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Authors: Phillip Mann
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hunkering down, sucking my fingers until they began to tingle. I slept in the day, making a bed of soil. I had no food and I sucked stones. My bowels ached and my stomach made wind as it tried to digest air.
But there came a day when I knew I was running downhill. It was a slight descent, but oh what hope it gave me and for out across the plain I could see a splash of green. A plantation, surely.
I ran on but it was not running such as you know. I hopped and jumped and nursed my feet which were cracked and bleeding.
Eventually I came across green shoots growing in the tunnel. These were a native shrub which had adapted to the kind of air we breathe. The leaves were poisonous, I knew, but the roots held nourishment and the worst I would get was a bellyache. I ate those roots, spitting out the grit, as though they were confections of the finest chefs. Starvation quickens every sense just as privation quickens one’s understanding of what it means to be human. But I could not eat much. My stomach felt full after a few mouthfuls. But I felt livelier and hopeful and more awake.
I ran on and at about midday when the shadows were at their smallest and the roof of the tunnel became misty, I thought I saw a figure in the distance in front of me. There was a place where a cross-tunnel of clear plastic joined the tunnel in which I was running and it was here that the figure seemed to be standing as though waiting for me. I waved but the figure did not respond. At first I thought it was a child, it seemed so small. Then I thought it was a woman, it seemed so poised. Finally I could see it was a human, a man, but he was as small as a monkey. He was dressed in a plain brown garment which matched the color of the soil. As I came closer I could see his face. It was compact, almost the face of a weasel, and he seemed to be smiling in a quirky way as though he knew something that I did not, and yet I did not feel alarmed or threatened by him. At the last moment I realized there was a light shining about him.
Then, when I was about twenty yards away, the figure suddenly started to expand. I felt an explosion in the space between my ears. The man’s face grew into the muzzle of a bull. Golden horns sprouted from his forehead. The shoulders bunched. The brown garment transformed to black fur. The legs became stiff and short and solid-muscled. I found myself facing a bull and its bulk almost filled the tunnel. It stared down at me with lowered head and eyes of yellow flint.
I approached it carefully, unafraid, filled with wonder, my arms upraised, and I stroked the fur between its eyes. I felt its hot breath. I touched its horns and as I touched them I knew I was in the presence of a God. I wanted to clasp the bull by its horns and swing my legs up and grasp it around the neck. I wanted to straddle its back and dig my fingers in its black fur and solid muscle. I wanted the bull to turn me and mount me and crush me. And when I wished this it seemed that the bull grew even larger until it occupied all the space in the tunnel. I fell down in a faint, unable to move but still conscious, and in that state the spirit of the bull penetrated me. Man or woman, bull or beast, the God entered me and possessed me utterly, through mouth, nose, ears, eyes and skin; yes, through penis and anus. Totally. No scrap of me was left untouched and yet I lived with dignity. The spirit of the God bubbled in my veins and made me merry. “Dip me in wine, O ye powers, and I will be one with the grape and the harvest.”
The God broke into pieces of gold and these spun around me. They became people, a golden blur of people. April was there, and the man I had strangled, and his wife and other women, and my mother and father, and my jailor and Medoc who lay for in my future. They were dancing around me like children around a bonfire. And I shouted that I was not dead, and as I shouted the visitors faded and I woke up.
I lay on the ground savoring the silence and
But there came a day when I knew I was running downhill. It was a slight descent, but oh what hope it gave me and for out across the plain I could see a splash of green. A plantation, surely.
I ran on but it was not running such as you know. I hopped and jumped and nursed my feet which were cracked and bleeding.
Eventually I came across green shoots growing in the tunnel. These were a native shrub which had adapted to the kind of air we breathe. The leaves were poisonous, I knew, but the roots held nourishment and the worst I would get was a bellyache. I ate those roots, spitting out the grit, as though they were confections of the finest chefs. Starvation quickens every sense just as privation quickens one’s understanding of what it means to be human. But I could not eat much. My stomach felt full after a few mouthfuls. But I felt livelier and hopeful and more awake.
I ran on and at about midday when the shadows were at their smallest and the roof of the tunnel became misty, I thought I saw a figure in the distance in front of me. There was a place where a cross-tunnel of clear plastic joined the tunnel in which I was running and it was here that the figure seemed to be standing as though waiting for me. I waved but the figure did not respond. At first I thought it was a child, it seemed so small. Then I thought it was a woman, it seemed so poised. Finally I could see it was a human, a man, but he was as small as a monkey. He was dressed in a plain brown garment which matched the color of the soil. As I came closer I could see his face. It was compact, almost the face of a weasel, and he seemed to be smiling in a quirky way as though he knew something that I did not, and yet I did not feel alarmed or threatened by him. At the last moment I realized there was a light shining about him.
Then, when I was about twenty yards away, the figure suddenly started to expand. I felt an explosion in the space between my ears. The man’s face grew into the muzzle of a bull. Golden horns sprouted from his forehead. The shoulders bunched. The brown garment transformed to black fur. The legs became stiff and short and solid-muscled. I found myself facing a bull and its bulk almost filled the tunnel. It stared down at me with lowered head and eyes of yellow flint.
I approached it carefully, unafraid, filled with wonder, my arms upraised, and I stroked the fur between its eyes. I felt its hot breath. I touched its horns and as I touched them I knew I was in the presence of a God. I wanted to clasp the bull by its horns and swing my legs up and grasp it around the neck. I wanted to straddle its back and dig my fingers in its black fur and solid muscle. I wanted the bull to turn me and mount me and crush me. And when I wished this it seemed that the bull grew even larger until it occupied all the space in the tunnel. I fell down in a faint, unable to move but still conscious, and in that state the spirit of the bull penetrated me. Man or woman, bull or beast, the God entered me and possessed me utterly, through mouth, nose, ears, eyes and skin; yes, through penis and anus. Totally. No scrap of me was left untouched and yet I lived with dignity. The spirit of the God bubbled in my veins and made me merry. “Dip me in wine, O ye powers, and I will be one with the grape and the harvest.”
The God broke into pieces of gold and these spun around me. They became people, a golden blur of people. April was there, and the man I had strangled, and his wife and other women, and my mother and father, and my jailor and Medoc who lay for in my future. They were dancing around me like children around a bonfire. And I shouted that I was not dead, and as I shouted the visitors faded and I woke up.
I lay on the ground savoring the silence and
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