Kyle Muntz - Voices

Blooming blooming I spotted a desert rose, calamitous. It was the kind that shouldn't be growing in the desert, the beautiful kind. It's petals were dark, pure redness, an elegant blooming, sprouting defiantly here where not even the strongest flowers grew, still

swaying in the wind, subtly,

just so that

I took

not

ice

of

it

the

st

e

m

glistening with the unmistakable shadings of weaponry. Sharp, shadowy thorns, acting always in defense of beauty, with prickling tips all along a path leading down to the

r o o t s

(Perfect beauty in a desert rose. Pristine petals clandestine

destiny)

::::::::::::::::::::

A great beast

rose out of the sea. It had scaled skin, big claws, and inconceivably large teeth. It broke

the surface with a wave, thrashing out: and a roar,

over

arching,

that most probably could be heard all throughout the city. Taller than a

building, it scraped the sky.

If

I were attempting to be

(contrite)

allusive, I would say it had multiple heads, red skin, three numbers etched on its forehead, a body composed of many

different animals, a clear voice that

could speak

a large #

of human languages, but that wasn't true. From this distance, despite

contradiction, it could most probably only

talk to snakes,

and it was barely

thirty

feet tall.

::::::::::::::::::::

When I got to the top of the mountain, a b

e

a

m

of light came to me, and I looked down at

the whole anonymous world, possibly asleep. In the distance the

carnal city, glistening next to the sea,

and the

emptiness

of the desert, in a warm dry cocoon. I relaxed, took

a deep

breath,

and looked

towards

the moon.

There he was, and he looked just like me. He had my face, my arms, legs, my eyes and lips, hair follicles falling exactly the same, that sweep of the brow, turn of the shoulder, stance, shift in the pelvis, pockets, a fondness for color, lapse, inclination to blinking. He stood on the opposite side of a line dividing me from me. He blinked. He shuffled. In an attempt to forgo similitude (impossible), I restrained myself.

I thought of taking a step forward. Dark purple arrows shot through the sky, sweeping in clouds, taking prisoners. Soldiers leered prismatic, inner skeletal structure of steel, blueprints, marks of construction, engravings of ownership. He did not own me. He looked like me but he wasn't me. He knew my secrets, from outside, cause and inter-action, a vilified shadow, but he wasn't.

Especial, a barrier grew between us, self and separation, my ghost. Surely he couldn't question this. And did I want him back, could I wonder, to think of absorbing. Metaphorically, though not in appearance, he had only one eye, and he kept secrets. His posture was not his own. The bastard had taken it upon himself to copy my shoes.

Could he, should he, would he know: the liar that is me, a lie. I'm not a fighter, and I'm not any good at keeping secrets. My games, my poetry, my language. No one listens to artist, not the artist himself; benumbing, I stuck, bleeding eye to eye to flaming banner, unable-no, not willing to undertake filial significance. All my life I'd been too good at being something like a person. To capture. What voracious weakness I. The keeping. No thought of (color). Not a glimpse of humanity.

To be an artifice one lie making voices and voice. I stumbled. Again. Stumble and choke. Lines of vivid color, distinguishing image and significance. A fondness for hearing myself speak: I like. Playing games- with: words. But; no(the liar) can never paint pictures enough. Shell of the shell, wanting for half a goddamn fucking name. Loss- time taking; no way(I've forgotten[how to speak]). Maybe in the past I'd fallen to the center of the universe. My disembodiment and my sense of the prophet. Death dying a whole unreal multitudinous ghost of voice.

::::::::::::::::::::

A great beast came roaring from the depths of the sea. Not to say I'm repeating myself, but the reptilian was clear in it, separating an element from the aqueous. Stepping heavily, on an indeterminate number of legs, it overturned ancient sand on the beach, into the canal, going against the water. It made its way to the bridge (jutting stone steal connecting land to land shit and flat surfaces cars emptiness and a big long row of yellow lines), and dropping, destroyed it: a shower of rock, falling into the water, crush and crash, this to destruction. Climbing outside, it sunk into buildings, destroying them; with some strange little panic for the virtual absence; no screaming, no blood streaming flesh in the bay. Underplaying destruction, it shore through a million dollars worth of glass, upturning cars, destroying the solidity of height, permanence and strength, petroleum syllables lining streets that ought to do a better job defending themselves. It roared. I realized it looked different from changing angles, growing heads, sprouting flaming tentacles, occasionally breathing a full flaring stream of fire, pure shining beams of plasma, bathing the world in acrid evening glows. Reaping death in the autumnal sun, a fanning swirl of leaves, debris and stuff all arching to some glutinous rainbow, it tore. Anthropomorphic claws. I thought of getting closer. Way back on the beach, watching it go, I though of clapping, as it put on quite the show.

Isn't it strange…

Sure

the hybrid crawling. It might be some ancient beast from a crevice way down in

the sea, a genetic experiment or an alien baby taking inverted vengeance to defend the virginity of the sky. Dust turned to flame

and burned.

::::::::::::::::::::

up,

*Looking ^

I took in

the sight *

* of our

sacred *

glow

holy mother, *

ing gloriously

pale quiet reflecting *

* in the center of the sky

a holy moon

blazing *

in stars, the perfection of

the night sky.

I would be going there soon, I would. From the top of a high

mountain: icy white beams shooting straight

metaphysical

presence the glory of release.

Down

below in the sickness of city, the world was nothing but plague, and I didn't have to complexion to make a home in

the valley

or starve all night in poor places, fearing sickness. So transcendence absconded me,

freeing the body, up to whatever grove of richness on the surface of the moon.

I was going there,

I could.

Senseless as the gesture might be, I was sick

of climbing

high

mountains.

::::::::::::::::::::

I met her atop a building. For miles a broken city spat plumes of fire, lighting vivid reflections of the sky, paths still gleaming in sea. We stood at an equal distance from each other, with the wind in our hair. I wanted to see her, couldn't stand to say goodbye: a problem. All my life I've never been good at letting go of things; not myself, not my trace in others. Drops of blood, from my arm and legs, beaded and fell. I stumbled.

"Do you really have to go?"

She nodded.

Do you really…

standing Munch shadows, solid color and a vague absence of shape. In her eyes

reflecting the embers of this goddamn burning city: a sacrifice to whatever unnamed, unnoticed gods. Our capitalist fingers; never. Breath caught in my throat a pained tears of choking.

"Don't go," I said. "You can't."

She closed her eyes, long lashes touching together, fine fine darkness, held both arms to her chest. From here, intersecting, I could make out the mountains, the sea, the desert and the ruins of the city, smoldering now in gray folding tendrils to the tops and past every building, replacing clouds in the sky. If this were to be poetic, then fell a fine dusting of rain, but no rain came.