by Corey Mesler
“Ortega y Gasset said something or other about the metaphor.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Can I just have coffee before we continue?”
“Is this to be continued?”
“Coffee?”
More Sue Pine
Sue Pine took the last flight out of Memphis on a damp, dark Memphis evening. She found her aisle seat and watched as the flight attendants moved up and down the plane with their synthetic smiles. One attendant, a burly male who could have played tight end in college, stopped in front of her seat.
“Sorry,” he said, his blond hair like styled flower petals. “I know you . . .”
“I don’t think so,” Sue Pine said.
“Are you on TV?”
“Are you supposed to chat up female passengers?” Sue asked with a feline smile.
“No,” he said, quickly. “I am not. I really am not.”
His apprehension made Sue repentant.
“I’m sorry. I won’t narc on you. My name is Sue, Sue Pine.”
“Willie. Waugh.” He shook her beautifully manicured hand.
“You may have seen me. I’m an actress. I just finished shooting the Eric Warberg picture.”
“Oh, Jesus. With Dan Yumont?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
The poor swain was speechless. He was also handsome as mountain snow.
“You wanna be in pictures?” Sue asked. She retook his hand and tickled his palm as if it were his foreskin.
Willie Waugh’s beam spread across his face like mercury on glass.
“I think maybe you are a dangerous woman,” he said, still smiling.
“You have no idea,” Sue Pine said.
On Babel
Camel took his time answering when Lorax asked him if he would critique her newest painting. He rubbed the stubble on his chin, thoughtfully.
“I’m not sure a critique is what you want from me,” he said finally. It still sounded wrong.
Lorax’s face went through a few contortions.
“But, Camel, dear, what do I want? I want you to see it,” she said.
“Yes,” Camel said. “It’s just—never mind. Let’s look at it.”
“And you’ll tell me what you really think,” she added.
“Yes, of course,” Camel said.
They walked the 20 feet to the next room as if they had been called by forces beyond their own control. Lorax held Camel’s hand.
Camel wangled his way in front of the canvas. The room was small and chaotic. He felt sorry he could not have offered her a better space.
Camel felt as if his eyes were blurring. He blinked many times. What was he seeing?
“I wanna call it ‘On Babel,’” Lorax said.
The painting was of the Tower of Babel but it was a modern view, so far from Brueghel’s as to be in a different medium. Camel was sure that Lorax had never seen the Brueghel. She was painting from ignorance, and from that other place.
“Sweetheart,” Camel said, moving slowing forward and slowly back, “I am momentarily stunned into silence.”
Lorax stood patiently by. She was not sure what her Camel meant. She began to feel dread in her chest, a painful little thrum.
“It’s magnificent, of course,” Camel said. “It’s beyond magnificent. It’s marvelous, as in full of marvels.”
“You like it?” Lorax sang. She executed a little dance in what space was there. She may as well have been a brownie on a toadstool. Camel laughed, his great face crinkling with pleasure.
“I do. I like it very much, Lorax,” he said.
“You said my name,” she said, stopping her twirl.
“Yes. Is that ok?”
“You have never said, have you?”
“I’m not sure,” Camel said. He watched her young face wrinkle.
“I’d rather call you My Paramour,” he said, quickly.
“Yes, that’s it,” she said. But neither of them knew what she meant.
“My Paramour,” Camel said. “Your painting. It seems to grow beyond the canvas. It seems to occupy a liminal space outside the physical world, outside of time.”
“Wow,” Lorax said. “They are trying to reach Heaven.”
“Yes.”
“Yes.”
“These figures toiling, climbing, moving toward their false goal, their false gods . . . I recognize some faces, don’t I?”
“I think so,” Lorax said.
“They’re—movie people.”
“Yes, some of them are,” she said.
“Hm,” Camel said. He put his face nearly flush against the canvas.
“They’re climbing, climbing . . .” Lorax sang.
“Yes. It’s quite a struggle for them, isn’t it? A meaningless struggle, you might say, except that all struggles have meaning.”
“You say nice things, Camel,” Lorax said.
“You paint wonders,” he answered.
“Camel. My Parapet.”
“Yes, dear.”
“Do you want to know my real name?”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
A portion of this novel appeared in Southern Gothic, edited by Jeff Crook, and another in Alice Blue, and another in A cappella Zoo, and another in The Prague Revue.
Special thanks to my readers Terry Bazes, Peter Coyote, Chris Ellis, Nicki Newburger, and Joel Rose.
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
“The Chronosynclastic Filmmaking of Eric Warberg.” Stanley Kauffmann. The New Republic, August 1990.
“But No One Wants to Be Eric Warberg.” Aleah Sato. The Sum Times, January 1994.
“Eric Warberg: The Director Interview.” Chris Agee. Filmmaker Magazine, November 1994.
“Eric Warberg and the Culture of Dissolution.” Creole Myers. Film Forum, January 1995.
“Sunset Striptease: What Eric Warberg isn’t Telling Us.” Jojo Self. Premiere, August 1995.
“Kiss Kiss Wink Wink: Eric Warberg’s When I See Beverly.” Andrew Sarris. The Village Voice, September 1997.
“Sandy Shoars and Eric Warberg: A Marriage Made in Stop-Motion.” Creole Myers. Premiere, February 2000.
“Eric Warberg: From Shlomo Stern to Spondulicks: Can Anybody Here Direct a Movie?” Jay Cocks. Time, April 2005.
The Films of Eric Warberg. Stefan Kanfer, ed. New York: Grove Press, 2005.
“Stuck Inside of Memphis with the Eric Warberg Blues.” Luke Apenail. Newsweek, September 2007.
BOOKS BY COREY MESLER
POETRY
For Toby, Everything for Toby (1997), Wing & the Wheel Press.
Ten Poets (1999), editor only, Wing & the Wheel Press.
Piecework (2000), Wing & the Wheel Press.
Chin-Chin in Eden (2003), Still Waters Press.
Dark on Purpose (2004), Little Poem Press.
The Agoraphobe’s Pandiculations (2006), Little Poem Press.
The Hole in Sleep (2006), Wood Works Press.
The Lita Conversation (2006), Southern Hum.
The Chloe Poems (2007), Maverick Duck Press.
Some Identity Problems (2007), Foothills Publishing.
Pictures from Lang and Fellini (2007), Sheltering Pines Press.
Grit (2008), Amsterdam Press.
The Tense Past (2010), Flutter Press.
Before the Great Troubling (2011), Unbound Content.
The Heart Is Open (2011), Right Hand Pointing.
To Writing You (2012), Origami Poetry Project.
Mitmensch (2013), Folded Word.
Our Locust Years (2013), Unbound Content.
My Father Is Still Dying (2013), Flutter Press.
Body (2013), Chapbook Journal.
The Catastrophe of my Personality (2014), Blue Hour Press.
The Sky Needs More Work (2014), Upper Rubber Boot Books.
The Medicament Predicament (2014), Redneck Press.
Stone (2015), Origami Poems (chapbook).
PROSE
Talk: A Novel in Dialogue (2002), Livingston Press.
We Are Billion-Year-Old Carb
on (2005), Livingston Press.
Short Story and Other Short Stories (2006), Parallel Press.
Following Richard Brautigan (chapbook, 2006), Plan B Press.
Publisher (2007), Writers Write Journal Press.
Listen: 29 Short Conversations (2009), Brown Paper Press.
The Ballad of the Two Tom Mores (2010), Bronx River Press.
Following Richard Brautigan (full-length novel, 2010), Livingston Press.
Notes Toward the Story and Other Stories (2011), Aqueous Books.
I’ll Give You Something to Cry About (2011), Queens Ferry Press.
Diddy-Wah-Diddy: A Beale Street Suite (2013), Ampersand Books.
As a Child: Stories (2014), MadHat Press.