i glanced out the window of the computer-run monorail at the crocodile-infested rivers and malarial swamps teeming with electric eels and fifteen-foot anacondas and then i looked back at marsha who was wearing a blush-pink silk blazer over houndstooth check wool bermuda shorts beneath her synthetic skin (a latex-like water emulsion polymer the color of café au lait), a network of white plastic arteries circulated compressed air throughout her metal and carbon-fiber chassis she literally had the words hitachi electronics corporation written all over her i estimated her development costs to have been approximately 2 billion yen she reached behind her head as if to smooth her hair and inserted a fresh floppy disk into a disk drive situated inconspicuously at the nape of her neck instinctively i reached across to help her and my fingers brushed against the floppy disk as it receded into the back of her head i looked into her sensitive almost vulnerable pale-blue electron diffraction optical imaging scanners your software is so soft, i said she smiled bashfully, averting her eyes, and continued to talk about the dulcimer player who was half-human, half-mole

  shortly after the humiliating fiasco at the elementary school, i was awakened in the middle of the night by a telephone call informing me that he had drowned himself in a fermentation vat at a puerto rican rum distillery i was told by a bacardi attorney that he’d flung himself into the vat with a kind of sublime grace that his back was arched, his legs extended, his hands pressed together above his head as if in prayer i was told that had it been a competitive dive with the high and low marks discarded his score would have been quite impressive i was told that as he hit the surface of the fermenting molasses he whispered my name distraught, guilt-ridden, confused—i began to see a travel therapist and after a number of tearful cathartic sessions, she suggested that i go to europe i took an apartment upstairs from the cern atom smasher in switzerland … but it was like living over a bowling alley … all that smashing so i moved back, to a basement apartment next door to the norad strategic warning center in colorado under cheyenne mountain and here i enjoyed a long overdue respite from the pierced nipple and enema crowd, here amid the murmuring mountain streams and craggy cliffs my soul was succored in days of arcadian serenity and tranquil restoration—often i’d awaken from an afternoon nap to find a caribou or elk performing a delicate pas de bourrée on pointed hoof from flagstone to flagstone, his hairy beer belly spilling over his leotard as he minced about the carp ponds and pepsi machines that skirted the grounds of the barbara mandrell in vitro fertilization clinic i had a wonderful next-door neighbor—a warmhearted, jovial, gregarious woman with an irrepressible zest for life she had a deep consuming passion for macaroni and cheese and often i’d awaken from an afternoon nap to find men in white overalls running a thick black hose from their gleaming cylindrical tank truck to an inlet valve in the backyard and pumping gallons and gallons of creamy yellow velveeta cheese sauce into her underground storage reservoir one day she said, dear dear relatives are coming down to visit me from their home in putrid beef, wyoming and she ground the wheat and made pastries she went hunting in the forest and shot the animals and ground their flesh into chopped meat for hamburgers and she took a boat into the ocean to catch the fish and baked a cake and threw the fish in for a fish cake and i asked if i could do anything to help and she said, no no no, you just go into the den and watch TV so i watched a documentary about norwegian explorer and writer thor heyerdahl proving that it was possible for a race of primitive people to have migrated from continent to continent on styrofoam kickboards and i watched a news conference at which the president announced that after having reviewed the film the dirty dozen with the trilateral commission he was sending jean harris, claus von bülow, john delorean, and nine other upper-crust felons to the caribbean in an armored yawl with a 155-millimeter champagne bottle mounted on deck capable of firing a 600-lb. cork from the coastal waters of eastern nicaragua right into the living room of comandante daniel ortega a gaunt pockmarked dissipated handsome sexy mosquito hovered at the screen window transfixed as if spaced out on smack a thousand images of the flickering sony trinitron reflected in his compound eyes his sharp proboscis flashed in the moonlight like a hypodermic needle with a drop of blood at its tip i could tell he was wearing black mesh panties under his skintight slacks he undulated his tight little muscular cylindrical abdomen it twitched it shuddered in almost imperceptible spasms he was saying, “let me in, marsha” and “marsha, do you have any sweet shit in your liquor cabinet like sambuca or kahlúa or peppermint schnapps or amaretto” and “marsha, don’t you recognize me—this is jesus, they freeze-dried my brain at san quentin” and “marsha, this is elvis … this is prince” so i ran and got a can of extra-strength raid and sprayed him through the screen window until death was his final reward the phone was ringing in my apartment it rang 50 times 60 times 70 times 80, 90, 100, 110 times finally on the 117th ring i picked it up … breathless … panting … it was my cousin, the gastroenterologist he said, marsha, you’d better catch the next flight to new york city—your father’s got kidney stones i flew in and took a taxi right to mount sinai hospital when i arrived my father was in the operating room immersed shoulder-deep in a special high-tech bathtub there was a large marshall amplifier next to the tub the surgeon turned to the nurse and said, “guitar” the nurse handed him a fender stratocaster the surgeon strapped it over his shoulder “guitar pick,” he said she complied, placing a guitar pick firmly in his gloved hand as the surgeon began to play jimi hendrix’s solo from “purple haze,” he held the guitar up against the amplifier, producing howling high-pitched feedback as my cousin, the gastroenterologist, later explained, the guitar feedback produces shock waves in the warm bathwater which travel harmlessly through the body but shatter the brittle kidney stones into fine fragments he said that the guitar-feedback method of smashing kidney stones had been developed at the monterey pop institute of kidney, bladder, and urethra disease and had just been approved by the FDA i trusted my cousin’s medical explication as i trusted my cousin—implicitly esteemed by his professional colleagues, affluent, and socially prominent, he was the shining scion of his immigrant family—although his father had achieved considerable notoriety in his own vocation—baseball he’d been the first rigidly orthodox soviet-style marxist-leninist to pitch for a major league team this was thanks to the enlightened and farsighted hiring practices of brooklyn dodgers owner branch rickey who signed my uncle in the early 50s, to the almost unanimous displeasure of organized baseball my uncle caused tremendous controversy when he refused to pitch on may day and later declined the opening start of a world series because it fell on the wedding anniversary of ethel and julius rosenberg notwithstanding one’s political affiliations one couldn’t deny his baseball prowess, and in fact he had such an incredible spitball that his salivary glands were insured by lloyd’s of london we were reminiscing over falafel sandwiches and diet cokes in the mount sinai cafeteria when my cousin’s face took on an unexpectedly somber aspect what’s wrong, i asked, do you have food allergies? is the wheat gluten in the pita bread causing you to become moody and capricious? is the nutrasweet in the diet coke making you epileptic? no, he said, it’s your father … there’s more wrong with him than just the kidney stones we discovered a gas pocket of freon in his brain what’s freon? i asked freon’s a refrigerant used in air-conditioning systems and he looked at me and with the grim urgency of a network anchorman he said, marsha, the freon bubble in your father’s brain is the work of terrorists your father was #1 on the trilateral commission’s hit parade well, can’t you just install a replacement head? i asked every body comes with two or three replacement heads and instructions on removing the worn-out head and installing the spare to remove your head simply take your left hand and hold the back of your head take your right hand and hold your chin firmly in its palm twist your head sharply with a counterclockwise motion until you hear it disengage to install your replacement head place the head assembly on neck housing and insert guide pins through mounting holes hold head firmly in position with both hands and rotate slowly clockwise until assembly locks into place if your replacement head features a built-in dish antenna you can test head function by standing in the middle of your backyard and determining whether you’re picking up any satellite signals if your replacement head fails to pick up any satellite signals then you either installed your head improperly or the head is defective if, after installing new head, you are unable to discern the contradictions in capitalist modes of production, you have either installed your head improperly or head is defective

  i glanced out the window of the computer-run monorail at the feed store, the international harvester dealership, the barbershop, the county courthouse, and the domed tabernacle of the aryan nazarene church and then i looked back at marsha at the epicanthic folds of her japanese-made eyes, at her olive silk pleated tunic and smoke-blue wool crepe pants and in the periphery of my vision i noticed a group of caucasian hoodlums entering the car i think they were delinquents from one of the bad parts of canada recalling the fashion of urban black youth of the 1970s who wore combs and afro picks in their hair, these caucasian thugs took it one step further—they wore all their grooming implements and toilet articles they swaggered down the aisle with q-tips sticking out of their ears, strands of dental floss hanging from their teeth, and big globs of styling mousse on the tops of their heads they were apparently a gang of deaf caucasian punks because instead of toting boom boxes on their shoulders, they each carried a letter-quality printer which churned out the lyrics of the songs they began to terrorize the women and elderly passengers i rose in my seat and stepped into the aisle you’re dead meat, i said, slowly enough so that they could read my lips i’m the last of the great musclemen for 100 years musclemen ruled the u.s.a. a muscleman sat in the oval office, coconut butter slathered across his bursting rippling physique the senate and house of representatives and supreme court were filled with musclemen and musclewomen the mayor of new york city was an immense muselewoman—165 lbs. of steroid-scented beefcake garnished with a red bikini that marked her bulging latitudes like two rubber bands about to snap but then the engineers with their microchips and modems overcame the musclepeople well, i’m the last of the great iron-pumping vigilantes i cornered each one of those q-tip-sporting caucasian animals and beat him with my huge fists until his face was a pudding of flesh and blood and his lower lip protruded stupidly from his mouth like the heavy petal of a summer flower

  after freshening up in the monorail lavatory, i retired to the dining car for a bit of supper what color is your mozzarella? i asked the waitress it’s pink—it’s the same color as the top of a mennen lady speed stick antiperspirant dispenser, y’know that color! no, ma’am, i said it’s the same pink they use for the gillette daisy disposable razors for women … y’know that color? nope y’know the pink they use on the wrappers for carefree panty shields? nuh-uh well, it’s the same pink as pepto-bismol, y’know that color? oh yeah, i said, well, do you have spaghetti? well, what’s spaghetti? it’s elongated thin solid strings of pasta no, we don’t have that, but i want to tell you, mister, that no matter what you order tonight you’re in for a treat because our new chef was a texas death row chef what’s that? i asked well, the state of texas is executing so many convicts that it’s been forced to hire special death row chefs to accommodate the spiraling number of last meal requests—a condemned inmate being of course traditionally entitled to the final menu of his choice in the old days, when capital punishment was infrequent enough to be noteworthy and when death sentences were meted out primarily to the itinerant and impecunious, steaks or cheeseburgers with a side of french fries or onion rings, coffee, and pie à la mode tended to be the order of the day but today, murder, mayhem, random violence, heinous brutality, and wanton slaughter of innocent life is just as likely to occur in corporate boardrooms, health spas, tanning salons, and video clubs as it is in slum alleyways and backwoods motels this coupled with your gastronomic education in the public schools and wardens are finding themselves obliged to accommodate last requests for everything from coquilles st. jacques and roast pheasant with chestnut stuffing to braised veal shanks, milan style, and cold sautéed trout in orange marinade electric chairs, gas chambers, and firing squads are working at such a frenetic pace that death row kitchens are sites of frantic raucous activity, with depleted items being constantly scrawled on the 86 board and waiters rushing in and out and yelling their orders: i got a steak au poivre, a stuffed sole, an order of fried zucchini sticks and cancel the bay scallops—governor’s pardon … the kitchen lights intermittently dimming as power surges to the electric chair ads for death row chefs and death row sauciers appear in all the major trade publications and the cornell school of hotel/motel management and the new jersey culinary institute offer degrees in last meal preparation students are trained in every aspect and nuance of death row cuisine including which wines more felicitously complement meals preceding death by firing squad and which wines more felicitously complement meals preceding death by lethal injection sounds good, i said, let me try that roast pheasant with chestnut stuffing we don’t have that how about the cold sautéed trout in orange marinade, that sounded good nope, we don’t have that what about those braised veal shanks? nuh-uh then why don’t you give me a cheeseburger with a side of french fries, coffee, and pie à la mode thanks for your order, mister i took a long drink of ice water my bruised raw fists ached from the beating i’d administered to those thugs i slumped down into the vinyl-upholstered banquette my body was exhausted my head felt like a buoy, bobbing on the surface of the water i tried to forget my own exhaustion, my own pain, by eavesdropping on the conversation of a man and a woman in the adjoining booth and i concentrated with such focused intensity that during lulls in their conversation i could hear the secretions of their internal glands drip with the audibility of leaking faucets they were both happily married to their respective spouses, but they desperately wanted to have a love affair with each other unwilling to risk jeopardizing their marriages, they’d decided that on a preordained night they would meet in each other’s dreams and that way they could consummate their passion for each other without actually, statutorily transgressing their conjugal vows they would make a kind of oneiric tryst they would have a sort of out-of-body affair they’d agreed that the day after this prearranged night they would meet in the dining car of the computer-run monorail to compare the delights of their telepathic liaison i don’t think they’d been there long when i started listening where were you last night? the man said angrily what are you talking about? asked the woman well, all i dreamt of last night was sitting on the bank of a stream eating a turkey salad platter garnished with mandarin oranges that was me! exclaimed the woman what? said the man i was the mandarin oranges or i should say i appeared in your dream in the form of mandarin oranges—because they are sweet and tart and small and cool like me—i was symbolized in your dream by mandarin oranges well, this is very annoying, said the man, why couldn’t you have simply appeared in my dream as you, like we planned? well … thought the woman, and then after a prolonged pause she said, well, you have some nerve being annoyed—where were you last night? the man squirmed a bit in his seat why, he asked, what did you dream? i dreamt i was lying on a beach blanket on an endless asphalt field in indiana, thoroughly basted with suntan lotion, reading lee iacocca’s autobiography and a squadron of french mirage-2000 jet fighters kept flying back and forth above the field in tight wing formation the man averted his eyes sheepishly, that was me, he said, i appeared in your dream in the form of mirage-2000 jets … but i didn’t mean to! i intended to come as myself well, said the woman indignantly, i certainly didn’t mean to appear in your dream as mandarin oranges—i had every intention of appearing in your dream in the flesh! the man reached across the table and took the woman’s hand in his i wish you had, he said softly this is the problem, said the woman, although we intend to appear as ourselves—we are apparently transmogrified en route into each other’s dreams into encoded images or symbols of ourselves this is quite unsatisfying, said the man, how will we ever recognize each other? we’ll simply have to assnme that any elements congruent with those which appeared last night represent each other you’re right, said the man, now i know that any time i encounter a garnish in my dreams it’s you—every olive, every tomato slice, candied apple, parsley sprig, lemon rind, grated radish, and maraschino cherry—it’s you! yes, said the woman, and i know that each time i discover an F-16 or a MIG-25 or a strategic air command bomber or a 747 passenger plane or the space shuttle or even a soviet SAM-7 surface-to-air missile—it’s you … you and only you!

  i found the lovers’ passionate predicament and their passionately ingenious solution quite poignant not only was i moved by the sophistication of their microcomponents—only fourth-generation robots were capable of dreaming and telepathy—but they made me think back to the springtime of my own youth, when i first fell in love the year was 1958 cary grant and sophia loren starred in a motion picture called houseboat it was a beautifully tender love story of an italian conductor’s daughter and a widowed father of three small children to me it was the most romantic film of my lifetime and i thought that sophia loren was the most potent embodiment of erotic love imaginable i suffered the agonies of an enraptured adolescent i can remember vividly the very sweetness of my longing, the hot sudorific intensity of fantasies inevitably doused in the icy realization of my desire’s futility … absently doodling her name on my gym shorts “sophia” … “sophia” … the word reverently multiplied on every wall of the weight room, scratched even in the vinyl-covered benches of my nautilus equipment she was the first and last woman i ever loved although cary grant and sophia loren appeared larger than life on screen, they were actually 10-inch scale models—graphite-reinforced shells of polycarbonate polybutylene resin filled with cellular urethane foam—designed and constructed by special-effect artists at toho films, the japanese studio also responsible for godzilla, rodan, mothra, and ghidrah

 

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