The silhouette sharpens the electric saw

with the sheaf of papers,
hitting the pages with the saw, and the red splotches
on the walls move around, coalescing and separating;

A hammer and sickle appear,
no, it’s a five-pointed star,
or maybe a stylized arrow-like jeem
next to an elongated map…

Is it a victory sign?
A sun? A peasant?
A laborer? Students?
The patches of color and the shapes
tumble and turn,
forming a river that seeps
along the corners of the room,
through the hallway, and to the back door.

The red river spills into the swimming pool.

The silhouette sharpens the electric saw

with the sheaf of papers.
“Come and get baptized,” he says
to the head poking through the glass door.
“We are the salvation,”
the carcasses repeat,
swinging to and fro,
spattering more blood.
“Come.”

The Monotonous Chaos of Existence, by Hisham Bustani, Quantum Leap, page 44

Note: the Arabic letter jeem (ﺟـ ), and the elongated map with an arrow make up the logo of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) The jeem is the first letter of the group’s name in Arabic; the map is that of Palestine; and the arrow signifies the right of return,

The story-poem is entitled Quantum Leap. The term references the discovery that matter at the foundations is a dance of forces. In common use today, the term suggests the expectation of transformative change, a change as if by magic, to mimic the “jump” of an electron from one energy level to another as “it” orbits the nucleus.

The setting of the story-poem is a finely appointed villa. A guest list, writers are all invited to the gala inside. In dreamlike fashion, inside of the mansion, the grand room is in fact a charnel house, with bloody corpses of headless lambs hanging from butchers hooks around the walls.

Damn, these are grim thoughts. Let’s think about the Super Bowl.

Everyone is invited to the final, and ultimate playoff game of the NFL season, to be televised on Fox. You are on the guest list if you own a television. No need to purchase a ticket, since the Super Bowl LIX spectacle, an Ad Manager’s wet-dream, is like the New Orlean’s Mardi-Gras. There are no limits…

I read this morning, the just inaugurated President of the United States is expected to personally attend. Of course, the televised event is a grand opportunity for more exposure.

Never enough exposure for the sharp dressed man, his countenance to be irrepressible, brooding.

(Never you mind, that someone is sharpening the saw!)

It’s time! We need a song. How about Sharp Dressed Man by ZZ Top!