Issue 22 - 1992

Coe Review • Issue 22
correspond to anything that anyone else ever thought or
apprehended about the thing, so from his point of view he was not
providing non sequiturs to her arousing questions, but rather making
incisive replies which he hoped to remember and turn into a book.
And yet, surprisingly, while formulating these ideal replies,
ideal for both the Pouch Dog’s arousal and his own penchant for
accuracy (though for separate but equal reasons), he dreamed of
lotus-eating, dreamed of unpredictable sex with homosexual
elephants, dreamed of lacing his tongue with tar, so that when he
licked envelope flaps they would fasten securely and not burst
asunder from the perturbations of their contents: in one important
case, a clan of specially bred gerbils, on whose shaved backs was
written correspondence to Timmy the Tubercular Seal’s faithless
mother, whose contacts with divinity turned out to be of the tensile
strength of Silly String and which, having snapped, cast her into
grave, but up to that instant, graveless despair. The writings upon the
blind, hairless gerbils were to the effect of, and actually consisted in
words the same: “Cheer up, for you have at least not ruined my life,
but to put it positively, have improved it, though sometimes when I
express my feelings they are as follows: I hope you consume the
sweet distillation that accretes in the corner of a lemming’s eye when
an infection is brewing there, and that the pungent precipitate tastes
good and becomes a need that rivals your love for sniffing your own
spoor and your wish to breed with a badger. Or feelings such as: I am
a manatee masseur and a carbuncle’s carbuncle, a bidet-breathing,
bolus-blowing, blasphemous blatherskite, who is furthermore
inwardly commanded and extracurricularly doomed to call onto the
terrestrial carpet the God-the-father who has forsaken Me-Mother-
Dear -- Ah, I weep! It is these feelings that are incompatible with the
good job you’ve done unto me, Good Mother!”
These gerbils were signed: “Your masturbating sadist of a
son, Timmy the Tubercular Seal.”
But while Timmy dreamed in such ways, the Pouch Dog
descanted words which were both lacerating to all self-esteem for
miles and also usable to build homes, they were so sturdily
constructed. She asserted that Timmy the Tubercular Seal’s nose
should be ground up and used for perfume, that his ears, though
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