Two Months Ago

Accordion music was coming from the center of the Spidermachine. As the legs slowly heaved upward, the music oozed and stretched out like taffy. At the apex of the stretch, with all the children now high up above their parents, perhaps even, the farthest they have ever been, or felt they have been from their mothers and sunday fathers...high above and far away... it was at this critical and existentially lonely point in their tiny lives, that the music would suddenly freeze and the legs would make a quick and violent jerk up-down-up-down. Tongues bitten, breath lost, the music would restart louder than before, popping, sputtering and gurgling on the way down in a false and mocking empathy with the children’s tragic wails. This went on over and over again. I must’ve stood there and watched it happen a dozen times, or at least until i finished my ice-cream cone. The tatooed carny got progressively gruffer and short-tempered with his little customers. I guessed he felt hurt and unappreciated. When he was that age, he would’ve given anything to get away from his folks. Anything. He would’ve enjoyed those few moments, high above and far away and wished it would last forever.

Aparna waved in the distance by the fat and shirtless cotton candy guy. His belly slowly turning the same pink as the candy in the August sun.

Missing Saraswati

The party was in Kensington, another up and coming neighborhood in Brooklyn. It was close to the ocean and although the streets refrained from oceanic names, the underwater theme was found in the most unusual places.

The party was loud and much was spilled on its marble floors.
Everything inside the apartment, like the hammerhead shark in the foyer, was old but perfectly preserved.

Aparna’s grandmother had recently died and left her the place, so Aparna was the only new and beauiful thing in there. I know, I know, she is a person and not a thing... but she awakens all my artistic sensibilities, such that when I see her lying on the couch all I see is form and color. A piece of sculpture lying heavily on overstuffed leather. That is, until she opens her eyes and smiles at me. Then all she does is defy gravity.

Aparna is long limbed, long haired, everything about her is long and flowing like a dark river.

“Are you the missing Sarasvati?”

That was the first thing i said to her. I thought comparing her to the once mythical river that flowed from the Himalayas into the Ganges and one day mysteriously disappeared, was a good idea.
It wasnt.

“No, i’m Aparna. Sarasvati went out to buy cigarettes.”

The music, as I said, was loud.

Many days later I would explain my come-on into the very softest part of Aparna’s ear. She insists I whisper the events of my day, any wishes, and all prayers into this area. The vibrations of my voice make her legs coil around me like a snake, and in her grip I reveal myself to the oracle behind her ear.