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NOTES FROM UNDERGROUND

NOTES FROM UNDERGROUND

(“Report from Wenceslas Square” by Jiri Myš)

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I am. Therefore I think. I do not think long or deeply. The effort is too great. And I have other things on my mind. I have to have all my wits about me just to survive. But I do survive. Therefore I am. I think.

I have been here long. I do not know how long. Time seems to have got away from me. I lose count of the days. And the years. When I was young my elders and betters would say to me: “Just you wait, Jiri, until you are our age. Then you will know that life is a serious business. Then you will think like we do.” But I have waited. And I am their age. And they are all dead. And my contemporaries have all grown old around me. And they all tell me that life is a serious business. But I do not know. And I do not know if I think like they do, or did. Because I do not know how they think. Nothing ever changes. Everything changes around me but nothing changes really. Only the surface of things. All my friends and companions, my contemporaries as I have called them, say to me: “If you were married, Jiri, like we are, with children to bring up, you would realise that life is a serious business, you would understand the changes that are going on around us. You would know what a terrible world we are living in.” But I do not know. All I do know is that change is the only constant in life. Therefore nothing changes. And the world has always been terrible. Once I had to avoid tanks. Now I have to avoid the high heels of the ladies of the night. Pardon my reticence. My contemporaries all call them prostitutes or whores. But I do not like such terms. As they are ladies and they come out at night, I can think of them in no other way. But I do not think about them long or deeply. The effort is too great. And to me their heels are as lethal as the tracks of the tanks or the boots of the soldiers.

I own nothing. Only a silver coin I found one night on the cobbles near the centre of the square. I do not know why I kept it. Why I dragged it back laboriously to my home. It means nothing to me. I do not understand the hieroglyphs engraved on either side. I do not understand the eleven planed edges. But it pleases me. My contemporaries all say: “Jiri, why keep it. It is useless. Only takes up room.” But I hold my peace. I hold my piece. Because I found it near the spot where he died. And because it sparkles in the fire like his eyes.

I said I found it near the spot where he died. This is not quite accurate. He died three days later in the hospital. But I try not to think too long or deeply about that. I like to think he dropped it as he ran flaming through the night. The night his day had become. Perhaps that is why I keep it. I do not know. There are so many imponderables. My contemporaries no doubt would all tell me: “Jiri, he could not possibly have dropped it. Years have passed since he died. This is a new world. Time has got away from you. You have lost count of the days. And the years.” This may well be so. But still I like to think that he dropped it. As I watch it sparkling safe in my lair. Because how can his dark flame of suffering ever be of the past. How can his blistering body ever not be now. But for now I have to have all my wits about me just to survive. A morsel of food waits near the heel of an old man two ladies of the night are arguing over. They will soon tire. And then my time will have come. I will scamper out, eyes alight, and bring it back here to my nest. Then I shall feast. I shall eat the flesh of my burning boy. And I shall live.

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