James Pate - The Fassbinder Diaries

Some of those noises are human.

Some are thought to have once been human.

But they could have been human long ago.

Pig Radio itself reveals nothing.

Pig Radio thinks of something else entirely.

The paradox of war is both here and there.

Or rather, the noises are Pig Radio entirely.

If only the singular pig could once regard the plural.

If only a plurality of pigs would withstand.

I’ve been to pig parties as silent as redder hours.

I’ve seen the pink masks and the thick masks.

I’ve touched the eyeholes and the mouthholes.

I’ve been to pig parties with their spew of hours.

The taste of the pig is counter to the spew of pig.

And the night of pig chews the day of the pig.

And the day of pig chews the night of the pig.

Pig Radio with its singular regard for the thicker kisses.

Pig Night with its infinite regard for the hours.

A pig can vibrate upon birth.

A pig can thicken upon birth.

A pig can gnaw through upon birth.

A pig can drain exclusively upon birth.

A pig can attend the pig party.

But not all parties involve the pig.

When I listen to pigs I think of pig angels.

Angels with pink meaty wings.

Wings and the most translucent of bones.

The night of the pig is there from the first day.

The day of the pig is there from the first day.

But Pig Radio is there before the first day.

Pig Radio is there after the last day.

Pig Radio, with its subtle noises.

Pig Radio, with its non-subtle noise.

The noise in the pig. The pig in the noise.

The time for pig time.

The end of the start of pig time.

The time of the pig thorn.

The mouth drooling in the heart of the pig thorns.

The heart drooling in the shape of the pig.

The hour of the pig light. The arson in the pig dark.

The noise of the pig in the human head.

The noise of the human in the pig head.

The pig fever in the human brain.

The pig light in the human eye.

The pig eye in the dark staring.

The lemon of the pig. The glory and run-off of the pig.

The pig wall alone on the human beach.

The human sand pink and the pig wall burnt.

The human hand scurrying in the pig night.

The mouth drooling in a human night.

The hour of the pig hour.

The hour of the blood drool.

The hour of the pig drool slipping from the light into the dark.

The human spew in the pig head.

The human dark in the pig light.

The peeled lemon of the pig. The hour of the pig lemon.

The crown of pig thorns on the pink sand.

The beach light bright in the pig eye.

I.

But the problem was something else entirely. So everyone suggested. I was broke and took the café job. The place had been called ___ for many years but it had been bought by two elderly and craven and sunburned hippies and turned into ___. Its walls were blue. Its two sofas were crimson. Its noise registered as a ceaseless hum. Its windows bright even on rainy days. I hated and actually kind of despised the entire customer service aspect of the job, the taking of orders and the making of coffee, even though I love coffee, even though I continue to love coffee despite my eventual aversion to it that balmy and rainy summer, both the taste and the smell, the taste and smell of coffee, and even the grounds, the black dense coffee grounds, their look of black dense earth, denser and blacker than the blackest and densest of earth. And the rain that summer wandered in and wandered in. The rain smell. The rain hum. The blue and ever dense hum of summer rain. The clattering across the roof and the clattering across the windows. A noise heard from both ends of a film, the beginning as well as the end, two anonymous sounds shifting imperceptibly toward one another.

II.

But the problem was something else entirely. So everyone suggested at the time. The café had white chairs and these white ceiling fans and some days I’d come in stoned and stare at those fans and it was like they were hypnotizing me, stretching the afternoons out until you could almost hear them snap. Ever so gently and gingerly snap. Most days weren’t so bad. Most days weren’t what I would call awful. Most days I drank more and more espresso and returned to my apartment so wired the blood in my head was sizzling. Crackling. A crackling that reminded me of radio static, a static through which I might hear a stranger’s voice, a static through which I might see a red light flashing in the sonic distance.

III.

But the problem was something else entirely. So everyone at the time suggested. The whole world rotting and the President stupid and wars and wars and that summer hot and glaring. Anger followed by wistfulness followed by erotic expectations followed by a chilly June haze followed by a Monday of alternating storm-light. I ever so gingerly and I ever so gently. My life a film nobody including myself wanted to cast. Most days stretched and sizzled. A café with blue walls in which rain was falling. The weather ever more clattering and dense.

I’d talk to my friend Maria. I’d talk on the phone to my friend Maria. I’d ask my friend Maria about the Thai or Iranian or Russian films she’d seen the night before. I’d ask my friend Maria about lifeless bars she’d gone to recently or the relentless songs she’d heard. My friend Maria was my best friend that very lengthy and balmy and rainy and unexpected and unnerving and hirsute summer. My friend Maria was like an eclipse. My friend Maria could have been said to be at least one eclipse. My friend Maria as that moment in a film where the soundtrack includes nothing but hedges blowing and distant traffic. My friend Maria as the furthest echo. My friend Maria wore blue summer dresses and white summer dresses and orange summer dresses and black summer dresses and a black summer dress with a few pink ribbons and an orange summer dress with a creamy lacy collar. My friend Maria wore black boots and red sneakers and white sneakers but never sandals not even on the hottest and longest and most unnerving of days. My friend Maria had orange summer dresses and a way of holding a cigarette that continued to. My friend

Maria telling me that in the convergence of the lifeless and relentless many passions would. My friend Maria participated in at least one of the summer eclipses. The tongue dreams my friend Maria alluded to. The song my friend Maria ended up writing near the closing credits. My friend Maria said no not right now maybe in the fall because of. My friend Maria said head games come in all sorts of, all kinds of. My friend Maria in the black spot of an eclipse. In the blank second of an opposing hour. In the invisible corner of an otherwise rain. The hirsute and unnerving summer my friend Maria had heard rumors of. The summer rain in which my friend Maria will have left her softer sneakers.

We would drink and argue and smoke up and argue and argue and smoke up and orange thoughts with lemon smears would occur concurrently and crimson weather with feathered edges and the redder angels without noise and once she made pork chops in a gigantic heavy and weathered pan and once around 3:43 am and once I heard You aren’t even in the running said possibly outside the window possibly on TV and once made a stir-fry and drank icy mint juleps and we would smoke up and argue but we didn’t employ overly personal or demeaning or stereotypical or cheaply advantageous insults and the redder angels without their conventional fur and the redder weather without noise and drink and smoke up and watch feverish television roiling with its fevered noise and a few wonderful and feverish films and while pork chops browned and while chicken sizzled and while drinks were poured and while ice melted and dripped down our legs and concurrently the orange and redder thoughts and argue and argue and the terrible hours and the fevered hours and the reddest expanse of the noisy angels during the more lemony hours and the chicken on the chopping board and several pieces and the ground meat she sizzled in the gigantic heavy pan and pink to gray and gray to brown and around 3:43 am and argue and argue and naked and overly personal.