wild idea materialized. The naked girl … I who spied on her… I was indeed watching the naked her. But it was a conditional nakedness. It was a nakedness already looked upon by someone else, and that was the fake me. Far from being satisfied by seeing her naked, my jealousy increased because someone else had seen her. When one’s throat becomes dry, it serves no purpose to be shown a picture of oneself drinking. At the same time as I was looking at her, another I was looking at me looking at her. I recalled a dream in which I had writhed desperately as I floated near the ceiling and looked down on my own dead body. I was ashamed and laughed scornfully at myself. The strength left my arm, the mirror tilted wildly, and the room flew off, I shifted it to my other hand and this time rested the edge of the mirror on the windowsill to keep it steady. When you’re thirsty you can’t help running in the direction of illusory water, even though you realize it’s a mirage.
The two were facing each other separated by about four paces. Her attitude was relaxed, and to my regret I could not detect the slightest antagonism between them. I wondered if she had already reported on what had happened an hour ago. Supposing that the two were in league with each other, they would really be laughing at me. A foolishly honest box man who had only been waiting to be tossed fifty thousand yen like a reward to some dog, spending as he had promised a half day watching the whirlpools under the bridge … box head … toilet box … sheltered man in a box… box juggler.
But on the part of the naked girl I could feel not the slightest malice or machination. Though I experienced a sense of humiliation as before, no feelings of hatred welled up in me. I intently followed on her heels. My water jar that had been stolen by the fake box man. Her naked body was far more charming than I had imagined it to be. It was natural; there was no question of my imagination being able to catch up with her actual nakedness. Since this nakedness existed only while I was looking at it, my desire to sec it became poignant too. Since it would vanish the minute I stopped looking, I should photograph it, or get it down on canvas. The naked body and the body are different. The naked body uses the actual physical body as its material and is a work of art kneaded by fingers which arc the eyes. Although the physical body might be hers, concerning the proprietorship of the naked body, I had no intention of retreating in impotent envy.
Her naked body was supported by the left leg, as if it were floating lightly in water. It was as if a mysterious cord stretched straight from the tips of a magician’s fingers. The toes of her right foot were placed over the instep of the left, and the bent knee opened slightly outward. What, I wondered, attracted me so much about that leg? Was it that it suggested the sexual organs? Judging from the cut of clothes today, perhaps one could consider the reproductive organs belonging to the legs rather than to the trunk. But if that were all, many other legs are more sexy. When one lives in a box, one looks principally at the lower half of people, and it’s the legs one is familiar with. The femininity of legs, whatever you say, lies, I think, in the simple fluidity of the curving surfaces. The bones, tendons, and joints are completely fused in the flesh and have no effect on the surface. Certainly legs are much more suitable as covers for the sexual organs than as instruments for walking (I am not being sarcastic, there’s no need for that; it is natural that a cover be needed for such a precious vessel). Eventually you’ve got to open the cover with your hands. Thus the charm of feminine legs (and he who denies that charm is a hypocrite) can only be tactile rather than visual.
However, I don’t mean that her very visual legs are masculine. A man’s legs, thanks to having continuously carried weight against the pull of gravity, are
The two were facing each other separated by about four paces. Her attitude was relaxed, and to my regret I could not detect the slightest antagonism between them. I wondered if she had already reported on what had happened an hour ago. Supposing that the two were in league with each other, they would really be laughing at me. A foolishly honest box man who had only been waiting to be tossed fifty thousand yen like a reward to some dog, spending as he had promised a half day watching the whirlpools under the bridge … box head … toilet box … sheltered man in a box… box juggler.
But on the part of the naked girl I could feel not the slightest malice or machination. Though I experienced a sense of humiliation as before, no feelings of hatred welled up in me. I intently followed on her heels. My water jar that had been stolen by the fake box man. Her naked body was far more charming than I had imagined it to be. It was natural; there was no question of my imagination being able to catch up with her actual nakedness. Since this nakedness existed only while I was looking at it, my desire to sec it became poignant too. Since it would vanish the minute I stopped looking, I should photograph it, or get it down on canvas. The naked body and the body are different. The naked body uses the actual physical body as its material and is a work of art kneaded by fingers which arc the eyes. Although the physical body might be hers, concerning the proprietorship of the naked body, I had no intention of retreating in impotent envy.
Her naked body was supported by the left leg, as if it were floating lightly in water. It was as if a mysterious cord stretched straight from the tips of a magician’s fingers. The toes of her right foot were placed over the instep of the left, and the bent knee opened slightly outward. What, I wondered, attracted me so much about that leg? Was it that it suggested the sexual organs? Judging from the cut of clothes today, perhaps one could consider the reproductive organs belonging to the legs rather than to the trunk. But if that were all, many other legs are more sexy. When one lives in a box, one looks principally at the lower half of people, and it’s the legs one is familiar with. The femininity of legs, whatever you say, lies, I think, in the simple fluidity of the curving surfaces. The bones, tendons, and joints are completely fused in the flesh and have no effect on the surface. Certainly legs are much more suitable as covers for the sexual organs than as instruments for walking (I am not being sarcastic, there’s no need for that; it is natural that a cover be needed for such a precious vessel). Eventually you’ve got to open the cover with your hands. Thus the charm of feminine legs (and he who denies that charm is a hypocrite) can only be tactile rather than visual.
However, I don’t mean that her very visual legs are masculine. A man’s legs, thanks to having continuously carried weight against the pull of gravity, are
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