The Photograph over the River Seine

The Photograph had been taken mid way across the Point des Arts.

Steven had been in Paris for almost three months now and was getting absolutely nothing from the experience. He had met no-one and had immersed himself in none of the cultural activity that he intended to. What unnerved him most was the sense of being left behind, of having missed out. He struggled to reconcile the photos of Miller and Durrell, or of Artaud and Breton that had emblazoned his bedroom walls during his teenage years with the city he now saw built up around him. He had slipped into the dusty footprint of another era finding it to be oversized and outdated.

More importantly he had written nothing. He never had in fact. the closest he came to truly feeling like a 'writer' was when he stumbled upon a second hand copy of Saul Bellow's 'Dangling Man' in an English bookstore near the river. He had hurried there hoping for solidarity, hoping that it would be peopled with other disenfranchised 'would be' writers. Instead he had found himself amongst a handful of confident American students whose French was far more fluent than his. They had tossed books to one another loudly discussing their content in a way that made him feel that he had stumbled into a literary circus. He climbed the stairs to the top floor where he had been told writers, down on their luck can find a place to crash, to gather their thoughts. Here the show was more grotesque than downstairs. His heart beat at the back of his throat. Whether he was being led through the city by the ghost of failures past or future he couldn't tell.

On the Pont des Arts he paused to look out across the Seine. The light was just beginning to dim now, the tourist boats pulling away from Pont Neuf were now draped in fairy lights, so that they seemed as haloed shadows. Steven watched the boats turn and glide toward him. He realised that he would be able to look down between the gaps in the bridge's wooden planks, that the lights would flow beneath him.

Last week he had received a frenzied phone call from his Mother asking what he hoped to achieve in Paris, why he didn't have a job. He found that he focused on the the tone of her words more than the exact details of what was said. That afternoon, wanting to feel close to other people, he had walked along the river toward the Trocadero and two quite unexpected images had pierced him, bringing him to the edge of tears. As he moved between the groups of North African men selling miniature Eiffel tower statues, he saw a small girl, perhaps three years old, chasing a pigeon. At no point did she come close to catching it, but as she ran she screamed with delight. It was a silly thing to take notice of but it suddenly made everything seem so unreal. He looked at the people around him. He tried to imagine the girl at seventeen or eighteen years old, being asked to attend interviews, to justify her 'passions'. It terrified him. Later, a tourist bus passed him on the rue de New York and he saw the same look of delight on the faces of adults peering from the windows. He realized then that writing was his pigeon as much as Paris was theirs.

He could hear the muffled tones of the boat's tour guide as it approached his bridge. The kush of the engine as it splashed amongst the waves grew louder and drowned the guide's voice so that only odd words could be heard, bubbling to the surface here and there. He heard 'Ile de Saint Louis'. Along the length of the Ile, giant posters of eyes had been pasted. Eyes looking back to meet those of the tourist. Some of the eyes were peeling away but he couldn't say whether this was the result of bad weather or the hands of angry Parisians.

As the boat pulled beneath him he saw faces looking up excitedly. He made eye contact with a fat man in a red wind breaker and the man smiled. As he looked up and back out across the river he was aware of a camera flash exploding to his left. He turned and a middle aged women beamed at him, motioning with her hands that she spoke no French. She moved further along the bridge scouring the crowd with her finger poised and ready to shoot. With his pea coat, cigarette, and beret, Steven realised that he must have seemed to her the quintessential French man of letters - Gazing out into the night, awaiting a flood of inspiration to wash over him.

The End

All his life Arthuro had been an accountant. He had a few friends with whom he drank a port or two after work, every night, on office days. They met at the cafe on the corner in the Barrio Alto. At the cafe there was room for four small tables, each with two chairs, while outside stood a table for four under a lemon tree. But this did not matter, for Arthuro had no more than three friends. The friends joked that there was not another friend because he would not have fitted at the table, while they laughed at their common jest. In the weekend however, Arthuro stayed home, he told his friends that he was writing. On Monday evening his friends asked what it was he had been writing on over the weekend, but Arthuro never said more than his usual reply: ‘oh, nothing. What do you drink?’ to which his friends would reply: ‘Port Arthuro, as always,’ and no one remembered that they had asked about his writing.
One day Arthuro stopped visiting his friends at the cafe. The next day his friends heard he had died in his sleep two nights ago. When they attended the wake, Arthuro’s son showed them a thick packet of papers, a manuscript of more than five hundred pages.
‘Look, this is what my father has worked on all his life. I remember, he was writing on it when I was still a child. Did he ever talk about it to you?’
‘Well yes, of course. We knew he was writing every weekend, as he was not at the cafe. But he never said what it was about.’
‘Did you read it?’ the three friends asked, naturally curious of course.
‘Yes, yes, it’s a travel adventure about four men, each living in a different capital of a different continent of the world.’
‘One friend, Tomas, lives in New York City.’
Tomas nodded.
‘Another, Vasco, lives in Paris.’
Vasco frowned.
‘And a third, Antonio, lives in Hong Kong.’
Antonio said nothing.
‘The four are brothers who know nothing about each other's lives, but they are all looking for their unknown father, a sailor named Arthuro.’
‘How does it end?’ the friends simultaneously asked.
‘It doesn’t!’ the son replied.
‘The last hundred pages are not there. There should be another hundred pages because the story abruptly ends and skips to a final and empty page, numbered a hundred pages higher. I was hoping that you would know about it. Perhaps he gave the missing pages to someone to read.’ The son looked hopeful at the three men.
The friends sighed and shook their heads with regret.
After the wake the three men went to the cafe on the corner in the Barrio Alto, sat down at their regular spots, and ordered a port.

Found Object: Postcard fom Guildford

FRONT

A wash of acidic blue. A blue that makes you think of lemons. The white of the clouds - burnt to life or as if the paper has been slowly eaten away, the ink and card at war with one another.

The castle is small, boxlike and acne scarred. It stands proud but broken, its flag as one last cry against the wind. Young trees scale its walls and seem to laugh.

What is the thin fragile fence that hugs the hill beneath it? What does it protect against?

Three men frozen in time, their faces hidden. One looks down, another gazes at his watch, the third stands with his back toward us. How small they are. How easily they could be lost.

BACK

Dear Cindy

I don't know whether you got my last letter or not but I thought I'd better write just incase you didn't get it. You might notice by my address or if you heard from Stella I decided to go back in the army and it's really great this time. I'm in for Postal and Courier so I might be going to Germany after my basic training but that isn't for a while yet. In fact I'm wanting to go to Northern Ireland, I feel that I'm needed there. Well I'll finish now, I'll write a propper letter when I have time meanwhile I hope this will do.

Love

Lavinia

-------------



THE LONDON CHRONICLE

Vienna - Jan 19, 1899
Today being the thirtieth anniversary of the birth of the postcard, its inventor, Dr. Emanuel Hermann, Professor at the Vienna Technical Institute, has received congratulations from all parts of the world. Dr. Hermann's first article suggesting the introduction of the postcard appeared in the Neue Frele Presse of Jan 26, 1869., Six months later Austria adopted the proposal, and all the other States followed its example.

Landscape 1: Puppy Love

I gulped down the last bottom of my glass of strong black wine, the local Homeric variation of home brewed wine on the island, and payed the bill, three Euro. I imagined to put down three silver drachma pieces. Would it not be better to still pay in ancient coinage? It is a wishful make-believe that everyone shared. It was night, the constellations guided my way home. The sky, the air, the tree and the road, everything was covered in pitch darkness. But in heaven the stars shone brighter than I ever saw before. I searched for Big Dipper and recognized its handle, the straight cup shape in the sky. The black blanket of night was pierced with flickering holes, a full view of curious eyes that spy on us. I walked up the hill, crossed the bend in the road and passed the trash bins. My eye fell on a carton box and the speckled white puppy head peeking over the edge.

Sarcophaga (Flesh Eater)

Most flesh flies are respectable eaters of carrion, but some have fallen to a state of resorting to feces. The sarcophage of this specie of flies stands not at the end of its life, as we humans might believe to be the proper custom, but at its beginning. The cradle of the flesh fly is a piece of rotting flesh or dried excrement, such is the humble start of its toddlers. The larva are verocious, eating their way into or out of anything edible. The womb of their conception literally a crime scene in which these murderous creatures find a home. They are carriers of common illness for man. It can hardly be a surprise that the fates of man and flesh fly meet.

Memory of an Imagined Dinner Party

I am on the corner of Prince and Mott when I call Roberto Bolano. They have set up a market in front of me and people are trying on hats, stepping back to admire themselves in a mirror propped against the church wall.

He answers just as I think the line will cut off. Roberto, I say, It's Tom. Ok he says. What time is it, I ask. 1973 he says. Listen I'm having a party, I'd love you to be there. Give me the where and when he says. Le Dome cafe in Paris I say, 1931. I hear him flicking through the pages of a diary. Ok but I'm bringing Mario. His voice clicks to silence.

I hadn't expected Mario, but I think it will be ok. I try to map out a quick seating plan. I'll head the table, and then clockwise from me: Roberto Bolano, Mario Santiago, Vsevolod Garshin, Henry Miller, and Arthur Rimbaud. We'll have to push a couple of tables together.

I arrive a little early, around December 1930 and making myself comfy at a table near the entrance, order a glass of Stella.

Garshin is the first to arrive. I see him trudging slowly toward the cafe, his hands behind his back, his eyes scouring the pavement. I wave him over and he turns to look behind as if I must want someone else. He joins me and orders a vodka. We sit in silence a while. I start the conversation badly. I explain that I've only read one or two of his stories but that I love his portrait at the MET. That's not my work he says, if you wanted to discuss art you should have invited Repin. I nod thoughtfully. An awkward silence falls. Miller arrives just in time to break it. He stumbles over a table close to us, sending it's contents flying into the street. Are you drunk? Garshin asks, but I see his eyes are alight. No, no says Miller gesturing apologetically to a waiter, well yes but only on air, on water don't you know. I can get drunk on water alone. Watch this. He takes a glass from a neighboring table, downs it in one and promptly falls to the floor.

Poetry is being shouted from somewhere. We look up. Poetry in Spanish. I see a man stood on a chair at the far end of the terrace. Long unwashed hair, arms waving. Bolano I call. Bolano, Garshin echoes. The young Chilean poet leaps from the chair and slouches towards us. Santiago is close behind. We shake hands and take our seats. Where's Rimbaud? Miller asks. I was keen to see him don't you know. He's late. We decide to order without him. Garshin and I choose fish, Miller picks out a steak dish. Bolano orders a bottle of whiskey. Miller, not to be outdone, orders a pitcher of tap water.

The meal begins well. We make small talk, we toast each other. We edge toward dessert and Rimbaud still doesn't show. It's a shame says Bolano, I'd have liked to have seen him. You should have invited Wilde Mario says shaking his head. Someone decides to call him. I have his number here somewhere says Miller rummaging through his jacket pockets. Santiago becomes very animated at this. Call him! Miller hands me a piece of paper with a number scrawled across it and I go inside to make the call.

It rings twice before a very thin and weary voice answers. Oscar? I whisper. Yes dear boy. I'm so sorry, is it late? He sighs. Yes I'm afraid so, at least 1897. I'll be stuck in this frightful place a while, there's simply no way for me to join you. I wish him well and hang up, a little sad at the news. When I return to the terrace all hell has broken loose. Gogol's Nose, out for a stroll along the Avenue de la Bourdonnais, spotted Garshin and has now joined us. The two have ordered a bottle of Vodka and are proceeding to dismiss Bolano and Santiago as frauds. What do you know about art? I hear Bolano scream, magic realism is the fraud, this nose is the fake. The nose seems offended. He explains that he is not the nose from the story but Gogol's actual nose, out to catch the air and relax a little. Therefore I'm real he yells. Where's the magic in that? Santiago upturns the table and the two South American poets disappear into the night. Miller is laughing. Garshin excuses himself and goes inside. Gogol's nose shrugs. I ask for the check. Miller overhears and says, give me two minutes, I must take a leak don't you know. After twenty minutes I decide they're not coming back. The nose agrees. I ask him if he has any money on him. He pretends to search his pockets. Well er, I really only had two shots of vodka, we're not splitting the bill equally are we? It hardly seems fair. I tell him to forget it. He tips his hat and hurries back out onto the street.

The following evening I receive a call from Rimbaud. Where the bloody hell are you? He says. Where am I? The Dinner was yesterday Arthur. What? Didn't we say Thursday evening? No Arthur, we said Wednesday. Oh for Christ sake. The line goes dead.

The Flood of the Mountain

The glass pane shudders in the wooden frame as the ripples of a sound wave hit the windows. The explosion in the clouds closely above speeds through the air. Thunder for the human soul that is shaken in the blast. The clouds are so thick and dark that I do not see the flash of lightning that announces it. I humbly shiver, my head pivoting on the thin needle of the vertebra, is shaken, my shoulders cramp toward my ears. Inferior is the brain here. Hail is released from the same clouds that are fog, that are air, that are rain, that are wind, the gods icy breath. The rain rattles the earth, the concrete ceiling of my house, the walls are drenched with water seeping through the invisible cracks, saturating the walls, within minutes water penetrates the cement. The light bulbs flicker, then, they too, give way. The hail stones hit the ground so fast, they jump up capriciously in unpredictable direction, hit the glass, hit the stone, while the rain, still, pouring, flooding. The houses of the village are gone, the sea and the horizon have disappeared, all absorbed, gorged by the hellish bright fog of the heavens flood. The mountain is washed from the earth canvas. Three nights and three days, every hour seem to last. I offer an incense of strawberry wood and olive branches, kindle the flames of the fire that stirred quietly before me. My only solace, my single hope, rose into the damp atmosphere of the chimney. On the crown of the mountain, it is not the sea that I fear, it is the heaven, broken open above, the sky of the mountain Ziggurat.

Cityscape 1: New York

1.

A Hush of wind.

Birdsong dying away, then rising again to answer distant crying horns.

The whine of brakes or the sigh of an unseen animal.

2.

A group of men stand outside the Catholic Worker on East 1st Street. Smiling, one singles out another, "Don't talk to this man. He's a lowlife." The men laugh and punch each other playfully. "This man's a lowlife son." The repeated joke causes silence. Was it a joke? I pass through as they search each other's eyes for an answer.

3.



"Where are the cafes with only three small tables, and tottering chairs? This is Gulliver's country. But I, who love human scale, small objects, small intimate cities, small trains, small cars, small restaurants, small concert halls, do not respond to giant scales."
Diary of Anais Nin, Volume 3, p. 12. Publisher: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich

4.

A sign at the Bowery Poetry Club reads:

'Rob's Word Store: Letters 50 Cents, Words 1 Dollar.'

5.

A street called 'Extra Place', once the service entrance to CBGB's. New apartment buildings tower on either side. Construction workers noisily remove the sidewalk close by, sending plooms of dust into the air. A small hand written note taped to a window directs people to a bespoke chocolate store, three doors down the alley.

Life Re-Created

Synthetic Genome Brings New Life to Bacterium

I have no father. I have no mother. But I am not an orphan. Technically speaking, my mother is a petri dish and cow, my genetic parent is a computer program at Vita Novis. Practically, my father is a lawyer and my mother a pediatric. I grew up with the people who ordered me, in a family like any other, and received all the love a child is supposed to. My classmates behave awfully immature and call me names. I cannot really blame them, they are only biologically human, some not only are mentally mediocre as a result of their innate dispositions, but suffer from horrible genetic diseases and shortcomings. I can only imagine the torment from such traditional state. Their parents must haves been awfully narcissistic and selfish, to want to pass all the flaws and mutations of their seed on to their children.

Rivers of the Underground: Acheron

I crossed the river of pain. Some say it heals, for only when one passes Acheron, will one no longer fear the flesh of the body. Tightly clenched in my fist, I still hold the coin. This is the realm of the spirit, where I hold angels dear. For many this is the realm of death, where they feel nothing anymore, know nothing. This is a time to greet, for joy, for welcome. The water is a stream that nourishes the dead who only sense emptiness, they, Lazarus, pray like baboons. But I fear not, no need to fall on my knees. I do not shiver, but frivol. Those who think of death as life, those who fear, they pay a price when they cross, they cannot return. But to me, death is in life, with the spirit in which I joy resurrected.