One down, ninety-nine to go.

. . .





#068. Explanation

"plus"

A deserted public restroom presides
at the end of the longest hall, its damp
tile scattered with trash and debris;
grimed marble, sole-toned scuffs on
the door she closes and locks to tear
open the floral-printed package (newly-
purchased). Its verdict gives her an
answer to the question she's feared
to ask, to the bloodless month spent
wandering down aisles of scented
shampoo and - at every corner -
crying at perfume display stands.

001.	Beginnings.	002.	Hours.	003.	Snow.	004.	Fixed.	005.	Outsiders.
006.	Rain.	007.	If.	008.	Passing.	009.	Storm.	010.	Drunk.
011.	Breakfast.	012.	Broken.	013.	Wheat.	014.	Why?	015.	Light.
016.	Hysteria.	017.	Coin.	018.	Letter.	019.	White.	020.	Watch.
021.	Ivy.	022.	Lipstick.	023.	Slip.	024.	Market.	025.	Hat.
026.	Finger.	027.	Lock.	028.	Kiss.	029.	Nightmare.	030.	Cold.
031.	Ivory.	032.	Rose.	033.	Train.	034.	Air.	035.	Pride.
036.	Shadow.	037.	Trial.	038.	Oatmeal.	039.	Batter.	040.	Birth.
041.	Soft.	042.	Blessing.	043.	Grieve.	044.	Slave.	045.	Blind.
046.	Aim.	047.	West.	048.	Rocks.	049.	Water.	050.	Smoke.
051.	Line.	052.	Forgive.	053.	Lemon.	054.	Professor.	055.	Window.
056.	Lovers.	057.	Earth.	058.	Politics.	059.	Temptation.	060.	Tears.
061.	Morgue.	062.	Cards.	063.	Vatican.	064.	Friends.	065.	Week.
066.	Rain.	067.	Lightening.	068.	Explanation.	069.	Insurrection.	070.	Bittersweet.
071.	Charred.	072.	Not Enough.	073.	Too Much.	074.	Time.	075.	Pure.
076.	Shade.	077.	Flour.	078.	Skirt.	079.	Bath.	080.	Toast.
081.	Sin.	082.	Snip.	083.	Wild.	084.	Yarn.	085.	Crimson.
086.	Sing.	087.	Paranoia.	088.	Kitchen.	089.	Key.	090.	Confession.
091.	Water.	092.	Sunset.	093.	Box.	094.	Jar.	095.	Filament.
096.	Needle.	097.	Sunlight.	098.	Swear.	099.	Mirror.	100.	Sweat.

One prompt, one piece of writing, one per month. Story or poem, I shall leave it up to whimsy. Though though overall tally may end up being more like one in general. =] Bold means underway, bold and underlined means completed.

Found bits of "Silence is Golden" yesterday.

#1. Emilija would not have seen it, but she would have felt it, thumb guiding itself up-down-left-right over his forehead before she fabricated an excuse to escape the house. Such a natural wish, escape from such a quiet kitchen, from the incessant ticking of antique clocks and the ghosts of unborn children which prowled in the hallway. They were his demons; she had none, but she was since dead. Today, a demon was in the parlor. Dusan did not see it until he sat at the piano, flipped the lid open and back, and glimpsed the reflection of the appallingly perfect face wavering in the varnish. It lingered at his collar, substantial as fumes. Frigid breath ruffled his hair and set the pages of music shuddering, sent Chopin's vulnerable soul fluttering to the floor. He watched as the residual vapor fogged on the wood and disappeared. "I could have killed you just then," the demon whispered in his ear. "Do you believe it?"

#2 ... nailed to the piano, iron through the palm and he finally heard himself scream. Red spray everywhere, on his face, in his hair, on the music. It had gone in through a vein. Nailed palm-up, palm open as if to receive instruction, fingers curling around the periphery like burning paper. He flung himself about, fell half-sideways to the floor and sent the stool flying with the knee that couldn't hold him. He screamed, "Bozhje moi, oh Hell, oh God, oh my God," at the keyboard, gasping for air and swallowing it with the bile as he caught at his shirt and his wrist and the ruin of a hand, but there was no God. No God was coming. Emilija would always tell him horror stories of village superstition. She would go to mass without him. Give it up, he would shout from the piano as she left angry, in a hurry and alone. Don't you know that God died years ago? That had been years ago. Now he begged a dead God for a merciful death all his own, begged the demon but the demon was smiling. Tried to pry the nail out with his free hand - too bruised to feel the worn iron - and tore off half of a finger nail.

... a.k.a. what happens when I find paper directly after a bad day in the practice rooms. But I'm disproportionately glad to have rediscovered it. I should actually finish this. Think of all the excellent catharsis which would be achieved.

(Yes, dammit, I'm well-adjusted.)

Residing on the bookshelf in my room is a thick journal, one of those expensive, archaic-looking things that you find in better bookstores: all cream-colored leather and an air of Italy. It's my book of days, a resting place for my mind's scattered loose change and odds and ends. Descriptions of people, objects, storms and feelings, dreams that make no sense but feel a great deal. Words that strike me a certain way or sentences that won't leave me alone.

I was going back through it the other day, all neat, small pencil and carefully dated wonderings.

...


July 22, 2007

Read bits of "Paint It Black", "Black Water" and "the nine lives of allen grey" today... as a whole, they got me thinking of "Silence is Golden" and poor, tortured Dušan: of courting insanity and going towards the things you fear. Playing Ständchen on the piano, slow and loud and ponderous, like thinking, I thought of nights spent in the hospital, the smell, the restless dark, the heat and the Edge. The thought of finding that Edge just enough to touch Dušan on the way back, like trying to touch hands through a thin, cold-frosted pane of glass, breath fuming in the chill. The thought of going towards the things one fears in order to better understand them, and in that instance of Schubert falling heavy upon the keys, of the memory of those maddening nights spent awake and breathing in the inescapable stench of injury, I thought that perhaps I might have understood this man and where he came from.

A memory for the Demon: teneremante, something Les said once, about music and passion.


...


July 30, 2007

Watched a PBS special on the power of art, the beauty if the abstract, the walking of that edge between creativity and genius, the open-armed, embracitory [not a word, I know] falling into an eternity that is neither explained nor defined: no explanation for its existence, its message. Just take what you will and enrich your soul. Guaze brown square in a wavering outline of darkness where light gives way to the night, raw and rough around the edges, with a secret core that no one can reach. That perfect patch of silence in a room where the windows and doors have all been bricked-up - but not a punishing isolation as Michelangelo saw it, but a peaceful and perfect room of shifting proportions, impregnable behind black ink, the spot that everyone seeks and no one ever reaches.


...


A world of artistic nonsense, on pages from Florence. Going back through this book made me want to work on "Silence is Golden" again... as did Ständchen. I swear that piece is a bad influence on me - I play it and I get all melancholy and weird. Then I start randomly philosophizing about Rothko and shadows. Then I become useless, and have to splurge on Age of Empires II and tea to regain my sanity.

I realized today that I don't need any flash of brilliant insight to set "Silence" in time. I was thinking today, trying to place myself in that story in that world, and you know what came immediately to mind? The parlor in Nana and Pop's old house. Quiet, warm, wide-open; lots of sunshine, miles of percieved seperation from every other room in the house; a softly ticking clock. I realized that that had been the unconscious setting the whole time. And what a wave of relief - there's no room in the world that I know better.