Yule-Tide Laziness

Well, this winter break has not been nearly as productive as I'd hoped. In my naivete I foolishly believed that I would be able to get some writing done while I'm at home in Georgia. Not so. Perhaps its the absence of routine and familiarity that's got me all constipated creatively, but I've grown pretty good at reassuring myself that it's alright. I'm just pulling a Hemmingway and letting things build in my unconscious for a little while before I get back to Colorado and let them explode on paper!

I've tried to compensate for my flagging creative output by doing a lot of reading and thinking, so to speak, about fiction. I'm very interested in manifestos at present, and in my spare time I've been compiling a list of what I deem to be fiction's 'responsibilities'. I'm not sure my attitude toward art and literature is really conducive to a manifesto--I've always been more interested in process than with form--but I'm trying. One thing I've discovered is that writing intelligent non-fiction is INFINITELY more difficult than writing fiction. Maybe it's because I haven't done it in so long; the process is all hazy and less intuitive. But once I finish my little manifesto I will be sure to post it here. Happy Holidays until then!

Biggish News

It's only obliquely related to my literary life, but as of 8:30 am on Dec. 23 I am engaged to be married. I'm really excited about it. Shannon and I are both at home right now in Newnan spending time with our families and trying to get used to this new way of looking at each other.

Fiancee. Fi-anc-ee. Crazy...

Just to establish a literary connection here (which, in this case, is admittedly a superficial one) in his book on writing--BookLife--Jeff Vandermeer has a section on relationships in which he talks a little bit about spouses and the kinds of interactions that are healthy between creative people. Now I'm paraphrasing from memory, but he says:

"It's good to have a partner who values writers, and who thinks that trying to be one is a good thing."

Check.

"Because of the focused and solitary nature of writing, writers tend to have a lot of extra energy and can be quite silly at times; it's good to have a partner capable of dealing with that."

Double check. If only artistic greatness was measured in silliness. It's one thing Shannon and I both have in spades...

No details on the wedding yet, but they're coming. Thanks to those who have expressed congratulations.

What is Story?

Story is an engine that combusts our sacred objects. Memories, beliefs, fears… Everything we hold and cherish in darkness, burns brightest there.

Story is a physical event. There are some things you cannot recognize from a distance. Some things you only know by touch, and, if you could see them clearly, would never pick up to begin with.

Zen Buddhists tell a Story of a caterpillar who suddenly becomes conscious of his many legs. What happens? He stumbles all over himself. The human mind is a fragile thing; it is a language machine that works best when you’re not looking.

Story is transparent. The best meta-fictions are still fictions: environments we enter into. And the best poetry is that which is still carried by the breath.

I am being contentious.

Story is contentious.

Story is greater than literature, it is greater than language, in the same way that a human is greater than flesh and bone. It is these things, but it is also something more that can only be grasped in darkness.

Storytelling is a carefully-constructed accident.

It is the Zen monk who wakes after thirteen hours of meditation and cannot say where he has been. It is the werewolf who rises in the morning in tattered clothes, his mouth all smeared with blood. How many hours did the monk spend staring at the wall, waiting? How many nights did the werewolf spend watching half-moons drift across the sky, until finally a full one arrived?

Story is alive. Story is life.

Checking In

Apologies for letting this blog run stagnant for a while. There are a couple of pieces I've posted below that are a little more recent and have made their rounds with the publishers... suffice it to say that I feel comfortable consigning them here for now.

I'm just finishing up my first semester in the MFA program here at the University of Colorado. The friends I've made have been great, and though there are aspects of the program that have not exactly lived up to my expectations so far, there are at least some writers whom I've been able to connect with and whose work I respect. Most of the stuff I've been working on is longer, and is still making its rounds publication-wise, so I have little to share here other than news.

The Man-Eaters of Tsavo, the novel I've been working on, sort of went stale during revision and just as I was on the brink of putting it away I've begun working with it in a way that is once-again exciting for me. That's probably what I'll be working on this winter break. I'm finding out that sometimes not-giving-a-shit gives you a degree of critical distance necessary to take risks you otherwise wouldn't. I originally wanted to have it done by...well, now... but clearly that's not going to happen. My revisions so far have been changing the text quite a bit without really bringing it any closer to completion, so now I'm hoping to finish it sometime this summer.

Lately my work has been exploring mostly The Terrible (i.e. terror) and The Fantastic (i.e. fantasy), and it's about time. Much of it has been terrible for a while, but in a different way. Rainer Maria Rilke said: "Beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror we're still just able to bear." That's something I'm trying to keep in mind these days.

Here's a link to my latest publication at Ghost Ocean Magazine (which was actually some time ago). Beautiful site. My story is in issue 1.

I will try to keep posting news and works of fiction here. I'm finding it tough to balance it all right now, but that is not an excuse. Just a plea for patience! Thanks to those of you who still check in from time to time.

Story: A Place to Sleep

It’s been a long time since they slept in each other’s arms, but he wakes at night with her clawing against his chest. It is their first in the new bed. “What’s wrong?” he asks. She murmurs something and he rubs the back of her neck. Shhhh he says softly, until she is awake enough to speak.

The dream is of him dying—not once, but twice. She can’t remember how it happened the first time, only waking in a sweat and pacing at the foot of the bed, questioning whether or not she should wake him. She stands beside the bed and shakes him by the shoulder, although he doesn’t respond. She shakes him with two hands, but still he does not answer. She feels alone in the room. She tries to scream but all that comes out is a weak stream of air. She climbs back into bed still screaming, unable to control her limbs, and lays her head on her pillow. Her legs grow numb, then her arms. She knows she is dying, and then she wakes.

“I thought that people weren’t supposed to die in their dreams,” he says, lying beside her in the dark. He listens with his eyes closed, and the way she describes it, he feels almost as if it were his dream.

“Maybe I didn’t,” she suggests. “Maybe I woke up just before.”

They go back to sleep and when they wake the next morning he is squeezing her. She asks what’s the matter. He says he can’t remember.

She has an interview today, and he sits drinking coffee all morning on their balcony, waiting for her to return. The set of patio chairs is their only furniture besides the bed, and now they cannot sleep. She returns at noon and says they’ve invited her to a second interview on Monday. They have the weekend to themselves.

At night they lie awake. Most recently, he’s died and gone to hell. She cut her wrists to follow, but landed in heaven instead.

“You’re not allowed to do that,” he insists. Something is wrong with her dreams. He gets up and fetches her a glass of water from the kitchen. She takes a sip and asks what he was dreaming about, but again he doesn’t remember.

Saturday and Sunday pass with him in the apartment. She wants to go to the farmer’s market. She wants to try the church. He does not want to go to either of these places and does not want her to go either. He stays home and draws the blinds, wishes the walls were thicker, that there were more padlocks on the door. He does not want Monday to come, but Monday does come, and she silences her alarm clock without waking him. She has slept through the night. This is a good sign. She kisses him on the forehead before dressing.

At noon she returns with a bottle of Andre and a smile, searching for him on the balcony although he isn’t there. She pours them both mimosas, and takes them into the bedroom where he is as she left him. She sits his drink on the nightstand and tries to wake him. He does not respond. She sits her own drink down, and shakes him with both hands, but he just frowns into his pillow. She begins to panic and remembers the dream from several nights ago. She wonders if she is dreaming now. She lies down behind him and wraps her arms around his torso, shuts her eyes and recites a prayer to herself, trying to remember what she dreamed of last night. She cannot. Last night she slept as soundly as a stone, and no matter how hard she tries now, sleep will not find her.

2 Stories I Wrote For Halloween

Dust to Dust

The plastic jack-o-lantern rests on its side, propped against a tombstone and grinning into the ground. Candy is pooled around it in the dirt, and she lies nearby on a damp plot of earth where the ground was struck but the grave never dug. The boys search for her among the stones.

Yoohoo. Come out wherever you are.

She closes her eyes and rocks from side to side, upending the dirt with her shoulders and shifting deeper with each movement. Worms writhe on top of her as the clumps of dirt break apart; centipedes, beetles, and slugs. The boys still are calling and she tries to remain still. A spider crawls along her forearm, eight points of contact. Her hairs stand on end. She can feel each of its legs on her skin—not quite a caress—and the beetles burrow in between her and the ground. Worms twist like curled leaves in the wind.

Her senses rise into her pores, like an electric current on top of water. Her body is a city, a sanctuary, giving shelter to the insects whispering into her flesh, filling it with a language none but her can understand.

Where are you sweetheart? I just want a treat.

Her fingers clutch at the earth by her sides. She feels along each slope and between her legs, at last grasps a pine cone and holds it against the seam of her pants. It pricks her hands. She twists the pine cone against her like a pestle—she is the mortar—and can feel her ashes mixing with the mud. The boys’ voices recede while she grinds it against her. Her mouth is open. She is sand. She is sugar. She disappears.


Hunger

The monster lives in a mansion outside of town, past forests of oak and juniper with high branches, so that your headlights shine a long way before being swallowed in darkness. You arrive at a clearing and the great shadow comes into focus above a steel archway, tarnished brick turrets piercing the sky and black windows flushing from inside.

When you were a girl, your parents would warn you to eat your greens, otherwise he’d come out of the woods and get you. This wasn’t true, but you ate them anyway. You had not met him. All you knew was that he didn’t have a mouth, and who knew what kinds of behavior would offend a creature like that?

Dinner guests arrive around twilight, and the host greets you at the door dressed in an impeccable dinner jacket. His skin is brown and spotty. His eyes are black. He has light blonde hair that is nearly invisible at the temples, and where his mouth should be, there is only a glossy plane of flesh, stretched tight as though there might be a mouth beneath it, though it is sewn up in skin.

You offer him your cheek and he brushes it accordingly with his own. He is a perfect gentleman, although he would not hesitate to swallow you whole if he were able. He is a monster, after all. You know this. When you go to the zoo you admire the tigers, but you don’t have any illusions about their nature. Their nature is what you admire. There is something about being eaten, isn’t there? Something about your blood on someone else’s lips that is… seductive. Not that that’s a possibility here. You pause on the threshold with your hand in his and concentrate on where his claws rest against your wrists, your blood vessels expanding beneath his touch.

Inside the light is scarce. Dark chestnut columns rise into a vaulted arch. The Persian carpet feels like moss underfoot. There’s a dinette table with black, liquorice-flavored cocktails on it, and you take one before entering the dining room where the other guests are mingling. The monster lives alone and prepares everything himself. This impresses the housewives.

“Have you heard about any more animals being discovered?” Mrs. Winston asks. “You know… drained?”

“Two last week.”

“My word! What do you suppose he does with it? The blood, I mean. It’s not as though he can eat it.”

“I don’t know. Bathes in it maybe?”

Mrs. Winston draws up in approbation. “Well good for him, I say. One’s got to cut loose every now and then, otherwise what’s the point?”

You are aware of the host’s presence as he shifts between groups. When he is close you talk of music—he is an accomplished pianist, after all—though when he is not you occupy yourself listening to rumors of his parentage. Some say he was spawned by a coven of witches, others that he’s the offspring of a wolf and earthworm. This last possibility intrigues you, although you know better than to take any of it seriously.

The women all wear rouge and low-cut blouses that cling to their flanks like saran wrap over prime rib. You’ve got on a sequined little number the others think is overdoing it—after all, you’ve got to go back to town at some point—but you don’t care. It’s him you are interested in. You can feel his black eyes stealing glances at your hips and inside your thighs. He does not have a mouth, but if he did you don’t mind fancying it’s you he would covet first.

You take your seat at the dinner table. There are places set for more than thirty, and the couples sit across from one another, alternating men and women. In the center is a row of sterling platters that the host unveils one by one. The menu is an array of forest creatures, skinned and broiled, braised in blood and infused with exotic spices and herbs. Certain morsels like the deer are a tad bit chewy, although the rabbit is succulent and delicious, tender like the inside of one’s mouth. There is another dish too, one you can’t identify, but which is the most wonderful of all. Your palette hums when you take a bite, as though an electric current were passing through it. It has been ages since the last gathering. You can hardly remember the gentleman’s name.

The host sits at the head of the table, elbows resting on either side of an empty plate, and watches the conversations go on around him. For dessert he distributes plates of stewed berries and homemade ice cream, smoked chicory coffee in silver tins.

The ladies eat until identical quarter-portions are left on each of their plates, and the men all recline in their seats from over eating, then follow the host into the drawing room. It is dark there. Long oak bookshelves line each of the walls along with faded portraits whom none can identify. The room is lit by a single set of candles positioned behind the great piano. You gather around in chairs and on stools, and the host arranges a score by Schöenberg on the stand. You are quiet, and resent even the sound of your breath. His spotty fingers rest against the keys and he remains there for a moment, head bowed, taking several deep breaths before he compresses the keys, commences with the melody, the complex descent into minor key. You listen to it with your eyes closed. The music is beautiful. He closes his eyes too and only opens them to glance at the music, and to turn the page when it is necessary.

His playing stirs something inside of you and eventually your eyes open. The guests exchange glances with one another and feel a tension gathering in their bodies. They stand and undress, hanging their clothes on the backs of chairs while the host continues to play, his eyes shut, hammering the keys as if he’s trying to convince himself that you’re still listening. You are listening, but you undress as well, spot a gentleman nearby and grab him by the arms, hold him between your legs and feel his body inside of you. It makes your organs shiver; your blood, your bones, your synapses. You are a flower waiting to bloom. You turn your head and watch the host, listening and regretting that others are not also listening, but then, it is like this every time. You permit yourself to enjoy the gentleman on top of you, knowing that what must happen will happen either way.

The music stops. The host is still for a moment. His chest heaves and he is slow to stand. He gathers the sheets of music and places them inside the piano bench, before facing into the room. The guests all freeze. The man on top of you withdraws, and watches, waiting to find out who it will be. The host walks in between couples, studying each, and your eyes follow after him, willing him to turn and face you. Your organs cry out, your blood is a chorus of longing. His black eyes find you out, and once more you can feel them roving over your hips, your thighs and bottom; all the tender bits. They other guests eye you too, also with hunger. They know a decision has been made.

He strides across the room and stands above you. You take hold of his claw and rise, trying to restrain your excitement. You grin into the carpet and allow yourself to be escorted into the center of the room, where the guests have cleared a space around a sheet of plastic. Their faces are unblinking. They are jealous and happy for you at once. The host stands before you and you meet his eyes, can see that his face is weary. For a moment you’re afraid he will change his mind, but he does not. He steps back. His claws stiffen. You lift your head and turn your palms toward the ceiling, feel your entire body pulsing with light. Air rushes into your stomach and you can feel the guests eyes upon you as a moment of blistering heat takes hold, and your body comes apart. The light escapes and what’s left is consigned to the following month’s menu.

We inch closer in an effort to be near. Our lips are wet, but the host stands still. His face is stern. It is time for us to leave, but we will see you again next month, briefly, one last time.