Irony
When Borges Fought the Civil War

Irony

As things have happened, and I have been returned to the place I used to call home, I sit in a pink room with a diminishing view of the ocean and recall a particular event for no apparent reason at all.

It was a brisk day and just at dusk. There was an event. A speaker had come to the school. The auditorium was full and the lights were dimmed. The speaker was covered in tattoos and currently surrounded by a security detail of expensive bicycles and brightly colored hats.

Many people sat around and looked sort of glum. They wanted to talk to this man, to become important friends. They wanted to say things to him, and when they were finished saying them, they wanted him to nod in approval. They wanted to talk to him but he was always already talking to somebody else. They watched him with envy and a certain amount of hunger in their eyes.

It was a much anticipated event.

Midway through his talk, the man suggested that we engage in a bout of group meditation.

"Ah yes!" everyone cried. "I was just about to do that anyways."

The lights were muted even more. Everyone sat in the auditorium and listened to the man speak.

"Relax," he said, "go deep into yourself and find an inner peace. It is quite easy and cool to do. I do it all the time. Find your inner peace. Find your quiet. Meditate. "

Everyone closed their eyes and considered how at peace they were. There was an itch but nobody dared to scratch it. There was a cough but it was terribly repressed.

Everyone felt quite obliged to be completely at peace.

The man stood behind a podium. His face was lit white by his computer. He read from words on the screen.

Outside it was fall. Dried leaves blew around the empty courtyard to prove it. The Moon hung low in the sky and always during this time of year there was a sense of loneliness and melancholy; a dark, excited twinge below your ribs. Nearby there were a series of graveyards.

I remember the evening well. I remember closing my eyes and unclenching my hands. I resisted the itch. Stifled the cough. And I remember going down into myself, and touching upon a great sea of shattering rage.

When Borges Fought the Civil War

And beyond that there were folds of thick cloth, some soft and some soiled. There were movements and the erratic sounds of popping balloons. There was 25 years of strangely passed time that he could not predict.

The man sighed and leaned further against the tree. Indeed as the days passed, he knew less and less. “I have forgotten…” And he tried to remember what it was he had forgotten.

“There was a great thing inside of me but now it is gone. I cannot remember what it was.”

And as he leaned against the tree, hour by hour and day by day, as the seasons changed and he began to darken, to eventually rust, he developed new companions altogether, utterly devoid of intentions one might see. And it was among this flock, the crumpled bag, a rolling paper plate, some greasy waxed paper tossed aside of half eaten food; these that came tumbled and blown to him by the light summer's breeze.

It was among this new way that he could not recall he had forgotten of soul.

“I'm bored,” said the trash at his feet. They rustled and lifted themselves in discontent. They waited for something to happen. But he only continued to stand there. To stand and say: 

“Yes. Yes. I am bored too."

And he recalled a brown horse he had once owned, long long ago.

“How long?” The horse had asked him one evening, his head hung over the gate, amidst the heat of burning stables.

**

Everyone agreed he had been a great man and after his death a statue was erected in the city park.

Kevin Luna divides his life between San Francisco and Stockholm, Sweden. He is the author of the blog An Immediate Account of the Busy Cafe (busyc.tumblr.com) and puts out the zine PETBOOKS twice a year.


His work has been included in publications such as deAdbeat vol. I and the RYC's Real Young Regionalism.