What is it ‘they’ say? “Home is where the work is?” Or is it “heart?” – “Heart is where the work is.” I am not sure; and it doesn’t matter, I suppose.

I sit at home and read and try to make sense of things in my head: subject, object, realism, dialectic, materialism, historical contingency, natural necessity. How do I explain all these without confusing myself and ‘them.’

What is it ‘they’ say?

And as I read and stack information in my head my mind starts to race and my heart starts to beat faster. So I try to walk away. But everything around me is information: images sounds textures. And my mind continues to race. And my heart beats faster.

Maybe if I read: “He who makes a beast of himself gets rid of the pain of being a man.” Johnson in Thompson in me.

Maybe if I masturbate I’ll get rid of the panic. At the end of a disgusting frenzy, calm? Quiet? No. Just more information. Sight sound texture smell.

My right eyelid twitches and I ask it to stop, but it just taunts me with a wink or two. As if to say, “…” – I don’t know; it’s nonverbal.

The feel of the keys on my keyboard on my fingers does nothing to assuage my feeling of panic. “No point mentioning the bats, I thought. The poor bastard will see them soon enough.”

But I mention the bats.

My right eyelid twitches and I resign myself to the frenzy.

The truth, here, is discursive, not literal.

That reminds me of a story once told by Harland Williams to a group of people assembled somewhere east of here, a story that takes place on a chilly autumn day, when he was sitting at home; and just as he – making himself comfortable on his old, worn-out couch in front of his old television set – just as he slit his vein with an old-fashioned razor blade, so shiny and new, just as blood started to pour out of him, slow like molasses on a chilly autumn day, he noticed some movies he had forgotten to return to the video store. What a bummer.

Sew sew sew. Quickly, before both the big and the little arm are on twelve. Or else: late fees.

Life, at times, is nothing but avoidance of late fees.

I think it was Nash, not the old one but new,
The one for whom e would quite simply not do,
I think it was he, from that York always New,
That said it best, that said it quite true:

In Toronto there lived a boy.
He wasn’t anybody’s joy.
Although his name was Jabez Dawes,
His character was full of flaws.

And although Jabez, with his gut so puh-lump
Kissed little babies when he noticed a slump,
He never was so quick to skedaddle
As when people of colours showed up with a paddle.

If that little fat sprite truly is Jabez Dawes,
Then Père Noël is my name, I’m a kitty with claws.
And when winter’s sun shines on that sprite that likes spin,
From behind that plump face an ogre’s will grin.

But fear not, good folk, ’tis no ogre we fear,
Look closer, smell careful, ’tis but stale reek of beer.
I sympathize fully, last year you were rash,
Four years will soon pass, then remember Og Nash:

From grimy feet to grimy locks,
Jabez became a Jack-in-the-box,
An ugly toy with springs unsprung,
Forever sticking out his tongue.
The neighbors heard his mournful squeal;
They searched for him, but not with zeal.
No trace was found of Jabez Dawes,
Which led to thunderous applause,
And people drank a loving cup
And went and hung their stockings up.

It is a period of civil war. Rebel spaceships, striking from a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire. During the battle, Rebel spies managed to steal secret plans to the Empire’s ultimate weapon, the DEATH STAR, an armoured space station with enough power to destroy an entire planet. Pursued by the Empire’s sinister agents, Princess Leia races home aboard her starship, custodian of the stolen plans that can save her people and restore freedom to the galaxy…

It’s what comes after that changes.

The Nemesis and I have moved into a new place. She is still the same, I am still the same, but the setting is different. Which means that everything is different. I work when I can and she works. The relative worth of individual players has not changed. But the setting is different; which means that everything is.             Different.

The home is no longer a house: it is an apartment. There is no more an eternal grotto to hide in; the light of day seemingly constantly streams through our wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling windows. Unlike her plants, I do not thrive in such conditions. There is nowhere to hide — I am always visible.

“What connection can there be,” she says as she walks into our room, momentarily darkened by heavy curtains, her hands hidden behind her back, “What connection can there be between the place in Lincolnshire, the house in town, the Mercury in powder, and the whereabout of Jo the outlaw with the broom, who had that distant ray of light upon him when he swept the churchyard-step? What connection can there have been between many people in the innumerable histories of this world who from opposite sides of great gulfs have, nevertheless, been very curiously brought together?”

“I don’t know,” I reply. “Thackeray?”

“Close,” she says.

“Not Dickens?”

“Ah, sharp as always; on second try.”

“I knew I should have gone for the obvious.”

She sits and pulls a book from behind her back. “I spent the last ten minutes memorizing that paragraph.”

“But you hate memorizing,” I say.

“Indeed I do; except when I want to prove something.” She pauses, looking at me, teasing. “But as of now, I shall do no such thing. From now on, I simply read:

Jo sweeps his crossing all day long, unconscious of the link, if any link there be. He sums up his mental condition when asked a question by replying that he “don’t know nothink.” He knows that it’s hard to keep the mud off the crossing in dirty weather, and harder still to live by doing it. Nobody taught him even that much; he found it out.

Jo lives—that is to say, Jo has not yet died—in a ruinous place known to the like of him by the name of Tom-all-Alone’s. It is a black, dilapidated street, avoided by all decent people, where the crazy houses were seized upon, when their decay was far advanced, by some bold vagrants who after establishing their own possession took to letting them out in lodgings. Now, these tumbling tenements contain, by night, a swarm of misery. As on the ruined human wretch vermin parasites appear, so these ruined shelters have bred a crowd of foul existence that crawls in and out of gaps in walls and boards; and coils itself to sleep, in maggot numbers, where the rain drips in; and comes and goes, fetching and carrying fever and sowing more evil in its every footprint than Lord Coodle, and Sir Thomas Doodle, and the Duke of Foodle, and all the fine gentlemen in office, down to Zoodle, shall set right in five hundred years—though born expressly to do it.”

“Oh, that Dickens,” I say. “Master of the eternal: Lord of the unchanging: Hero of the universal.”

She scoffs — and I am slightly injured.

There’s no tennis today, so we’ll find very little to bond over.

McGuinty’s a bum.

e-Health.

Obama’s proving useless.

The Senate.

Wall Street.

The bailout.

I live in a world with no rooms.

…

Am I Krazy? And the world? Ignatz? And who are you?

I am not my brother’s keeper.

Nemesis, in her own form, approached me yesterday and offered me life everlasting through a sexual communion with a dove.  ”God dwells here,” she said, and smirked.  ”God dwells here.”  And her fingers slid into her panties.

I was afraid.

She licked my ear lobe and hissed, “Don’t you want life everlasting?  Don’t you want to spend eternity with me?”

And I shivered.  With delight.  Heavenly delight.

“Take it,” she said as she offered the object in her hand to me.  ”We both know you want it.  And then, life everlasting.  In my presence.”

She was beautiful.  She is beautiful.  I so want to live forever.

But I am not my brother’s keeper.

On the palm of her hand stands my brother.  He is meek, merciful, and pure of heart.  He is beautiful.  He is smiling at me.  The Nemesis is smiling at me.  They are both angels.  I, however, am a creature of muck.  Of dirt and dung.

“He needs your protection.  I need your protection,” she says.

And at that moment I am suspicious.  She never needs protection.  Is she fucking with me?

“Be good to your brother,” she says.  ”Be good to me.”

I consider my options.

And then, in a predictable fashion, I reach out for my brother, and I take him in my hand.  I grasp his head between my thumb and index finger and I squeeze, lightly at first, and then slowly increasing the pressure until – pop – his head ruptures like a grape and whatever was inside it forms a sticky substance on my fingers and my face.  I smile.

“How fucking predictable,” she smiles restraining her anger.

And then she punches me, breaking my nose, and leaving me on the floor, bleeding.  She walks away silently, without a word.

She is beautiful.  She was beautiful.

I wake up early in the morning, on one particular Monday, and the thoughts in my head race the moment my eyes open.  I am not my brother’s keeper.  My nose aches.  ”Fuck,” I think, “That’s gonna leave a mark.”

“Come ‘ere, fat boy,” she coos, and for some reason I think of my zombie-obsessed friend; but it’s only a momentary lapse of attention.  Her body draws my focus and I forget to blink; my eyes get dry quickly and start to tear up.  ”Don’t cry.  I was just kidding.  You ain’t fat.  Come ‘ere.”

I move slowly towards her and she hugs me close to her, breathing into my face, her coffee-breath reminding me of the smell of dog feces.  Her chest is pushed up against me and I quickly push her away, wiping the tears from my eyes.

“You ain’t fat.  You’re just big —”

“Fuck off,” I interject.  ”I know I am not fat.  And it doesn’t matter, anyways, Margaret,” I say emulating Dennis the Menace, “because I am happy.”  She recognizes the reference – of course she does; she always does – and assumes the role quickly, without blinking an eyelash.

Grabbing me by the nose, “Tough kitty-paws,” she ejaculates and drags me to the ground.  I sit down docilely and smile.  And she sits next to me.  Slowly, she lays me down on the floor, and takes her place next to me.

“Would you have ever imagined, when we just met, that this would be us, so many years later?  Thirsty for one another?”  She slips her hand into my pants and starts stroking me slowly.  My eyes are closed and she breathes into my ear.  I smell a faint odour of dog feces again.  ”Hungry for each others’ bodies?”

My mind tries to wander, but her body grabs it firmly and will not let go.  ”Would you have ever imagined?” she coos, and once again, my mind starts to slip away, but her tongue finds its way into my ear and, penetrating my skull and my brain, refocuses my attention.  She kisses me and I shed a tear.  My eyes are not dry this time.

She is wearing only a skirt, no panties, so it’s relatively easy for her to get on top of me, pull me out of my pants, and slip me inside her.  I moan quietly, and she smiles a devilish grin.  ”You’re all body now, aren’t you?  And you hate it!  Let loose, for fuck’s sake,” she orders me.  And I obey, for my own benefit.  And a Jethro Tull song plays in my head, but only for a second.  Sliding off of me, she slips me into her mouth, quietly whispering, “Tastes good,” and I am all body.  And all I can do is laugh.  Rejuvenated.  I am all body.

After it’s over, she moves away from me with aged grace.  But her body shows only the latter.  Nailed to the floor, I lie with my pants around my ankles, a ridiculous image for curious eyes.  I hear the water running in the bathroom and my body sings a song,

Hello you straight-laced lady,
dressed in white but your shoes aren’t clean.
Painted them up with polish
in the hope we can’t see where you’ve been.
The smiling face that you’ve worn
to greet me rising at morning —
sent me out to work for my score.
Please me and say what it’s for.
Give me the straight-laced promise
and not the pathetic lie.

Tie me down with your ribbons
and sulk when I ask you why.
Your Sunday paper voice cries
demanding truths I deny.
The bitter-sweet kiss you pretended
is offered, our affair mended.
Sossity: You’re a woman.
Society: You’re a woman.

All of the tears you’re wasting
are for yourself and not for me.
It’s sad to know you’re aging
Sadder still to admit I’m free.
Your immature physical toy has grown,
too young to enjoy at last your straight-laced agreement:
woman, you were too old for me.
Sossity: You’re a woman.
Society: You’re a woman.

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