The Televisionary Oracle (65 page)

My infatuated fantasies have officially leapt to the next higher octave. Rapunzel is incorporating some of my own ideas into her rap, ideas I’ve proclaimed loud and strong from my bully pulpit as lead singer of World Entertainment War. “Genocide of the imagination” and “entertainment
criminals” are virtually my trademarks. She also used them a few days ago when she invaded my home, true, but at that time they were merely fodder for her derisive attacks on me. Now she’s weaving them lovingly into her analysis. I take this to be a sign that even if she does harbor serious criticisms of my work, she also regards it as interesting enough to steal from.

The implications of this make me giddy with greed. It means her potential is not just as a lyrical lover, not just as a challenging consort, but also as a rowdy partner in crime—a true equal with whom I can whip up twice the creative trouble I already do. I picture us sneaking out together at dawn to steal the garbage of a Bay Area celebrity, maybe Robin Williams or Adrienne Rich, and auctioning it off at an impromptu “Garbage Sale” during one of my shows. I visualize us collaborating on a rock opera about the Menstrual Temple and performing it at weekend-long salons which also include workshops on the Drivetime and rituals designed to foment holy mischief. I can even imagine us writing a book together. It could be called
How To Make Smart Love with Your Best Friend
.

“Drivetime is a hard-earned luxury,” Rapunzel says as she steps back to admire her hairstyling efforts, “available only to those who’ve cultivated a vigorous relationship with the True Dreamtime while at the same time maintaining a practical grip on the very different rules of the Waketime. But oh is it a luxury.”

“What the hell are those noises?” I say suddenly in response to sounds like voices and banging chairs out in the dining area. I’d heard them before but rationalized they were merely my overwrought imagination. Now they’re getting too loud to ignore. “I’d better go check.”

Rapunzel grabs both my arms and forces me to stay. “Don’t worry about it,” she says. “I invited a couple of friends in with me. They’re out there straightening up.”

“But how did they get in without me seeing them? The front door’s locked.”

“Never mind. It’s time to get ready for the next part of your menarche.” She reaches into her black doctor’s bag. “Here’s the rest of your menstrual lingerie.”

The costume she hands me consists of emerald-green velvet knee pads, a satin plum-colored vest featuring an embroidered image of a
vulture, and black satin slippers.

As I put on the rest of my outfit, Rapunzel leaves the kitchen and goes out to the dining area. A moment later I hear an explosion of many female voices doing that funny amazon ululation-cum-war whoop. My imagination gets goose-bumps.

Rapunzel returns and takes my hand.

“The Menstrual Temple’s welcoming committee awaits you,” she says invitingly. She walks me out of the dingy kitchen. Where the dining area begins there is a long, narrow red carpet, newly placed.

The room has been transformed by the addition of eighteen to twenty women, who’re sitting at the tables. As I arrive, they applaud and blow me kisses. Though they’re all ages, they have in common a slaphappy sartorial sense. I see a rainbow beret sprouting pheasant feathers and a khaki military shirt paired with yellow velvet overalls. There’s a gold brocade frock coat and bulbous red clown nose and green silk pajamas and black chiffon skirt that looks like it has a bustle underneath.

The restaurant has mutated in other ways. Stretched across the back of the main room of the dining area is a banner that reads “The Eater of Cruelty Cafe.” Below it is a neatly hand-drawn poster listing “Tonight’s Specials”:

Near the menu, on two tables pushed together against the far wall, is what looks like a pagan altar. It’s crammed with red candles and snapdragons and small animal skulls and a small cauldron and a hundred other things. The centerpiece is an odd television which resembles the one I saw in the gallery installation on the evening before World Entertainment War’s last show at the Catalyst. It’s either made
of stone and mud or else is an ordinary TV with those materials glued on. In several places, vines sprout out of cracks in the mud.

The images on the screen are like those of intense dreams. At the moment, Abraham Lincoln is giving Mother Teresa a big wet hickey on her bare shoulder as they lie outside a Disneyland-like fortress called “Drug City” while an African grandmother dressed in a turban and a tuxedo holds up a sign on a stick that reads “This Bud’s for you, Uberwoman.”

When I arrived earlier tonight, the tables were covered with white linen. That has been replaced by red satin. Each table now sports a fanned-out deck of large Tarot cards, as well as an oversized silver goblet—about the height and heft, I fantasize, of the goblet used by the giant in the story of Jack and the Beanstalk.

“Here at The Eater of Cruelty Cafe we refer to that particular story as
Jill
and the Beanstalk, Osiris,” Rapunzel says to me, although I haven’t said what I was thinking.

“How could you have possibly known I was thinking about Jack and the Beanstalk?” I wonder.

“I have a telepathic homing device that turns on whenever I’m in the presence of a person who’s ripe to have her archetypes mutated,” she replies. “And I hope you’ll forgive me if I use the feminine form as the all-purpose pronoun. Of course I mean to imply that my homing device also turns on in the presence of a person who’s ripe to have
his
archetypes mutated. But you can’t imagine how important it is to use ‘she’ and ‘her’ to refer to generic humanity. It could literally be a factor in whether or not all human life disappears from this planet in the next thirty years.”

“I’ll buy that,” I say. “I’ve always wanted to save the world.”

“Good, good,” she approves. “I’m always looking for more soldiers to help me kill the apocalypse.”

Rapunzel ushers me to a table in the middle of the room where there’s a woman I recognize. It’s impossible, but I do. She’s Jumbler, the Norse leprechaun androgyne from my superdream. There’s the same thick, flaxen helmet of hair, the pale skin and turquoise eyes.

A Napoleon-style hat made out of aluminum foil wobbles on top of her head. She’s also wearing pointy green velvet shoes and a red leather pouch with a silver buckle cast in the shape of a bull skull. This
all contrasts with her sheer black mesh catsuit, which is garlanded by organza ruffles decorated with intricate paintings of red and black vultures.

“Hi, Jumbler,” Rapunzel coos to her, confirming that this person has the same name that she did in my superdream, “you look like you’re in the mood to kick the apocalypse’s butt tonight.”

Jumbler places her two thumbs and two index fingers together, palms held up and spread out, and greets me with a perverse toast: “May Persephone annihilate the rotting patriarchal imprints within you—without killing you. Somewhere over the rainbow, may She inspire you to resurrect the splendorous beauty of poisoned masculinity.”

She reaches into her pouch and produces an egg. I’m too startled to stop her as she reaches over, pulls forward the waistband of my shorts, and breaks the egg against my belly. The oozing slime only enhances the erotic fever I have been nursing steadily since Rapunzel’s arrival.

“And may Persephone dissuade him,” Rapunzel adds with a giggle, “from being just another boring example of the patriarchy’s crowning achievement: the hate-everything-that-doesn’t-adore-me and fuck-everything-that-adores-me hero.”

Jumbler’s greeting is scary. I don’t like her broken egg and I don’t like her violent references—“without killing you” in particular. Better not complain, though. Don’t want to alienate Rapunzel’s buddy on our first meeting.

As soon as we’ve eased into our chairs, a visitor from a nearby table glides over. A handsome, weathered woman with shoulder-length brown hair and a cracked smile, she looks about forty. She’s holding a guitar and wearing a decal-bedecked black leather motorcycle jacket over a hunter-green satin mini-dress. One of the decals says “Menstrual Minstrel,” which she proceeds to illustrate as she sings us a short ditty that consists entirely of variations on the phrase “The penis is just a clitoris suffering from delusions of grandeur.” Rapunzel plucks out the tampon applicator flute that I’d stored in my vest pocket and plays along.

“What’ll it be, televisionaries?” she asks us when she’s done singing, pulling out a pen and notebook. “Breakfast of Amazons cereal? Rosicrucian
Coca-Cola? Tender Adrenaline Ice Cream with Ancient Spider Webs?”

“Just the cereal for me, Artemisia,” Jumbler says.

“Do you have the Unicorn Ovaries with Dragon Mucus and Sacred Cow Memories tonight?” Rapunzel says straightfacedly, whereupon Artemisia nods. “Good. And why don’t you bring me a quart of Moon Flower Brine, too, OK?”

An aroma I’d been subliminally aware of before has now crept into my full awareness. How to describe it? Sweet almond blended with musky goat and wet feathers and vinegar mingled with rose. It’s not coming from any particular direction. It’s just in the air.

Jumbler chooses this moment to pinch me hard on the arm as she makes a throaty aside close to my ear. “Everyone in this place happens to be menstruating at the moment. Except you and me, of course. I’m a hermaphrodite. Don’t know what your excuse is.” She cackles at this comment.

“You know how it is,” she adds. “Women who spend a lot of time together get their periods synchronized.”

“What should I bring for the sperm pod?” Artemisia asks Rapunzel sardonically, ignoring me. “Is he in the mood to eat?”

“Let’s not call him any bad names tonight, sweety,” Rapunzel says, sticking up for me. “He needs our love and support. Besides, he deserves a little credit. He did read
The White Goddess
long before it was hip. He has Marija Gimbutas’ photo in his wallet, and I dreamed that he once had a sexual fantasy about Gertrude Stein. I even heard he’s got ‘Listen to Women for a Change’ tattooed in a very private place. This one’s special. He’s ripe. Maybe even a true Lesbian Man.”

“Woooooooo! You gonna give him the full treatment?” Artemisia whistles. “Persephone-style immersion? The Honest-to-Goddess eucharist?”

“Could very well be,” Rapunzel replies. “I’m proceeding with the Rowdy Ruby Glissando of the Silk Lotus spell.”

“Yow! He must be a hardy one if that’s his starter plan. Guess you don’t want me to bring him any appetizers that might spoil his appetite, then.”

“Yup.”

I assume this exchange has been scripted ahead of time. It’s flattering
to contemplate the possibility that all these women have plotted and rehearsed tonight’s festivities solely for my benefit. Though I’m also daunted by the responsibility of having to live up to such an immense gift.

As Rapunzel and Jumbler have a whispered exchange that is not meant for my ears, I examine the Tarot deck on our table. It’s a bizarre hybrid. One side of each card has a mutated replica of an old baseball card with categories of statistics unlike what usually appears: “Ecstatic Prayers” instead of “At Bats”; “Sacred Pranks” instead of “Runs Batted In.” My childhood hero, Al Kaline of the Detroit Tigers, appears in one image, except that here he’s wearing a helmet with the horns of a bull protruding and a necklace of vulture figurines. Looks like he has amassed a good number of Ecstatic Prayers, but has been less prolific in the Sacred Pranks department.

On the other side of each Tarot card is a surrealistic photo collage of a female deity garbed in lingerie, below which is a written text. Al Kaline, for instance, is paired with Medusa. Though she has her usual writhing green snakes for hair, she’s portrayed as a smiling, pregnant fashion model striding down a runway. The title at the top of the card is “Medusa the Sexy Mama,” and an accompanying text, credited to Joseph Campbell, reads, “She is Black Time, both the life and death of all beings, the womb and tomb of the world; the primal, one and only, ultimate reality of nature, of whom the gods themselves are but functioning agents.”

I’ve become aware of a twinge in my lower belly. It comes and goes, throbbing in a slow rhythm. I can’t imagine the cause. No food has gone down my gullet for hours.

“So,” Jumbler says to me, “would you like a Tarot reading?”

“Sure. Why not?”

Jumbler shuffles the deck several times, then has me draw a card. It’s the old shortstop for the Washington Senators, Rocky Bridges. He’s dressed in a loincloth and is depicted leaping over a bull in the manner of the athletic maidens of ancient Minoan culture.

“Ah yes,” she sighs knowingly. “You are now on a rocky bridge between your old life and the new. You are perhaps leaving behind your role as rockstar and crossing over to the other side of the abyss. I say perhaps. There seems to be some doubt. The going may be rocky.
Here, draw another card.”

This time I get Early Wynn, a pitcher in the 1950s.

“Yes. I see the problem. You are unfortunately seeking an ‘early win,’ a premature victory. Something about cheating. Fraudulence. You’re trying to skip some steps. Cross the bridge without really crossing it.”

I freeze. Could Jumbler have sensed that I’m being less than honest and complete in carrying out the program Rapunzel designed for me when she invaded my house? That though I’ve suspended the band’s operations in order to take on the job as janitor, I’m not really planning to make it permanent?

“Take two more cards,” she demands.

I draw Hall-of-Famer Nap Lajoie and an obscure old-time player I never heard of named Kid Maddox.

“Ah. I see. Kid and Nap are telling me that you are not performing your kidnap with a pure heart. I think you know what I am talking about—the self-abduction the avatar suggested you undertake. Do you see? Your kidnap must be done with ‘la joie’—for joy alone. Not with covert agendas. Not with an acquisitive eye. And it must be done as ‘mad docs’ would do it—crazy doctors. The cards are advising you to trust the inscrutable wisdom of the wacky healer. Do not imagine that you know better than she who was born to administer the sacred prank medicine.”