The first time Doris turned away from Bob in their bed, she was twenty-two. They had lain staring at the ceiling for some time, illuminated only by a solitary lamp casting ominous shadows. In one swift movement, and with a deep frown between her brows, she rolled onto the left side of her body to face the wall.
Was it the unsightly tuffs of hair on his knuckles, or was she tired of the way his shoelaces always hung two inches too long over the side of his shoes? Was it the fingerprints he frequently left on the windows as he daydreamed, or was it the way he always ironed the collar before the sleeves that made her resent him? Or was it simply that she had grown weary of being with someone only capable of expressing his thoughts on a label, a sticker, a stamp or a tag? No matter. In that split second when she turned to face the wall, Doris just resented him.
Bob's words continued to drift in and out of her ears, rising and falling, but she heard none. She barely moved. She offered only her back to him. She did not care that there was growing irritation in his voice, and she was not stirred even by his steaming breath against her neck. She only winced once when he pulled out his label-maker to punch out those familiar sounds, thumping out his ritual retreat into his mind: punch— impact— slide— cut. The more she ignored him the faster he typed, and the faster he typed the more resolute she grew. Punch— impact— slide— cut— punch— impact— slide— cut— punch— impact— slide. She stared at the wall unblinking as he churned out his loving-hate one strip at a time — three words, five, six, then two, fifteen letters — and when he stuck them to the base of her spine they were cold and hard like the face of a knife.
Wednesday 24 October 2007
Tuesday 9 October 2007
Accompaniment to train announcement #8
Passengers, I apologise for the shakiness of this ride and the breathy chill inside the carriage. To keep warm, please snuggle up to the stranger next to you, and hold their hand. I could make up excuses for this technical inconvenience, but truth be told, I have not stopped shivering since I heard the cop’s description of the woman.
When he first saw her strewn across the tracks, there was blood everywhere. But it was not the blood that spooked him, nor the fact that her limbs lay twisted under her body. What grabbed the base of his spine with urgent offense was the multi-layer epidermal canvas of strips on the woman’s back. Strips of words. Strips of embossed words. Like the one on her palm, but in the thousands. Some of the words still stood tall and sharp, but the strips that were partially covered by others, partially faded, were unadhering. They only hung on by the weaving bits of skin that had wrinkled, hardened and grown around their hard edges, knitted together by the layers of flesh that created an unwieldy labyrinth of words and stuff of nightmares. Nightmare of labels end to end, labels overlapping, labels clustered, labels braided, labels twisted, labels overflowing.
It makes me shudder out involuntary gusts of chill through the air vents just thinking about it. Again please accept my apologies. I will have to get the technician to check my temperature gauge before I lose control.
And hopefully before I succumb to my nausea.
When he first saw her strewn across the tracks, there was blood everywhere. But it was not the blood that spooked him, nor the fact that her limbs lay twisted under her body. What grabbed the base of his spine with urgent offense was the multi-layer epidermal canvas of strips on the woman’s back. Strips of words. Strips of embossed words. Like the one on her palm, but in the thousands. Some of the words still stood tall and sharp, but the strips that were partially covered by others, partially faded, were unadhering. They only hung on by the weaving bits of skin that had wrinkled, hardened and grown around their hard edges, knitted together by the layers of flesh that created an unwieldy labyrinth of words and stuff of nightmares. Nightmare of labels end to end, labels overlapping, labels clustered, labels braided, labels twisted, labels overflowing.
It makes me shudder out involuntary gusts of chill through the air vents just thinking about it. Again please accept my apologies. I will have to get the technician to check my temperature gauge before I lose control.
And hopefully before I succumb to my nausea.
Wednesday 3 October 2007
So he said: two words, seven letters
Label me cinder. Label me lush. Label me mortal and pink. Label me blind flying, label me seven times soaring. Label me rolling in the grass pitch perfect, high above the mountain juices flowing. Let us stop time for yearn, stop time for linger, stop time for forming golden amorphous. Label! Labour! Love! Incline to inspire, inspire to recline, recline to delight. Prolong my amity, amnesty, adoration. Labour to unleash, unleash for me your animalistic aimless abandon and might.
Monday 1 October 2007
The label-maker II
The first time Bob had a thought for Doris too complicated to be expressed by a simple sticker, he was sixteen.
It was true that Doris had an uncanny ability to understand each of Bob’s sticker-thoughts – sometimes even when he didn’t – but this particular thought was more important than the meaning of his fragmented life combined. He considered and eliminated every sticker shape, every colour, every number, every size, every level of glossiness, even all the animals of the ark. He even tried to imagine where it would end up, thinking he might work backwards. He had seen the way Doris arrange his sticker-thoughts in groups and columns, patterns and rows, even shapes and piles, on the back of her yellowing doll. But no matter how hard he tried, he could not picture how this thought would blend into the labyrinth. Frustrated by weeks of fruitless pondering, he bought a roll of address labels instead.
Doris was reading on a park bench when Bob approached on nervous unsteady feet, wiping his sweaty palms on the front of his trousers. Instead of a greeting, he paused to write his thought on a strip of label in a slow and tender hand – it was, after all, the first time he exhibited his handwriting to her – then carefully wrapped the label diagonally around her fourth finger. Doris rolled her hand over and around three times to read what he had written: Two words, seven letters.
When Doris smiled, Bob instantly knew the exact position this label-thought would occupy on the back of her fading doll.
It was true that Doris had an uncanny ability to understand each of Bob’s sticker-thoughts – sometimes even when he didn’t – but this particular thought was more important than the meaning of his fragmented life combined. He considered and eliminated every sticker shape, every colour, every number, every size, every level of glossiness, even all the animals of the ark. He even tried to imagine where it would end up, thinking he might work backwards. He had seen the way Doris arrange his sticker-thoughts in groups and columns, patterns and rows, even shapes and piles, on the back of her yellowing doll. But no matter how hard he tried, he could not picture how this thought would blend into the labyrinth. Frustrated by weeks of fruitless pondering, he bought a roll of address labels instead.
Doris was reading on a park bench when Bob approached on nervous unsteady feet, wiping his sweaty palms on the front of his trousers. Instead of a greeting, he paused to write his thought on a strip of label in a slow and tender hand – it was, after all, the first time he exhibited his handwriting to her – then carefully wrapped the label diagonally around her fourth finger. Doris rolled her hand over and around three times to read what he had written: Two words, seven letters.
When Doris smiled, Bob instantly knew the exact position this label-thought would occupy on the back of her fading doll.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)