Are we going to be
remembered? And who do I mean by we? I like it when people ask what kind of
animal I’d like to be. Because I’m already an animal. I’ve got eight legs, a
public address system, and a mustache like Groucho Marx. Therefore, I’m
qualified to raise worms. On a worm ranch. In Wormely, Hertfordshire, Sussex.
That’s correct. I’m a rootin-tootin-wormboy and this is a wide-open prairie. At
least until I fill it with words. And give an address on a public address
system. Because I’m an animal. It’s what animals do. We stick together and sing
songs and ring bells. We pick out cards for birthdays and Christmas. We lift
boxes and squirt DNA at sadly pummeled walls. We forgive our faux pas with
silence and rumination. We offer our hands when a hand is necessary and the
theater is full of applause. We ponder swamps with inquietude and philosophy.
We go down rivers in inflatable narrations. We gird our loins and walk into the
fog of city council meetings and parliamentary debates. We shine a light into
the dark. We write books. We make movies. We wipe the splatter of soap from our
mirrors. And wonder who belongs to the face looking back at us from the other
side. The other side of what? The other side of ourselves. Which is a stew of
whoever. And smells like teen spirit. And lavender and percussion and wine. And
Keith Richards at 48.
Writers, said Anthony
Burgess on a TV talk show, are people who can’t do anything else. I find that
relatable. Debatable, yes, but also inflatable. I can inflate this distinction
into an inflatable dinghy. Don’t ask me to fix the flush valve on a toilet.
Wait on tables. Install an electrical panel. Manage livestock. Sell hot dogs at
a sports event. Don’t. Can’t do it. Here’s what I can do: put words together.
It’s not really the kind of skill you learn in a high school workshop. It’s not
like working on cars. Though it is, a bit, when you think about it. William
Carlos Wiliams referred to poetry as a small (or large) machine made of words.
I find that relatable, as well. And lacrimal and affable because why the hell
not. It’s not a bad life. Not if there’s a literate public around with a few
extra bucks to buy a book and a few extra minutes to read it. We don’t have
that luxury now. I’m more like a horticulturist of rare tropical flowers. I
press a word into the soil of my brain and wait for it crack open and blossom
into a caterwaul, or a lopsided mechanical discharge of smoke and mirrors and a
chorus of sexy predicates creating grammar.
I generally trade in things I can't actually own, which makes everything vague and Mallarméan. It’s not a strategy calculated to draw a big audience. It's more like what happens when things splatter while roasting a heartache a bit too close to the window. The idea isn't to love it; the idea is to create pearls and flywheels through observation. To ensure everything works smoothly by the time the jewelry is finished. If my calculations are correct, the cat should be wagging her tail by now. It’s always promising when something alive happens in a sentence. The lights go on, the radio murmurs something cool and sad in the background, and a certain faint pulse begins to make the syllables wiggle into place and start blinking on and off. If I’m ever visited by an apparition imbued with depth, I mark the occasion with a blue ribbon tied to a bone at the end of the sentence. The image helps me find a radio station tattooed to my forehead like a jar of mustard, and if it enables me to see stars I know there is a redemption among my pleasures. This is how writing enables itself now. It bends the air into clothing, which is revealed in dance and exhilaration. There’s a universe in my sock that nobody has seen, and if sheer necessity unites this discrepancy in a net of syllables, the mind shoves it about until it becomes an anatomy of skin and defiance, and the results are witnessed as quail.
