Then I got hidden away, stuck into the attic, shrunken and parched and covered up in fusty draperies. Hell, I used to have breasts! Not just two of them. Lots. Ever wonder why a third tit was the crucial test, once, for women like me?
Or why I’m so often shown with a garden? A wonderful garden, in which mouth-watering things grow. Mulberries. Magic cabbages. Rapunzel, whatever that is. And all those pregnant women trying to clamber over the wall, by the light of the moon, to munch up my fecundity, without giving anything in return. Theft, you’d call it, if you were at all open-minded.
That was never the rule in the old days. Life was a gift then, not something to be stolen. It was my gift. By earth and sea I bestowed it, and the people gave me thanks.
3.
It’s true, there are never any evil stepfathers. Only a bunch of lily-livered widowers, who let me get away with murder vis-à-vis their daughters. Where are they when I’m making those girls drudge in the kitchen, or sending them out into the blizzard in their paper dresses? Working late at the office. Passing the buck. Men! But if you think they knew nothing about it, you’re crazy.
The thing about those good daughters is, they’re so good. Obedient and passive. Snivelling, I might add. No get-up-and-go. What would become of them if it weren’t for me? Nothing, that’s what. All they’d ever do is the housework, which seems to feature largely in these stories. They’d marry some peasant, have seventeen kids, and get “A dutiful wife” engraved on their tombstones, if any. Big deal.
I stir things up, I get things moving. “Go play in the traffic,” I say to them. “Put on this paper dress and look for strawberries in the snow.” It’s perverse, but it works. All they have to do is smile and say hello and do a little more housework, for some gnomes or nice ladies or whatever, and bingo, they get the king’s son and the palace, and no more dishpan hands.
Whereas all I get is the blame.
God knows all about it. No Devil, no Fall, no Redemption. Grade Two arithmetic.
You can wipe your feet on me, twist my motives around all you like, you can dump millstones on my head and drown me in the river, but you can’t get me out of the story. I’m the plot, babe, and don’t ever forget it.
Let Us Now Praise Stupid Women
—the airheads, the bubblebrains, the ditzy blondes:
the headstrong teenagers too dumb to listen to their mothers:
all those with mattress stuffing between their ears,
all the lush hostesses who tell us to have a good day, and give us the wrong change, while checking their Big Hair in the mirror,
all those who dry their freshly shampooed poodles in the microwave,
and those whose boyfriends tell them chlorophyll chewing gum is a contraceptive, and who believe it;
all those with nervously bitten fingernails because they don’t know whether to pee or get off the pot,
all those who don’t know how to spell the word pee,
all those who laugh good-naturedly at stupid jokes like this one, even though they don’t get the point.
They don’t live in the real world, we tell ourselves fondly: but what kind of criticism is that?
If they can manage not to live in it, good for them. We would rather not live in it either, ourselves.
And in fact they don’t live in it, because such women are fictions: composed by others, but just as frequently by themselves,
though even stupid women are not so stupid as they pretend: they pretend for love.
Men love them because they make even stupid men feel smart: women for the same reason,
and because they are reminded of all the stupid things they have done themselves,
but mostly because without them there would be no stories.
No stories! No stories! Imagine a world without stories!
But that’s exactly what you would have, if all the women were wise.
The Wise Virgins keep their lamps trimmed and filled with oil, and the bridegroom arrives, in the proper way, knocking at the front door, in time for his dinner;
no fuss, no muss, and also no story at all.
What can be told about the Wise Virgins, such bloodless paragons?
They bite their tongues, they watch their smart mouths, they sew their own clothing,
they achieve professional recognition, they do every right thing without effort.
Somehow they are insupportable: they have no narrative vices:
their wise smiles are too knowing, too knowing about us and our stupidities.
We suspect them of having mean hearts.
They are far too clever, not for their own good but for ours.
The Foolish Virgins, on the other hand, let their lamps go out:
and when the bridegroom turns up and rings the doorbell,
they are asleep in bed, and he has to climb in through the window:
and people scream and fall over things, and identities get mistaken,
and there’s a chase scene, and breakage, and much satisfactory uproar:
none of which would have happened if these girls hadn’t been several bricks short of a load.
Ah the Eternal Stupid Woman! How we enjoy hearing about her:
as she listens to the con-artist yarns of the plausible snake,
and ends up eating the free sample of the apple from the Tree of Knowledge:
thus giving birth to Theology;
or as she opens the tricky gift box containing all human evils,
but is stupid enough to believe that Hope will be some kind of a solace.
She talks with wolves, without knowing what sort of beasts they are:
Where have you been all my life? they ask. Where have I been all my life? she replies.
We know! We know! And we know wolfishness when we see it!
Look out, we shout at her silently, thinking of all the smart things we would do in her place.
But trapped inside the white pages, she can’t hear us,
and goes prancing and warbling and lolloping innocently towards her doom.
(Innocence! Perhaps that’s the key to stupidity,
we tell ourselves, who think we gave it up long ago.)
If she escapes from anything, it’s by sheer luck, or else the hero:
this girl couldn’t tear her way out of a paper bag.
Sometimes she’s stupidly fearless; on the other hand,
she can be just as equally fearful, though stupidly so.
Incest-minded stepfathers chase her through ruined cloisters,
where she’s been lured by ruses too transparent to fool a gerbil.
Mice make her scream: she whimpers, teeth chattering, through the menacing world,
running – but running involves legs, and is graceless – fleeing, rather.
Leglessly she flees, taking the wrong turn at every turn,
a white chiffon scarf in the darkness, and we flee with her.
Orphaned and minus kind aunts, she makes inappropriate marital choices,
and has to dodge ropes, knives, crazed dogs, stone flower-urns toppled off balconies,
aimed at her jittery head by suave, evil husbands out for her cash and blood.
Don’t feel sorry for her, as she stands there helplessly wringing her hands:
fear is her armour.
Let’s face it, she’s our inspiration! The Muse as fluffball!
And the inspiration of men, as well! Why else were the sagas of heroes,
of their godlike strength and superhuman exploits, ever composed,
if not for the admiration of women thought stupid enough to believe them?
Where did five hundred years of love lyrics come from,
not to mention those plaintive imploring songs, all musical whines and groans?
Aimed straight at women stupid enough to find them seductive!
When lovely woman stoops or bungles her way into folly,
pleading her good intentions, her wish to please,
and is taken advantage of
, especially by somebody famous,
if stupid or smart enough, she gets caught, just as in classic novels,
and makes her way into the tabloids, confused and tearful,
and from there straight into our hearts.
We forgive you! we cry. We understand! Now do it some more!
Hypocrite lecteuse! Ma semblable! Ma soeur!
Let us now praise stupid women,
who have given us Literature.
The Female Body
“ … entirely devoted to the subject of “The Female Body.” Knowing how well you have written on this topic … this capacious topic…”
– letter from the Michigan Quarterly Review
1.
I AGREE, IT’S a hot topic. But only one? Look around, there’s a wide range. Take my own, for instance.
I get up in the morning. My topic feels like hell. I sprinkle it with water, brush parts of it, rub it with towels, powder it, add lubricant. I dump in the fuel and away goes my topic, my topical topic, my controversial topic, my capacious topic, my limping topic, my nearsighted topic, my topic with back problems, my badly behaved topic, my vulgar topic, my outrageous topic, my ageing topic, my topic that is out of the question and anyway still can’t spell, in its oversized coat and worn winter boots, scuttling along the sidewalk as if it were flesh and blood, hunting for what’s out there, an avocado, an alderman, an adjective, hungry as ever.
2.
The basic Female Body comes with the following accessories: garter-belt, panty-girdle, crinoline, camisole, bustle, brassiere, stomacher, chemise, virgin zone, spike heels, nose-ring, veil, kid gloves, fishnet stockings, fichu, bandeau, Merry Widow, weepers, chokers, barrettes, bangles, beads, lorgnette, feather boa, basic black, compact, Lycra stretch one-piece with modesty panel, designer peignoir, flannel nightie, lace teddy, bed, head.
3.
The Female Body is made of transparent plastic and lights up when you plug it in. You press a button to illuminate the different systems. The Circulatory System is red, for the heart and arteries, purple for the veins; the Respiratory System is blue, the Lymphatic System is yellow, the Digestive System is green, with liver and kidneys in aqua. The nerves are done in orange and the brain is pink. The skeleton, as you might expect, is white.
The Reproductive System is optional, and can be removed. It comes with or without a miniature embryo. Parental judgement can thereby be exercised. We do not wish to frighten or offend.
4.
He said, I won’t have one of those things in the house. It gives a young girl a false notion of beauty, not to mention anatomy. If a real woman was built like that she’d fall on her face.
She said, If we don’t let her have one like all the other girls she’ll feel singled out. It’ll become an issue. She’ll long for one and she’ll long to turn into one. Repression breeds sublimation. You know that.
He said, It’s not just the pointy plastic tits, it’s the wardrobes. The wardrobes and that stupid male doll, what’s his name, the one with the underwear glued on.
She said, Better to get it over with when she’s young. He said, All right but don’t let me see it.
She came whizzing down the stairs, thrown like a dart. She was stark naked. Her hair had been chopped off, her head was turned back to front, she was missing some toes and she’d been tattooed all over her body with purple ink, in a scrollwork design. She hit the potted azalea, trembled there for a moment like a botched angel, and fell.
He said, I guess we’re safe.
5.
The Female Body has many uses. It’s been used as a doorknocker, a bottle-opener, as a clock with a ticking belly, as something to hold up lampshades, as a nutcracker, just squeeze the brass legs together and out comes your nut. It bears torches, lifts victorious wreaths, grows copper wings and raises aloft a ring of neon stars; whole buildings rest on its marble heads.
It sells cars, beer, shaving lotion, cigarettes, hard liquor; it sells diet plans and diamonds, and desire in tiny crystal bottles. Is this the face that launched a thousand products? You bet it is, but don’t get any funny big ideas, honey, that smile is a dime a dozen.
It does not merely sell, it is sold. Money flows into this country or that country, flies in, practically crawls in, suitful after suitful, lured by all those hairless pre-teen legs. Listen, you want to reduce the national debt, don’t you? Aren’t you patriotic? That’s the spirit. That’s my girl.
She’s a natural resource, a renewable one luckily, because those things wear out so quickly. They don’t make ’em like they used to. Shoddy goods.
6.
One and one equals another one. Pleasure in the female is not a requirement. Pair-bonding is stronger in geese. We’re not talking about love, we’re talking about biology. That’s how we all got here, daughter.
Snails do it differently. They’re hermaphrodites, and work in threes.
7.
Each female body contains a female brain. Handy. Makes things work. Stick pins in it and you get amazing results. Old popular songs. Short circuits. Bad dreams.
Anyway: each of these brains has two halves. They’re joined together by a thick cord; neural pathways flow from one to the other, sparkles of electric information washing to and fro. Like light on waves. Like a conversation. How does a woman know? She listens. She listens in.
The male brain, now, that’s a different matter. Only a thin connection. Space over here, time over there, music and arithmetic in their own sealed compartments. The right brain doesn’t know what the left brain is doing. Good for aiming though, for hitting the target when you pull the trigger. What’s the target? Who’s the target? Who cares? What matters is hitting it. That’s the male brain for you. Objective.
This is why men are so sad, why they feel so cut off, why they think of themselves as orphans cast adrift, footloose and stringless in the deep void. What void? she says. What are you talking about? The void of the Universe, he says, and she says Oh and looks out the window and tries to get a handle on it, but it’s no use, there’s too much going on, too many rustlings in the leaves, too many voices, so she says, Would you like a cheese sandwich, a piece of cake, a cup of tea? And he grinds his teeth because she doesn’t understand, and wanders off, not just alone but Alone, lost in the dark, lost in the skull, searching for the other half, the twin who could complete him.
Then it comes to him: he’s lost the Female Body! Look, it shines in the gloom, far ahead, a vision of wholeness, ripeness, like a giant melon, like an apple, like a metaphor for breast in a bad sex novel; it shines like a balloon, like a foggy noon, a watery moon, shimmering in its egg of light.
Catch it. Put it in a pumpkin, in a high tower, in a compound, in a chamber, in a house, in a room. Quick, stick a leash on it, a lock, a chain, some pain, settle it down, so it can never get away from you again.
In Love With Raymond Chandler
AN AFFAIR WITH Raymond Chandler, what a joy! Not because of the mangled bodies and the marinated cops and hints of eccentric sex, but because of his interest in furniture. He knew that furniture could breathe, could feel, not as we do but in a way more muffled, like the word upholstery, with its overtones of mustiness and dust, its bouquet of sunlight on ageing cloth or of scuffed leather on the backs and seats of sleazy office chairs. I think of his sofas, stuffed to roundness, satin-covered, pale-blue like the eyes of his cold blonde unbodied murderous women, beating very slowly, like the hearts of hibernating crocodiles; of his chaises longues, with their malicious pillows. He knew about front lawns too, and greenhouses, and the interiors of cars.
This is how our love affair would go. We would meet at a hotel, or a motel, whether expensive or cheap it wouldn’t matter. We would enter the room, lock the door, and begin to explore the furniture, fingering the curtains, running our hands along the spurious gilt frames of the pictures, over the real marble or the chipped enamel of the luxurious or tacky washroom sink, inhaling the odour of the carpets, old cigarette smoke and spilled gin and
fast meaningless sex or else the rich abstract scent of the oval transparent soaps imported from England, it wouldn’t matter to us; what would matter would be our response to the furniture, and the furniture’s response to us. Only after we had sniffed, fingered, rubbed, rolled on and absorbed the furniture of the room would we fall into each other’s arms, and onto the bed (king-sized? peach-coloured? creaky? narrow? four-posted? pioneer-quilted? lime-green chenille-covered?), ready at last to do the same things to each other.
Stump Hunting
1.
DEAD STUMPS are the favourite disguises of wild animals. How often have you been roaring past in your motorboat or paddling in your canoe when you’ve seen a dead stump sticking out of the water and said to yourself, That looks like an animal?
Just the head of course. Swimming.
And then when you came up to it, it was only a dead stump.
Don’t be deceived! Usually these objects really are animals.
Here’s what you do.
Shoot the animal, more or less between the eyes, or where you guess the eyes must be. This will kill the animal but will not cause it to shed its disguise.
The next task is getting the animal out of the water. This can be difficult, as the animal will still be holding on tenaciously with the parts of itself that look like roots. You may need a chain-saw, a lot of rope, and a powerful motor on your boat. When you have at last managed to chop and pry the animal loose, tow it to shore, where you will have parked your car.
No blood will be visible.
Let the animal dry out a little. It will be doing a good imitation of being waterlogged and very heavy. Heave it onto the hood of your car or the roof of your van, and rope it down securely. Drive it into the city. Other hunters, with moose or bears or deer or even porcupines strapped to their own cars, will shake their heads and laugh at you, but remember: the last laugh will be yours.
Good Bones Page 2