In the Colosseum, See the Tragedians; or, Thee Sequel No One Asked For

The tragedians were not yet on the wasteland. The tragedians were still in their ramekins in the hinterlands — which is where they belonged — which is where everyone said they’d stay. 

The ramekins were pleasant. The ramekins had good light in the afternoon. One tragedian had begun conducting his Rimsky-Korsakov a beat too early — just a little, just under his breath, just the wrists — but the other two told him to stop and he stopped. For a while he stopped.

Then, Miami. The bike only goes so far. The record store has everything except what you need, which is the thing you don’t quite have the name for yet, the thing you saw for three seconds on television before your mother changed the channel, the thing with the clothes and the spitting and the feeling of repulsion that is indistinguishable from recognition. Maybe a Butthole Surfers album — maybe Locust Abortion Technician. You are twelve, or thirteen, or already a hundred years old in the way that certain children are. You write the words Sex Pistols on the inside cover of a notebook and feel briefly criminal and alive.

This is before. This is still before.

The mango sits. The fan wobbles. The cassette hisses.

Nobody has been brought up for ordination.

Nobody has answered for the organ.

What about love?

What about love.

Here endeth this misbegotten tale.

What I’m Reading:

“What’s missing in the rest of the world is courage,” she said. “Mayors could say: ‘This is my opportunity [to leave a] legacy,’ but most will not dare.”

— Ajit Niranjan / “How Paris swapped cars for bikes – and transformed its streets” / The Guardian