a daemonic Punch at least when set ahead of
its embrasure. White-washed it is or can be construed to be
especially if redolent of a vicars surplice thats been turned to
ice. Possibly one of Wyndham Lewis lithographs comes to mind
herein minus Michel Leiris taxonomy. These clown lips find
themselves curled from behind a card which was sequined to
oblivions diving. Must ones expenditure suit its seven curses
over the implementation of a deliberative Whist? Yet a Guardian
373
angel stands over the other side and he wears a mask together
with a sword between its upraised palms. Further to any of this
(however) our mannequin hints at Brancusis ellipses and does so
by dint of some white chalk. But where comes formal
desecration within modernism?, intones our Harlequin. It
savours of an internal relapse, encodes our moderator,
primarily towards the primeval or quite possibly the maniacal,
dreamy, onanistic and solipsist. Take Max Stirners The Ego and
Its Own, cross with Wyndham Lewis The Demon of Progress in
the Arts and give a stir. Hey presto(!), youve arrived.
FORTY-FOUR: (44)
Oregons Eugene sits beholden to two Men of Iron and this was
irrespective of Andre Wadjas film. Because Harlequin
Thoomeys head is seen in profile by way of some balsa and
saw-dust, and with a cheroot clenched between his teeth. The full
hair, beard and moustache are still discernible what with a
sombrero which has been dyed to a sapphires elixir and points to
the right. A thin corduroy of smoky ash moves perpendicularly
thereby seeking the ceilings boards or uppermost casements.
Our sheriff begins a forgotten conversational aporia in the
following way. You may be correct in your diction, Mister
Pinkerton! For your information, though, the Smithers coterie
did pass through or down main street. But shoot to a gang like
that, sir, Eugenes a mere chicken bone and not even Mario Puzo
could pluck up the interest. We dont possess a bank or a credit
union, and Wells Fargos intermittent in its stay. Too few crumbs
from a Giants table or by dint of Jacks Beanstalk, I guess.
Harlequin Thoomeys reply then came after a lugubrious
glottalstop. Where did their fancy take them to roaming?, he
asked. Up yonder, the semi-marshal eagerly enjoined, crossways like, and by treading down the valley, possibly with
plunging feet.
374
FORTY-FIVE: (45)
Our heroine-victim seems to be surrounded now by snow or
slush. May its ice-sheets render a coming nemesis redundant?
Truly, we need an ice-queen to complete the picture but wait a
moment: could she be among her kindred already? For Toblerone
Harpie rears up now --- at once all-reigning and naked save for a
shaven intrigue. A loin-clout covers her vagina while its satin
radiance dazzles the dust. Above this, though, a brassiere marks
time by way of a shoulder-pad; with each one covering a delicate
teat. It in turn goes on to sub-contract a collar which lies
about the throat and behind this a great foam of black-hair spills
down her back. Her head, however, has altered its aspect under a
peaty light: with the former being little more than a subterranean
and transparent blue. Next to this harpy and around such a
vixen a monstrous retinue gathers itself together and each one
is a refugee from Miltons lost paradise. For example, Egghead
Morgan stands out with a mediaeval helmet on his crown; albeit
when rescuing his latticed skulldom from grief. Hes adorned
with a tattered cloak, a broadsword and a Hospitallers shield.
Likewise, Axon Tree howls at the moon; an orb that was
brushed, as it is, avec a lions-manes teeth. Each eye stares out
preternaturally within some reddish coals. Whilst alternatively
and on the other side of this gathering these offerants from
Tobe Hoopers Texas Chain-Saw Massacre make sport. Heres
Lift Spenser Wingate carrying an axe the blade of which curves
down supernaturally towards a slice. His format resembles a
Churchs corbel or demonic gargoyle what with bats-wings,
slanted eyes, horns and heavy rib-vapours. Wherein we can see
that Old Man Smithers other creatures as measured by
darkened amoebae are joined together hip-to-hip. These consist
of Low Termagant, Pond Granite and Rapacious Quicksilver.
Each of them measures a new bestial consciousness (somewhat
residually): whether it proved to be ursine or wolverine and by
a canines turn. Quicksilver who bears up last recoils to a
miniature item or bonsais cabinet, plus a wizened micro-head
spoiling towards ichor. It happens to be black in colour.
375
+
Toblerone had wanted to say: Help, let me go, no-one needs
me its so cold! But it came out garbled or encrypted
differently. It is hot where were going, she intones.
FORTY-SIX: (46)
Our dreamy sequence then returns outside of all progressive or
linear notions of time. A period during which Toblerone Harpie
pushes out her lower lip rather lugubriously in order to give a
truculent air. Are we to comment on Old Man Smithers
movements (?) whereby he lies askew of his target and with a
cards castle erected before him. Harlequin Thoomey and
Toblerone Harpie (a husband and wife team) look on distantly.
What playing-drives does Smithers drool over now? Why, they
could be cards which are devoted to his erstwhile Family! By
this vernacular, then, they were alternative birthday tokens or
McGill postcards with any what the butler saw obscenity
removed. First up, Pond Granites calling card goes abegging
and it revolves around an ebon flask (perpendicularly). Wasnt
there a thirties noir magazine called Blackmask? In this Damien
Hirst effort we notice that a scrawl of chinese white paint
intrudes. It has been appended with a brushs fattened end
rather after William de Koonings example. Behold my
crucifixion, it smears. My creed is goodness destruction. I
became an enemy of society from an early age. My mind can be
described as a creative nothingness. Nought really eventuates
from Stirners pit (you see). Like sciences confabulist A. E.
van Vogt in his criminological essay Im always right. (A
large blot of white lead obscures some graffiti here). Rape always
makes way for bind-weeds intercourse. We live in a pestilential
age do we not? This cardboards backing once formulated
as a square now shows a poniard on a green ground. Through it
all our clown-chorus has been singing albeit internally.
Crimes a state of mind
we know our own kind
376
FORTY-EIGHT: (48)
Female mouths remain silent!, snorted Old Man amid a flurry
of snow flakes. Truly, the wind whistles around him like a
hacksaw blade or its spore. At this point however Rapacious
Quicksilver starts up. He musses Toblerones hair with a thickly
mittened hand; while Egghead Morgan holds a sabretache to her
throat. Heavy lumps of ice-water continue to cascade around
them throughout. Plenty of ways to extract ones chill, girly, he
rumbles To which Blackbird Leys Dingos response
epitomises an Icelandic geyser YEEEAHH, Pa!, he yodels.
Hows about a moment which is devoted to gang-rape albeit
by way of a ceremony? A carousal with the wench is a rite of
Thongor, surely? For her forms stripped naked from beach ware
together with a cylindrical gold-ring on every limb. Arent we
just a spider that pursues these palisades; thereby swinging from
our web? Oh so delicately because, in this instance, the brown
male tarantula has its master class; primarily so as to fall from
the heavens with a blanched arachnid. It then has to labour in
some shadowy pitches Whilst saying all of this and in
expectation of more Blackbird Leys brow coruscates with
passion. All of the above occurs (however) under his battered
bowler hat itself rather like a variant on Samuel Becketts
Pozzo in Waiting for Godot. Do you remember such an elusive
diction? This is Lucky. Hes my slave. Thats not lucky.
Hes lucky to have no illusions, et cetera
+
But still, Leys Blackbird gibbers on after the fashion of an
Australian wild dog. His eyes glow exultantly or almost
exorbitantly, and with a preternatural touch In that instant,
therefore, hes more infamous than Denis Nielson! His coarse
fibres when aided by some spittles rat-tails squelch lividly.
Indeed, the youth effloresces like a tumour while his cheeks
adopt a pale tallow. To follow on from which his gob-slit
opens tumescently and like a poisonous snail he devours a fish. It
hangs open on a latch whilst dribbling rheum or spray, and such
a process reveals wisdom teeth which chatter on their own. Has
378
379
FIFTY: (50)
In this third gift of plenty, however, Harlequin Thoomey and
Sheriff Eugene stand looking at one another. But already Eugene
is pouring himself a stiffener; a factor which is itself pursuant to
a golden whiskeys slice of glass. His shadow creases the table
afore he raises the tumbler to his lips. Viewed aslant ways now,
the lawmans profile seems guttural in its moustachiod longing.
A red glow suffuses the whole shebang or bereavement
especially when set against the bars surrounding green wood.
Can I tempt you to a draughts tincture, my friend? May this
Hell-Fire Clubs steward lead you astray? For truly, our
cremations urn has a fine medallion on it which is named after
the Greek physician Aesculepius. Should one mix it with pitch
and water so as to suffuse it with wines fumes? Yes and no;
odi et amo? I thank you kindly, but the result has to be
negative, responded the Pinkerton. Such liquor heats a carcass,
to be sure yet what about the truly spiritual?
+
Declaring the facts to be thus, our man-hunter bursts through
some swinging doors that capture sunlight.
FIFTY-ONE: (51)
We were hopin() to rake you home like a nightmare passage
and all of it occurring before attending to our task. But we
wouldnt want you freezing to death, imponderably so! Or
otherwise wed have to unthaw those thews albeit unbidden
towards midnight. Whilst announcing or essaying this --- by the
by --- Pond Granite held a scimitar up to Toblerones throat.
What do you intend?, she sobbed. For, and as steady as she
goes, Harpie no longer waxed quiet so eloquent as a child of
desire. Evidently then, her body was no longer wrapped in a red
brassiere and clout; nor does it exhibit a tanned flesh to the
wrists. Neither were her hands hurled provocatively behind her
nape thereby fingering a flowing mass of hair. No: this young
woman just appears to be afraid now.
380
FIFTY-TWO: (52)
Resultantly heretofore, the third card in our predictive reading
has been turned over and it reveals pitilessness trope at least
in terms of Axon Trees lucklessness. This encounters
evolutions blade in consequence, if only to inspect a square
circuit out of an old physics text-book. Do you detect such a
source? It revolves around a rare plenitude of condensers all of
them attached by hooks and sprockets to a trip-wire. The device
illuminates enslavement by being driven from its den or isolation
cube, and it gnashes ones teeth in the night-time. But what does
Axon himself say about the matter? He ruminates thus: a
cosmos sickens and perishes. I alone reign supreme in my
punishment of worms. Look behind you!, the children shout
particularly when experiencing an absent force. For bullying is
essentially a bladders breathing! It means that such hop-scotch
will be played with severed heads or beads. Lo! My dung-hill in
West Wycombe reeks of Jenny the pirates moll in Gays The
Beggars Opera. She screeches about class war or vengeance;
and isnt this what Howard Brenton called practical
communism?
To the accompaniment of which our clown spreads his arms
out wide. Could he possibly be caterwauling into an invisible
mirror?
Behold revenges electrolysis
leading to abundant paralysis
out of every sort
only to be bought
or customarily wrought
in front of any court
and by all means fought!
FIFTY-THREE: (53)
In our nineteenth century vintage, however, Harlequin Thoomey
set his horse towards galloping straight up the valley. It was
381
FIFTY-SEVEN: (57)
The scene had calmed somewhat, but only by virtue of a
victoriously achieved peace. Several of Old Man Smithers sons
lie sprawled about on this snow-scape. One of them, in
particular, has a redoubt of white water covering his wrist*.
(*The individual in question happened to be Pond Granite). It
streaked onto the impermanence of an icy gesture; together with
a woolly mitten gesturing beneath. Now Rapacious Quicksilver
continuously rubbed his heads soreness, if only to search under
a capacious balaclava. While Blackbird Leys Dingo gazed on
sullenly from afar and his demeanour mixed belly-aching with
subdued lust or ennui. Wasnt he about to start whining like a
hyena? From all of these miscreants, though, a thin spiral of
breath rose up into the ether. It turned into a twister only then to
die or evaporate, in turn, like some neer-do-well smoke. For her
part, Toblerone Harpie stood at a leagues distance from these
malcontents albeit in the guise of a creature of phantasy.
Moreover and somewhat instantaneously the eroticism and
vampirella sheen seems to have left her bereft. She no longer
affects any bravado or haughtiness, but rather a sense of
diffidence, shyness, insouciance and a momentum towards
plucks absence. A dull grey blanket surrounds her lissom form
at this time, primarily in order to keep out Jack Frost.
+
Whereas the major figurine in this Brechtian tableau, Old Man
Smithers excelsior, stood to one side of a carousals past. His
arms were folded crossways in a patriarchal mien or cast, and the
oldsters capo di tutti capi aspect looked augustly at the snow.
(But surely we are speaking seasonally rather than imperially or
religiously?) A potent brew of Capstan full strength occasionally
twirls to a spiral or mezzanine, and it wove smoke up between
his fingers. Soon he would address his klavern or extended
brood.
386
FIFTY-EIGHT: (58)
But on another plane altogether a further playing card has
been turned upwards for our edification. For lets not forget
that Old Man Smithers lies on the ground or a floor made from
lino albeit when manufacturing a card out of Mies van der
Rohes architecture. One of those items produced belongs to Low
Termagant. Whereupon we find that its back details his
psychoanalysis all of it in red felt-tip or a violets shading.
Could it embroider on Thomas Szaszs or R.D. Laings denial of
mental illness? Anyway, our collective clown-face chooses to
deal with a Uranian necklace; at least when next door to an
inebriate square or carding. It (the image on the back of the card)
comes fixed like a tattoo something which has been
impregnated by glaucous wires and depicts the Tower. This
resonates as a tarot card that delineates chaos, defeat, nihilism,
annihilation and what St. John called the Last Judgement in
Revelations. Yet this red gossamer or smoke screen also
describes Lows homosexuality. Inversion, he daubs by way of
a preface, relates to a biological premise. Forget social or
cultural theories of causation a la Otto Weininger as outlined
in his book Sex and Character. My debility has to do with a
female hypothalamus in the under-brain itself a downward
tending or spiralling parabola which occasions adolescence viz.
Freud. Yet underneath it lies paedophilia or the effeminacy of
ones dour youth. Didnt Alec Waugh call his autobiography The
Loom of Youth? Lets leave it to William S. Burroughs molester
aesthetic in Wild Boys or, somewhat alternatively, a trajectory
which begins with Queer on its way to Cities of the Red Night!
+
Termagant has ceased speaking now even though were left
with The Towers munificence. It breaks through at dawn plus
we detect a turquoise colour thats all lit up by a blue shimmer;
and it also involves linseed oil and orange. A pineal eye
superintends every available rainbows destruction. Didnt Henry
Miller and Goethe call it the cosmological eye? Our clown too
provoked by this Glocks alternative rendition starts to croon.
387
SIXTY-FOUR: (64)
Can you disclose its breed time or moment of reclamation?
Because Toblerone Harpie in a dream festival stooped to pick
up a card from a thronging pack. Might it be Death or the number
thirteen which indicates absolute transformation? Anyway,
whats written on the reverse is what animates her. For it codifies
Blackbird Leys Dingos hermetic. In this respect, then, Dingo
wheels his chair along the ground in a manner thats forlorn of all
mist. It squeaks as it traverses some concrete, but also remains
silent at an alleviations turn. Suddenly he rears up in a doorway
the likelihood of which corresponds to a dark tunnel. Each
noise-plug repeats itself and becomes increasingly irritating,
rather like the tannoy at the beginning of Ligetis Dance of
Death. Certainly Dingos whine echoes in these chambers yes,
even at a time when the language licks at zero and comes to be
delicately etched on his cards back. Ahead of him or abreast of
these sepulchral tints several mannequins glow in the shadows.
Each one of these figures waxes flesh-toned or pulchritudinous in
a witness terms. Evidently then, the angularity of these modelled
heads when carved into rectilinear planes recalls Marc
Quinns efforts. Can you tell that these are part store-dummies;
whilst they hint at a return of Flaxmans putty somewhat
restoratively. But like all cripples even speculatively
Blackbird Leys Dingo starts lashing out. His words are as
follows: Shut off the disabilist discharge, my language clears
it away apace! Its not for me a position or a piece of white
ticker-tape albeit at the starting-line in the para-Olympics circa.
2012. Arent they supposed to be in Londons East End a
territory which finds itself choc-a-bloc, as it is, with ingrate
immigrants and doleites? No. I claim such privileges by rite of
ugliness or deformity, and this is whether they are suggestive of
Quasimodo or not in my own branding. Leaven my breads flour
with some spittle, I ask you! Because in accord with Erich
Fromms The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness one only
assesses beauty through its opposite: namely decrepitude.
Beauteous starvation assists a criminal urge (therefore). Reject
392
body fascism, embrace a spas(.), exalt a crip(.) and risk the day! I
demand my Francis Bacon portrait that has been cut up in slices
and still gesticulates over Isabel Rawsthornes reserve. To
repudiate able-bodied tyranny loosens a thousand stays like
with Queen Caroline. Corsetless, didnt her belly flop around her
knees? Oh yes, an unheroic or dog-in-the-manger attitude suits
us. Were Thalidomides toasties --- always fit for purpose!
Cripples, free-loaders, runts to boot
get out on foot
by any possible root
irrespective of soot.
Toot, toot!
SIXTY-FIVE: (65)
Our invisible camera pans across now onto Harlequin Thoomeys
face. Hes parked his horse to one side momentarily; at once
pursuant to conflict or, at the very least, his own O.K. corral
shoot-out. A hat lies aslant his head, the brim of which comes
down to a shadow over the lawmans visage. It suffuses a grey
penumbra together with a texture that leads onto a beards
template, if only then to point towards magnetic south. A brilliant
purple such as this when embroidered with whiteness lays
itself open to affected cumulus. Nor can we avoid those streaks
of French blue which tilt like Hockneys lines or dints at least
when contrasted with Thoomeys dot pattern. Can you dismiss
printings pointillism especially when drawn from
Lichtensteins example? Resultantly though, their horses
whinnied and circled behind them as if sensing ensuing conflict.
A lightish sapphire-cluster fell as either man gained control of
refractory mounts when this proves to be pursuant to various
rocks carved like a grey gargoyle. Each cowboy stood occluded
before the others rage; whereupon two six-guns reared out of
Dingos holsters. Behind his assailant a conifer moved slowly in
the breeze. Mesmerically speaking, Harlequin stood gauntly like
393
them; the latter being lowly cast in its proximity and streaked
with cerulean. Fatally any dye has been strewn about since
the desperadoes trail led here.
SEVENTY-EIGHT: (78)
Wasnt the blood pounding in Lift Spenser Wingates ears? He
certainly looked about him without somnolence now. For his
head found itself arched against blues brightness --- throughout
which large snow clumps continually fell. An orange pylon
covered this haze, but it lay higher up in the atmosphere or its
compromised mist. Seemingly then, all of the trees around him
were wintry and ashen together with slush surrounding their
lower perimeters. Wingates mitten clenched around a blade
whether independently of all else and his features looked to be
frozen. Momentarily, they stood outside time. His lower face
came grizzled and stubbly, as well as accentuating its planes
from below or underneath a cap. All in all, such a physiognomy
wintered on its discontent primarily by remembering Elisabeth
Frinks Goggle-heads from the sixties. Werent these the
apotheosis of male brutalism; at once celebrated to a fault and
crying out against feminism? No matter for Spensers bent lies
captured in a triangular dimension or causeway of thought. How
does it materialise, then? Why, it relates to one peregrination
alone or above, and this adopts an aliens mantle. Whereby a
heavily armoured trunk + gauntlets together with a green face
lilts towards the Iron Cross at its centre. Instantaneously though,
Lift Spenser Wingate spies his brother in the snow albeit off to
one side and in lieu of any explanation. His trajectory has taken a
leftwards tilt but whereof doesnt he move? Axon, what ails
thee, bro?, he stammers. He soon discovers that no answer
boomerangs back in Oregons sleet.
SEVENTY-NINE: (79)
Our couples Socratic dialogue about modernism unfurls
further In all honesty, neither of them can have scanned
Tomislav Sunics article, Art in the Third Empire. But no
406
floor or its tiles whereon she spies those cards thrown by Old
Man Smithers. Each one has to be a personality index thats
devoted to itinerant clan members. Moreover, her cheeks are
slightly flushed with a dulcet or Burne Jones tone when assessing
these plates. Could their resources amount to story-boards which
were painted on bamboo by Kurosawa in Japanese cinema? Still,
mascara streams down a maidens flushing cheeks with each
line radiating a constellation or a New Wave gyroscope. She
holds her hands in front of one bodice too far. Listen, if we take
Mario Merzs Untitled as at all relevant then its reverse adds
nothing to our graffiti even if signed. Mark it the painting of
this void becomes more evident than ever (though). Do you
register Samuel Becketts codex in his Dialogue with Georges
Duthuit where he talks about colouring nothingness? He relates
it quite insistently to Bram van Veldes Oeuvre; but it applies
more generally. Yes, a viduity or a commingling with nullity
thats what he requires. Certain fellow travellers at Transition,
the avant-garde magazine, thought his rants might damage van
Velde. How so? Oh, merely over whether it could harm his
painterly desires --- van Velde being an innocent or naf,
turpentine excepted. But Becketts Not I lacks the viscera of
Wyndham Lewis Physics of the Not Self it just advocates
nihilism tout court. Possibly yet one has to side with Stirner
here: since the true nihilist might have to reject his views as an
affirmation. He could still approach it in stages (though) after
Becketts affidavit in Comment Cest. How it is, in English, as
an attempt at a positive statement, you mean? Verily, thou
hast said it: where sub-human creatures move forwards
agonisingly in muds plenitude like Bim and Bom. They are
situated on a plenitude of melting earth, you see. It must be a
version of Dantes fifth Circle of Hell, and by the lights, no
love! Beckett dredged it up from his unconscious or reserve
primarily in terms of an artistic stream of consciousness. To
prove what? Why, just the fact which says that writing was
totally autonomous if not automatic. Again, to what end? I
dont know possibly so we can say that silence is marginalised
416
433
during this procedure his features waxed youthful, dewyeyed, switch-bladed, insolent, truculent and psychopathic
(withal). Little has really changed from before --- by Lombrosos
bladder --- and despite phrenologys error a criminal
physiognomy exists. Do you recall the adage? Namely, if you
place a mirror down a lags visage or half way across then the
left-side stands out. Touch! Yet Blackbird Leys Dingos mange
was or remained full-on. It inspected a glass which happened to
be grinning, bowler-hatted, toothsome, rats-tailed, inebriate, jugeared, all aglow, sweaty, covered in stubble and sadistically
inane. You see, criminality is biological. Like the dissident
commissioners analysis in Julian Barnes novel about Conan
Doyle it results from alienage or a genetic predisposition to
asociality and anger. It runs in families; and it often stems from
miscegenation or blood impurity. Late Koestler, Lombroso,
Eysenck, Yochelson and Samenow, Wilson and Shockley are
much closer to its source than Michel Foucault an
environmentalist. No way: reprobates of this sort were born and
not made. Reclamation can occasionally suffice as the world
witnessed in Joseph Beuys salvation of Jimmy Boyle who later
went on to sculpt and write an autobiography. But its
momentary and occasional gravy. For punishment always fits the
offence --- it solves all our problems.
ONE HUNDRED-AND-SIX: (106)
A debate ensues between our peaceful minions in the fourth
dimension outside time namely Harlequin Thoomey and
Toblerone Harpie. She looks back at his graven image; even as a
clowns hand looms behind her. But how can primitivism in the
arts be prevented, if your analysis be aright? Look at one of Cy
Twomblys effusions, for instance. It mulcts out to black and
reds impermanence while summoning up ones headstone. A
child would be embarrassed to festoon its necessary gloss! Yet
its not involuntarily primitive or a case of talents absence
save with an individual like Basquiat. No; it presages exhaustion
or a post-industrial repletion: whilst every other insight looms up
436
+
What do you see?
ONE HUNDRED-AND-SIXTEEN: (116)
Our mother figure has taken up a defensive part in the nineteenth
century. She wears a bright green-dress and her hand gestures --somewhat accusingly --- at an accompanying Comus Rout.
Havent they kidnapped her kindred and sectioned them in
loneliness hut? Rare wooden boards rise behind her in a
perpendicular fashion albeit as concerns a trellis work of
brown. Her husband wilts beside his wife; together with a
bandage wound around the latters scalp. It traverses two ways or
paths; by virtue of sloping from left-to-right. To one side of him
and down farther than a distaffs incline leans a boy. Hes
very small in size with a tousled mop of blonde hair over
preternaturally brown eyes. Meanwhile, their assailants stand
about brandishing muzzled guns and each one is silhouetted
towards or scores with the Blue. The woman speaks indignantly
like Euripides Medea although in reverse circumstances,
ethically speaking. (Surely G.E. Moores morals cant intrude
here?) For isnt this Toblerone Harpie circa. the Reconstruction
period and improved upon by motherhood? Her voices pitch
lilts upwards like a soprano playing Salome in Strauss opera.
Youve got no right to keep us imprisoned, do you hear? Our
boy whos wearing Glocks gloves keeps asickening. Hes
liable to go down with a fever most regularly. Doesnt your
cruelty embody that of various clowns who flaunt Tommy-guns
whilst wearing Billy Smarts cover-all? Her interlocutors
remain as mute as stone. Can they intone or entomb --- in
petrifaction --- an Easter Island sculpture? In vacuo, her husband
intervenes: Hush Tobey, these brigands wont understand.
ONE HUNDRED-AND-SEVENTEEN: (117)
Toblerone Harpie screamed again and again now that she was in
her husbands grasp. Could it be Reliefs onset or the tolling of a
new dirge like at Black Narcissus culmination? Do you
446
457
wooden boards especially when compared to a stove or roughhewn implements above such friezes. For his part, Old Man
Smithers still wore a Federal or a Union uniform; and it
discharged a dark-blue tint plus a yellow stripe amidst gloom. He
appeared to be highly agitated. Beside him two of his sons
Axon Tree and Rapacious Quicksilver gaped askance. As you
will recall, these siamese twins over-lapped so as to compose one
form. Dont they comport the freakishness of yesteryear or last
century wherein a human slug crawled around a stage-set?
Any road up, Axon-Rapes corse pointed beyond its own glass.
(Wont atomic radiation thats been compounded with sand
produce the same effect?) Look-ee, Daddy-o, burbled a misfit,
aught flits before our gaze like a mirage. One moment its there
limned between red-woods and the next absent.
Correspondingly, it lets loose a cry in a lycanthropic manner.
AAAAEEEIIIOOUUU! Do ya hear it, Pa? Because even
when its gone the moons tarot shines on. It spins disc-like and
comes to resemble a Roman coin. Afterwards we notice whether
a trail of blue mist crosses her face. Doesnt the lunar represent
those feminine, mystical, treacly, emotional, tidal, menstrual and
stagnant forces? Again Ginsbergs Howl was heard abroad:
AAAAEEEIIIOOUUU! Shut in tarnation up!, bellowed Old
Man Smithers. Was he losing control?
ONE HUNDRED-AND-THIRTY-TWO: (132)
Cornered in his labyrinth amid the snowy drifts, Harlequin
Thoomey turns at bay. But where will he find a minotaur or a
ball of string? Regardless of which, he rears up over Low
Termagant and Rapacious Quicksilver and he almost describes
a gorilla protecting his young (thereby). Look at the Lawman,
sneers Rape, hes all outta puff n run. Yeah, agreed
Lout who nodded vigorously. Nows our chance to crucify a
saviour without Golgotha! Doesnt he typify a grizzly bear who
stands erect on his hind legs with bristling hair and chest? Hes
guarding a mate, you see. Yet heretofore were in a position
459
to skin him and treat the carcass as a rug. Perhaps Toblerone can
walk across it on a polished floor in order to savour our victory?
+
Facing destruction or nullity, then, our hero ponders the future:
Hopes vanguard has deserted us. Maybe Fortunes wheel plus
various candles in its sockets had spun a full circle or
revolution. It remains true that we have momentarily drawn the
Death card. Let us face it further, the figure of Toblerone in her
skin-tight lycra fulfils no hope. Whereas and immediately
behind us a mauve or rubiate rock-face rises sheer. For, like
rats in B.F. Skinners mazes or Pavlovs dogs, were trapped,
hemmed-in and hazarding nothing but slaughter. During this
soliloquy individual diamonds continue to cascade although
with a rasping and crunching underfoot Old Man Smithers, Pond
Granite and Egghead Morgan come up. Each of them waves a
titanium blade about in the freezing air. Dont their thoughts
crystallise on a greying ether?
ONE HUNDRED-AND-THIRTY-THREE: (133)
Between dimensional doors a close-up occurs on our clowns
jump-suit. Assuredly, his painted face will do, but might this
bring back the Hood amongst Gerry Andersons puppets?
Returning to the Turner Prize, mused our cachinnator, lets
examine Marc Quinns oeuvre. After Goldsmiths college he has
achieved fame with a literal blood-mask. Here it is: and it
consists of haemoglobin, stainless steel, perspex and refrigeration
equipment. Although Quinn happens to be tapping a tradition
which involves a wax frontage to death. (To whit: the expressive
skins of Beethoven, Cromwell and Keats pass muster all of
them denying a Cycladic uniformity). His thirteen ton sculpture
in Trafalgar square, inter alia, plumbs new depths it also
delineates a pregnant thalidomide victim, Alison Lapper. Yet to
renew our appeal Quinn is returning to classicism via
disability. If you will, hes adopted a politically correct pose in
order to reach Thoraks Atlas by legerdemain. (After Europes
second civil war, 1939-1945, this sculptor sought asylum in
460
kettle, spoons and simple earthenware bowls. Above this an oldfashioned oil-lamp limbers up and its mechanism sports a
cadmium-yellow flue. Whereas by contrast Egghead Morgan
carries a Colt. 45 that glows blood-red amid any contracting
litmus test. Do ya ken its quicksand, Pa?, trembles an
underling. Be quiet!, thunders Old Man Smithers. Taint
nought available, my brethren. Yonders a mirage or a fancy
which proves unamenable to science. Youve used a doublenegative, suffixed our Egghead. (He was obviously eager to
affirm grammatical pedantry even in American English). Ill
gut the first stripling who confronts my will!, responded their
patriarch. Truly, Egghead Morgan/Low Termagant, Rapacious
Quicksilver/Axon Tree and Lift Spenser Wingate/Pond Granite
all revere Old Man Smithers as a Moses. But has he foregone
killing swine or their piglets?
ONE HUNDRED-AND-FORTY-ONE: (141)
A century farther on our concentration has to be on Harlequin
Thoomeys face. For it narrows in about the eyes when adjacent
to a panning-beam or its long-shot. Yes indeed: his elongated
features are equal to a new tasking or issuance. But its the orbs
which arrest such diatribes as these; they also foreshorten a
moments stillness before this Battle of Maldon. Why so?
Because they set about an eaglet with its dark blue only to
relieve such a primary token. Whereupon and contrary to any
other license a grey filter superintends over these slits. It masks
a coming sepulchral tint; thereby registering a lugubrious entry
or a closing off to new possibilities. A swollen interlude
supervenes now primarily in terms of two Anglo-Saxon
warriors fused together. It deliberates upon pink or violet; whilst
casting an ebon shade. What can our Harlequin be thinking
about? Why, its merely that Old Man Smithers has overplayed
his hand. Given this a Joker grins inanely from a pack of cards
which just casts yellow ahead of a sports defeat! In any event,
those other lacquered boards in this five-card trick were the Six
of Clubs, an Ace of Diamonds, a Jack of Spades (nought else)
466
472
or oneiric in its substantive fact: save that the child wont rise
again. But in reply --- somewhat strangely --- Old Man Smithers
happens to be in deadly earnest. Hatless, and with his gun
discarded, he almost pleads for contact or intimacy avec
Thoomey against what? Presumably a wolf-spirit which lurks
beyond. In this particular Smithers waxes beady-eyed,
inconstant, galvanic and plangent all at once. You dont
understand, bounty hunter! The chickadee proved to be a conduit
for a Red Mans demon yeah. I finished him before he
devoured all of us. Yet youve got to help me across the
remaining negative kami, huh? Its your duty to assist us.
+
Perhaps only now Pinkerton Thoomey fully comprehends what
has happened.
ONE HUNDRED-AND-FIFTY-FOUR: (154)
In the twentieth century, however, our eight-pack waits for an
avalanche to hit or overwhelm them. It subsists all afore it in
relation to a North Eigers southwards tilt. Altogether now the
compacted snow rolls down; and it exists in accordance with
barbed strontium or some slashing planes of alabaster. These
funnel up into the air at least in terms of frigid methane clouds:
and this was whether they happen to be light or dark blue
spectres. Amidst such chaff as this our malcontents bodies are
hurled up in a purple livery. In the foreground though
Harlequin Thoomey places a masculine glove over his wifes
head. It is a loving or protective gesture regardless of a
darkling fog which surrounds them all. What does fate have in
store for his clan? They fare badly one and all. To whit: an
enormous ice-block knocks out Axon Trees eyes and this occurs
before a boulder dislodges the brain. Whereas Pond Granite sees
a shaft of ice pass via a mans spine or cord, and it resultantly
transfixes his heart. Just occasionally or in the merry-go round
of existence two corses become knit: after Lift Spenser
Wingates and Low Termagants fashion. Each of these became
spliced inside an icy cube prior to asphyxiation and they
476
478
+
Even though at a squint or one remove the younger Thoomey
harks back to his master in that he stood apart, metaphorically
speaking. He smouldered with a giants torso and reincarnated
Josef Thoraks Atlas outside Chicagos central railway station.
Whereupon, and at dream-times other end, Old Man Smithers
face was seen to dally on a pike. Did it scream in agony or fall
from its nail like one of Ensors masks? For their part, his
features were painted in fluorescent yellow and they recalled a
day-glow extra but not on diamantine. For like Marlon
Brandos tribally-painted head in Apocalypse Now it pulsated
slowly. You see, in a screeching fit only a luminescent skull may
win the Turner prize!
ONE HUNDRED-AND-SIXTY: (160)
Speaking of which, my friends, a great flurry of snow-flakes
churns up underneath the autogyro. Isnt this an illustration of
impressionism no matter how inevitably miscued?
Nonetheless, Toblerone Harpie arches under the chopper in her
skin-tight leggings or lycra as it rises from the tundra. A
youthful Oregon ranger then hauls her aboard a factor thats
already been mentioned. During this transfer, however, her
orange tresses stream behind the waifs back while
Harlequins coat circles her upper body and moves sheer on a
windy diagonal. It billows out on this lissom slip-stream whether
suggestively or semi-erotically and this is irrespective of how
frigid it might be. Certainly, Toblerone had been loaned the coat
for a purpose. What was it? Why, it definitely helped to conceal
Old Man Smithers stripped face from another dimension. For
deep inside this cover-all it chafed against her left breast.
Maybe Dumas slip found itself contained inside an ebon box
with convex sides? Whatever happened to Smithers family?,
queried our ranger over the rotor blades. (They basically roared,
whipped, whelped and crashed in a cacophonous vein. Didnt
these rotations inveigh upon concrete music or serial composition
betimes? It all illustrated Elisabeth Lutyens work you know,
482
485
A BALLET OF WASPS
an other gothic stories
An introduction
This volume consists of four short stories and a play. The first
effort, A Ballet of Wasps, deals with a woodsman who offends a
vampire with tales of derring-do. Our second story, Golgothas
Centurion, focuses on the chiaroscuro and ochre tints in Giotto
and Cimabue. It also makes use of the same template as Mel
Gibson in his Passion of the Christ, but this time to illustrate Lex
talionis or the right of retribution. The third piece, Wilderness
Ape, delves into the world of zombies or the living dead. Our
fourth javelin, Sixty Foot Dolls, considers the vexed topics of
ageism, eugenesis, regression theory and evolution. The last
romance, Stinging Beetles, is a theatrical exercise in daemonic
possession which brings together flash backs, dream sequences
and other filmic techniques. Its finale again enforces the point of
the whole book namely, that heroic values and aristocratic
mores need to take over once again.
486
A BALLET OF WASPS
a short story
ONE
Have you ever perused Sir James Frazers The Golden Bough?
Well, this is a tale which escaped from its twelve compendious
volumes and extensive foot-notes...
TWO
A Woodsman bragged before a coterie of his drinking
companions in eighteenth century White Russia. A large oaken
table with cross beams lay in front of his gnarled hand. He
grasped it using main force; while the other mitten contained
within it a tankard of steaming ale. Who is not to say that it had
been brewed from rare berries, or cast into a vat with variously
exotic fruits like pomegranates? Do you hear? The Woodsman
himself was stocky, oafish, slightly ill-kempt, and he happened to
be wearing a fur-lined jacket made of boar skin. It glistened
under the available lights all of which kept up a subterranean
glow from niches and corners. Each lamp, moreover, had tassels
around it and came attached to basalt pillars that dotted a
cavernous inn. Perhaps it resembled the atmosphere of a
converted barn; or alternatively, one of those pseudoTransylvanian films which litter a Hammer House of Horror.
Anyway, a rare trellis-work appearing to be Tudor in origin
festooned the inner walls of this structure, rising up in its
multiplicity from the ground. Ever more complicated Arabesques
were then noticed, each one lifting up, tier on tier, so that they
filled the inner canvas of these walls with straight black lines. In
their complexity and allure, they seemed to notify one of
Wyndham Lewis military compositions from prior to the Great
War. They virtually called out to you in the manner of a board
like Planners (Happy Day), dating from 1913. In it, a Front
moves in a labile construction towards an unknown goal each
one blocked out by arrows. The picture transfigures its own
Essence, if only by dint of oblivion or necessarily, in a way
487
hair came thick, straight and black upon the scalp. He continued
to trespass a look of hunger all the way down to his pointy beard:
after the fashion of a saturnine George V! Similarly, his skintone, chameleon like, waxed now yellow and then white under
the lights Whereupon, in dress terms, he had about him a
heavy grey mackintosh; a vessel or instrument of wrath, (this),
which swept down to his knees. He denied the facility of a cape,
but somehow came to seamlessly embody it. Yes, thats right:
and at his throat our example of Anne Rices Undead wore a
cravat. Bright red or scarlet it was: with more than a hint about it
of unobliging haemoglobin. His name didnt really suffice
anymore. Some dared to whisper about the nomenclature of Lord
Weirdorf (or Temple Bickerstaff) behind the webbing of each
glove Yet nothing came of it. For these purposes a tale like
this drawn from Russian folklore doesnt have to provide
nemesis with a name.
FIVE
To one side of our braggart sat a range of hearty spectators. They
deliberated pipe in hand or open-mouthed, especially when
confronted with tales of derring-do. Boisterous announcements
of valour poured from the Woodsmans lips While in front
of his rather helpless admirers a litany of bottles, vodka
glasses, fake liqueurs and malts littered a wooden bench.
Immediately adjacent to and behind his hearers, however, a spear
with a fluted end plus a halberd or axe found themselves
attached to a wall bracket. The vampire listened on with greater
peevishness and became more & more aggrieved.
SIX
Eventually, the Woodsman staggered from the tavern, thence
passing out into desolate conditions of ice and snow. He almost
slipped on a treacherous strip of Jack Frosts bounty or loss
and this was before the Vampire pounced on him. His talons and
teeth were exposed, and the two of them crashed down into
barren wastes. It would be wrong to say that the forester put up
489
491
GOLGOTHAS CENTURION
a story
PART THE FIRST
A hot day of Sicilian sunshine has ended; or fallen in balmy
eventide over the town. Initially, the solar orb had been brutal in
its heat, but now the hamlets white-wash glowed with a
refulgent cooling. Yes, the swash of sky behind seems to be
streaked avec orange, green and turquoise. While those buildings
which characterised a Sicilian hamlet other than the ones made
out of lava appeared to be higgledy-piggledy or ramshackle in
a golden haze. A few peasants were abroad either walking
about, mopping their brows, or knocking out the contents of clay
pipes on various outposts. Most assuredly, since in the
background and under a sky of brilliant azure, there lay a domed
church with its spire scratching the surface of the heavens. Didnt
it resemble one of those delicately classical or early Renaissance
piles that contains the odd fresco, and which doubles pink or
yellow in the light? Occasionally, a slight tincture of blue sweeps
across a given department of wall. In the distance and with a
dramatic mountain rearing as a backdrop a solitary figure hoves
to. He is a man alone. He walks towards his village with a
sureness of tread.
PART THE SECOND
The man concerned came of middle-size with slacks on his legs
and a faint velvet waistcoat flung across his torso. A
hidden/panther-like power or suppression was observable in the
limbs. He walked with a casual gait, but there had to be an
undertone of menace to his stalk. His name, you ask? Frederico
Borghese Gaati remember it.
It is him, HIM, the old crone almost screeched in her
husbands ear. In remarking this, Simone, an octogenarian
dressed all in black recalled to mind a sibyls presence but not
the one articulated by Michelangelo. You see, eh? EH? He has
492
returned, the brother of the whore the scarlet woman, the one
whom men mount in an ecstasy of forgiveness. As she lisped
these words, perchance, could one detect a certain nostalgia or
disappointment in her voice? Hush woman, mask those
entreaties with silence, commanded her husband. He was an old
man, possibly five or six years younger than his spouse, whose
face abbreviated some dimpled suet. This elderly member of the
chorus stood erect, clay pipe in hand, and looked vaguely like a
sentinel or a watchman as Gaati slouched past. He for his
part refused to give the couple a second glance. Behind them
were a few individuals, apparently in middle life, who were busy
shovelling some ripe oranges into a sack. One of them wore a
traditional hat, fluted like a stack, and of southern Italian design.
All of these denizens regardless of their occupation slightly
froze when the man who bore the family name of Borghese
passed. Werent they vaguely supposed to be aristocrats from up
north? Surely a fascist magazine had once been called Borghese?
Didnt a war-time photo exist of the count in naval uniform and
sat next to an SS driver in a sleek limo? An image which could
only have been taken during the Salo republic. It also proved to
be reminiscent of Italian neo-realist cinema.
PART THE THIRD
With a setting sun behind his aspect, then, Gaati strode on with a
jacket slung casually across his shoulder. To one side of him a
peasant crowd has already gathered; well they knew his famed
temper of old! A house on two storeys albeit with rickety
windows and a slate roof loomed up at right-angles or in a
hidden vertice. But Borghese looked straight ahead as if
nothing could faze him. Do you hear? His hair has been whitened
by mainland imprisonment or care, and yet the features remain
noticeably unchanged. For one thing the face is square,
masculine, massive, slow, Cimmerian or Hyperborean and
incredibly violent. It betokens a combination of two sculptural
types: perhaps these were the smoothness of Dobsons intimation
concerning Osbert Sitwell when spliced with a Paolozzi head.
493
495
500
502
finally come to blows? All of this bursts out amid the suffocating
heat of Californias Death Valley!
PART THE TWELFTH
Our attention now shifts to Gaatis trial for the above offence.
The southern Italian district judge is summing up. May this entire
imbroglio have taken place during the reign of a certain Iron
Prefect? Anyway, this official looked at our man from behind
reinforced spectacles. A chain of prefecture or administrative
discipline lay around his neck. Might it have dazzled what
Nietzsche once called, in Thus Spake Zarathustra, the pale
criminal? Yes assuredly, but perhaps our attention becomes
transfixed on the policeman to his right. He stands there
gnomically and after the fashion of a forgotten sculpture; with a
double-chin resting on a blue compartment or space. Necessarily
so, for behind our Judges receding hair-line, when slicked back
with the sheen of a felt-tip pen, we observe stain-glass windows.
Like in a domed architectural design they are, with many
individual pieces of mock-frieze making up a plaster. Each sector
of resin reflects a multi-dimensionality; avec every shard then
becoming overwrought in comparison to a spectral imprint.
Doesnt a ray refract from such dexterity rather prismically (?);
and in relation to the cosmetic beauty of Newtons experiments?
All of which came to be characterised in H.T. Flints
Geometrical Optics, when this professor was serving in the
physics department of Kings College, London. Most availably
Whereupon the judge, Bernadotte, announced in full pomp:
Frederico Borghese Gaati, do you have aught to say afore my
Court pronounces sentence upon you? To which the accused
answers in a baritone voice. Yes, your Honour, I must stain the
silence with a flames effulgence! Certain matters of family
honour can only be settled with a sacrifice of blood.
Haemoglobin in such circumstances as these remains the
kaleidoscope of our forgotten years. Biomorphic excuses,
pertaining to Lombroso or the social causation of liberal
utilitarianism neither of these are enough. I must answer with
504
pitchfork can pattern this pig for slaughter because all attempts
to fatten it have fallen before one final hurdle. Rest assured, I
have pitched up most mightily against filths reservoir. Yes
indeed, now inform me, strumpet, what Ive occasion to intend
namely, where resides my sister, Suzy Travolta-Imray? During
the course of our Beauty & the Beasts encounter, (sic), the slabsided entourage of Frederico meets a Medusa full in the face. Has
one ever recorded the advent of Jean Cocteaus faery tale in
1945? Similarly, the girls Skin 2 breathes nought but the air of
one of L.S. Lowrys waifs; and she comes up close to Gaati
while feeding on Anns ubiquity. Are you free to loosen such a
moments shackles? Still and all, each visage closes on the
others absence what with her black hair flecked behind them
or reminiscent of a snakes threshing. Might it be a copperheads example albeit when necessarily taken outside of
Keneth Robesons fables? Her dewy eyes gaze into his retinas
while his granite protuberances --- jaw to chin --- resemble the
crenellations of Mount Rushmore in terms of many a U.S.
president. Both sets of lips are full, heavy, succulent and just
given over to a reprieves absence They also happen to be very
Mediterranean in aspect. Tell me what I want to know,
exhorted Frederico. Cease your inconstant babbling woman. I
must ascertain the truth about my sisters embraces or their ready
longing before the Gods. Do you remember that sketch from von
Stroheims The Wedding March itself pursuant to an arranged
marriage where a butcher takes his ebon-tressed bride to an altar?
A dais of blood it proved to be after a sequence which is drawn
from a Japanese Macbeth. Again on such a template we can
see a husbands virtually psychopathic stare for the occasion; it
appears to come right out of a Colin Dexter mystery. Wherein a
bald man who exists in twilight searches desperately in the nighttime could his tonsure be rendered next to Elgars music? It
happens to be Christmas eve but any thought of an eleventh
hour has long been suppressed; since the minute hands strayed
past midnight. December the twenty-fifth had now emerged; and
yet this desperado continues to feverishly hunt for some object
524
spawn of our mothers womb like me, no-one may degrade us.
None will ever successfully drag your sister into whoredoms
roils. For merely human standards leave me bereft now that I
AM A VAMPIRE!
+
Presently, her face is seen against the moons solid entity and
Borghese hadnt noticed the canine incisors over ruby lips
before. Suzys black hair cascaded behind her and the witchs
planet shone clean or sheer while atop our vixens head she
wore an Etruscan mask. Theatrically, it bore upon its cover the
Agon of Greek theatre a factor by no means unknown to Sicily
given settlement from the Peloponnese. Each eye-slit has about it
Clytemnestras cruelty in the Oresteia at once fervidly
delivered in those nets and adjacent to ones bathing. It is then
that she leapt and carried her brothers body over the frieze. He
hardly has time to scream whilst Suzy Imray ripped out his
throat with her vampiric teeth. Both of their bodies caromed
together nakedly or breast-to-breast. They hurtled to the ground
with her tapering nails pawing convulsively at his back. She
suggestively wore an ormolu arm-bracelet around her upper
limbs. Its the sort of useless detail your mind registers at this
hour! Her body when leaping like a diver in Leni Riefenstahls
Olympia crashes into his. Over they went. Her hair embraced
him akin to a crones all-enveloping shawl; itself darkly ebon.
The last thing Frederico Borghese remembered as a red and
black sludge inundated his eyes was the fact that he didnt die
alone. For another Gaati enjoyed revenge as much as he did. But
surely a vampires victim returns as part of Polidoris brood?
Now brother, whispered Suzy Travolta with a mouth full of
gore, you shall share my lusts!
THE END?
533
WILDERNESS APE
a vignette
I
Hadnt Haiti been an island or a fierce dependency of one
thousand drums? Assuredly then, its rivers or islets measured the
green across its length; and each curving bay of this fumaroles
shore maximises ones strength Customarily and again, the
whole came livid with a lush undergrowth even at a time where
the leaves wetness proffered many advantages or it hints at a
hospitality to do with the jungle further in. Do you begin to
protect this truth? Since when viewed from the air our
republics trajectory lay like a dead seal on its side at once
covered in trees and with the odd promontory jutting out
perpendicularly. Nothing comes of this repast but the water
lapping around its extremities swam clean or it flitted like a
silver-backs entrance The semblance of Dr. Moreaus island
in H.G. Wells essay on vivisection, and known as The Island of
Doctor Moreau, seems relevant here. (N.B.: This is never mind
mentioning Brian Aldiss later rendition by way of a sequel).
Still to one side of this phantasy stood an African mask
which has been carved out of bark. It rained on the perimeter of
its frontier with ovals for the mouth and eyes and by dint of a
zeros native signs. What does a Fool tell Lear, but not in Edward
Bonds travesty of the Bard? Nuncle, thou art an O without a
figure; a nothingness or suchlike words. Here one can
ethnically spy its resolution in this aboriginal summa. Is it primal,
nocturnal, secretive in its blatancy and otherwise hailing from
Cameroon in West Africa? Lets be sure in witnessing this that it
doesnt possess two faces; i.e., one in front and the other behind
in order to ward off animist spectres which are all stalking ones
back-line.
II
Revilo P. Olivers book The Education of a Conservative has an
essay on Haitian politics, but our tarot predicts an entirely
534
V
Having been cursed by the Houngans voodoo, our wench
collapsed soon afterwards. Passing through some island bushes
which were all verdant with emerald, she immediately felt a
constriction or malady only then to fall head-first on the loam.
It was almost as though lifes breath had been forcibly
expelled as if by magic? Soon after her familys women
gathered around with tears in their eyes, in order to place a
muslin sheet over her corpse. The material was light and
diaphanous if unaccustomed to any fleece. Eventually it
covered the half-breeds entire corse or dead body. Multidimensionally though, her three-armed saviour made some shift
towards a lift door. It lay somewhere in a graffiti-bestrewn block
and it hung on its hinges. (This walkway served as one of le
Corbusiers contributions to rats in mazes, albeit thanks to
sixties urban planning. Didnt they call it renewal?) Moreover,
isnt spray-painted art just the under-class psychic vomit
contrary to Dick Hebdiges mores? In this respect, it
institutionalises the psycho-art of Jean-Michel Basquiat: a
Congoid, thief, juvenile delinquent, rent boy, sub-Genet hoodlum
and AIDS wallah. The photographer Robert Maplethorpe later
fixed him in aspic as an effeminate mattoid (primarily). It
somehow revisits Eric Mottrams post-modern study of William
S. Burroughs which was known as The Algebra of Need.
VI
Yet again, our three-armed mutant ran towards a closing lift;
when this was itself illumined in half-light. Whilst at this doors
basis stands our Blue skin, who was essentially as beautiful as
the day she was born. But when one came to think of it had
she actually been conceived at all? Furthermore, the power
source over the escalator exists elsewhere and it subsists deep
within a trajectory of marble or virtually at the earths core
(nethermost-wise). This sapphire Nefertiti with her breasts
almost out then stands with Three Arms on one side; together
avec the roebuck whos merely haltered in green. While two
538
544
SIXTY-FOOT DOLLS
a scientific romance
A switch, a moon and a wee bonnie loon och-aieee --- Old
Scotch rime
ONE
A grill behind the bed served as an exit; or was it possibly a
trellis-work beyond ones brain? Adjacent to which a large
pillow propped up an aged head; the former being a severance or
a grey dome that lilted towards black-current in terms of its hair
dye. An orange blanket lowered down its frame and it waxed
complacent avaunt a balustrade. Is it made of metal at our beds
end? Most definitely, a side-table existed in all its starkness and
it stood next to this couch with a large pewter jug situated on its
middle. A glass, at once holding a tooth-brush inside it, lay in
close proximity. Further afield various rectangles intruded and
they patched up to some light green thence indicating a
rhombus before folding back on themselves. Surely a yellow
square of window subsisted outside or beyond our ken?
Likewise, the proportions or perspectives of this agency
indicated a picture. (Possibly one of William Nicholsons spare
landscapes comes to mind and cant he be remembered as
slightly more than Bens father?)
+
A few nurses talked on in conclave and next to egress
happenstance. Whilst somewhat alternatively an aged patient
lay in his bed over the way. A dullish, off-grey lampshade
coalesced next to his wizened head and it appeared to kindle a
fifties design.
+
In the rooms centre stood two doctors who were both dressed in
their customary white coats. One indicated a younger age; while
the other illustrated a stoic spore or Senecas likeness to Neros
indulgence. Their names were Pickford and Carruthers-Smythe,
and delicately placed black ties refused to distinguish them
545
FOUR
On Adams cerebral cortex another drama unfolds its banner.
Without doubt, it has no need for a bookish theatrical agency and
embodies Nick Hern Books thereby. Especially when this deals
with Peter Nichols seventies diaries or Caryl Churchills
demotic translation of Senecas Thyestes itself raw from the
Latin and by way of Atreus fall. Do your crystals register such a
livery? For within these corridors of power a female android
makes her rounds. A grey pall of steel sweeps away behind her
visage and its merely registered over undelivery as she carries
a residue of drinks on a silver tray. It glistens in artificial light or
splendour while on its surface a pitcher of light-red liquid
spills. Two tumblers remain adjacent to its absent pollution or
isnt that some residual polish? Regardless of this: her name
sports a twin with Andalusia and shes about six-feet tall. Highly
erotic whilst remaining antiseptic she had magenta garters of a
refined plastic which come up to her thighs In a situation
where her overall body waxes green; and thus spreads out with a
lost translucence or sheen. Further, a coif of blonde hair that is
basically modelled short curves delicately across her forehead.
Wherein the perfectly proportioned body supports globular
breasts which rest on a reclining wave with various fixtures
and fittings aft. Does one see now? It all relates to these
cylindrical tendencies of eros that hone in on G-spots or
erogenous zones when each one can be traced by its
extremities. They effectively take up a format of long-evolved
ear-rings. May they betoken a reptilian state of consciousness in
accord with three-brain theory: as explicated by Arthur Koestler
in Bricks to Babel? Likewise, serpentine arm-cords pitch up near
a right shoulder or its ambit; and these connect with wrist
bracelets and shine with dulled gold somewhat
ambidextrously. Do they indicate an 18-carat Magnificat? To be
sure: a golden bodice wraps around her torso and it just links to
one movement; and it extends from a cupped mammary all the
way round to her crotch itself aswirl. Are we then left with
geometrical eyes, lips and brows? For this goddess mouth
548
+
Dont you want to be young again, Adam?, enquired Doctor
Pickford. He seemed to be genuinely in earnest as if mounting
an evangelical crusade or mission. Surely no-one in their right
mind could reject such an elixir vitae? Just a little injection,
posited our white jacket, and youll be able to insure a lost life.
Maybe you wish to walk abreast of our sun (?); or possibly find
the full effulgence of its rays once more? Think man, you can
step out of a body thats raddled with disease and into the corpus
of an Apollo or even a Dionysus minus his cups. Wouldnt you
exchange a male crone for the life of Macbeths saviour?
Truly, a double-take may be yours at this juncture. Exchange
Scrooges lineaments for Myrons Discobolos, I beg you! Make
the break senilitics of the world unite; you have nothing to lose
but your colostomy bags! I reject youth, hissed our elder
berry. Tis times fool; it will not endure --- please lets praise
its absence. Like Sir Oswald Mosleys work The Alternative after
the war, I prefer to dream along dissimilar lines. May one notice
it aright? There are too many responsibilities in being young, you
see. Each to his own I am content with oblivion or even brain
liquefaction. Do you remember the emperor Claudius (?); why
yes for the Praetorians insisted on making him imperator after
Caligulas assassination. But he may not have really required it
A quiet life is what furnishes sleep; albeit with no lisping there,
nor epilepsy and a wish of ages. Who would have married
Messalina had they enjoyed the truth (?) whether one reads
either Robert Graves or Albert Jarry for a choice of partner. No
young divine I refuse your bait and no hamsters are waiting
here for lifes chop. My frames lived too great a time already
and I cant bear the spectrum all over again not even counting
up every sun-dials requiem. It is an endless return without any
stay of execution. I refuse your wonder drugs jab or MMR
vaccine do ya hear? His voice trailed away like a mouse
caught in its trap with a screech. There was no echo hereabout
and no cheese to speak of.
550
SIX
Andalusia hummed to herself while walking along. (Even though
these events took place in Adams recesses and perhaps he
wished to draw his bus pass in order to savour them more?)
Instead of which she gambolled with fates stray partiality
nonetheless. For what looks like a weapon gathers pace behind
her and it shines out of a deep patch of darkness irrespective of
any sheen. Our robot, though, bends down her beautiful head so
as to arrange ones drinks. They stir restively in their liquidity
particularly as she swirls them with a see-through glass pole. Her
blonde coif hangs over abreast of a blue forehead; while the girls
heavy ear-rings slant across towards a Bishops diagonal. Our
green androids lips are pursed; and this was despite her inner
locution or timbre. An unseen presence by the by
acknowledges her want of care. Truly, it begins now
SEVEN
Hey, slow down in your affidavits travesty, burbled Doctor
Pickford. No-one wishes to force you down a lane you dont
want to travel on. No sir please remember (also) that we
dispute the theories of Jack Kevorkian and Peter Singer. We still
imbibe the Hippocratic Oath in this practice, you know? When
doctors like ourselves recognise the illicit nature of compulsion,
if its used to entice you into a snakes mouth. By the way, do
you recognise Richard Westmacott the Elders monument to
James Dutton in Sherborne, Gloucestershire circa. 1791. It
transfigures a guardian angel standing above a sacrificial urn
with its arms aloft and wings outstretched. Presumably, shes
releasing Duttons corse or skeleton so as to permit its ascent
at least in accord with Christian notions over bodily resurrection,
physically speaking. Why man, Im able to offer you a similar
route without any deviousness! A pinch of my serum and the
years will fall away like a snakes shed skin. One final point,
Adam, seeing your reluctance to speculate how old are you?
+
551
555
TWELVE
Each twilight spelt out its foretold vampirism once more. For
now the shape which menaces Andalusia took a physical form
even a three-dimensional eddy. Didnt it realise, en passant, a
misprisionment or a blob the like of this standing with a pistol
in its mouth? Or so she wished Summarily, a bank of
machinery became discernible behind her. It whistled towards
grey or a pumices tone; primarily in terms of a lost tournament.
During this the boom-tubes red mouth leapt into prominence or
exhibited itself. Our robot has fallen silent now and no ditties,
worthy of Arne or Purcell, trip from her synthetic lips. Whilst her
eye surrounded by fibrous eye-lashes had opened wide in the
interval. Its most suggestive feature is a negative pupil; because
within ones socket no eye-ball manifests itself there was
merely the solace of an empty plexi-glass sliver. To be fair, a
throaty if sibilant voice calls out: Yo-ho, beauteous one! Oh,
Andalusia?
+
Whereupon the weapons safety catch clicks onto a FIRING
POSITION.
THIRTEEN
Doctor Pickfords head turns narrowly over its shoulders
impress. A dull-looking filing cabinet replete with papers
leads away from his gaze. He also holds a yellowing manuscript
in his hand. It cant be borne, Carruthers-Smythe, yelps our
investigator. Since such a pabulum confirms that our ancient
mariner has been here since the Anglo-Boer wars end. Never
mind Thomas Pakenham; lets consider Sir Arthur Conan
Doyles Official History of the conflict. Adam must have
occupied yonder truckle-bed (or one like it) for a hundred-andfour years. Come on But his medical orderly remains stoical
throughout this. Our homes records never resort to disorder,
sir, he purrs. Why not consult these treatment papers lying
roundabout? Truly, facts emerge from ancient newsprint; it
reflects algebras needs. More than likely, though, it will prove to
556
peon in Ivanhoe. His feet pop out on stubby legs from what
appears to be a mediaeval smock (primarily). Likewise, can it
address a calling that reverberates to Georg Baselitzs name;
albeit with his reverse paintings in mind? Upside-down they are;
plus Baselitzs paint is drip-fed into an unknowing tube. Does
one really care? Also, some of the publications avec these on
their covers include William S. Burroughs Queer and Junky
both of which are early works. Nonetheless, Adam IIs forearm
and face are uncovered; and each waxes muscular to its defeat by
being necessarily monstrous or otherwise inflated. It comes after
a recognition of Lewis Carolls Humpty-Dumpty or egg; a
character who, post-structurally, believed that words can be made
to mean what you like. Adam II also has a succulent orb under an
eye-lid; the latter merely hatched to a brilliant white. While the
hair which exists atop ones mask remains thatched, Brillo-like,
Hecate inducing or liable to make over Macbeths three sisters
out of Fuselis example. These features rather memorably signify
Fat: whether it be rolling, flabby, multi-dimensional, pummelled,
hanging, dough-like or coruscated. His livery irrespective of a
ray-gun in its mitten then notices both emerald, dice and ebon.
EIGHTEEN
Meanwhile, Doctor Pickford has acted on his curiosity. Had he
fallen prey to what Moreau the vivisector in H.G. Wells
romance once called the colourlessness of pure research? To
be quick about it: our centenarian has been led naked into the
examining room. May all of this quicken an Adamite pulse? Oh
yes since the fluoroscopes eerie glow flickers into life
resultantly. Both Carruthers-Smythe and Pickford study the
oldster intently. They looked at his body whether quickened to
a spasm or not and seen through a fluorescent screen. Likewise,
this glass-box represents a fish-tank most rare what with
Adams grey mop bobbing up and down above its Rediffusion
list. Pickfords and Carruthers-Smythes faces or profiles then
looked on at an amazing hinterland all of it unknown to
medical science. The younger white coat stares particularly in
560
disbelief. His head appears above and slightly to the side of its
colleague. Moreover, their features are illumined in a ribenas
tint all of it linked to a shifting ultramarine. It pulsates
stroboscopically within a Roentgen rays glow; while
kaleidoscopes shimmer from one spectrums end to another
inside a darkened room. Didnt Newton experiment in
Cambridge with refractions via prisms (?); and by way of holes
bored in blinds. Every world turns full circle, you see? It is
impossible, expostulated our Pickford. A trick has been
perpetrated on Grays Anatomy. Look here some hoaxer must
have become lost at his work bench. I refuse to countenance such
stud poker. Not even a sculptor like Brancusi can carve a
minimal head from the Cyclades like this especially on its
side. Do you hear? His older assistant keeps shushed
throughout because there was an hysterical hint in Pickfords
voice.
NINETEEN
Against such grains though Andalusias robotic head is spied
from one side. Seen in profile it may well be: with after-cares
necessary lost witness and despite any provenance such as this.
For her lambent skin glows in the dark or gloom, and it possesses
a limpid extraction of emerald in its undulating contrasts. Could
it reconnoitre a stanley knife, thereby? Or, more truthfully, does
it absolve any other transformation --- moving, as I say, from
turquoise to pthalo by way of permanent green. All before it
morphs into a lighter gesture still isnt it then really abreast of
Hookers green? Whilst an abundance of sap and citrus when
out of chromium oxide and olive threw itself onto
photosynthesis screen. Still, the blanched sockets are without
wit and her blonde coif remains active albeit all around the
scalp. Heavy ear-rings lay adjacent to her grassy calm; they were
tabulated in ormolu. Whereas her mouth looked like a cherubs
orb and it resiled to a crys opening gesture as it evinces or
occasions a steamy evaporation. It recoils like a serpent in lieu of
any taste but no Stygian interlude can hide its eroticism. In this
561
doubled back on its carcass. A blade had shorn the head from its
body thence leaving its trunk to writhe on the ground in
controlled contortions. Still and all, these palpitations stroked a
cellular tomb or they manifested a yellow claw that groped
feverishly. One sallow head popped up with jaded gems for eyes
or slits, and it was somewhat gloomily witnessed. Throughout
this a naked damsel with snakes around each breast danced the
tarantella. She did so in the background near a nethermost crypt.
Our young Pickford only entertained this phantasm momentarily,
however thus dismissing it.
TWENTY-ONE
Andalusias body will have been carried away by her assailant
now. The shape which has done so can be seen from behind
(forsooth). It stands out against several rectangular barricades
all of them illustrating opal when awash with pumice. Lets see:
her mouth entertaining Asimovs vision of not I Robot
continues to smoke. Perhaps a brackish incense poured out that
was unknown to Heavens redundance? Her purple bootlegs also
swung obligingly --- when next to Adams right arm. Yet, intradimensionally, it is Adam whos making off with some booty
itself merely replete to a capture. No murmur can be heard. All
one recognises happens to be its bulk as limned in a corridor or
gesturally observed. Essentially though, Adam seems well
pleased with his work for hasnt he imprisoned a female side
or tic? After all in pure Kabbalism Liliths sin is necessary
because she falls from lifes tree only to redeem it, and in order
to overcome dualism or provide ascents possibility. Cant this
unite dualitys primal form beyond the provenance of man and
woman, male or female? Yes indeed let us forget the pseudoKabbala of Madonna and concentrate on G.G. Scholems Jewish
mysticism instead. Since Lilith can intrude even before Jehovah
in legend. Wasnt her necessary evil spiritualitys quanta; or the
mechanics of a freedom to will? Or put another way should
assertive liberty betray its absence? Above all, as evidenced by
Genesis Chapter Five; Verse Three, our nights demoness came
563
scanner looked like blue scallops and each one was rubbery
to the touch. Surely fate had meant something distinctive by this
turn of events? Because Doctor Pickfords voice sounded
uncertain throughout, rather than exasperated. Will you examine
those lungs, Carruthers-Smythe?, he asserted. Entrance ones
devils, man! Id swear to it that they are not mortal. How can a
humanoid breathe with yonder apparatus intact? Its almost as if
they were constructed, inter alia, to inhale and exhale on another
planet other than our earth. Dont be absurd, expostulated his
colleague. But he did so without force or conviction, and merely
as an after-thought. Both of them have been captured or
captivated (somewhat exhaustively) by this analog screen. What
can it mean?
TWENTY-THREE
In our fellow dimension, though, Adams alter ego surveys a
dead nymph. Green she happens to be (perchance) and
reminiscent of a Playboy centrefold in its ripe undulation! Her
circumference is upended albeit being reversed and
Andalusia lies head-first over a grey sledge. May it resemble a
dais or an expectant moons custodian? With any certitude her
breasts are almost out at least when contrasted with a gold
bikini connected to a frame. A sore cleavage also reveals loves
tunnel, basically insofar as this can be compared to the steam
issuing roundabout. It susurrates a wound while looking up
forevermore. The green robots blonde mop hangs down if only
to sacrifice a sort of ashen crucifixion in terms of Athene and
Hephaistos creating Pandora, even Anesidora. Will not
Andalusia incarnate a thousand starlets herein? Whether they
were Jordan, Trine Michelson, Sarah Young, Caprice, Raquel
Welch, Bo Derek, Pamela Anderson or Sylvia Krystal et al.
Truly, and by way of reflexion, when does an artiste become a
scarlet woman or what Marlene Dietrich called a soldier of love?
Well, it surely hardly suffices with a robot! For Andalusias
mouth rests open in the form of a red opal plus some teeth, while
next to this aperture a pale green rheum flowed freely. No-one
565
knew its lost extent whereas liquid from her inner circuitry has
splashed on her breasts and thighs in what Lord Lichfield would
call a wet look. Yet might the misshapen form above her, Adam,
actually intend benevolence rather than its converse? His form
luxuriates in Quasimodos lustre (to be sure); yet who can say
that he will be left alone with no-one to talk to after times
fullness? Since his ultimate intention was to give this femme his
conscience jurisprudentially speaking. He wants to reassemble
her in order to reverse the usual trajectory of Adam and Eve.
Now instead of the betrothed who bites into knowledges apple at
the behest of a serpents wiles we have Adam distressing
Eves purity through illumination. A second Lilith cannot emerge
from such an egg, you see? In these circumstances, then, realism
is the key to insights ferocity. Didnt William S. Burroughs
declare in a letter to Ginsberg that he was a factualist? He wished
to return truths maxim at every available level. So be it. This
recycles or turns around the intentionality of Adams self-regard.
Suddenly he hears a BEEP-PEEP the communication device!
Master Pickford was obviously trying to contact him again.
BEEP-PEEP.
TWENTY-FOUR
Our two physicians remain huddled before their fluoroscope
whereat everything in a circumambient mist turns green. Could it
be some sort of portent? Moreover, the two of them became
increasingly dumb-founded by todays evidence or slide-show.
Now each of them crouched before olive celluloid or its plasma
screen; together with a glassy surface of resin passing out
amidships. To look at our scientists from behind CarruthersSmythe stooped slightly to ones left; while Doctor Pickford did
spot-work from points right. A bank of cells, metallic note-pads,
dials and rickety instruments collided with this reality or lay to
one side. Yes truly: thereupon it delivered a livery or a steel plate
which recognised a ventriloquists silver. Above all though, one
luminance stood out beyond other matters. It was Adams eyes.
These gazed on like two lost orbs both of them greenish and
566
Pickfords serum was causing Adam to shed his years. They fall
from him like a Jokers pack of cards! When repetitively, the
mimer reappears and merely gestures with his thumbs up all of
it against a bright blue background. He holds up both his index
fingers in gloved digits; at least when pursuant to LeCoqs theory
and practice Let one see it relieved (thus): in that the
simplicity of performance apes at reliefs index particularly in a
playlet where we are free to behold silences art. Can it be a
reverse threnody within the enactment of ones film?
+
During this endeavour small circular pulses or bubbles revolve
around Adams opening eyes. They detract from mayhems
affidavit; while, Stanley Spencer-like, our dotard continues to
rise from his water-bed. --- Take up your bed and walk (!)
where have we heard such phrases before? Suddenly, a bright
effulgence clears Adams head; and it haloes him in a golden
glow as he begins to speak. Doctor, he starts by lisping via a
croak, I beg you to stop the serum prior to its biting too deeply.
You dont understand the implementation of such a care. It will
only resile from deaths absence by opening the flood-gates
(thereby). I entreat you to think before you liberate this course. It
is not a game or a jeremiad youre playing; albeit after the
signature tune of a television drama like The Wild, Wild West (for
example). No. Try and reverse it, stop it or momentarily alter its
transformation. Nothing but dysgenics can result from this
plunge or dive. You see, I adopted this old or shrivelled form
which was waiting to die many years ago. It renovated the
illustration of a Colin Dexter novel called The Riddle of the Third
Mile in all its livery and purposes. Whereby an eviscerated
corpse is delivered to various victims when cut into pieces all
of it pursuant to blackmail or past infractions. Surely you
remember its motif (?); i.e., a medical head and shoulders that
were barely marked with surgical lore or they resembled
Grays Anatomy when peeping out from straw. It came
surrounded in turn by some rudimentary packing cases from
Bishops Removals in Wokingham, if not bloodied hammers
572
betimes! Dont upend this signal, Pickford! Why dont you bear
forth instead when bleeding from lifes whole Cassandras
warning which concerns those furnished nets? Namely, these
were the ones that caught Agamemnon within ichors steaming
bath. Heed whatever tumbrels disfigure you (thereby). I utilised
old Adams body deliberately; primarily so as to conceal what
lay beneath. His real name happened to be Adam Bartholomew
Jefferson, did you know? But let it ride if I become younger
and younger, as you desire, my true self shall stand revealed or
wax naked avaunt this dawn. Assuredly, should I revert back my
younger form will burst an amniotic surface and penetrate to
such a level from below. Nor is that all. Since, in these
circumstances, truth telling must go on to beget Armageddon
after the fashion of a thousand flies. Those who wait outside can
see me then. Thats the signal; the unholy margin of fate. Once
my true partialitys out it provides a sign-post for the watchers.
They shall observe and act. For when I morph into my true
formula a starting pistol gets released. My metamorphosis
bewitches any and all futures. Nor can it be dismissed after
Kafkas example with the idea of transubstantiation into a
beetle or suchlike grubs. Mecynorrhina Polyphemus can be dealt
with! On the contrary, however, this idiolect may reform Babels
Tower after Breughels observations. It has to be the end. Cest
Fini. Prevent me from changing; its a clapper-board or a
notifying firework for them.
+
With which clarion (then) Adam slumps back in his bed tired and
exhausted. All of this was despite his growing youthfulness
whether page by page, hour by hour, minute by minute or hairon-wrist by pulsating second!
THIRTY
Adams voice seemed to be hoarse and distant now. Regardless
of which he still continued to warn and cajole. Mightnt this be
the imprecations of one so damned? I told you, he repeated,
you have to prevent such a transformation. Resile from it I
573
beseech you. Its still never too late. No instantiation can ever
really interfere leastways not with an eagle circling above. We
are at modernitys final vista, doctors. Surely it resembles
Boccionis sculpture entitled Unique Forms of Continuity in
Space from 1913? It trundles towards us with seventies flares
portending much movement and wrapped oer with speed even
immediacy. Act now in order to prevent disasters
unravelling During this outburst Pickford and CarruthersSmythe remain strangely perplexed. One stood to the right of the
other with a constellation of yellow or fluorescent lights above
when contrasted with a blue window out back. I dont like it,
Pickford, mouthed Carruthers in alarm. Just listening to old
Adam sounding off in this way; why, it gives me an attack of the
screamers! It disables or causes alarm without any sanction.
What does it mean? The younger white coat of the two looked
more sanguine. He merely shrugged his shoulders. Dont be
perturbed, my good fellow. His reaction keeps to normalcys
fellowship under sanctioned medication. After all, hes simply
delirious. You dont want to join the company of Christopher
Marlowes The Jew of Malta, do you? Where to quote from
one of Washington Irvings stories bogles and spirits don a
night-cap only to flit about.
THIRTY-ONE
Again and again, Adam imprecates them in a sobbing whisper or
spout, and its one that finally ceases with a gurgle. Why do two
texts come into ones mind; and these are Dalton Trumbos
Johnny got his Gun and L.P. Hartleys Facial Justice? Both deal
resultantly with meats manipulation primarily amidst a burst
of soul engineering. Finally though, Doctor Pickford is seen to be
wide-eyed or in profile, and hes staring at Ovids chest of
drawers. Adams ditty has trailed away now; it masquerades as
an intruder in its dust. He hardly assaulted anyone with an empty
boxing-glove, by the by. No. His last testament hissed the
following: Forget these fates. Yesss I tried to warn you. No
symposium can surrender to a bats warriorship (thereby). For, in
574
this very moment, Im changing back through the glass of nonidentity to what I once was. It cavils against my veriest doing or
undoing. I liked your species, homo sapiens, not much but
enough to want to save you. A Latin tag fiat experimentum in
corpore vili. Now a land of falling towers awaits your evolved
apehood. You see, this transformation bounds on apace and I
revert to my true form. Correspondingly, no disguise will haunt
my keen anomie. All alienations shall consequently end with this
one. Have you ever consulted Emile Durkheims monumental
study on suicide? It were better if you had done so; lest you face
unarmed what is to follow ones genesis. Too late P..ickford;
too late, doctor death. Those about to fulfil Eric von Danikens
prognosis; why, they salute you! All too l-l-late
+
But Pickford luxuriates ecstatically and like a candle in the wind.
You observe, Carruthers-Smythe, that I was right to press
ahead. For this change of life proves to be upon us it happens
to be like a cosmic menstruation or the tides alteration. I aspire
to knock over your pig-headedness by way of daunt and dash. It
works (I do declare); this serum labours and delivers, I tell you.
Adam has recovered or rediscovered his long-lost youth. Eureka!
A Nobel prize awaits me
THIRTY-TWO
Yet all must turn on occasions like this to ashes in the speakers
mouth. since Adam had indeed been rematerialised. Why so?
Because our young creature has become a little green man. His
eye-sockets were shrunken within a spaces expanse or delta, and
both of them appear to be basins inside the skull. Do they have
occasion to reinterpret a Frank Herbert monstrosity from Dune?
No sir even though these apertures are unseemly, rounded,
gaping, tubular and unduly redolent of the word hole. Each of
them takes up a craniums levelling; whereas in contrast the
nostrils wax barely discernible on their apex. Nothing hints at a
friezes articulation (thereby); at least in a situation where a brow
coruscates over some staring, limpid eyes. Great flabby ears of
575
THIRTY-FOUR
Suddenly the hospices top storey found itself illumined by a
dazzling flash. It came from outside. Since irrespective of a
homily scene where low-rise buildings intersect in suburbia or
are occasionally punctured by a passing Volkswagen a weird
craft jets into view now. It hovers teasingly above the building
and is surrounded by others of its ilk. Such a ship betokens a
classic flying saucer of yore what with a cylindrical
oscilloscope which was as flat as a pancake allows. While its
discus arabesque recalls a Myron without hands and feet, or is
pursuant to a million unidentified flying objects. Doesnt it
incarnate a billion UFOs (?); and this was never mind
government research in order to track them down. It seems to be
constructed from platinum or a lost semblance of steel, and it
reminds us of Gerry Andersons television series UFO. Yessss
each vehicle casts off in a red frisbees direction; together with
blue windows and a sensory projectile that looms beneath this
skimming coin. For all the world it looks like an ant-eaters
sprout albeit one which has been constructed from metal. It
appears to be searching out aught amiss possibly given some
signal or other. Whereupon it becomes obvious over whether
these vessels are propelled by powerful launchers or boosters
which were situated in their rears. Clearly they happen to be a
thousandfold more advanced than contemporary or mortal
science. All Carruthers-Smythe can do was to interrupt his
colleagues mental breakdown. He fidgets nervously by a
window. D-Doctor Pickford, look, out yonder on this tube and
amid a darkling sky, were inundated by a Martian invasion. Isnt
this our very own war of the worlds?
THIRTY-FIVE
Within the alien space craft, however, all remained calm.
Because, ceteris paribus, little green men go about their business
or duty, and their task is imperialism. It proved to be
undoubtedly so Note: in this particular scene four emerald
mugwumps gather around a telescreen in order to observe. Two
578
THIRTY-SEVEN
Grieving helps not the wretched Senecas chorus in
Hippolytus
With this wave after wave of flying saucers descend upon the
planet. They pour down from the blue clouds above and spray
death from their nose-cones. Soon purple and brackish smoke
begins to billow forth all of it coming from flashes of flame
which light up the ground. Greek fire illuminates everything
(thereby); as human screams become admixed with a holocaust!
(Wasnt this just a word that meant destruction by pitch, if used
amongst elder Hellenes?) Before long the green-and-blue orb
was ablaze. Yet amidst such End Times as these, transfigured by
haze, the following scene took place. For superimposed on
each UFO or looming amid its impact and the sky stood a
SIXTY-FOOT DOLL. It embodied Andalusias deportment.
HER LIPS WERE RED>HER SOCKETS VACANT>HER
SKIN GREEN>HER HAIR GOLDEN>HER LIMBS
LITHE>HER EAR-RINGS & CHOKE AMBER>HER BIKINI
ORMOLU>HER LEGS LONG>HER VAGINA BARELY
COVERED>HER LOIN CLOUT PEARLESCENT>HER
CLOAK FLAMINGO>HER HEELS HIGH>HER NAILS
TAPERING>HER VOICE LIKE A BELL!
Who might she be? Well, future anthropologists will call her a
Goddess for little green men!
FINI
580
STINGING BEETLES
a dream
Cast of characters:
These are Mezzanine Spratt, a travelling salesman and
adventurer, together with Tanith Carpentier, a heroine, plus two
mages named Biff and Boff. Various emanations of these
thespians also zero in (spiritually speaking). The text will make
this clear throughout. Likewise, Lord Talbot deserves a special
mention. He was Anton LaVeys spiritual advisor on Roman
Polanskis Rosemarys Baby although a revisionist ouija board
had disembarked Ira Levin early on.
(Authors remarks: this is a story about diabolical possession).
I
Mezzanine Spratt, the main puppet in this particular roadshow,
has been dreaming.
II
Tanith Carpentier began by thinking aloud: The rain drops have
stopped beating in their plentifulness albeit primarily on an
empty screen. A wind-screen, I mean Nonetheless, Mezzanine
Spratt has definitely crumpled over with tiredness. His red
convertible had almost left the road a while back. Was it either
driver error or fatigue? Possibly both but, in his imagination,
something more distrait proved to be happening.
+
For he is sitting at a masquerading table which was basically lit
up by multiple candelabra. These festooned the dining-room, and
this appears to be despite the wind and water that lashed without.
A rare dispersal of goods lay down on this special linen some
of these items in silver salvers or rare pewter jugs. Didnt the
candle-light glisten off them rather spectacularly? A bowl of fruit
became discernible now; while various tureens of meat or fish
581
+
Whereupon a hominid who was accustomed to a lit parade sat
still for a moment. His measure may be found out by those
candles; at least when each one is metered sequentially from the
next. They lay along a tables middle or rested thence in
accordance with its brevity. Every one of them flickered within a
kaleidoscopic burst out of whose flames his disfigured head
can be seen to bob and weave in a bubble. An incident of many
years before now came up albeit matured by his minds eye. In
it he was seen to walk along with a beautiful babe who proved to
be blonde of hue, and they were exiting from one night-spot or
other. All too readily, though, various persons in their vicinity
had begun to scatter or flee. What went on throughout this; or
have they begun to study his face, perchance? Because at a
later date and under the fluffy bow-tie it has started to melt. Is
it deliquescing or discombobulating bit by bit? Whereat, and like
the unmasked visage of Gaston Lerouxs Phantom of the Opera,
one rip or tear reveals an unripe plum that vegetates behind a
balaclavas indifference. Does an objective observer know
however unsteadily whether such an image relates to Lord
Raglans Crimean campaign? Too true, old man since ones
pericarp came blinded to a geyser like this or its liable to meld
like clay especially while pursuant to a forgotten regime. Did it
possibly relate to hygiene at all? By virtue of which and beneath
the girls outraged or stilleto'd feet, when glued to the pavement,
Spratts flesh had cascaded down after some viscid rheum and
when merely given over to kissing ones ground. Slowly she
swooned in an itemised cocoon now that her date has melted on
the spot thereby representing a Toblerone or a triangular
chocolate if subjected to a naked flame.
+
Throughout all of this the moon reflected its abundant light; at
once calm, gibbous, mesmeric, held-in, enraptured and cool.
584
V
Mezzanine Spratt had folded himself over in order to sleep in his
vehicle. I am speeding on now beyond the temple of ones
dreams. Yes indeed, I lie semi-comatose in my car even
though these head-light beams of mine can barely cut through
this darkness. All of which proves to be irrespective of any water
that cascades and pings off metal! No sir but the grip of
dream-time or its somnolence is upon me. Cant you grapple
with its craggy outer limits, my friends? First up, my melting
sickness seems to have led to hospitalisation yet not in any
expected capacity For arent I outside the intern faculty or its
wardship, and looking in? Assuredly so, I leap in a fleet of foot
manner towards a casualty department which has been lit up
from the outside-in. Certainly, no-one really wants to configure
what I might have become or evolved into. To tell you the truth it
all means nothing to me whatsoever, but I do remember the
expectations of a vault or a scenario where, unlike the two public
school-boys in Arthur Seatons Aunt, I leapt towards my fate!
+
Touch! Didnt my hooves ricochet from a parked laundry
vehicle by way of this darkness while arching up towards
nothing other than a black space? I catapulted myself upwards
through some jagged shards which were themselves illumined by
false balsam or an echoing yellow. Must one substantiate the
matter further? Anyway, my feet ground upon the hospitals
carpet and crunched it underfoot particularly now it was
covered over with the windows sward. Then again, I should
possibly have wondered why this aperture is wide open before
Id arrived. Never mind since I crouched down pursuant to any
utterance and prior to leaving off. Ahead of me lay Biff with an
enormous laser-ray in his armoured fist. Truthfully, he wore a
dark-green cape around his frame; itself steel-clad and velvetmade like a mediaeval knight adorned with the latest gadgets.
But these gewgaws aside and bestrewn around the place
something struck me with main force between the eyes!
Inevitably, wasnt there a connexion between this skull-head and
585
a past one which had grown all magisterial? Quod havent I gone
abroad rather masterfully and in blue vestments, but without Sir
Henry Irvings self-confidence? You know that he was the
greatest Victorian actor, I presume? Leastwise, Bram Stoker
turned out to be an able amanuensis in his two-volume
Reminiscences of Henry Irving.
+
Nonetheless, a striking similarity grew up between Biff and me
at least in terms of my palsied existence under a glass-dome that
had been wrapped around the head. Oh so mercifully now
dont you summon up Brian Aldiss novel Barefoot in the Head
instead? To be certain of our time, O want of blood: Biff wore a
helmet containing antlers like a pterodactyls ferment
especially when occasioned by matching bones. Perhaps it came
to vent what Arthur Koestler called The Act of Creation (?); or it
wanted some dysgenic plastic thereby. It definitely appears that
he wore about him some animal skin or pelt, and even luxuriated
in an absent purchase from this vista. Necessarily so since lying
redundantly upon the floor or before his weapon lay Boff. Could
it have been a residual emanation, though? Anyway, it happened
to be a dwarf or one of the little people! Yet within such a
semblance of pain werent Biff and Boff supposed to be allies?
No matter: this daemons gun waxes jammed; and wasnt it only
a vaudeville blunderbuss to begin with?
Biff, who momentarily speaks through a mouthful of fish, masks
up slowly. My fluted rifle has misfired! How can this be? What
outermost purpose or drama in ones ethics of misplacement
gels with any metaphysics which go on here? Didnt the Jew or
the Son of Man whom the Romans crucified at the Pharisees
behest want to declare that everything has a purport, even as it
relates to two birds falling to the ground? You see, it must be the
metaphysical objectivism of all metaphysical objectivisms
especially after the fashion or interregnum of Julius Evola. May
one consult without compulsion his revolutionary codex which
makes war on modernity in the name of tradition? Radex, you
586
infer he wishes to return to the root or to ones blood-in-thebone abreast of its spectre.
Boff has been reduced to a midget by dint of mixed breeding. For
all miscegenation helps to illustrate a bounty of decay. His voice
measures the following He must have fled from us, O my
brothers primarily after the failure of his sten gun to fire.
Didnt you notice it? Yet he speeds from us merely expectant
to his need and in order to avoid fatalitys arrest. Lets
recognise the way he chooses to run when pursuant to nought
save self-interest and hemmed in by aluminium. He moved
laterally with his cape veering behind him or seen as an
architectural slide. Might it embody a Pop Art vestibule by
Rauchenberg or a still frame from von Stroheim?
VI
Mezzanine Spratt ran slantwise in the rain and always in accord
with one vehicle or tother. He spoke solemnly to himself in
mesmerisms grip. I leap abroad when attendant on deliverance,
but not without pain. Or maybe it has to do with the end result or
its prognosis (?); I forget which. Suddenly the dwarfs
outstretched boot seeks to trip me or to send me sprawling on the
linoleum otherwise constructed from lapis lazuli. Cant it be
construed as slippery in the extreme?
Boff holds his gaiter up high in contemplation of the void. He
declares. Huuuuussssshhhh, miscreant listen to me well!
Your involvement in this case is unwanted, unheralded, sprightly
and without either terms or offering leastwise given such a
spirit of sacrifice. Yonder intervention cannot be wished for, do
you see? Any fight that you seek to delve into or relish doesnt
want your presence
Mezzanine Spratt replies in high dudgeon. Wrong, my friend,
the gander is up or all troubadour tunes have broken out of their
fastness. Dont I fling myself forward and somersault in mid-air
587
588
VIII
Mezzanine when alive to an odyssey of humour said the
following. Well, the store-front opened its offerings to me with
a blank doorway marked do not enter hiding some reddish
light. May it be chloroform or ether in an objectless space?
Various bottles lie in squared cubicles when packed away from
lino to ceiling and in subdued tones. Not a hint was heard from
these surroundings Now Biff looked down with a scarlet bulb
transfixing ones glow almost as if he were part of a wall of
sarcophagi whose faces were turned up. He wore antlers upon a
handicaps brow throughout this turn
Biff: Mezzanine doesnt hear the prod of ones silence behind
one. Nor need he grapple with anything too complicated;
especially when fear laces envy with respect. Possibly a large
bottle of formaldehyde which was mixed with pure ethanol
crashes near him. Moreover, the conundrum of its explosion
happens to be louder when it is confronted by stillness.
Poisonous fumes are released thereafter. They vaporise and all of
them collocate or build upon the budding air. Each swirl of
driftwood lists towards yellow and it finds fault resultantly, or it
troubles a witness over sciences ready passion. In these Stygian
vaults a thousand bottles can fall only to repeat a growing
impediment to phantasy. Does one detect it? Since, in von
Stroheims original nine-hour epic Greed, the murdered Marina
haunts Trinas dreams. (It all came from Frank Norris naturalist
or socio-biological novel McTeague). Whereupon Maria grapples
with a fence; at once lemur-like and clutching at straws so as to
gain her revenge. Might she become a Joker in her own pack of
Aces?
Tanith Carpentier: My looking down on this scene has the
solemnity of a dream or a female orgasm. Doesnt the latter have
to do with a blueness, a serenity or an utter calm with ones
partner even a blanking out in the brain. Regardless of this a
whole constellation of vials and casks plummet downwards
(thereafter). An enormous roar results when this heavy glass
589
reek of gas seeks to rise up and away; at once filling the space
feverishly with its insecticide.
Biff stands fully adorned in a daemonic rig. You have stood up,
proud one, only to admit your defeats luxuriance. Nothing
awaits your spirit now but a Tarot card the one marked death
and that often indicates transformation or renewal. Discard all
other discourses or mend the magic of forgotten days! Too true,
your vanquished sigil comes covered in rheum or green-spirited;
and is measured by bloods barometric pressure. Forget it not
because my pagan head bellows a kindred indifference towards
our plight. Are you a stranger to a tabernacle of lost pain? Any
road up, the very pterodactyl feel of my head-gear seeks the sun
like Icarus in reverse. He flew too near ones glistening solar
panel in Greek myth (you know). Its orb proved to be too strong,
singed his wings and sent him plummeting to the turf beneath.
Lo, but look, helmet and all, I have become Lord Talbot! He
incarnates a very devil, demon or lower thaumaturge. May his
green-spiked dome come forwards in an undefeated manner!
What did Madame Blavatsky say about Lucifers gift of fire to
mankind in her Secret Doctrine? Might it wax promethean after
Heraclitus blessing?
IX
Tanith Carpentier continued to comment on events via a distant
haze. Yes, he remains conscious in his diligence throughout.
Too far it seems Given the implementation of the following
agreement: in that his head slipped down beneath the seat.
Orange it was and with shiny appurtenances. Above all, the topn-tailed trilby sunk down or delved towards a skulls
irretrievable nature. What can he be thinking about? Why, merely
that nought ever really happens to him; viz., no excitement,
chastisement or adventure occurs within. Do you see? Since no
wife or woman waited up for him in the one-room apartment he
called home. No sir it wasnt a defeated architecture, but he
did remain aware of the rains pitter-patter. Its onomatopoeia
591
+
We then cut to the scene of an enormous explosion.
X
Mezzanine Spratt: I wander towards this devil-doll which is
adjacent to my studio vista. Moreover, its claws are transparent
especially when seen through the thick etheric slaughter of ones
mists. Against such thinking an oversight of orange gauze floats
up from below; its adrift of those shattered boards which came
from the shelving roundabout. Before me stood Lord Talbot; at
once grasping a stave before a savage iota of Halloween. Doesnt
it declare itself to be a candle that flares within a pumpkin (?);
the mouth, nose and eyes of which have been cut out with a
knife. All of it has been recorded by some reflective dye, you
know? Similarly, the demon afore me hissed out of a reptilian
bastinado (possibly). It reared up like a greenun or when
percussive to an old dinosaurs witness. On I surged as I sought
to pummel it with my fists but against its saurian armour no
impact could I make. I blundered on in the half-darkness often
keening at this rage or turret, and yet susceptible to change. Look
at it now: my limbs felt heavy and over-burdened as I attacked.
Could it embody the final conflict between Marcus and
McTeague in von Stroheims Greed? (A hemicycle that was
filmed in Californias death valley at the apogee of this particular
sun). Unhesitatingly though, the pot-bellied significance of Biff
came through regardless Might it reallocate indistinctiveness
obesity or the sin of gluttony (?); thence having occasion to spin
over into the half-light. It also indicated an inner connexion
between Talbot and Biff. Werent they the same daemonic entity
(?); albeit masquerading behind a carnivals obsession with one
harlequins hanging. No matter: because the oval of such a belly
helped to trap a variant on uncleanness, even if only circulating
to grey now. Everything found itself held up within this dilemma.
But soon I was down or flattened to Camus Fall primarily by
one of those demonic blows. Talbot stood over me with its
nostrils twitching and snorting.
593
XI
Biff and Boff were speaking in unison as siamese twins. Let us
examine a plenitude of freaks, my brothers. For wasnt Caligula
just an undivine child whos otherwise wasteful to its source (?);
or liable to make his favourite horse into a Consul? Couldnt this
be done by virtue of an alternative mission statement (?), even a
grafted on treaty. Surely it would illustrate a reversal of Raoul
Vaneigems The Book of Pleasures, a decadent volume which
advocates paedophilia?
+
To be evident about it: Mezzanine Spratts head has slumped
down into a trilby-laden seat. Indefinitely though, the pain or
effulgence of this water almost cascaded through the glass
metaphorically speaking. Might it be an example of one pane
favouring another before the gesture of these Norns (?) all of
it occurring ahead of a northern wind. Remember that in another
incarnation Spratt proved himself to be a tragic figure; i.e., one
who merely sacrificed himself for the love of a waxen doll. All
of this took place in a manner reminiscent of German
expressionist cinema or von Stroheims luridness. Out
Hollywood way it was wherein the gypsy-like Zerkow dreams
(in Greed) of retrieving the ormolu dinner-service from a burial
ground. His face during these shots found itself convulsed with a
gross livery or beholden to an unholy love!
+
Mezzanine slowly revives. For a while he nearly rests his heavy
chin on the steering-wheel. What to do next, however? Clearly,
he cant snuggle up like this when pursued by dampness residue.
Since he primarily needs to quit this place or find solace in a
boarding house nearby. A neighbouring hamlet could be a
possibility anyway, he slews the car around and heads off into
these swirling undercurrents. May he now turn the vehicles key,
engage its starter, and feed petrol into its engine only to see it
lurch onto a glistening road? Lets take this bishopric or diagonal
movement in chess as far as it can progress.
594
XII
Tanith Carpentier gestures from afar like Gloria Swanson in
Sunset Boulevard by Billy Wilder. Isnt she the Vamps vamp,
thereby? Truthfully, I knew his absence would impart some
renewal to this circle. Dont misunderstand me! Because do you
see a vampirella in front of you oppressed one of another
existence? I constantly stride towards a basalt column which is
just tempted over to sequin and idly lists forwards. Truly, a swirl
shows up everything else. It occurs amid mist and many of my
colleagues gather in a darkness well off to the west. Or shall it be
a species of leftism, spiritually speaking? Needless to say, this
zeitgeist has turned over on itself amidships. Didnt Julius Evola,
the author of Revolt Against the Modern World, speak of a war
of position like a vesuvian chess match? Yess-s-s, since his
gargoyle lolls over your craniums side in a dragons get-up or
rig, and it merely waits to still such distempers. Its refusal looked
like a dinosaur (perchance), or even a brontosaurus and a
pterodactyl. It waxed turquoise in its delusion and waited to
foment ichor from a creatures mouth.
+
Doesnt Lord Talbot leer over him now with Richard
Wagners Ring cycle blaring away in the background? A
dexterity that intimates nothing other than a claret sky leastwise
it carpets the space between them avec vermilion. No matter how
brilliantly since in a matter of moments Biff had become
enormous. He dwarfed this tableau and wore a reptiles helmet
throughout, and Talbots covered over by intertwined bulletbelts. A cape masqueraded over one shoulder and it concerns a
rampant dragon the heraldic device or imprimatur of Talbots
house. Moreover, his grin came blackly etched from one of
indifferences wounds or amid bleeding teeth. Slowly & surely
Mezzanines body was dragged outside through a door
downstairs and across a yard. An alley cat, dressed in black-andwhite fur, looked on inquisitively as Biff passed with Spratt. He
shifted him roughly across these stones keeping.
595
XVII
Mezzanine Spratt kept driving onwards while his gloved hands
were fastened onto the wheel. What makes a man take one course
of action rather than another? Sincerely, it had to do with the way
the Norns arrange things for you. Some call it fate or karma.
Whereas Mezzanine continued to speed on; and this was
basically oblivious to all crime or hazard. In these circumstances,
he manoeuvred the roadster under a thunder-cloud. A burst of
lightening lit up your foreground; a factor which was attendant
upon a neglected point of view. Never mind hed heard of
hurricane Katrina plaguing New Orleans so; and yet Mezzanine
also knew that all progressive notions fall sheer before natures
majesty. Since no-one can choose their race, ethnicity, eugenic
capacity, disabled absence, non-semitism or Gentile status, class
strand, sexuality, intellect, beauty or lack of such. You see,
environmentalism or social causation proves to be catalepsys
lozenge. For everything subsists within a biological filter. Man is
born and not made, in other words. A scenario whereupon
cultural studies only replaces natural lore with a furnished
definition. Ceteris paribus, marxism stands refuted by a single
example of Zeus thunder claps or bolts. Wasnt this all-father a
master of our living lightning, thereby?
By estrangements token, Mezzanine became aware of some
lights on amid the trees. Surely a hamlet reared up amongst a
sward otherwise washed clean by oblivion?
XVIII
She had seen him break free in order to seek succour from an
oubliette. Alternatively, he sensed a one-eyed Cyclops emerging
from the dark!
++
Biff, who was shading into Lord Talbot, zig-zagged towards
some more trouble. Here we go for Mezzanines figure lies
recumbent in this gloom. Has it really left an ambulances portal
(?); or can he have sped through mortal doors by way of
600
XIX
Biff and Boff, who were dressed in purple cowls and vestments,
appear behind them. Whilst a motley collection of ill-assorted
mountebanks follows on or aft, and they represent a choked-off
sea. All of these denizens wear close-fitting gear somewhat
after the fashion of puppets in Commedia dellarte. Each one of
them comes to be reminiscent of Ensors painting Skeleton in a
Mirror with Masks. Basically then, this tableau relates to their
peeling rind or magenta hoods.
+
Biff and Boff can scarcely conceal their sadism (thereafter). But
where does Lord Talbot reside? Harken, a delinquent has
appeared amongst us. Are you aware daughter of us all that
the circles been transgressed by one whos known
contamination possibly via unhallowed meats? Could his
hands and mouth have quaffed uncleanness or trotters; primarily
by an example drawn from The Road to Wigan Pier? Might he be
porcine; at least in those terms which are available within a novel
labelled The Pork Butcher? Our matzos arent kosher (withal).
No matter: you wont speak to us leastwise, when it comes to
negotiating the zip weve fastened over your faces. HA! HA!
HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! Lets also adjust to the following
channel
Lord Talbot has Biff and Boff smeared across his features.
Leaven this bread of ecstasy, my fellow sprites! For our
ambulance had trundled off into a sense of transparent gloom.
Now we realise the chance to seize upon unhallowed rites!
Again, a beam split from its enclosure even though the red light
atop the ambulance didnt flicker at all. It decomposed to a
scarlet residue under the trees or next to a vehicles blue.
Needless to say, Biff injected Mezzanine with a narcotic in order
to keep him hopeless and docile. Do you visualise it? A gothic
imprimatur captured this while Biffs face snarled in rapture; it
milked its sapphire tint and came surrounded by a verdant cape.
His teeth grinned on in a gorilla-like manner from inside those
603
the inside of this vessel within which such toads vomited their
fancy!
+
Do they at once essay creatures in Hieronymous Boschs The
Temptation of Saint Anthony? For here, they besport themselves
within alabaster or a new roof. Yet on occasion a snout-faced
creature who is dressed in black, porcine or sallow, and with a
mandolin or lute why, he crosses a threshold between life
and death. Isnt that the case? Lhomme propose et Dieu
dispose Moreover, what about the owl which perches on his
scalp? Because all polycephalous spectres come to a point where
they recommend this. Again, each figurine was maimed in its
quietude and it lay adjacent to a machine that looks on
indifferently, or alters its trajectory. May sepulchral gloom play a
part herein? Further, why does a virgin over-straddle the saint by
proffering a dish of Holy Water? In comparison to which,
various owls make hay with arrested purity before an oneiric
defeat. Yes these mediums sought to lift a veil on the next life;
if only to cast a chiaroscuro upon twilight or its semblance. Do
you detect any sundry import? Since this perverseness renders
itself aloof with distant shadows or halves; themselves shrunken
or betokening dwarves. All in all, they mushroom out as
Grotesques thence occurring on the margins of manuscripts or
bewildering us in their illumination. Are they basically a bygone
ages incunabula?
XXIII
Mezzanine Spratt: My form has concocted a rope or its stepladder; the levitation of which surrounds me from every side. It
holds me bitterly in such an entreaty. Furthermore, these mages
think that theyve bound me hand and foot but Tanith stands
beside me now. She leans against my blue-garbed body so the
weight of her hand might conceal something. It (whatever its
nature) writhes adjacent to her scarlet dress.
608
a lop-sided way. HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA!
HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA!, they roared.
+
Still and all, her skull has been picked up and it spat fire from
woefully green irises. In point of fact, her orb floats up via depths
of red and brown but what did she have wedged between her
lips other than a scarab? An insect thats crawled there primarily
in ones imagination. For havent you heard whether every beetle
draws a sting, or not? Of what else abounds, perchance (?); why,
its merely an unconscious revelation
+
Because once the girl known as Tanith wanders abroad with
those magicians they cut off her head with a mock-guillotine!
This device was originally concealed behind a hillock which
proves russet in its hue. Whilst our homunculus or invunche
drains the gore from her severed neck into a porcelain bowl.
Mightnt it have been made from spode china (?); or a reflex on
ones distaff side? Even so: she remains alive --- in spite of all.
XXIV
Tanith speaks now and her irises were brightly lit up so as to
fill the available sockets. No astigmatism fails to communicate a
story like this (you see).
Tanith Carpentier: Ones head-chickens sprout is off and
youre even free to make a wish. Where has all of this blood
come from (?); and its reminiscent of the first stages of an
infants birth. Ugh! Yonder pot contains those innards which
belaboured ones insides certainly prior to any relief. What
purpose do ones intestines have when confronted with the knife?
A poniard too far, one feels yes, my spirituality makes free to
float like a bird thats unburdening its aura. But truly, any
impermanence must mark time for my sureness finds its
sacrifice aslant a miracle or forlorn of all tissue. My head was off
you see and it bounces after a ball with its green-eyes
distended. A scene where the colour of a scalp remains
610
Biff and Boff exist some way off. They are surrounded by lesser
Grand Masters and look like members of British Israel.
Surprisingly, we are ahead of you or at our thinkings
discretion, my dear. Because daemonic presences are merely an
entreatys tad-pole. Given this, one crippled lutanist approaches a
reddened hearth (thereby). Mightnt he be playing his stick
forlornly (?); or otherwise proving oblivious to all else? He came
accompanied by a carnivals dog; the former a mutt who wears a
wine-coloured hood about his cheeks. Do you retain a regard for
these facts? When we consider that those reptiles which do so,
Tanith, move eastwards from the west to the accompaniment of a
chestnut hue. It settles, this latter dispensation, upon chocolate:
i.e., a chiaroscuro shot through with fire and akin to red eggtempera. But still these hog-heads or heresiarchs move closer
and all the while they are composing that lute music which spoke
of an alchemists bridal chamber. Yess-ss-ss.
(Note: British Israel is a Gentilist and supremacist cult).
Tanith Carpentier: Tell me, coven of warlocks, what befell my
head in another dimension or space, and after it had been severed
from its trunk?
Those male witches who are gathered in conclave can only sneer
in reply: Why dont you use your imagination, girl?
For what fate opens up when pursuant to a Deaths-head can
only be this volute in which, mutatis mutandis, the knife,
spear, arrow, sword and axe all make their appearance. They
happen to be assorted emblems of Alchemical fire and each helps
to feed its furnace. Do us a favour why dont you? By virtue of
the fact that this head swivels free from its corse; if only to
manoeuvre beyond a night-times borders. Are you brave enough
to see it? Further, this plastinate found itself linked to such a
balustrade, contained, as it was, within some plexiglass. Can one
remember a character known as Doctor Sun from a graphic novel
of yesteryear? Never mind: since her cranium whips around
quickly, and it caroms like a billiard or snooker ball with a sigil
613
++
OPERATION RE-WIND: if we were to begin again
I
Which road should one take through life; at once immature to its
particular stillness? For Mezzanine Spratt lay slumped in his
convertibles seat, red in colour, with heavy rain beating on his
windscreen above the wipers. But ones mind lay elsewhere;
irrespective of those gloved hands that gripped the wheel. He
should have taken a previous turn; itself locked in the
implementation of its wood and way back there in an inky
diaspora.
Mezzanine Spratt: A parepraxis wanders abroad in terms of a
free-flowing bio-cast. Can one credit it? Since one fork in this
road doesnt prepare me for an exclusion, given the toucan which
is mirrored in turquoise and who rests on a tropical branch.
Various figures gather below in vegetations clearing; they are
roundabout, spectral and seen in microscopic size. Let them
waste themselves in illusion or by wrestling a breach; a factor
which leaves them unprepared for a biological misfit. He looms
up later. It stands head-to-toe in these leaves; the latter being sore
in its study of such violence. Any head-dress so worn derives
from the sward; it exists as a deluge of humus hanging down. It
also configures its own wake --- at least in terms of like carrion.
Do you interpret this matter differently? Each one of us addresses
a configuration on the sly; a distribution of identity that
occasionally slips over into phantasm. Our contribution also
comes minus a semblance of living bark; the former enlivened to
a pitch or sliver. Now isnt this altogether necessary? For a bat
flits away from us in Bram Stokers chronicle; it was held inside
a dark tumbrel and relished the closing out of one enemy too far.
Such a tunnel proved to be very deep; it even came to be
separated from such a funnel by ones entreaty. Its abundant
roots found themselves inflected with herbs. Such a string-fellow
615
you notice it? Since such spheroid skulls as these mount agape;
nor do they merely witness ones Tyburn tree or siphon it off into
a play-station (thereafter). Above us these tides turn in a
maelstrom or its immensity; and they beckon beyond us towards
the grave Yet they remain alone; if somewhat isolated. Can I
hurl myself forwards?, he asks at a time when hes just joined
to this rupture, but not by any steadfast indent. Hold on! For blue
bubbles move around his cortex and brain, if only to festoon an
eye-ball: itself brought up sharp and centring on the iris. It looms
out against a possibly misshapen scarlet or swells to a fitting cure
primarily so as to reveal a black dot at the heart of this couplet.
Lets sneak up close to the rim of such a cornea the latter
festooned at an eye-balls heart. Dont we really discern a
blinding light here (?); one which looks expectant in its glow
(essentially). Further, it contrives to fill up ones mental screen or
dish like in Michael Powells film Peeping Tom. Wherein the
rich go forward to die or bake out such a prospect; and they see
the whole zodiac in an instant while listing to a negative colour.
Never trust these results, my friend, because a refulgent burst
fills ones screen (albeit momentarily).
III
Mezzanine Spratt: Again we find a spectrum in this darkness
one thats sent listening to any sound and without a blunt beacon
further off Even though such a glow-worm flickers avec the
alacrity of one of Derbys lights. (This is Wright of Derby, the
painter of the industrial revolution do you recall?) To be sure: a
blue sweep-stake grows up behind us; whereas its penumbra
illuminates the whole As two figures amble forward with each
of them withering to a torch in its light plus the reverse
archaeology of caves growing all around them. May it be an
opposite chasm of non-identity (?); one which feasts on this
rapture underground, and that signals off at various levels avec
some light green oxide together with prism violet and Prussian
blue. Does she embody at this moment in the proceedings a
western punk per se (?); or the innermost matrix of Siouxie
619
Sioux and the Slits? Was Ambrose Bierce right in his reckoning;
primarily in terms of her Mohican shawl or its withering haze?
But what of Taniths eyes, though? They were azure or
deepening to purple, even if maddened and looking in no
doubt. Yet again each of them swayed to its course like a
marble: with either orb sovereign in its hate or otherwise caught
out It also proved to be capable of a sly interlude, an aporia in
being; one which can be interpreted later on through mirrors.
Sideways-on or refracted they are whilst being urgently
mystified over a source; and theyre often unkind despite
penetrating these leathery shadows under a tousle of flickering
flame. Isnt it true that punks lit up their hair when all aglow
like human cockatoos? Whereas one fact escaped their attention
and this was amid American and Australian slang that the
word means hustler, mountebank, beseecher, even moral
whore Wherein a black execution or nihilism closes in around
them; if only to reveal this truth.
IV
Biff and Boff dwell on a triumphant accomplice, if only in their
dreams. Lets look at a resounding distaff, my friends. For an
eye rears out of a quadrant of self. It has blood specked around
its circumference the former being rheum red and travelling to
its source, or finding itself delivered within the refraction of a
cameras instant. Yes are these configurations falling away in
a curving arc thereby? Most assuredly quod Mezzanine Spratt
has arrived. He lies within a circle of ochre or finds himself
reflected in its vice, and its fairly cracked over the
impermanence of concrete nor need it be adult in its waystation. Various geographical features become pronounced
since horrors charm is the sweetest and most moral of traps.
Again now, Spratt finds himself chained to a lathersome instant;
primarily by way of a wall, altogether silted over, and ignoring
both fate and fortune. It stares up at a carriage of cerulean blue
if only to be surrounded by demons. They were modelled after a
mediaeval Book of Hours (or some other bestiary). Similarly,
620
VII
Mezzanine Spratt: Youre here to gloat, then?
Tanith Carpentier: Gloating remains the sacrifice of a victim
which doesnt know its glory.
Mezzanine Spratt: I wonder if youve the stomach for an
enabling discharge.
Tanith Carpentier: Quiet the rain is coming down on the
inside of your skull. If you remain silent for a moment, youll
hear it.
Mezzanine Spratt: Wretch, no wonder man can never trust
woman since the Garden of Eden! Nothing prelapsarian may rest
enough for an adder to make its way up your leg (effectively).
Tanith Carpentier: Flattery cuts no ice with those who are
accustomed to seeing a skull in ones picture. Its
autobiographical, you see. Do you remember the elongated
Golgotha which breaks up the flow of Holbeins The
Ambassadors, replete with a velvet green betwixt?
Mezzanine Spratt: All I can recall to memory was that
Savonarolas strictures about Renaissance painting were right.
For Botticellis canvases are impregnated with a pagan lustre.
Tanith Carpentier: Your nonchalance intrigues me. What force
lies behind ebon lines drawn upon white, in terms of runic
inscriptions which a skilled mind might read?
Mezzanine Spratt: Thats easy hes called Satan!
VIII
He had driven off the road and almost into a ditch yet still the
rain thundered down relentlessly on his wind-shield. Wasnt this
so? Anyway, his head-light beams could hardly cut a swathe
624
627
XI
Yet how goes it back on planet earth, with Mezzanine Spratt as a
ready witness-statement? Firstly, he had begun to fall asleep in
the cars front leather-seat. Again, rain continues to lash down on
a glass above the dash-board. Shall there be, if you pardon its
scintilla, an element of hail mixed in within it? To be sure:
Spratts trilby became more and more slumped down as his
head reclined with a greater lowness particularly when set
against the vanquished leather-cushions beneath. They bore
about them an orange livery during a period where the mans
hat stooped towards a plastic steering-wheel. Dun-coated it was,
yet Mezzanine seems to dwell on his lifes presumed loneliness,
without either a wife or a partner to help things along.
Zzzzzzzzzzz He went on sleeping with just those ricocheting
pellets of water for company. Suddenly his scalp bobbed up; its
occasionally pursuant to a stray sheet of lightning that lit up the
night-sky. Must he persevere with stoicism via legerdemain? He
has to promulgate the possibility of some discharge or other.
What is the line from Goethes Faust which so fascinated Sir
Oswald Mosley that he had to introduce it? Right at the
beginning, there was an action --- not a word. Note: thats the
Christian gospel!
+
So Mezzanine Spratt decides on a course of definite enquiry. He
guns the cars engine, presses his foot down on the accelerator,
feeds it petrol and causes his vehicle to lurch forward in the rain.
SLOSH! Wouldnt it be better to drive on and find a comfortable
bed & breakfast? Therell be no dreaming on those pillows,
then
XII
Tanith Carpentier: Do you see me oppressed one of another
existence? For I constantly stride towards a column of naked
basalt; itself tempted over to a semblance of sequin. But still, it
otherwise lists forwards and in every which way. Truly, a sapswirl shows up aught amid a mists declension, and many of my
628
Friend, future lover and husband listen to me. You were once
my slave in that the listless object of your abandoned eyes led
you to me. Not a sense of contingency, no, but a beguiling
magnetism from Robert Graves The White Goddess brought you
here. Quickly at once fix the complexity of these dreams to my
poniard; a dagger thats strapped next to my naked thigh by a
thread of gold. It happens to be transparent in its lucidity. Do you
detect its faintness now when akin to the bronzed leg
pulsating neath it?
Mezzanine Spratt: Who are you?
Tanith Carpentier: May well you stare stranger at my
breath-taking beauty. Lets consider it to be an example of
Cleopatras knowing innocence Most especially, when it takes
place with an Egyptian dome of hair; the latter amber to its lit
nectar plus blue-lips which were aflame with passion, and
fluorescent eye-shadow smeared around Basilisk reaches. Can
you detect their Ophidian lusts? Doesnt the White Rastafarian
hair-do when pleated in its peroxide magnificence recall
Lulu? You remember her Stygian vaultedness? For she was the
main character (or a nymphomaniac lodestar) in Alban Bergs
opera. But to reverse a spell or some feminine fatigue my
armour bears upon it a trace of Macha; i.e., the female crone in
Celtic mythology. And all of this occurs at a time when shes
revered next to a ravens tracery!
Mezzanine Spratt: Where are we?
Tanith Carpentier: Do these dreams fail to instruct those frontal
lobes in Grays Anatomy (?) according to which your physical
co-ordinates are traced. Wayward man, you have been drawn
towards a concealed magnet under chlorinated paper, in relation
to that O level experiment in physics. Wherein Farradays
postulates were signed off for, as regards ferrous filings and their
electro-magnetism.
634
+
Loving one, my game of snakes and ladders has led you to a
sorcerers village. Here magic reigns without any brook, stint or
surcease. It comes to be altogether untrammelled. Perhaps it
would do you good to think of yourself as a character trapped
inside Dennis Wheatleys semiotic, or in a novel like The
Satanist for example. How can one of Pirandellos six gain
egress to this hamlet, you ask? Why, it may often come about on
wild and stormy nights to quote Bulwer Lytton out of context.
Its only then that strangers or outsiders will find the portal to a
forbidden cosmogony. Do you navigate around the metaphor of a
green door made of wood (?), an entrance whose substance
conceals a magic garden behind a wall. It encloses it completely.
(Whether one masters it in fictions as diverse as those of
Rosamund Lehmann or Arthur Machen, depending)
Remember: once youve gained entry by dint of free will, our
multiple version of a three-headed Cerberus wont let you out!
Too late; they have detected your presence. Like me, Mezzanine
love, you entered on a billowing even-song --- only to never be
allowed out by them.
Mezzanine Spratt: Who are they?
Tanith Carpentier: The Magicians
XVII
Biff and Boff, dressed in purple vestments, appear behind them.
A motley collection of ill-assorted mountebanks follow on
rather like a choked-off sea. All of these wear close-fitting masks
about their features, reminiscent of the painter Ensor, and under
their magenta hoods.
Biff and Boff are scarcely able to conceal a sadistic munificence.
Hark, a delinquent aberration has appeared amongst us from
without. Are you aware daughter of us all that the circle had
been transgressed by one whose hands and mouth have known
635
when ready to run through one of their number who hasnt made
the grade. Well tighten you up, weakling, suggests one of them
with a snide smirk. Another remarks: lets rifle him out with a
halbert or a combined spear and its battle-axe. Enough talk,
wheedles another, Im anxious to beat upon such meat. In
response to this remark or tasking, a younger version of
Mezzanine utters the following words: You boneless larvae, I
despise you all! Go on, take your kicks, you wretches or spawn.
Do your worst AAAAAGGGHHH!, they cry in unison.
Prevail upon him not to pass out of your mission, at least in
relation to a posting next to oblivion. Yes sir Make way,
remove your shoulder from the bladed bone. I want to crack
those legs, primarily so as to execute the marrow within. Aha!
Lets look at such a ventriloquists spiralling orb. Have I fixed
him to the work bench by placing a pin via a rare beetle,
thereby?
Simultaneously though, doesnt this intone an earlier
performance of Punch and Judy? A scenario or playlet (it is)
where Punchs figurine emerges from behind a purple cloak.
May Sir Harrison Birtwhistles atonality accord with our
swazzlers psychic attributes? Only Mezzanine stands
continuously on this shingle or outside the booth never mind its
sound. For there were no other children to respond to the blood
and thunder of such a Grand Guignol. Truly, the child within us
often requires violent emotions nearly all of them set off
against a moral code of absolutes. Yet not even metaphysical
objectivism can compete with a wall of dolls; each one of these
laid out photographically by Waldo Lanchester. Do we really fail
to respond to their grinning teeth, revolving eyes, sinister mien
and papier-mch heads? This is never mind the pomegranates
of such a bestiary which were lost behind an ovoid touch
necessarily, of so many hachures.
638
XIX
Yet these turquoise-clad mages have elemental tones at their
command, such as a flickering flame or an Indian rope-trick. Up
lasso, they proclaim to an inanimate object Go to the
outsider, bind him hand and foot or fast and loose!
Mezzanine Spratt: What is this?
Biff and Boff: It remains nought but our rendition of a full metal
jacket. Have you yet to recognise the labyrinthine quality of your
dreams? Within which you might savour a miasmas
displacement; at once delivered headless or redolent of Punchs
gibbet plus a cranium in a box. Doesnt such a Headman
indicate a sense of panic? Necessarily, since water and fire are
both alchemical symbols of a heretic world! Furthermore, any
adventure must take note of your relative light-headedness
Given that Tanith Carpentier walked away from Mezzanine, who
was held captive in a bath, with various hippogriffs appointed on
every corner. She stalked on amidst a velvet green (most
definitely), avec the latter twisting and turning adjacent to
illumined piles all of them Gothic to this last. They rose up out
of a tessellated floor; together with the ghoulish exhibition of
many victims lassoed above. Might these cadavers codify one of
those plastinates by the anatomist, Professor Gunter von
Hagens? Still, a pink embrasure filled this scenes monstrous or
composite body given those blue tiles, in a perfect symmetry,
that provide a mesmerism over ones floor-sheen. In its
arithmetic then this parquet harks back to a mosaic or
(alternatively) a lapis drawn from Islamic art. Also, behind her
hyacinth a dioxaxine purple swept away; the former showing
Biff or myself in silhouette. While those reptilian fancies when
borne aloft by their mystification began to shower Mezzanine
with a sulphuric indent. He lay, for his part, chained to the inside
of a cylindrical vessel within which such toads are free to
vomit their fancy!
+
639
Tanith speaks herself now; and her irises are brightly lit up so as
to fill the available sockets. No astigmatism really fails to
communicate a story here (therefore).
Tanith Carpentier: Ones head-chicken sprouts off or aft, and
youre even free to make a wish. For where has all of this blueblood come from like in the first stages of an infants birth?
Ugh! You see, yonder pot contains those daemonic innards
which belaboured ones insides at least before relief. What
purpose do ones intestines have when confronted by the gutting
knife, eh? Its definitely a poniard too far, one feels. Yes, my
spirituality makes free to float like a bird whos unburdened by
the spirit. But truly, any writhing impermanence must mark its
time for my aspic certainty (when forlorn of issue) finds its
wonder sacrificed before such a miracle. My head was off, you
know, and bouncing like a ball with its green eyes distended.
Most particularly when the basic colour of a scalp remains
pearlescent and nacreous, and it rode its luck if surrounded by a
rose penumbra. All I could manage by way of a shout remained:
UGGHHglug-glug-glug! Not to worry, though: since ones
rootedness to the ground has to involve an absence of legs.
Perhaps now, my decapitated rind can be picked up by Biff who
moves next to a stalk or a root of the brightest yellow.
Mezzanine Spratt finds himself pursuant to an internal swazzle.
You must never forget the advanced reproach of Saint
Anthonys temptation, however! A scenario wherein the saint
wears a grey cowl next to his affected grace; irrespective of any
surrounding loucheness. Do you realise the solace or redemption
now afoot? For one permitted larceny remains within a sows
recognition or ken, and at least in terms of a grey eminence that
occasionally lists towards black. He or it approaches Saint
Anthony sideways-on; and yet such a will-o-the-wisp comes to
be undefeated by silence. Do you recall its similarity to a copperhead that is: the most poisonous snake on the north american
mainland? Or alternatively, this summons up from the depths a
642
++
OPERATION FAST-FORWARD: if we were to use the future
perfect
Biff and Boff: Move away from his circumference, Tanith, lest
you wish to undergo exquisite pain such as a salutary
beheading! Dont doubt over whether it will be artistically
accomplished, sweetie. For by any other commando issue,
though, Up Flame go to them and summon their obedience to
our power. If we might invert Aleister Crowleys diction, hate
shall be the whole of the law! Again Waves prevent the
completion of their egress and lock them out (then) within the
dancing juniper of your tidal spume.
Irrespective of any of this, however, our two outlaws have
reached the car; if only to see it submerged by a cascading
wavelet. Still, do they manage to make it out of the village
albeit with water lapping around their stagecoach on every side?
The vehicles engine roars into life and they create some
necessary tracks as a consequence.
XXIV=XXVII
Mezzanine woke up a while later in his cabin. He had had the
temerity to fall asleep in his works craft throughout. A liquid
wetness has entered the cab from somewhere yet he remains
alone and somewhat bereft. Lets consider the following analogy:
might this be an example of English heroic legend or folk-tale, as
narrated by Kathleen Herbert? Anyway, may this entire
imbroglio have been a dream (?); or some sort of phantasm of
waking consciousness? Mezzanine Spratt rubbed his chin for a
moment he couldnt make his mind up between the two
alternatives. But Tanith, beloved Tanith, with the red skin,
blonde hair, large bust and blue-and-white bikini surely she
was real? Maybe, he mused aloud to himself. Yet if she were
chimerical why did she leave such a definite impression? He
647