Asunder

THIS IS TO BE WITHOUT CEREMONY.

This is to be the marriage of disparate ideas.

Concerning someone in particular and the kind of woman who signs the guest book at her own son’s wake. On the surface it’s complicated. Deeper down it has to do with something else altogether.

Someone in particular wanted to compose a story without characters and details. Without a setting. No themes, no ambiguities. Being that someone in particular doesn’t consider himself a writer he feels he can dispense with many rules and regulations.

And then the kind of woman that takes twenty-five pills a day.

No flashbacks, no dialogue, no obscure academic references.

What’s more is someone in particular is shamefully ignorant when it comes to the rules and regulations. For instance, he has no idea what a split infinitive is.

And then the kind of woman who sends her twelve-year-old grandson a birthday card with a five dollar bill taped to it and writes I am broke under her signature.

Any use of simile or metaphor or foreshadowing or alliteration or onomatopoeia would be unnecessary in such a story. Nothing at all synecdochical.

Even if someone in particular knew what any of that meant.

To heavily second chance the lonely alone.

And then the kind of woman who applies lipstick at inappropriate times and identifies people by their ethnicity, all of them savages.

Who’d come running when her husband would whistle for her to come running.

Which is not to say someone in particular doesn’t respect those who are cognizant of the rules and regulations and adhere to said rules and regulations. That someone in particular doesn’t consider himself a writer should in no way reflect upon any of those people.

A story without exposition or a conflict or an arc and with nothing at all at stake.

And then the kind of woman you cannot believe actually raised two children and held down several jobs and who derives a queer satisfaction from having her picture taken and is the kind of woman you can say is the kind of woman for years and never run out of she is the kind of womans.

Joan of Arc.

Any assumption that someone in particular is the author of the lines This is to be without ceremony and This is the marriage of two disparate ideas would be premature at this time.

Joan of Arc being the one who led four thousand French soldiers into Orleans to expel the English in 1429, all at the tender age of sixteen. Then she was taken prisoner by the Burgundians. Then she was burned at the stake in Rouen. Then they made her a saint. Someone in particular has a hard time swallowing any of this.

Some of this can be considered adulterous.

Then the kind of woman who is afraid to answer the door lest she be attacked by the Savages probably knows next to nothing about Joan of Arc. The arc of that particular story clearly being Joan herself. Joan was also what was at stake, too.

Derivative. Superfluous.

Someone in particular has given little thought to how long such a story should be. If he ever decides to write it, that is.

A story not subjected to editors or critics or awards or anthologies.

It goes without saying someone in particular has his own problems.

Right around this time the marriage seems headed for trouble.

No plot, no backstory. Research is something someone in particular wouldn’t have to do for such a story.

Someone in particular does not feel he is in any way obsessed with the kind of woman who dyes her hair at the age of eighty-four. He does, however, feel he sometimes devotes too much time to the thinking of her. Point being he can stop whenever he wants to.

The actual relationship between someone in particular and the kind of woman who discusses regularity in mixed company isn’t worth mentioning. She in no way dominates his consciousness. Someone in particular often goes weeks without giving the kind of woman who spreads lite butter on lite bread a single thought.

Nothing linear. Nothing avant-garde. No discernible style whatsoever.

And he has never had a single dream in which she has made even a guest appearance. So she is not a part of his subconscious at all.

Essentially a story with no language to get in the way of the telling.

Or is it unconscious? Do dreams belong to the subconscious or the unconscious? Regardless.

Point being someone in particular has a life of his own.

A life that has nothing to do with the kind of woman who harps ceaselessly on the fact she is all alone.

Retaliation. Misogyny. Blatant disregard.

Connubiality.

Marriage without consummation is subject to annulment.

Someone in particular originally conceived of his story in his native language and then translated it into its present form. It is fair to say it has lost something in the translation.

And then the kind of woman who identifies people by their ethnicity is actually bilingual.

Nothing that may pay homage to something done long ago. Or echoes this or calls to mind that. Nothing ahead of its time.

The sanctity of the institution.

None of this should be taken literally. Nor should it be taken figuratively, orally, rectally, intravenously, three times a day, on an empty stomach, with milk, or lying down.

Not realism, impressionism, minimalism, dadaism.

The someone in particular knows his proverbial goose has been long ago cooked.

The someone in particular intended to compose a story disregarding all of the inherent trappings common to such endeavors while still addressing the life and impact of the kind of woman they write stories about. If someone in particular could somehow allude to the great women of history like Joan of Arc doing some kind of juxtaposition then that would be an unexpected bonus.

Someone in particular realizes he possesses certain gifts. He plans on getting up early tomorrow to exchange them for something more practical. Like a toaster-oven. Or a cutting-board.

A story that cannot be dissected or explicated by any would-be dissectors or explicators.

Here comes the bride. All dressed in white.

What certain explicators might call an off-rhyme. Or is it slant-rhyme?

Someone in particular would like to hit it big posthumously.

Does anyone know what comes after all dressed in white?

This way he will have nothing to live up to.

No movements, not neo-this or post-that.

Da-Dum-Ta-Da-Dum-Ta-Da-Dum-Ta...Daaa.

And then the kind of woman who lives well past a hundred, burying husbands, sons, daughters, grandchildren and as yet unborn and distant progeny.

Involve. Revolve. Dissolve. Absolve.

Given such an ill-conceived union between someone in particular and the kind of woman who sits in the backseat of cars because the front passenger side is the death seat, two things happen, both unfortunate. One is it makes the kind of woman who believes everything she is told more important than she actually is. And secondly, there is never an appropriate ending to end with, such a story as this and such a woman as she.