encasement. The combined effect of trillions of microscopic silicon
lattices breaking and echoing off the sheer concrete surfaces
exhilarated them. They felt like artists or shamans, absorbing the soft
stuff, destroying the hard.
“You know, unless we do something drastic, no one’s going to
come to this stupid coffee party!” Partment informed Colin.
“Why not?” Colin was lying on his back watching the stars
wobble.
“Because coffee has no flesh, no body, no blood. People want to
dissolve in their drinks. They want Dionysus, not Apollo. Orgasm,
not epiphany. Not verse, but the perverse. They want freedom,
absolute fucking freedom.”
“I guess only seasoned rebels like us can handle absolute fucking
freedom.” He raised his bottle proudly.
“Hell, I was an Apollonian my whole life,” Partment confessed, “I
discovered the truth too late. I had no idea how unhappy I was.”
“What did you do?”
Partment shook his head. “I was a lawyer!”
“Wow,” said Colin, shaking his head sympathetically. “What
saved you from that?”
The old man let out a winded exhale. “You could say I was
blindsided on the road to Damascus. My whole life fell apart before
my eyes. But I was freed. I learned that happiness didn’t come from
the law, from structure. It came from essence, from the liquid.
Worshippers of Dionysus crack the shell to get back to the creamy
center, the juicy stuff, whether it be wine, or milk, or sap, or blood.
Philosophically, I am a Dionysian.”
Colin pictured in turn the crushing of grapes, suckling of breasts,
tapping of trees and the murder of men.
“I dig most of those things,” he said. “Are you sure that this
Dionysus cat isn’t dangerous?”
“Apollo is the dangerous one,” Partment assured him. “Look at
that horrible excuse for a river. That is a sheer destructive force. They
do that to people too, carving them up and plastering them over. All
with the excuse of protecting them from their nature. I’ll take nature
over that any day.”
“I’m with you,” Colin agreed, “So what about the party? How do
we attract the bleeding at heart?” He drained the last of his bottle and
cracked open another with the practiced ease of a circus juggler.
“We just put the river back on its natural course!” the old man
ABYSSINIA
44
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