Whistle Blower

Please, do not be angry with me.

I know my whistle is harsh, its sound echoing off the concrete and steel of the skytrain tram station. But if the whistle was not so shrill, you would ignore it. I know this for fact. I have been an employee of Bangkok Skytrain for seven years, and I know this about people. You only hear what shocks you. A pleasant note, a melody, a simple tune would not keep you away from the yellow line.

You might think bright yellow line would be enough. Or maybe signs, big signs we have, would stop people. Wrong. People ignore everything, even when it is their safety to do so.
You ask someone, “Hey, don’t you know railway dangerous? Skytrain is automated, cannot stop or even see if person falls onto track?” They know, but pretend not to. Everyone is hurry, rush, rush, rush. That is okay. That is what people do. This is why my job is so important. Most people, they look through me. I am another sign, another advertisement. This is okay, as long as the stay away from edge, from yellow line.

I have learned much about people at my job, too. One look a couple, I know if they are happy, whether man or woman is cheating, if they have babies at home. I can tell the dreams of a young man by the way he waits for a train—he stand straight, he wishes to be business man. Slight crooked stance: doctor. Left foot forward, teacher. I am never able to check, but I know it is true anyway.

When I was new, I did not understand people. I thought I did, was wrong. Thought whistle was too loud, too rude. Thought job unimportant.

That first day, I see a girl peering over the edge, past, way past yellow line. She looking for train to come, but she looking wrong way. She so pretty, long, silky hair, kind eyes. When I now remember her posture, I know she is woman with much love in her heart. The whistle is too harsh, I think. It will hurt her ears and she will be upset with me for scolding her. So gently, I say, “Miss!” Nothing. Louder and louder I yell, but it too late. The train comes, and it catches her arm, throws her onto tracks. I am blowing whistle then, my cheeks hurt from it, but it cannot be heard over the screech of brakes and screams of people.

It took many months before I could close my eyes without seeing woman’s face as she fell, kind eyes open, mouth wide. Many more months before I could see line as yellow instead of a rusty orange. So, please, do not be angry with me for blowing whistle.

Swansong

I was standing in my kitchen, and when I glanced out the window to note the huge thunderheads, I thought I saw something on the power line. Assuming it was nothing out of the ordinary, I turned to face it fully, but there was nothing there. Except...it was like a bulge in the movie screen. I could only see a black blur of it out of the corner of my eyes. I tried hard to focus on it, but I couldn't--my gaze rolled off of it like a marble on a globe. It took a minute of seriously straining my eyes to roll it into my field of vison, but I had nothing to do particularly.

I gawked. It was this huge bird. Not comically huge, but big enough to take down a baby deer. The power line was a little weighed down by it. Claws for ripping, more like talons, really. It was eerily silent too, like radio booth foam, as if sound was drawn into it and then cancelled out. The bird just sat, staring off down the graffiti and broken glass soaked alley, unmoving. It had the darkly intelligent, detached look of a bird of prey, but no raptor I’ve ever seen was that shade of black, glinting coral blues and turquoise opals in the morning sun. The beak was long and curved, elegantly sharp and, like its breastfeathers, were iridescent, oils on colored glass.

What really got me were the eyes, though. Size of a half dollar, yellow-gold, gold-yellow-orange, purple-green-blue, I'm not sure. But they pierced you, went right down into your heart and just grabbed hold of the soft spots. All those places where you are thin and scabbed over, where some holes are so deep that to survive, you must patch glossy veneers over them, like bridges made of bone china. Those eyes speared you right in the heart of the matter, held you there, shined a spotlight on them so brightly you couldn’t look away anymore. I gasped, because I was forgetting to breathe, and because suddenly I was inside the surging rush of blood pounding at my temples and inside my chest. Time slowed and crystallized. Finally, the bird opened its beak, a slow moment of beauty in and of itself.

He spoke one word--my name. It was the voice of my younger brother, who had died two months ago. I was shocked at how much one can cry silently if he just stops blinking long enough. He gave me what I could only interpret as an expectant smirk.

An audible gasp broke the spell for an instant, and over the shoulder of his wing I noticed a tired neighbor-lady standing on her balcony across the way. She was smoking a cigarette and wearing what may have been a maid or waitresses dress. The cigarette dangled off her lips in an impossible way, and her mouth hung wide. She had heard the bird speak as well. "Harold? Is that you? Harold?" She shouted, working her way up to a hysterical pitch. Then she stopped, mouthed I love you, and hugged herself with both arms, rocking slowly back and forth, humming an old slow song to herself.

As for the bird, it still had not moved, but now he contracted and burst off the line in one liquid motion, and as his wingspan, impossibly huge, expanded outwards, I saw what may have been an entire galaxy of stars and planets, or blue fire, or melting diamonds, or the memory of my brother and I, throwing a ball for the dog at the park, trading stories. Then it set off in an easterly direction.

Last One Out

Now, my task is almost done...t beginning of it is lost to me, everything is a swirl of tectonic shifts and lava flows, the throes of birth… both mine and Hers—our tasks set before us: Hers was to mother, to create and nurture, mine to shape, carve, erode—our dance has been going for innumerable kalpas, ranges of mountains rise up, and I tear them down with centuries of gales, my breath never ceasing, fighting with my cousin Water for the attention of Earth…Water is weak, spread out, and lacking internal drive; while I, Wind, carve canyons and whistle my shrieks with cavern-mouths until She blushes with longing, joining slowly in my desire, groaning with pleasure for millennia until another mountain range is born—in the past, you may have found the spots where our lovemaking has ground her surface flat, dry, where I have chased even Water away…I do not only exist to destroy however; It is I who brings the breath of life everywhere I travel, cooling Her with breezes, light caresses, blowing zephyrs where she is cold and in need of touch—still, I go about my task, finishing, making sure the job is well done, I have all the time I need…it has been so long since anything moved on Her surface…once it was teeming, now, I have conquered all life, choked it with sand, my victory roar—but it is a hollow one, for I am all alone…in the throes of his death-rattle, Father Sun boiled my liquid cousin away…I tried to save him, to catch as much as I could so he could rain down again, but it was wasn’t enough… Mother Moon lay dull and lifeless, having no light to reflect, and no one to gaze upon… Father scorched my lover’s beautiful skin, leaving nothing but bleached skeletons and cold, endless cold darkness… Faced with such loss, with nothing to nurture, Earth herself lost all hope, and we grew distant, lovers who turned into strangers —then She began to slow…no mountains came…then no new islands…even her tremors stopped: Her internal fire was dying, and there was nothing to be done, whether it was by force of will or just the way of things, it was happening nonetheless, and I, so powerful, could do nothing…I screamed at her to wake up, roared longer and louder than I had ever dreamed I could, but no reply came—she was gone…there is no telling how long I raged for, eons, epochs, perhaps, but when I was done, with nothing but her dead husk to mourn over, I had carved a belt of desert around the diameter of her shell; wearily realizing that my task would be over when I had truly ground her down into flat, efficient uniformity—I was able to clear the western hemisphere simply by remembering her curves in the early days and how now I was erasing them, while it took me several years to finish the Himalayan ranges—I saved the old metropolises for last, as they were the simplest—just some light metals and crystals, with occasional concrete for good measure…now that I know I am done and nothing remains, I release my atmosphere, my own gravity, and drift into nothingness to join Her…how simple it is, how beautiful…I had it within me all along, my task and prison were of my own making, but now it is over: I am resting, ceasing, finally at peace and at an end.

Sore Thumb

That evening, all the streetlamps were wearing halos. Sirens bleated in the cooling air, as the fumes of the city were drawn upwards by incoming coastal breezes. I wasn’t particularly looking forward to walking the dog that night, because it was a restless dusk and also because earlier that day my neighbor from across the alley, Hector, had reminded me that my white-ness made me stick out like a sore thumb. He wasn’t bullshitting me-- he told me straight up, yo. Tatted up and crucifixed, Hector had been to prison. He knew what was what.

I knew what was what as well, it would’ve been hard not to know how badly I stuck out amongst the other residents of Gardenia Street, made up of barely-above poverty line Cambodians, African-Americans, and Mexicans. Yet when he said it, it had made it real—I had been lying low, flying under the radar, but now I had been singled out and made vulnerable. However, Hector was not the type to feel vunerable. He had outlined a plan in which we both got paintball guns and shot at the crackheads from our windows. My thoughts on the subject involved me donning a Kevlar body suit, motorcycle helmet, and a metal pipe in order to really lay the hurt on, but his idea seemed more practical.

Hector had told me to be helpful-- he was an earnest guy, and I liked him. He knew a lot about what went on in the alley. Apparently some crackheads had been smoking rock outside our apartment windows a few nights ago. That wasn’t too surprising, as the alley itself was decorated with abandoned mattresses and derelict couches, liberally colored with spray paint, with weeds and mosquito-larvae spawning pools thrown in for feng-shui. Virtually invisible from any street, it ended abruptly outside my apartment, halfway down the block, and was unlit, so the cops never rolled through. It was a junkie’s dream home, minus all the crack.

All this flickered in the back of my mind while Stella, my six month old boxer, gazed at me with desperately pleading eyes, meaning that she was due evacuate her bowels any second now, making some sort of action on my part unavoidable. I briefly considered how many drug deals I had accidentally witnessed, how many stolen stereos I had seen, out there on the street where there was one long parade of cars with their emergency lights on. The sideways glances I always received from the rest of the street residents unnerved me—were they sizing me up for a later mugging or simply trying to determine if I was an undercover cop or a narc? I understood that I wasn’t welcome here, I had broken the code, was living outside my designated area. Not that it wasn’t a family neighborhood, far from it, children played everywhere in the evening, an impromptu soccer game on the narrow sidewalk where a broken recliner and a discarded car seat formed the goal, and the broken glass that sprung up like flowers were the stationary defenders, to be avoided at all costs.

As much as I would’ve loved to stay indoors, relatively safe, there were other factors to be considered, and I found myself walking the dog out to the sidewalk so I did not have to clean up shit and piss from my floor that night.

I decided against bringing anything except my keys and a steak knife—just the essentials. This was it: I was ready to face my neighborhood, ready to walk my dog. Then, as I was heading out of the complex, over the dirty terra cotta tiles, I happened to glance at my neighbor and his friend relaxing in their den, the open door filling in for an air conditioner. They are a hardworking Mexican family, just like everybody else in the building-- overworked, poor, and certainly distrustful of me (until I got a dog, of course). It was a completely normal scene, except that my neighbor and his friend were both dressed as birthday clowns, full makeup, wigs, and all. Stella’s ears perked, and from the street, a car with its emergency blinkers on was bumping what seemed to be a Spanish version of Avril Lavigne’s hit single from six years back, “Complicated” while a shady character quickly loaded three duffle bags into a dying hatchback.

It wasn’t a question of fitting in here. It wasn’t even about being safe, or unnoticeable. My presence here was strange, but it didn’t matter one goddamned bit to this street. I was only slightly more noticeable than the rusting bicycle frame I was standing next to, just a walking curiosity that broke up the visual monotony. This is just how it is, how it was, and no amount of Kevlar bodysuits or paintball guns was going to change it. With nothing else to do, I laughed quietly and waited for the dog to take a dump.

The Gravity of the Situation

Everyone, this is Lucas. Lucas is in freefall. His hands close and open automatically, searching for something solid to grab hold of. The rush of air is strong, so much so that he cannot open his eyes. If he could, he would see an expanse of clouds, a blanket of soft white wool covering the Pacific Ocean. If Lucas had a altimeter, it would read 27,000....26,570...25,982. Lucas has reached terminal velocity. He holds his breath automatically, because five year olds have not yet forgotten the infant instinct to do so. The instinct for holding your breath when no air is available is a survival mechanism, born of thousands of generations of babies falling into rivers and baths and lakes and oceans. Those who held their breath lived. Sadly, there is no survival mechanism that instructs five-year-olds towheads who are bored on airplanes not to open the emergency doors. Planes haven't been around that long. Lucas doesn’t want to be tumbling through the air, turning over and over, as if unsure of which side is best to present to the rapidly approaching sea.

39,238…

All Lucas ever wanted was to taste the clouds. He is sure, sure, that they taste like marshmallows. It seems perfectly reasonable to him that God created the sky to keep His delectable treats fresh until He needed them. Where does God roast His marshmallows? Probably over the sun. He pictures an old man, wearing a bathrobe, perched on the moon like a stool, with a stick longer than the eye can see, contentedly reaching into earth and pulling out a few clouds, skewering some and taking one and popping it into his galaxy sized mouth, chewing fitfully, bored.

26,786…

This situation might not be so unpleasant for Lucas if not for the lack of breathable air, or at least breathable air that isn't whooshing by him so fast that it would explode his little lungs if he were to open his mouth. Asphyxiation will cause him to pass out before he penetrates the cloud layer. It would be okay if he could hold his Buzz Lightyear toy, or hear his dad snore. Instead, all he hears is the put-put-put of his cheeks, which he cannot feel because of the cold.

38,431…

It was cold in the airplane as well--his mother was ignoring him because he had woken her up by asking about the clouds. She wouldn't tell him whether or not clouds taste like marshmallows, even though he could tell she knew the answer. Lucas wanted to find out. He is a big boy, and big boys don't need help. They are good at sneaking, and Lucas is the sneakiest, he is good at not being noticed by his mother when he slips out of his seat, by the fat man who snores with his stinky mouth open, by the stewardesses who smile fakey mouth-smiles at him, and so, it is with great triumph that he puts his big strong arms on the red lever and pulls.

38,293…

Rarrrrrrrrroooooosh. He gets one second, less than that, maybe, to see how big the clouds are from outside, and how far away the plane is already. Then his eyes cannot open. There is no time to be afraid. Lucas thinks maybe he is flying, wants to breathe, needs to, but he can't force his mouth open. Old instincts are hard to overcome.

23,100…

Everyone, say goodbye to Lucas. He won't find out that he was right--fresh, unpolluted clouds, just on the edge of the atmosphere, whether by divine design or by some strange alchemical coincidence, do taste just like marshmallows.

Ayers Speaks

Time is a song we are all dreaming together. Try to understand, although you cannot. Close your eyes and hear the dreamsong of my creation, how two tribes of snake-people fought over me, their battle digging channels into my stone skin, carving my face, how the blood that spilled stained and shaped me.

It happened long ago. It is happening now. It has yet to happen. Time is a orchestra, a symphony that begins and ends in an instant, yet takes forever to do so. You softquick things, you forget to sing the dream, forget to listen, which I think is why you destroy. It is an anger borne of ignorance, a hatred for what you do not know, for the dreamsong, for your own need to hear it, but this need has been unfulfilled for so long that you seek it through destruction.

Sadly, it works—at moments of great destruction, it swells to a crescendo and the small glimmer of beauty makes you little things happy. But it is but a whisper, a mere hum when compared to the beauty of the dreamsong in the throes of creation, an ecstatic birth of being where everything is beginning and all is melody and even time stops for a moment or two to listen to itself.

Oh, quicksoft creatures, you seek to destroy me as well. You stole my dreamname, Uluru, and calling me by a false one. Even in the face of this insult, I persevere, but the song has become off pitch, tinny, flat.
I could weather these minor slights, impermanent nuisances as they are, if that is all they were. But why, you insignificant parasites, do you steal my listening, my soul, with your tiny flashing boxes? It is a slow, painful thing, and such a small one at first. I didn’t mind nor notice. But eventually, the song grew distant, if only by a infinitesimal fraction. More and more now, certain notes are out of range, bass rumbles that I do not register. At one peak, I even heard silence, and I quaked when faced with its ugly nakedness.

No matter. Soon you will find your own destruction. It is a beautiful song, and you all cry at once when it dawns on you that it is the finale. Filled with flashes of suns and wind and heat, deserts of glass everywhere, burning snow. I am patient, waiting for this part of the song, dreaming it into existence. This is easy to do, for a mountain. Soon, soon. It happened long ago. It is happening now. It has yet to happen.