Day One

By Michael Allswang

This book should be read as much as possible by trying to grasp what was taking place in the mind of the writer.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Sep 8, 2021
• ISBN: 9781098386542

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Copyright © Michael Allswang 2021

All rights reserved.

ISBN      (print): 978-1-09-838653-5

ISBN      (eBook): 978-1-09-838654-2

For  comments, questions, orders, or permission requests, please contact the author at: [e-mail]

For Catherine

Table of Contents

RAPTURE

ANGUISH

COMFORT

In the violent pool of the night-marsh, life multiplies and pullulates—no landmarks, nothing static—only the wombs floating, propagating, the life-forming death muck settling. Nothing rests anymore, nothing lasts—not warts on the index, not juice in the uterus. Once life was deductive and reasonable, linear and logical—all questions answered, the future known, every story a beginning and an end. Previously my road was an arrow, the shortest way between two points—until a feather sent me reeling. Now everything is helix and vortex, cyclic and spiral, fission and fusion, the overlap and underlie, intersect and outermost. What was is no longer yet tomorrow will be, all ebbing and flowing by laws unknown, interpenetration on infinite levels at once, sphere within sphere; no discernible cause and effect, no ‘why’ and ‘because,’ only ‘universal pulsations of indeterminate matter.’ A slight shift in the relative equilibrium and earthquakes split open the earth, ice covers the planet. Nothing understood, nothing sure except change, the vital whorl, the whirlpool and waterspout, the flux and reflux, diastole and systole. Once I tried to shape the world to fit my mind. I tried so hard my mind exploded. I once thought the world was made of touchable stuff: plants and animals, minerals and men. Now I see it is the square root of imaginary digits. Yet mathematics is a mystery to me, I know not the meaning of numbers, and often it is that I look in mirrors and write my name to comfort myself that I exist, something separate, something felt.

RAPTURE

I am gradually awakening from a very deep sleep. In that twilight world between sleep and wakefulness, I succumb to that soporific state when the muscles being lax allow the pulsating life force to flow freely throughout the body, spreading a divine feeling of tranquility and languor. Slowly passing into an awareness of the cozy snug warmth of my quilt-covered bed, I become conscious by degrees of a yellowish-orange color pressing steadily against my eyes. Down in the street below my apartment the muffled passage of one car breaks the stillness. I realize that it must be Sunday since the usual clatter of traffic cannot be heard. I feel a moment of joy at the thought of not having to work today, of being able to walk out of my apartment into the warm sunshine, arms bare, shirt open, my face turned upwards towards the blazing sunlight, rather than descend into the gloomy cold fog of early morning that the murky hours of my nocturnal job at the post office require.

Fully awake now, I focus my attention on the brightness of the color that I am perceiving with my eyes. Lying on my back, I ask myself if my face is the receptor of a shaft of sunlight coming through the window. The warmth I feel confirms that this must be so. The color is not harsh but rather soothing as if I were looking through polished amber. I occupy myself for awhile by leaving my eyes barely closed thereby experiencing a blaze of aureate yellow. Gradually exerting pressure, slowly squinting my eyes until they are tightly shut, the brightness fades seriatim into gold, apricot, copper, ecru, sepia and terra cotta. I notice that I am thinking in terms of color, but I am not quite sure if this is appropriate for my eyes are not yet open. I wonder now whether it is in fact possible to experience color with the eyes closed. Lionel told me the other day of that marvelous dream he had in color…not the same thing unconscious I’m awake eyelids not opaque light the optic nerve retina rods cones…

…standing by my bed looking forward to my cup of coffee with eagerness. Quickly dressing, I walk to the kitchen, put on the pot, and set a cup on the table. As I wait for the coffee to brew, I begin to wash the dishes that have been piling up in the sink for a week. The first plate I pick up slips from my hand and shatters on the floor, the pieces scattering helter-skelter in every direction. This is disheartening because now I will not be able to enjoy my coffee as I would like. For just a flash I think about jumping back into bed but instead go to the refrigerator and take out a couple of eggs.

Standing over the frying pan in a daze, looking down like a somnambulist at the two jaundiced eyes staring up at me, I see but two happy suns greeting me good morning. But this childlike reaction is quickly interrupted as unthinkingly, without the slightest volition, I take the fork that I have in my hand and with a precise, delicate stroke the fragile membrane of each of the yokes is punctured, the viscous yellow liquid oozing out over the white of the egg as lava over a plain of snow snaking its way through the silvery blanket, forming small tributaries to the side, infusing searing heat into the frosty field. Erupting bubbles and fumaroles appear on all sides as the scorching lava and frigid snow form an incredible display of steam and smoke, rumbling and hissing, as these two great forces of nature battle for supremacy in the icy winter. The slope of the crater, only  moments before a dazzling white illumed by the sun, darkens into a smoldering mass of black, igneous rock as the lava, ceasing to flow, hardens into dull metallic tumuli under a choking cloud of sulphurous smoke…

Disgusted, I fling the burnt eggs into the garbage, violently throw open the window and commence to pour myself a cup of coffee. As I bring the cup to my mouth, my hands quiver in trembling agitation, spilling the coffee over my clothes, burning my arms, until hardly a drop is left by the time it reaches my lips. Giving up the idea of breakfast altogether, I part hurriedly from the kitchen and begin to pace around the other room in a vicious circle eyes straight ahead…

A double zero on the wheel of fortune turning on the edge of a sucking whirlpool leading down into unknown nether worlds, on that extreme outer boundary of the primordial swirl where