day 1

what was bil thiking at the head of his caravan, on his way back in to the city by the eastern sea, at the western edge of the continent, at the western edge of the jungle, the great forest, on the north bank of the river, the great river. o, he stared at the sun through the fronds of a palm leaf, and dwelled on it in his thoughts. each frond, or rather the space between each frond, created a unique separate individual shaft, or ray of light, making a little cathedral of light and shadow there in the high air under the jungle canopy. high enough to be at his shoulder’s height as he rode the elephant? the great lumbering beast, lumbering like a banht, too bored even to trumpet through its long nose, not questing, not seraching to and fro to eplore its environemnt with its own sense of touch/smell/tase that we will never know what that’s like, but the nose swaying back and forth to maintain balance like a tail maintaining its all right his balance while he walked. that’s why he was so fucking bored, dude! because he had to engage his tnose in simple balancing act. small insexcts roly poly somersaulted through the light cathedral, tripping through the light fantastic.
the ciry at the edge of the continet, a circle of its fame burst out of the middle stories of its large metal studded buildings, built on stilts even so, wooden scaffolding shining with bronze discs, and real skyscrapers as well? why not. bronze decorative discs, glittering in the sun, and the blue electric circle of fame and spooge-like lively city life energy, open converrsations at cafe tables, that anyone could walk up and join c=because we are all of fthe same generation, adn we all understand each other, we all come from the same experience … though of course bil and cal are exciles, adopted sons of the city, even with ther mother tthey had come here.. is she also an adopted mother? a grateful second wife to her new husband, brother adopted brother to her late husband. a circle of energetic fame, fleeing like rumour over the ocean waves, over the tops of the jungle canopy trees, over the snow-capped mountains, the mountains to the south over which Bil has come travelling at the head of his caravan, with elephants, donkeys, mules, ponies, and oxen – but strangely no horses. wagons. white blue glinting off of the waves of energy of this expanding concentric circle, trailing waves or tails like the tail of spermatazoa, or the ocean waves over which it itself is travellig yes.
bil wanted to pluck that palm leaf, but thought of it too late, he was busy contemplating it, which was staring at it simply, just staring and thinking half of nothing, he was caught up with that until somehting deep in his contemplation, of which he wasn’t consciouf up until that exact moment, told him to pluck the leaf and hold it in his hand to continue his thoughts, which wew, to reiterate once again, mostly at a subconscious level and unknown wholly, or only barely half-known if that to his own waking self.
so he thought of it too late, and when he turned, twisted his body as far as it would go riding on the neck of this elephant, because he didn’t ride in a basket thank you, but a fucking _saddle_, that’s right tthank you very much. he turned his body twisting it awkwardly only to, that is to say in order to, only in order to, just to realize that he was exactly one millisecond too late he was not in a position to pluck that leaf. it was moving past him already. if he could turn completely around and face the rear like on a swivel chair maybe he could still reacch out and grab it, but not in the saddle he was sitting in, he couldn’t turn his body around that much, it started to get painful as he turned and stretched and strained. he gave up and turned front facing front again. he suppressed a sigh. and half out of spite half out of a desire to try to make it up to himself, his unconscious self, which was enough of an other that he wanted to placate it to maintain the relationship between the two of them. he looked out ahead and picked out a palm leaf coming up that he could reach out and pluck. it briefly occured to him to try and find a similar leaf, but there was no time for that thought to take hold to take root and then hold before he ha ddecided on one, braced himself, reached out carefully balancing himself by stretching back the other hand, and gfrabbed on to the stem of a leaf on a low-hanging branch as he passed by. he had to hand on and was afraid he was going to be pulled off is elephant for a second before he got a firm grip, re-secured his grip for himself to his own satisfaction, and gave it a really good tight tug. so then when he had tugged, pulled it loose and was holdig it in his had, adjusting himself in the saddle so he wasn’t sitting on his own balls and crushing them. and twitching his shoulders round in circles to reseat them comfortably again in his shirt and tunic – what is a khaftan, a hat? what is the long muslim shirt called, not a nehru jacket obviously, i don’t think it’s mufti either – oh well i’ll look it up later. then the thought caught up with him. and he looked at the one that he had plucked, and wondered, is it similar? do i even remember what the other one looked like, the priginal one? no i don’t fuck. now i feel like this plucking has been pointless. he was a little bit angry at himself for doing something that seemed pointless, like a waste of time. and then he was left with an almost inert piece of vegetable matter in his hand and wondering hwo he could use it to reconstruct what was now a fast-crumbling thought about shafts of light or some fucking thing?
he sat, holding it in his hand, twirling it now and then, and let his mind turn it self off again, sunk himself back into his reverie. he turned his head and looked down and to the side. his face was well-tanned, dark. he war a beaded headband with a high thread count. his long jet ink black hair was bound in cloth strips and snaked down his back, lying there like an armadillo on his shoulder blades.
carts were in his caravan too. he was traveling coming from the south, from over the fucking mountains. he was returning from a successful business trip – obviously. there were only legged animals, beasts of burden in his caravan? no vehicles? hmm, I’ll have to think about that. what size containers would he be shipping? in what goods does he trade, i wonder. if the elements and camels and llamas and ponies are pulling carts or vehicles or cartons, are these on wheels, or do they float? did the citizen’s vehicle float in the previous novel? was i ever explicit about it? i wonder.
he is going to have to cross a bridge if hes coming from the south and the city is on the north back of a river. where are is wareshouse – on the outskirts of town, no doubt – wait vechilces won’t take the rough terrain he’s traveeliing over. that’s why he’s so successful he’s trading with countries, terrirtories few other people hav etraded with because it’s so hard to get ot them. his warehouses are maybe on the south side of the river – near or on the entry to this new trade route, but then again on the river for ease of river transport to trade with the interior or even the ocean. whay is it hard for people to use the ocean to trade with the south now? hmm. i’ll have to think about that.
his warehouse is a red building. corregated sides – why? again, why?
a large sliding barn ir hangar like door at the front., it’s not right on the river. i think it abuts an access road to one of the docks. it’s not closes tot hte dock it’s about seven or egight warehouses fromt he dock itself. he’s in an area where there is an unloading or stevedor company which servces a dozen or two dozen wearehouses aroun tha partifcular dock, it’s a bit like a cul de sac of suburnam houses. and who is the guy that runs that little stevedore operation with his mgnetic or tow field crande, littlebobac=cat backhoue tractor wheel-having little crappy scrappy machine that sometimes he himslef pilots or drives rounde. when he’s tired of paperwork, entering sms and contract revisions inot his little electronic data pad. which they call something – a, uh, a _token_ or something like that. this guy’s name was joe or some analog to that in this world joe, jo, geo, goe, jioe. Jioe, i like that. ok, let’s go with that.
mvoing out of the jungle onto paved road from the beaten down ground track a track sometimes washed away as mud by a heavy downpoor, that’s the rain get it rain forest for ya. then into stretched of road with streetlights, then into the warehouse district, or maybe some low-rent residential district first – by the way did I mention the north bank is reactrational parks – it’s been reserved for that, while hte south bank is loading docks and other insustrial uses of the river. his journey from wild, from jungle gradually into the viciliation and brightness, exposure of the ciry mirrors in reverse his family’s journer fromth ecity into darkness, wild and uncertainty in the alst story the last novel.

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