The Rote of Spring

Coleman Edward Dues

that’s the way that it goes:

the

it

ripping down the

way,

the

way

billowing around the

it,

the fireball

going,

the whimpering

going

of it all, and that

that

that’s there always, an orphaned index warped into a fatal arrow . . . that that’s the way that it goes in the unthinkable ritual of breaking, the continuum qua the lack thereof, the unthinkable ritual of shitting on yourself and laying in it and keeping the chair anyways, the unthinkable ritual of dying all over yourself and being laid in it and we’re keeping the chair anyways, or the frazzled prophesying and the frantic boredom, the maudlin ambient music intended for meditation or yoga used provisionally to “pass to the other side” but nonetheless periodically interrupted by Geico advertisements, the question is he dead yet and the fact of being dead yet or the fact of laying in the chair so as to be similarly, yet not quite, dead yet, or the rigid stillness of candleflame, and the primeval stillness of rooms, that it was so repelling as to remind one of desire, the reality of the constancy of a dim flame burning in near-suspension while the entire world and the entire world’s darkness seemed to gather around it, of meaning being the stigmata upon matter such that we name it so as to wound it, the unthinkable ritual of petering out, the fact that we wound it, the unthinkable ritual of disintegrating in November, or the totally fucked ecstasy of the dying, that the dying can be conceived of as melting into gore and grinning in it, and swooning, with little windshield wipers pumping over their cracked, plastic eyes, hypnotic swirls in place of their weepy, swollen eyes, red raining inside their mouths like weather and burning syrup, or that the dying can be imagined as dying how they’re supposed to die, weepy eyes in place of their hypnotic swirls, their anguish their anguish, the weather the weather, the world the world, or the reality of our very suppositions about the dying, or the reality of the propositions that they levy with their deaths, the fact that it was a massage chair, that realistic movies aren’t real enough for the dying, for the needy dying when their dying is a gap, for the greedy dying when their dying is a glut, or that it wasn’t even spring but that death declaims its own spring regardless, that death is the night sky of its own almanac anyways, and that the grief gets giddy, that the grief girds, that every space between every word is the grief, that there are no original thoughts on dying though there are original feelings, that an original thought on dying is candy-apple red and moves at a speed faster than any real number, that an original thought on dying is driven by a winking nun with a tattoo that says shhhh, that the dread-whimsy of time is atomic because the dread-whimsy of time is its meaning, and the reality of being born on the island of Galveston, the eternal fact of the Gulf and the eternal fact of engulfment and the ancient fact of the bayou but the absence of its verb, that its secret verb is how to vanish forever without moving a muscle, that its transcendental verb is adios in brackish rainbows, that

galveston o galveston i’m so afraid of dying,

that he isn’t simply dead but very, very complicatedly dead, and no not the funeral but the fact that they threw darts afterwards will have been being true.

And that that familiar bouquet of beer and butts and breath will have been hanging over everything, that that smell will have been sitting on everything like somebody quiet and heavy and patient will have been being true from before Reno’s Karaoke and Pool Bar had a name. It will have been being familiar from before there was anyone to be familiar with it. From before there was any Reno to name it Reno’s, from before “Reno” was even a name at all, it will have been being a fact that it will have been being a dive bar. It will have been being a total dive from before its plunge into total existence. Someone down the street with two limousines parked in front of their three-bedroom home will have been being the alleged owner of Reno’s. The limousines will have been being parked one behind the other on a round driveway, two glamorous tangents on a cracked half-circle flanked with hardy, dark grasses. As if to supply a complicated, more mature symmetry to the scene, two matching jet skis will have been resting on a lopsided trailer dispatched toward the upper-right of the small lawn. It won’t have been being known whether any Reno was there or not. The wooden slats of Reno’s Karaoke and Pool Bar will have been being full of dancing cowboy silhouettes, transferred there by blue neon and Budweiser lamps. From before its plunge into total existence, the idea of Reno’s will have been being one that clicked in some number of swooning heads, and likewise the idea of Lonestar beer will have been being the condition for the primeval fact of Lonestar beer, whence heads that spin and women on dancefloors that twirl. In the unconscious of everything, in the very void between everything’s atoms, Reno’s Karaoke and Pool Bar will have been checking bags at the door and confiscating small hunting knives, returning them upon exiting into the parking lot of a strip mall.

galveston o galveston . . .

W’s hair will have been being a sort of dirty-blond, long, stringy. Later that night he will have been performing his black-metal rendition of Vanessa Carlton’s “A Thousand Miles” before being escorted out for sneaking a knife past the bouncer and then flashing it at someone, not quite menacingly but idiotically. Beneath its high ceilings, the huge tableaux of cigarette smoke will have been drifting through Reno’s like kites tethered to the lips of the hundred patrons. They’ll have been lighting and burning an entire rainbow’s-worth of Marlboros, first the reds, then the golds, etc., lighting and burning and burning, the folk drama of combustion. A shitty ’90s mustang will have been revving its engine in the distant strip mall parking lot—distant because Reno’s will have been being long rather than wide, and also L-shaped. A cowboy with an eight-ball in his pocket will have been climbing into his Ford F-350, practically jumping into it, and other folks will have been marching into the bar with every intention of leaving three hours later in the exact same manner and state as he.

when the temperatures drop, we’re turning it up [engine revving]! when you hang that left [tires screeching] we’ll be doing you right [slide guitar], cause when there’s uptown traffic [blaring car horn] we play that downhome [cowbell] country [indistinct animal bleating] music [man yodeling, gunshot, shattering window, police siren]! for all the full-moon-howlers, this is ge-ge’s suede yowler, at 707.9, the rambler.

And draped in a waterproof “Salt Life” fishing shirt, W will have been waiting in the passenger seat. The cowboy with the eight-ball, G, will have been presenting the eight-ball along with a big, red straw, probably from a Sonic (Sonic will have been being “America’s Drive-In”). He’ll have been scooping the cocaine into the straw—Tilt your head back—and W will have been sniffing it from the straw, still sticky from a different kind of Coke, as G administers it. They’ll have been snuffing in rupture-like bursts with a fierceness no other than the spirit of the nose:

. . . G, it’ll have been being true from before Reno’s Karaoke and Pool Bar had a name, I’ll just have been skipping the table’s edge like a stray shot and rolling in the lamplight, crossing the damp dark and the damp dark and the dark, the dark, dark, and what have you, I’ll just’ve been getting so stoned . . .

. . . “we don’t wear sequins ’cause we think we’re great,” goes a quote attributed to cosmic country legend gram parsons, “we wear them ’cause we think sequins are great” . . .

. . . W, you won’t’ve been knowing jackshit about lamplight ’cept that’s what blinded you, you’ll have been forgetting everything you know about damp dark from before you ducked out of it, you stupid hillbilly. You’ll just’ve been being a stupid hick you stupid hick. Little drunken country boy, there will have been being many drunken country boys, there will have been being glissandos of being across ’em that leave ’em gone, gone away, their dim histories will have been being proof of concept for a certain keyboard. The unthinkable ritual of keeling over will have been being. Sniff . . .

. . . Well, I’ll’ve been smoking cigarettes, and then, I’ll’ve been understanding cigarettes. It’ll’ve been being a poor, lizard dream . . .

. . . of all the bands that parsons was a part of, the flying burrito brothers is probably the one that we remember him for—even today in the country music hall of fame, his iconic nudie suit (visible on the cover of the 1969 album the gilded palace of sin), made of white sequin and embroidered with poppy flowers, oxycotin, and fully nude women, is on display just around the corner from a whole host of legendary guitars, banjos, fiddles, and other ephemera from the history of the genre, including elvis presley’s diamond-dusted cadillac . . .

. . . The world will always have been being a place where words have lost their sense, that’ll’ve been being the tension of moonlight

[keyboard solo] . . .

. . . Yeah but what about the ugly nun that whipped me, into what Latin will she have been evaporating? And the dead owl we found in the white belltower, toward what asymptote? . . .

. . . but, what’s usually missing from the conversation about the infamous sequins is that they weren’t originally created for the flying burrito brothers, or the byrds, or even parsons’s early project the international submarine band. around the same time that he started recording with the flying burrito brothers, he was quietly writing songs with another, almost-forgotten band: ge-ge’s suede yowler . . .

. . . Intellectuals’ll’ve been being photographed while sitting down, and likewise, police while standing up. Hillbillies will’ve been being photographed lying on their backs. You’ll’ve been walking around with that knife like Jim Bowie, barefoot and all, and then boom! the cops are in your wetware. Listen, this story will have been being the dead owl’s story . . .

. . . There’ll’ve been being these hunting knives for sale, everywhere in every world, on either side of every door, there’ll’ve been being knives of every inch for sale, the void between atoms will have been being the Christian god’s slashed windpipe. And if there’s a West Virginia, then maybe there’ll’ve been being a West Me, I hope . . .

. . . in the liner notes to stardust special—which is the only studio album ever released by ge-ge’s suede yowler—parsons writes that “our gossamers aren’t just sensationalistic—they’re beatific.” but, despite the existence of an entire studio album, we still don’t know who the “our” in that statement refers to: strangely, the album doesn’t list the names of any personnel, making it so that parson’s vocals are the only clue as to who might have played in the band. . .

. . . W, I hope if there’s any Virginia then you’ll’ve been being the angel’s share . . .

. . . G, I hope if there’s an East Texas, then we'll've been being drunk and high and east in it . . .

. . . nonetheless, “our” sequins were apparently the idea of parsons and his mysterious bandmates, whoever they were, as alluded to in a note written in parsons’s handwriting that was recently discovered in an archive of his personal belongings: “mr. [nudie] cohn is gonna dress [ge-ge’s suede yowler] like to have been swimming in silver moonlight, with pills and poppy blossoms and beautiful women floating around us like angels. [. . .] what we do, what we record, is sacred” . . .

. . . Quit doing that shit with your hands, someone’ll’ve been thinking you got Tourette’s or something, bouncing off the walls and shit. Shit, it’ll’ve been starting my mind to grieving, these shallow roots and shallow pools. Water table’s so damn high we won’t even’ve been being able to bury him . . .

. . . He’ll have been buying a house with a fish like Jesus and calling it the fish-house, we might ought’t’ve been frying the house and eating our histories for dinner. That way everyday’ll’ve been being Good Friday, good lord. You can’t spell truth without two crucifixes, that’s how the priest’ll’ve been talking . . .

. . . this sort of ethereal imagery occupies ge-ge’s suede yowler throughout stardust special, but the best example is the song “the ballad of galveston bay.” in parsons’s shaky, nearly pleading baritone, the song begins: ♫ the light of oil-rigs spoke to us / in tongues of gossamer / and bade we disinfect ourselves / we snakes and gossipers. / their bouncing, flitting bodies / gleamed like silver in our brains. / they took us on their phallic ship, / unraveled us like skein. ♫ here “gossamer” shows up again like in the liner notes, flashing at the listener like the twinkling telecasters behind it. the pedal steel (played in a style very close to buddy emmons’s) flexes in weird, banshee tones, almost adding what emmylou harris’s supporting vocals do on parsons’s solo projects . . .

. . . All that’ll’ve been being left is the chimney anymore. And every step will have been being a prison break. Eventually, the prison’ll’ve been being in your veins and your meat. I just can’t cool off, that’s how I’ll’ve been talking . . .

. . . . . . But our heads will have been going coniferous? . . . . . .

. . . . . . by the song’s end, ge-ge’s ufo ballad turns into a murder one: ♫ i woke up on the shoreline / next to her in galveston. / they say she drowned, but near they found / a rod of halogen!! ♫ the instrumental outro, though, overshadows the narrative aspect of the song: it uses movements and structures that predicted what we today call drone music, ambient music, or any number of genres that start with the prefix “post.” even composer igor stravisnky, then in his final years, said about the song that “[c]ontrary to its simple compositional elements, which are allied most closely with the folk musics of africa and the americas, its moods are more sophisticated than the work of any living composer of which i am aware” . . .

. . . Yes, our heads’ll’ve been going coniferous. Once, I’ll have been slipping a broadhead through a ten-point like buttercream. And the deer will have been stooping its pretty neck for a tuft of grass like he never died before . . .

. . . Once, cousin will’ve have been blowing a deer to bone splinters. Sniff, I’ll just’ve been floating on a dead cow down a dead bayou . . .

. . . what’s more, just as the album has no personnel, the song doesn’t have a runtime. nobody is sure how long the album is, though music historians agree that it is, in fact, music. it’s hard to say whether the album ever ended, or whether it ever began, or whether or not it’s still playing right now. after listening, some have reported an experience similar to the feeling of a dream rapidly vacating the conscious memory upon waking. even yesterday in the country music hall of fame, parson’s infamous corpse will have been appearing and reappearing inside of his infamous sequins . . .

. . . That’ll have been being the Christian god’s collapsed vein. The whole world will have been barreling like Dale Earnhardt. And we’ll have been constellating zeros, and we’ll have been counting upwards yet . . .

. . . . . . Sniff . . . . . .

. . . but, rather than in galveston, texas, it was in joshua tree national park that ge-ge’s found their muse. although unknown until recently, parsons embarked on multiple solo trips to joshua tree throughout the late sixties and early seventies, apart from those with margaret fisher and phil kaufman. much of the material for stardust special was written and recorded during this period, all the way up until just before parsons’s death by morphine overdose on september 19, 1973.

a photograph suspected to have been taken just days before he was pronounced dead shows parsons in front of the characteristic rock formations of the region at an indiscernible time of day. on the back of the photo (in handwriting belonging to someone other than parsons) there is a message that reads, “on the 0th of november—all alone together—we’ll have been shimmying our way—into it!” in the background of the image, a small desert bird thought to have been extinct for over thirty years at the point that the photo was taken is perched atop a piece of signage that wasn’t installed by the parks department until the mid-nineteen-nineties. even tomorrow in the country music hall of fame, when your mouth hangs it will have been hanging agape like the mouths of a dying man; even tomorrow in the country music hall of fame, when your hand rests it will have been resting like the hands of a dying man on either side of his deathbeds; even tomorrow in the country music hall of fame, when your tongue drinks it will have been drinking like the parched tongues of a dying man; even tomorrow in the country music hall of fame, your voice whispering will have been whispering in the obscure voices of a dying man; even tomorrow in the country music hall of fame, your eyes crying will have been crying the tears of a dying man who fears his deaths; even tomorrow in the country music hall of fame, the mire will have been capturing your feet like the camera your footage. you will have been being gone like you are everywhere now: on the 0th of november

and there will have been being a radio full of darkness, there will have been being a radio full of darkness, there will have been being a radio full of darkness, there will have been being a radio full of darkness, the dread-whismy of time is atomic because the dread-whimsy is its meaning, and there will have been being a radio full of darkness, there will have been being a radio full of darkness, there will have been being a radio full of darkness.