— How many olives ya got here?
— Got five. Ate four. One left. But you ain’t getting it.
— Let me have it.
— Okay, eat it. Four for me. One for you. The world is fine like this. It’s good for my stomach. I ate three. You watched me eating the fourth. And you asked for the fifth. I gave it to you. You asked. How kind. I ate four. Gave you one. Did you want to eat what I had — you had less than me — didn’t protest — are you hungry — why did you let me eat the other four — without saying a word — and now you even have the courtesy of asking permission — I am the boss because I didn’t mind eating the other four — I didn’t think about you — that’s what made me the boss — I am still hungry — are you satisfied — I gave you my olive — a pit of my appetite. The world is fine if you feel fine. I ate four. You only one. We are compatible. We ate five.
— Pum, pum, Paco. Pum, pum.
— She’s poetical, but she lacks Poetics.
— Sí, sí, sí.
— It’s chaotic. She’s looking for the order of chaos, but she lacks order too.
— Sí, sí, sí.
— Hey, watch out for Xana. She just told Paco you don’t have a Poetic.
— And what did Paco say?
— He smiled: sí, sí, sí.
— Sí, she has a Poetic, or sí she doesn’t have a Poetic?
— I don’t know. He said: sí, sí, sí.
— Like the Associated Free State. Puerto Ricans are semicolons. They can’t decide on the period or the comma. Of course she doesn’t know I have a Poetic because she has never read my work.
— Why do you care what she says?
— Why do you tell me what she says?
— Pum, pum, Paco. Pum, pum.
— And what about mine — aren’t mine soft too?
— Yes, they are soft, but hers — touch hers, she really has soft hands.
— Aren’t mine really soft too?
— Yes, they are soft, but hers, sheer silk. She hasn’t washed a dish in her life.
— You’re not kidding.
— Spoiled. Spoiled rotten.
— Hey, give me your hand.
— Why should I give you my hand, simply because you asked for it, without any certainty about a friendship, something that made you think I’d give it to you simply because you were going to ask me for it, I was going to give it to you, I wasn’t about to refuse it, but my pleasure isn’t your pleasure, yours is in my hand, mine is in refusing it. Tant pis. ça m’est égal.
— And it is quite true what our royal highness said.
— What did I say? I can’t remember.
— She suffers the collective amnesia of her people.
— What? What did I say? I already forgot.
— I won’t forgive what you said to me. I do remember it.
— What did I say? I’m sorry.
— I won’t forgive you.
— I won’t forgive you either unless you tell me what I said. Please tell me.
— I forgot already. It’s on the tip of my tongue.
— The chair I sat in, like a burnished throne, glowed on the marble, where the glass held by standards wrought with fruited vines. I was reading with five feminists. Three of them had already read. And I wondered:
— Why aren’t they sitting in the chair?
They had told me:
— You can’t read with Tess because there is one chair behind the table. Only one of you can sit down.
But none of the three sat down. They read standing up. And the throne was empty — waiting for me — from which a golden cupidon peeped out. Another hid his eyes behind his wing. Doubled the flames of seven branched candelabra. So I was very angry because they thought I could not read well without Tess, and when my turn came, I sat in the chair and stole the show. Now a woman complained:
— Stand up. We cannot see you.
— Madam—I answered—there is a throne here and I am going to sit on it.
— Pum, pum, Paco, let’s dance.
— Later, Xana, let me enjoy this cigar.
— Bin gar keine Russin, stamm’ aus Litauen, echt deutsch.
— I feel Croatian, surrounded by all these languages.
— And, and, when we were children, staying at the Archduke’s, my cousin, he took me out on a sled.
— You stole that sled from my diary. It was not my cousin’s, it was my brother Benny’s.
— No, she took it from Rosebud, Rosebud, the sled in Citizen Kane. What Orson Welles had lost was a sled — his childhood — in a big Bonfire of the Vanities.
— The fire, the bonfire — I still see it — it is burning in flames my eyes. Tyger, Tyger, burning bright, in the forest of the night, what immortal hand, or sight, build thy fearful symmetry.
— Oh, be drunk, be always drunk.
— Yes, be always drunk with fire.
— Tyger, tyger, burning bright, in the forest of a night.
— I see him coming.
— Fire, Mona, fire.
— Reflecting light upon the table as the glitter of her jewels rose to meet it, from satin cases poured in rich profusion, in vials of ivory and colored glass unstoppered, lurked her strange synthetic perfumes, unguent, powdered, or liquid — troubled, confused and drowned the sense in odors, stirred by the air that freshened from the window.
— Yes, crack a window — it’s stuffocating. The air is not going through the chimney. Start a fire. Wood, wood. It’s Christmas.
— Well, she stole my diary. That was written in my diary. And down we went in the mountains, there, were you feel free.
— And I was frightened. He said, Marie, Marie, hold on tight.
— He said, Mona, Mona, hold on tight. And down we went, in the mountains, there where you feel free. I have never experienced that wild freedom of death again. Sometimes, like now, the fire burned like a tyger, tyger, burning bright, in the forest of the night.
— Mona, look at my new glasses.
— Spectacular. Put them on.
— I am seeing the tygers burning bright.
— Wear them, you’ll experience ants tyghding back your sight.
— Cushions, give me cushions. I need comfort. I need to feel cozy, mushy, like in my bed. I want to go, down the mountain, with her, in her sled, there where you feel free.
— Come here, I’ll lend you mushy cushions. You’ll feel the comfort with me.
— These ascended in fattening the prolonged candle-flames, flung their smoke into the Laquearia, stirring the pattern on the coffered ceiling.
— I still prefer this painting of Mama Mona. The setting of the stage. The candles burning. The tygers, tygers, running wild, in the forest of the child. Laquearia, unguent, smoke, in rich profusion.
— I am burning, it’s too hot. Crack another window.
— I fell deep into sleep. The comfort burning bright in the forest of the night.
— Where am I?
— Here, in Mona’s house. You’re just drunk.
— Be drunk, be always drunk. And if sometimes, on the stairs of a palace, or on the green side of a ditch, or on the dreary solitude of our room, you should awaken and the drunkenness be half or wholly slipped away from you, ask of the wind, or of the wave, or of the star, or of the bird, or of the clock, of whatever flies, or sighs, or rocks, or sings, or speaks.
— I ate too much. The turkey wings are starting to flutter inside my belly. I’m stuffed. I can’t budge from this chair. I’m falling asleep.
— My head is spinning. In a rollercoaster. Down and up the Russian mountain, there, in the amusement park, where you feel free.