anarchy

(i wrote this many years ago)

The William is attempting sleep on a plywood plank under the rock overhang . Crude four-poster bed in our pseudo-cave, protection from the sun's murderous glare. I'm careful to be quiet. I want him to sleep. I want to be alone.

There's no silence in the desert, but the closest you'll get is at noon. No wonder they dueled to the death at High Noon in the Old West. What more suitable time to die out there. What more likely time. Me, I don't need a siesta. I welcome the time to myself and, like a lizard, bask in the sun. Sit with thighs sticking sweatily to a faded blue plastic 60's chair by the cooking grate. Must remember to disengage slowly or I will yelp in pain, wake him, lose my solitude. He never mentioned a cooking grate or I would have brought hotdogs. Instead we're surviving on raisins and pull-top cans of beans. My appetite has abandoned me anyway. The act of eating performed only to fuel the body. I've slipped into some subsistence state in which the food I love has become meaningless. The growling of my stomach perplexes me. Doesn't it realize my mind has rejected food as unnecessary? Water is all I need. My body has become the desert.

We are on BLM (Bureau of Land Management) land just over the Arizona border in Utah. We crossed thirty-five miles of nothingness to get here. I think wistfully of the azure expanse of Lake Powell not so far away. But we are isolated. It's what we wanted. The road out was hardly more than dried up river bed winding between forbidding buttes the color of decaying ship's hulls long sunken in this arid sea. One cloudburst and we'd be cut off. But the pristine sky above breeds no clouds and that danger is only my fantasy.

This is Church Camp. The Zen Anarchist Sanctuary. A bizarre cove of vague toothpick civilization in the infinite desert. And it feels as infinite as the sky. I feel so small. The silver underbellies of planes glint occasionally and I think in a small voice, "Hello. I am down here. No one knows I am here. You can't see me from your cockpit I am so small. You look down here and you think 'there couldn't possibly be anyone down there.' But I am here."

The William found this place quite by accident during his wanderings in the Flying Skull, his midnight blue Jeep. The top of which has never come off. And I can't understand that. To me, a Jeep in the desert screams to be topless (as do I, come to think of it). We should have been caged only by the gut-spattered windshield and rollbars. But he has his CD player and his gear to protect, not to mention his fair skin, and so he's never unscrewed the lid and just driven with the wind in his hair. No need to tell me to fasten my seatbelt on the trip out. The manic jouncing of the Jeep left me feeling so vulnerable that I wanted to be battened down. His driving is demented. He is a show off and for that I spent two hours jerking like a marionette in my seat, nails pinching my thighs as he spun donuts in soft sand.

Ranchers (where do they live?) lease vast tracts of land out here to graze cattle (what do they eat?). Invisible creatures, bread crumb trail of dung to the creek that's long since gone underground. I had a vague fear of crashing head on into the grill of some pickup truck as we rounded a boulder out of control, but the chances of that were minimal, considering the desolation. The William had temporary squatter's rights at the makeshift camp. He recounted an ominous story of men arriving at the camp one time months back, demanding to know what he and his friend were doing there. (They were tripping their brains out). Did they work for the rancher? (I had a secret laugh at anyone mistaking the William for a cowpoke) and making threatening noises about tourists being unwanted in these parts. The William made it sound like we could be killed by these modern-day outlaws for trespassing. Images of my skull bleaching in the Utah sun gave me pause. I'd learned to take his truth and cut it in half, however, and then I'd have something closer to fact. At least I counted on that when it came to sinister ranchers. In the worst case scenario, I figured I could rely upon my charms to spare my life and to hell with the William.

The camp comes up like some wished-for truck stop. A stand of ancient cottonwoods sponging off the creekbed, home to four owls that swoop from limb to limb, mystified by the humans. Just beyond the trees, an incongruous swamp in miniature, complete with reeds and bullfrogs, encircled by a fence to keep cow and horse dung out of the fresh water source. Beside it is a giant's step of rock, waterfall gone dry. I look at it and picture the Flying Skull airborne as the William wonders where the road has gone.

The site is inviting to humans. It's surrounded by rock ledges and one of the blue retro plastic chairs perches up there like a throne. The Birth Canal is behind the cheap throne, where the William had once shoved his head in drug-addled curiosity and got stuck for a time in the tight crevasse of rock. Fool. I figured one trip through a birth canal is enough for anyone in a lifetime and besides, it was strewn with dried mouse droppings. No Hanta Virus for me, thank you. I sometimes wonder how he's survived. Below the ledge is a corral spattered with horse droppings and strewn with old straw. A long pipe from the mini-marsh feeds the horse trough and spills in a lackadaisical trickle onto the thirsty ground. The trough could fit two humans easily in its depth, provided you don't mind the layer of rusty silt and algae on the bottom. And in this sun, you won't. Hunched amid the bushy sage sits a plastic port-a-potty. It's got toilet paper. Someone didn't think much of squatting in the bushes, ass bared to passing rattlesnakes. I love them for it.

When we arrived, the William parked the Skull in front of a small trailer which surrenders its paint to the harsh environs. Stovepipe jutting from its round airplane hangar body. Not even fit for a trailer park, this thing's about as homegrown as they come. But the trailer does have a sad charm. We declared it home and tossed our belongings on the bunkbed inside, stashing our meager food supply atop the stove. The William insists upon closing the split wooden door tight between visits, oddly convinced that the trailer is inpenetrable to vermin. I point out mouse shit on the mattress. The ceiling is a planetarium of frightening psychedelic verse and scrawled names. This could have been home to Jim Morrison, Charlie Manson.

Outside, in the silty dust shaded by the rock overhang and the trailer, we set up the tent. A space-age thing I'd seen only in outdoorsman magazines. A trained monkey could have set it up. We'd forgotten to level the ground beneath it, or clear it of foreign objects that would later wreak havoc on our spines. At first I wasn't sure I liked the site. I inspected the area thinking it might be nicer beneath the cottonwoods (although no doubt spattered with owl shit). However, that meant setting up in the creek bed and even if a sudden flood seemed ludicrous, it wasn't totally out of the question. I preferred not to drown in the desert. The William spoke of moving camp later into the open desert but I balked, preferring even these shreds of civilization.

As he sleeps, I abandon my chair for the huge boulder that has enticing hollows. I'm certain I can find comfort on it. The curve of my ass fits neatly into one hollow, the spread of my shoulders in another. A small lizard, subtle iridescent beauty, skitters over my brown belly. It doesn't know me from the rock and has no fear. I'm at a luxurious lounge chair angle and bask in the sunlight, flicking pellets of dried grey mud off my legs, ecstatic to be a living highway to a small creature. He cocks his head amusingly, pinhead eyes examining my movement. But I realize it's not me who holds his attention, it's a careless beetle flying spasmotically in our small rock realm. Too close to the earth. I'm captive to the lizard's predatory grace. With psychic accuracy, he knows where the beetle will dip in flight, and swallows it whole.

I'm already so dirty and it will be days before a shower. Earlier we'd gone on an excursion out to some pillars of mud and caves of mud. Desert sexuality, dried and cracked like geriatric genitalia. Touch the pillar and its crust crumbles beneath your fingers. Mother Earth has a sense of humor, giving birth to this erect phallus that dwarfs us in dimension. I offer it a Lilliputian embrace, paying perverse comic homage to the penis. The William leads me to the cave. A slit almost invisible in the haunch of a butte until you're on top of it. I eye it dubiously. He's already inserted his body into its mouth with gymnastic flexibility. He insists I am no bigger than he is and can fit without a problem. He forgets, I have breasts and hips. I watch his luminous white skin swallowed by the crumbly grey mud cave, shimmery white-blond head plunging into a womb of darkness. I'm really not so sure I want to go in there. I look up at the rocky mass overhead and imagine it choosing the moment of my exploration to cave in. The William is persistent, however, and to prove I am no coward, I gingerly thrust a leg into the jagged mouth of the cave, twisting gracelessly and struggling for footholds.

--You know, this looks like the perfect home for rattlesnakes.

--Well I've never seen one in here.

--It only takes one time.

--We'd hear it rattle before we got to it.

I'm not particularly reassured. But at least he's in the lead. He'd disturb the venomous resident, after all, not me. As my fingers bite into talcum walls and my feet test and cling to dried outcroppings of mud, my imagination invents a scenario where we hear the tell-tale rattle, amplified in the small space, and he screams and plunges into the narrow slit. Pinned. Twin pricks oozing blood. How do I drag him out when I can barely maneuver my own body? And if I get him out, will he remain conscious to guide me out of these confusing look-alike canyons? My mind divides, dwelling on these ominous visions while contemplating the best route through the curving rainwater spout, dry as chalk and crumbling as my body scrapes its walls. It is a thankfully short cave, opening into a chalice of rock. I crawl out with relief, yet immensely pleased with myself for daring. However, there's one more challenge. We're still in a pit about six feet deep. In a moment, it's just me. He's scrambled out with land crab mobility and peers down at me from the lip, offering a hand. I'm completely unconvinced that he could tug me out. He may be agile, but still appears somewhat frail and I am a solid woman. Over and over I attempt to use my upper body to pull myself out but I lack the power and my muscles are shaky from the cave-crawl. It's just beyond my capacity. My foothold never seems sure enough and it would be a hard fall. Now I know how it feels to be trapped and a vague panic begins to curl round my throat. I could exit the same way I entered, I suppose, through the mud cave. But that's not appealing either. And so I grab and hold and stretch and pull and climb and scrape and finally, every muscle and sinew singing, I breach the rock lip. God, it feels good. Twin escapees, we survey the hole, and I see how the cave was formed. We'd traversed ancient depths, the drainpipe of a mountain. Perhaps the path of least resistance for water, but not so for humans. Exhilerating to have wriggled its length and be born again into sunlight.

No wonder the William is beat. We didn't slept much last night and we'd driven north from Flagstaff the day before. I insisted on opening my window despite his complaint that the Jeep didn't drive well when catching air. Upright square vehicles are just not aerodynamic, open windows or not. Deal with it. Besides, we had two jugs of gasoline in the back and I figured a little air circulation would be useful. And it just wouldn't do to smoke a cigarette in an enclosed space with gasoline, would it? An open window only made sense and he had little choice but to bend to my will. I needed the window open to see anything. He thought that never washing the windshield would make the Jeep look somehow more 'rugged', like it had been places. Frankly, I found splattered bug guts at close range vaguely nauseating and spent many miles pondering why he didn't go cross-eyed. We had the CD player cranked on the trip up but the rugged roads had Beck's Stereopathetic Soulmanure skipping so insanely we had to make do with conversation.

--I'm tempted to find out where Beck lives and knock on his door and tell him 'I'm Beck too! Don't you get it?'

I didn't get it, but I nodded as if I did. I'm sure Beck would be delighted. Everyone loves a stalker. Particularly one with the apparent delusion that he too is you.

As he slept, looking like some crumpled angel with scuffed up knees, I rose from my rock and sought shelter from the sun beneath the gnarled cottonwoods, alighting between dried owlshit splatter on a ledge of rock. A jackrabbit rustled behind me and the owl posse exchanged tree limb perches above. Glorious solitude. I will him to sleep for a very long time.

My canteen smells bad. Backwash, I suppose, or mildew taking hold of the insulated pouch that is never quite dry. I slosh the water thoughtfully in my plastic Army canteen. It's one of the favorite things I own, the best four dollar investment ever made. A small pocket on the front of the olive drab pouch holds a small brown bottle of water purification tablets which I regret never having occasion to use. It's got metal hooks that I clamp the the back pocket of my low-slung jean shorts and if I get any skinnier the weight of the water will drag the pants right off me. There was a time when I had no idea how to properly drink from a canteen and would sip in a ladylike manner. But then an Army vet set me straight. I had to wrap my lips completely around the mouth of the bottle, he said. I tried it. Problem solved, no longer would I suffer water-spattered breasts. I guzzle now like a good ole boy tipping back a cold one. The William brought along several odd black canvas pouches he calls 'Ant Babies' (and to his dismay, I bastardize it into Beanie Babies). I declare their inventor an idiot. What sense does it make to color a water pouch black so it can suck up all the sun's heat? The water inside is rude, hot and noxious. I decided that the Ant Babies made better pillows and we needn't use them since he's also brought a huge plastic, spiggoted jug of the stuff. If nothing else, the William is an ample supplier of water and although I may starve, I shall not die of thirst.

Something rustles behind my rock perch and I turn to find our Friendly Neighborhood Jackrabbit. He'd spent the last evening near the Skull grazing off a shrub of sage, one big dark eye fixed and unblinking in our direction. We were transfixed by the rabbit's eye. How long we sat there staring silently back at it, who knows. For him, we were apparently some novel dinner show and he seemed quite unfazed by our presence. I thought perhaps he'd like a change of pace from the sage diet and crept forward with offerings of bread and Wheat Thins only to find he was unmoved by my gifts and let them go stale in the dust overnight. He has ears of Mule dimension, perhaps more alert than those jet bead eyes, and it's hard to believe he's a rabbit as he hops - no, you can't even call it a hop - he very nearly lopes like a coyote.

The lizards investigate me more thoroughly and fearlessly than any other creature and I begin to recognize and identify them. One by his crooked tail, another by half moon mark in black round his throat. I love the way they bob their heads in puppetlike greeting. They appear territorial and menace one another until diverted by a possible meal of bird. Restless, I walk to the bottom of the dry falls where a green rivulet feeds a small pool and strange small wriggling creatures fight for survival. Some, I am astounded to see, are tadpoles and I imagine the others mosquito or some bug larvae. There are other small alkaline pools in the ruts of the road. How long do they have, I wonder? Who knows when it rained last and when it will rain again? They valiantly try to reach adulthood before their tire track world goes dry. And I guess they pray that another tire doesn't roll over them.

There is only one creature in this wilderness that I resent. Or one flock of creatures, rather. The crows.- or are they ravens? I never get close enough to distinguish the tell-tale difference in beak. Monstrous in size, they have vocal chords to match, and I awoke at some hellish dawn hour to their rusty shovel cries. Toss and turn, sandwich my head with an Ant Baby and a balled up sweatshirt, I could not muffle the godawful racket. No choice but to get up and make instant coffee by balancing the camper's pock-marked tea kettle atop the propane flame. The birds simply traded fence posts, never halting their demented symphony until I began to believe that their sole purpose in haunting the corral was to let the humans know we were not welcome. Only when I strode through the dust toward them did they relent and flap off in a Hitchcock show of menace.

I'd somehow managed to exit the tent without waking the William, despite the loud rip of the zipper. The clothes I'd worn to bed the night before and wriggled out of in the heat of daybreak were too filthy to consider again. I balanced at the mouth of the tent and inserted my feet into my Nike hiking boots (or sneakers, I've never quite figured out what they are) for it's unwise to tramp unshod in the desert. With no audience in the world, I rose like Venus. Utterly and magnificently nude. With an exquisite thrill, I shook loose my hair and gathered up a towel and toothbrush and strolled through the camp wearing nothing but my boots. I imagined myself the original homo sapiens sapiens, feral and primitive, unaware that any other such creatures existed besides ourselves in this vast sunlit world. The morning sun was gentle on my skin, unthreatening to the pale moons of my buttocks and breasts. The silence (now that the crows had flown the coop) absolutely breathtaking. For that time nothing else existed, all had been stripped away. Well except for my boots. I was Eve, Lady Godiva, Mother Earth. I unraveled my hair like Rapunzel, studied the tranquil water of the horse trough like the Lady of Shallot. And I pondered if a Prince or a Frog lay slumbering in the tent. I had not yet reached a conclusion.

Fucking the William had been a curious and novel experience. If you're looking for the Big O, sex is better approached sober because a DXM hallucination is serious competition for an orgasm. And it doesn't discriminate between the sexes. One can and will fuck for hours with no resolution, but fortunately it's only vaguely frustrating at the time. There's so much else going on inside your head it's hard to care about the gratification of your clit. Even when I concentrated on coming it was irritatingly elusive, so I would console myself with the impossible length of time we were able to fuck. I confess to more amusement than compassion for the William's lot - a penis that would forget its purpose, hang its head in confusion, then rise back up to the challenge repeatedly.

We were sprawled on a blanket on the plywood platform. When I sent him into the tent for condoms he forgot why he was in there and I had to stifle my laughter. The only reason I knew why he was there was because I'd secretly halved my dose. I couldn't fully surrender in this wilderness. Still, I can't be sure how long it was before I even noticed he was missing. I wanted to say hey, this is next to impossible, let's just forget it. But he was so intent upon fucking. That is, when he remembered that was what he wanted to be doing. Me, I didn't care. The night sky teeming with stars and the bats swooping for bugs above our guttering candle were as captivating to me as a good round of sex. When I was alone on my back on my personal boulder I took huge delight in the exquisite close encounters I was having with my beloved bats. I could see their mud colored underbellies and hear the magnificent flap of their wings millimeters from my ear. No fear that they would become hopelessly entangled in my hair. The black sky was encrusted with more diamonds than a Romanov's crown. I watched in childlike delight as they'd take turns falling, arching past Orion's Belt and then fizzling into nothingness.

When the drug took absolute hold and I was again entangled with the William, I became the night sky.He lay on his back beneath me and I rose over him. Stars fell from my fingers. I became infinite and celestial. He was the desert below me and I spread out over his expanse, my fingers deconstructing into the wind that caressed every arroyo and and boney crag of his wilderness. In slow motion I swooped like a freetail bat over my world with nothing nothing nothing tying me to the earth. He seemed so solid and grounded below me while I seemed to have shed any human form. I was nothing, insubstantial, and yet I was everything. I fucked him. Amazing to be so big and know no limits. Entranced, I fell in love with the sensation. And I fucked him. Before, the very concept of infinity frightened me. Too big, too inconceivable to grasp. How can there be no boundaries? How can something never ever end? Yet, when I was infinite it was achingly beautiful. No fear. Only delirious and endless fucking. But eventually even infinity had to end. The world telescoped again into our small place. Where our inept bodies struggled to come together. When there was no hope that we ever could.