2 December 2003 | Vol. 3, No. 4

Intersection

by STEPHEN OLIVER

The secret lies in elevation; in the erection of it, its meaning, what it relates to. The concept of the finite gave way to loss. Dream gave way to prophecy. Clearing the plains of primordial forest invited perspective. The finite, elevation, loss, perspective. These are the fundamental ingredients that define homage. Stone is the vehicle for homage, because stone represents elevation and irredeemable time; it is a man-made contrivance in the spirit of permanency, an acknowledgement of absence.

The analytical axe split the proposition in two: material—shamanic. Exactly what is lost cannot be known because absence simultaneously suggests replacement. A tree is replaced by a standing stone. A bush thicket becomes a hut, the moment of destruction is the moment of discovery, orgasm is death, violence and sex, etc. Loss, however, is immeasurable because it is boundless. Loss accretes over time into mythology.

The metaphysician slowed, paused at the lights. In the car opposite (to his left) a blonde with a Nordic profile gripped the steering wheel like a seafarer gripping the tiller in an Atlantic sea squall. Her eyes, unambiguous as a theodolite, calibrated the coordinates from point, to the shopping-strip four intersections distant. Her knuckles that whitened on the steering wheel indicated a life of vigorous, dominant sex. Her tensed form, crouched over the dashboard reminded him of the trebuchet, sprung, at the moment of release. He was at least five hundred years and one continent out in his appreciation of this woman.