Telling
Aujourd’hui, maman est morte. Ou peut-être hier, je ne sais pas. J’ai reçu un télégramme de l’asile : « Mère décédée. Enterrement demain. Sentiments distingués ». Cela ne veut rien dire. C’était peut-être hier.
The first paragraph of Camus’s The Outsider, as translated by…
Jack Kerouac
My mama’s dead today so it’s a long limping day like a vet crippled more by mortar memories than his bum leg though man it could of been maybe should of been yesterday I don’t know. My yesterdays are all untender and soon gone grooves and spreading out like spent tomorrows and I don’t know. I only know of the telegram sent by the house of long to die that said, “Mother dead. Funeral tomorrow. Condolences.” Now it’s hot and it’s sad as the day after Christmas and I’m not feeling what I’m supposed to but it was hotter still yesterday, so maybe it was then.
Anonymous Mobster
Yo! Get dis. Yeah, so my old lady she kicked it today. Fuckin eh. Ah, maybe yesterday, who da fuck knows. Pass da cannoli. Get the fuck outta here they’re all gone. You’re a fuckin pig. You know dat? So I get dis fuckin telegram from dat old folks joint, you know, what a fuckin racket dat is! Fuckin goombahs, “Mother dead. Funeral tomorrow. Balance due: eight Gs” What da fuck. Maybe it was yesterday, I dunno. Who da fuck cares? May she rest in peace.
T.S. EliotOn this day my mother died
Amen and let us guess which men have cried
Which men are weaving cobweb tales
Of love gone bitter and love denied.
And yesterday my mother died
To the twisting handkerchiefs of those to follow
All those conceiving and conceived
All those relieving and relieved.
Will my not knowing say to all what son I am
Oh, do not ask, “which is it?”
I know only of the telegram:
“Mother dead. Burial Weds. Please visit.”
Burrowing into the ether fog of well-rehearsed self-pity
Straightening the guise of that good son
Who does not know if it was Tues. or Mon.
The architecture of my dirty grief rose towering like the city.
Young Martin Amis
His mother was a bitch. Now she’s dead. It happened yesterday. Maybe today; he doesn’t know and doesn’t care. Mum. Mother. Malva. Her name sits in his mouth like cold wet peas long after everyone has left the table. He’s an asshole. A real asshole. Dante and Dillinger rolled into one. But there are worse than him. Where? His boss Lucie, pungent sudor of humanity, oddments of vice, backroom Lothario and auteur extraordinaire of shag and snuff ‘em movies that he proffers as Art, with the pride of a man who just got double pussy. The Eiffel towering limb of that capital A obtrudes through the phlegm of his ale-stained voice as he insinuates his latest oeuvre to the lonelies. An oenologist savouring stark esurience. Tower of Babel-on-Thames. They’ll scuttle on home to tissues and darkness and post-coital self-odium. He’s worse.
The pious changers of nappies, purveyors of ultimate demise as high-growth industry who sent the telegram, “Mother dead. Funeral tomorrow. Sincere condolences.” They’re worse. The Supremes as Euripides’s Chorus. He’d stared with careful detachment at the triptych announcing his mother’s passing. Passing his grip master from hand to hand and with each squeeze, reread telling himself he didn’t care. So nonplussed by the sudden febricity moving under his skin – a hot prickle of skittish and decidedly unwelcome 8 mm memories. Sarah, birthday parties, cousin Sarah, that summer by the sea with Sarah and what was said. So much was said. And done. And Sarah. And telling himself it doesn’t matter. And he won’t give in to it. Maybe it was yesterday. Maybe he’ll ring up Jeanine. She’d leave without a fuss.
Elton John
To the tune of Candle in the Wind…
Goodbye Sheila Dwight
Though your genes prolly made me bald
You had the grace to make porridge
While I around you crawled.
I crawled across the kitchen…
Your turn.
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Comment
- Google
Today, mom died. Or perhaps yesterday, I do not know. I received a telegram of asylum: “Mother deceased. Burial tomorrow. Distinguished feelings “That wants nothing to say. It was perhaps yesterday.
— leftoverboy Jun 7, 2:12pm # - ee ccummings:
mother died (perhaps
yesterday perhaps
i mustn’t know.
a letter a telegram a
shout from the hilltops
that mother is dead (—she like death wore velour trousers)
deceased faded away
(like so many poppies of spring
and to be buried tomorrow
in the earth a harmonica
will play but no voices will rise (there
is nothing more to add. mother died
(perhaps yesterday.
— verbify Jun 7, 3:57pm # - Dan Rather
Unconfirmed reports show that my mother died yesterday, or perhaps the day before. Documents that I have received from an anonymous source state that “Ms. Rather is dead. Funeral arrangements have begun and the burial will be tomorrow.” Grief has swept the nation in response to her death as thousands flock to the small city where this woman was born, to pay condolences to the deceased. Reports are sketchy, but some say that the time of death occurred late last evening. We will continue to monitor this story, however, as it develops.
— Doug Jun 7, 7:14pm # - Babelfish: French -> German -> English
Today mummy died. Or I do not know perhaps yesterday. I received a telegram of the asylum: the “deceased nut/mother. Funeral tomorrow. Distinctive feelings.” That means nothing. It was perhaps yesterday.
— Jay Jun 7, 9:04pm # - Damn funny stuff – I’m not even going to try to add my 2 cents worth…
— roggey Jun 7, 10:08pm # - Queneau – Unexpected
They were sitting round a cafe table when Albert joined hem.
Rene, Robert, Adolphe, Georges and Theodore were there.
“How’s everything?” asked Robert amicably.
“Don’t ask” said Albert.
He called the waiter.
“I’ll have a picon,” he said.
“Nice day,” said Robert.
“Bit cold,” said Adolphe.
Adolpe turned towards Albert: “Well, Albert, what’s new?”
“Oh well, i just received a telegram,” said Albert.
“A telegram?” Asked Rene.
“This morning, delivered to me,” replied Albert.
“What telegram?”
“From the asylum, my mother died today.”
“Your mother died, today?” asked Robert.
“Today, or maybe yesterday, don’t known exactly”
“What did it say then, the telegram” asked Rene
“Not exactly an exercise in style” said Albert, “It read: Mother dead. Funeral tomorrow. Condolences.”.
“Tomorrow?” said Georges.
“It seems”.
“Was that all?” asked Rene.
“No funny thing is, It was signed ‘T’” said Albert
“Just ‘T’ ?” said Georges.
“Just ‘T’”
“How odd” said Robert.
“That is in fact the telegram i sent this morning” said Theodore.
— Raf Jun 8, 7:58am # - Damn, you guys are good.
— gail Jun 8, 11:28am # - Today, screw die mom. Or possibly yesterday, he did not know. Obtaining protects the telegram of the place: After mom. It will bury tomorrow. We want you not to believe to that, to you they thought, remarkable feeling. Possibly it yesterday was the fact.
— The Fish of Babel Jun 8, 9:51pm # - My mother is a fish.
—As I Lay Dying, by William Faulkner. Chapter 5
— Lakati Sapo Jun 9, 1:58am # - Excellent fun. Try this: The Beatles – A Day in the Life
I read the news today oh Ma
About a plucky girl off to the grave
And though the news was rather sad
Well I just had to cry
I saw the telegraph.
I think we can drop the next line “she blew her brains out in a car.”
— roger Jun 12, 9:50am # - George W. Bush:
Mother, a person for who I feel, felt, a deep affectation, I mean my mother – in contrast to someone else’s mother, since we all have mothers, deceased, which means died. Today. Or, maybe, yesterday; I can’t be sure. It’s a complicated matter, yesterday, today. It’s a matter of deep chronology. The telegram from the Home – the institution says: YOUR MOTHER PASSED AWAY. FUNERAL TOMORROW. DEEP SYMPATHY. So it’s an uncertain thing. Because today is today, but it could have been yesterday that she died. Which is the ultimate icing on the camel’s back.
— mig Jun 14, 10:44am # - I am laughing so hard, can you hear it?
— .~. Jun 17, 12:56pm #
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