The Twilight of the Bums (9 page)

What, inquires Boy 1 of Boy 2, does the rattle-snake approve? Then they both chant the answer to the question, which we now invite you also, dear reader, to sing along with them:
The rattlesnake approves of himself without any reservations
.

Where is this literary effort going, where is Wislawa Szymborska? Why doesn't she answer her telephone? Where are you Wislawa, dear? Why won't you reveal yourself and come dine with the old rattlers, whose tails knock so hollowly in such unreserved approval.

What to do, where to go, how to proceed, what surface other than the poem to inhabit. The boys order more boiled potatoes and another round of vodka (yes, beloved reader, yes indeed) and start chanting another Wislawa line:
We see here an instance of bad proportions, we see here an instance of bad proportions
.

Bum One[alias Um]:

Is it clear to you my dear Laut that our friendship is the only light & joy in this miserable life of mine? That the rest is gloom, despair, anguish, rejection, silence, repulse, disgust, hammering anger, wretched shunning, unchecked desperation, aggressive paranoia, psychotic anxiety, reactive depression; that except for our friendship, I am lost in the hills and valleys of neurotic anguish which I helplessly manage by mirroring; that I am located exactly in the place uttered by the mud of nothingness.

Bum Two [alias Laut]:

You know Um sometimes you really get on my nerves, I am fed up with all your gloom, despair, anguish, rejection, silence, repulse, disgust, hammering anger, wretched shunning, unchecked desperation, aggressive paranoia, psychotic anxiety, reactive depression, and all the rest. Do you ever consider that I too feel exactly the same as you do, and if it were not for our … ah what's the use of explaining it to you. Forget it. Come on, let's go get a beer somewhere.

The Bums have decided to become
artiste-peintres
, and so they go to Paris, rent an artist studio in Montparnasse, put on artist smocks and bérets, and to get started paint on the walls of their studio everything that is inside the room. It's a large square room with a high ceiling and one window looking onto the street. Working together in perfect harmony they first reproduce the window on the wall opposite the window, so that now there is a perfect replica of the window, so realistically done that one cannot tell which is the real window. Then they paint the paintings hanging on one wall, all of them self-portraits of the Bums artfully framed, so that now all the paintings of themselves also appear on the opposite wall, but flattened into that wall, and yet just as well done and as convincingly as the originals. In one corner of the room two desks are standing next to each other against the wall. They paint the desks, and the chairs in front of the desks, in the corner of the studio directly opposite the real desks and chairs. The composition and the perspective is so perfectly executed that if someone were to enter the room and decided to sit at one of the desks, that person could not possibly distinguish the real desks from their reproductions. On the ceiling they paint everything that stands on the floor, the working table, the stools, the paper basket, the easels (they each have their own easel), and themselves too, but upside down, of course, and yet so exactly replicated that someone standing on his or her head looking up at the ceiling could not possibly detect any difference between what is on the floor and what is painted on the ceiling. Eventually all the objects in the studio are mirrored on the walls and on the ceiling, including the easels in the center of the room with the large canvas propped on them representing the room and the two Bum-artists standing before their easels in the process of painting a portrait of themselves. They then paint themselves with a smile of satisfaction on their faces standing before the easels in the painting of the easels they have reproduced on the wall. Finally they paint themselves sitting at the imaginary desks, head between their hands, elbows resting on top of the desks. For a while they stare at themselves sitting at the imaginary desks, then walk to the real desks, sit down, place a large sheet of paper on the desks and begin to sketch a picture of themselves sitting at the desks sketching themselves.

Though they will not admit it openly, the two bums often deplore the fact that they have not gained recognition for their achievements, and so they sometimes speculate as to what the title of a book about them would be if such a book were to be written. Over the years the bums have kept adding possible titles to the list they would propose to the potential chronicler of their twin-life if such a person were to offer his or her services.

Here is that list:

The bums are discussing
the poetry of their existence
and arrive at the conclusion that the very fact of the
irreverence of their dual-beingness
destroys the solo solipsism of the poet who thinks he or she can find his or her voice, as the saying goes, by writing lyrical poetry, a romantic fallacy akin to the obligatory
starving-in-the-attic-tubercular-bleeding prerequisite for poetry
.

Indeed the two bums are aware that their
negligence of style
in everything they do,
their coldness
and especially
their superficiality
, and
their disdain
of the arrogant pomposity of lyrical poetry
is their forte
, and that their friendship is like a great poem,
because friendship tends to blur language, and generally gives rise to imprecise and fuzzy blubbering
, which is the essence of real poetry.

One day Displaced Person One, for no apparent reason, regressed into his native tongue and gesturing wildly said:

Ich wurde von meiner Mutter in einen Schrank geschubst, Aber ich glaube jeder Mensch hat das was ich eine Schrank-Erfahrung nenne. Ya, jede Mutter sagt zu ihrem Kind mal du gehst jetzt in dein Zimmer und da bleibst du. Manche Kinder sind gerne in ihrem Zimmer allein andere haben Angst davor. Der Schriftsteller ist jemand der sich in einen Schrank einschliesst. Ich wurde auf eine Art ja am leben erhalten weil meine Mutter mich in den Schrank schieb sie gab mir noch einen Roman, meine Mutter gab mir Arbeit für mein ganzes leben. Das ist ein sehr grosses Geschenk.

Displaced Person Two was astonished and said, also regressing into his native tongue: Parfois, tu sais mon vieux, je ne comprends pas du tout ce qui se passe dans ta tête. Moi je crois que tu es en train de perdre la boule.