SmokeLong Quarterly

In this one, I’m at a border crossing. Over here they speak a language outsiders are forbidden to learn. That side’s famous for buttermilk. As contested boundaries go this place ain’t much. No fences or searchlights or dogs. Just a rectangular room, bad carpet, metal detectors and conveyor belts. A strip of duct tape down the middle of the floor with a pair of guards on either side. They chat only to each other, in their respective languages. Every few minutes a bell rings and the guards stand up, shout across the strip of tape about who annexed whom, then settle back in at their posts. I am the only person in the security line. I am handed a form. The form is tattooed with geometric shapes, symbols for vehicles and animals, warnings in red. Embark or disembark? It’s not that I don’t understand the question. I’ve just never thought about the meanings of these particular words, or their relationship to each other. One graphic near the bottom of the form is of a patient in a chair like a dentist’s chair. Over the patient looms a figure in a long coat, a doctor or a lab technician. The figure in the coat appears to be inserting something or removing something from the patient’s forehead. Can a brain embark, or disembark? I am interrupted by a tall man in a black ball cap, the kind worn by major league umpires or insurance actuaries who go to gun shows on the weekends. He doesn’t say anything. It’s possible he speaks the forbidden language. Or no language at all. I raise my hands to indicate helplessness and confusion. He points me over to a corner of the room. I’m not worried though. A few nights ago I won a poetry contest at a bar. I’d picked up enough to string together images and words. It came out as a surreal collage. People clapped and brought me a shot of liquor that tasted like sand. To the man in the ball cap I say, I think: ‘my love is like a train in the snow; her cat is very cold.’ He points again to the corner. On the way I say, in my own language, ‘It’s not like I’m smuggling crazy-balls or something.’ Another guard comes over. Without a word they seat me, roughly, in a dentist’s chair. ‘Is this about my ear?’ I say. ‘Implant.’ I try to explain that I’m not supposed to be near any large magnets. I may as well give them my drawings of bees or my essay about how language works. One of the guards puts on a lab technician’s coat. I raise my hands to indicate helplessness and confusion. I heard a story over here. The civil war went on so long that all the indigenous trees and animals disappeared. When it came time for the centennial celebration the officials in charge couldn’t find any living specimens of the national bird. So they scooped a pigeon off the street, killed it, stuffed it, painted it the colors of the flag, and glued it to a perch. ‘It’s fine,’ I say, ‘I’ll just re-embark.’ Nobody claps.