Twentysix Read Online Free Page B

never stop never stop and reflect only move towards that is the point only move towards the point that is coming that comes that is coming that comes that came that has gone: the eternal is present in an atom of duration. 

L l
     

     
    I must have a body because some obscure object lives within me.
    Ruby, who in a former life was Rudy, running around with his Chelsea hooligan mates kicking nine bells out of anyone and everyone, is telling us about her latest trade. Ruby has yet to have the chop the op and finds plenty of men who want to suck on a cock in a frock. She is regaling us as we stand by the moonblue trees, having a break from the relentless hunt for satiety, performing for us the monologue with which she accompanied her last conquest. She is dressed to depress, in a black strappy number that shows off the scars where the British Bulldog and Union Jack tattoos have been removed; she stands there, cross-eyed with drink in a cross-eyed wig, yelling: ‘Oh, yeah, go on, baby, suck on my gonorrhoea, suck on my AIDS, suck on my herpes, yeah, suck it, suck my syphilis, go on, suck my AIDS, go on, suck it, suck my gonorrhoea, suck my herpes, suck my fucking AIDS.’ She waits for the laughter to die down before adding, ‘And you know what, the bastard wouldn’t even swallow.’
    Now and again Rudy makes an appearance, and Ruby’s feminine demeanour disappears in a vapour of violence. She builds such walls around herself that no one could ever scale them. But I have also seen that moment when who she wants to be and who she appears to be coincide so gloriously that it is enough to make you trust in saints.
    It is thus not a question of language or the body, but language and the body as an interface of matter itself.

M m
     

     
    A wasteland.
    Bald earth sprouting a comb-over of weeds.
    Night-time.
    A suburb somewhere in Southern Italy.
    A man I have just met is fucking me over the bonnet of his car, which is parked in a pathway swathed between an overgrown field and a dense orchard, beyond which the only indication of civilisation is the howling of a pack of dogs. The stars and the sound of the cicadas knit a blanket around me, and the metal against my skin is still warm from the engine. His friend has his cock in my mouth and thrusts unenthusiastically, more taken by the sight of his mate’s cock slamming into me, a sight he illuminates with a torch that he holds and guides like a spotlight. They chatter away to each other in Italian (a language I don’t speak) and behave, for all the world, as though I weren’t there. The present no longer has any meaning. I am merely a sensation suspended between them, an excuse for a commonality each, perhaps, in his own silent way, craves – but couldnever, except now, with my flesh shared like a meal between them, even begin to articulate. These visions of excess burn brightest.

N n
     

     
    A dream about you.
    Its appearance, furthermore, provokes both fear and fascination.
    I was in a record shop when suddenly there appeared before me a naked man who so corresponded with my desire that it was as unsettling as a dream come true. He wanted me to wash him and as I did – people all around still rifling through records – I realised, with a joy that also broke my heart with its impossibility, its fragility and its immateriality, that it was you. I washed your body slowly, tenderly, my heart speeding away: so happy it hurt. When I had finished, I stood up, and our eyes met for the first time, followed by our mouths. To kiss you again made me weak and afraid, but so happy. So happy. Then you told me you had a lover, and he appeared beside you, also naked. He doesn’t speak English, you said. I told you that I too have a lover and I turned around to him. I put my arm across his shoulders. It is clear to both you and me, without a word being spoken, that we want each other as much as we ever did. Your eyes, my eyes, our eyes. Our bodies like two strangeangels, calling to each