Free The Moon In Its Flight by Gilbert Sorrentino Page B

begin your first day tomorrow, I would like to point out to you that Management would be very pleased should you come in an hour or two—or three—early, so that you might busy yourselves with the small departmental chores of air-conditioner repair, sidewalk shoveling, pen-and-pencil filling, and the like. The cafeteria is still open if you wish to have a bite. Good afternoon.

THE SEA, CAUGHT IN ROSES

    It was not possible to find gathered together rarer specimens than these young flowers. Of course, as the phrase so often has it, there are flowers, and then there are flowers. Some commentators, as always, have vulgarly intruded remarks concerning “figural language,” if one can countenance such opinion without displaying some small degree, at the very least, of levity. At this moment, before my eyes, they were breaking the line of the sea with their slender hedge. “The line of the sea,” I admit, may be taking things just a little too seriously; but events, one hopes, will bear out its ultimate propriety. It should also be noted, and the earlier the better, that the sand was almost uncomfortably hot because of the meridional blaze of the sun, savagely brilliant in the usual white, cloudless sky. They were like a bower of Pennsylvania roses adorning a cliffside garden. In gardens such as these, small domestic animals tend to cavort, on any pretext. The question of why larger animals neglect to “follow suit,” if such an idiom may still be employed, is, at present, moot. Between their blooms is contained the whole tract of ocean, crossed by some streamer. This is an ocean “as you like it,” which is the message presented by this crumpled note. The note also contains the formula for making roast leg of lamb mavourneen, sometimes called—the formula, that is—a “recipe.” The steamer is slowly gliding along the blue, horizontal line. With the aid of a pair of good, not to say excellent binoculars, one can just make out the name of the ship—the SS Albertine. On the other hand, it may well be the humble forest cabin which we have seen before, albeit in dreams. The line stretches from one stem to the next. As we know, the rose is beautiful, and is often called the queen of the green world because of its cruel thorns. This sobriquet doesn’t seem precisely right or just, if I may, for a moment, interrupt the gardening with a gently puzzled remark, as I have, or so it would seem, just done! An idle butterfly is dawdling in the cup of a flower, one long since passed by the ship’s hull. Some of the more sensitive guests are leaving, including a few of the young flowers. There are barely concealed grimaces of disapproval, and some of the older gentlemen, placidly elegant in black tie, appear to be trying to sink the steamer before it reaches the buffet. The butterfly can wait before flying off in plenty of time to arrive before the ship. But according to a telegram carried by a sweating courier, “Nobody else can wait.” And there, once again, is the old, familiar sound of breaking glass! He can wait until the tiniest chink of blue still separates the prow from the first petals of the flower. Two of the women have nervously rushed into the gazebo, despite posted warnings. And, as one might easily have imagined, the “chink of blue”—actually aquamarine—has grown no smaller. The ship, of course, is steering toward the flower. There are cries and imprecations against Pennsylvania and what some call “salts,” whatever they may be. The blue, horizontal line is quite striking in contrast to the blank glare of the sky.
    But only last week, the flowers that were flowers had vied with what certain celebrated authors term “the shining turn of the wave,” or “the turn of the shining wave,” or perhaps “the thundering wall of water.” Figural language often defeats one, especially at the seashore, where one’s head simply swirls! The line of the sea, however, seems, always, somehow to remedy just about