Mingus & Linguistics (kinda)

People use the word "harrowing" too much. They say, "I had to wait in line for fifteen minutes! It was harrowing!" Or they say "The traffic on I95 was totally harrowing today!" Perhaps "Ugh, the dentist! What a harrowing ordeal."

But we know not, reader, unless we've been initiated to the special world of pain, this: "deeply disturbing or distressing; grievous; a harrowing experience."

Special world of pain?

The nightmares of my nightmares. Spinning silken thread as from a spider. That which becomes caught on everything, an arm, a leg, dangling from hair. An abscess.

Dream with me - a bite, those two puncture wounds, teeth as though sharpened, the quick zing of electricity as the body registers a bite, a bite, a bite!

And no, reader, I won't divulge the animal, the biter; imagine possum or feral cat or raccoon or dog. Imagine those eyes you see lighting up in the night; imagine standing shock-still. Imagine the glow of after-pain as it dissolves your shudders to pitiful mewling.

A kitten like myself, nearing nine years, mewling, cowering in darkness, suffering the violence to my body, the spaces proving my violability.

Harrowing? No. Not yet.

Days passing and nothing amiss save steady burn of puncture.

So I slept, dreampt myself torture dreams; I was a young bride, excited for my wedding day, and careful men broke into my house, donning clean, white aprons, "we'll begin the interviews soon," they said in my dream, and I knew what they meant, which was that they meant to rape me, torture me, kill me.

Dreampt myself outside, alone. Flashing brilliance of passing cars and my bean-bag-body dragged across the pavement sudden and hot as midday.

Dreampt myself lost at sea. A speck of dust. A many-legged-creature smaller than a grain of rice. And I dreampt never-redemption, never-freedom.

Fever pitch of dreams until one day upon waking - a bump.

A bump, a bruise, a swatch of blood. Pain began to unravel the definition of harrowing for me. Began with its tendrils to caress my fevered neck.

And eyes rolling back in my head approaching MR who gentled me to sleep, who murmured something white-noise-ish, who grasped her own bedsheets and cursed, I think, although I felt safe enough to allow my mind to dissolve.

Distant shores. Shipwreck saved as parachutists gliding down dust motes winding tethers to my heart, my eyes, my teeth, breeze of warmth sluicing through me.

Warm water channel, warm water bath. Awaking the next day to my own stench. An abscess, so says the Internet, and pain like a thousand flowers blooming all-at-once-lavender.

Shock of warmth inside my eyes. Taken away in a carrier to a vet, knocked unconscious, upon waking made to wear this ridiculous shirt so that I would not further injure myself as though I had no means of my own to stay my quivering tongue which ached and ached to lick my sore open, a blossom.

And taken back to vet. Stitched closed like a blanket. Like a pillow full of feathers. Harrowing. The word tastes like brackish water. Slightly salty, hot, something stinging about it as it coats the inside of my throat.

And nightmares still but not like before. And pain but also not as before. Every night asleep with MR. Every night a lick on her hand.

Not that I feel I owe her, but she comforts me. Has pulled me free of shipwreck debris.

And I attempt anew to get outside, get to freedom. I brave bites and worse. Make oaths to myself I know I won't keep about cowardice. About lamentations.

Because now I know pain. Know the root of "harrowing." And therefore enough to know what I risk as I risk it. And I love my freedom so much I still reach and reach for it. Still dart to open doorways.

Because the animals stalk me yet.

And yet my heart yearns to bite them back.

The Dog Contemplates Luco's Snide Remark of Yesteryear

I'm trying to curl up into a small ball. I'm tall so it's hard because my legs are long sticks that poke out away from me when I'm trying desperately to be tiny.

And this blanket isn't helping me either because I want to curl up so I can hide and the couch is tan "cappuccino" says Lucy and the blanket you can see it it is green and white and a lighter green than the other green.

Why do I want to hide you ask me? I was just reading Luco's blog and I came upon this one which I understood some more of the words than when I read it last time and it made me a shaking dog that can't really stand up and a dog that doesn't really want to look into anyone else's faces a dog who wants to hide and to not be seen by anyone of all the others in the house where I live and where I sleep when I am tired.

He writes "Suicide is too easy. It is ignoble. It is an act the dog might consider if the dog could become aware of his own existence in any meaningful sort of  way."

Which is meaning what? I know the word ignoble because I looked it up it hurt my heart like an ice cube pressed into my muscle fiber which burns and stings and is somehow cold all at once a thing like that that doesn't make sense that is so cold it is somehow hot and my face is burning and I can't feel my tongue in my own mouth and what does he mean when he says I might consider it?

Does he think I should?

Am I such a bad dog such a terrible entity (which means like a thing that exists which I do I do I do) that I am so stupid I shouldn't be here in this house wandering around with my long bent over legs and my drooling mouth trying to lick Lucy or whatever and how does Luco know when to say I should kill myself?

When or why or how or where or who so what does that tell me about him who I thought was my friend who I stayed with him years who I held onto him sometimes when he let me and him who I looked and looked in his eyes and decided not to eat him who is warm when he's sleeping and sometimes soft who wants to be pet but can't let himself who wants to love but can't let himself and him him him who writes and thinks these terrible things which I respect so much but don't understand so much sometimes but when I do again it's like the ice cube but all over me and he's the one saying I'm ignoble? 


That I should kill myself?

Maybe he didn't mean it. Had a bad day and thought I was a dummy creature with no feelings just cloth inside me but that's not true I have this horrible heart.

It's horrible because it's so strong and you know the word intense? And it beats and it beats and it beats and when I think of cheese it beats faster and when I think of Lucy the Scarecrow and hey Luco I thought you were my family but now and now and now you don't know me at all want to say to me these things like I'm a black hole sucking in all everything that was good and just killing it so I should kill myself?

Don't you Luco remember any of the times I licked you?

But I am aware of myself anyway which is different from what you said which I don't get because you're supposed to be so smart and here you aren't being smart because I know of a thing you don't know and my body gets hot in the sun when I lie Outside and look in at you with your pointed feral face and you want what I have maybe but you can't admit it.

Or you admit it but not really with some words that hide what you really mean and so I hide here in this curled up sad ball that isn't small enough because here is MR anyway taking my pictures!

I want to love more and I want to feel more sunshine and so even though I'm aware of my own existence in something that could probably be called a meaningful way no I don't  Luco want to die and I don't want to be dead and away from my Lucy and my Mingus and the other ones also who skitter through the house and who never say to me they'd prefer I was dead.

Because I can quote Hamlet too Luco I can say words from it like the verse that is my favorite: "Let Hercules himself do what he may the cat will mew and dog will have his day."

So but I understand if a better word for how Luco feels is jealousy and jealously and jealous but he should be nice to me! He should try to be.

Remember when we were a family and you didn't love me maybe but you didn't act this way? Remember when I was as good a dog as I could be? Remember when everyone says stupid things sometimes but maybe not that someone should kill himself because really that's going past some kind of a line I think which I know I don't know as much as Luco does but am I crazy?

Tell me am I?


It's just that I think of the taste of sand the grit of it in my teeth Lucy's sharp bark in the morning the songs of cane toads and delirium a flash of Mingus' tail as he whips around the hall the steadying pressure of MR's hand the cool of water and clouds whorling a hundred millions of things I want to still tell you and tell to Lucy who is my shingingest the green of the morning when it's hazy too and the sound of traffic every yell from a happy kid and babies screaming their little cries so distinct the taste of meat and the softness of it between my teeth when I bite and I chew and saliva fills my mouth so delicious.

And when I think these things? No matter what you think I'm worth?

Then I don't ever want to not be alive.