Dorthe Nors - So Much for That Winter

Minna has lain down on the couch.

Minna looks forward:

The prospect’s hazy.

Minna looks backward:

Time has passed.

Minna recalls the Bay of Aarhus.

Minna recalls Dad:

Dad and Minna hike through Marselisborg Forest.

Dad and Minna hike down to Ballehage Beach.

Dad and Minna sniff the anemones.

Dad and Minna change into their bathing suits.

Dad and Minna position themselves on the pier.

Dad and Minna inhale the salt.

The wind’s taken hold of Dad’s hair.

The wind whips around Minna’s ditto.

Dad and Minna stand with their arms extended.

Dad’s armpits hairy.

Minna’s bathing suit with balloon effect.

Dad’s finger toward the horizon: Helgenæs!

Minna takes a running jump.

Minna shoots out into the bay.

Dad’s a water bomb.

Dad and Minna dive.

Dad and Minna splash each other.

Dad and Minna can do anything, but

Minna grew up.

Minna had to bathe alone.

Minna hiked through Marselisborg Forest.

Minna wanted to hike down to Ballehage, but

Minna met a roe deer.

The deer stood on a bluff.

The deer stood stock-still and stared at Minna.

Minna stood stock-still and stared at the deer.

The deer was a creature of the deep forest.

The deer was mild and moist of gaze.

Minna was mild and moist of gaze.

The deer’s legs like stalks.

The deer’s fur in the sun.

Minna’s hair in the wind.

The forest was empty when the deer departed.

Minna looked across the bay.

Minna inhaled the salt.

Minna gazed at the pier.

Minna picked mushrooms from half-rotted stumps.

Minna threw her arms around a beech tree.

Love ought to reassert itself.

Loss ought to do something, but

Loss and love are connected, Minna thinks.

Minna lies in Amager.

Minna turns on her side.

Love presupposes loss.

Minna deeply misses Lars.

The pain’s connected to hope.

Hope is light green.

Hope is a roe deer on a bluff.

Someone has got to love, thinks Minna.

Someone’s got to fight.

Minna’s got a lot to fight.

Lars has deleted her.

Minna is no longer friends with Lars.

Lars has spoken.

Minna’s been expunged.

Lars has disappeared from her wall, but

Minna can see Lars everywhere.

Lars hangs out with the others.

Lars invites people for beer.

That’s awful enough.

This is worse:

Lars comments on everything Linda Lund says.

Linda Lund also attended the conservatory.

Minna was good at piano.

Linda was good at guitar, but

Linda’s better suited to the music industry.

Minna can screw a reporter without getting her picture in the paper.

Linda Lund just has to cross the street.

Linda’s sex appeal is undeniable.

Minna can feel Linda’s sex in everything.

Sex is power.

Sex is currency.

Linda is loaded.

The world’s a stage.

The stage is Linda’s.

No one may block the view of Linda.

Minna knows that.

Minna and Linda run into each other now and then.

Minna still has scars from the last time.

Minna stood there with her score.

Minna was making for the stage.

Minna was supposed to perform just like the others, but

Minna ran into Linda in the wings.

Linda pulled out a mental machete.

Linda slashed a couple times.

Linda said, That dress will blend into the curtain.

Linda said, What’s your name again?

Minna almost couldn’t perform afterward.

Lars is in for it.

Lars congratulates Linda on her birthday.

Linda replies, Thanks for last night, kiss kiss.

Lars writes, Nice!

Linda says, It certainly was.

Lars says, Rock on, babe!

Linda’s a cannonball in jacket and skirt.

Lars is a hypnotized reporter.

Minna sits and gasps.

Karin sits on the grill of her 4x4.

Karin sits and smiles on her 4x4.

Minna unfriends vehicle and Karin both.

Minna unfriends Linda Lund too.

Minna doesn’t want to be an unwilling witness!

Minna doesn’t want her nose rubbed in the piss.

Minna unfriends another two people.

Minna unfriends more.

Minna unfriends Britta.

Britta’s an old schoolmate.

Britta’s written,

Britta’s put the pork loin on the Weber.

Minna can no longer leave well enough alone, but

The unfriendings provide no relief.

Minna’s been unfriended herself.

The pain of being unfriended is unbearable.

Minna misses Lars.

Lars has inflicted a trauma.

Minna’s in love with someone who’s traumatized her.

Minna figures that makes her a masochist.

Minna doesn’t want to be a masochist.

Minna wants to be a human being, but

Minna’s expunged.

It hurts so much, Minna whispers.

Minna goes in the shower.

Minna lets the water run, and then she stands there:

Minna with her lips turned toward the tiles.

Minna with blood on her hands.

Minna with soap in her eyes.

Minna with no roe deer.

The ringmaster of a flea circus lets the artists suck his blood.

Bergman strokes Minna on the cheek.

A daydreamer isn’t an artist anywhere but in his dreams.

Bergman reaches for the buttermilk.

Bergman has indigestion.

Minna has a burnt taste in her mouth.

Bergman whispers, I contain too much humanity.

The days are long, large, light.

They’re as substantial as cows, as some sort of bloody big animal.

Minna snuggles up to Bergman.

Dad strokes Minna’s cheek.

Dad settles himself on his rock.

Dad understands.

Dad isn’t scared.

Minna’s read Bergman for a couple days.

Minna’s tired of lying in bed.

Minna checks her email.

Minna’s gotten a lot of email.

Mom and Jette have written.

Elisabeth’s written, and look here:

Karin’s written.

That was expected.

Minna doesn’t know if she’ll read Karin’s missive.

The street clatters with bikes and cars.

The sun’s risen over Amager Strandpark.

Baresso’s opened.

The coffees to go are warming palms.

The coffees to go are out walking.

The cell phones, the blankies, the coffees to go.

People trickle toward City Hall Square.

People resemble shoals of shiny herring.

People press on with sand and sleep in their eyes.

Minna eats a cracker.

Karin’s missive awaits.

Karin wants to be nasty.

Karin wants to upset her applecart, but

Minna’s cart has no apples.

The damage has been done.

Lars has disappeared.

Linda’s getting laid.

Karin has a dog.

Karin takes walks with her dog on the beach.

The dog’ll fetch a stick for Karin.

The dog whips back and forth.

Karin throws farther and farther.

The dog doesn’t hold back.

Karin casts the stick in the ocean.

The dog throws itself in.

Karin keeps casting the stick.

The dog keeps bounding.

It could continue this way forever, but

Minna’s got to get to it.

Minna reads:

Karin’s discovered that she’s been unfriended.