Woes of the True Policeman

Then, by way of a postcript or curious side note, on a half sheet of paper and in tiny handwriting, Padilla talked about a trip to Girona to visit the parents of one of the poets, and about the nearly empty train that transported them through the “Catalan countryside,” and about a North African who was reading a book backwards, prompting the poet from Girona, polite but exceedingly nosy, to ask whether it was the Koran, and the North African’s answer was yes, the sura of mercy or compassion or charity (Padilla couldn’t remember which), which led the poet from Girona to ask whether the mercy (or compassion or charity) preached there applied to Christians, too, and again the North African’s answer was yes, certainly, of course, absolutely, all human beings, and he spoke with such warmth that the poet from Girona was emboldened to ask whether it also applied to atheists and homosexuals, and this time the North African answered frankly that he didn’t know, he supposed so, since atheists and faggots were human beings, weren’t they? but that in all sincerity he didn’t know the answer, maybe yes, maybe no. And then the North African asked the poet from Girona what he believed. And the poet from Girona, preemptively offended, tacitly humiliated, answered haughtily that he believed in what he could see from the windows of the train: woods, gardens, houses, roads, cars, bicycles, tractors — progress, in short. To which the North African replied that progress wasn’t really so important. Which made the poet from Girona exclaim that if it weren’t for progress neither he nor the North African would be having this comfortable chat in a half-empty train. To which the North African replied that reality was an illusion and that at this very moment they might just as well be talking in a Bedouin tent in the desert. Which, after it made him smile, made the poet from Girona say that they might be talking in the desert or they might be fucking. To which the North African replied that if the poet from Girona were a woman, he would definitely take her to his harem, but since the poet from Girona seemed to be only a faggot dog and he was only a poor immigrant, that possibility or illusion was barred. Which made the poet from Girona say that in that case the sura of mercy meant less than a bicycle, and that he should watch what he said since the tip of a bike seat had been known to give more than a few people a poke in the ass. To which the North African replied that this would be in the poet’s world, not his own, where martyrs always walked with their faces held high. Which made the poet from Girona say that all the Moors he had known were either rent boys or thieves. To which the North African replied that he couldn’t be responsible for the kinds of friends a faggot pig might have. Which made the poet from Girona say: go ahead, call me a faggot and a pig, but I bet you won’t let me blow you right here. To which the North African replied that the flesh was weak and that he might as well get used to torture. Which made the poet from Girona say: unzip your pants and let me suck you off, darling. To which the North African replied that he’d sooner die. Which made the Girona poet ask: will I be saved? will I be saved too? To which the Maghrebi replied that he didn’t know, he honestly didn’t know.

I would have liked, said Padilla in conclusion, to take him to a hotel, he was a North African open to the poetry of the world, and I’m sure he’d never been buggered.

Amalfitano’s reply was written on the back of a Frida Kahlo postcard (The Two Fridas, 1939) and he said that on Padilla’s advice, though he actually couldn’t remember whether Padilla had suggested this explicitly, he had begun to look for Arcimboldi’s novels. Naturally, his search was restricted to the Mexico City bookstores that received new releases from Spain, and the International Bookstore of Tijuana, which carried hardly any books in French, but where he had been assured they could be found. He had also written to the French Bookstore in Mexico City, though it had been a while and he hadn’t heard back. Maybe, he ventured, the French Bookstore has gone out of business and it will be years yet before word reaches Santa Teresa. About the Larry Rivers postcard he chose to say nothing.

Padilla’s next letter arrived two days later, not long enough afterward to be a response to Amalfitano’s letter. It was, along general lines, a synopsis of the novel that Padilla was writing, though for a synopsis, thought Amalfitano, it was rather vague. It was as if something — during the two-day trip to Girona or in his previous postcard or in the Girona home cooking he’d eaten — hadn’t agreed with him. He seemed drunk or drugged. Even his writing (the letter was handwritten) was agitated, at points almost illegible.