Mark Z Danielewski
Page 45
[Typed ]
December 15, 1974
As often as I have lingered on Hudson in his shallop, I have in the late hours turned my thoughts to Quesada and Molino's journey across those shallow waters, wondering aloud what they said, what they thought, what gods came to keep them or leave them, and what in those dark waves they finally saw of themselves? Perhaps because history has little to do with those minutes, the scene survives only in verse: The Song of Quesada and Molino by [XXXX], I include it here in its entirety.
[D]
April 29, 1975
Mother wants you to call home STOP It is 105 degrees and rising STOP White Christmas indeed!
Bada-Bing, Bada-Bang, Bada-Gone! Bing! Bang! Booooom!
[Typed]
February 11, 1984
Is it possible to love something so much, you imagine it wants to destroy you only because it has denied you?
[E]
August 4, 1985
I dream of vampires. I dream of god. I dream of no vampires. I dream of no god. I dream of nothing. And yet that too is still my dream.
[F]
May 2, 1988
The angel of his youth became the devil of his maturity. He went out with women when he was young, always holding something in reserve. There would always be a reason to break it off, which opened the door to a multitude of relationships. Heaven. Or so he thought. As age encroached upon his sensibilities and form, he longed for something with enough vitality to endure. But the covering cherub of his Lothario days had stayed with him and was no longer so angelic. It haunted him, guarded him, kept him from intimacy, promising the ash dry glory of so many toppling relationships, toppling like dominos, one after another, ad infinitum, or at least until he died.
[G]
August 30, 1988
"He wanted to go to bed with her immediately, pull the sheets around them, dig his toes into the mattress, her heals pushing against his calves, her fingers running rivers along his sides. But these days fantasies flourish and die like summer flies."
[Typed ] March 18, 1989
A maze. Amazing maze. A maze meant... What did it mean? A May zing perhaps. M.A.s in the bush or amidst the maize. Quite amazing huh? Not to worry I am not that impressed either but grant an old man a chance to play.
[H]
February 8, 1990
It stinks here. I know what stink is and it stinks here. Cat piss, rotting fruit, moldy bread. Something. I am certain that girl is at fault. She must not have taken the garbage out. She can read (I will
find out soon if she can transcribe) and she can flirt. But I wager she has failed to take the garbage out. I should get rid of her. I should take it out myself. I hate garbage. It stinks. I should throw it out myself. I should throw it all out.
M
October 11, 1990
Incomplete. Syllables to describe a life. Any life. I cannot even discuss Giinter Nitschke or Norberg-Schulz. I merely wanted Glas (Paris: Editions Galilee, 1974). That is all. But the bastards reply it is unavailable. Swine. All of them. Swine. Swine. Swine.
Mr. Leavey, Jr. and of course Mr. Rand will have to do.
[/]
April 22, 1991
An atrocity sinking into waters of darkness; without order or bars of earth; where light must mean shadow and reason dies in the hold:
((((((((((((Jonah in the belly of the beast))))))))))))
[/]
May 3, 1991
Stars to live by. Stars to steer by. Stars to die by.
[/]
May 26, 1991
Kutch Dekta? Kutch Nahin, Sahib.
[/]
May 30, 1991
Do not wake me from this slumber, but be assured that just as I have wept much, I have also wandered many roads with my thoughts.
Reminiscent of another film by my eye fell in. Aye. K
[J]
June 30,1991
Goddamn! Goddamn, Goddamn it! Goddamn! Goddamn! God Damn! Yes, of course write it down! Write all of it down! Everything I say! Every goddamn word! Goddamn! Capital G!
Goddamn it all! All of it, every last word. Goddamn her wrong!
[•/]
July 27, 1991
Make no mistake, those who write long books have nothing to say. Of course those who write short books have even less to say.
[K]
August 7, 1992
How did I end up here? I know of course. I am referring to the itinerary I followed. But that hardly helps me understand the whys any better. I still walk out into that dusty courtyard and stand amazed, amazed that I should have ended up stuck in such a shithole, then I think to myself "Not only did you end up here, you are going to die here too!" Of course Hollywood is the land of the blind with churches for the blind so in my case it makes a certain sense. You think I am bitter about being here, yes? You think I am bitter about this grave I live in and that bed of weeds I scratch around in? You think I am bitter about dying? What do you know? You know nothing about bitterness because you know nothing about love. Get out. Get out! No, stay. Please stay. Let us read something. Forget everything I just said. It is not so bad. I am just old and you know a good deal about love and I would like to think I know something more because of my age. Let us read something.
[M]
April 3, 1992
Walls black like black waters when they are heavy and seem to belong to other seas.
[M]
December 3, 1992
Why can I sleep no more?
[N]
May 7, 1993
The house is history and history is uninhabited.
[O]
June 19,1994
Prometheus, thief of light, giver of light, bound by the gods, must have been a book.
[O]
November 11, 1994
Defend a stray's hun? Never used the word. Never will.
[P: Written in the margin of the December 15, 1974 entry.} April 3, 1995
"Forgive me please for including this. An old man's mind is just as likely to wander as a young man's, hut where a young man will forgive the stray, an old man will cut it out. Youth always tries to till
c.
and Pieces
Wi-'
D.
Letter to the Editor
"Seeing's Believing But Feeling's Probably Best!"
September 17, 1978
In last week's article on collectibles, you reported that a man by the name of Kuellster had several World War II Ithaca Model 37 Trench guns for sale. As shotgun aficionados are well aware, this weapon is a rare find as only 1,420 were ever produced.
Fortunately, the WWII Model 37 offers several distinguishing characteristics, including bottom loading, handy shell ejection similar to the Remington Model 10, a commercial blue finish, and standard sling swivels. It also bears some important martial markings: a small "p" on the left side of the barrel; a flaming bomb and the letters RLB (inspector Lt. Col. Roy L. Bowlin's initials) on the left side of the receiver. Kuellster's guns, however, all have a parkerized finish, lack swing swivels, and while there is a small letter proof "p" on the barrel, there is also one printed on the receiver.
All of which proves that Kuellster's shotguns, while Ithaca 37s, were produced long after the World War II Trench guns he is currently and falsely selling them as.
On a personal note, I wish to add that as I have been blind for over two decades, I had to determine most of this by feel. Unfortunately when I presented my conclusion to Kuellster, he demonstrated his unparalleled probity by ordering a security guard to escort "this intoxicated indigent" from his store. I suppose in his world if a recently manufactured Ithaca 37 is the same as the WWII model, gingerale must pass for bourbon.
Sincerely,
Zampand Venice, CA
Our apologies to Mr. Zampand and all other collectors who due to our article visited Mr. Kuellster's store. Mr. Kuellster no longer claims to have any WWII Ithaca Model 37s for sate and refuses to comment on anything he might have previously suggested to
our reporters. — The Los Angeles Herald-Examiner
E .
The Song of Quesada and Molino
434Missing. — Ed.
The Song of Quesada and Molino434
F . Poems
That Place
Summer broke on the backs of children, even though swings performed miracles and breezes sang psalms.
For that summer, from the outskirts of some far off even whimsical place came the low resolute moo of a dragon.
A child, of course, could not recognize that fabled moo or the serpentine tail close to her feet, wound up among the thistle and milkweed like a hose.
Nor for that matter could she recognize the starry white bone left upright in the sandbox like some remarkable claw or shovel.
Not when the sun was out and games continued. Certainly not when there was summer love and rootbeer.
But at dusk when the fog crept in, thick and sweating,
suggesting some kind of burning far off, down over there,
(where someone once saw two eyes —pale as October moons— blink)
a child could know the meaning of fall.
And that August, two weeks before school began, some children went down to that place
and they never came back.
The Panther
The panther paces.
Waiting reminds him that clarity is painful
but his pain is unreadable,
obscure, chiaroscuro to their human senses.
In time they will misread his gait, his moon mad eyes,
the almost gentle way his tail caresses the bars.
In time they will mistake him
for something else—
without history,
without the shadow of being,
a creature without the penance of living.
They will read only his name.
They will be unable to perceive
what strangeness
lies beneath his patience.
Patience is the darkest side of power.
He is dark. He is black.
He is exquisitely powerful.
He has made pain his lover and hidden her completely.
Now he will never forget.
She will give birth to memories they believe he has been broken of.
He smells the new rain, tastes its change.
His claw skates along the cold floor.
Love curled up and died on such a floor.
He blinks. Clarity improves.
He hears other creatures scream and fade. But silence is his.
He knows.
In time the gates will open. In time his heart will open.
Then the shadows will bleed and the locks will break.
Love At First Sight
Natasha, I love you despite knowing love is more than seeing you.
(Untitled Fragment)
The angles of your wrists preserve a certain mystery, unknown by any lips or written down in history.
To measure their degree would solve the oldest questions — providence and alchemy answered in your gestures.
But god and gold will never rival the way your fingers curl. They hold my breath's arrival like a rare and undiscovered pearl.
There is only a black fence
and a wide field and a bam of Wyeth red.
The smell of anger chokes the air. Ravens of September rain descend.
Some say a mad mad hermit man lived here talking to himself and the woodchuck.
But he's gone. No reason. No sense. He just wandered off one day, past the onions, past the fence.
Forget the letters. Forget love.
Troy is nothing more than a black finger of charcoal frozen in lake ice.
And near where the owl watches and the old bear dreams,
the parapet of memory bums to the ground taking heaven with it.
Little solace comes
to those who grieve
when thoughts keep drifting
as walls keep shifting
and this great blue world of ours
seems a house of leaves
moments before the wind.
La Feuille
— [illegible]
You Shall Be My Roots
You shall be my roots and
I will be your shade,
though the sun bums my leaves.
You shall quench my thirst and I will feed you fruit, though time takes my seed.
And when I'm lost and can tell nothing of this earth you will give me hope.
And my voice you will always hear. And my hand you will always have.
For I will shelter you.
And I will comfort you.
And even when we are nothing left,
not even in death,
I will remember you.
Appendix II
Due to the unexpected number of inquiries regarding the first edition, Mr. Truant agreed for this edition to provide the following additional material.
— The Editors
A.
Sketches Polaroids
#175079
#046665
#081512
B.
The Pelican Poems
A Palimpsest of Austere Pelican Jake
Prospero dreams
'twixt green sea and azur'd vault setting war
while the corner clock ticks in the evening den.
"Charlotte. Charlotte. The moments here are short and I am mad."
(mutinous waves usurp the land) dear God here?
and raising a sun struck hand — yes here again.
— For Claudia. New Haven. May 26,1988
Pelican Considers a Cha-Cha with a Long Island Ice Tea in Hand
Mr. Jake misplaced his armor. And how the wind whistles through,
"A swell of thought, the tumescence of a moment, only that, but... 1"
A father tossed in that
storm with iron cufflinks cut by Cain.
"We hesitate in chance"
But Pelican's begun now —Avatar
Pelican's begun his occluded dance.
— Left at Klub Restauracja. Warsaw. July 6, 1988
Pelican Jake on the Eurydice School Bus
We hold our dreams
in lost dreams and tear our hearts out over chance.
"She carried the songs of centuries"
and in her passing my madness passed.
— For the waitress at Cafe
Wilanowska. Warsaw. July 7,1988