Homo Sacer

The city lights received no power. The unaccustomed stars appeared, as though late for a casting call. The storm had blown through, and in its wake the severed power lines cackled in the saturated ground, or sent currents uselessly into puddles. An electric green light arced between the disconnected utility poles, fogging the vanishing point above the road leading into the city. Driving slow through the tree limbs, I occasionally had to stop the truck and drag debris to the roadside in order to continue home. It was not so much the silence that estranged me from my city, nor the lack of light, but the sound of conversation through the thick insect song and the red balls of cigarette embers glowing hot on the distant porches.

agency

it’s not voluntary,
the salve dissolves too
quickly
soaks in the blood stained napkin.
to be pressed in a book.
to remember.
leaves lose color in spite
of trying to keep them. then
become flat colors of resentment.

i want to mold and mulch,
open my mouth and wait
for beetles to scent
the mouth stays wet
and where I was hit
bruises plume to surface
under command of spreading foliage
an exhaling end
of the corporeal
season.

your flesh
a pillow for my pressed thumb.
your mouth
my salve that i keep wet.

every word an anchor
thrown out in iron links
slit by my teeth.

the world recoils
so the sounds don’t make sense
and never hit bottom.



it’s not voluntary.

kenneth, what is the frequency?

isn’t your girlfriend getting married today?
yes she is
aren’t you going to go?
i’ve already gone.
she’s married already?
no.
did she run off?
no. the ceremony’s at six.
samjay knew april had no future. her father was a cast iron and her mother was a foot. april was pure twine and her fiancé was named buster. when samjay brought april home for the first time, his parents took turns trying to lace themselves with her. april’s mother could fit perfectly into each of samjay’s parents. samjay’s parents were both right soled shoes. susan’s father stayed home in the fire. there was no water in auckland.



how can you have already been there if it hasn’t happened yet?
happening is not a place.
to my right time jumps an hour at a time. to my left it drops an hour. the distances per hour are not equidistant. for instance, april’s house is always an hour behind samjay’s house. the wedding is always ahead one hour of whatever time it is at any given moment in this story.

samjay’s parents owned a dry cleaning business, for which samjay was a proud product. susan worked there. she looked down from the pole and told samjay,
remember daylight savings tonight.
tonight? fall back?
yep. one hour.
already?
it’s the first year of that bill that passed.
it’s tonight, not last night?
i don’t know.
oh god.



samjay’s parents could catch glimpses of each other between the footsteps of their walkers. but the sound of so many other shoes and pitiful shoeless feet, making contact with the ground, then lifting again, made it impossible for them to communicate. finally, after a solid city block, they caught up together and spoke, though they were visually obstructed by Mr. Johnson’s left shoe. it sounded like the electronic drumbeat of the street signal for the blind or leather stretching, or even the sound of your own footsteps after you’ve stopped walking; not because some metaphysical self continues after you stop, but because your mind expects something even after your body stops and assumes the continuation for you. Mr. and Mr. Johnson stepped into crossing traffic and were killed. all plans were cancelled and samjay’s bloodstained parents are for sale in a thriftstore.

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The Always Hung Jury

"...do not cede upon your desire..."



the action expresses possibility. not from the moment of enactment nor from tension of near finality, are we included.



the observer of the visual field captures the world mid-flight.





the witness embarks upon an eternal mistrial.



the narratives of the world outside our direct experience shut down possibility. understanding is violence. placing a plot is not the job of the bondsman. the always mistaken jury.