Duras (Nothingness) – Vandal Poem of the Day

When writing, the writer leaves the world. She vanishes into the

folds of her mind. She dies there. Alone, in a field of words. The

words are the field, are the words and images of her mind, made

manifest, manifold. By writing, the writer leaves her body and

enters the page, the text, the otherworld, the one she dreams.

When writing, the writer dies. She dies to the world. The phone,

the bloody black ringer, rings on; the birds sing outside the shut

glass window, the writer is gone. Writing is transformation,

transportation. By writing, the writer leaves. Her body remains.

Her body, a terrible hump of flesh and blood, cells and disease. But

she is given the gift, grace—she is able to escape her body and the

world. She is transported via the electricity inside her mind into

the page, into the sea of the words.

M.D. becomes nothing by writing. By thinking, already escapes.

Poverty and drinking, destitution, isolation, a lifetime of

abandonment. And memory. Booze loosens it up. Booze closes it

down. Writing is the same, though different. Writing breaks down

all the doors, smashes all the windows in the house, her great big

white mansion—and she is free.