Ana Toader

I am half way through Mann’s The Magic Mountain. High-school all over again, finally scratching beyond the surface of things, justifying my existence a bit more than usual. Claw, claw, claw, reveal something lasting, something worthy of attention, something that can move me. So few books can engage my mind to this extent.

I am no one from this book. A bit of them all, but no one in the end. It is not my kind of book, yet so precious. And Clavdia Chauchat, this bullet with butterfly wings, awakens little demons in my head, makes me want to waltz through life and human hearts, find some joli bourgeois to examine.

So listen and be charmed:

“Oh, enchantante beaute organique, qui ne se compose ni de teinture de l’huile ni de la pierre, mais de matiere vivante et corruptible, plein du secret febrile de la vie et de la pouriturre! [..]“

“Tu este en effet un galant qui sait soliciter d’une maniere profonde, a l’allemande.”

What can all this mean today? Does this still exist? I want this. “Adieu, mon prince Carnaval!” 

What gap in perceptions. Mine, theirs. Theirs is not mine, never mine. How some of these precious kinds in my life saw me as a Lolita. What mythical young temptress substance do i exhude? And I felt 1000 years old, but I enjoyed the part.

One night, two years ago. The Puck need to plant my female, red-hot needle into a man’s heart, even if he was not for me. “Miss me mister”.  And that never went well, but what a perfect moment, as Sartre would put it.  Emotions focused into something small, something thin, something burning. So satisfying in itself, but to no pragmatic use. I sure enjoyed playing Lolita then, fluttering something forbidden in front of him, sure that nothing could happen to me, nothing could be lost. What freedom. I miss that.

Miss me mister.

Soundtrack of a love.  http://www.dresdendolls.com/downloads_n_lyrics/index.htm

“missed me missed me now you’ve got to kiss me
if you kiss me mister i might tell my sister
if i tell her mister she might tell my mother and my
mother, mister, just might tell my father and my father
mister he won’t be too happy and he’ll have his lawyer
come up from the city and arrest you mister
so i wouldnt miss me if you get me, mister, see?

missed me missed me now you’ve got to kiss me
if you kiss me mister you must think im pretty
if you think so mister you must want to fuck me
if you fuck me mister it must mean you love me
if you love me mister you would never leave me
it’s as simple as can be!

missed me missed me now you’ve got to kiss me
if you miss me mister why do you keep leaving
if you trick me mister i will make you suffer
and they’ll get you mister put you in the slammer and forget
you mister then i think you’ll miss me won’t you miss me
won’t you miss me

missed me missed me now you’ve got to kiss me
if you kiss me mister take responsibility
i’m fragile mister just like any girl would be
and so misunderstood (so treat me delicately!)

missed me missed me now you’ve gone and done it
hope you’re happy in the county penitentiary
it serves you right for kissing little girls but i will visit if you miss me
do you miss me? MISS ME??
how’s the food they feed you??
do you miss me
will you kiss me through the window?
do you MISS ME? MISS ME??!!
will they ever let you go???
i miss my mister so!!!!

copyright 2002 amanda palmer”

It must have been a while since I felt like this. Like my heart swells and swells and becomes enormous and crushes my chest under this purposeless happiness. All those strings around me, waiting for me to pull them, make someone move. Right now, I face a world of potential happy lives, not the certainty of moderately exciting domestic bliss. I love these choices. My bees, humming with pressure in their box like electric wires. I will hush now, let Sylvia Plath speak. This is my heart.

“I am not a Caesar.
I have simply ordered a box of maniacs.
They can be sent back.
They can die, I need feed them nothing, I am the owner.

I wonder how hungry they are.
I wonder if they would forget me
If I just undid the locks and stood back and turned into a tree.
There is the laburnum, its blond colonnades,
And the petticoats of the cherry.

They might ignore me immediately
In my moon suit and funeral veil.
I am no source of honey
So why should they turn on me?
Tomorrow I will be sweet God, I will set them free.

The box is only temporary.”