KITSCH

Late at night we’d sit in the kitchen imagining we were fish. Then the sun came up over TV aerials and we wore dark glasses and linen suits. Walking to our offices we were annoyed by certain billboards which emitted a stench of rotting fish. For days the weather was cool and the clouds formed a tablecloth whereon the gods ate freshly caught fish. 

Every word in the above paragraph is in the Romanian language. Some children put their toys into a  little boat pushing the boat out on a pool shaded by washing hung out to dry. Late at night we’d look at photographs of Victorian churches in London suburbs and Gretel would cover her lips with marmalade. These painkillers make me feel sick. 

Some places have a curious atmosphere as if they aren’t really there. You were the first person to point that out to me as we waited at the top of a hill for a bus to take us away. The hospital shone like a precious stone beneath a diamond cutter's eyeglass. Every alphabet is also an anarchy everyone reading the first paragraph above now understands. So I’ll tell you a secret. When I was a child I fantasised about being run over and crushed by the cars on the high street. This wasn’t anything other than a sexual fantasy and in truth is no longer anything other than a fantasy about a sexual fantasy. Romanian is a fine language for philosophy in exile. 

Soon it got so that we’d go out at night thinking fish thoughts. The cool green water seemed both to part with our gliding along and to part us as along we glided. The air above was thunderously still. I have no skill at writing, no talent for poetry. The pebbles below us resembled the beautiful eyes of fallen angels. We feel asleep smiling and that’s all there was to that.