I then began to realize death had worked her charm.
Taking myself of nothingness I chose a road to walk.
[Charles Mingus]
I
I wondered how much and for how long. Each new awakening is a realization of the wasted. If indeed there is something better, if something different is possible, why do we bother with what never happens? A different man would be needed for new circumstances. The futility trap is generally not avoided. Sooner or later you see yourself hanging upside down, without a future, freed from the need to have any ambition, without a solution. You feel less and less and helplessness becomes closer. The sadness, that you were endowed with at birth, has never disappeared, has never left you, you haven’t escaped it, your chances have been zero from the start. Only sometimes, tired of itself, it would go to sleep and sleep long, just long enough for you to forget it, relax, and let your guard down. Rested, it would stretch, yawn a couple of times and again, who knows what time in a row, would let all hell loose on you. Another love expires on your hands, and your new job went down the drain just when you thought it might be different and possible. The art you invest in everything you do is no longer enough. It never was. But at least it used to buy time and illusions. Nothing can be mended and everything is as it seems. There are ugly glasses on the tables and silence is an endless space of being out of air. Every outcome comes down to the same thing anyway.
II
Next to every cemetery the door to the motel, which charges by the minute, is wide open – I listen to the echo of that sentence that your lips slammed against the walls in front of us. As if it takes away with it the only truth and knowledge that will disappear the moment the echo goes silent. I loved you the best I knew. There were days when I wanted it to stop, there were nights when I couldn’t even stand myself in my childhood pictures. Images that preserve the time when everything was achievable and realistic at the tip of the tongue. Between the land and the stone some interesting memories are written in which I superbly played a couple of major roles. And then the film tapes wore off and as a lifetime achievement award I got you. A prize of extremity, a trophy from the border, all in one. Depending on the day and the pills on the repertoire.
III
I listen to them talk through trash and flowers. They alternate in monologues instead of listening to each other. Such order of things suits third parties. In this way their time will really come, never to stop. My job mainly comes down to listening. What I hear I memorize and write down, and then I use in tactics perfected by the one who introduced me to the business. The results are amazing. The use of force almost never occurs. I do my best to avoid such a development. Because the outcome is usually the same – too much clutter, fluids, too many extra combinations that I prefer not to deal with. Violence is pointless. Just as nonviolence is, actually. Depending on the circumstances and the angle of looking at things. None of this is interesting to me. I’d rather sleep long on the floor of a room with nothing but speakers in it. I’m ready to forever forget bottles and headaches.
IV
You loved me, I love her. Who knows who she loves.
Translated by: Zorica Teofilova