The Outsider

by

Klaus J. Gerken

(2013)

I

He floated just below the ceiling.
The air was warm up there.
Everything was magnified.
Time to dust the lamp shade, he thought.
The desk looks like a painting
with all the books and papers 
scattered collage-like around the laptop.
He wanted to splatter paint over it
and hang it on the wall.
He notice how the cats walked
a pattern around the room.
Anti-clock-wise. Right to left.
An outlandish premise entered 
his mind as if the patters mirrored
and unknown movement of phantom
particles in the universe yet to be
discovered. He was lulled to sleep.
The sleeping did not disconnect him
from reality, rather, it enhanced it
thousandfold...He floated through 
the ceiling above the building above
the clouds beyond the stars he
floated into the abyss merging
with the fundamental congruence
of infinity evolving into eternity
swallowing itself...himself...he laughed
he saw HE SAW he...understood.

II

He heard a whimper. Outside. At
first he thought it nothing. The wind.
Drafty windows don't just rattle
they also whistle. All was quiet.
He went back to reading: Late Night 
Thoughts Of A Physicist. The fireplace 
radiated a yellow warmth and Chiaroscuro. 
He became the book. He became the
thoughts. He became the pages.
The words. The ink. He merged and
reemerged, transformed himself
realigned himself to a new pole star.
He moved and the sofa chair creaked.
All was silent except for the crackle
of the wood. He went on reading. Then
it was again: a whimper. Ever so slight.
From outside? Behind him. He out the 
book down, marking his place with a
spanish leather bookmark richly
embroidered. The window. He looked 
out on the snowy scene. Nothing there.
The door. The cold ravaged his skin.
Nothing. But then... something moved
A shadow. Behind the trees. Flowing.
The whimper turned to an own hooting.
Eyes in the darkness. Perception. He watched
intently. might it be what? A spirit? A 
wounded animal? The path was too deep 
in snow for him to investigate. He
closed the door and thought nothing
more of it. Then again. This time a
scratching on the wall. More than animal.
Spirit. The wind began to howl and
falling snow turned into a raging storm.
It was 3 AM. He felt a chill up his spine.
Footsteps on the stairs? But there is no one
in the house! He moves toward the
stairs. Is there anybody up there?
Silence. He ascends, step by cautious step
into the upstairs shadows. The owl hoots.
Whoo Who! Whoo Who! He hears a door
slam! He rushed toward it. Rips it open.
Nothing. The bedroom empty. Bed made.
Window closed. He catches his reflection
in the mirror. His reflection! Or is it? He
looks behind him. There is only one
in the room. Only one. He is relieved.
Or is he? He closes the door and return 
downstairs to his chair. Just the old house
acting up he convinces himself.
Goes back to reading. Falls asleep.
Dreams of a dark forest in the winter.
Spirits haunt the pines. He walks among
them. There it is! The whimper! A child
abandoned the the forest. He runs toward 
it. It disappears. There is no child. Just
an illusion. The own stares above him.
Whoo Who! Whoo Who! Laughter. Beyond
the trees. Heckling laughter. Evil laughter.
He is frozen. He has no coat. He stumbles
on. Slowly in the haze a cabin. A woodcutter's
abandoned cottage. In bad repair. He forces 
the door and collapses on the floor exhausted.
In the morning he wakes still in his chair.
The book in his lap, and the fire almost out.
He rubs his eyes. Goes to the kitchen and
puts on a pot of water. Some hot coffee.
Then a knock on the door. The storm has
abated. He opens it, expecting the postman.
It's an old ragged woman in torn rags.
Alms she shivers. Alms! She demands, not
begs! He gives her a few pennies. Begone!
And don't come back! As she wobbles away
she mumbles It's your child. He can't quite 
hear. Runs after her. What did you say? It's
your child! What child he yells at her. The 
child that is not here. He recoiled in fright. 
She tried to wander off. Who are you?
She stares out his paralyzed eyes. You know
who I am then wanders off. He is paralyzed.
After a moment goes back in. Stirs the fire
and pours himself some coffee. It echoes
in his mind: the child is yours. The child
that was not there. He dismisses it. The
ranting of a deranged woman. I have work
to do. Can't afford this indulgence.

III

Younger years. Spring. Apple blossoms.
Lilac. April skies. There you are dear. Your 
morning papers and your coffee. Are you
going to the university today. He takes her 
hand. I have to, sadly. Final exams, you know.
I won't be late. I promise. She caressed
his shoulder. I'll be here. I know you will.

IV

Years later. Windy night. Rain. Lightning.
The ambulance finally arrived after being
stranded by a fallen tree. Too late. Both
mother and baby did not survive. He went
into hiding for a year. Then another. And a
third. Never left the house. Disrepair. Hair
and beard grew wild. No communication
with the outside world whatsoever. He grew
complacent. Wrote wild poems, tore them
up. The emptiness surrounded him. 
Strangled him. He grew feeble, weak.
His housekeeper began to fear him.
His drunken rages and his rambling
moods. Demons harassing him.
He was mad. Chapter closed or just
begun. He was on the run. His house-
keeper of 15 years abandoned him. New
help didn't stay long. he refused to be 
seen. Stayed in his rooms. Wild stories
relegated him to ghost. The isolation
forced his hand. He would return to
teaching. He would forget the past. 
He would never wander these cobble-
stones of despair again. He thought.

V 

The years went freely. 15 years turned 
in 20 then 25 then thirty.
Time for his retirement. So soon? Had
he done enough? Age had come too fast
to be a useful entity. But he walked away.
They patted him on his back and sent 
him on into the wilderness that is the 
"golden years". The golden years he thought.
Oxymoronic. Twisted logic. Nothing golden
there. He retired to his books, his pipe
and his flask of wine. Browning was his
favourite, and Marlowe's Faust and that old
disgruntled King. Deluded with his fool
protecting an illusion. War raged
around him. He didn't care. He was 
unaffected. It didn't matter if the world
went mad, he was already mad beyond
the sanity of his abandonment. Slowly
the time wore on like wind upon a mountain
Smoothing ridges into hills and valleys.
Stone became meadows covered with
daffodils. Even Wordsworth knew it
wouldn't last. Nothing lasts forever.
His present past. His future sic feet lower
to confuse future archeologists who
try to date his skull. O Yoric! how art thou
become the fodder for the serious!
I beseech thee, never loose your smile
even if your teeth are full of sand and eyes
are only sockets. We all the same. 
Cosmetics is our only gain. Wisdom 
hardly matters where the silver tests
the rusted cup of dereliction. Fools!
He shouts! I have left the word. Now world
leave me rest before the altar of eternity!

VI

Days were quiet. Even aches and pains were
soothed by wine. And thought flowed freely
through the harbinger of time. No regrets.
We it even real? Thirty years so gone and
nothing to show for it except some papers
hung upon the wall. No one came to consult
him. His knowledge was no longer useful.
Daily strides are made he cannot understand.
There is no helping hand for useless uselessness.
He fount it amusing people called him sir due
to his age and not his academic standing.

VII

One day. Always unexpected. He encountered
A homeless woman. Pregnant. Begging on
the street. He bought some food for her. They
spoke a while. A week later he saw her 
sleeping on the sidewalk. He went over and
put some money in her cup. People were
stepping over her. Pregnant in the street.
No woman should have live like that he 
thought. It never occurred to him she chose
theat way to live. He friended her. After a
few weeks when autumn was upon them
he invited her to stay at his house. She
reluctantly accepted. It was a disaster
from the first. Street-wine meets sheltered
bookworm. Bt they worked it out. His 
housekeeper wasn't impressed and they 
into many argument. It didn't help. The drugs.
It didn't help she stayed away at nigh and came 
home wasted in the morning sleeping on the
spare room. He ate his food and drank his
wine and he couldn't stand her music. One
morning in January she walked to the hospital
and had her child. She gave him up for 
adoption. Then disappeared for a month.
In spring she came back. Through difficulty
they formed a bond and an attachment to 
each other. Then in the summer she announced
she wanted her "boyfriend" to move in with her.
He was shattered. He threw her out. He closed
the door on another chapter of his life. He was
used and cast away like a useless piece
of scap no one cared to bend back into shape.
He drank more an more. He justified the
emptiness, the hollowness, and took the echo
as a trusted friend. The house didn't much feel 
empty as a deserted castle. Cobwebs in the
shadows of his soul. He settle in. The aches
and pains of age got worse and so did his 
mobility. His recourse from boredom was his
daily walks, his books, his cats. Always the 
cats. And of course the wine. Always the wine.

VII 

Dark. The night is dark. Dark sea. Ink black.
No harbour. No safe harbour. You avoid the
shark tooth sabre rocks. Memories guide you.
Memories become your maps. Midnight tolls.
Foghorns in the distance disperse into a
wild cacophony of disparate proportions.
There is a harbour here. Memories tell me
there is a harbour here. Rest and comfort.
Memories. Always memories. There! A light!
Shines ever slightly. Blow it out. It guides
a jagged path. Only the inner light guides.
Lost sailors trust the tide before a human
intervention. When home they bow to earth.
When at sea they bow to wind and fate.

VIII 

He puts down his book. Removes his specs.
Rubs his eyes. Is that a reflection in the
window. Or something outside? The fireplace
is warm. The cats are curled up around the 
room. The clock ticks slowly in a fourth
dimension. Ah would that be real! Would
time be a manipulation on the shoulder
of our fantasy! Give nothing up. Neither past
nor future. The present is not credit here.
We're never in the mix of it. Just looking from
the outside in. It can't be manipulated since 
it's already in the past when we perceive it.
He hears creaking floorboards above him.
These old houses have many ghosts.
And they always have a bar in the basement.
I better stirr the logs. Get some heat in here.
Still snowing out I see. 2 AM. Time moves 
too fast when age pulls the rumbling wagon
over cobblestone or dusty pathways far
beyond you will ever imagine. To go out
with a bang and not a whimper. What's a
whimper to a bang? What is lightning to 
a shadow? They consume each other. 
The mind's the folly of a curse. Once gotten
it get's worse with each hand you cannot
touch. Each voice you cannot hear. Each
thought you cannot understand. Isolation
is a caravan to the land of milk and honey
but leave you behind in the wilderness
to confront the burning bush of your
desires. The snow twinkles from the 
lamp post light. Always movement. White
curtain. Phantoms skirting between
the trees. Whoo Who! Whoo Who! an
owl somewhere sharp eyed looking 
for field mice skirting beneath the snow.
All is prey. No one is immune. Neither
god nor man. Flesh consumes flesh.
Blood transfers spirit. Consumption
of you enemies. Gain their strength
in retribution. Osiris forbade the
consuming of human flesh. So wine
becomes the resurrection and the 
host through refining the method.
No one lives alone. No one dies alone.
The earth is a mass grave. Whoo who!
Whoo who! I know it's watching. I know
the child's in the cradle. That's what 
the owl is hunting. The child is a new
beginning. And abandoned child is a
revolution if it survives. The wolves are
out in force. They lie in wait for blood.
Oh what is this emptiness I shiver through?
Is Lear my only companion on an endless
journey? And what of the lotus eaters?
Forced to take the oar and parish on the
wild black sea? Is dying preferable to
lethargy? To die with dignity will always be
the wish that cannot be fulfilled by
democracy. Socrates knew that. Drunkards
and poets know it. Achilles know it!
Am I mad? Will madness be my savior?
I have nothing left except my failure.

IX 

There it is again. That sound. Wind or
whimper? Outside or in my mind. But
what is mind? What is outside? Is not 
everything perceived by mind and manipulated
into what we can accept in the context
of our limited understanding? The owl
is in my head. Whoo who! Whoo who!
It is like the woman taunting Caesar
on the Ides of March! Or like the witches
in Macbeth! All warnings ignored. What
should be done at that point? He walks
into the kitchen. A pot of coffee. Warm
an old man up. Bones are brittle on
a howling winters night. I wish that I
could float. Float into the sky! Be lighter
than the air! Oh to fly! to fly! The silent
house shifts on its foundation. It is
alive. Everything is alive. The trees.
The rocks. The very earth worms dig
to cultivate. Everything's recycled. The 
old the young it doesn't matter. Time 
is an illusion. What a moment or a 
decade? A life's the purpose that it
lives. Nothing else. Shadows touching.
He returns to his chair. I was once young
you know. I was once young. He talks
to a shadow of himself perhaps.
Young I once was. Even once was in love.
So very long ago. So beautiful she was.
We were barely married whens he left.
I don't remember where she went. I only
remember one day she was no longer 
there. Sometimes cats are best as a 
companion. They don't desert you when
the hour nears. I hear a whimper. A cry.
Is it a cry? I have the image of an old woman
in my head. Is she there or is she dead.
I can't recall what Shakespeare said.
There's only clarity where there can be
confusion. I should investigate. Don't 
forget the key. That's what she always said
to me. Don't forget the key. How I wish
I could just float away. Float like a cloud
into the firmament beyond the firmament.
Float away. Silently away. Once I loved.
I think I loved. Once I was a man. Young.
Not old. Once there was a future I was told.

X 

He floated just below the ceiling.
He smiled at his adventure. A child
he had only fascination with the present.
The future did not yet exist. It was warm.
He could touch the ceiling. He wanted 
to touch the firmament and merge
wit the substance of transfiguration.
He wanted to be everything and nothing.
He was happy just to float away.

kjg 755am to 727pm 21 dec 2013


All poems copyright (c) 2013 Klaus J. Gerken
Published by Ygdrasil Press
December 2013