The sirens sing the same names as last night. At the edge of town, where the
outbound ends, a shadow dressed in rain walks alongside cemetery rows of
expired parking meters. At the traffic light on the corner, the ghostly
figure crosses the empty street, steps over the tracks, and descends a long
flight of stairs. At the bottom, there’s an old walkway. Steam rises from
cracks in the concrete, streams of heat flowing beneath the street. At the
end of the walk, there’s a large break in the pavement. The soaked traveller
walks to the opening and sits down. He moves his legs into the hole, and
lowers his body through.
Below the street, in the forgotten reaches of the subway system is
Underland-a shantytown inhabited by a population of winos, drug addicts,
maniac drifters, and early releases. They exist outside the
machine-phantoms, who belong nowhere: no world, no way of life, no
particular time or place.
Malachi lives here. His beard is white, and his matching mane of hair falls
down his back like a small avalanche. He’s in from the storm after another
day of hovering on street corners, whispering hopeful songs into the deaf
ears of a thousand fearful souls.
He’s relieved to be away from the thoughts and prayers of the hopeless.
Malachi is burned out from too many years of reducing every image to its
essential elements: from light to dark, line to space, phrase to phrase-all
taken apart, scrutinized, and screamed into. Waiting for something to come
back: an answer, an explanation, anything other than an empty echo dying
away against the nervous noise of the city.
_____
Once, others like Malachi had lived in this subterranean world, but they had
lost hope and drifted away-vanished into the gray twilight of infinity. Now,
Malachi Wolff is the last angel in Underland.
This place is his shelter from the outside world-a place to get away from
the jarring dissonance of human reflection. Bottles, needles, crack pipes,
and the relaxing fact of madness blunt the volume of thoughts in this
vagabond village.
Malachi has spent untold time languishing in his empty outline of an earthly
body. Now he wonders if there is anything else to be done-one more reason to
stay here in this crumbling shack by these static steel rails to nowhere.
_____
Dee is asleep, crumpled in her cardboard cottage like dirty laundry. The
residents of Underland are “architects of necessity”, magicians of
construction, who can imagine a cardboard box into a house. Abracadabra… a
refrigerator, once in a box, is now in a house-a human, once in a house, is
now in a box.
Dee is a crack addict-thirty years old going on sixty. Sometimes, she brings
Malachi a cup of hot tea, and sits next to him while he drinks. She talks
about Freddie. He was her man until they found him, one morning, propped
against a wall like he was waiting for a bus-frozen solid.
Malachi walks over to Dee’s place and sits in a frazzled lawn chair. He
stares out into the gloom, and tries to shut down some of the circuits that
are buzzing inside his head. Gradually, he enters a half-awake dream state.
Behind ice-blue eyes Malachi’s mind tracks a monochrome slide show of words
and broken images:
Supernatural powers> falling towers> fear in the air> reason runs scared>
nihilistic existentialists> suicide flights> into the light> of paradise>
last dust of reason> streaming> through city streets> globalization> United
Nations> coming undone> God bless us> every one> the walking dead> crack
heads> inebriated> incapacitated> annihilated> fucked up> falling down>
crawling around> shattered> scattered> lights out> passed out> in abandoned
buildings> train stations> bus stations> a cardboard box> detox> inside>
outside> down by> homicide> suicide> overdosed> cold exposed> overloaded>
city morgues> tiny stainless steel> freezer doors> gurneys overflowing> with
a thousand> tagged toes> a bloody> black and white> slide show…
Suddenly, Malachi is fully awake. He gets to his feet, and begins to walk
back and forth, mumbling to himself.
Dee’s voice comes out of the dark.
“Malachi, are you okay?”
“What’s that?” says Malachi, as he turns toward Dee, a preoccupied
expression on his face.
“Is there something you want?” asks Dee, walking over to where he’s
standing.
“Want?” says Malachi.
He runs his right hand through his hair as if he’s considering the question.
“Yes, I want to give up this divine existence. I want to terminate this time
without end. I want to live in the present-in the moment. I want to feel-to
know the same fears the people know.”
Malachi pauses.
Then, in a low voice he adds, “How can I help, if I don’t know?”
Dee has no idea what Malachi is rambling about, but he looks so unhappy she
takes his hand and lays her head against his shoulder. For a few seconds,
they stand this way.
“I’m going for a walk.” says Malachi, “Why don’t you try to get back to
sleep?”
“No way.” says Dee, “I’m gonna heat some water, and make myself a cup of
coffee.”
“I’ll be back later.” says Malachi, heading off into the perpetual dusk.
_____
Malachi is halfway through the tunnel when he feels the steel rails shudder,
and hears the ear-piercing screech of metal on metal. He turns and squints
into the oncoming light. An angry look in his eyes, he drops to his knees
and tilts his head back as far as it will go. With both fists clenched, he
extends his arms over his head and screams:
“Let me know, or let me go!”
The ground shakes as the subway train rips through every molecule of
Malachi’s body, leaving not a mark. His eternal heart goes on beating…out of
habit. His unstoppable mind continues to fire…simply because it can. But
there is no enlightenment-no epiphany-no flash of righteous light to show
the way.
Malachi’s body trembles as he looks back over his shoulder and watches the
last car disappear into the shadows. With an obvious effort, he gets to his
feet, turns, and starts walking along the oily gravel and crossties…
following the inbound back into the city.
ROBERT JOHNSON
TAMPA RED
DUANE ALLMAN
MIKE BLOOMFIELD
FREDDIE KING
BONNIE RAITT
DAVID GILMOUR
SONNY LANDRETH
ROBBEN FORD
WES MONTGOMERY
