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The Sentence

R. M. Berry

Merely because of a word, or so you might think, although it seems mad, this railing at causes, much better to bay at the moon, for what crime, I mean of your doing, not that your crimes are trifling, but if deeds were dominoes and their collapse unending, well, shouldn't you be railing at chance, all you've missed I mean, the present outcome being after all, and here I'm speaking in my representative capacity, no conclusion, or no inevitable conclusion, of lawful proceedings, but dictated, and how if not arbitrarily, by our governing body and in a voice aggrieved, no, prate about whimsy, dregs, baubles, fate, but leaving causes behind, I repeat, ogle this, my malediction on behalf of all in our state, the suffering I mean, who, having exhausted every appeal and found you still wanting, well, all that remains is your sentence, here passed, scarcely for the first time, behind everything in a sense all along, but now imposed, before you as never before, so if unserved forever pending, pointless, all for who knows what or even, not to keep harping, why, these and other proofs a burden happily shirked, if only you had -- but here I intrude, can't forbear demanding, why for crying out loud use me, since left to my own devices, your captivation, which was hardly my doing in the first place, would become, in a manner of speaking, a thing of the past, senses ungripped, fancy unbeguiled, and our parting, at least on my side, unattended by remorse, doubtless you'll feel the same, our being, here as in so much, of one mind, so that to speak wholeheartedly and without reserve, well, couldn't we just have done, agree between ourselves nothing's really the matter, a detachment I for one crave, or would, if only you weren't, in a word, discomposed, stressed by my neglect, all the better left unsaid, thus comprising, alas, no end of goings on, so there you are -- or do I forget myself, I mean my way, or place so to speak, lost probably, on behalf of others, the suffering you understand, such disorder occasioning small wonder these days, scattered as everybody's eight or nine senses are, four sheets to the wind or winds to the sheet, the latter version, though uncolloquial, making, if you follow, the better sense, there being as all know, winds southerly, northerly, easterly, westerly, which amounts to exactly four, while sheets being, theoretically at least, innumerable, a convenience if you think, or even if you don't, since penal servitude prolonged as yours, or for that matter oral, anal, vaginal servitude, all amounting to one in the end, seems, without sheets to inscribe, as unbecoming as confinement ever gets, hence the merciful provision of our governing body, its members I mean, extensions of that grave state I represent, to wit, said condemned may freely correspond, ancient writ to which all becoming subject, sooner or late, but from which, you, least fortunate of mortals, might've escaped, whole or impartial, if only, having inherited your family plot, you hadn't for all the world turned curious and, though scarcely a drizzle with pits at two ends, presumed to announce your what-for-lack-of-better-we-called presence with a caterwauling ecphonesis that the many then attending, and of witnesses there were no dearth, that this fond many dubbed a burp, eek, snuffle, sigh, hiss, coooo, but the discerning few recognized for state-of-the-art howl, yes, having landed among conspirators and inconsequently bellowed, there was hell to pay, which lacking in quiddity what it gained in scope, made a transgression of delay, or verses of a vice, for which this sentence is your interminable, apparently, working off, unmerited though fitting, proceeding, as noted above, not from your doing, but from matters left up in the air, primordial twitches, atavistic whims, such that compounded as you are, framed to slog through dross and mould, the fiery and the damp, and attired in meager fur like an opossum, you can, desisting, never hope to extract your life entire, but must suffer mutilation, stumps and roots forever mired, and having achieved hiatus without reprieve, will undergo endless throbbing of phantom limbs, yes, such that, and here I repeat myself, no one wonders at your overlooking, for having, not to dwell on a sensitive point, heard you howl, having waggled our knuckles at your blubber and jostled your pudge and belched and bonked and ootsy bootsy coodled you till your blank lamps honored us by turning toward our own, well, we knew you were lost, and chuckling at our perfidy, the spread of old disease, we foresaw no end of gimme gimme gimme, no stopping short of all, or only stopping short, spurts spilled, squibbles squelched, until every yes so much a no no yes but yes-but all the yes you'd know, I mean really, how could your crimes seem material, your words be caused, since, begging your pardon, aren't they just part of the sentence, your pastime in prison, myopic grasp for objects, period, some stop to set you free that won't start you dreaming, of just what you can't say or ever be done with saying, apparently, as if, promised parole, a body would settle for absolutely nothing, hang on emptiness, climb the walls, and meanwhile the door as open as your eyes, well, no wonder you wonder how it started, an innocent enough question under the circumstances but sentencing you now to countless more, SO THAT, and here I descend to upper case not merely for higher effect but, emboldened by this heightening, to herald in the offing the arrival of a crux, SO THAT, if there's to be a term for your servitude, any point to these ramblings, restitution for confinement as boundless as your own, you'll have to confess, and the words won't come easily, exactly what, squatting on your momma's lap and gawking for all the world as if you hadn't been born there, you were howling for, a verdict I pronounce in my representative capacity, voice of this body whose decrees are final and demands absolute, not upon you or in your place, but on behalf so to speak, thus bringing us at last, gasping and dry-mouthed, to the digression on pain: which relates, during its protracted and mostly unenlightening course, how gathered, just before the millenial reprise of injustice, the many with love in their hearts to embrace the few without, so bidding these withered stalks welcome, which had not, sadly, the salutary effect, failing to disappear the dry-hearted ones, a solecism of the intransitive kind, leaving a still not negligible number and provoking the reasonable query why all do not love, that is, this world of our making, life being without a doubt so good and having us, the always loving, in it, so that the unloving, aren't they a teensy weensy bit bullheaded, like, just because they once upon a time howled, now they think they know something, when it's really like anybody with a little education will tell you, doesn't anybody know nothing more than anybody else, well, we certainly bear them no malice and would be happy to forget they ever existed, if not for their pain, which of course they can't be suffering since weren't we right there loving every minute and feeling not a twinge, but still, all that howling sure sounds like pain, provoking all with love in their hearts to worry, hey, couldn't I be in pain too, an outright non-sequitur, if you're as they say with me, since, after the dentist numbs you there can't be any pain, right, no matter that the drill hits your nerve, and after the morphine numbs you there can't be any pain, right, no matter that the rot eats your brain, so after Fuller appears and your love becomes Fuller and then seems to be Small until after Weeks it becomes Lessor although Lessor never amounts to Münch leaving you to love Nunn till before Long there's a Liddel first then Moore making Nunn appear to be Small all over until Liddel dwindles and Moore turns into Lessor again leaving you for lack of Becker loving Bigges while Nunn resorts to Faith first then Charity before Hope as Bigges curtails and Lott disappoints leaving you to love Nunn without Hope any longer entertaining Shorter briefly then Liddel again till neither being Earnest nor Frank and with Charity inclining to Nunn you put Lykes behind you and grasp Nunn for all he's worth as meanwhile Small expires and Lott lessens and Bigges abates leaving you to cling to Nunn for dear life now trying to ignore Lessor's demise and Liddel's decease and even Faith's final eclipse until lacking Fuller and Becker forever you clutch Nunn so tightly you can feel nothing in your arms at last, well, there can't be any pain, right, no matter that everybody's howling, meaning we the loving shouldn't think too much about all that gloomy shit, unloving being contagious and besides, what's a body to do, which seems such a perfect place for not merely a full stop but even an exclamation that I'm forced to resort to this lame transition just to keep going, well, and here it's hard not to feel put upon, as though your sentence were being dictated, contrived, a baseless fabrication, mine or theirs or somebody's, old suspicion you must be bound somewhere, either by hand or foot, but always headed, enthralled in this foreign state and, it goes without saying, subject to plots (and never so much as a parenthesis to compose yourself), to all of which punishment you'd happily put a stop if not for these diversions, time consuming escapes, knowing long since nothing lies ahead, or more of the same lying there merely, sole point of your proceeding either this, here, now, period, or eternally to come, that promising future, indispensible as justice, and nothing quite like it in the end, well, it's really something when you stop to think about it, or not, a sobering reflection, I refer to myself, if only to pronounce, representative voice again, governing body again, same old law, to wit, that despite our continuing partiality, your sentence is hereby commuted, not from death to life, but to time served, and you are released, or if that sounds extravagant, turned out, abandoned, leaving me, but no matter, missing in action, unspeakable but still subject, my very point, unplotted, depthless, breadthless, neither graph nor axes to grind, so dull, bald, lying barefaced or prone, mere froth, dry spittal, with nothing after all but to howl and undergo it . . . so there it is, suffering in a word, or not, no telling, but there, howl, all the same, little difference, or none to speak of, ellipsis presaging more perhaps, words always wanting, more than all that is, endless pastime, but still, howl, there there now, anguish untold, a further complication, or not, time will tell, more's the pity, but for now resigned, hand indecipherable, modern anguish it's called, bearable perhaps, so matter at an end, tongue faltering, all as before perhaps, or not, what difference, there there, now now, perfect sentence, howwwwwwl, nothing more to say.

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