The Autobiography of Red by Anne Carson

Geryon?
     
    Nothing.
     
    It’s a freedom dream Geryon.
     
    Yes.
     
    Freedom is what I want for you Geryon we’re true friends you know that’s why
     
    I want you to be free.
     
    Don’t want to be free want to be with you. Beaten but alert Geryon organized all
     
    his inside force to suppress this remark.
     
    Guess I better get off the line now Geryon my grandmother gets mad
     
    if I run up her bill but it’s real nice
     
    to hear your voice. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
     
    Geryon? All right if I use the phone now? I have to call Maria.
His mother
     
    standing in the doorway.
     
    Oh yes sure.
Geryon replaced the receiver.
Sorry. You okay? Yes.
He tilted
     
    to his feet.
Going out.
     
    Where?
she said as he angled past her in the doorway.
     
    Beach.
     
    Won’t you need a jacket
— The screen door slammed. It was
     
    well past midnight
     
    when Geryon got back. The house was dark. He climbed to his room.
     
    After undressing he stood
     
    at the mirror and observed himself emptily. Freedom! The chubby knees
     
    the funny red smell the saddening ways.
     
    He sank onto the bed and lay full length. Tears ran back into his ears awhile
     
    then no more tears.
     
    He had touched bottom. Feeling bruised but pure he switched off the light.
     
    Fell instantly asleep.
     
    Anger slammed the red fool awake at three a.m. he kept trying to breathe each time
     
    he lifted his head it pounded him
     
    again like a piece of weed against a hard black beach. Geryon sat up suddenly.
     
    The sheet was drenched.
     
    He switched on the light. He was staring at the sweep hand of the electric clock
     
    on the dresser. Its little dry hum
     
    ran over his nerves like a comb. He forced his eyes away. The bedroom doorway
     
    gaped at him black as a keyhole.
     
    His brain was jerking forward like a bad slide projector. He saw the doorway
     
    the house the night the world and
     
    on the other side of the world somewhere Herakles laughing drinking getting
     
    into a car and Geryon’s
     
    whole body formed one arch of a cry—upcast to that custom, the human custom
     
    of wrong love.
     
     

XXV. TUNNEL
     
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    Geryon was packing when the phone rang.
     
     
    ————
     
    He knew who it was even though, now that he was twenty-two and lived
     
    on the mainland, he spoke to her
     
    usually on Saturday mornings. He climbed across his suitcase and reached
     
    for the phone, knocking
     
    the
Fodor’s Guide to South America
and six boxes of DX 100 color film into the sink.
     
    Small room.
     
    Hi Mom yes just about
     
    . . . . 
     
    No I got a window seat
     
    . . . . 
     
    Seventeen but there’s a three-hour difference between here and Buenos Aires
     
    . . . . 
     
    No listen I phoned
—
     
    . . . . 
     
    I phoned the consulate today there are no shots required for Argentina
     
    . . . . 
     
    Mom be reasonable
Flying Down to Rio
was made in 1933 and it’s set in Brazil
     
    . . . . 
     
    Like when we went to Florida and Dad swelled up
     
    . . . . 
     
    Yes okay
     
    . . . . 
     
    Well you know what the gauchos say
     
    . . . . 
     
    Something about riding boldly into nullity
     
    . . . . 
     
    Not exactly it feels like a tunnel
     
    . . . . 
     
    Okay I’ll call as soon as I get to the hotel—Mom? I have to go now the taxi’s
     
    here listen don’t smoke too much
     
    . . . . 
     
    Me too
     
    . . . . 
     
    Bye
     
     

XXVI. AEROPLANE
     
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    It is always winter up there.
     
     
    ————
     
    As the aeroplane moved over the frozen white flatland of the clouds Geryon left
     
    his life behind like a weak season.
     
    Once he’d seen a dog having a rabies attack. Springing about like a mechanical toy
     
    and falling over on its back
     
    in jerky ways as if worked by wires. When the owner