an unlocked little locked
My first night in that hotel when standing in the hallway listening
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before I went back into my
I took the elevator down to 3. I walked. I did not see a thing on 3.
What does he look like I had asked.
You’ll know him when you see him she had said.
Which room is yours I later asked her. Then
Which room is his.
These people say that people who insist that they had no idea about such things are lying.
lacquered box.
I took the stairs to 4 then took the elevator up to 7 where the hallway lights were out. Still nothing. No one. Took the stairs back down to 6.
I turned the corner entering a long transitional space that linked the statuary to the paintings in a gallery called Baroque. This long transitional space was covered on both sides with
mirror images
a matching painted reproduction of a set of draperies hanging from a fancy valance pulled together at each side with lavishly painted golden ropes that left me feeling weakened in the knees.
I did not go into Baroque.
Heart palpitations challenged by a draining queasiness throughout my limbs I claimed my things then started walking back as quickly as I could to that hotel.
Inside a KITCHEN doorway leading down into the BASEMENT (Night Six) she said It’s the oddest thing. She said I just don’t see you very clearly in that big apartment building you are living in. She said I see the building in the distance. Getting closer I can see the walkway see the double doors can even see into a little of the lobby. I can feel your feelings hear your thoughts. Make out the numbers on your door. She said But I can’t enter into where you live.
She closed the BASEMENT off said We won’t go down there then led me back upstairs.
The contrast was
The windows in the basement all have iron bars she said as we proceeded up. She said And if I understand you half as well as I
She stopped herself.
She turned looked back at me said By the way do I detect in you a little
Stopped.
The change in atmosphere as we proceeded from the STAIRCASE FROM THE KITCHEN TO THE BASEMENT to the STAIRCASE HALL that led us back into the STUDY where he had been waiting for us with some special late night sweets produced in me immediate sensations of relief.
This was the night when I had been invited to stay the night but did not make it all the way.
cheeks pink eyes outlined blue blue lidded lashes body scented blue no straps no cups legs shimmering sheerest blue shoes blue blue velvet buckles ankle straps she waits inside this room in waning candlelight where sapphire powder for her eyelids got into her eyes all images dissolving in it as she lies down on the bed her face now floating down upon the blue tears staining streaks into the cotton white
I took the elevator up.
One day a man went out of doors to call out for his wife.
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They gathered they petitioned on those walls that had been papered in the very same (607) aspects of an ordinary Chinese lifestyle. On the same red background brightly colored figures
As the man’s wife had not answered any of his calls he had no option but to go into the forest searching.
argued to the judge
His heart beat rapidly as he imagined what he might discover in the forest and while he advanced he prayed that when he found his wife she would be safe. However at the same time he felt angry that his solitude had been disturbed.
But looking around I noted plenty of substantial differences as well. I put my tote bag on the bed unpacked a few things from my suitcase. For example just one nightstand. In addition to a one bulb ceiling fixture over the bed the pineapple lamp was small. Cream pleated shade. No floor lamps. No black table with a drawer below a shelf.
Although it was so early I turned down the very same leafy bedspread exposing the same pink
On the bed I laid my dinner long limp french fries hotdog mustard relish catsup packets on a towel.
The man recalled his house his chair and ottoman the gentle breezes through the open windows. So as not to lose his way he kept his path as straight as he could keep it. But what he had not anticipated when he went that afternoon into the forest was the movement of the outer and the inner rings of trees. Like gears rotating in opposite directions they were turning.
It’s a little difficult to talk about she might have answered had he asked her whom she had been listening to that night when I had called them on the telephone. But I will try. Each little story
No let’s say each song she might have said. It has an atmosphere.
It would have been a cooler night on the VERANDAH where the feeling would be private. Intimate. Exclusive.
Something scampered up the screen.
This singer is in harmony with certain states of inner life she might continue tuned into the same dimension as the song. What happens in a case like this is simply the inevitable effect of
Do you see she might have said in an attempt to redirect
Each one is written on a plane.
I see he might have said. A plane.
Or if you like she might have said
one last attempt to put it in a form that he could understand
it floats within a world to which I momentarily attune as soon as I pick up the phone.
At other times he found himself transported back into the cloakroom where that woman who was much too old for such exhausting forms of labor would be cleaning organizing toilets hanging clothing on the racks. Down on her knees at first then standing stretching reaching in as far as she could reach
she’d even disappear in there
knees creaking
momentarily
then out again
still searching. He would watch her desperately flickering hands whose skeletal fingers rummaged hastily within the racks as seen from his perspective from that corner of the ceiling.
What’s she looking for in there?
One day
It was a wretched day.
he turned into the park then chose a narrow pathway passing under trees with icy steely colored branches decorated with the white lights of the season. He stopped walking looked across the cracks upon the frozen lake but he was right away transported back to where the wheezing woman in the lower rack of clothing searching
reaching
going in
For what?
That was the time when she did come back.
I’ll look for him
I told myself
a little later on.
Day 4
Next morning figuring good idea to go back where I’d started I was in the reading room again. Grand hall watched over by elaborately framed dark portraits shining facelessly from where they hung upon the walls. Illuminated by the ceiling lights was dust from far too many solitary arid paths picked up then carried in by lonely people who had somehow made it to that place that seemed consumed by feelings of true heartbreak
although entering into there was to attempt to lose oneself in notions of imaginary heartbreak.
While the guidebook raved at its collection much of which could be requested quickly fetched what left a more immediate impression was the smell of alcohol enhanced with body odor. Wanting to look at the people responsible for the smell competed in me with not wanting to look at anyone who might look back. Also snaking its way in between these divided desires was an irrational but profound physical impulse to look at the smell itself.