Killspeak

“C’mon,” Isra said, walking into the hallway, “I need to find the flight number.”

David got up. He worked himself out of his sweatpants on the way to the bathroom. He turned the faucet, full, and shook his head at the thin hot stream. The downstairs’ must be using the water, just flushed. David could hear the flow through the pipes in the floor and leaned against the shower stall until they went quiet. He suffered the weak, too-cold shower. Stepping out, he heard Isra calling him through the door.

Hinges cracked. “Really, we should go soon,” the door opened a bit more. “Sorry. I was running the dishwasher.”

It sounds like Beth Gibbons

Blue and indigo, scars bleeding butter-yellow curtains of sunlight. The feeling of being at a tremendous depth, on the floor of the atmospheric ocean. The mind sings its vertigo in a voice of wavering dread and sadness, a crying theremin sound.

“I don’t have his flight number. I’m not even sure when he’s arriving.”

Isra stepped out of the car and toward the line of locked luggage carts. Security guards in deep navy jackets were hustling the cars and taxis crowding the curb of the terminal, waving their hands, urging haste. As she pushed her cart, a red-nose bent down to look in at David through the passenger window. Isra saw the guard release a cloud of winter conversation, the car’s turn signal begin blinking, the car join the trail of taillights to the parking lot. David looked back at her through the rear window and falling snow. He would know which gate to meet them at.

The wheels of the cart she’d chosen slid, not rolled, packed with ugly snow. Through the sliding doors, she was blasted with dry heat.

Rubbernecking

What looked like fat static when they had left the airport was now much denser. The world had gone white. The flakes were now so large, the fall so dense that their impact was heard as a faint crackling inside the car.

What is it, what is it
That goes sighing through the alcoves
That goes whispering in verses and lyrics
That goes by in dark corners in small houses
That goes through minds and mouths
That goes lighting candles along dark alleys
That speaks loudly in bars
That yells in the markets, that certainly
Is in nature, Is it
That which is never certain, and never will be
That which is not fixed, and never will be
That which has no size

What is it, what is it
That lives in the ideas of these lovers
That the most delirious poets sing
That the crazed prophets vow
Is in the processions of the mutilated
Is in the fantasies of the miserable
Is in the day-to-day of the prostitutes
Is in the plans of thieves, of the handicapped
In all senses, Is it
That which has no decency, and never will
That which does not self-censor, and never will
That which makes no sense

What is it, what is it
That no warning will help avoid
Because laughter will defy it
Because all the bells will play it
Because all hymns will consecrate it
And all the boys will let it loose
And all destinies will meet
And even the Holy Father, who is never really there
When looking at that hell, will bless it
That which has no government, and never will
That which has no shame, and never will
That which has no judgement

What is it, what is it
That no warning will help avoid
Because laughter will defy it
Because all the bells will play it
Because all hymns will consecrate it
And all the boys will let it loose
And all destinies will meet
And even the Holy Father, who is never really there
When looking at that hell, will bless it
That which has no government, and never will
That which has no shame, and never will
That which has no judgement

(Original lyrics in Portuguese)