Monday 14 June 2010

Cold

He zones out pretty much with his head at this weird angle over the back of the leather chair. A sort of reverie - his teeth, the odd taste & the unaccustomed extra blood flow.

It's this story about ill prepared arctic explorers boiling up boots in melted snow, fading out into a tiny pinprick of nothing in some dreamy bed of ice and scurvy. The dogs might howl, if they hadn't all been eaten weeks ago.

Soon the explorers are all just so many little shards defrosting in the warm bellies of wolverine cubs, arctic foxes, or each other. It's night now and everything goes to sleep in caves or holes hollowed out of compacted snow. The paws of the mother fox twitch in her sleep as one of her babies hacks up some indigestible fragments of tweed and horn button, scratches and returns to sleep. Finished.

The story ends before whatever it is that's going on behind him does. One of the men says something derogatory about his feet. He's pretty sure that the soles of his feet have this covering - layers of dirt on dirt, compressed and shiny smooth like tar or really unsavoury lacquer or ... whatever.

Something tickles, something else stings.

A trickle of blood escapes from his nose & runs upwards, or downwards, towards his eye. He's about to wipe it away when he remembers that his hands are bound together behind his back. The knots are sort of loose and ineffectual but acknowledging this seems a particularly crass and discourteous thing.

Wearily he moves his head a little, as if to brush off the blood on the rough pelt of some sibling or other. Fragments of leather in his teeth & his paws twitch filthy in his sleep.

Finished.

7 comments:

  1. i got this image of sleep deprived guantanamo prisoner, looking for a 'happy place' only to find wolves and other creatures of the night. it's really good. good images.

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  2. Great writing as always. Even though i don't quite get where ur getting it. I'm not the one for subtle meanings, lol.

    Is someone dreaming? Which is the dream and which is reality?

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  3. hey thanks syreearmwellion - fuck i typed that right without checking - curious you got that impression, the intention was way more ... domestic or something? & wolverines pretty much are my 'happy' place. thanks for the chemistry too.

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  4. nerstes! I said before maybe you should blame my lack of clarity rather than your lack of insight - or something. explanations are for losers but I want to if you give me an email address x

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  5. Hey.

    'Cold': The switch and blend between human and wolf is really remarkable. Sometimes they switch before the reader (or me anyway) knows, as is the writing's wish, I'm imagining, and by the time the change clear, it's too late: so there's this kind of double exposure, this constant eating and regurgitation, and the two actions become indistinguishable, and it's like reading a single story with two different casts, human and animal simultaneously. Pretty amazing. The way you used 'finished' is great, very effective. Yeah, very strong piece. And I think the lush, run-on, delirious prose you've been working with lately hasn't been more effective than it is here. I think your grip on it is an ever more refined one, and it's beginning to be able to do a lot of interesting things quite seamlessly.

    'Hot Dog Man': Again, very good. Really like how 'broken' and broken up it is. Love the story's gradual transition into the exchange. Love the dialogue's relationship to the swirly, violent surroundings. That relationship is simple but very evasive too. The clapping motif is a beauty. The 'reveal' of the children. The whole thing has this great poisoned and harsh fairy tale quality. Do you know Agota Kristof's 'The Book of Lies' or Robert Pinget's 'Fable'. They're both huge faves of mine, very recommended, and It reminded me of them although its independence from them is clear too. So, what were your concerns with this piece? Other than maybe a very few slightly stiff few phrases that I didn't even notice enough to suggest they should be changed, I don't see problems here, but perhaps you're trying for something in particular that you don't feel you've achieved, and that particular goal is unknown to me? Anyway, great respect for now. Like I said, I look forward to when we can sit down sometime and and talk about your writing in a full way. Take care, man.

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  6. Changeling,
    I'm a loser for asking explanations. Or for not understanding the artistic intentions behind the piece, or any piece that just doesn't s-p-e-l-l it out for me. It makes me laugh, and feel rather stupid because, I mean, obviously, some brighter than me people get the artistry (see above, oh Dennis!); I just know I like sth but can never be so accurate about it. not tthat i know anything about the effectiveness of language or how anyone can achieve that. It just amazes me, it awes me that some artists can be so surgically precise about how to achieve what they wanna achieve. Is it a matter of erudition, or instict, or talent? Are you aware of all these things that DC has pinpointed in your writing? Do u know which words are effective and to what degree and place? I'm just asking, cos i'm always just shooting in the dark, blind, unaware, deaf, my pen just spitting words which might or might not find their destination. I hope you realize i'm saying all these with the greatest admiration, awe and respect of your work, and with only a slight pang of wistfulness and jealousy. I'm being 100% honest with you. I'd give my left hand for a comment from DC in my blog, lol, re: my writing, i'd just throw a party and crack open a champagne.You deserve the attention and i think it totally says sth (great) about your writing.
    My e-mail address is: orestes.gr.m@gmail.com and i would love to hear from you for whatever reason. I enjoy our conversations, and u def make me wanna be a better writer.

    Take care!
    L.

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  7. Okay, this is just depressing. Beginning to know what you mean, Nerstes. I look at what I try to write by comparison and see that it's just what it is: the pseudo-arted-up diary of child who doesn't know shit.

    About the story, yeah, what Mr. Cooper said. Even the stuff I didn't even understand. I'm sure he knows what he's talking about.

    Acually, I loved the story. No idea who he is or why his head is at that weird angle (you did that again in the shave piece, you like weird head angles, huh), but I loved the piece about his soles. Prob just projecting myself onto the piece but made it easy to identify with him. Hell, the whole arctic setting did. And I loved the bit about the discurtesy of freeing yourself from bonds. I feel different though: Someone tries to tie me up and only does a half-arsed job, I get totally pissed off. Like they don't take me serious or what? (But then it doesn't take much to get me totally pissed off, lol.)

    So, yeah, kudos. Great fucking work. I hate you.

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