He whispers, undulating: comforts me: he will take care of
me now.
*
130
The contracts are signed. I have been breath-fucked, undulated,
through several intimate talks on the phone. The phone is
slobbered over, whispered over, bits of spit are the silent dissent. In my throat there is a lump the size of a man’s fist.
*
My throat has a rock in it, busting the seams of my neck: each
breathe-pause-breathe is a word lying down there to die,
to decompose, to be a pile of dead bone fragmented in the
throat. Each breathy hello, each breathy sentence about he is a
hero, he is a rescuer, he is a genius, he is a savior, pulls its way
past the rock, bone, graveyard of words not said, remarks not
made, a woman’s slow death, the familiar silence, the choking,
the breathy death. Oh, so quiet, so timid, so wordless, so deferential. It is the only way to absorb, to honor, to recognize, to survive, his immeasurable greatness, his sublime intelligence,
his magnificent sensibility, his superbly-intuitive understanding. Breathtaking qualities: breathtaking love: of an editor for a writer: of a man for a woman: you are so wonderful, I say.
Undulating, he knows.
*
In my throat there is a lump the size of a man’s fist. In my
throat there is a rock the size of my tears. In my throat unsaid
words lie down to die: they are buried there: the writer is
dying: the woman is being reborn. Oh, says the breathy little
thing, you are so wonderful.
*
The air tries to push past the fist of tears. It comes out in a
rush, having had to push through. Oh, says the air having
rushed past the swollen lump in the throat, oh— breathe—
breathe— pause— a tear silently dies, a word dies— oh, you are
so wonderful.
His voice undulates, confident, melodious, whispery, I try not
to have to talk to him, the phone rings: I have begun already
to be afraid: he never says who he is: the undulating voice says
and slow like a four-syllable word, the inflection going up and
down singsong: and he begins talking: it is invariably chivalrous— I thought you would like, I thought you would like, to know, I remembered that you like, I protected you from, I
131
saved you from, I remembered that you wanted, I was thinking
about you and wanted to know if you wanted— but the voice
undulates: like there is some secret: the voice of someone whispering a secret: each time I think it is an obscene phone call but something warns me and I don’t hang up, I am courteous and
quiet, I listen, and it goes on and on, this undulating voice,
and then he says something recognizable, businesslike, but in
