pink/Brown
Walking
in the City with my Partner
Walking in the city with my partner I come to the number 2, a
tattered, dull orange plaster sculpture that looms a meter over me. My partner
notices her shoelaces are loose as we approach the figure, but I continue
closer and stand in its serpentine shadow. Through the top curl of 2 I can see
the skyline and blinding reflections from windows that divert the sun my way.
Tracing its loop and drop, I come to the acute base with weeds and grasses at
its edges as it sinks into the cracked sidewalk. I glance back to see a figure
reaching to her shoes, one knee pinning her sunflower skirt to the concrete,
her orange hair falling along her back. And, turning around to the mono(or is
it dual?)lith before me, I note the upper loop is a broken centrifuge, a golden
(or is it orange?) ratio that breaks its own monotony, escapes itself like the
nautilus that peaks from beneath its shell, the sunflower that arranges its
seed heads in the center to dance out precisely. That part of 2 could circle in
itself endlessly, fractions within fractions, a wave that keeps rolling even
when it doubles into itself and the water. Looking through the loop of 2, I
also see a green sculpture 3 on the other side of the park, a double-centrifuge
figure, doubly infinite, deeper. Do numbers only operate on the surface level,
I ask myself while staring again at 2's flat base, the orange line that
dissolves to concrete-gray in the corner of my eye. And I ask myself whether
the base of 2 devalues it when compared to the unity (or is it duality?) or is
it triality?) of 3, whether I want long orange hair or bobbed green, my current
partner or that woman with whom eye contact was sex from afar when the way we
lingered on each other became gross and indulgent, understanding and
consensual. Even the breasty form of 3 is appealing to me without making me
feel silly. I think of green hair and a naked figure forming its own 3, doubly
centered, her nipples' bumps maybe resembling the center of sunflowers with
their spiraling, perfect ratio—though that’s just a mathematical
fantasy. As synesthesia begins to force itself on me, since the color and
form of this 2 in front of me and that 3 across the park are now inseparable
from their values, I remember my childhood and my mornings in classrooms with
paper numbers scattered along the walls, the way beige 1 soothed me, blue 4
nursed me, red 9 defeated me, and bloody 5 haunted me. I may be falling out of
love with orange 2 and into it with green 3. Still, between them there are
as many divisions and degrees as there are infinite integers, a small infinity.
I ask myself again if numbers only operate on the surface, and even add to that
a question of whether the surface coincides with skin. To answer myself, I figure
1 is a reflective number that denotes both a singular value and valuable
individual, and to which we all assign ourselves, naturally. 1 equals 1. 1 is
1. We are 1. I am 1. The number does operate on my level, extending out of its
system and into my own. Actually, it's obvious just how unnecessary these
reasons are, since the axiom is that everything is 1: all levels are the
content of a singularity. 2 is the great unifier and producer. 3, a figure that
refuses fracture, cannot be divorced, will not suffer fools. This is a
digestible answer to my question. So if this small infinity between 2 and 3
also extends to me... can I even hope to understand where I am at either end of
the spectrum, the sweetness of orange 2 to the hum of green 3, when between the
two I can't even grip the endless, indecisive fractions? There’s an itch to walk
away as she is tying her laces and hide behind that figure 3, either lie down
on my back and curve my legs and torso to align with the bottom bell, or just
stand straight against the portrait backside, the figure being 3-dimensional
and thick. Because I'm absorbed in finding a way to connect the depth of me to
the depth of these numbers, it makes sense that I should attach myself to 3, as
it's the closest representation of nature's dimensions—but that begs me to
attach to blue 4, which has always been comforting. And even then, a bloody 5
has even more truth, because it allows for another dimension I may not have
heard of yet, and has the humanity of blood in its value, terrifying though it
makes it. I'm fracturing, I’m a pink and brown fraction that is decidedly
indecisive, whole but split, unsure of its favorite color. The thought makes me
feel childish, but I'm already counting numbers so I ignore it. The green girl
would be my third lover, I realize. I hump the thought. Limiting myself to the
space between 2 and 3, though it's no limit at all, I creep along the part of
nature that I've allotted myself by holding to each degree—the problem being
each degree slips away from me as it dissolves into slighter, more fickle
fractions, either forcing me to jump ahead or fall behind. Still, seemingly
hopeless, this is a system of certainty that I've proven to extend to me. Hold
on a second, comes from the ground, my partner behind me. A man in the field spins
a small girl who is wearing heavy black clogs, and as some wind swirls grass in
front of me he loses his grip and she flies away, spinning and sailing, her face
finally scattering the dirt. The thud and yelp tear me from the sculpture to
consider the green hair bobbing behind a hedge across the park. I hate math but
it compels, starts me running across the field and hurtling over the child in
the dirt, getting closer to the green girl even as she walks away from me.
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