Primordial: An Abstraction

81

Somebody drives by the front gate of the University in a minivan. They’re going fast.

The back doors of the minivan butterfly open and somebody else throws out a body.

The minivan speeds away.

The body rolls across the grass like an unmanned ventriloquist doll.

I happen to be kneeling there. A long time ago my geology professor told me to find some good rocks. “The best rocks,” he insisted, “are near the front gate, hidden in the grass.”

I’ve been looking ever since.

The body has been wrapped in cellophane.

I pace across the grass and flip it over and tear open the cellophane so I can see the head.

It reminds me of the head of my dissertation advisor.

It’s thin and gray and haunted by corpuscles.

So unlike my dissertation.

My dissertation was dense and vibrant and invigorated by Desire. I miss it more than I miss my own youth and the feeling of sand between my toes.

I cover the head.

I don’t bury the body.

And when the mortician shows up, I’m gone.