No Variations (Argentinian Literature Series) by Darren Koolman Luis Chitarroni Page A
Authors: Darren Koolman Luis Chitarroni
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come, they float downstream, the décolletées.
“He dined on a mess of shadows,” one of them said, “what a mouthful (placed out of the children’s reach, yesterday—out of reach of their grasping nails). And now, once again, investors want to pluck out their own eyes, to be merely clients, but the kind that don’t pay.”
But we cannot be less useful than we are. We arrive late, but we don’t care. We are content to dine on leftovers. We, the Slow Ones. We take in their necklines with inadequate glances. We used to be nearsighted—now we’re farsighted; myopes become presbyopes (curious, is it not, the transit from a silent E to one with a stress?). That which we used to be, we are, in the high Sufic night, we, the violate relics. How we suffer to return.
[II] An eruption, a volcano. The scientific vocation is certainly wanting in mortals who commune closely with the gods.
Clucking tongue. The décolletées passing. Scapular. Swaying solemnly , that arbitrary souvenir , a volcano scapular from Storyville , the red-light district , which I still have. Why do I keep it , what will I do with it?
NO
Superimposition
of the bottom of my glass, a brief instant—a slick of melting ice, to the last drop—over the window of a Havana hotel. It’s raining in the dry season.
Out of a Greek Gift
Ranelagh, 29 December, 1995/91?
“So Doctor Yturri Ipuche is also Doctor Purcenau?”
“Could be”
“And apparently he lied about everything”
“Don’t know, maybe it was just nearly everything.”
“Nor could one simply attribute this to the fact that they’re all, well, fictional characters?”
“Hardly even that: they’re floating voices, like in that Sarraute novel …”
“Some English writer did the same thing”
“ Les Fruits d’ Or ”
“careful now, it’s not like we don’t have examples closer to home”
“since nobody understood a word they said”
“There’s just no way it can be sustained for long. Four or five voices without social or political status to differentiate them, all chasing after the same chick, a muse with a capital M ”
“Please stop”
“Ave María purísima …”
“Ave martini … dry”
“Maybe if they shared a real project, a political agenda, then you’d be able to include them. What did you say the book was about, exactly?”
“Well, it’s centered mainly on her, as a peripheral figure—no, better to say a hidden figure … being a girl. But—in any case. Here they saw the potential for many roles, right?”
Hopefully it rained. It was raining .
“How learned you are, what did you say it was called, again?
“No, those guys were such navel-gazers. Completely incapable of telling a story … Look, if I’d actually studied …”
“It was psych, for me, lit for everyone else …”
“thing is, it was going to be a play, the title of which escapes me just now …”
“Urn something”
“and you called it … ?”
“oh, a … prolegomenon to an awful play. The awful”
“He was no stranger to them. And didn’t those guys also do work with the Brits and the Galicians?”
“perfectly bilingual”
“well, there you are, Melchior, it’s already getting hazy for you—he was Flemish, un flamand , he spoke six languages.”
“with that stupid face of his? … Tribilin … [?lingual]”
“Come now, we don’t want to let our reminiscing spoil your …”
“Spoil what?”
“The broth. This theory, hypothesis, or whatever it is”
“Wrong and wrong. Want another guess?”
“It’s a monograph”
“The hell you say”
“Don’t let the owner know, but that review of theirs keeps on coming out”
“and we two still contribute. Sporadically”
preaching to the deaf. My illegitimate father. Second chance , prayer of the river at the shores of
“He dined on a mess of shadows,” one of them said, “what a mouthful (placed out of the children’s reach, yesterday—out of reach of their grasping nails). And now, once again, investors want to pluck out their own eyes, to be merely clients, but the kind that don’t pay.”
But we cannot be less useful than we are. We arrive late, but we don’t care. We are content to dine on leftovers. We, the Slow Ones. We take in their necklines with inadequate glances. We used to be nearsighted—now we’re farsighted; myopes become presbyopes (curious, is it not, the transit from a silent E to one with a stress?). That which we used to be, we are, in the high Sufic night, we, the violate relics. How we suffer to return.
[II] An eruption, a volcano. The scientific vocation is certainly wanting in mortals who commune closely with the gods.
Clucking tongue. The décolletées passing. Scapular. Swaying solemnly , that arbitrary souvenir , a volcano scapular from Storyville , the red-light district , which I still have. Why do I keep it , what will I do with it?
NO
Superimposition
of the bottom of my glass, a brief instant—a slick of melting ice, to the last drop—over the window of a Havana hotel. It’s raining in the dry season.
Out of a Greek Gift
Ranelagh, 29 December, 1995/91?
“So Doctor Yturri Ipuche is also Doctor Purcenau?”
“Could be”
“And apparently he lied about everything”
“Don’t know, maybe it was just nearly everything.”
“Nor could one simply attribute this to the fact that they’re all, well, fictional characters?”
“Hardly even that: they’re floating voices, like in that Sarraute novel …”
“Some English writer did the same thing”
“ Les Fruits d’ Or ”
“careful now, it’s not like we don’t have examples closer to home”
“since nobody understood a word they said”
“There’s just no way it can be sustained for long. Four or five voices without social or political status to differentiate them, all chasing after the same chick, a muse with a capital M ”
“Please stop”
“Ave María purísima …”
“Ave martini … dry”
“Maybe if they shared a real project, a political agenda, then you’d be able to include them. What did you say the book was about, exactly?”
“Well, it’s centered mainly on her, as a peripheral figure—no, better to say a hidden figure … being a girl. But—in any case. Here they saw the potential for many roles, right?”
Hopefully it rained. It was raining .
“How learned you are, what did you say it was called, again?
“No, those guys were such navel-gazers. Completely incapable of telling a story … Look, if I’d actually studied …”
“It was psych, for me, lit for everyone else …”
“thing is, it was going to be a play, the title of which escapes me just now …”
“Urn something”
“and you called it … ?”
“oh, a … prolegomenon to an awful play. The awful”
“He was no stranger to them. And didn’t those guys also do work with the Brits and the Galicians?”
“perfectly bilingual”
“well, there you are, Melchior, it’s already getting hazy for you—he was Flemish, un flamand , he spoke six languages.”
“with that stupid face of his? … Tribilin … [?lingual]”
“Come now, we don’t want to let our reminiscing spoil your …”
“Spoil what?”
“The broth. This theory, hypothesis, or whatever it is”
“Wrong and wrong. Want another guess?”
“It’s a monograph”
“The hell you say”
“Don’t let the owner know, but that review of theirs keeps on coming out”
“and we two still contribute. Sporadically”
preaching to the deaf. My illegitimate father. Second chance , prayer of the river at the shores of
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