The pilgrim and whale king shuffle through the stifling, labyrinthine confines of the subway station. They slowly ascend a set of stairs surrounded by mooing pedestrians who swipe their tails with agitation. The whale king and pilgrim hesitate too long at the security bars of the exit.
The bovines shove and hustle them towards the light. As they emerge from the dark subway station, the brilliant Phoenician hue of the twilight sky sets the skyline of the sunset city in sharp relief. It looks like a post-card, the whale king thinks. A tear forms in his eye.
Meanwhile, the pilgrim inflates a small bubble of pink gum. The globule explodes just as the whale king's gaze is broken by the boisterous honking of horns and the whizzing of relentless city traffic. The cattle moo angrily as the steers (predominantly) steer their vehicles around the whale king's macrocephalian mass.
The heinous traffic finally subsides when the cattle guard is revealed via autonomous machines set to shift with the changing lights of an elaborate traffic-signal. The guard divides the street from the avenue indescribably. For a brief moment the whale king and pilgrim are able to scuttle over to the sidewalk before the cows in the perpendicular cattle chute are released.
The sidewalk is no reprieve from the city's phenomenal pace. Bovines buzz by blithely blowing bubbles beget by bubblegum bought blindly behind brothel-beset boulevards because butts banter bellicose beside brimming billion-dollar bills. You foul minx, alliteration! I thought my rainbow blast destroyed you long ago the whale king mentally mutters to himself as the Cosmic Corpuscular Cattle corral past him.
The whale king and pilgrim stare upward at the Speckled Spiral. The agonizing alliteration of the amorphous (polymorphous?) crowd seems to dissipate as they stare at the spiral.
"A city of great sights..." The pilgrim cheerfully points out to the whale king. The whale king turns and prepares to grin at her CHEERFUL SMILE. Yet, like two beams of an upside-down equilateral triangle being turned right-side up, his eyes shift unconsciously when he gazes at her. Her CHEERFUL SMILE is dramatically twisted into a disgusted grimace. Within moments he knows why. The foul stench of urine burns their noses inaudibly irritating inner-cores. "..and awful smells." She finishes her sentence despite the mouthful of bile.
As she chokes down her disgust, the pilgrim thinks to her self ponderously. What would happen if there were never any corpuscular cows at all here. Would the sun rise or would it set? Who's to say. Whose to say.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
The Whale King Journey: Episode 5, The Big Tuna
The floating sunset city is a city of sin and faith. A city of love and hate. A binary bungalow of two options: chew bubble gum or kick ass.
The whale king and pilgrim quickly unwrap two packages of chewy pink strips. Big League pouches come in handy for these moments. A sizeable pink bubble slowly forms out of the whale king's blow-hole. The pilgrim rides atop the whale kings bubble and blows a similar form. The weight of her body gently deflates the whale king’s pink globule of air. As she descends her bubble pops explosively. She carefully reforms the sticky shrapnel of Big League into a chewable polygon and happily throws it back into her mouth like a show-off with a grape.
The skyline of the floating sunset city is truly impressive. Ivory Towers and Onyx Skyscrapers loom over the city's shimmering streets. The streets lie atop enchanted bedrock. The bedrock, wrenched from the sea floor, floats gently in the air. The sun shines golden on the purple horizon.
The floating sunset city is said to be a last ditch effort by the Atlantians. The onslaught of Squidish Squadrons had left Atlantis in ruins. As the Giant Squids descended into the city's core, the wise and brave sorcerers of Atlantis opted to make the ultimate sacrifice. Rather than leave the city's advanced technology in the hands of the wretched Giant Squids and their mysterious leader the old Squid, the sorcerers formed a powerful deus ex machina. The Giant Squids did not anticipate the sudden and vaudevillian disappearance of Ancient Atlantis, a city they considered ripe for plunder (they lovingly referred to it as the Big Tuna). The Atlantians drowned in the sky and the remaining Squids suffered a similar fate (or plummeted to their deaths.) The magnificent city was soon found by the Cattle of Crepuscular Light. The cattle had been living as nomadic sky-pirates, floating on their great Bovine Barges. Wherever they went the sun soon set. Wherever they stayed the sun remained hung in confusion between night and day.
The whale king thinks of the Lost City of Atlantis as he approaches. Surely this great Floating Sunset City is proof of the tale's veracity. What mysteries does the city hold? How powerful must its residents be? How much ass do they kick whilst chewing bubble gum?
In the distance the whale king and pilgrim see the great Speckled Spiral. The spiral's dramatic coloration alludes to the city's massive bovine population. Massive in size and numbers, the bovinic bellows of the Colossal Crepuscular Cattle can be heard far more than five times a day. Their mooing is directed at the very atom of the city, the Speckled Spiral. Nearby the Spiral, on WIDE STREET, the business bovines shout "MOOO! Mooo!" frantically as the cow stockholders lick their nostrils anxiously. Approaching, the whale king and pilgrim see the lighted torch and veiled udders of the Bos Babe. Her figure is carved from ivory and inset with onyx. Her torch is lit continually. It can also be repurposed as a flame-throwing device during a bombardment, especially from Wyrms and Dragons of all varieties.
The whale king and pilgrim stare in awe at these things. Yet, the city’s magnificent beauty is coupled with an olfactory assault. Their noses twist and turn as the the floating sunset city nears them (for they can move no futher, transfixed in space and time.) Through their pain, they realize they have not even reached their destination. They are merely in Guernsey City. It costs them six dollars to ride the Mootro into the Big Tuna. The stale air of the station greets them like a dusty mummy’s tomb. As the two journeyers ascend the stairs into the city, the sun sets anew.
The whale king and pilgrim quickly unwrap two packages of chewy pink strips. Big League pouches come in handy for these moments. A sizeable pink bubble slowly forms out of the whale king's blow-hole. The pilgrim rides atop the whale kings bubble and blows a similar form. The weight of her body gently deflates the whale king’s pink globule of air. As she descends her bubble pops explosively. She carefully reforms the sticky shrapnel of Big League into a chewable polygon and happily throws it back into her mouth like a show-off with a grape.
The skyline of the floating sunset city is truly impressive. Ivory Towers and Onyx Skyscrapers loom over the city's shimmering streets. The streets lie atop enchanted bedrock. The bedrock, wrenched from the sea floor, floats gently in the air. The sun shines golden on the purple horizon.
The floating sunset city is said to be a last ditch effort by the Atlantians. The onslaught of Squidish Squadrons had left Atlantis in ruins. As the Giant Squids descended into the city's core, the wise and brave sorcerers of Atlantis opted to make the ultimate sacrifice. Rather than leave the city's advanced technology in the hands of the wretched Giant Squids and their mysterious leader the old Squid, the sorcerers formed a powerful deus ex machina. The Giant Squids did not anticipate the sudden and vaudevillian disappearance of Ancient Atlantis, a city they considered ripe for plunder (they lovingly referred to it as the Big Tuna). The Atlantians drowned in the sky and the remaining Squids suffered a similar fate (or plummeted to their deaths.) The magnificent city was soon found by the Cattle of Crepuscular Light. The cattle had been living as nomadic sky-pirates, floating on their great Bovine Barges. Wherever they went the sun soon set. Wherever they stayed the sun remained hung in confusion between night and day.
The whale king thinks of the Lost City of Atlantis as he approaches. Surely this great Floating Sunset City is proof of the tale's veracity. What mysteries does the city hold? How powerful must its residents be? How much ass do they kick whilst chewing bubble gum?
In the distance the whale king and pilgrim see the great Speckled Spiral. The spiral's dramatic coloration alludes to the city's massive bovine population. Massive in size and numbers, the bovinic bellows of the Colossal Crepuscular Cattle can be heard far more than five times a day. Their mooing is directed at the very atom of the city, the Speckled Spiral. Nearby the Spiral, on WIDE STREET, the business bovines shout "MOOO! Mooo!" frantically as the cow stockholders lick their nostrils anxiously. Approaching, the whale king and pilgrim see the lighted torch and veiled udders of the Bos Babe. Her figure is carved from ivory and inset with onyx. Her torch is lit continually. It can also be repurposed as a flame-throwing device during a bombardment, especially from Wyrms and Dragons of all varieties.
The whale king and pilgrim stare in awe at these things. Yet, the city’s magnificent beauty is coupled with an olfactory assault. Their noses twist and turn as the the floating sunset city nears them (for they can move no futher, transfixed in space and time.) Through their pain, they realize they have not even reached their destination. They are merely in Guernsey City. It costs them six dollars to ride the Mootro into the Big Tuna. The stale air of the station greets them like a dusty mummy’s tomb. As the two journeyers ascend the stairs into the city, the sun sets anew.
The Whale King Journey: Episode 4, The World of Eyes
The tears of the salted earth form a deep layer beneath the whale king and the pilgrim. A light gleams in the corner of the pilgrim's eye. She gently commands the whale king to look downward.
The salty mixture of their tears turned to sand has hardened into a shimmering surface. The whale king and pilgrim look deeply. They are reflected in a cosmic mirror. They look into their own eyes.
The whale king sees the dark lines around his heavy blue eye-lids. The sparkles that normally translucently glimmer on his lower lobe are abnormally dim. They grow dimmer as the whale king stares deeper.
His eyes, brown and green, form an earthly plain. He can see himself sitting on this plain. He lifts his small flipper to sip a martini awkwardly. He smiles happily at the Alaskan sun (or at least he assumes it's Alaska) and leans back in his lawn-chair. His ridiculous sun-glasses reflect the harshish rays of the artic sunlight. He takes another sip from the martini. The sun continues beating down in its cold way. The martini glass finishes. The whale king reaches his small flipper for another, but finds none.
He realizes he is on an earthly plain and there is no one in sight. Certainly there's plenty of air here, but with no water he feels a bit like dieing.
The pilgrim, meanwhile, drifts in a dark and rich river of chocolate. The confectionery delight of this river entrances the pilgrim to float. While she floats she feels bound to fully immerse herself. She wishes nothing more than to drink deeply of this dark, rich river. The bonbon brook seems to bade her, "bathe deeply in my bubbling beauty." With so much alliteration she can hardly resist. She drinks deeply of the coco current and feels the dark, rich liquid running up her nose. She rushes away in its growing stream.
The whale king hears a distant roar, the sound of wood cracking. There is a strange butteryness in the air.
The white chocolate caps of a tasty chocolate Tsunami roars toward the whale king. The heavy dark liquid covers his body as the wave crashes on the Alaskan tundra. Though not attractive, at least he doesn't feel like dieing. "Funny," he thinks as he drinks deeply, "I never thought a thick black substance would save my life."
The pilgrim gasps for breath, but can find none. She struggles in a form of Hershey hell brought on by her hell-raising hedonism and hungry heart. The alliteration begins to strangle her mind.
Heroically and dramatically, the whale king beats back the alliteration with his large head. "They don't call me macrocephalus for nothing!" From the nearish top (a little to the left) of his box-like head he sprays the alliteration with a Fissure-Forming Rainbow Ray and shakes his brilliant rainbow mane.
The pilgrim really doesn't notice this. She passes out from a delicious and wonderful overdose. The whale king rolls the pilgrim on his snout and carries her upward and skyward, away from their World of Eyes.
In front of the mirror, the pilgrim awakes suddenly with a burp and licks her lips. The cosmic mirror looks dirty, she thinks. A lot like a river of chocolate draining into another dimension. Another delicious dimension...
She pats the whale king's rainbow mane. This reassures the whale king. She smiles and breathes deeply. The skyline of a city emerges in the orange and purple sky. It rests upon a large piece of earth. She has never seen this city, but she knows it well. "We've arrived," she announces, "at the floating sunset city."
The salty mixture of their tears turned to sand has hardened into a shimmering surface. The whale king and pilgrim look deeply. They are reflected in a cosmic mirror. They look into their own eyes.
The whale king sees the dark lines around his heavy blue eye-lids. The sparkles that normally translucently glimmer on his lower lobe are abnormally dim. They grow dimmer as the whale king stares deeper.
His eyes, brown and green, form an earthly plain. He can see himself sitting on this plain. He lifts his small flipper to sip a martini awkwardly. He smiles happily at the Alaskan sun (or at least he assumes it's Alaska) and leans back in his lawn-chair. His ridiculous sun-glasses reflect the harshish rays of the artic sunlight. He takes another sip from the martini. The sun continues beating down in its cold way. The martini glass finishes. The whale king reaches his small flipper for another, but finds none.
He realizes he is on an earthly plain and there is no one in sight. Certainly there's plenty of air here, but with no water he feels a bit like dieing.
The pilgrim, meanwhile, drifts in a dark and rich river of chocolate. The confectionery delight of this river entrances the pilgrim to float. While she floats she feels bound to fully immerse herself. She wishes nothing more than to drink deeply of this dark, rich river. The bonbon brook seems to bade her, "bathe deeply in my bubbling beauty." With so much alliteration she can hardly resist. She drinks deeply of the coco current and feels the dark, rich liquid running up her nose. She rushes away in its growing stream.
The whale king hears a distant roar, the sound of wood cracking. There is a strange butteryness in the air.
The white chocolate caps of a tasty chocolate Tsunami roars toward the whale king. The heavy dark liquid covers his body as the wave crashes on the Alaskan tundra. Though not attractive, at least he doesn't feel like dieing. "Funny," he thinks as he drinks deeply, "I never thought a thick black substance would save my life."
The pilgrim gasps for breath, but can find none. She struggles in a form of Hershey hell brought on by her hell-raising hedonism and hungry heart. The alliteration begins to strangle her mind.
Heroically and dramatically, the whale king beats back the alliteration with his large head. "They don't call me macrocephalus for nothing!" From the nearish top (a little to the left) of his box-like head he sprays the alliteration with a Fissure-Forming Rainbow Ray and shakes his brilliant rainbow mane.
The pilgrim really doesn't notice this. She passes out from a delicious and wonderful overdose. The whale king rolls the pilgrim on his snout and carries her upward and skyward, away from their World of Eyes.
In front of the mirror, the pilgrim awakes suddenly with a burp and licks her lips. The cosmic mirror looks dirty, she thinks. A lot like a river of chocolate draining into another dimension. Another delicious dimension...
She pats the whale king's rainbow mane. This reassures the whale king. She smiles and breathes deeply. The skyline of a city emerges in the orange and purple sky. It rests upon a large piece of earth. She has never seen this city, but she knows it well. "We've arrived," she announces, "at the floating sunset city."
The Whale King Journey: Episode 3, Gnome Flowers and Elephant Tusks
As they cross the liminal zone between this world and the next, the pilgrim and the whale king feel an alteration in their perception of reality. Had they been shot? Are they falling? Was that Spider Man? The line between concrete interaction and ephemeral perception is blurred in this world of wonder, imagination, fear, love, laughter, dreams.
The pilgrim's world is rich and vibrant (with a side of GNOME FLOWERS and APPLE SAUCE). The whale king's world is heavy, over-educated, ripe with ambiguity and essentialist ideology (reeking of ELEPHANT TUSKS and DONKEY TAILS.) The fissure in space that formed this ambiguous liminal zone slowly closes around the whale-king's kaleidoscope flukes.
The fissure's tightening grip reminds the whale king of his old-days as a colorful cachalot (long before he became the rainbow rex physter macrocephalorum that he is today). The pressure of the collapsing fissure translates to the helpless feelings he had back in '62, the year the men came. They'd been coming for his race long before, thirsting for their oil and fat. But it was in 1762 that his family was destroyed. He remembered the horror as he saw his mother and father, his brothers and sisters, wrenched from their primeval, aqueous home. He recalled screaming out words of damnation to the cursed giant squids as he saw the harpoons pierce his sister's breast. (The 30 year war with those bastard squids had wreaked havoc on the physter macrocephalus infrastructure. The humans, seeking their sperm oil and spermaceti, were able to easily capture his weakened race.)
As he thinks about these things, the fissure's grip turns the whale king's chromatic flukes to a pastoral hue. A small tear falls from the while king's eye.
The pilgrim, meanwhile, smiles brightly as the flowers laugh gaily and the bunnies snuggle her waist. She calls out in laughter, giggling from bunny tickles, "Onward whale king! Onward!"
The whale king sighs and shakes his head. The past and the present merge into one complete void. As the void forms and matures, its eyes open. The fully formed void stares at the whale king and the pilgrim. They stare back.
Suddenly and dramatically the pilgrim yips and the whale king's variegated tail flips. They are released from the fissure's sphincter-like grip. As they float forward through the void of blurred reality, the pilgrim prepares to enter a celestial world of light and sublime pleasure. The whale king prepares to face the darkness of memory.
The earth is salted with tears of joy and sadness.
The pilgrim's world is rich and vibrant (with a side of GNOME FLOWERS and APPLE SAUCE). The whale king's world is heavy, over-educated, ripe with ambiguity and essentialist ideology (reeking of ELEPHANT TUSKS and DONKEY TAILS.) The fissure in space that formed this ambiguous liminal zone slowly closes around the whale-king's kaleidoscope flukes.
The fissure's tightening grip reminds the whale king of his old-days as a colorful cachalot (long before he became the rainbow rex physter macrocephalorum that he is today). The pressure of the collapsing fissure translates to the helpless feelings he had back in '62, the year the men came. They'd been coming for his race long before, thirsting for their oil and fat. But it was in 1762 that his family was destroyed. He remembered the horror as he saw his mother and father, his brothers and sisters, wrenched from their primeval, aqueous home. He recalled screaming out words of damnation to the cursed giant squids as he saw the harpoons pierce his sister's breast. (The 30 year war with those bastard squids had wreaked havoc on the physter macrocephalus infrastructure. The humans, seeking their sperm oil and spermaceti, were able to easily capture his weakened race.)
As he thinks about these things, the fissure's grip turns the whale king's chromatic flukes to a pastoral hue. A small tear falls from the while king's eye.
The pilgrim, meanwhile, smiles brightly as the flowers laugh gaily and the bunnies snuggle her waist. She calls out in laughter, giggling from bunny tickles, "Onward whale king! Onward!"
The whale king sighs and shakes his head. The past and the present merge into one complete void. As the void forms and matures, its eyes open. The fully formed void stares at the whale king and the pilgrim. They stare back.
Suddenly and dramatically the pilgrim yips and the whale king's variegated tail flips. They are released from the fissure's sphincter-like grip. As they float forward through the void of blurred reality, the pilgrim prepares to enter a celestial world of light and sublime pleasure. The whale king prepares to face the darkness of memory.
The earth is salted with tears of joy and sadness.
The Whale King Journey: Episode 2, The Liminal Zone
The wind whips round the pilgrim's head. She pats the whale king's mane for reassurance. The dark clouds ahead look ominous. The whale king senses her worry. She feels a shift beneath her. A sound like sirens or doves suddenly emits from nearby. From the whale king's blow-hole a small light forms. The pilgrim covers her eyes as the light slowly illuminates the sky with a blinding intensity. The colors are vibrant, prismatic, and entirely progressive. She feels and hears the yellow, red, blue, and green of the rainbow. The violet comes as a vibrating bass line, more sensation than sound.
The dark clouds scatter and the very fabric of space and time is torn asunder by the whale king's rainbow emission. The pilgrim can only hold tighter as she stares forward at the bright and polyvalent (multi-vocal?) fissure in space. Yes, there will be no dark clouds in her future aloft the whale king's mane.
The dark clouds scatter and the very fabric of space and time is torn asunder by the whale king's rainbow emission. The pilgrim can only hold tighter as she stares forward at the bright and polyvalent (multi-vocal?) fissure in space. Yes, there will be no dark clouds in her future aloft the whale king's mane.
The Whale King Journey: Episode 1, Pilgrimage Begins
The heat of the summer day is diminished within the confines of the church walls. The apsidal space featuring Christ on the lignum vitae immediately summons all of the pilgrim's earthly attention. She progresses along the floor's central guilloche of red porphry and green serpentine roundels surrounded by sinusoidal strands. The central quincunx in the floor's design echoes the apsidal mosaic's cross and forms a royal pathway. As a representation of the Tree of Life, the depiction of Christ on the lignum vitae reveales the paradox of Christian cosmology: the death of Christ brings life. Yes, to be in that space is to feel the power of that paradox. Yet, the pilgrim can not reach that divine space. She is cut off, denied. The pilgrim's progression halts at the edge of the schola cantorum. She watches the bishop and clerics progress into the paradoxical zone. Sees the bishop deliver his message at the head of the quincuncial cross marked by a square of red porphry. Ante altare subtus pirfireticum lapidem, ubi pontifex stat, quando missam canit.
That's when the whale king drops salvation down like a lumpy pickle. Big, blue, and ready to roll. He fills the void above the lignum vitae, the heavens of a three-tiered universe. His fin crosses in the shape of a Chrismon with the loop of a hook forming the P. The alpha and omega written clearly on each half show that this fin is for more than swimming. It is the beginning. The end. The whale king ad aeternum.
The pilgrim understands now, as the whale king appears to her, that the church is no place for pilgrims. It is a place for pontiffs and priests. Her place is in the ocean, in the skies, riding aloft the whale king's mane, like two star-crossed lovers in a crowded room.
That's when the whale king drops salvation down like a lumpy pickle. Big, blue, and ready to roll. He fills the void above the lignum vitae, the heavens of a three-tiered universe. His fin crosses in the shape of a Chrismon with the loop of a hook forming the P. The alpha and omega written clearly on each half show that this fin is for more than swimming. It is the beginning. The end. The whale king ad aeternum.
The pilgrim understands now, as the whale king appears to her, that the church is no place for pilgrims. It is a place for pontiffs and priests. Her place is in the ocean, in the skies, riding aloft the whale king's mane, like two star-crossed lovers in a crowded room.
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