I brought the war, by Callista Womick

Repost from tiltfactor:

The following is a response, or perhaps companion, piece to Olia Lialina’s My Boyfriend Came Back from the War. 

---

I didn’t go- none of us did.
They thought we went, but we didn’t. 

Here. 

We were here.
They didn’t think so, so they screamed at us
and shot at us
and wanted us to die.
“Maluus zebr” they said about
each of us in turn. 

But here it is, I still have it. 

And this- see the dust
still caked into the fibers?
I shouldn’t have it, they have rules about trophies,
but this is from when we were bombed
out of bed-
well, I wasn’t in bed. 

I couldn’t sleep, so I was bare and wet
in the cement shower house.
I knew I was going to die.
I sobbed under one of those
crummy metal sinks, waiting for the walls to cave in
on me or a mortar to drop into
my lap or my crazy heart to just explode. 

But they didn’t and it didn’t and it didn’t,
but maybe I still did. Die. I feel dead.
I’m not a man anymore. 

Please don’t look like that.
I don’t mind.
I’m good at what I do.
I’m a killing machine.
I’m a god. 

This is what they make of us, and they’re damn good at it.
I was in basic with this
scrawny, nerdy wimp from
Minnesota.
Ethan. Ethan Brown.
Most boring-ass name ever.
He’s a sniper now.
He could hit you right between the eyes-
equal distance from each-
from 2000 meters.
You wouldn’t hear a thing,
and then you’d be dead.
How about that scrawny nerd from Minnesota? 

Babe, don’t cry. 

Yes, I like your dress.
But you know I like green on you
so much better. 

White, hell, I don’t know how tokeep anything white. 

I would touch you,
but you look so beautiful.
My hands are dirty.
Yes, they are. Look at them.
LOOK AT THEM. 

I’m not shouting.
Ok, I’m sorry. Please don’t cry.
The dress is beautiful. 

Then why are you crying? 

…HIM?! 

THEY KNEW?! 

You didn’t write.
I wrote to you. 

No. 

No. 

No. 

…I remember.
I’m not sure than I can, either.
Not since. 

Please don’t ask
me now.
I’m so tired. 

Who knew that the dead slept?
I always imagined we would torment
the world of the living after nightfall.
Who knew that it was the other way around? 

I’m tired.
I’m so tired.
Here, hold me.

Visit the Last Real Net Art Museum for more works inspired by My Boyfriend Came Back from the War.

long last, like eyefire and spin-swimming laughter,
a click-swish click-swish step,

long silence,

like this is what it's like
this is what it's like,

long nights, like "look what you've found
in me, look- thank you."

Saving Time

Dance barefoot on the ice.
Feel the ice.
Slip.

Roll in the snow and wash it all off.
Wash it all off.
Forget.

I don't think I

"And I know, and you know too
that what this is is bad, bad news."
---She and Him, more or less

...but...

...but...

...but...

What I don't do do want don't dare wonder do, do, do wonder don't do do think do think do think don't think daren't think think anyway do want don't want do want, don't want don't do daren't do do think, do think do want but don't do: your hair through my fingers and your neck on my cheek and head-spinning scent of you and I know what makes you laugh when you don't feel like laughing and you let me know when you don't feel like laughing because I can trace the weave of your speech-spinning hands and I've felt your fingertips on my palm and I've known the stretch and shrug of your shoulders and know how they hunch when you feel heavy and how to hold you to help shoulder the weight and you share my weight and everything's lighter when we're together, even the serious things, so sometimes we get mixed up and take the silly things seriously and the the serious things sillily and sometimes we're simply silent and stare into one another and this used to terrify me about you because I have walls for everyone but you- everyone but you, but I never had walls for you because something there is that doesn't love a wall that's for you so I'm for you and you are the spring and the mischief in me and when we meet to walk the line it isn't to heave stones or even sighs because there's nothing between us but what we want there and what we want there is shared and what we do is like like two-wise pastries and identical disinterests and word trades which sound nonsensical because we have eyes and minds in common enough to not need breathe long explanations of being so it's so easy to be honest and this used to terrify me, too, but when walking side-by-side feels more intimate than any love I've made then how could I not...

And it would be easier if you were a stranger or I could forget all your sweet smiles, all the time passing, the peace, the heat, the pain, and all those long nights where our words were our freedom, but I can't unknow don't want to unknow don't do do want dare wonder do, do, do wonder don't do do think do think do think daren't do do want do want, don't want to not do daren't do do think, do think do want but don't do.

Turning wordsmith smooth surely sighs surely smiles surely-
schorn smiles, singular glance-glint skip lip smiles!
Shower sounds soft silent night-out lunar light out,
stranger sleepfall supplanted.

soft, soft, soft skinshine stanzas
straying staying saying, delaying.

He bought her salad

"How many, ma'am?"
"We're just one."
"Alright, right this way please."

Among other things, I'm going to tell you about that woman and how she's changed me.

Of the hundreds of people that I have seated in my past month at Something Differerent, the number of couples that have opted to sit side-by-side rather than across from one another I can count on one hand. Only four couples have done so. Which begs the question, for me at least, why? I asked my boss: he admitted he'd never wondered and deferred my wondering mind to a waitress. She suggested that people prefer to look at one another, that only the really touchy-feely types (the kind that are likely to do bedroom things with their hands and ankles under the shade of the burgundy tablecloths) that only they want to sit so near. What she said, essentially, is that the more emotionally and intellectually near a couple is, the less they feel the need to be physically near, to be at one another's fingertips- a breath away.
I do not understand.
Why is this?
I don't see why a deterioration of the desire to be near physically should be required in order for two people to grow closer in other, less tangible (or is it more tangible?), ways, but that's just me. I already hold my truth to be self-evident. As for others, I guess I'll just have to start setting menus side-by-side and see how many more loves are like to stay where I put them, or shy away.

But that's not what you expected to read. Oh dear. Disappointment. Do I dare appologize? No, I do not. I haven't lied to you. There was indeed a man who bought a woman a salad, which constituted the entirity of her meal, and I will tell you about them- just not today. I have pressing matters to attend to.