Companions of the Day and Night

by Harris, Wilson

  The voice was running now, flying, running into the structure of a thorn that blazed in the Fool’s eyes as if lightning midnight candle flashed.

  As if her eyes/his eyes had kissed and then parted into a door, into a sky that stood between them now.

  The Idiot half-stirred, half-woke to the fact, the dream-fact, that he stood in the street, cobbled street, that he had lifted the knocker and struck the door once, carved into a thorn. He lifted it again, rapped, knocked.

  “Good afternoon sir,” said the porter.

  “Good day,” said the Fool. “I have an appointment with Sister Joanna. My name is Nameless.”

  The porter regarded him closely. “Sir,” he said. “She died.” It was the hard almost off-hand way in which he said “died” that grounded the dream-wire, dream-fact, into an electric circuit that drew to earth the mid-Atlantic cabin in which Sister Joanna had stood.

  A dumb flash enveloped the scene like the distant gunfire of a heart. Failed heart, stopped heart.

  “It was quite sudden sir. A couple of days ago. Father Marsden was out. I was in the studio with her. I had brought her a letter. She opened it, began to peruse its contents and collapsed—as if she had been shot. Turned to me and said something about a shock, a friend, the death of a dear old friend. All there she said in the letter. Then she cried something that sounded like Merde. Or it could have been Mardie. ‘Merde, Mardie, I want to confess. Who will hear my confession?’ Imagine that. Confess! What had she to confess? A saintly old lady like that. The best, the most good. And yet I fear there was something she needed to say for she haunts the place now …”

  The distant gunfire was fading as the troops of death receded, across earth and sea and sky.

  “Her last good deed was to take in the child …”

  “Child? What child?”

  “Do you not know of it sir? A child—a few days old at most I would think—was placed at our door. Wrinkled, wrinkled newspaper; wrapped in newspaper…. And that reminds me sir. I have this for you. A slip of paper. Father Marsden said you might care to visit the last remaining sisters, Maria and Rose. They live in New York City. And on your way to Mexico …”

  ON YOUR WAY TO … ON YOUR WAY TO … The door slammed fast. A door slammed somewhere in the house. Ground-level, ground fast … The Idiot was stirring, awaking. Wrinkled paper, wrinkled dream-wire, dream-fact. Descent into the all-encompassing structure of a thorn that invaded his eyes. Halo. Breast. Two breasts. Two eyes. Canvases of taste. Milky darknesses.

  One mother a child has but she seems many, multi-form, multi-dimensional, many cultures, many skins.

  And at first it seems a calamity to have been severed from the womb. Until one dreams one is pierced by an arrow of taste, tastes, ecstatic riddle, ecstatic morsel.

  To taste is to see. To taste is to descend into black spaces, multi-form spaces, eyes of gravity in the fire-eater’s model. Firing squad of sensations. Two holes. Two eyes. Numberless number. Numberless dying. Numberless living…. It was the beginning of the child of humanity—the beginning of the obscurity of pity, the obscurity of antecedents, the new fall or Fool born outside of his time. Forced into conception … A conception of unsuspected dimensions written into the passive birth or death of objects reflected into history….

  THE SIXTH AND SEVENTH DAYS

  (Door into the Creation of the Gods)

  Teotihuacán’s doors into the creation of the gods lay a giant fire-eater’s hand from Cholula, Puebla and San Francisco Convent in a desert of painted landscape. The Idiot felt he had been tumbled into his Seventh Day when he came in sight of Teotihuacán’s pyramid of the sun, pyramid of the moon, sea, land, shell, serpent, all exposed to him upon their beach of sublimated seas and spaces.

  Which way lay the door into the gods? Which way lay the door into the riddle of early cloven settlement, lapsed settlement, extinguished settlement? Did it lie backwards through the Way of the Dead, forwards into the Way of the Unborn or by way of deaf, dumb, blind traces of fire, tongues of ash, staccato voices of moon, erratic abysses of time, serpentcraft around Jupiter, Venus?

  Painters, sculptors in the school of the fire-eater had drawn the pyramids and their associated temples like commodities upon a chessboard of time across nameless cities beached here and it was this sensation that wakened the Idiot to nurse his own shadow into indistinct senses of economic nakedness.

  Anything first of all, in the rat-race of economies of fate, to appear naked while richly clad, to camouflage lust and disaster even as the paint on one’s lips cracked into charismatic sex, charismatic vessel, charismatic metamorphoses of ex-god, ex-goddess, ex-priest, ex-priestess, ex-Christ, ex-nun. There was a time to marry landscapes and a time for divorce from landscapes. A time to visualise concealed force, concealed reason, concealed unreason and how these concealments drew one to the threshold of change even as they frustrated the pregnant scandal of an age into an assumption of static property or constitutional dress.

  A time to be innocent carving, a time to be pathological carving of blind, deaf, dumb commodities of god. To be an orator, an emperor, a dictator, a president, a captain of ships, a member of oracles. To be the child of wretched ambition, the child of desired greatness, the child of paradise, hell.

  “Are you unwell sir? Are you . .?” He stopped, his eyes hardly discerning the face of his interrogator half reflected, half blurred across a trance of seas in the blind shout of vendors like a marketplace of shells that rose to one’s ears. Confessions of the sea, of hollow faintness, indistinctness of memory. Articles thrust at him—at his eyes, nose, throat—unfathomable confessions, vanished wave. Tricks of memory. Agents of the fire-eater’s sea, conspiracy of emotion.

  “Conspiracy of a shell,” he breathed. “I am … I am … nothing.”

  “Are you unwell?” The question was asked again with studied care, implicit hostility (idiotic poverty versus idiotic wealth), indistinct sales-talk.

  “Let me help you sir.”

  They (the vendors) had concluded that he was their ancient victim (half blind, half deaf) for they swarmed upon him with a new vehemence. He was abreast of the pyramid of the sun, the shell of the sun. They swarmed. He was deluged by misery and chaos, tides of nameless feud. Yet hardly able to see, hardly able to hear. Who was Subject, who Object? He made a great effort, rolled himself up into a map, into a kind of dead rockfastness, dead steadfastness and the Sea of Feud imperceptibly it seemed began to alter, to change into his painted attire. Painted Subject. Bargain Object. Bargain Soul.

  The old sublimated sea of riddled cities he had traversed on the Way of the Dead was still there but it had acquired an extra density of transparent shell, conflicting sculpture, under the pyramid of the sun. And the chaos of youths, chaos of vendors, swarming there was distilled from a ghost of inspiration that related it to itself as to a shared insensible body upon which the sun fell to etch figures upon a brow of shadow, draw others insensibly upon shoulders of shadow, still others again clutching thighs (wrestlers), others fists (boxers), others feet (runners).

  The Fool staggered in the surf of old/new worlds painted by the fire-eater.

  “Sir,”—for the third time—“are you unwell? Let me help.”

  “I am much better now.”

  “Agoraphobia?” asked the youth. “I know of people who suffer from exposure to open places. To sea and land. A constriction, a helplessness, assails them.”

  “I suffer from …” he was about to say “gravity” but stifled the complaint. Fall into surf of deafness, fall into surf of blindness. Was there an insuperable element between man and man, an unbridgeable chasm between culture and culture? Erection without door? Chasm without erection? “May I see . .?” He took an article from the young man’s hand in his desire to touch and be touched, to feel, to know. Had seen it before but now saw it again as if he had not seen it before and as though a new religious feeling (and response on his part) arose from it. He touched the exquisite self-deceiving brazier, ran his fi
nger around the wide-brimmed self-evasive hat, wide-brimmed distillation of fire that addressed him now of all things like a sun of mist, an expan sive halo. “You have thinned it out”, he could not help crying in his astonishment, “into an expansion of the thorn of the gods. Brazier. Halo. Technology.”

  “Easter,” said the youth. He looked insolent and yet sad. “A halo always appears upon the fire-eater’s head at this time of the year. It’s the trademark of Easter and”, he added, “of Christmas too.”

  The Idiot held it up. Easter Christ. Easter technology. Christmas Christ. Christmas technology. He could not help laughing a little at himself. The young salesman smiled too, irrepressible humour, lips thin as bone, human shell, indistinct echo/halo of blood.

  “This wrinkle,” the Idiot said as if he addressed both sun and surf, “why this? Why a wrinkle? Christ has no wrinkles.”

  “You will find many wrinkles on the old, old fire-god Huehueteotl,” the young man said stubbornly. “The old, old fire-god is older than the oldest priest or nun who may ever have lived in history.”

  “Hueheuteotl. Christ. I do not see the connection. A halo in the context of Huehueteotl’s brazier perhaps. A wrinkle never.” The Idiot was on the defensive, defensive fall into brow of clown, wave of misgiving, controversial brow, self-divided prison. Earth.

  “This halo is a wave,” cried the youth as though he were shouting a newspaper headline of disaster at air or sea, or advertising a new play, a new heady paradise, a new film, a new expression. “Can’t you hear me?”

  “I hear nothing. I am going deaf. I am falling.”

  “Fire and wave together. Wrinkled youth. Wrinkled soul. Way of the Newborn. Can’t you see me?”

  “I see nothing,” said the Idiot. “I am going blind. I am falling. Nothing except economies of nakedness. The rat-race of love.”

  “Nakedness,” the young man was outraged. “How can he be naked when he wears these?” He was pointing to flattened bullets the Idiot had overlooked that dangled from Christ’s head like earspools painted deep, painted red, opaque manufacture of blood beneath grey-haired thinning haloes. Technology of fire. Technology of water. Animism of blind, deaf Capital. Earth.

  It was a deafening commodity for an unconfessed tycoon, innocent falling tycoon, to buy or sell on the Way of the Cross and an indistinct uproar, an indistinct clamour, assailed him now. A wildness had been secreted in his deafness, in the jingle of his coins, which matched the indistinct murmur of millions crying “Merde, Mardie” as he bought his pre-Columbian/post-Columbian cloven god. A wildness had been secreted in the clash of haloes (fire-eater/fire-saviour) shouting “Merde, Mardie”, indistinct shouts, jingle of coins, he coiled around his head in the mint of suns as he bought his sacrified cloven Christ. Deaf. Blind. He had banked … he had purchased … how many million shouts, gold shouts, bronze shouts?

  “Am I unwell—well—well?” Just an echo of a voice in the sun, in the wind, in the elements. Deep. High. Indescribable cleavage. The suffering creation of the gods.

  *

  Idiot Nameless retired against the pyramid of the sun. The echo of a voice “I” had come out of the ground as out of bone and blood he banked in a wave of gods. Banked floods (surf or sea of emotion), banked shores (wave of obsessions). Which was inner strand, which outer chasm or precipice?

  He ascended, eyes riveted, nailed to the steps leading up to the top of the pyramid of the sun. How many human hearts he wondered had been plucked from bodies there to feed the dying light of the sun and create an obsession with royal sculptures, echoing stone?

  As though what remained in the wake of ex-heart, disengaged heart—in the wake of ultimate sacrifice—were a cloak to be worn by the high priest of the sun as he intoned his lament “Merde, Mardie” and sought shelter against the night, the rain of night.

  It was time to take stock of others as hollow bodies and shelters into which one fell. Hollow newspaper into which one fell, newsworthy sacrifice, wrinkled skin, FIRING SQUAD OF RAIN. Headline. Heartline. STOCKMARKET SHELTER, CITY RAINS. Deadline, CANVAS REQUIRED, SACRIFICE REQUIRED.

  For centuries it seemed to him now he had been ascending, descending, sliding, falling into rain inch by inch, into shelters of paint, shelters of stone. Sacrificed paint. Sacrificed stone. Lament for the dying sun. This was the altar of his malaise, Idiot shelter, Idiot fascination, fall into the sculptures of the greatest men (upon whom? from whom? times rained).

  Fall into the skin of emperors, admirals, conquistadores, kings at the corner of a street, Great Ladies, Beatrice, Joanna, centre of a square, Way of the Dead, as though these were his sacrificed bodies and he (Fool, Clown) were high priest of the elements after all. High priest of stone rain. Rain Emperor.

  HIGH PRIEST OF STONE RAIN

  The Idiot fell from the precipice of the sun into imperial mist, atmosphere, cloak of emperor, rain that drenched him upon his pedestal in a nameless city. He was alone up there, beached, abandoned, in the middle of his great fall, great square. Carved, illustrious rain. Disengaged heart, hollow cloak, absent sun within which the Fool secreted himself now.

  Idiot spark in stone emperor upon his pedestal above the square of a city whose name he had forgotten. The traffic of a great metropolis rolled beneath him, moved in the rain, sometimes seemed to stop at the heart of night, sometimes to edge its way forward. Mexico City? Madrid? Paris? London? New York? . . Where was it? The Stone Emperor Rain had forgotten, had forgotten his own name, his own voice, his own city. In his sacrificed spaces (mosaic of cities) the fallen Idiot spark blown across landscapes nestled now, spark buried in rain, spark buried in stone.

  Would spark run by undreamt-of degrees into the emperor’s hand? Would spark lift the rain god’s imperial hand to inscribe with a finger another eyelid of sun, another eyelid of dawn within nameless cities the emperor had forgotten?

  Emperor Rain—half mist, half stone on his high stage—had forgotten where he stood. The traffic edged its way around him, past him, sparked edge he reflected as it reflected him, sparked chasm he glimpsed as it glimpsed him in a mutual pool upon which the rain dashed its rivets of stars. The Fool’s eyes were flattened in the emperor’s night head. The pools on the ground looked flattened too within the starred rain as if to ponder a distinction between the nature of seeing (the nature of something glimpsed) and the nature of passivity (the nature of something reflected).

  In the degree that a genuine transaction of vision (rather than reflection) informed the high priest (fallen high priest) the Fool had riveted it there as water rivets fire; as water wears naked fire and fire wears the hollow disengaged heart of rain into which it bites and burns to make day out of night. The idiot friction of naked fire, naked water, naked day, naked night, within each other’s self-contradictory hollow pool, hollow flame was the movement of an eye, the movement of being glimpsed by each other across ages, across reflected passive galaxies, across reflected passive technologies, across reflected passive cultures.

  On the other hand in the degree that a purely passive reflection (devoid of authentic glimpsing, authentic transaction of vision) informed the emperor, Idiot Nameless had deserted him. Left him both beached and drowned, for ever isolate, for ever besieged by a motorised futility of sparks that bathed his forehead, motorised headlights, motorised infantry; for ever self-besieged, for ever reflected as disengaged heart in each hollow rocket or vessel aimed at the sun.

  These were Emperor Stone Rain’s dimensions of torment Idiot Spark glimpsed. Would spark really see to flick a nail in the emperor’s hand, drip by drop of stone matching the paint of the sun upon sawn-off reflected mountains, shadow and light, marriage to cavernous landscapes, divorce from from cavernous landscapes with the coming of each night?

  In the blind reflected square that emptied within the night, the ghost of a woman now moved. Her gown splashed. Splashed rivets of rain, lightning. Lightning on earth the emperor had forgotten, friction of elements Idiot Spark recalled now, the friction of glimpsed seed-with
in-ghost-within-womb-within-sun.

  She was wet to the skin. Indeed—the Fool felt—she was, in this respect, as indifferent to the rain as the emperor’s night monument above was indifferent to the sky. And it was this indifference that led him, as fallen priest of light, to glimpse the possibility of a connection between their bodies though divided in apparent substance. Emperor Stone above. Ghost Woman beneath. Hollow shelter, imperial majesty, on his high pedestal of night. Ghost womb, splashed gown, in her blind square of sex.

  BLIND SQUARE OF SEX. Blind connection of Stone Rain in Battered Dress or glimpsed repudiation of passive man-condition to passive woman-condition in hollows of culture within the passing night, passive fashion-plate wired to fashion-dish, love-bird to sales-bird.

  The rain was lessening now and the mutual indifference to each other embodied in Emperor Rain and the woman in the square slipped like a skin from one to the other in the Fool’s sparked eye. So that in the degree that the emperor rain knew her as his naked monument within her naked flesh, so too the Fool knew her as spark within ghost.

  The shape of her back loomed up before him, the movement of her hips, window dressing of absent dawn in the light of a passing car, emperor’s patrol.

  Half of her was reflected here (monumentalized here); half darkened there (glimpsed there)…. Back a light, front a shadow. Blind conception of dawn. Window dressing of dawn, emperor’s mistress in a nameless city.

  She moved across the square, came to a dress shop at which she stopped to anticipate an electric dawn, moved on and turned a dark corner. The Fool wondered whether she had deserted him. He in turn began to desert Emperor Rain’s passive reflection of out-thrust arm, out-thrust foot, passive reflection of coercive embrace that made her look unutterably forlorn but a moment or two ago within the night’s connection of stone rain, in battered dress, buried in the heart of nameless sleeping citizens, nameless whoring citizens, nameless dead cities.