THE KING AND THE FOOL

Against the Sun

      As he runs screaming from the room, he stops to pick up his nose and the reason for his screaming. Now he continues to scream out of the room. On the street though, it's no better. The smell here is still horrible, and he's already sick and dying from it.

     He stands now in the street, unable to decide whether or not to go to the ocean - but he finally goes anyway. Where else could he go? And waves of nausea sweep over him. High upon a lonely rock, he glares fiercely at the sun. With powerful outstretched hand, he stands impotent and rains curses down upon the sea. Now he dies. And waves of nausea wash over him.


     The sun is hot, very hot, and his hand is sticky, but he won't let go of his sanity. The doctor holds his other hand in sympathy and smiles at the sun. "He shouldn't have run out of the room like that. The others are dying too. It wasn't the thing to do. No one likes to be reminded."

     The sticky-handed man sits here and holds onto his sanity. "This room is so hot and the sun so bright, and I remember him stopping for his nose. Oh God!"

     The body is brought back from the ocean in a box in a long car, and everyone stops to watch before going back to their shovels, digging their graves. He is buried in the box, and now they go back to their shovels. The digging is important.

     The man in the room still feels the doctor hold his other hand, but in spite of this he finally loses his hold on sanity - and dies. The doctor should have died now too, but he's needed to help watch the sun. And he has a way of holding hands too - with a firm grip.


     The wind blows from the dark seas and devils seek for his soul. Balanced on the void, he laughs and strides away. His home is grayness, and he never sees the sun. He always smiles.

     A tree grows in the grayness, tall with no branches until the very top. He rests at this tree, smiling in his heart, and thinks of the sun.

     "Old sun, many days ago I remembered you over man. Today there is no sun and dark seas rage against you!"

     He races along the sea, daring the darkness, and the devils seek for his soul. He laughs and runs away.

      Now he balances on a high rock and sings his song:

Hail to dark seas and grey days.
There are no nights and only one tree.
Hail to dark seas and devils seeking.
I seek no sun, and I run with joy.

      He forgets the sun, and it pleases him to tease the devils and to laugh when they fall. He throws himself upon the sea now, and she quiets and loves him and then dries him with the wind. He always smiles and from time to time there is God to laugh and race with down the long, white sands to the sea.

The Smallest Child

     This story will be something like Tristan Shandy, which I'm in the middle of reading now. Tristan had just delivered himself into the world when I had stopped reading. I'm at just that point myself. And I also will allow only a midwife in attendance. The doctor is busy downstairs anyway.

     This book will find its own style. It will always read well aloud. I may begin by playing editor, as in last century's romances:

     "Upon my return from my visit with Lord M., imagine my utter astonishment at finding a new manuscript placed mysteriously within my locked rooms. This romance, like the ones before it, I have decided to publish in order that the reading public may judge the truth of these strange claims upon our credence. I make only minor alterations to protect certain members of the Royal Family."

     I could just begin it, as Kenneth Patchen did, although he had trouble ending his. I already have my ending.

     I'm reading this book as I write it. I find it difficult. I don't really understand it. I'm laughing at you, reader. It isn't at all important what a writer means, only what he has seen.

     The young child runs to his father, who's a philosopher during the week and who sleeps most of the weekend. "Come and see the giant squid playing with the thirteen puppies, daddy." And his father asks him what he means!

     Herding the smallest child, gift of the Lord, into the light, his feet turn inward. The beginning....


     "What does it all mean?"

     A startling question which sets the blood back, but beneath her mask the girl gives no hint that only minutes ago she had been listening intently to my new symphony. She wears the mask in a last bold vain attempt to remove herself somewhat from my total grasp. However, I will soon carefully clutch her trembling disguise from about her and remove all traces of laughter, gay signs and abandoned hesitations. Carefully clutching her trembling blouse now, I rip it from her body. Her eyes fall. She and I undo her bra together, and I pull her down to me. We lie here loving, her warmth sliding about me.

     There comes a time when a man must write, when he can do nothing else. That is, when he can nothing else well.

The Fool

      A small band of men are seen leaving by the north fence. They are led by the fool who follows in their rear, silently tugging at his bad ear with either of his long hands. Slowly, painfully, one at a time, each man climbs over the fence, daring the others to follow.

     The others follow. The fool follows. "No matter what you do, it doesn't really matter. Who cares? It isn't forever. You die and you finally escape. Everyone's dead eventually."

     "Not just all at once."

     "Says who?"

     "If all the dead bodies were piled on top of one another, I wouldn't have to climb these fucking fences!"

     "Yeah. What a smell though, and in this heat!"

     The fool descends now to the unleveled ground and makes his painful way after his followers who stand there, peering into the night. "All those bodies stinking in their cool and smiling graves...."

     "Maybe we will all die. No use saving myself any longer. I've always saved myself. I always have. Did you hear about the man who saved himself? No interest, or only a little bit."

     "You can bank on that!"

     The fool tugs at his ear. He thinks it's like shooting pool, you take your cue from what the others do. They know. They must. But who teaches them? They always seem to know. I come into a room, and they all look at me, always thinking that I don't even know the secret handshake known only to everyone.

     As his followers reach the next fence, they speak reverently of their leader. "He suffers from a lack of innateness due to cutting the cord so late. The cure is...."

     The fool is startled. Do they know? The late severance is more permanent. I was old enough to watch it cut. Everyone turned grey, away. They were embarrassed, gay in turns. I never spoke to any of them again.

      Feeling his approach, the followers become embarrassed, gay in turn.

     I never saw them again. They had pulled the blinds, the grey blinds. I heard them one last time though. "Ladies and gentlemen and other ringmasters, I bring glad tidings. But first I must announce a death in our family. Our only son and true successor has passed away from us." The glad tidings were about a new and improved secret handshake for the family.

     That was one thing. Another was the swings. They wouldn't stop. They went right on over. Scared me. And then the fall, screaming into the darkness.

     "I never hit the ground!"

     The wiser of his many followers picks the fool off the ground.

     "But I never hit the ground."

     And now together, they debate upon the proper manner of surmounting this new fence, which rises beyond their sight into the darkness of night. After many hesitations and head shakings, during which the wisest of the many followers beats an ass or philosopher with a stick, they realize their only course. They begin to climb.

     "We may not die. They could be wrong."

     On they climb. They can all climb fences well, the fool especially. Soon he can see the dark forms of his followers above him. He could always climb fences well - especially the tall ones with grass growing through the lower holes. One of these had a hole under it for dogs and those small devils who wished to go with the dogs. "The great hunter stands, shading his eyes from the searching sun, searching himself for sign of sparrow - or devil."

     The fool climbs ever upward. His arms seem to pull themselves up, his feet follow naturally. Hands up, then the feet.

     "Hands up. Move and you're dead."

     Carefully sliding my concealed hand under my groin cloth, I scratch my balls, pull back the hammer, take aim, and shoot the nasty robber in the head. "Call the police."

     He climbs onward, fingers surely grasping holds in the sheer rock face of this giant mountain never climbed....

     At the top, he pauses, wondering if his followers, his brave little band, have gone down. He feels only the darkness. Slowly he edges himself over the jagged top and starts down. How many fences is this, in all? There's a certain truth in that odd, neglected saying: "never take your eye out of its socket." You see, it's this way, blind man.

     "Poor K. So light, almost no substance. Standing on the fence!"

     Near the bottom, the fool's hands reach for his ear and he falls, landing on the tops of his followers. From within the jumbled mass of fool and followers, he speaks again, "Poor K."

     "What was it about him?"

     "His father."

     "Yes, his father's dead too, earlier - and in spite of knowing the secret handshake."

     The heat is getting to them all now. They have taken too many hay fever pills. "It's too hot now to even sneeze."

     "No birds."

     "If I could sneeze now, I'd blow myself down, apart. Sneeze downwind. Always! Look to the future for the past. Eternal regurgence! The future is constantly spewing forth its past."

     At this fitful outburst, his followers fall back in terror. Under their breath, they murmur, "fool, fool...," until, afraid of their own pasts, they begin to reel along the broken path, looking back over their shoulders, afraid. "If he ever...."

     The fool, now careful to lose sight of these wise men, meditates upon birds. Hell of a day without birds - the farsighted ones. They know. Perhaps today though they have flown too close to the new day's fiery light. Horse feathers! "I'm afraid he's allergic to horse feathers, and to cats and mice and birds of all sorts of feathers."

     "Oh, dear, what shall we do?"

     "Sneeze downwind, answer the mail, and flock together."


     Later in the day, this longest day, the fool sits quietly watching some cats at play. His followers are lost to him. How would they ever pass all the fences? How many fences have they already climbed?

     There was the first one, with the dead guards marching around in utter rout step. A record of thirty seconds over it - had to hurry.

     The second one, the tall one, that was the one that got K. Poor K. He should have crawled under it, through the dogs' hole. Tradition has it that he did so once. Maybe that's why he didn't this time. Last chance to show us he could climb.

     The third fence was easy, merely a humbling exercise in the scaling factor.

     Rising now, the fool stumbles over a huge tree root and would have fallen but for the welcome assistance of the larger of two dwarves who have run out from behind the barn.

      "Watch out for roots, sir."

     "And you, barns," answers the fool.


     Leaving the two dwarves, the cats, and the barn to their day, the fool carefully enters upon a long discourse with himself in the manner of those early Greek philosophers:

     "The days are past when one can even put his finger in the tea. Burns! Fires rage against us. What did I do...? Hell! Hell is where the fire is - the home is. The fourth fence, was there ever one?"

     Turning about now, he notices the fence that he and his followers had climbed earlier. "There it is, right behind me all this time. I must have just climbed it. It's been watching me all this time, this I know - has it heard me too?"

     Suddenly, fired with enthusiasm, the fool recklessly bounds ahead, finally unbinding his fears.


     A small band of men sit upon hot sands under the burning sun. They expect death.

     "He's going too fucking fast. He should slow down!"

     "He's nuts. He should save himself."

      "Well-known phenomenon called the letting go with the will."

     "Dionysion forgetfulness of self."

     Expecting to find only death, the fool is overcome by all this talkative life. "I could never forget," he reassures them.

     At this solemn confession of deepest significance, the wisest of the followers is moved to speak of him. "His whole life is a stage, but only he is aware of the acting."

     The fool tugs at his ear with either of his two long hands. "But you have still misunderstood me, it is not my awareness of my acting that's unusual. It is that I cannot leave the audience."

     The angry mutterings of his followers become louder.

     "Yeah, never forgets. Fucking elephant!"

     "Over hill, over dell, we will hit the dusty trail with our twenty five dollar packs on our backs."

     "Shit, it's hot!"

     The fool looks at these wise men standing around him. He begins to laugh softly. Their mutterings slowly die down, die away completely, and soon they settle down to their afternoon naps. The fool stands guard over the broken camp.

     I wonder if anyone has tried all five fences. I'd draw the line there. What if she were right? I'd never know.

     He thinks of the meeting in the old church, the woman preacher telling them that "man is not meant to climb five fences. It is evident. Give us a man who climbs fences and we'll show you a fool, a climber." And, "due to the present emergency, all fencing permits are revoked and all residents are advised of their heights." Which was nothing to speak of really.

     What really was the case was that nothing was said - just like in school. The doctor though was something else. "Based on all sorts of observations and computations, it has been determined without question - no more than five fences.

     After five, you are definitely dead. The heart stops."

     Behind the barn, the dwarves have taken it upon themselves to perform one of nature's functions. And the moon struggles to free her bonds, to no avail.

     The world explodes!


     While the cats and the followers sleep, the fool begins to speak, softly at first, then louder, "man is an end, and every man has his own end. I tell you this - no matter how many times you may kill yourself, you will still die."

The Parting of the Ways

     The fool, looking ahead on the path, sees his followers standing together. They're gesturing wildly, one even doing a funny sort of dance. They're pointing down at a long, black line, which, as he approaches, becomes a road.

     "A road! No more dusty trails!"

     "Look at how straight it is too."

     "And narrow," responds the fool, joining them.

     The wise men sit down, remove their caps and wait. The wisest of the followers speaks, "But what of the trail we've been following? It enters the hills now."

     "And it's dusty," someone objects.

     At this, the fool starts up the trail, then stops and slowly returns. He stands with his back to his followers. Which way, up or right? An odd choice, up or right. Most choices aren't this difficult. Usually it's between right or wrong or up or down or just plain fucking off.... Never do that myself, of course! Only with hay fever pills. "You take a hay fever pill, a little blue one, and a cup of coffee. Real good high! You don't lose control, just sense - "I could have sworn the light was green, officer."

     The men sit down, and one of them draws from his pocket an old, old deck of cards. They begin to play. The fool continues to stand apart, playing with his thoughts.

     I never fuck off. I used to work so hard to convince everyone, even myself, that I was at least thinking. Maybe I was just lying there, but I was still thinking - probably trying to decide whether or not to take a pill.

     "Which way?"

     Yeah, which way? Up the dusty trail, or right, along the hard paved perfection which is forever level, never rising to danger, never overheating.

     The followers decide to level with him. They put their cards on the table. "Let us level with you."

     The fool is jarred loose from his thoughts. "Let us level with you," that's what they all say. "That one there, he is too high. He walks like a man. Let us level with him." The levelers! More than one giant tree has fallen in their woods. "He was keeping us from the sun," they say. Their sun, they say. They forgot that they had crowded around him, drawing from his warmth - until he became too hot for their paler shades of green.

     Different shades of reality. "Which shade will you have, sir?"

     "I don't know. I haven't seen them all yet."

     There is always a missing shade. "Think of two shades, just a shade apart. Now put a finger on that one, another here on this one. Hold tight now. No, really hold tight! Now sneeze." All gone! Should have taken a pill.

     Which way? They all shade into one, but sometimes you can't tell. I might go up into the mountains and meet everyone there. "Surprise, you took long enough." Or I might find myself running along that perfection cinder track of a road, jumping hurdles with the rest of them.


     "Boy, he's nuts!"

     "Then it's all settled?"

     The followers start down the road, slapping the dust from their clothes. The fool stands laughing. Happy days are here again. Wonder where the cats went? Probably under a house, cool to the end. Cats are always cool. Never flip. You put them down, and they still meet you. They never remember a hurt - or a favor. And when they wake up, life is good. Never a bitter cat. Flip, flop, chase a ball down the hall.

     "Cat said many things, among them is a taste for devils." They know. No cat has ever tried to level with you. God no. Tail in the air maybe, fuck you maybe. I beg your pardon sort of thing probably, with the eyebrows almost meeting the tail.

     Wonder where they went? I would carry them, one in each pocket filled with cool leaves and no deadness. They would go with me. And in the darkness, we would walk until we could all see with equal fervor. To walk with a cat at dark and know that she knew, to know that you were in, accepted.

     There are, however, no cats. This monstrous desert is empty of all life, except for the barn which has approached unannounced - and the two dwarves who cower behind it, laying with their faces pressed tightly into the sand. The fool lifts them to their feet.

     "It was that man, sir. He ran out of the barn screaming. And his nose...."

     "It was in his hand, sir," adds the smaller of the two.

     The fool starts. "A shadow just passed."

     "Oh no, sir, it's as bright as day."

     Then the dwarves start to dance around the fool, around the barn to the back where they cower again in the sand.

     The fool closes his mouth. He looks at the barn. It is old, tired, and has served three masters. With a last extraordinary look, he starts up the path.

     Well, the others went right, the comfort cat way where it might be night again. But maybe the sun won't kill me - maybe I am the long lost son brought out by wondrous subterfuge into the heated argument to speak again. "Oh father...." My throat is dry, and I'm fuzzy again.

     Walking along the dry desert path into the mountains, the fool suddenly makes an incredible gesture and shouts softly - "As for the man who cooked and ate his sons, he did this for hunger, yes, but not for hunger of their flesh." A needless sacrifice. Everyone's fear.

     Fuzziness is like being happy, sort of like having cotton in my ears.

     I've never been up. No people there, only wonder. How nice, only wonder. And musical sounds of rocks melting in the heatness of noon time - the noon tide.

     Wanderer and his shadow. Where has the wanderer gone? Bright shadows dwelling in regret. Shadows come and go, speaking softly, very softly. You can hear them only in the wind rushing across their dark countenances, speaking volumes. They are the tuning forks. You can't disguise your shadow, it sounds truly. "Oh shadows, come and go but hurry softly, the sun is coming."

     In the pale quiet of this great desert that is slowly becoming a high mountain, a giant bird flies overhead, circles once, and then drops to a rock guarding the trail. The fool walks to the rock, expecting the bird to sing of the heights. But it has no eyes, and what could it sing of anyway?

     The fool walks on. "Up, up and away!" Superman, flying over man. Flying overman. Sprinkling the plains with happiness and saving only hardness for these heights. "Oh father...." Too soon to know, but at least I'm not dead. All else may be, but I carry them within myself, to be revived upon my death by miraculous means. "Take a dead frog and the leaves of sickness, pour in grease...." Magical formulas, revived by the heat, reliving their past efficiencies. Magicians everywhere.


     Looking down from the path to the long road still visible far below, the fool sees a giant army of devils, or men perhaps, at this great distance he can't be sure, rush upon his followers and devour all but the wisest of them. "He goes his own way."

     Of course, as any fool knows, it's cooler on these heights. The only question, the only reason for my hesitation when we parted below, was whether or not I'd make it. To try and not make it might be worse than not trying at all. Never know who is looking on.

     Sort of a late refrain, over and over.... "Never know who is looking on." Always work like someone is going to stick a hammer in your head if you even think of slowing down. "Oh shit, run, the hammer! Keep going, faster and faster, until you fumble and fall anyway. Never knew...."

     But I can set my own pace now. This is my happiest thought - my own pace, my own peace. No hurrying, no worrying. It was so bad in the past. If I stopped to look, I would be left behind.

     Left, right, always up the hill. Enough time and I can do anything. "Down in the valley, the valley below...." "Sing a song of sixpence...." That's how it was then, so low, so tense.

     Past tense, they all spoke in the past tense then. Everything was behind them. They even put it this way, saying that "it was cooler in the past." They thought they were safe in their iceboxes, insulated ovens and coffins finally. "Fire, fire, go away, come again another day."

The King's Supper

     The fool wakes now from his thoughts. What's that great, swelling sound? While he stands staring, a huge procession comes into view, slowly unwinding itself down the small mountain path. In its fore runs a man of unusual proportions, yelling, "hats off!"

     "Hats off, the King comes and Her Ladyship too."

     The King and Queen approach now, on the backs of men, while other men carry a bucket, one huge bucket being carried down the hill by thousands of men too dead to be hot.

     "Hats off. Heaven is opening up."

     King speaks to the fool. "Have you come far, sir?"

     "From the heat, sire."

     "And where do you go?"

     "Up, sire."

     "The Queen and I went up for our last vacation. Nice there."

     "Cool, sire."

     The procession begins to move again. The men shoulder the huge bucket. The Queen smiles, and the King says, "by an act of God and by the grace of our dearly beloved, we wish you at our supper this evening." Now the King and the Queen and all the men with their giant bucket pass away.


     Two glass eyes, and only one of them dead. For a King, he looks.... But I thought he was one. Ever wandering in these foothills. For every foot raised, the mountain raises two. Everything is bigger in the dark too, and the clouds play in their holes, biting each other's necks with their angry flashings. Rain, rain, go away. But come again for the supper, the King's supper.


     The fool dresses for the supper. He frowns. Thirteen courses, all done in the new style, and all the while page boys of green visage dance under glass, pheasantly awaiting his appearance. Which may be of any sort, depending on whether he is dressed and how. One can also hide the face by smiling.


     Leaving his dressing room now, the fool hurriedly runs down the narrow corridor to the dining room, arriving just as the supper begins. There are thirteen long tables. He takes his seat at the King's table.

     Tossed green page boy salad opens the supper. "French or Russian, sir?" Magicians everywhere!

     Sitting quietly, the fool hears the Queen speak, as if to the air, "the King still looks to be an awful fool but not a word of this to him. His sword is most sharp. Polished by the most hidden stone and taken from the halberd but once - to conquer the fool. Riding from battle at the head of a once awesome foe, riding on the all white charger called by no name for fear of my safety, he was thrown and somehow managed to lose the fool, although not the look."

     God's eye, but it is impossible to be a hero. I always have to go to the bathroom and my sword can't cut shit anyway. Waving my mighty sword, called by it's secret name, I hurriedly pull up my pants and rush out to battle. "They've all gone now sir, hours ago."

     The meal ends, the page boys hurry about, cleaning here and there, and now the ladies leave. The meal was good, the lesson half learned. Green visaged play boys!

     Not a word of this to the ladies, sir."

     "Oh indeed not, upon my honor, sire."


     Later, the King and the Queen and the page boys all pass away, and the fool takes up his climb again into the heights. I go now, without pity, into the bright night to seek my shadow. He left me, but the sun is coming!


     The conductor jumps from the passing train now and runs up to the fool, shouting, "tracks right up the mountain, to the very top. No need to walk, man! Take the train, leave all the effort to us." The fool waves him off. Once I rode. Fucking conductor lied to me then too, never did get to the top. They call an ant hill a mountain. "To the very top, sir." Never even got there. I'd be on that train yet if I hadn't gotten off when I did. Fucking conductor!

     Today has been the longest day, and now the fool is tired. He lays down to sleep, perchance to see where his shadow has gone. Oh where, oh where, has my shadow gone, my shadow so low. Down into the valley of the shadow.... Shadows come and go...."

     And in his sleep the fool dreams.

The Fool's Dream

     He had spent the night with his followers, and now with the dawn he's alone. With the first light he sees the road and the land on either side. The road runs straight, through a landscape devoid of feature, flat on each side and sloping upwards before him. As the sun rises higher, he sees a figure moving ahead, then it's gone from view and only the road remains. The sun hangs high in the sky, but he has no shadow.

     There are no forks in this road, no more choices here - just unending straightness, broken only by the steady climb. In times past, even this gentle slope would have stunned his legs and his lungs, but now it's just one foot ahead of the other, with no thought to fatigue, with no thought even to loneliness.

     As the road becomes a path, he sees that figure again - a man, as he can now see. He's very far away, already climbing the path towards the clouds, swaying, perhaps from tiredness, perhaps from the wind at those heights. Funny, he hadn't seen those heights before, but then he's seeing many new things on this longest of days. As he climbs, the path becomes a wanderer that picks its way around and over but always up.

     This steepness is a challenge to his renewed life, and soon he realizes that there's a limit even to this endurance born of his long toil on the road. But still the left foot flashes ahead of the right which flashes ahead of the left, and the road is soon long behind him. The sun, still hanging overhead, looms larger with each step. He feels its warmth on his face and in his heart, and still he has no shadow.

     The land changes now. It is no longer flat and empty. Instead, there are giant boulders flung from above and long gashes in the earth, where the hands have clawed in agony. It has never been night here. He knows this. nd yet he goes on, towards the clouds which seem at times to float just overhead and then be far above him.

     The path begins to recoil, to retreat, as if from fear; but now, finding courage in its task, it flings itself upward with a glad leap - and he's just below the clouds. He already feels their coolness and the rest they promise. One more step, and this warmth in his heart will glow awhile, then die. He takes the step. He has known night before.


     He still sees here but not with the sun's light. The clouds have melted the harshness of this high world, and the path itself seems to take heart from this and renews its climb to the heights. He smells the greenness that waits just ahead. He plunges on now, tired and yearning for a resting place. The greenness will be his pillow, the clouds his blanket. It has been a long road.

     The land becomes more gentle now. There are no more boulders, and no more giant rakes plow their terrible agonies in the ground. Yet still there is no night, not even here.

     He rounds a gentle curve now and sees his first green, a dead or dying leaf. He hurries on to see the tree. The path, perhaps regretting its ease, takes a last jagged leap upwards and leads him out into a meadow and the night. He feels its coolness on his face and in his heart, and he sleeps.

     And in his sleep, he dreams that he's walking down a path, this very same path. Yet now it's an easy walk and through a newer country, with rolling hills away. There are orchards, and streams play amongst the trees. All is green, and the way is always downhill, towards the road, towards the welcoming night and his followers. He will smile and tell them of the heights and all he has seen.... And later maybe, after they have eaten, he'll tell them of the sun and of its warmth. And later still, he'll cry.

     Crying, he wakes. With a gladness, he dries his eyes, and soon he's following the path again as it hurries through the meadow, happy to be on its way. His legs and heart are renewed from his sleep, and he's ready for the climb, now eager for the sun.


     The path soon gives a last, violent wrench and then throws him out into the dawn. It's the sun's day now. The clouds are left behind. He has risen from the depths to this new world of light. The path is fainter now, but still it raises always towards the heights, those new heights. Looking upon them, he sees the man again. He will be with him soon, the man's swaying tells him so.

     Looking behind himself, he sees the path stretching back down to the road, which then cuts across the earth to the ends of the world. Looking ahead, he sees the other man, now bent with effort. He thinks of helping, but it's not his battle. Quickly though, he gains on the other, who now looms ever larger in his eyes and in his heart.


     As he watches, the man falls to his knees but continues on, still climbing, still struggling. He hurries after, wanting to see the end, and to witness the new beginning too. Around a last bend, he comes upon the man, leaning against the dead boulder that marks the path's end.

     "Dear companion climber of these heights, your journey has wasted you. You are at your end now. You will die in these heights."

     "You are the first to follow, are there no others? Are you the last man?"

     No one follows after me. The path, even the road, is empty."

     "But there is still the road?"

     "It remains, with its signs that people can no longer read. How can I help you?"

     "Go on now. This is my ending, not yours."

     "But there is no more path. You are its end."

     "That was my path. Until now, you have followed me. Now you must go on."

     "I will also make a road, others will see it."

     "I once made a road."

     "Good-by, father."


     The sun no longer rises as high. Winter is coming to these heights. Because it's a new day but not yet another day, he looks down the path to the road. And still no one comes. It has been so long. He looks into their hearts. He sees clearly. They think they need the warmth of the plains, the moisture of the sea. But here the sun never sets. Here the shadows never gain the upper hand. Below, the dead lay dying amongst great singing and other noises - and the waves lap against and over their little sands. Here, a great bird will sometimes come, but it will have no eyes and what could it say anyway. And still no climber comes. Do all babes sleep the night away?

     Tired of dragging, with each step, that long and empty road behind himself, a chain tying him always to both hope and despair, he finally lets it go. Doing so, his feet suddenly lighten, and he strides joyfully on ahead. His heart sings. "Yours was not the only way, there are others too. And with a bound, a glad leap, and other birds will fly even further!

The Last Fence

     The two dwarves help the fool to his feet. "What's the matter, sir? Are you ill."

     "I was dreaming, just dreaming."

     The dwarves run to the barn. Soon they return, carrying a manuscript. "It's a story we wrote, all about a man who....

     The fool grabs the papers and begins to read at random. "Good-by, father...." Reading this, he begins to cry, great sobs of anguish. He knows not why. "Why do I cry so? What was my dream?

     The barn, unnoticed, comes up behind the dwarves and kicks them in their backsides. The fool sees this and does a sort of dance, then shouts, "up, hats off and away!"

With light leaps, I scale down the giant mountain. With light leaps, I fall on my face amidst the howls of hunger. Wolves, crying for their morning milk, heated and served to them in their bowls. Bowled over....

     Up I rise, uncrushed but with sore face. "The light looked green." I can't even leap like a true philosopher - up the side of truth. "I'll have a side of truth, please."

     "We have only the backside, sir." But that's only his side of it.

     If all the King's men came at once, I'd never make it up this cunning rock with my bite sized leaps. But no one comes at the noontide, not in the heat of His anger. At noon time, halfway - and more if you think of it. No more dead after noon time. The King is already dead though, and all the King's men and all the King's horses too. Only the Queen remains, playing with herself and her cats.


     The fifth fence! It's merely an academic question as to why I've come this far. And only a postponement of the dare - "five fences and you die!" Thus bellowed that expert, long since dead, smiling in her sweaty grave. But what did she know of mountains or kings?      Hands up, both now, a foot here, and push. Now up, and over. And jump! Only a fool....

     And he runs screaming from the room....

The Fall

     "How can I bear to die?" To answer this question is to evade it. All answers are evasions. One should rather paint this question on one's wall to always see - and to live with.


     One answer, Joseph K's was to spread his arms and accept death, and the knife. This was Jung's answer too, only without the knife.

     Nietzsche never wrote on this question. But it was his question, behind all he wrote. The tension generated by defying this question was the reason he became who he did (and not only at his end).


     Madness strikes down the sons and the daughters, and God and his devils hold their sides and laugh.

     They have the edge.

     Which they continually hone over us.

     God once asked one of his devils for the time. What was the answer? "Nine o'clock, morning, sir."

     And then all hell broke loose. God among them. It was Him come as He had promised.

     God, the curator, the stuffer of animals, the snuffer-outer of life!

     Questions come and go, except for that one! God Himself was once asked for the time. He said, "watch! Let there be time." And time and time again, the angels, all of them, felt themselves to be insufficient. They hadn't the time nor the energy nor the money nor the hate to be sufficient. Not onto that day!

     On the morning of the day in question, the day being questioned, agreed to a pause, so as to let time come up from behind and acquire a finished, or polished, but always ready state of eagerness. However, due to an overabundance of acquired dispositions to act as a fool, the day hobbled along, keeping God waiting (as was proper) for half of it.


     The big dog feels the warm stickiness sliding slowly down his large throat, and lacking heed, slides quickly after the warm stickiness itself, with an eye and a throaty growl directed towards the larger of the two dwarves who are standing in carefully concealed disarray before the barn. Needful of paint, old, having served three masters, the barn stands proudly behind these two dwarves, who, cowering in the rain, are unmindful that they are about to be kicked again in their backsides.

     Sulfur sometimes belches forth from God's mouth - a parable of course, as any dwarf knows.

     Pillows are made for stuffing under the bedspread so as to cleverly build up a mock image of sleeping heads beneath its death. "Beneath me lies a wealth of pillows," thus speaks the proud bedspread, which in other times is not so minded to speak. Realizing likely that unnecessary speech may give away lies as presents to all present.


     In spite of the warmth of the day, she is fully clothed in bra and panties, which carefully, although not cleverly, conceal yet reveal the mocking eyes beneath that banded mask, and the pouting mouth below.

     In spite of the heat, the two crawl and claw gracefully at one another. "Oh God, it's so good! Fuck me." Bodies joined to one mind, they heatedly pummel each other into oblivion and then back again into each other's arms. "It's so good."

     Can you picture the beautiful sight of he and she? At it, fucking? "Drive it on home, baby. It's so good." Fucking is where the heart stops and the breath becomes another hand - a certain sigh.

     And he walks on the path in the garden of the valley and the sky is full of His love. And His hate goes before Him too, overcoming. And he walks and He talks in the valley of the garden and a song is made to be ever sung - of golden notes hanging from a high horse overstanding all. And not understanding at all.

     If God were a horse, his genitals would exceed my fondest expectations and set me to wondering as to the properness of it all - of the properness of balls the size of halls. I recall seeing balls the size of balls, and I cried then, seeing balls that small and large. But of course, as any fool knows, God isn't a horse but a man with a beard, a shaft with which He supports His game right leg, and a small ball of shit unnoticed in the hair of His ass of asses.


     Bodies locked in close embrace, the two on the bed fail to notice my approach. Quietly I watch as he moves his now wet tool in and out of her love. Moaning softly, then even more softly, she pulls him ever closer until I'm unable to tell where he and she are two. Crying loudly now, she strives to drive him away, then closer, but always in and out of her flowing and dancing cunt, which, crying itself with pleasure, contracts once, again, and yet again, expanding now all the way to heaven, and only slowly falling back to earth. Falling slowly back, she feels his maleness splash against the sides of her love and rises up to wish him happiness. Quietly I watch all this, then slowly turn and walk into the garden to await the lovers for dinner.

     Having whetted my appetite, the now fulfilled two appear, and we sit quietly together, moaning softly over our repast.


     The table stands on its own two feet, totters, and now boldly declares that it will serve no more - all slaves have been freed. And it smiles knowingly as it crashes back into place without disturbing a dish. We sit here, continuing to force the food down our gnawing doubts.


     No matter how many times you kill yourself, you will still die!

Night Fears

     Carefully removing his hands from the dry, harsh dishwater, he wheels about, quickly drawing his concealed revolver, and fires at the dark forms facing him. With a glad cry at night, the heavy old clock tells the time again. And again birds do their work on the world.

     Church bugs - they prey upon your knees!

     With a smile of vengeance, I cast myself upon your breast which thrusts against the darkness. Music is a wish to die, to live by. If God had been kind, He would have given us perpetual hard-ons, hat racks.

     The shadows lengthen, the day ends, the child's cries cease, and at once the drums begin. From nearby in a thicket, black men count the change to be a good one. It has been drummed into their heads. A snake crawls through the thicket, then leaves in confusion.

     As the shadows lengthen, their heights exceeding all expectations, we all fall on our hands and graze as animals do. Of course, as no one has informed us fully of all the consequences of any of our actions, we feel it to be beyond us (or beside us) to act in any other manner. Or, in any manner for the most part.

     The day ends, and I cast aside my wisdom for the dark side of it all. Wisdom comes and goes - with the sun. With a smile of vengeance, I disown my words, which subtly serve to beckon me into and away from myself.

     "Fear yourself!" Words to survive by. A wise man once asked an ass, that is, a philosopher, for the meaning of a toadstool. The ass answered, "to die." While beating the philosopher with a stick, the wise man shouted, "then die."

     The baby cries. He would be silent, huddled in the darkest corner of his life if he knew what he will know. All this just to die?


     Down the long river's path flies the bird. Witness to his utter lack of gravity, he sings as he flies. People raise their heads now, cursing him. "You should be put away, foul creature." Rising from their toilets, they curse the birdshit raining down upon their lives. But life is one big toilet bowl, and it's seldom that one sits upon it.

     Behind, in the woods, the animals live in some sort of disarray. Believing in the freedom to dig to one's own depths, they have displaced the landscape, except for a thin and hollow shell over their lives.


     The table, recovering from its near attack of freedom, remains quivering under the weight of our elbows. We're crushing it again, although, being of good will and perhaps fearing a lynching, we do refrain from mentioning this unlikely incident to the inquiring reporter.

     Now the world, spinning ever faster, gets dizzy and falls off. The turtle gives a little sigh of relief and then dies, leaving only a thin crust, where before there had really been nothing.

The Academic Question

     It's merely an academic question as to why I've come this far....


     Only a fool!


     Several or quite a few philosophers (depending on your perspective) are out on a walk, as is not their custom. Hearing a commotion nearby and sounds of struggle, they run away, as is their custom. Except for one of them, who's fuzzy and sort of deaf in one or the other of his ears. He advances towards the struggle, which he takes to be other birds, singing.

     A massive naked horde sweeps down upon the philosophers as they try to run away, and they all became a naked, jumbled mass. Soon only a philosopher can tell he is one. Now naked, they show no signs of the inner depth which all philosophers imagine they have.

     Soon all are engulfed in a ferocious struggle (which commentators might well be advised to call life) - even the deaf and fuzzy one, who takes it to be a great flock of seagulls engulfing him. He soon feels otherwise.


     Everyone's naked now. Who is friend? Who is foe? No emblems, insignia, badges, nothing. Of course they all fight on. But the philosophers are also faced with a moral dilemma.

     "If there is no way to tell good or evil, then there can be no good or evil. All is jumbled." So the philosophers say, as they lay down, covering their heads and becoming asses to everyone's view.

     Except for the one who's fuzzy and sort of deaf in one ear or the other. Except that now he's not fuzzy or deaf, or if he is, he gives no sign of it. "True, there is no way to tell good or evil, friend or foe, all is jumbled now. There is no good or evil - yet." Saying this, he picks up a dead sword, brings it to life, and soon creates good and evil, friend and foe. Blood always tells!

     Soon, he has cleared his immediate area of evil and has surrounded himself with good and dead bodies. The others are good enough to keep their moral distance. "Now this is good," he concludes.


     Only a fool....

Sodden Grass

     When sodden grass causes trouble, it's time to call an end to it. The King had thought this earlier, and now at the end of this longest day he thinks again of sodden grass.


     In the morning early, before even the sun was awake, the King had leapt from his bed and, without thinking of his wife, had taken thirteen of his finest men and set forth for another land. They had crept from the darkness with fists at their eyes, rubbing away the sleep that still held them.

     The King, as was his custom, had led the men through the new paths into the new land. Tall and strong, with long flowing hair, he had led. The men had followed, joy and fear at their hearts.


     In the morning, early, even before the sun was up, they had crossed sodden grass. All were lost then but the King and his favorite hunting dog which he had left behind with his wife. Thus fate had dealt the dog kindly.

     After much struggle and great effort among the sodden grasses, the King had reached shore, dry land. That's when he had first thought that sodden grass causes trouble.

     And in truth he was right, for what does it cause but trouble? The loss of thirteen men, almost his favorite dog - what would the Queen say? And the King, what could he say? In the new land, they would wonder. Who is this King who comes alone, with muddy feet?


     On dry land now, the King removes his belt and his boots, his tie and his hat, all significators of his rank. The Sun, sitting nearby and seeing that the King is exhausted, rises and offers him his chair. It's time now to leave for the west anyway. Encouraged by this unforeseen act of kindness, the King sits down in the vacated chair and begins to eat from the food on the table before him. The table, resigned to this by now, no longer shudders at the touch.

     The grass dries slowly but the King is patient. He has all day. And then, well, he'll see. He's crossed sodden grass before.


     In the other land, men look to the setting Sun. "Where is the King? He's long overdue. He was to come with you."

     The Sun starts home. "Send us the King," shout the men at the gate. Soon the sky darkens, and the people lose hope and close themselves off from the night.


     As everyone is looking for the King, it is of of no wonder that the fool who darts through the closing gates causes no sensation or alarm. This fool with bloody feet makes his awkward way through the emptying streets and shortly stops before the inn. He appears to argue with himself. Then unexpectedly, he runs around the corner, into the alley.

     Soon he returns and stands again before the inn, trying not to show the damp spots that trail down his pants leg. Attempting nonchalance, he finally enters the inn, which is old and tired and has served three masters. He looks around for dwarves. He wonders where the cats have gone.

     The innkeeper, noticing this oddness and thinking him to be a messenger, asks, "are you from the Queen?" The fool shakes his head and tries to cover the stains.

     Under repeated questioning by the innkeeper, who had been the King himself, the Queen's husband in fact, this obviously stained creation admits that he's come to offer his services to the inn. "I saw you sleeping earlier at the Sun's table - when you were deciding that you were no longer the King. I realized then that I no longer had to be the fool."


     How the King crossed the sodden grass and arrived at the town, how he entered the gates and became the innkeeper, and why he did not reveal his glory to the people is not of importance here. It suffices to tell only of the King's breakfast.

     It was an excellent breakfast, and afterwards, completely refreshed, the King had sat there at the Sun's table, in the Sun's very own chair, and slept.

     By Eugene Marks