Les Amants ~ René Magritte
Looking down a time tunnel provided by foresight may not have provided her with a picture acceptable to her, then, frame of reference.
Foresight may have allowed her not to have left the apartment on Tuesday morning; not to have crossed the zigzag brickwork that patterned her mood with interlocking thoughts; not to have paused at the kerb to allow the clouds to pass in a gutter puddle.
Perhaps the myriad possibilities that conspired to lead her to this point are best read by starting on Friday's page and working backward; perhaps it is only via this reverse engineering that the present can be understood as a coherent design.
In truth it would only be possible to answer these questions from a distance that disconnects you from the red lipstick and dark kohl she uses to punctuate her face; from the taste of her breath on your lip; from the arc of her brow as she manipulates the tiny brush.
Pictures framed within minimal strips of black; mounted with care upon white apartment walls; framed as if to contain all of the energy, the life that created them; gaze out into another world where you and she are yourselves created, posed in slivers of tender motion: a Futurist composition of lives entangled.
Hindsight may now offer you the opportunity to savour the interplay between unconnected events; the subtle timing of Tuesday morning traffic lights and flapping newspaper readers – useless headlines wasting ink and paper – words to burn; the carbon dust suspended in the air that brings a grit tear to blur your vision as you descend into the day.
In reality were you not blinded until that very moment; asleep at the wheel of your desires?
And now the edge of Friday's bed is decorated with her legs (legs that connect those zigzag bricks to these parquet floors); one knee under her chin as she tends to the palette of her toenails, perfuming the room with astringent chemical triggers.
Your smile – unseen by her concentrated efforts - includes, through the apartment window, the world that goes about its business with a distinct brush-tint of added significance: people meet beneath roadside trees to exchange unheard secrets while traffic decides the current of the street.
Your feelings are extended to all that you see in a benevolent act of love.
Foresight may have allowed her not to have left the apartment on Tuesday morning; not to have crossed the zigzag brickwork that patterned her mood with interlocking thoughts; not to have paused at the kerb to allow the clouds to pass in a gutter puddle.
Perhaps the myriad possibilities that conspired to lead her to this point are best read by starting on Friday's page and working backward; perhaps it is only via this reverse engineering that the present can be understood as a coherent design.
In truth it would only be possible to answer these questions from a distance that disconnects you from the red lipstick and dark kohl she uses to punctuate her face; from the taste of her breath on your lip; from the arc of her brow as she manipulates the tiny brush.
Pictures framed within minimal strips of black; mounted with care upon white apartment walls; framed as if to contain all of the energy, the life that created them; gaze out into another world where you and she are yourselves created, posed in slivers of tender motion: a Futurist composition of lives entangled.
Hindsight may now offer you the opportunity to savour the interplay between unconnected events; the subtle timing of Tuesday morning traffic lights and flapping newspaper readers – useless headlines wasting ink and paper – words to burn; the carbon dust suspended in the air that brings a grit tear to blur your vision as you descend into the day.
In reality were you not blinded until that very moment; asleep at the wheel of your desires?
And now the edge of Friday's bed is decorated with her legs (legs that connect those zigzag bricks to these parquet floors); one knee under her chin as she tends to the palette of her toenails, perfuming the room with astringent chemical triggers.
Your smile – unseen by her concentrated efforts - includes, through the apartment window, the world that goes about its business with a distinct brush-tint of added significance: people meet beneath roadside trees to exchange unheard secrets while traffic decides the current of the street.
Your feelings are extended to all that you see in a benevolent act of love.
15 comments:
Symbolic from start to finish, a real feast for those hungry for excellence.
Symbiotic from fore to hind, this sight into the infinite present is an affectionate win-win caress you share with all who read it and an orgasm for thoise minds beholding the simultaneity of it all.
yodood...really?
really nice...i sensed an unfortuitous conclusion, but you surprise me.
Or something like that, then.
Gorgeous.
Magritte is perfect... he often looked on from a more or less safe distance as well...
as soon as I read : the present can be understood as a coherent design, I knew I was in for a treat as a reader. I especially liked the positioning of the people, places,happenings, things, body parts... these were for me such a coherent design.
....and there is something a bit unsettling about this benevolent act of love
Jimmy: bon appetit!
Yodood: Don't worry, I know what you meant :D
Tom: The clue to a fortuitous conclusion is in the title :)
Zoe: :)
Harlequin: I always go looking for a picture after I've finished writing the piece (not vice vesa) - sometimes it takes ages but this one came to me immediately - I believe this paintings with faces covered are a result of the drowning of Magritte's mother, her dress floating up to cover her face.
Perhaps I phrased the benevolent act of love wrong - perhaps I should have added 'involuntary' in there.
perfect prose... and as you sometimes say, "i wish i had written that!"
every word leads to the next flawlessly. in my humble opinion, there is nothing extraneous here, no digression. it feels like the most perfect painting, if a painting could capture movement in time... could capture this notion of foresight, hindsight, cloud passage, taste of breath on lip, arch of brow, carbon dust and grit tear, decorated edge of bed... i could go on and on.
there is a sense of foreboding in the opening paragraph that i thought might have a later denouement; but much to my surprise and pleasure, you were true to your word, you did connect the red wire to positive!
perhaps the dark side we feel, and that you (perhaps unconsciously) hint at, is that moments of such perfect bliss will end as all moments of perfect bliss end... tragedy awaits us... the gaping eye of the grave. oh, the hills and valleys of this life! :>>))) xooxoxox
Can't get past the Magritte but shall do so.
Nice narrative here... I like how it situates me within the scene... watching those same clouds in the puddles...
and as with lots of your writing, this piece is so subtle, yet disquieting.
Laura: I had presumed that i was producing something positive - I guess the unconscious had better ideas :)
Jon: glad to have disquieted you :D
no .
no pears of wisdow fron me .
just a nice to meet you .
Water usually flows in the path of least resistance... but it's more interesting when it doesn't.
Beautiful piece.
JeffScape: "Water usually flows in the path of least resistance" - except when taken up by the sun ;]
I can see I've missed a lot since my non-foresighted PC crash! But wit hmy new-found hindsight( and some great new security 'ware ), it'll come to pass, wot? Brilliant as always, sir.
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