The Twilight of the Bums (16 page)

Those bits of cloth in the water, those bikinis floating in the surf like deflated balloons, in the context of the situation, have symbolic content complicated and yet somehow clearly decipherable.

It is easy to understand that sex has sped away on the cigarette power boat and left the old geezers in its wake futilely dueling, violence being the only thing left to them.

As such the old geezers may have stumbled into a great poetic moment if not a great poem.

It's New Year's Eve. No need to specify which year is coming to an end and which will begin at midnight, that is unimportant, what counts is that the bums are preparing (without even consulting each other) their lists of New Year's resolutions.

Bum One's list reads as follows:

No more Baked Alaska

No more Beef Wellington

No more Chocolate Dredge Strawberries

No more Three Dip Banana Split with Hot Fudge

No more Ice Cream Sundae with Extra Nuts & Cherry

No more Bourbon No more Bonbon

Bum Two's list reads this way:

No more wishing I were in Paris

Ah Paris Paris

drinking a bottle of Perrier

Ah Paris Paris

smoking Gauloises

Ah Paris Paris

sitting at the terrace of a café

Ah Paris Paris

on the Champs Elysées

Ah Paree Paree

The bums have decided that before they change tense, before they enter the void of non-being, they would like to experience one last great adventure -- to go out into the world and gain ultimate power, if not total omnipotence.

And so Bum One proclaims that for him the great adventure would be to sit on the Papal Throne in the Vatican and rule over the millions and millions of Catholics in the world.

Bum Two bursts into laughter, I can't believe this, you would be willing to give up sex, or even sex fantasies, just to be Pope? You're kidding.

You have a point there, says Bum One, forget the Pope.

I have already, says Bum Two still laughing.

What about you, what would you like to be? asks Bum One.

A king, I would like to be a king, replies Bum Two. An emperor even, a conqueror like Alexander the Great. Yes, I would like to be as powerful, as omnipotent, as Alexander the Great who conquered all of Capristan and there married the beautiful Roxanne and accumulated so much gold and precious stones that when he decided to return to his homeland because he was homesick and wanted to see his mama, he could only carry with him 0.5% of that rich stuff. Yes, I would like to conquer an empire.

I'll go with you! exclaims Bum One, and maybe along the way I too can conquer a little kingdom for myself. Come on, let's get started immediately. On to Capristan!

Dear Readers, we are sorry not to be able to report at this time the progress of our two bums. Since they set out for their great adventure, more than three months ago, we have not received any communications from them. But rest assured that as soon as we hear from them, we will report to you as faithfully as we can all the details of their great adventure. Meanwhile, if you don't mind, continue to do whatever you do when you are not listening to us.

One day (here we go again dear readers) Bum Two (whomever) was telling Bum One a story
my life began
and for some unusual reason the latter
among empty skins
was actually listening … a very unusual thing indeed, actually listening to the story
and dusty hats
that Two was narrating. Actively listening rather than interrupting, laughing, kibitzing, stopping, turning away
while sucking pieces of stolen sugar
eating a cold waffle, and in general co-creating intersubjectively the community language experience
outside the moon
of the narrativity. It was, to be sure,
tiptoed across the roof
, not much of a story. Indeed, and in fact, if you asked Bum One about it now … a mere few hours after the telling
to denounce the beginning of my excessiveness
, he would in all likelihood not be able to recover a shred of it, nary a syllable would have survived the telling … although
but I slipped on the twelfth step
, to be sure, he may in this disremembering be exhibiting rather more of a short-term aphasia
and fell
, an age-appropriate disability, than creating an interpretation of the text. (Hey, this is muddy stuff
and all the doors
, eh readers, bet you wish you had a tissue, and some soap.) We mean here,
opened dumb eyes
, meaning no disrespect to Bum Two, that the story was lost on Bum One not because of its innocuousness and banality, but because
to stare at my nakedness
the old guy's motherboard is cracked. (What?)