32.

(First of all, I'd like to note that I dislike the last part of this piece. I wanted to write something else, in a different manner; what's down there is the sincere sentiment i wanted to express but not in the way i would have expressed it if i had a smidgen of charisma or vision. Anyway, the last part was a sloppy incompetent way of trying to communicate my concerns, hopefully someday i will be able to say what i mean.)



The bo(d)y just lies there, on its back, the bed only wide enough to contain last night’s struggle, call it massacre. On this bo(d)y the white linen sheet is placed, not quite white anymore but besmeared with stains of big and stains of old, an accumulation of memories, bo(d)ies, midnight tremors and terrors, the evocation of and escape from -Death- on this white bo(d)y this white linen sheet is placed, as if to hide, as if to consecrate, as if to enshroud the vestal white bo(d)y.




Whose long white leg is dangled from the ratty edge of the formerly white linen sheet, not quite white anymore, but studded with holes of blood and holes of fire, a long stretch of skin peeled off, some inches below the hip, he stood by the frame of the door, leaned there in pounding headache and lit a cigarette and gazed at it, the long white leg from where, some inches below the hip, where the thigh gets a curve of flesh and is juicy, a long flap of skin is missing, skid marks engraved into the flesh, from the thigh down to just below the knee.



He notices the bo(d)y cannot bend the leg to the knee, the long enflamed wound cannot allow any movement, so the long white leg just hangs there from beneath the ratty edge of the formerly white linen sheet, sticks out like a piece of bleached wood (bone?) and dried blood has made a dried snail trail down to the ankle, and across the side of the shank.



He was looking for connection, he was looking for release. The bo(d)y was all fleshy lips, and big violet elf eyes and a wild tangle of honey-blond hair. The bo(d)y could barely ask any questions or answer any answers. The bo(d)y shrugged for drugs and shrugged for sex yet he was sure, somewhere beneath all the perfect white skin, lodged somewhere between all the intricate bone structure, hidden behind the big violet elf eyes was a diamond of wisdom, a secret language kept well, a treasure chest full of bo(d)ily delights.



The answer to all the shit, anyway. If it wasn’t hidden in money and it wasn’t hidden in fame and ambition, if it wasn’t hidden inside books and history, then it must be hidden in the body. The more perfect a body seems, the more unknowable it looks. The absolute must contain the truth. Or maybe the truth lies in the human need to destroy and defile anything pure. Maybe the truth lies in this very instant: you open up a bo(d)y and it tells you no secrets. You cut into the flesh and the only fact it gives you is that the lower layers of flesh are whiter than the epidermis. White and defiant, you need the right sharp blade to cut through deeper, to excavate more truths. In aperfect world, the bo(d)y would spill its guts. But you pry under tendons and into veins and past that film of mucous surrounding the organs, and the bo(d)y remains mute, shut down, closed up, no secrets to whisper, no truths to reveal, no knowledge to disclose.



Except maybe: “You’re insane.”



[EDIT: okay, I guess what i really wanted to say is:
You've tasted the cum
You've showered in the piss
You've eaten the shit
You've drank the blood
You've chewed the flesh
You've smelt the bowels
You've punctured the stomach
You've worn the skin.
Now what?]