Monday, June 15, 2009

Loam

The last I heard from Zillmann was a few months ago. He was writing mad poetry about Mars and working in a plant nursery. We spoke recently and he said he has been digging his hands in the fresh loam. I told him it was vile to say such a phrase, but he insisted the loam is where his hands have been. I countered by telling him that if I ever bothered to find out what the hell loam is, I may congratulate him on his loam. But for now I will keep my eyes set upon this bloated dog on the sunny side of the road hoping that Zillmann will keep his loamy hands to himself.
Been on this bus for too long. Somewhere between Only God Knows Where and a Borracharia. I feel all these people have a right to be on this bus because they need to be on this bus. They need to be somewhere, and hopefully soon. Maybe it's work. Or maybe family. But it's important for them to get there.
I have nowhere to be. And I tell myself that is a good thing. Some kind of Buddhist load of shit about not being owned by material obligations, and letting go, yet I feel queer and nauseus with these thoughts. And it could be because I am writing while in a moving vehicle, but maybe I have reached a time in my life where traveling has become tiring revolutions around the anywheres of the world. I am no longer shocked by culture, wealth, poverty, or landscape. I understand that we live in different places and that we eat different foods, that water falls and deserts dry, and the hills are high and the valleys are low.
What blows my mind more than anything is that we are alive. That on this bus we have all achieved, up to this point, a moderate success in not dying. Waking up is a tremendous miracle. Throughout our experiences, at any time, the introduction of one unneccessary particle to one ordinary situation can shatter everything. A displaced particle can make this bus driver kill us all, or such a particle can cause the man next to me go for my gringo throat at the next rest stop. But none of this will happen. We will still drink wine and eat bread; this is miraculous. We are alive while phantoms circle over our bodies. Zillmann sifts through the loam and writes beautiful poetry about Mars.
Incredible.

6 comments:

  1. love this!!!! SOOOOOOO completely true!!

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  2. If you can...read this passage again listening to "Those Anarchist Punks are Mysterious" by Against Me! on their Acoustic EP, you should. When I did this I felt amazingly happy...and then when everything was over with I punched a huge hole in my shitty blue acoustic guitar. Now I'm really happy =)

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  3. so...what is loam? will we ever find out?

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  4. I cannot believe I missed out reading this piece. It is really good!!

    Short but with lots of heavy thoughts... I hope it'll be published soon!

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