Inspired by 'O me! O life!' by Walt Whitman
Are human pleasures (love, beauty, romance) discredited if the person does not seem to be with the ‘current reality’. If one believes does it become truth?
At some point, it was vaguely established that it was suicide. Somewhere along the line the words had been uttered, they had been etched in black and white, and truth was made.
I think it’s important for you to know the old local legend that flowers grow by the train tracks here. In this dry, burnt town of oak and dirt – lilacs peep out from beneath the iron tracks. Children commonly scramble to see them, piling over each other bitterly competing to catch a glimpse. All in doting vanity. But this girl however had always danced in a cloud of gold. Or so it seemed. She basked in beauty others failed to see. She danced to music when most would hear devoid silence. She inhaled the sweet scents of flowers that grew by the train. Clamorous psychedelic colour poured in, and from her. And O, amongst the endless trains of the faithless she was completely and utterly mad.
I visited the spot some weeks later. On this day it echoed, as if cold and empty. It was a large foreboding room in an abandoned bar, discarded police tape decorated the floor. Everything was cloaked in silence and ominousness hung bitterly in the air. Joey’s was the sole bar in town and it’s yet to be replaced. To most it’s quite inconceivable how one could ever recreate a place like Joey’s. It had spirit, history they say. You know the kind.
I remember closing my eyes, breathing in deeply, and you know I swear I could see her – dancing in the centre. And in my dreams the room hummed a deep red. Men whispered in the corners whilst girls draped themselves across the couches – tired; boys held hands anxiously beneath the bar and the guitarist strummed absently upon a small island stage. Just as it had always been.
And Jasmine was in the bare abandoned dance floor that glowed of red. Spinning and spinning and spinning. Her wounds on show for all. A grin teased her eyes, the corners of her lips. Yet to her it would have been the most natural thing in the world. Swimming in elucidating hallucinations, the most natural thing in the world. I recall I opened my eyes then and I was embraced by silence.
And there was a hell of a lot of it after it happened. Silence. The lifelessness that dripped from the echoes of the school hallways tasted sour. The epitome of plodding sordid crowds if I ever saw it. Clean too. Never have I had such easy work, barely a scuff in the corridor. I resented this wholeheartedly. Grief must be earned and they believed she was mad, how dare they be silent, how dare they be clean. And all for me! The most sour thing I’d ever tasted.
Yet it was the train ride home that could be, at times, the sourest of it all. I used to like to fill the time with thoughts about our tangoes with time, mine and hers, Tango Tango Tango in red salsa dresses and ravaging music, like a big fuck you to its writhing trickery. We’d dance so fast the speeding hands would break and we were the only ones that never tripped! But when that got sad, I’d concentrate really really hard out the window of the racing train.
And I swear, yes, I swear - I saw a purple lilac, peeping from under the tracks.
At some point, it was vaguely established that it was suicide. Somewhere along the line the words had been uttered, they had been etched in black and white, and truth was made.
I think it’s important for you to know the old local legend that flowers grow by the train tracks here. In this dry, burnt town of oak and dirt – lilacs peep out from beneath the iron tracks. Children commonly scramble to see them, piling over each other bitterly competing to catch a glimpse. All in doting vanity. But this girl however had always danced in a cloud of gold. Or so it seemed. She basked in beauty others failed to see. She danced to music when most would hear devoid silence. She inhaled the sweet scents of flowers that grew by the train. Clamorous psychedelic colour poured in, and from her. And O, amongst the endless trains of the faithless she was completely and utterly mad.
I visited the spot some weeks later. On this day it echoed, as if cold and empty. It was a large foreboding room in an abandoned bar, discarded police tape decorated the floor. Everything was cloaked in silence and ominousness hung bitterly in the air. Joey’s was the sole bar in town and it’s yet to be replaced. To most it’s quite inconceivable how one could ever recreate a place like Joey’s. It had spirit, history they say. You know the kind.
I remember closing my eyes, breathing in deeply, and you know I swear I could see her – dancing in the centre. And in my dreams the room hummed a deep red. Men whispered in the corners whilst girls draped themselves across the couches – tired; boys held hands anxiously beneath the bar and the guitarist strummed absently upon a small island stage. Just as it had always been.
And Jasmine was in the bare abandoned dance floor that glowed of red. Spinning and spinning and spinning. Her wounds on show for all. A grin teased her eyes, the corners of her lips. Yet to her it would have been the most natural thing in the world. Swimming in elucidating hallucinations, the most natural thing in the world. I recall I opened my eyes then and I was embraced by silence.
And there was a hell of a lot of it after it happened. Silence. The lifelessness that dripped from the echoes of the school hallways tasted sour. The epitome of plodding sordid crowds if I ever saw it. Clean too. Never have I had such easy work, barely a scuff in the corridor. I resented this wholeheartedly. Grief must be earned and they believed she was mad, how dare they be silent, how dare they be clean. And all for me! The most sour thing I’d ever tasted.
Yet it was the train ride home that could be, at times, the sourest of it all. I used to like to fill the time with thoughts about our tangoes with time, mine and hers, Tango Tango Tango in red salsa dresses and ravaging music, like a big fuck you to its writhing trickery. We’d dance so fast the speeding hands would break and we were the only ones that never tripped! But when that got sad, I’d concentrate really really hard out the window of the racing train.
And I swear, yes, I swear - I saw a purple lilac, peeping from under the tracks.