Rough Diary: A Senegal Diary

I took a slender canoe, made from a single tree, out into shallow marsh water to a large mangrove where I saw women half-submerged in the murky water, fishing for oysters. As the canoe passed them, they lifted their heads from the water, shielded their eyes from the sun,  and waved to us. I waved back. The canoe passed on, and they bowed  back to the water. 

The canoe cut through the mangrove and arrived at an island made completely of oyster shells: shells shucked for centuries until  accumulated into a landmass between the grooves of the mangrove. On this shell island, rice and sorghum were grown, two of the most  ancient food sources: ancient land, ancient food. Still standing in some areas of the shell islands were the traditional tiny huts of brown  thatch on long stilts. They seemed like cranes about to lift off to the sky. I walked past them, shells crunching beneath my feet, toward  the “mixed” cemetery on the island. My guide explained to me that  Muslims and Christians, for centuries, have been buried there, each  playing a role in the different sects’ burial rituals. He explained that the two religions have shared an intimate closeness for as long as forever in Joal: a typical family from Joal, like his, was made up of both  faiths. The cemetery seemed to have more crosses, however, which were skewed in directions that appeared consistent enough to suggest  a pattern. I asked why the crosses were laid out in these different ways, and he told me this was due to the different Christian denominations  on the island, four I believe, the majority being Catholic. Later, indeed, I got to see the main Catholic church, which was in the center  of the island, the altar laden with fruit offerings to various saints, all  represented by white figurines. 

We left the cemetery, crossing by foot the beautiful long bridge, recently built, of the shell island from Joal into Fadiout. Fadiout is a  large island of about six thousand people. An extraordinarily beautiful place that reminded me of the rugged terrain of the parish of St.  Elizabeth on the southern coast of Jamaica. I brushed my hand on  the dusty, pebbly ground. Tufts of grass grew in sparse bursts all over  the marl-like earth. I put the dust in my pocket and we walked on.  My guide took me to the four public meeting spaces, all big gazebos  built in a small square surrounded by flat-roofed residential houses. In  the meeting spaces were men of different ages, broken up into small  groups talking or playing checkers. Some looked up from their conversation or game and greeted us. 

After the last meeting place, the guide said he would now take me to the King of the Sea.

***

The King of the Sea was ninety years old. He could be a hundred  or over a hundred, depending on whom you asked. He was a very  old man, one eye sunken so deep into his skull and congealed into a  smooth lump of skin, the other, opened, small and clouded over with  glaucoma. I was told about him before going to Joal and that I had to meet him. From all accounts he was an amazing man. I didn’t ask a  lot of questions about him in Dakar, where I first heard about him; I loved the fact or idea of his title, King of the Sea. It was not a title, as  was explained to me, but a calling, and I wanted to meet him on the  terms of just that detail. 

My guide and I arrived at the King of the Sea’s house, a small raw concrete structure crowded in by other houses nearby, nondescript and plain. A woman who seemed to be in her thirties took us  to the living room, where we sat on a sofa and waited for the King of  the Sea. Shortly, the old man came out of his bedroom to the living  room, brushing his hands on the furnishings as he made his way to  the large sofa, where he sat on one of the cushions in a far corner by  the curtained window. The sofa seemed to envelop his small form  like quicksand. He was dressed in white cotton pajama pants and  a loose T-shirt with a thin gold chain with a cross pendant over the  shirt’s collar. Above his head was a calendar with an image of Christ of the Sacred Heart, the same one ubiquitous in Caribbean homes:  my grandmother’s house had one of these calendars, and I started to  wonder if I had ever seen my grandmother sit directly beneath her  calendar Jesus. A TV blared loudly from another room. 

I stared from the sofa in front of him at the large white tiles on the floor, then back at the King of the Sea; I did again and realized I  could see him reflected in the tiles. His shaved head had sprinklings  of white on it. Then he began to speak. He lifted his head slightly up  and down as if nodding and raised his right hand in the same rhythm  to match his speech. His voice was husky but not deep. I listened intently to it as my guide translated softly, directly into my ear. He told me that the King of the Sea has welcomed me, that I’m not a stranger  to him. Though by now various people have said this to me all over  Senegal, to the point that it has become commonplace, here it moved  me so much as I listened to the cadence of his voice, which, the more  I listened, the more I’m convinced was like sea waves on a calm day. 

I wish I could’ve thanked him in a shared language, but I asked my guide to tell him that I’m grateful to be in his home. He welcomed me  again and said I’m free to ask him any question. I asked my guide to  ask him to tell me, what is the work of the King of the Sea? His cloudy  eye blinked, and then he began to speak at length, so much so my  guide wasn’t able to keep up with translating and began to do something I hadn’t noticed since we met: he clicked his tongue to signal he  was listening. The King of the Sea spoke for a long time. The guide  clicked and I listened. After a while the King of the Sea fell silent. The  guide then summarized for me. 

The King of the Sea says prayers for fishermen before they go out to sea; he prays for a good catch and for the sea to be kind to the fishermen on their journey. If the catch is bad, the King of the Sea goes to  the sea and makes sacrifice and prayers to the sea for a better catch next  time. He repeats this ritual of sacrifice and prayers until the sea answers  with good catches. The King of the Sea cannot—can never—spend a  night away from the village; wherever he is during the day, he must be  back to the village by nightfall. The consequences of staying away from  the village for a night seemed dire, but I wasn’t told what they were. 

After the guide explained this to me, I asked him to ask the King of the Sea how he became the King of the Sea and if he always wanted  to be king. Again, the King of the Sea spoke for a long time, much  longer than before. My eyes strayed from him, down to the white  tiles and then outside to the window behind his head: the large light  behind him framing his head was as magnificent as that in the print  of Christ above his head. When he stopped speaking, the guide gave  a rough summary.

One day the elders of the village came and said to him that since he was such a good boy who went to church and was a good son to  his father, he would make a good King of the Sea. He was selected  because he belonged to a particular ethnic group that was the minority in his village, which all Kings of the Sea came from. No, he didn’t  want to be the king. But then regular people, his friends and family,  first in jest, began to call him King of the Sea. That bothered him  and he spoke to his father about his discomfort with the whole matter. His father reassured him that the matter was his choice and that  he was free to say no to becoming the king. He didn’t say no then to  his father after they spoke, neither did he say yes. One day after that  talk with his father, he was leaving the hospital, whether as a visitor or  as a patient was unclear, and he met an old friend about to enter the  hospital—again it was unclear whether as a visitor or as a patient—who called him King of the Sea, and right then and there in front of  the hospital he decided he wanted to become the King of the Sea. He  spoke again to his father. His father was happy about his choice. The  rites were performed, many decades ago, and ever since he has been  the King of the Sea. 

Was he a fisherman before he became the King of the Sea? I asked. No, not in any serious way. He was a farmer. He said this, and for the  first time I heard him laugh.

–Ishion Hutchinson

Ishion Hutchinson was born in Port Antonio, Jamaica. He is the author of the poetry collections School of Instructions: a Poem, House of Lords and Commons and Far District and the book of essays, Fugitive Tilts.

ZONGO

i.

Let’s start with some ground rules. Rule actually. Because there’s really just one. If you get up and walk away or even try to leave this table, I will kill you. I know that sounds like a joke coming from a guy in a propeller hat with bright orange glasses and a daisy pinned to his polka dot overalls but the .45 on my thigh is all business. Make a run for it, I will pump you full of lead in the middle of this Applebee’s, so help me God. Take a look. Am I lying? Wait—the hostess is—okay now. Cool, we have an understanding. So, here’s how this is gonna go: you’re gonna sit there and enjoy these hand-breaded coconut shrimp and I’m gonna tell you a story. I’ll tell it once and I’ll tell it fast. You should listen. Because there’s gonna be a quiz at the end. And it’s very, very important you pass.

We good?

Our tale begins on the way to The Beacon Theater, just a 30 minute drive from Jersey City. It’s Sunday. I’m taking the fam to see - you guessed it - Zongo Live, a matinee performance by their favorite bespectacled and propeller-hatted YouTuber. Do I want to go? No. Do I look the way I look now? Fuck no. But my 4 and my 5 are fans. And my wife says it’ll make their year. As luck would have it, we’re on the West Side Highway when - wham - we hit a pothole. Good news is there’s a spare in the trunk. Bad news is tying their shoes was a saga - and with a flat, there’s no way we make the show. My 5 is head in hands. My 4 is screaming “Why” like some scene out of a horror movie. So I call an audible. We book it to the mall.  While they go HAM on some rides, I DM Zongo himself, a Hail Mary that explains where we’ve been, what’s happened, how heartbroken my 4 and my 5 are, and what it would mean if he’d send us a video; maybe - getting old school here - drop an autographed pic in the mail. I’m bold enough to give him my address. And this, you could argue, is where things take a turn. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Couple weeks pass; life is… life. I’m the managing director at an ad agency. That job’s 24/7. Kids don’t love school, one more or less than the other. And sure maybe marriage isn’t the fireworks-slash-fuckfest it once was—but we love each other. All of us. We’ve built a world. Until—well, you know.  

Fast forward to the end of a long day. I ferry home from work. Normally I hole up inside, catch a nap while the skyline rolls by, but that day I stand on the upper deck, let the wind bite my ears. Can’t say why. Maybe I want to wake up instead of conk out, maybe there’s an itch in me only a little pain can scratch, but when I walk through my door, maybe 45 minutes later, I see, seated on my L-shaped West Elm sofa, none other than Zongo himself. I don’t mean the actor. I mean the guy. Full costume, just like the one I’m wearing. And committed, doing the bit. When I tell you I’ve never witnessed my kids so happy, I’m not exaggerating. My 4’s eyes are shining. My 5 has a thousand watt smile that could power the planet. I guess. I’m not sure how watts work. But they’re at the tail end of a private performance and even my wife, who I know can only take so much of this shit, looks pretty damn delighted. Before I make it to the living room, he gives each of them a balloon animal, takes a bow and receives the most epic round of applause ever. The kids hug him. He shakes my wife’s hand, heads my way. “I can’t believe this,” I say. “Thank you, Zongo.” He just flashes that goofy grin, rests five fingers on my shoulder, goes, “You asked for it.” You asked for it. In the moment, I don’t think much of it. I figure he’s referencing my DM, the request and all to make up for missing his show. And before I can turn it over, he’s gone. In his car or an Uber or whatever. And now the hugs are for me. I am showered with adulation. A conquering hero in my home for what I’ve somehow, someway, conjured. And at the risk of oversharing, that night, I score some extra adulation in the bedroom too.

You’d think the glory of this feat would subside in time. After all, what did I do except drop Zongo a line? Put in for an unlikely make-good after a stroke of bad luck. But the praise heaped on me by my fam seems to multiply by the day. My 4 greets me each morning with a strawberry Pop Tart. My five looks at me the way the Aztecs must’ve Cortes, a God on four legs—before, y’know, things went sideways. And my wife? I feel like she’s falling in love with me all over. Not that she’d fallen out. But man, she listens and gives me grace and — you’ll excuse me but—delivers blowjobs to completion. After 10 years of matrimony, 16 years of togetherness, that means more than you can wrap you mind around.

Then—another turn. Wife texts from her 9-5, we’re having a guest for dinner. First thought: one of my kid’s friends. Hope there’s enough Stovetop. Last thought: the famous YouTuber who paid us a surprise visit less than 10 days earlier, back for seconds, only 10% less costumed and yet it is. “Delighted to delight,” he explains, orange glasses gone, propeller hat also conspicuously missing. He’s all compliments when it comes to my wife’s cooking, my kids show him their class projects, beam with pride. And I know - I know - I should be grateful. But beneath the pudding skin of my friendly reception - there’s a heebie-jeebie-ness. A something’s-wonky sensation I want to but can’t deny. One visit is unexpected, two is weird. So I probe. “Busy guy like you must have a hard time making time. Is your tour moving on from NYC? When? Oh and hey, how did you get my wife’s number again?” As he sidles over to the sink, sleeves rolled, dish rag cast over one shoulder (insisting, INSISTING, on cleaning up) he’s got every answer, casually chatting while my better half sponges and he dries. Fans are what make Zongo—Zongo; connecting with them is everything. Tour dates? They’re extended. He’s gigging some more in the city. And my wife’s digits? A friendly exchange when he last stopped by.

In short: no big deal.

A bigger deal, as it turns out… my rudeness. No, my “passive aggressive vibe.” At least that’s how it’s explained to me once Zongo takes off and the kids bed down. Apparently my comments felt more like jabs, my questions like diet accusations; and did I really have to let him tidy up? As suddenly as it arrived, the favor I’d earned from his first visit fades, and the favor I could’ve earned from this one? Squandered to say the least. No one asks me to sleep on the couch, that night, but my wife and I curl up on opposite sides of our mattress and might as well be on different continents.

Now, in any logical universe, this would be a reasonable if strange ending to our tale. Order restored-ish. Hero status having run its course. Lightning would not possibly have the sociopathic audacity, the elephantine cojones to strike thrice. And somehow, SOMEHOW, thrice wasn’t nearly enough.

As the next couple months unfold, Zongo doesn’t just come back, he embeds himself in our lives. Sunday brunch. My 5’s Karate class. My 4’s school play. One day, the furniture’s rearranged. Who helped my wife move it? There’s no grand transgression, no hostile takeover; it’s death by a thousand balloon animals, and I can’t help but notice: every time we see Zongo, he’s a little less—Zongo. Like I said, he’s lost the hat and glasses. Then the overalls go. Next: the orange shirt and oversized shoes. Eventually he’s rocking V-necks sweaters and Levi’s. Stuff that, frankly, could’ve been plucked from my closet. And when I bring it up? My wife’s response is he’s getting more comfortable. Just being himself. Isn’t it nice to have another friend, someone the kids are wild about, who’s wild about the kids, and why the fuck do I care what Zongo wears? What’s the difference?

For obvious reasons, I need to know more.

Fortunately I work in an industry that’s very “of the internet.” I may not make TikToks, but I consume them. My Instagram presence is present; and I can online sleuth as well as any elder millennial. Which makes my deep dive into Zongo that much more frustrating. Because this ubiquitous man-child, this clown with no make up, has tens of millions of followers but no backstory. No bio. No birth name. No birth year. His wiki page: just about his career. His IMDB only lists his stage name. His X, where I’d DM’ed him, is also a shallow pool of non-information; which I have to imagine is a deliberate play to really sell his character in world where kids chronically Google. And when I try to draw more out of him? Nada. A wink, a smile, a joke to change the subject; so, I watch his videos. All of them. I call in sick a few days, see his shows. I’m not sure what I’m looking for but something, anything, a nugget of intel on who he is. Because the worst part? Not the fact that I feel gaslit, that my wife and kids seem to think I’m nuts for questioning Zongo’s sudden materialization in our lives, but that, after achieving my highest approval ratings as dad-n-husband, I’m easily the least interesting person in our house. They like him better than me. They wish I was Zongo. Or Zongo was me. And it’s palpable. I can feel it. He matters. I don’t. I’m losing them.  

So, I do something I normally wouldn’t.

If it’s Zongo they want, then Zongo they shall have. What I mean is—if making myself more like Zongo will, I dunno, ingratiate me to them again, then … why not? I’m kinda willing to do anything because in the oddest way, I feel my people slipping away. It’s not hard to find the costume. Amazon has a million and with Halloween in the rearview, they’re all on sale. 40 bucks and 24 hours later I’ve got the goods. It’s a quick change on the ferry from work, they fit like a glove. And donning my orange glasses, polka dot overalls, propeller hat, and clown shoes, I tip toe through my door, couple hours early and—I’m gonna pause here a minute.   

Y’know, I met my wife in college. We were friends before we were … intimate, I guess, and there’s something profound about that. Our interests aligned, we went to football games together, we loved the same shitty top 40 songs, and exchanged books as often as secrets. We knew each other. So the sight of her, lodging her tongue inches deep in Zongo’s asshole, cheeks spread, simultaneously beating him off, as I stand there in costume is an image so jarring, so destabilizing, I’m still not fully able to process it. And—and I have to say—if that horrifying tableau, that nightmare fresco of an adulterous rusty trombone, were the least savory element here, I might be able—over years and with hella therapy—to work through things. In fact, if Zongo went on to Jackson Pollack my West Elm sectional with his Polka Dot spunk, I still might live. However, what knocks me back, what shocks me infinitely more than the infidelity is the surprise I read from them. Not that they’ve been caught, by me, dressed this way—but that they have no idea who I am. My wife screams. Zongo, who is now completely un-Zongo’ed, inflates his chest and orders me to leave before he calls the cops.  

I… I’m paralyzed. I stand there for 30 seconds, a minute, a year maybe, then bolt.

I’m operating on instinct at this point. There is no thought. Somehow I stumble to the PATH train, head back to the city, drift to my office to seek refuge and presumably pull my shit together. Only security won’t let me in. I can’t find my key card. The wallet and phone I have in my pocket aren’t mine. I see a couple of coworkers heading out of the elevator and hurl myself at them. They recoil. They’ve never seen me either. 

Fuck this shit, I say. I run—full bore—out of the building, across Times Square, up to the Beacon. This home-wrecking harlequin, this monster in giant orange wingtips, has a show to do — I’m gonna get there before he does, wait by the stage door, and break his fucking windpipe. I’m in position too, fists balled. When some handlers grab me, pull me inside. Security, I assume, I’m screwed, but instead they say they’ve been looking for me everywhere, where have I been, do I have any clue what time it is and they throw me, catapult me, on stage.  

The spotlights are blinding.

I can barely make out the sea of faces in the crowd; kids, parents - like me - waiting, watching, eyes wide, frothy with excitement. I can hear a pin drop, the blood circulate through my veins. Then the musical cue—and I know it’s crazy, I know it’s insane but I just … start doing the act. I’d seen the show so many times I know the moves, heard the songs so often they’ve wormed their way into my brain. And when it’s all over and I take a second, third, fourth bow, all to a hurricane of woohoos from happy ticket holders, I float back to my—his—dressing room, and stare in the mirror. What’s happening? What cosmic fuckery has asserted itself? How? I reach for my orange glasses. They don’t come off. Not that I lack the strength. They’re just, woof, glued to my face by a force I don’t have the language to label.

The door opens.

Families with VIP badges flood in. Their tee shirts say “If Zongo is Wrongo, I don’t wanna be right.” Photos and markers are thrust in my hands; I’m signing autographs, big wild flourishes for Zs; tussling hair and posing for selfies; thinking, why can’t they see me, why don’t they know this is not who I am? I’m part of a family—my wife is named… I don’t remember. My 4 and 5 are… names gone too. Everything - everyone - up in smoke. But I still know a few things.  On Sundays, we order from Applebee’s. I do pick-up and sneak in a Mud Slide at the bar. So I make a lethal purchase after hours in another part of Jersey; load the chamber, and bide my time. I’m sure you’ll be here. Just like I’m sure you’re living my life, fucking my wife, and playing dad to my kids. Now, Zongo, here comes the quiz. We’ll start with a softball…

What in the name of holy hell have you done?

ii.

I want to be clear. I don’t know you. I’ve never met you. I’ve never seen you before in my—ow, OW. Okay, okay, I’ll talk. Just quit shoving the gun between my ribs. Deal? Thank you; jeez. For the record, I was never this aggressive. I don’t think the others were, either. And yeah, of course there were others. You think you’re the first dude to get Zongoed?  

Alright, what’s the preamble? What’s the… GOT IT. “Even if you kill me, you’ll never get your life back. No matter what you do, it’s gone for good.” That part sticks with you. So get comfortable being uncomfortable; it took me too long. But here’s the silver lining: a way out exists. I can help you if you’ll let me. Pull the trigger and you’re outta luck, yeah?

Have a shrimp. They’re actually delicious.

Now, it’s my turn to tell a story.  It’s your story too; all of ours, really. And it’s just as important that you listen. Nod or something to let me know you—great, that’ll work.

Once upon a time, you’re the guy you know. You do what you like with who you like. You recognize yourself when you look in the mirror. Then—one day—that all starts to go, the appearance, the identity, even the memories aren’t cut from crystal, anymore. And I’m not talking about Zongo. I’m talking about having a family. We age and we’re replaced; by who? Strangers. Bizarro versions of ourselves. People we’d be embarrassed to be seen with before they snatched our minds and bodies. Fact is I can’t remember who I was before I got Zongoed, but I do remember this: an avalanche of No. No more Me Time. No more buddies. No more style. No more six pack. No, you can’t watch that show. No, you can’t play that song. No, you can’t take that trip; it’s too expensive for four people.

Naturally, it begs the question: if that life is all about No, why say Yes? Well… you don’t love responsibility, but you love your kids. You don’t love ceding liberty, but you love your wife. You don’t love the elliptical but you love looking decent. You don’t love cos-playing as some corporate a-hole but you love feeling like a boss at the office. It’s complicated. And this tug-of-war, these tectonic plates of conflicting desires, working on each other since the dawn of civilization, is what sparks Zongo into being. He isn’t new. He’s existed for thousands of years; more maybe. Other names. Others callings. Unsure of the deets. But sure he was born to be a gift. Think about it. Right now, you get to delight kids without cleaning up after them; no moments that push you to the brink. You get to win at work; you’re rich, famous; no pressure to earn or climb. Physically, fine, you’ve got “a look,” but real talk: the ladies dig it, and you have no idea how many freaks want you to keep the glasses on—

HEY. EASY WITH THE PISTOL. I’M PICKING UP WHAT YOU’RE PUTTING DOWN. Even though we wished him into being, he’s still fake. And the fakeness of him can’t compete with the flawed truths we leave behind. Message received. With no static. I’m just painting a picture of the upside. Because the next part’s not easy. It may sound that way because you’re desperate, but Zongo-ing some other guy isn’t just stealing his job and his lady; you’re highjacking his life.

I—I’m not ashamed to say I almost end it, off myself, at the prospect. Before you, Zongo-ing another dude seemed unconscionable. Keep in mind, I’d been him for six months, trying everything to stick it out. When the YouTube comments quit fueling me, I turned to mid-day cocktails. When the drinks stopped working, I chased them with blow. When the coke didn’t cut it, I dialed some escorts; maybe they could numb me out. But my endurance, my will to don the orange glasses, was fading. Heavy is the head. Then a ding—a digital bell peeled across my bedroom. And I lifted my face from a mound of freshly driven blow, white as a geisha, looked beyond two slam piece single moms, and a pro I’d hired, passed out my on polka dot four poster. And, like that, the orange sherbet fever dream of the last six months—paused. The residual hell of losing my family and living behind the bars of this body, did too. Because when I read your message, delved into your profile, I saw something different from all the other candidates, gents I’d considered but gave up on Zongo-ing. The other dudes, they were young enough, fit. I don’t mind being seen that way. I’d been told to look for partners I could stand, kids who were worth a damn. Saw a few of those too. But there was something else. Something that no one had ever mentioned. Something I hadn’t thought of until you slid onto my radar. I could offer your family everything you couldn’t. As a husband, a father, and a man.

Whoa, Finger off the trigger. You’ve gotta hear this. I’m not giving you your out until you do, okay?

When I look up your socials, I clock photos from work trips, shoots in LA. Family getaways? What are those? When I tail you that weekend, you’re at your kid’s karate class; but your face? Glued to your phone. A week later: anniversary dinner.  You’re at the table, I’m at the bar. “Cheers to 10 years,” you say, then put in for a rib-eye. But you’re attending in body more than soul, just waiting for your wife to hit the head so you can comment on a client’s LinkedIn post. “Congrats on your promotion, Carlos, well earned.” Tell me this: what are you thinking the day of Zongo Live? When you’re ferrying the fam from Jersey City? The joy the show will bring the kids or the inconvenience of the drive? The memories you’ll make or the points you’ll earn from wifey? Coming together? You say your job’s 24/7 but you spend time how you choose. You complain your kids don’t love school but when’s the last time you asked why? You claim marriage is no fuckfest but I struggle to picture sex as anything but a quest for a nut for you; though I am sorry about the butt stuff—might’ve been overzealous with your better half—my better half.

The point is even when you’re there—you aren’t. You could be. But you lock up your life in a dark garage like some cherry red droptop you’re too distracted to drive. As far as I’m concerned, it might’ve belonged to you, but only technically. You lived around it, not in it. Which, you’ll forgive me, makes it forfeit.

Tough pill, I’m guessing. But I can’t imagine it’s uncommon. We’re boring in our failings. Achingly cookie cutter in our endless deficits. Maybe that’s what Zongo teaches us. How unoriginal our selfishness can be.

Don’t cry. Here, take a napkin. Careful, it’s got mango chili stuff on it.

Now, a promise is a promise.   

The ritual is simpler than you think. You look around, and land on Yankees Hat by the bar—Irish twin on way by the look of his lady; or Mr. Salt and Pepper with his Botox Bride, working on the Chicken Wonton Tacos; maybe even Divorced Dad in the booth by the bathroom with his two unhappy campers. You spend the time, you decide, place a hand on their shoulder, and recite the words “you asked for it.” Because, in every way, through their choices and actions, they probably did. Then the switch begins. The only question is—will you?   

Will you do what you’ve always done? Or will you do—

i.

{bang}

THE END

–Ian Grody

Ian Grody has written superhero shows, dystopian thrillers, and raunchy country musicals for networks like MTV, SyFy, and CMT; optioned features domestically and abroad; and published a graphic novel with AWA and The Tribeca Film Festival. He’s also the Chief Creative Officer of Giant Spoon (Fast Company’s #1 Most Innovative Ad Agency).

C

This piece is an excerpt from Until the Victim Becomes our Own, written by Dimitris Lyacos and translated into English by Andrew Barrett.

A day blotted out. And, if it ever really existed, it was already blotted out from the head, and the head slumped over the knees and the knees tilted down alongside the alien body, as sleep kept on flowing inside it. And right at that moment, when the body had finally found a way to stay still, never mind on what kind of bed, a thought ran through it again. What will happen tomorrow. And the same person woke up, the one that had slept, myself, the one that startled awake in the middle of the night, I startled because what I saw roused me as if it had dealt me a blow the moment it rushed out of my mind. And the mind opened as if it were a book, and with one eye I was looking inside it to find out what was written there while the other eye was still searching for something within my sleep. And in front of me, the book was growing larger as an image was opening wide inside it and the eye was staring at it, the image unfurled and became brighter, and it was encircling me while it kept spreading and growing. Now it was huge in proportion, and I was turning around to see it as best as I could, but I couldn’t get a full idea of it, nor could I discern what was going on in the background, but it was as if something was coming from there. And it scared me because it did not stop growing (larger and larger) and I could no longer perceive its edges, at first it was only that kind of fear like when you don’t know what’s really happening, but then, as you go along, you realize that you are part of it too, and you get used to that, and become less afraid. And that was the moment he came: a towering man, a few feet ahead, he approached and yet he remained motionless, he was only a few feet away, and I was trying to figure out if he could see me as well, I could not make out his eyes for some reason, and then I looked down at his feet just in case he might decide to walk over to me. I couldn’t make out any eyes but the head was yellow, there was a light inside it and it illuminated the whole body below, a very bright light, and yet the arms and the chest were pale, silvery, it seemed as if they had been resting for years, and then the belly and legs down to the knees were glowing red as if the whole of his blood had gathered there, and it looked as if there was no skin to hold the blood in, and it seemed to me as if he tried to take a step forward but he ended up staying in the same spot. His legs were red from the knees up and his shins were black down to the ankles. Maybe there was a little red on them too, a somewhat drab shade of red, and they were black and hard as thick iron poles nailed to the ground. I still couldn’t get an idea of the feet, one moment they also seemed to be black, but it was bizarre, it was not like that, on the one hand, they looked hard and black at the heels but less so as you went towards the toes and from a certain point on the rest seemed like broken bits, like bits of shells or plates or something, I could not really tell, and yet, nonetheless, they did look like feet at the end, and had toes, as they should, I thought maybe they were sunk in the dirt, or maybe were made out of dirt, I could not really tell, in other places it seemed quite clear that it was like a black hardwood, or a kind of iron and then slowly their shape would vanish. I realized deep within myself that these legs were not made to walk. But again, I couldn’t really tell what this was about, and then I saw that people had gathered around him, out of the blue, as if they had come from nowhere, for an instant I turned my head elsewhere, and when I looked back, everyone had gathered at once. Some had also brought ladders with them, and others had brought tools and were struggling to cut the man into pieces, it seemed that they were craving to cut him into pieces. It seemed clear that they had all come together and were working to break or chip off whatever they could, pieces that were like stones in various shapes, they would take them down, carry them further along, start building with them and then go back, and those who cut them, gave them more. Bricks and stones in colors depending on which part of the body they were cut out from, and they erected stairs, like scaffolding, and slowly lowered his head, slowly, lower, and lower. While his body was hollowed out, houses kept being built around him and after they had removed the final pieces, his head was left in the middle, and yet as always, it lit up from within, and at that point they started to build around it as well and then walled it off, until nothing could be seen anymore. And while they were working non-stop, there was a noise, and they turned towards where they heard something suddenly snapping, like the branch of a huge tree, carried away by the wind. The wind had picked up and flung a rock toward them that broke off from the opposite side. It landed on top of everything they had built, and, in an instant, everything was in ruins, and the wind drowned them in dust and from far beyond it brought stones and wood, and papers and clothes, from who knows where, and gathered them there in one growing pile. It was bizarre, because the houses were destroyed and those that were left looked like crumpled cardboard boxes that the wind had carried and filled with rags and papers. It started off like a pyramid, now it was already a hill, still climbing, and you couldn’t tell where these people were, if they were still there or if they were gone, but they were probably there, and it was bizarre because if you drew closer, it seemed as if they were also made out of paper, or rather, clay and rotting paper, photos, newspapers - a mountain of trash that flapped like flags in the wind. It was very odd because all of this was vaulted over there by just one single gust, and that happened now, and yet it seemed as if it were a long time ago that the whole thing took place, but no one could see it until this very moment, like a stone wearing away in the wind for a long time now, like a tree that keeps growing until it withers, and what’s left is a nondescript land, where something has ended and nothing will ever change again, and when it's over, it’s over, that’s it, this very pile, everything is contained there. And the tree has now withered. Its day is buried inside that place. But for you it is not yet the case, for you the end has not come, you have just woken up, soon the day will break. Do not bother to think, because this whole thing means nothing at all, and if you stop thinking about it you see none of that anymore. Turn around and go back to sleep. Nothing has changed. It was just a dream. That’s always how sleep comes, splitting the mind in two, and then everything gets confused with everything else. But it was a dream and it’s over now. Sleep.

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Σβησμενη μερα. Κι αν πραγματι υπηρξε ποτε, εσβησε πια στο κεφαλι, και το κεφαλι εγειρε πανω απ’ τα γονατα και τα γονατα επεσαν διπλα στο ξενο κορμι που μεσα του τωρα χυθηκε ο υπνος. Κι εκει που ειχε βρει το κορμι ενα τροπο να μεινει ακινητο, σε οποιο κρεβατι, ετρεξε μεσα του παλι μια σκεψη. Τι θα γινει αυριο. Και ξυπνησε παλι ο ιδιος, αυτος που κοιμηθηκε, εγω, αυτος που στη μεση της νυχτας πεταχτηκε επανω, πεταχτηκα επανω, γιατι αυτο που ειδα με ξυπνησε παλι, σα να με χτυπησε οπως εφυγε απ᾽το μυαλο. Και ανοιξε το μυαλο σα βιβλιο και το ενα ματι κοιτουσε εκει μεσα τι εγραφε και το αλλο ματι κατι εψαχνε ακομη μεσα στον υπνο. Και το βιβλιο μπροστα μου μεγαλωνε, κι ανοιγε εκει μια εικονα και το ματι την εβλεπε, η εικονα ξετυλιγοταν και γινοταν ολο και πιο φωτεινη, και με αγκαλιαζε ενω απλωνε ακομα γυρω μου μεγαλωνοντας. Τωρα ειχε γινει τεραστια και γυριζα απο εδω κι απο εκει για να τη δω οσο μπορουσα, αλλα δεν την εβλεπα ολοκληρη, κι ουτε ακριβως μπορουσα να διακρινω στο βαθος αλλα σα να ερχοταν κατι απο εκει. Και με φοβιζε που μεγαλωνε και δεν εβλεπα τις ακρες της πια, στην αρχη ηταν μονο ενας φοβος οπως οταν δεν ξερεις τι γινεται αλλα υστερα καταλαβαινεις πως ενα κομματι αυτης της εικονας εισαι κι εσυ, και συνηθιζεις, και φοβασαι λιγοτερο. Αυτη τη στιγμη ηταν που ηρθε: Ενας αντρας, πανυψηλος, λιγα μετρα μπροστα μου, ηρθε αλλα ηταν ακινητος, ηταν μονο λιγα μετρα μακρια και προσπαθουσα να καταλαβω αν με βλεπει κι εκεινος, δεν μπορουσα ομως καθολου να ξεχωρισω τα ματια του, κι υστερα τον κοιταζα κατω στα ποδια, μηπως περπατησει και ερθει σε μενα. Δεν εβλεπα ματια αλλα το κεφαλι ηταν κιτρινο, ειχε μεσα ενα φως και φωτιζε ολο το σωμα απο κατω, ενα φως πολυ δυνατο, ομως τα χερια και το στηθος ηταν χλωμα, ασημενια, εμοιαζαν να ειχαν μεινει για χρονια ακινητα, κι επειτα η κοιλια και τα ποδια μεχρι τα γονατα κοκκινιζαν σα να ειχε μαζευτει ολο το αιμα του εκει, και φαινοταν το αιμα σα να μην ειχε δερμα να το εμποδιζει, και μου φανηκε πως προσπαθησε να κανει ενα βημα μπροστα, εμεινε ομως στο ιδιο σημειο. Τα ποδια κοκκινα μεχρι τα γονατα κι απο εκει οι κνημες μεχρι τους αστραγαλους καταμαυρες. Ισως με λιγο κοκκινο μεσα κι αυτες, ομως λιγο μουντο, και μαυρες σκληρες σα χοντρα σιδερενια κονταρια καρφωμενα στο χωμα. Τα πελματα ακομα δεν καταλαβαινα, μια μου φαινονταν μαυρα και αυτα, αλλα ηταν περιεργο, δεν ηταν ετσι, απο τη μια φαινονταν σκληρα και μαυρα στις φτερνες μεχρι λιγο μπροστα κι υστερα ηταν σα σπασμενα κομματια το υπολοιπο, σα κομματια απο οστρακα η πιατα, δεν καταλαβαινα, οπου φαινονταν ομως στο τελος τα δαχτυλα, κανονικα, σκεφτηκα μηπως ηταν βυθισμενα στο χωμα, η μηπως ηταν φτιαγμενα απο χωμα, δεν καταλαβαινα, φαινοταν ξεκαθαρα σε ορισμενα σημεια πως ηταν σα μαυρο ξυλο σκληρο, η σιδερο και υστερα σιγα σιγα χανοταν το σχημα τους. Ενοιωσα μεσα μου πως αυτα τα ποδια δεν περπατουσαν. Αλλα παλι δεν καταλαβαινα τι ηταν ολο αυτο, κι επειτα ειδα πως ξαφνικα γυρω του μαζευτηκε κοσμος, εντελως ξαφνικα γιατι δε φαινοταν να ειχαν ερθει απο καπου, για μια στιγμη ειχα γυρισει το κεφαλι αλλου και υστερα αμεσως ειχαν προλαβει να μαζευτουν ολοι εκει. Καποιοι ειχαν φερει και σκαλες μαζι τους και αλλοι ειχαν φερει εργαλεια και προσπαθουσαν να κοψουν κομματια τον ανθρωπο, φαινοταν οτι ηθελαν να τον κοψουν κομματια. Φαινοταν οτι ειχαν ερθει ολοι μαζι και δουλευαν να σπασουν η να ξεκολλησουν ο,τι μπορουσαν, ηταν σαν πετρες σε διαφορα σχηματα, τις κατεβαζαν τις κουβαλουσαν πιο περα και αρχιζαν να χτιζουν με αυτες και υστερα γυριζαν πισω και αυτοι που τον εκοβαν τους εδιναν και αλλες. Τουβλα και πετρες σε χρωματα αναλογα με το σημειο του σωματος που ειχε κοπει, και ειχαν βαλει τις σκαλες, σα σκαλωσιες, και σιγα σιγα κατεβαζαν το κεφαλι του, σιγα σιγα ολο και πιο χαμηλα. Καθως το σωμα του αδειαζε χτιζονταν σπιτια τριγυρω και οταν πηραν τα τελευταια κομματια το κεφαλι ειχε ξεμεινει στη μεση αλλα φωτιζε οπως παντα με το μεσα του φως και αρχισαν τοτε να χτιζουν και γυρω απ᾽αυτο και να το κλεινουν μεσα σε τοιχους μεχρι που δε φαινοταν τιποτα πια. Κι οπως δουλευαν και δε σταματουσαν, ενας θορυβος, και γυρισαν να δουν προς τα εκει που ακουσαν κατι να σπαει ξαφνικα, σαν ενα κλαδι απο ενα τεραστιο δεντρο, που το πηρε ο αερας. Ειχε σηκωθει αερας και ειχε σπασει ενα βραχο απο απεναντι και τον ειχε πεταξει επανω τους. Πανω σε ο,τι ειχαν φτιαξει, και σε μια στιγμη εγιναν ολα συντριμμια, τα επαιρνε ολα ο ανεμος και τα επνιγε μεσα στη σκονη και απο περα μακρια εφερνε πετρες και ξυλα, χαρτια και ρουχα, ποιος ξερει απο που, και τα μαζευε εκει σε ενα σωρο που μεγαλωνε. Ηταν παραξενο, γιατι τα σπιτια ειχαν διαλυθει εντελως κι αυτα που απομεναν εμοιαζαν με βουλιαγμενα κουτια απο χαρτονι και ο αερας εφερνε και τα γεμιζε με χαρτια και κουρελια. Μια πυραμιδα, ενας λοφος που ανεβαινε ακομα, και δεν ηξερες που ειχαν παει ολοι αυτοι αν ηταν μεσα η αν ειχαν φυγει αλλα μαλλον μεσα ηταν, και ηταν παραξενο, γιατι αν πλησιαζες πιο κοντα φαινοταν πως ηταν κι αυτοι απο χαρτι, η μαλλον χωμα και σαπιο χαρτι, φωτογραφιες, εφημεριδες - ενα βουνο απο σκουπιδια που ανεμιζε σα σημαια στον ανεμο. Ηταν παραξενο γιατι τα ειχε φερει ολα εκει ξαφνικα μια σκετη ριπη, κι αυτο συνεβαινε τωρα, αυτη τη στιγμη, αλλα απ᾽την αλλη φαινοταν σαν να ηταν πολυ παλια που εγινε αυτο, σα να μη μπορουσε κανεις να το δει, σα μια πετρα που λιωνει στον ανεμο πολυ καιρο τωρα, οπως μεγαλωνει ενα δεντρο ωσπου να ξεραθει, και μενει ενας συνεχομενος τοπος οπου κατι τελειωσε και που δε θα αλλαξει τιποτα πια, κι οταν τελειωσει, τελος, αυτο ειναι, αυτος ο σωρος, ολα εχουν χωρεσει εκει μεσα. Και το δεντρο ξεραθηκε. Εκει μεσα θαφτηκε η ημερα του. Για σενα ομως δεν ειναι ετσι ακομα, για σενα δεν εχει τελειωσει, εσυ μολις ξυπνησες, θα χαραξει σε λιγο. Μη σκεφτεσαι, δε σημαινουν τιποτε αυτα, κι αν δεν τα σκεφτεσαι ουτε καν θα τα βλεπεις. Γυρισε παλι να κοιμηθεις. Δεν αλλαξε τιποτα. Ονειρο ηταν. Παντα ετσι ο υπνος σπαει στα δυο το μυαλο οταν μπει κι υστερα ολα μπερδευονται. Ονειρο ηταν. Κοιμησου. Τελειωσε.

–Dimitris Lyacos, translated into English by Andrew Barrett

Andrew Barrett is a translator and musician, who lives in Detroit, Michigan. He translates from the ancient Greek and modern Greek. He is currently working with modern Greek poet and writer Dimitris Lyacos on Until the Victim Becomes our Own, the follow up to Lyacos’ Poena Damni trilogy. He is one of forty-two translators who contributed to a new translation of the Dionysiaca of Nonnus, published by The University of Michigan Press in 2022. He attended the Banff International Translation Centre. 

Dead Verbs

After Xavier Blackwell-Lipkind’s Death Sentence, published in The Columbia Review’s 105th Volume

            I’m fighting through a vague nausea in some Marriott Banquet Hall, with a lanyard around my neck. There’s a typo in my name but I really don’t mind the mix-up because at least it brings some excitement to the semantics conference How Dead Verbs Have Imprisoned the English Language. I ate a continental breakfast before this, so I figure I may as well endure this too. Apparently, we should imagine English without the verb to-be because it gets used to death, because it prevails in substandard writing. Stan Kazikowski passionately lists 112 reasons we need to end their prolific overuse. I try not to blow my brains out.

            During the q&a portion, there’s about thirty seconds of silence before he answers because he won’t just say the thing is… or well, I am… or the question is… There’s no place for a dead verb, for is, even in the colloquial. He clearly wants to use it, but instead he suspends us all in some purgatory.

            A person in the row ahead of me turns to his friend and says, dude he’s totally edging us, this is all a performance on semen retention, just one big metaphor. His name is Charlie, but I’ll get to that later.

            For someone worried about being imprisoned by dead verbs, Stan has walked himself into another cell, but I guess, paradoxically, freedom requires constraints. Stan’s refusal to use a dead verb even though he wants to is probably the only time I am on the edge of my seat at a semantics conference. He says something about Dead Verbs confusing possession, identification, attribution, and causation; says that he’s doing a sort of post-modernist semantics movement, because we can’t ever really say what something is.

            Maybe Stan will put to rest the age old question, to be or not to be, by getting rid of the words entirely. It’s all the rage in writing right now, to speak this way, as if words are already dead, as if nothing is.

            Here is the valley I grew up in, here is my sister’s rumbling laughter right from her belly, here is where my brother taught me about guilt without ever having to say the word. Here is the time I had a shit shot on the buck and my brother said nothing, just put his head down and chased it until it finally collapsed. He saw all the meat I’d ruined, and I was nothing more than ten with a gun which had never felt so solid before. Here is where I met Charlie and let everything dissolve, where I let all the verbs die.

            I am (I am) staring down a barrel when I write, just not pulling the trigger, when I write about love, and about Charlie, but that’s for later. And if we are both staring down the barrel, how do I know who has their finger on the trigger, how do I know who is?

            It’s about resisting desire, resisting certainty.

            I’ll tell this all to Charlie, but that’s later.

            Here is the valley I grew up in, soft red dirt, my family. Here that I never want to give up, because I am so afraid of loss when everything seems to be about loss, about anticipating the final definition, the final death of the dead verb.

            My sister says I need to let go of the past, but how do I do this when I look at her face and I see everything there is? She says if you really want to lose nothing, you have to let it haunt you: it won’t save you from any pain, it will actually be more painful this way, you can’t lose loss, you can only have loss, I think you’re driving yourself crazy sometimes.

            Loss has to be devastating again, okay, I say. My sister says, well, I’m not sure you’re really getting what I’m trying to tell you.

            I am not dogmatic about anything, I don’t care about politics, I just care about verbs dying and dead verbs. And maybe this is why I shouldn’t use them, maybe I shouldn’t say what anything is, if I really am doubting everything. But I’m the only one here, and so far I’ve proven unable to answer.

            I call my sister again to ask about the death-sentence because she’s a law student with a lawyer wife and I have been searching, in all of this, for a simple verdict, something final: guilty or not guilty. My sister says the death-sentence has nothing to do with dead verbs, really, for which I entirely disagree. She says that you have a tendency to get caught up in little matters, that I’m really overlooking the bigger picture here.

            I say, the law is all about being definitive, that’s your realm, I’m trying to say it’s all relational, there’s nothing tidy about it. Nothing is. Networks of meaning are all dissolving anyways, it’s all symbols that merely reflect one another, free-floating semiotic systems, because God has died and we’re off the gold standard, living without go(l)d to ground anything, just reflecting one another, purely relational, so maybe I should be convinced to not ever say what something is. She just says yeah, okay, I’m glad I’m the lawyer of the family.

            Here is the desert, the valley, here where rust turns to sand, where all my memories bleed into one another, resist any particular order; where all the ends scatter and blur, hoarding verbs. I follow the footsteps my brother left behind before he went off with the cattle, before he became estranged, until the wind of time has obscured them and I don’t know where else to go. Deserts have no borders, no sure horizon, they’re always whistling and encroaching beyond, without framing, without sure borders, always dissolving.

            My mom is still (is still) there, so I suppose I am too.

            I book a flight to see her with my credit card. She asks about my writing, and I tell her about my problems with dead verbs and Stan Kazikowski, that I’m so scared of everything because it’s all uncertain, that I’m afraid when I write I am always looking down a barrel. That I’m not sure if Stan is right, that I don’t know how to write if I can’t say to-be. That it feels like dying if verbs can die too. She laughs, kindly. Apparently I have always needed something to kick against. Maybe you’re always chain smoking because verbs are like cigs, you never want them to end. She tells me this with her own newly acquired habit of vaping from the kind of vape that looks like a grenade when you hold it.

            We drive out on dirt roads, far past all the empty parking lots, into the mountainous desert that hasn’t yet been developed into concrete on top of flat dirt, past McMansions and plastic lawns, to shoot some cans; I stare down the barrel. I am (I am) ten again with a rifle in front of a dead buck.

            Metrosexual hick, I joke to my mom, there’s not enough metrosexuals or hicks these days. When we’re done shooting and we sit around a fire, I pour us vermouth-and-seltzers because that’s what the Beat Poets drank, so she asks if it’s offensive to call me a metrosexual for my choice of drink, which makes me laugh. She takes a rip from her grenade-vape. Later, the car lulls me to sleep, where I am forever, forever, and never–only red soft dirt and empty shells from the smoke at the end of the barrel.

            That month I pay off my credit card statement with no problem.

            There is Charlie, the one I met at the semantics conference, the one about dead verbs. I find his name funny, and he’s a philosophy student with a big dog, which is something I’ve always thought of as a marker of normality. The dog part, at least. I ask if he wants to get drinks after those grueling couple hours and not think about dead verbs and to-be, because it’s really exhausting. It’s important in that far-off way but I want something in my hands, him or a drink or both. The bar is an unsynchronized flash of games and news and ads, and Charlie says if you watch enough ads back to back it sort of looks like looney-tunes, and there’s no volume on the news so all the bickering just looks like talking heads and teleprompters. Big teeth everywhere, blown up baby heads on grown ups. The bartender asks what we want.

            I am apprehensive, but with Charlie it was actually very easy to fall in love.

            It seems like one of those things you don’t have to say, because it’s so obvious. It just is, I guess, like a dead verb. We are walking his dog, Buster, through Central Park, through the North Woods, and I tell him I still sleep in his bed even though I’m allergic to dogs, and isn’t that enough?

            He says–and together we end up digressing until we’re more confused than before–well, I guess you don’t owe me anything. I tell him he’s stupid if he actually thinks that’s how any of this works, that that’s not what I meant. There’s just things that pain me to say, because aren’t all the words dissolving and dying, doesn’t that scare you?  It seems, he says and he’s talking in that far away place like he’s just observing, it seems like you want nothing and you’re okay with that.

            No, I want, I say, and there’s you, then, wanting, I and you.

            It’s predictable. We kiss in the end–the babbling streams of the North Woods fizzle out of our reach, and we go back to his. I take some Zyrtec. Charlie kicks the dog out of his room during our ruckus but after, Buster prances back in and stares. This never bothers Charlie, but I feel some sense of immodesty when I’m nude around a dog, staring back into him and wishing he didn’t have the ability to make my nose stuffy–though I suppose Buster is naked too.

            Here is the rhythm of the subway track that lulls Charlie’s head to rest on my shoulder, the tip of his nose in my peripheral. The ends of his fingers. Here is so soft, not fragile but tender, and I wonder if doubt is the foundation for love. If dying verbs have anything to do with this, if there’s a reason I’m so afraid. I don’t care about philosophy, unless it’s from Charlie. I just care about dead verbs, and ghosts. Here is an empty desert scattering the footprints my brother left behind–my brother used a single-barreled gun, he never needed a second shot–and I still don’t know where to go from here.

            If I believed verbs could die, it might be simpler; all of this clutter, love, would just be a matter of rearranging and replacing what is, stumbling through the unsaid and brushing off my bruised knees, the fray of my pants that always made my mom tut–though I’d wake to find they’d been patched up, hung on the kitchen chair, in the pale morning light, still ringing with her lulls and humming–still in the stitching as I stretch through the thrum of the city on my way to Charlie’s, nothing but brute need; there’s no rhythm or dance to the plot, just signs and images, their flickering associations, and a prayer of loneliness, and I still wonder if maybe now I can make the final decision, if I can finally say what is, if I can stop being so afraid of words dying.

            He asks about my writing, I say it’s endless, that I just need, well, I’m missing the story, and I’m missing. But enough about ghosts and that I’m afraid of dead verbs.

            Buster sees me nude again. Charlie tells me about his philosophy paper. Apparently you can tithe with cryptocurrency, and maybe, Charlie says, we need to pretend that God really has died and we’re still awaiting his arrival, an Eternal Saturday, so that we can experience purposeless excess, something lost which never promises return, without confidence, always doubting. Some preacher in Colorado got charged with 40 million in fraud for creating his own crypto exchange company. Said he took God at His word and spent it on a home remodel, but the preacher will accept whatever verdict he gets.

            I understand Charlie half-way, and maybe this is how he half-way understands me, at the margins between, when I leave before the verb dies. Charlie is tracing etymology, with his mouth on the wisps of my hairline, translating the words debt and credit and guilt, tracing back the meaning of the words to the origin.

            He trails off mid-sentence, mid-thought, and I say, look who can’t finish now; good, Charlie says, good, then I’ll keep haunting you. And I want to say the thing I promised I wouldn’t. I want to say what it is, but I’m still not certain. There’s a calculation to it–something thoughtfully left unspoken–because here and now, Charlie next to me, is not the right time. I’m withholding because it’s so sorely needed, I’m hoarding it, saving it to be spent later, against all the debt between us.

            Here is the barrel, just a promise, and I still don’t know who has their finger on the trigger. Here is the bathroom where we talk through the mirror, shoulder to shoulder, conjuring spirits; I spit out my toothpaste and meet Charlie in the reflection–Stan Kazikowski should note I did not say Charlie is in the mirror.

            Here he is in his small gestures hidden from sight, in silence, and I think about what he’d said in the North Woods, that no one owes anyone anything, and if maybe he’d meant there’s no obligation, no debt or guilt, no quid-pro-quo, nothing expected in return, but we still do it all anyways because here he is; thank you, I say, and I’m sorry and also thank you, and Charlie says–oh, it was nothing.

            One morning when I can’t tell which direction the sun will go, I ask him, what did you mean, about nothing? Charlie just laughs, like soft red dirt, like a desert seance, and says nothing, see? Nothing, you’re afraid of nothing. Nothing is profound. Nothing is profound! Let it be nothing so it can be everything.

            Here is the valley. Tripping, falling. Where barrels are balloons. You are years. Here is God. It is all then, it is all still then. The word is dying, yes. Yes. I’m so afraid. Dissolving. Yes, I know, Charlie. I think I get it now. It is nothing, really, so I can hold it.

–Andrew Blake

Andrew Forrest Joseph Blake is dissolving. He studies Creative Writing at Columbia University. He also likes cars. 

TWO MYSTICS

Abylai Mikhailovitch, may the earth sit lightly on his bones, lived as a child for thirty-three years, as a sage for sixty-three years, and as a mystic for sixteen minutes.

From his birth-shriek all through his boyhood, Abylai Mikhailovitch was hounded by words, and words eluded him. Every word he heard spoken to himself or to others stung him all day afterwards, and the more beautiful the words, the sharper the sting. And whenever he sought words himself to speak about a three-legged donkey he had seen on the road into town, or the sweetness that wafted in on a spring fog, or the painful green of an oak leaf fallen into the ashes of a traveller’s campfire, only a warm draft came out of his mouth, and he felt the words crouching and taunting him, hidden in the ferns and reeds in the pits of his lungs.

At seventeen Abylai Mikhailovitch learned Arabic from a passing hafiz, who took as payment two milk-pails of aquavit from Abylai’s father’s shed. Now the boy could speak, but only in citations from the Qur’an, which his family and friends could not understand. His new knowledge did not stop the words from hunting Abylai, nor from fleeing him. And so he took to the open road, studying every language he could find, in hope of a cure. By thirty-three he could read perfectly in Persian, Sanskrit, Greek, Hebrew, Syriac, Tamil, Armenian, Chinese, Slavonic, Oirat, and Khmer. Wherever he travelled he drew an eager following, more of gawkers than of disciples.

It was, after all, a hard and silent business to be the disciple of Abylai Mikhailovitch. If spoken to in any of the languages he knew, the boy would cower and hold his palms before his face, like a man trying to steal two more breaths before becoming a wolf’s breakfast. Those who wished to consult him had to write their questions down and hand him the paper. After that Abylai Mikhailovitch could answer, but only using words found on the paper in front of him; the words still fled and mocked him when he sought them in his own memory.

One day as he passed through the town of Bursa, Abylai Mikhailovitch was approached by a boy of seven or eight. The child held out a slingshot in his left hand and a dead squirrel in his right, and spoke through sobs: “He is dead, efendim: he did not taste the pistachios, he kept running away, and now he’s dead.”

Abylai Mikhailovitch could make no answer: no words he had ever read matched the scene. But at last the sage began to see the source of his own troubles. No language, not one, was adequate to the things which it named or the thoughts it voiced. All languages, written and spoken, sought to capture the true shapes and resonances of things. Some languages, like Chinese, leaned more towards shape, while others like Greek tended towards resonance, but all languages had to contend with both elements.

Abylai Mikhailovitch now had a dual task before him: first, to examine carefully every thing in the world to know for himself its true shape and resonance; second, to grasp how each language had attempted – and failed – to capture these elements, so that he might draw out from all languages the right name of each thing and the true form of each thought.

For thirty-two further years Abylai Mikhailovitch travelled, collecting shapes and sounds. He would stand and stare at a shepherd’s hut for days on end, moving by only a hair every minute so as to see it from every angle. He would listen to rushing streams with his head right above the water, then dunk his head under to listen from inside. He would spend an afternoon rolling a single grain of sand on his tongue. And as anyone must who undertakes such a task, he filled his heart with the light of all beings and of their Creator.

For another thirty-one years after this, he copied out, over and over, every word in every language he knew, setting the words on top of and beside each other, pulling out the true, original words from this confusion of symbols and sounds. And as will happen to whoever does such a thing, he fell in love with the true words he uncovered and with the Word which wrote them before time began.

At the age of ninety-six, in a small apartment at the top of a tower, Abylai Mikhailovitch completed his task. With an eager pen he splashed on a fresh sheet of paper the first true words ever strung into a true thought. These words should be, as he saw it, the sum of what he had learned, and so he wrote simply, God is One. As he finished the final stroke, Abylai Mikhailovitch felt a chill run through him, and he stood up to close the window.

Now it happened that from the window he turned back to look at the desk, and went stiff: viewed upside down, the page read not God is One, but God Cannot Be. The words had been written, and so he could speak them: he opened his mouth to say the first true words ever said, and heard that “God is One” was composed of the same sounds, in the same order, as “God cannot be”. He picked up the page and turned it round in his hand, and read again God is One, but finding he couldn’t control his fingers, they kept spinning the page round and round, from God is One to God Cannot Be and back again.

It then dawned on Abylai Mikhailovitch that there was no way for anyone else to know which way the page was supposed to be held, which of the two thoughts the author had meant. Bending forwards and wresting the page from his hand with his teeth, the mystic drew the true language into his mouth, chewed, swallowed, and jumped out of the window to his death.

It is said that Abylai Mikhailovitch lived another quarter of an hour after hitting the ground, for Death, who had not expected to receive him so soon, had to shake off her slumber and travel many miles to meet him.

In that quarter of an hour, in Abylai Mikhailovitch’s hometown far away, was born Avram Selimovitch, who became a mystic at the age of five when he ate butter in a dream and woke up with a greasy tongue. He lived three hundred years and died smiling.

–Malcolm Sepulchre

Malcolm Sepulchre is from Nova Scotia and now lives in Montreal, Quebec. His work has previously appeared mostly on park benches, in lengthy strings of phone memos, and perhaps down the sides of a couple bus seats.

Traba Nada

Our hero, Pablo Traba, has left his human race to rot under the guava tree at the highest point of his mother’s land, a cosmic effort to turn the hot sun of the mountains into stars in his divine black out. From the main square you can’t make him out from the sleepy town condor, who had stopped visiting the Traba land for fear he’d get knocked again pecking a taste out of the vinegary boy, whose particular pose was that of an anteater curled in a sea of tranquility. En esa montaña de sereno, in that black peak, the only peak in el Cauca entero known to go this dark in the daytime, Pablo groaned to ward off its inhabitants. The Misak no longer let church bells chase their hunt off, but for now they had Pablo withdrawing like an angel rehab-ing in the town, down from Chiquitas and opioids heaven. He hated how much everyone tried to cleanse him, coca leaf and smoke ceremonies, mist over the mountains, burial songs, banana leaf whippings, nothing sent him higher into the mountains than Ron Viejo and the putrid guava earth under this tree since Don Mercurio the pharmacist discovered what cough he was really addressing with all that codeine… The tree picked up all the valley’s noises and turned it into fruit nobody would eat, so everything was Pablo’s: the ELN soldier visiting his alien mother in a jaguar suit losing battles in el Huila but having won his own land back at least; the Western Union lady telling the ice lady how much his mom’s alimony had grown since the dollar shot up; the two kids he taught how to spin the bottle, playing; his researcher, who hates him, making fuck sounds at an oso de anteojos. He begins to feel Catholic, visionary and depressed, he hears his mother landing the telephone on the moon, his father’s signal interrupted by the Andes, el Cauca entero llenándose de voces, and the condor, patient, nearby again, protected by his groaning.

–Brian Alarcon

Brian Alarcon is a Colombian-American poet, performance and visual artist from Queens, New York. His poetry crosses the borders between mediums and industries, having performed at art galleries, for media clients such as Versace and Drome Magazine, non-profits like City Artists Corps and Counterpath Press, and he’s received fellowships from the Queer|Art Foundation and the Jack Kerouac School.

The Smiling Man

“Mateo, come!” His shout wakes me up. It takes me a moment to pin down who I am.

I’m Mateo.

“Mateo!” he calls again.

Sebastián is calling me from the shower. He’s my husband. I fling the comforter to the side and, with it, a dream already forgotten. We’re about to have shower-sexy-time We haven’t had shower-sexy-time in months. Not since Sebastián became an even bigger shot at the bank and started showering in the morning to crisp up, now that he has also given up coffee.

“Come quick!”

The sight of Sebastián’s naked hairy body jiggles my horniness loose, as if I were encountering his delicious nipples for the first time, impish through his coarse chest hair, or his stout hanging penis—borrowed blessings I enjoy when possible.

“Come in here,” he orders.

He isn’t in a sexy mood. Rather rattled. I swing the glass shower-door open.

“Take your clothes off!”

I’m quick to strip. I always am. I step in naked and semi-hard.

“Count my toes.”

I kneel on the warm shower tile. The water stings too hot on my back. Seems like Sebastián is boiling himself a new skin. I’m not complaining—a frizzy, eager part of me still hopes for sexy-shower-time. I count his toes. One, two...nine. Sebastián has nine toes total. My belly cramps. I recognize the empty fall of terror. He’s missing his right pinky toe. I count again, sweating for a way to reach ten, but one can’t simply conjure up a missing toe out of roaring distress.

“Nine, right?” asks Sebastián.

I graze each of Sebastián’s hairy knuckled toes one more time. Even in panic, I’m delighted to touch his toes.

“Nine,” I say.

“Count again, please.”

I count for a fourth time. In place of Sebastián’s right pinky toe there’s nothing: no scar, no tiny stump, no bone sticking out, no congealed blood, as if the toe had never grown.

“Your pinky toe is missing,” I say, pruned from the water and blushing.

Sebastián knows that when I blush I’m lying or, at best, hiding something. I’m terrible at deceit, but with the scalding water, the steam, and both of us panicked and sweating, Sebastián doesn’t clock my guilt. Besides, his missing pinky isn’t my fault. I didn’t eat it.

The man comes at night, stands by the entrance to our closet where moonlight and streetlight shine least, and smiles. His teeth are large, square, widely gapped, and bright. Each like a lamp carrying its own set of fluorescents. The rest of him is utter darkness, no eyes, no nose, no arms, no legs, the sleek tubular shape of an ironed-out ghost. The Smiling Man also wears a large wide-brimmed fedora, almost too wide to be taken seriously if he didn’t carry it with a panache that shuns the ridiculous. I’ve known this man since childhood, forever smiling in the darkest corners of the rooms I sleep in, quiet until he gets hungry. When I was six, he spoke for the first time, “Feed me,” he said, and ate my left middle finger down past the knuckle; at thirteen, he ate two-thirds of my right ear; at twenty-one a peach-sized chunk out of my calf. I let Sebastián think my body’s missing parts are birth defects, something old and irremediable. I don’t want him to realize I’m cursed. He’s too luminous to understand darkness.

“Should I make you an egg?” I ask.

Naked on the bed, Sebastián inspects his foot, wiggling the toes that are still there. I towel myself dry and gather slacks, a shirt, underwear and socks for Sebastián to wear, hoping he’ll soon register he has a job to go to and stow his missing toe in the back of his mind. I need to regroup, swallow my guilt, and stop sweating so I can keep pretending I have no clue what’s going on. I’m forty-two. I recklessly believed the Smiling Man had finally lost his appetite and remained with me only as a dark guardian angel sent by a god with a bizarre sense of what is comforting.

“Where’s my toe?” Sebastián asks in a high-pitched whisper, ignoring the clothes I’ve laid out for him.

I pull his head to my chest and attempt to squash his worry. In our two years of marriage he hasn’t been sick once. But the year before we got married, only a few months after I met him, he got mono and fussed as if Death were outside just waiting to ring his intercom. I nursed him with his favorite lima soup from the Yucatán stall at the market, served scalding. We watched arthouse films—films he finds comforting and I try hard not to sleep through. He’s trembling under my embrace. I kiss his head. If I had superpowers I’d make him forget all about his missing pinky. Zap! Although, if I did have superpowers, I would’ve gotten rid of the Smiling Man a long time ago.

His phone rings. I let his head go. He has tears in his eyes. I poke him with his phone. The name of one of his most important clients glows on screen. He shakes his head. The phone goes silent. What now? Will he want to go to the doctor? Have a million tests done? They’ll find nothing wrong. The Smiling Man isn’t a medical condition.

His phone rings again. “Seems important,” I say.

Sebastián ventures no effort, and I answer for him.

“She says it’s urgent,” I whisper.

He takes the phone. His voice comes out thin, and he asks his client for a second. He clears his throat, straightens himself up, and finally speaks as if his toe weren’t missing. “I’ll take care of it.” He hangs up. He accepts the pair of socks I hand him and slips them on without looking.

“I have to go.”

I nod.

He stares at me as if I should stop him. As if I should tell him he’s crazy to put work over a missing toe, but I smile and kiss him goodbye.

I list things when I’m frazzled. I list the friends I met when I lived in Berlin, after I’d lost my first two loves and decided not to love deeply ever again, when I was easier with my skin and my drugs and I swung naked over the Spree on a makeshift swing waiting for the sun to rise, before I came to Mexico City and met Sebastián. There was Leni who thought I’d be a famous artist one day—I crocheted such pretty things. There was Akiko who photographed flowers and printed them so small, but printed so many that she covered an abandoned wall—of the many that stood in Berlin—and transformed it into a portal glittering in miniscule flower-shaped fairies. There was a guy who fanned himself with a red paper fan, a fan he later gifted me because he liked the way I danced, a fan I keep tucked inside one of my desk drawers. I was someone else then. Almost darkless. A Mateo swinging naked waiting for the sun to rise.

In our closet, I list Sebastián’s dress shirts, nothing too attention seeking, pressed into stiffness by his beloved iron. I list his shoes: brown wingtip oxfords, black simple oxfords, burgundy tassel-loafers, two pairs of dress sneakers—white and indigo—and two pairs of bright running shoes—pink and orange. I wear his brown oxfords, my feet dancing inside them, and I become horny just sensing his feet’s residual warmth. Where I now stand wearing my husband’s shoes, the Smiling Man stands at night. Perhaps he too likes to be close to Sebastián’s things. Last night he said “Feed me” in his small bird-like voice, floated to the foot of our bed, then, with great tenderness, bit our comforter and slid it off us. Sebastián curled into a fetal position but remained asleep, pushing out his little snores. I watched as the man opened his mouth, clasped down on Sebastián’s foot, threw his head back, and swallowed. I reacted then. I couldn’t just sit in bed and do nothing. An eaten Sebastián would leave me! I hurled Sebastián’s alarm clock at the man, but, as expected, it bounced off. The man smiled wider. “Leave him,” I whispered, but, already fed, he disappeared.

Sebastián and I visit three different podiatrists, none of which can tell him how he lost his toe. They say his x-rays show no sign that his toe ever existed. One of the podiatrists suggests a psychiatrist. “Am I crazy?” Sebastián asks as I drive. I tell him he’s not. Once, a few days ago, he did have ten toes.

The week goes by, then two more, and Sebastián relaxes. At least he stops mentioning his toe. Maybe he realizes he doesn’t need all ten of them. Meanwhile, I keep pretending we won’t get eaten, neglecting to dwell on how antsy the Smiling Man is acting. Instead of standing still, he sways. Side to side. Back and forth. Side to side again. He chomps the air too. Scrape, scrape, scrape, as he grinds his teeth.

The first time he did this routine I was twenty-three, and I’d moved in with Andrej, my first love. One morning Andrej showed me a dent where his left nipple used to be. He didn’t fret. We were young. “Maybe it just fell off,” he said. Things like that happened. But after feasting on his nipple, the Smiling Man became antsy, swaying, and, a few months later, he swallowed Andrej whole. I swore I wouldn’t share a bedroom with anyone else ever again. Then Checo appeared, and he was so committed, so serious, so in love with me I couldn’t resist. I was thirty-four. Eleven years had passed, and the Smiling Man seemed less hungry. He hadn’t even eaten any more of me. One morning an apple-sized chunk of Checo’s ass had disappeared, and I decided to fight the man once and for all. I hit him, kicked him, hammered him, tried to poison him. I stabbed, hatcheted and axed him. But he’s squishy and pops back unhurt, like immortal jello. I shifted strategies and tried scolding the Smiling Man, saying he wasn’t allowed to eat any more. I threatened to despise him. Think him the worst companion ever. The Smiling Man only swayed and ground his teeth. Checo would be eaten too, I realized, and so, I warned him. He was the first person I told the Smiling Man existed. I proposed we fight the man together, immediately certain that was the way to do it, together, wielding something magical like the power of love. Checo called me a nutjob. He needed medical help—couldn’t I see a chunk of his ass had vanished?—and all I could do was speak of battling a made-up childhood monster. How could I be so childish, so callous!—Checo didn’t know which was worse. I left him. He’s still somewhere, ass-bitten but alive.

A month after the toe incident, Sebastián comes home from work and lingers inside the hall by the apartment’s entrance. I say, “Hello.”

He doesn’t answer.

“What’s wrong?”

Sebastián’s eyes are puffed pink. His hair wild. There’s an awesome beauty to his bedraggledness. I want to hold the back part of his neck where his hair prickles and kiss him, but he exudes an angry aura that prevents me.

“Undress,” he orders.

I shove my jeans down. I should’ve taken my boots off first because I stumble trying to ram my jeans past my feet. In the meantime, I slip out of my sweater and peel my t-shirt off so that his furious gloom can amuse itself with my bare chest. I drop to the floor, unlace my boots, yank and throw them. I stand up and, naked, spread my arms in a silent ta-da! Sebastián limps toward me as if his foot hurt though I know it doesn’t. Whatever the man eats leaves no trace, including pain.

Sebastián’s face hangs a centimeter away from mine. There’s alcohol in his breath, sweet like jasmine at dusk. When I was a teenager, I sat by my bedroom window letting jasmine waft in as I ran the back of my fingers over my lips—the way I thought a kiss would feel. I want Sebastián to lick the remnants of my eaten ear, but he pinches it instead. He grazes my cheek with his stubble and travels down my body with his nose. He kneels. I get hard. He takes my hand and traces the emptiness where my middle finger should be. He sits on his heels and swivels me around. I gaze past our large windows, eleven floors up, at Mexico City extending far into a glow beyond the horizon. This city where he was born, and I try to convince myself I belong. Sebastián brushes the dip in my calf with his fingers. I imagine a young, hovering version of myself watching us from outside, happy because I’m not alone. How did he use to explain his loneliness? Floaty. Loneliness as being unanchored. I won’t have Sebastián much longer. I’ll leave before he gets eaten.

“What happened to you?” he asks, pinching the skin where my calf used to be. The apartment feels empty in my silence. I get goosebumps. “Tell me.”

“You won’t love me anymore.”

“Please.”

I turn. He’s so sad and scared. My mouth opens before I can stop it. “I’ll show you.”

We wait in bed. Our room devoured in shadows. No one but myself has been able to see the Smiling Man, but now because he wants to, I expect Sebastián will be able to see him too. The man is taking a long time to show up. Sebastián nods off. I’m scared. What kind of bonkers plan is this? If Sebastián sees the Smiling Man, he’ll be terrified. He’ll get rid of me sooner. Won’t even contemplate sticking it out with me to fight the Smiling Man together.

Still, I can hope.

The man finally appears. I elbow Sebastián awake. He yelps.

“You see him?”

Sebastián scuttles next to me, almost on top. “Is it a demon?”

I never regarded the man as evil, only hungry. “He’s the Smiling Man,” I say.

The man’s grin widens.

“Did you summon him?”

“He appears on his own. Ever since I was a kid.”

The man glides closer to the bed. Sebastián thrusts his back against me, nesting his legs on his chest.

“Feed me,” the man says in his twittering voice.

“He’ll eat us!”

“He won’t,” I say. “It’s too soon.” The man didn’t eat Andrej until months after his first bite.

The Smiling Man worms his way into bed and seizes our comforter with his teeth.

“Mateo!” Sebastián howls.

The comforter flies across the room.

“Mateo!”

I jump on the man, slip, and land hard on the floor. He’s slick like a greased-up eel. Sebastián kicks himself farther up the bed. The Smiling Man slithers, his teeth hounding Sebastián’s feet. I hurl myself on the man but skid back onto the floor. Sebastián kicks. Knocks the man’s fedora right off. I believed his hat was an inextricable part of his body. “Yes! Kick him!” I shout, getting back on my feet.

Sebastián attacks again. This time, his foot plunges deep into the man’s head. Stuck.

While Sebastián tugs on his leg to get his foot unstuck, the man’s head morphs into a swallowing mouth, dragging Sebastián inside him. I dig my fingernails into the man, refusing to slip off one more time. I climb him. I bite. Pinch. Squeeze. His organs wriggle underneath like worms inside a lubed up punching bag. Sebastián flails and groans, struggling to drag himself away. He reaches for the headrest with a freakish spasm of his arm. He squeaks a bitter, stabbing note and goes limp.

“No!” I jerk my heft backwards, hauling the man down with me. Something gives within the man, a nook where my arms squeeze without almost any effort. Like colossal seltzer, a bubbling fizzes inside him. The man vomits my now slimy husband. He straightens, lifting me up with him, and whips his body. I fly across the room. The light is knocked out of me. I can’t locate the muscles to get up and continue fighting.

“Mateo.” Sebastian’s voice travels like a spark.

He’s alive! Suddenly it’s simple to locate my bones, my tendons, my muscles, my breath. I bounce back to my feet, primed and ready, but the man has vanished. His fedora lies on the floor, a hat-shaped black-hole.

“You kicked his hat off,” I say.

Squatting on the bed, Sebastián whimpers, color-drained and floppy. “So?”

“I’ve never been able to.”

“He ate me.” He points a quivery finger to his feet. I sit and hoist his gorgeous calves on my lap. He’s missing his other pinky toe and the one toe next to it. He drops his face to his hands and weeps.

“I’m sorry,” I say. I could continue to hug and pet him until his shock and sadness seep away. He would still get eaten. I step down from our bed, walk to the closet, find a duffel bag, and stuff t-shirts, socks, and underwear inside.

“What are you doing?”

“Leaving. The man will follow me. You’ll be safe.”

“You’re going to leave me alone?”

“I’ll take him away. He’s always been with me.”

Sebastián wipes his wet face and, with great effort as his soggy noodle limbs won’t help him, he scoots forward to the edge of the bed. “Come here.”

My legs want to go to him, but I restrain them.

“Come. Please.”

I shake my head no.

He breathes in and tries to temper the terror sketched on his face. He still shivers. “You may have seen this thing first,” he says, his voice soft, though more doubtful than he would normally want it to come out. “You may think he’s yours, but he wants me.” Sebastián raises his foot, the left one with the newly eaten toes. “You don’t get to give up.”

“I’m protecting you.”

“You’re being a coward.”

“He’ll eat you.”

Sebastián flings one limp arm toward me. Like he wants me. He could also be shooing me away.

I zip up my bag.

He takes my hand and guides me to him.

“We’ll fight the man,” he says. “I can spare a few more toes if I get to keep you.” I could ask why, but I keep my mouth shut. I snuggle on his slime-covered chest. His nervous heart beats on my ear. Mine is a whole drums section. I wait to catch the moment when our hearts sync up. They don’t. Seems as if they’ll continue skipping in a boundless reach for one another.

–Gerardo Sámano Córdova

Gerardo Sámano Córdova is a writer and artist from Mexico City living in Brooklyn. He is the author of Monstrilio, winner of the Balcones Fiction Prize, finalist for the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award, and named a Book of the Year by NPR, Elle, Goodreads and others. He holds an MFA in Fiction from the University of Michigan and is the current Writer in Residence at Fordham University. Gerardo has also been known to draw little creatures.

The Polar Bear Escaped from the San Diego Zoo

and trudged north for hours alongside a desolate highway. The polar bear hitchhiked and thought it strange that the signal for such a miserable activity was the thumbs-up. Hours later, a rumbling eighteen-wheeler pulled over and sounded its air brake. The polar bear climbed aboard and savored the swirling A/C inside the truck’s cabin. “Marty,” the driver said, extending his hand. “Where you headed?” he asked. “Alaksa,” the polar bear said. “Want to see my birthland.” Marty said he could take him as far as Fresno, but that he wasn’t headed to Alaska. The polar bear nodded. “You never been?” Marty said. “Born and raised at the zoo,” the polar bear answered. Marty pulled out his cell phone and showed the polar bear some videos of Alaska on YouTube. Marty pointed to a Wendy’s chocolate Frosty in the cupholder and told the polar bear it was all his if he wanted it. Marty then put the truck in gear and rumbled away. The polar bear stared through the windshield at the dashed yellow lines on the highway. To the polar bear—they were all pawprints, leading the way home.

–Mathieu Cailler

Mathieu Cailler is the author of seven books: a novel, two short story collections, two volumes of poetry, and two children’s titles. His stories, poems, and essays have been featured in over one hundred publications such as Wigleaf, the Saturday Evening Post, and the Los Angeles Times. Cailler has garnered numerous awards for his writing, including a Pushcart Prize; a Short Story America Prize; and accolades from the Paris, Los Angeles, and New England Book Festivals. Connect with him on social media @writesfromla or visit mathieucailler.com.