PARIS

UN BAR AU PLACE CONTRESCARPE

THREE MEN SIT IN A CORNER TABLE OF A DARK BAR, THE SUN HAS SET , IT IS SATURDAY, NEARING DUSK.

VERDUN: 40: MELANCHOLY, DRINKING WHISKEY*

PIERRE: 45: VERDUN FRIEND , DRINKING GIN*

CORENTIN: (COCO) 19:  COUSIN OF VERDUN, DRINKING WINE*

VERDUN: *“Money is a hell of a thing.  It will smooth you out won’t it.”

“When you got money and you got time and you got Paris, talking nonsense is the next step.”

PIERRE: “Women love it. “

[Verdun stared onto the plaza with a dense look]

VERDUN: “So much for what makes a mans edges. “

“A mans edge is his beard “ chipped CORENTIN

[Verdun’s irritation grew deeper]

VERDUN: “Whats the use of them anyway? If my beard scratches your face, the hell with it. “

“That’s the barbers job.” [PIERRE said for no reason*]

[…pause…]

VERDUN: “But it won’t be for me that you can’t make way in this world for yourself, partner.  It won’t be for me. “

PIERRE: “I mean really, what the hell you talking about ?  Have another drink.”

VERDUN: “I don’t know, you might call me bitter, but I can’t see much farther than my own disgust these days. “

CORENTIN: “It’s the weather , come on now. It’s been changing in odd ways. “ [he looked towards the sky with a child’s look]

VERDUN: “It’s death man.”

“I just can’t handle that I won’t see it coming the way we live now”

PIERRE: “Well can you ever see it coming?”

VERDUN: “Yeah I think you can, and further, a man ought to live in a manner that invite’s its company. “

PIERRE: “That’s damn dark. “

VERDUN: As Jean used to say “Death is like an old whore at a bar, I’ll buy her a drink, but I won’t go upstairs with her. *

[All three laughed at this and In that moment forgot their conversation]

[They drank.]

[Verdun remembered his feeling and went back to it-]

VERDUN: “Now you can’t pay for the pleasure to share the same room with her. You gotta live all confused with yourself.”

[PIERRE AND CORENTIN looked down, thinking of their own general confusion in life]

VERDUN: “The goddamn edges man! Just what exactly do you think they are for? A mans edges?”

PIERRE: “Hell, for getting in trouble. “

VERDUN: That’s what I’m saying Pierre!

[Tears welled in Verdun’s blue eyes]

VERDUN: “You take a tiger through an amusement park, you think he’s inspired?”

PIERRE: “Poor tiger,  I bet the worse tiger he could be the better they’d he’d like that park, if only his stripes didn’t slide off.” [Pierre said this halfwittedly]

VERDUN: “The edges are for fighting you idiot, they are for playing your hand rough with life, the only way life deals. I just can’t take it anymore. “ [Verdun continued]

“I can’t take the towel being thrown before I enter the ring, and I gotta pay to forfeit too, A man lives in feeble condescension. It’s a shame. I’m ashamed. I’m ashamed cause it’s a shame and I gotta pay to take a file and smooth the edges. Can’t even buy the old whore a drink anymore huh” [he could barely get the last part out, stammering with emotion.]

PIERRE: “Damn it Verdun! “ [Pierre grew frustrated but couldn’t understand it.]

VERDUN: “I’m so tired of the world being a goddamn show for a man, I’d rather it be formless, like clay, like that quiet you hear in the mountains, I’d rather the threat of that cold quiet that can kill you if you aren’t ready. I’d rather it threaten me , I’d have a fighting chance if my edges be flat I’d have a meeting with that old whore on my own accord. “

[Verdun drank his whiskey down, then continued]

“It’s just now, I can’t see her coming, I know she won’t delay with me but I can’t see her and I can’t deal like a man. This town goes on acting like we won’t die if we just keep buying tickets to that show. Success is a lukewarm soup for a man trying to make his way, smells fake and tastes like ass.”

CORENTIN: “You definitely have to kiss some ass”

[Corentin felt awkward in his attempt at cynicism]

VERDUN: “I tell you though,  it won’t be for me you boys can’t make your way in this world, I promise you that, it won’t be for me. “

[CORENTIN thought about his family, half lawyers and half in government, 'VERDUN’S words reminded him of a feeling he had when they’d speak to him sometimes. How they spoke to him after meeting his new girlfriend Lucille. What they said when they always found him jobs in their offices, but he never showed up to work]

PIERRE: “That show feeds your family, what would you do then cousin, how would you —— change this world!” [Pierre got close to Verdun’s feeling of insecurity and anger but went further because he understood it less.]

“I’d be a bullfighter “, VERDUN interrupted.

[his eyes turned from desperate to a cool crystal blue, glistening]

VERDUN: “I’d spend time and life with those bulls, even the fake ones to learn it “

PIERRE: “They’d smooth you out , vraiment”

VERDUN: “I’d work true in it, you’d see what you used to see with me on the boats, I’d know how to carry.”

“The women here look like bulls” - CORENTIN said, [trying to cheer up the conversation.]

VERDUN: “Damn your nature coco, You might think something of me then, and it wouldn’t have been me that bitched you, as I said “

[They both looked at him now]

“I’d perform like an artist and take great and unintellectual pleasure in the immediate triumphs of the bull ring with my pay in ovations, alcoholism, being pointed out on the street, general respect and the other things you boys will never get**. “

[his eyes shone like an angels]

“and I’d be at peace, knowing each fight, I’m buying death a drink and taking a bit of a rest in her company. “

[VERDUN’ expression wore long, his chest rose and fell with emotion.]

[At this word, a collective heave fell on the three mens chests, and like sharing a yawn, all instinctively shifted their backs into the chairs and looked off to the distance.]

[Corentin looked out the window, thinking long and hard, he felt his cousins pain , and knew it himself, he just wasn’t sure how to deal with it. A penetrating stare came across his eyes, fixed towards the trees of place contrescarpe across the street. His stare begun to set itself heavy into this feeling , fixed towards the tree. And just as his heart started to dig into these painful questions, a woman entered his fixed stare crossing the street with a young man, entering Corentin’s stare at the moment when it’s philosophical entrenchment began, his stare fixed at the precise location of her bouncing bosom. The woman raised an arm like a rocket towards her face which wore glasses. Corentin’s stare was too deep to react, but the rising rocket hand carried it up and he was jolted back noticing the disgust on the woman’s face and realized her arm rocket was a scold to him for having the audacity to search his heart while her bosom crossed the street.]

*Cover Art: La Vague, Yves Klein

**Letter to Ezra Pound, July 19, 1924:, Ernest Hemingway