Bob Heman


from INFORMATION

INFORMATION

Knows the first time a check was written in the movies, the first time a taxi driver was portrayed by a black man, the first time a woman was shown wearing pants. Knows the first time the moon was shown in the sky. Knows the first time a scientist's laboratory became part of the plot. Knows the first word that was ever spoken.


INFORMATION

Knows there's a story behind one of the doors, a story that will contain blood or a mirror or a woman who is waiting to punish him, that will contain an animal that must be described using numbers or an incomplete set of colors, that uses the idea of pain only as a first step to a revelation about the efficacy of words, or of the punishment strap, to give his life a new meaning.


INFORMATION

They will eat the dead. They will eat their own hands. They will eat the machines that look like trees, and the water that trickles out of the sky. They will eat the dreams that might have saved them, and the words that try to explain it all. They will eat the future even before it is able to arrive.


INFORMATION

Sometimes a man is added to the plot so she won't have to drive alone. He might be dressed like a farmer or a sailor or a traveling salesman. She does not notice that he is wearing a mask, so she never wonders who he might really be. Somehow the distance never gets any closer.


INFORMATION

The pieces can be arranged differently each time. Sometimes the woman is placed where the priest is supposed to stand. Sometimes there are rabbits hiding in the car the bears drive. Each time the sign says the name of a different city. Each time the milk wagon arrives too late, or is filled instead with cantaloupes or honeydews.


INFORMATION

Is able to tell a story using radishes or small stones. Is able to tell the story of the man before he became a man. Is able to return to the barn where the story began. Is able to enter the stories of others, but is never more than a fragment of the real story.


INFORMATION

If they are afraid it means they were given the wrong word. If they are happy it means they were given the wrong body. If they are sad it means they are in the wrong building. If they are hungry it means that they chose the wrong door.


INFORMATION

Is afraid to touch the dead. Is afraid to touch the living. Is afraid to touch the air. Is afraid to touch the ocean, or the fire that resembles us. Is afraid to touch the earth from which we were formed. Is afraid to touch the machine that gives us life. Is afraid to touch himself, or the shadows that we leave behind. Is afraid to touch the only memories that inhabit us. Is always afraid. Always.


INFORMATION

The lighthouse reappears in the story about giraffes. There are almost enough women in the forest to fill the boat. They were never able to explain the clouds that hovered over their heads. They didn't understand that they were only a metaphor.


INFORMATION

They say it is night even though it is not. They claim the car is a hippo and that the forest is only painted on. They think that speech is only possible using the words printed on the page. They think the color red is an aberration, and that counting is a way of measuring the sky. They understand that the woman is no longer an explanation.


INFORMATION

Thinks the truck is more powerful than it really is. Uses the rope and the ax to save the children. Tells stories about the barn later on, after the children have children of their own, and the birds are only a fading memory.


INFORMATION

The mechanical heart allows the tree to live again. Each night the barn is affixed to a different place on the mountain. The bears are never allowed to use the boats. Instead they must imitate the process of walking as they try to make the distance disappear.


INFORMATION

Removes the body from the sitting room so he can sit. Removes the windows so the forest can enter, and the ceiling so the sky can be seen. If there are cows he knows it is summer. If there is a machine he knows the night will soon approach. The words he says would be appropriate at any time.


INFORMATION

Never wonders how the pecans get out of their shells and into the can. Never wonder why the flowers in the vase are always yellow. Never wonders where the bears went. Never wonders why the women are all given the same line to speak. Never wonders if the horizon is real. Never wonders if the machine will start working again.

Bob Heman continues to be filled with information.

 
 

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