blondie vs darky 1 & 2

1.

When he sees you he acts as though he has never seen you before, you with whom he spent at least a thousand nights, even if he never wanted you on that bare floor-bound mattress of his, even if in fact it was merely accident that you were there and you both unconsciously tried not to touch each other (you less than he, a slide of armskin against the lightly-haired hollow of his back would have been acceptable for example), or perhaps consciously, though each of you for different reasons, he perhaps because of loathing or because of emotional damage, you have this much sympathy for him, he may be damaged, he may have been crushed or bent when he was a tender young shoot, there is often a peculiar look in his eye, especially when he regards you or rather does not regard you but fixes on a spot just past you on the wall or counter or windowpane or a book. He is tall, lanky, as perpetually disheveled as his bed, in which you often wake up finding the single sheet (patterned oddly with screen prints of gaily-calligraphed vegetables) wrapped tightly around your leg, your face abraded by the polyester mesh of the mattress so that you have a raspberryish chafing on one white cheek through most days, under your gray sleepless eyes; nevertheless you would not change this dishevelment of his, though you are naturally one who would require neatness at the least of any good friend, at the very least, care of appearance, hypocritical of yourself perhaps for your own appearance is wan you know, your single black dress is shoulder-bleached from time under the sun, and there is also a white nickel-sized stain of birdshit that did not wash out you let it stay there so long, still you keep your dark hair pulled down tight on each side, you do not own a comb but your palm saliva-wettened like a cat’s will slick down the flyaway hairs, and your part is an overly white rut in your dark hair, carved meticulously with a twig or coffee-stirrer, whatever is at hand; so that your appearance is bizarrely neat perhaps, nothing that radiates health or style but neat at least, maybe because you are uncertain as to any other criteria by which to judge your own appearance and therefore others’, for the absence of judgment itself makes you crazy, and if you are uncertain as to whether your judgment is in any way valuable, that in itself does not diminish the pleasure you get from rendering a firm, final judgment, reassuring as a tuffet at fireside.


2. (unrevised)

You find yourself often wishing you did not care for him and are not even certain that you do care for him, it may be that you do not for you are not familiar with caring, you have never found space for caring in your busy life, or rather you have cared for many people before, and deeply, but all of it crumbled, you don’t remember names, faces either, you do remember faces but you cannot be certain which person was which and whether they were in fact lovers or perhaps a plumber who came once to remove hair clogs from the sink at whoever’s apartment you were then squatting in, with or without them knowing (you do not remember a plumber but that does not mean there wasn’t one), , do not remember if they were a plumber or a face that fascinated you on the street one evening in central park or one with whom you shared a bed as with this man of the moment who will remain nameless for the moment because you do prefer things nameless for the moment it is more convenient, efficient, efficient to what end you are not sure, yet there is a relief in efficiency; it also may be of course you do not know his name, perhaps that was overlooked and you are far past that now, embarrassing to ask, unnecessary too. perhaps it is easier to blend his face in with the others and again to forget (is he lover or brother or friend, each n intriguing possibility, as with these others you have cared for, already you can’t remember), though perhaps you did not care for any of these past figures, perhaps it was something else you had with them, something other than love.