The Corpse Of Mickey Mouse

Thank you, Walt. Thank you, Mr. Donnelly. I bow to you, Pushead, unworthy to groom your toenails, let alone your wonderful, graying locks. For grand inspiration, toys, Goethe and Hollywood. For the sadness ever present in my heart, a ball of joy for La, for Charlotte.

Anti-Copyright 2007. Mackinaw Spoon. Steamboat Books USA

The Corpse of Mickey Mouse (A Cartoon) circa 1999-2006 by Mackinaw Spoon

Certainly for years now, M, exhaling in scant sunlight and pane, is clinging to life, having day and night and again felt something more than smoke drift out though the proverbial window. Decades ago policy hadn’t taken to tasking tobacco. The literal window: smoke has nowhere else to go. Today its consumption is limited by time and confined to the open air. M has opened the window … But he doesn’t seem to care much for anything anymore. He puffs angrily. Unknown to M, secret signs and code words have already placed the image of his corpse ahead of him. Unknown to M, his perfect body will be displayed forever. Dissected even, seven years after the first risen companions. A companion does not have an object. It has reassigned, for all time, its place as the passing of an object. This companion has managed to subject the mouse. As much as it can, death struggles to assemble itselfbut in matter, disintegration; in memory, soil serves to insure solidarity, complete finitude; in speech, resolution is a perquisite. Death, however, has transformed M, not completely, but gradually, like the slow consumption of an entire resource; and finally, only finally, yet, it has already destroyed him, without so much resolution. (And curiously, risen ‘fore the dissection … back from the dead of the dead, and quicker than the catalog can close.) Unknown particles, the stuff of ghastly propulsion, leave traces present in the companion’s fart. Sanguine motives govern its charm, and marketability. The question most likely to rise these days goes, How did he do it? Most recently, M has taken to smoking in the boardroom. He refuses to discuss his presence in the presence of his corpse. And his corpse is always present. Even when the companion isn’t perfectly situated within a given time and space, the possibility of its appearance, becoming the very measure by which it is absent, is always lurking. The way darkness begins to round about near twilight, M drifts in his seat, and often drops his butt from his lips. All of you will die, every one, he often rants (when he’s not drowsing). In a corner, the companion stands perfectly still. Everyone is waiting. * In the city, they say, the dead whispered long before those who heard, listened. Language itself had to rise from the furnace, and fix itself into an observer. This language has learned to crawl through masses. It has tucked behind its buttons all the secrets of

accumulation. It has reduced all of us to bits, and calculated our proximity to its disastrous tone. When will he speak, they wonder aloud outside the boutiques. When will he vanish? When will we be through? M has the luxury of having been the proverbial frontiersman with respect to the blossoms of eyes integral to the industry; eyes that are more like ears if we consider the true work, the staggering accomplishment of film. In other words, M never asked for “an ear,” or a shoulder for that matter. M requested our eyes. M prides himself on having had no uncertain role in the subjection of humans. He likes to think of the audience as a zoo. The eyes watch a screen where those who had watched the eyes have reassembled an expression, a mirror. In those days, watching the eyes gather and go was something like Wall Street. The studio’s tickers produced large numbers out of the coins dropping on box office counters everywhere. The heads of the studio buoyantly bubbled with ice, scotch and whirls of thick smoke. It has been through animation that a particular subjection of human culture, represented largely by animals, and eventually, most convincingly, expressed through endless death, has proliferated and informed other forms of visual expression. Today, M rests on his laurels, and makes few public appearances. Having taken to Warhol, M has copies of himself everywhere. But then the copies changed. He often thinks, This is not how it’s supposed to be. Unsure as to who might have said that, he’ll groom at the mirror or tend to his oral hygiene. Sometimes M is uncomfortable with having impressed so many eyes into his skin. He wonders about a mouse’s life. He struggles to recall nature. * In the darkness of the studios, M sneaks after custodians. He’s on foot, in shadow. He hasn’t thought so much of what he is about to do; nor has he been successful in determining his path home. His memory washes in images fixed, not chains. His head spins and only his gaze offers up an anchor. Here an anchor, there an anchor. The following events unfold lacking premeditation, or much strength (not altogether true if one notes the flask in M’s back pocket and the pile of butts, evidence of great strength). M hangs back. He waits for the custodians climb into a basement. He cautiously follows, hiding in shadows. Relying on his ears, closing his eyes, M takes note of the clacks and snaps of mousetraps. His cells remember something nearly intangible, the unforgotten trace of which fills him with terror while simultaneously suspending his mind’s grasp.

M opens his eyes when the noise of their production moves up the hall. In the half-light, he moves very slowly, carefully studying ground while dodging pipes and conduits, wires and wheels … he finds a scattered, few traps. Oh no, he weeps into his gloves, how could I have forgotten? Silver-red, ripped fur. Whines. Subtle chirps. They are all dying. In the dark, M smokes. He’s on the ground as close as he can get without touching a mousetrap. The cheese from this one, unsprung, shines magnificently in the mossy grimelight. Having nearly succumbed, having glanced ‘round, having seen the other mice aching or dead, he withdrew and lit up. That would have been it, regarding the cheese. More divine for having such a blow countered against it, these tiny cubes of orange goodness cry for me like the shredded brown shit wrapped in paper an’ popped into foillined packs signals from my pockets. M decides the deathblow to be significantly less instant, and puffs. Later that night, he dreams of the basement, mixing up what happened and many other scenarios. Over and again M wakes up in perfect pain, holding his hand or tail. In one final dream, M travels alongside his body to the morgue, into the drawer and out again. When the time comes for autopsy and funeral preparation, M catches the reflection of the companion in the bright lamps hanging from the ceiling. Into its chest he glimpses its heart, glimpsing himself there, broken and contorted in a mousetrap. * Recent years have made M very fond of the “eye-opener.” Every morning, in fact, M ponders the excellence of such a drink immediately following breakfast, which has followed coffee, and the daily meds … This morning M moves for Orange Rum and cream. He adds an orange slice left on his plate and makes way for the pool. With sunglasses, smokes, his glass and the morning paper, M settles down in the sun and tries very hard to forget the events of last night, and the dreams that followed. Having snapped for a servant, M now sits with his notebook. He‘s determined to crank out another hit. How long has it been, he asks, knowing. He and Mr. Hauser had collaborated on “Runaway Brain” in 1995. Everything since has been low, television, video games, market. I want to get back to work, real work! He thought of G, and D where only two years ago they’d tried to recapture the magic as legendary musketeers … retard, and inarticulate fuck. There has to be something, something out there still … Pages and pages. M stops now and then to smoke and read. The sun’s movement is noted. M finally stops writing, and returns to his newspaper. Snaps for another drink. This morning the paper reveals that a certain Mrs. M has just signed a deal to pit her against such hordes as the twisted lil’Brats, an obvious attempt the segue back into the

mainstream. Tramp, taking a gulp, having wadded the newspaper and dropped it to the concrete. She still looks sooo good … M moves from poolside to the Crow’s Nest. Up top of his mansion’s a tiny lookout of sorts; enough room for a few people, chairs and a table, or a telescope. M enjoys peeing on his roof and yawping loudly. He once calculated how many butts he’d need to line, end-to-end, from his roof to the moon. He thought that was a fantastic idea. For a long while he told people, when asked, that THIS was his current project. But they began to take up a lot of space. And smell very badly. Min left years ago. The public was not kind to her during the first few years, but following the publication of her autobiography, a stint of talk shows and television work, she appeared to be back and ready for the world. M wanted everything. He wanted to kill her, he wanted to court her. He wanted to taste her lipstick, and he wanted to fill her nylons with blood. Why was it, M struggled to recall, why did she leave? More drinks. No answering the phone. No leaving. Much neglect of the mail today. The fingertips of M’s gloves bear stains of relentless smoking. Only the television finally calms him. Only the couch holds him still. One should have a drink whenever one awakens, M long ago maximized. In recent years, M moves from states of insobriety to states of unconsciousness almost exclusively. Few are the hours wherein this fact is less than obvious. All the hours measured by the ability to keep drinking. Every minute draped in the painful certainty that one is alive! Later, after the sun, after the decision to forego a meal in favor of many Miller High Lifes, ‘fore sleeping, M sorts his mail. So many bills. Endless realtor junk. Industry rags and announcements. And just as it seems his final spark of consciousness is about to fade away … One letter is addressed from Min. Sweet synchronicity, heart swings, and a molasses tummy. He tears open the envelope, reads. It seems as if word of the companion has reached Min, and in the event that amicability persevere, she’s withdrawing interest in a divorce, and delicately proposes an arrangement of trust with respect to his existing estate, pursuant to the wishes of the widow … ?@! In the bathroom, into the mirror, I’m not dead, I’m not dead … * In the months subsequent to the arrival of the letter, M’s security clearance has been downgraded. The Board told him to lay low. We’ll forward your checks, and we can confer by phone. M wasn’t ousted, he would still earn his shares and cash from the meetings, but his presence in the boardroom was, more or less, prohibited. A star, I mean a Star, a friggin’ star on the Walk of Fame! You can’t do this to me! After much screaming, cursing, and slamming of fists on the enormous table, he turns to leave,

delaying his exit only so long as to light a smoke, and urinate on the legs of the companion. He imagines it coming to life upon his departure. Maybe not right at this moment back there in the boardroom (tho the thought did not seem so fetched), but when he has blown out his last breath, when he is lowered into the ground, will the companions gather and begin to communicate? Will they sign contracts, open studios, race round the globe in the forms of stickers, comic books and lunch boxes? Will everyone forget the Steamboat? What antique speedster will have heralded the coming of the companion? Or perhaps their methods are truly futuristic! They come and go invisibly, moving about like tiny, nonlinear particles. One minute they’re here, and the next they’re gone. M begins to focus on time. He races home thinking wildly about the duration of his drive, the perfect line. He wonders if his commute could be better spent, and where he would spend these thirty to forty minutes. Rather than a line, the road, why not a wave, where at one end M was standing in front of his corpse watching his stream of pee, and the other where he was home … where does the companion spend all of its time when it is not present? Is it waiting … At home, finally … pitchers of margaritas, M’s huge chalkboard, textbooks and his glasses and white coat. I’m coming for you. Days of equations, alchemy, physics, notebooks, textbooks … M’s gone through two cartons and empty bottles litter the room. The work takes its toll on him, and he finally sleeps. For two days, he sleeps. Nightmares fail to rouse him. In one, he recollects his darkest sin. An icy-cold plate of vanilla ice-cream and frozen brain tissue returns to him, and though he took no uncertain joy in consuming it, as it drifts back to him now, he shudders dreadfully, hanging on to the image of W’s empty skullcap lowering back into the cryogenic vault. Black companions, glowing ones, even ragged and decaying companions fill the audience of a Victorian era examination room. In the shadows lurk doctors full of saws, pliers and knives, M is sure of it. Min still loves him. They run away, and the companions are reduced to M’s skull. M’s wakes at twilight. Just as he is wrapping up his oral hygiene, the sun drops from the sky, and he plops into the sink. He slowly walks to his study, turning on lights along the way. He grabs a beer from the mini-fridge, and returns to the chalkboard, neglecting an impressive stack of mail delivered by the staff. Another stint of hours in review, recalculation, before the dream of the doctors returns to him. Eureka! Mr. Disney had perfected the art of archiving long before he elected to freeze his head. In 1940, M had starred in a cartoon informed by Dukas’s symphony (inspired by Goethe’s

Des Zauberlehrling). The short was a success, and Disney insisted on keeping all of the props and elements of the set in an underground vault. Even M’s costume was hanging there. As were all the ancient books shelved and stacked, brought to the production by Yen Sid (whose very presence set gooseflesh afire for everyone in the studio). M knows what he has to do. Since his security downgrade, his movement is severely limited. He will need a plan. * M waits a couple of days (spent crazily, filled with boredom, and watchful companions) in order to secure forged documents. He knows they will get him only so far. He frowns gravely, filling his hands with his face. The documents do get M further than he thought. So many security zones, friggin’ W, but he keeps going, confidently putting forward the appropriate piece of fake identification. He chuckles to himself. One of the guards actually gets excited, oh, I know who you are, pleasure, it really is, go right on through … In the beginning, few were the number of eyes falling on his ID, fewer still those falling to dwell … But now, as he moves deep into the echelons of the Disney vaults, the guards are taking their time, scrupulously. When his documentation fails, M resorts to giving a blowjob. He gives three of them, receives a Cleveland Steamer, and finally, at the end of the line, submits to sodomy, his tail nearly ripping off (in fact, his asshole minutely rips when the guard donkey-punches him). Thanks, says the guard. Oh, my pleasure, ass-jerk! Did you have to be so rough? Of course I did, smiles the guard, once-in-a-lifetime deal, this here. Thoughtfully, M agrees, and silently buttons his shorts. Finally, finally here, card in hand, only the vault door eludes me, and only momentarily. In a vast underground room full of vault doors, all bearing serial numbers, M quickly finds the appropriate door and slides the card through the reader. The dial spins, deep, metal sounds muffle out, and the door swings open. The original sets, props, everything is here. Even the smells rising about when M gets inside are those he has not since known, unmoved by piles of decades. Before memories gather him up and away, M moves for the bookcases. * After a very long shower, a stringently hot and soapy shower, M emerges, and actually feels sober. Covering himself, he moves for the Crow’s Nest, and lights a smoke. The sun is coming up. He wonders if words regarding last night’s adventures have begun to circulate. Most of the guys were wearing wedding bands, could take a while. With the sun, the offices’ll fill up, and language will, inevitably, do the rest. Oh Min, knew this was a one-way ticket …

After several shots of encouragement, M brings the bottle, picking up his glasses, and his smokes, and heads for the study. Into the texts he leaps. Dust, grime, sheer, translucent matter rising in rays of light infect M’s senses; or rather, they hit him, like tiny lil’doses of ether. He pours over books with titles like An Echo of Odyssey, Scrolls of Cnidus, The Castration of Uranus, Hyperborean Remnants & Incantations, and ‘tween Hades, an’Yon Mount. He draws diagrams, calculates arcane measurements, arranges mirrors and tiny candles, bowls of water … All of a sudden, M stops, and leaves. In a moment he’s back with a bucket of black paint, and a brush, both of them taken to task the very glass in the windows. He returns to his table. Out of the Soil of Attica, like potatoes, M muses, but through the soil, into the tomb to finger the serpent’s tooth! M lucks into a few elementary spells, and soon begins to recall his tutelage so many years ago, in preparation for the shoot. No broom this time, a summons. He reads aloud continuously, from chapter to chapter, from text to text. By this time the dark is so complete, a single candle, though many others burn, illumes the study. The mirrors invite M into many, unfolding angles. Pegasi, Chimaerae, Gorgons, Cyclopses, monsters and twisted otherworldly beings begin leaving their imprints in the shadows near the mirror’s limits. M struggles on and again in disbelief. He knows the power of the books, but hasn’t expected that they might shear his brain. Fear and awe pulse through M, sufficient for him to easily cast everything to abandon. Lions and weasels, heal my feet! Bring with you the ancient bind you possess with the gods! I deny medicine, I reject science, and philosophy! Yank open my sleeping eyes so that I might walk, and talk, with my companions! I embrace every lie I ever attempted to bury, or utilized in advancing one thought, or another! My truth is of no concern, only the truth, an answer, a destination. I want to know what they mean! So resolute is M to speak with his companions, to pull taut that cord ‘tween his soul and the spark of animalism present in the calm, silent companion, that he quickly moves through levels of magic with which he is not so familiar; in fact, languages completely unknown to him, but unlocked nonetheless in the verbal overture culminating now as he stammers aside in disbelief … the tomes all join choir. In the house of Glaucias, M hears softly, lullin’in through the darkness like a children’s song; In the absence of Mama’s patience, we must grow, and go to show … In the darkness, now somehow spiraling from the mirror, companions mull about. Many are gently singing the lullaby. So far into the mirror M leans that he begins to make out the bedroom where several companions have gathered to sing to a child. Slowly a window pulls in scant impressions of stars and sky. Now M is aware of the fabric, the huge quilt pulled over the bed where one companion now stands, obscuring the moon. M holds his breath. Death has always been with us, the companion finishes, and smiles.

The first companion says his name is Midas. Midas of Babylonia, who once rose into the air, flying to Hyperborea in order to secure a lot of wine lost in a less than friendly wager; Midas, who amassed a small fortune wielding torches and sulfur round the barnyards; whose charm is so great as to make of the gods, puppies; who was once bit on the big toe by a viper, and in the throes of death removed a piece of tombstone, affixing it to his foot in order to be drained of the poison; who shortly thereafter carried the very litter upon which his body had been dispatched to the graveyard, back to the farm. After that incident in particular, Midas was able to draw reptiles out of the ether, snakes in stupefying numbers, asps, horned snakes and lizards, small dinosaurs … and vaporize them back into thin air, producing only the slightest scent of sulfur. Entire devotions formed round the sight of him walking on water or fire, or rising up and up into the atmosphere. Midas conveys the following story to M: I was once called to the Son of Alexicles, who had just buried his father, and fallen in love with the wife of another man. The love affair prolonged his tutorials, especially in philosophy for, having solved fallacies and completed entire lectures on natural philosophy by the age of eighteen, his progress had begun to move so slow as to drive up his tuition. Thus, I came. (And were I to unite the young fellow with his love, Chrysis, I stood to quadruple my pay!) The moon waxing, the dug out earth from the court of the house stored up in pots so that I might stand below ground, round midnight … I called to Alexicles, who then had been departed seven months. He shortly appeared and said he hated the idea, and scolded his son; but in the end he was, after all, familiar with love, and conceded that his son should attempt happiness. Next I summoned Hecate, who brought along Cerberus; then I pulled down the moon like a drape. Upon the interiority of its fabric, H danced like a woman, then turned into a bull, and finally took the form of a puppy (a good forecast). Confident I could now fetch Chrysis (and secure payment), I fashioned a miniature Cupid out of clay, and whispered into its ear, “go and fetch Chrysis.” Before long, there was Chrysis standing in the very threshold, having thrown open the door in what was soon to become obvious and furious love. I was paid, and I left them to amorous rites. M frowns, I may believe that had I seen it, but pardon me please if my ears fail to believe what they hear. For I don’t know the Chrysis of whom you speak, but a loose and randy one she likely was. Dare I suggest that she could have been your client’s for the very fee that he rendered unto you? You are still so doubtful, says a glowing companion, moving close to the bed next to Midas (whose yellow, marked eyes have begun to reflect the luminescence of the second companion, leaving faint burns streaking the dark). What do you say of them who have been set free by manifest exorcisms? As ancient as the world, as long as stories have found tiny places to hide and grow inside thinking heads, there have been stories of the miraculous, tales of the future, and warnings of punishment. Have you never seen the black smoke rising out of the very pores of those inflected by possession? M tries to hold back terror. He drops the quilt from his mouth, I have seen many things, but the forms, if they are anything at all, are certainly limited by the eyes of the one who

observes them––the clarity of the forms depends on our vision. He quickly pulls the quilt back into place, covering his nose this time. Have not thousands, millions reported seeing spirits? Do they fail to shed dollars in order to possess a tiny bit of knowledge, a confirmation that something more is waiting? In fact, before the hordes of capitalists, before currency had become that mode by which sacrifice and worship finally and undeniably became realized in concert, therefore a realization tethered to the gods, it was very common to pay statues, decorate statues, and pray to them for relief from illness, grief, and for hope. In those days, there was little need for speed. Before the globe had blossomed, long before wires and satellites, the solidity of rock inspired the soul. Artists in the business of sculpting modems earned a reputation closer to the gods than all others, ‘less they bore the mystics, and pledged their life to the service of the gods. Today, service to the world is service to the gods. The world has become that statue to which we turn with an eye on preservation, and survival. How can you look out at the evil and not realize it? Those who do not believe choose not to see. And all of what goes unseen has occasioned the rise of darkness. M is trembling. Gooseflesh begins to rise on him. Midas steps back, and the next companion says his name is Pellichus, the Corinthian, who led an expedition against Epidamnus over 2,440 years ago. Lifting his glowing gloves, he begins his story: In the homes of those who had commissioned my image, or inherited it, I was very fond of sneaking about at night, bathing, singing, taking a bite of food; nothing threatening, as I was usually held with respect, but I did enjoy heckling and frightening those who mocked me. On more than one occasion, it was necessary for me to make examples of those who did not believe. One such example was the thief of some obols from my feet in the house of Eucrates. Among the obols were silver coins stuck in wax, leaves of silver, votives, and payment for having relieved a fever ailing Eucrates. One of his servants elected to remove these offerings one night after I’d removed myself from my pedestal. Upon discovering this fact, I kept him from leaving the home by tilting the curvature of the house, and erasing doors and windows. When the sun did finally rise (I held it away as long as even I could), and the others, from their beds, begin their routines, he was discovered with the offerings still on his person. For his insult, he was flogged for an entire day before he finally died, the welts bustling from his body when they pitched him into a hole. Well, whispers M, back behind the blanket, so long as men make statues, I shall not fear them, for they are just that, not gods. You don’t fear us? Lets be honest, Pellichus says. Antigonus, a prominent physician, a man of science, respected and exemplary, kept my image, among others, of course, fixed in his home. I adored teasing him for his schizophrenia, mixing up his medicine, abbreviating his texts until the threads were entirely shattered. Do you want to see, M? Do you wanna watch me play? Pellichus lifts one of his legs until M could see that an X has been cut into his shoe. Resting on the bed, tiny neon snakes are slipping out from the slits, and into the blankets. M wants to leap free, but an earthquake pulls his body into the

bed, shaking the room. The glass in the window cracks, and falls free. With a loud load of thunder, Pellichus turns into a woman, so tall, M thinks the ceiling must no longer be there, above the room. A torch, three times the size of a baseball bat, is in one of her hands, while the other wields a sword as large as a diving board. Supporting her weight are enormous snakes where her toes had been. Behind her fiery, snake-green hair, M glimpses the face of a Gorgon. Hellhounds are now snapping at the bed. M wants to close his eyes, but the thumping of his heart is too loud between his ears. The Gorgon stamps its feet into the floor where a chasm cracks open. After a moment, she leans into it and disappears. M finds the courage to peak over the bedside. He sees everything in Hades, the river of liquid fire, the lake, demons, and enough dead to recognize a few. My father, still wearing his funeral suit! The dead, lounging upon the asphodels, while away their time with friends and loved ones. Socrates and Plato are there too, administrating. Then, very quickly, the chasm closes, and M, briefly alone, cannot slow his heart. His breathing affords him an almost intoxicating sway. The objects in the room ripple ‘neath shadows carved and pointy from broken glass and lunar light. Just as the chasm is sealing up like a zipper, dirty, torn gloves begin to poke between the floorboards. M watches as a third companion rises from the grave. The color of dirt, of a mummy, full of cysts, ripped and deteriorating, the dead companion stands and shakes away bits of soil, splinters, and insects. Some of his body is long dead, bones are presented behind tattered clothing and decaying flesh. Rotten teeth gleam in the absence of lips, drying blood and pus reflect black light ‘long remaining skin and muscles. Now that you have seen Hell, he says, let me tell you of Cleodemus. The third companion says his name is Demylus, a blacksmith and neighbor of the aforementioned citizen. They had both fallen ill ‘round the same time. Demylus was not well known, and so word of his affliction had not traveled quite so quickly. But many people had come to see Cleodemus, many doctors; much offering was taking place. Even my wife visited on two occasions, offering updates on my condition to those present. After the second evening spent in his home, after seven days of an impossible fever, Cleodemus relates the following tale to his doctors, family, and friends; my wife, sobbing, later relates it to me: “However reluctant he was to slip away in sleep, he eventually did succumb to slumber. ‘A brief rest,’ he insists, for having awakened to behold an angel in sparkling white robes who raises him to his feet, and leads him into the chasm … Cleodemus reports having seen Tantalus, Ixion, Tityus, and Sisyphus ‘fore slipping too deep, and thus prepares himself for landing upon brimstone. Upon arriving at the court, he sees Aeacus and Charon, the fates and the Furies, and even Pluto, sitting upon a throne encased in glass, reading from a large text, from which he could now ascertain were the names of those nearing the entrance to Hell. ‘The angel sits me down in front of the cube, but Plato moves close and petitions the king, saying: “The weave is not yet done with him, his thread spins still. Let us reach for Demylus instead, whose yarn has long been removed from the spindle.”’” Full of joy, Cleodemus returns from his sleep, and rises from his bed quite cured of his fever. But he tells everyone of his vision, and that I would soon die. One more moon I saw, and one more sunrise. After that, the mourners move

from the home of Cleodemus, and hold vigil in my living room. Now, here I am before you, M, on the heels of your lens into Hades. M feels quite sure he’s going to pass out, head spinning, eyes dizzy and glittered, but he summons the wherewithal to retort. What is there surprise in that? I’ve heard about a man buried for twenty days, the victim of bad medicine, who woke and had the happy luck to have been buried with his cherished whistle. I’ve seen Beatrix Kiddo die twice! I’ve been very drunk with George Romero. M, says Demylus, look at me, moving so close M smells Pluto’s perineum stenching out from the companion’s mouth, I am not alive. M trembles, and vomits on the quilt. Demylus steps back. I am sorry, M, he says, you cannot deny us. Very soon, you will be the apparition who returns to a loved one, with details of where you had last deposited your favorite smoking jacket. M watches the companion walk out of the room, or more poignantly, into the dark. He wonders if Demylus might step out of the mirror and into the study where the Sorcerer’s books lie open. He thinks for a moment about horror movies, and regrets having not cooked this tale up for his latest feature. However reluctant to believe what he sees, M’s bones are full of the certainty that he will never escape the darkness. He yearns for Min. He regards his broken heart as he might a dead mouse. M’s time on the other side sufficiently affords him the loss of the clock. He wonders if the sun is coming up. He looks out the window, and shakes his head at the still sky. The moon fixed like a sore. Out of the shadows, boiling through the darkness like smoke in sunlight, M begins to see the slight luminescence of two ghosts. Hanging back, but entirely visible now, are the ghosts of Ub Iwerks and Walt Disney. W is quite headless, and therefore signs for lack of speech. Ub translates, always the doubter, M, he says. Here we are, and what can you say about that? Those who doubt, replies M, so disrespect the truth that they ought to be spanked with a twisted old smoking jacket! Chuckling, oh no, says Ub, there will be no such foolery here. I have confidence you will soon realize it, and stop prodding and simply poking. You have what you want, now understand. W goes into a flurry of signs, W offers an apology for our early appearance, for we have not been appointed quite yet, but our presence here does take stage following one more story, and this one is so good, we wouldn’t miss it for anything. M can feel W’s missing smile somewhere in his chest. The ghosts continue to hang back. M’s thoughts continue to spin … now two companions can be seen wheeling in a stretcher with a sheet obviously hiding a body. The wheels squeak and don’t quite cooperate in the spirit of utility, rather they make circles against the floor, they rotate on top, impeding progress. The companions heave the stretcher, and

scoot it accordingly. They bring it past Ub and W, right up to M’s bed. Without a glance to M, they turn, walk away, and disappear. M studies the sheet on the stretcher. He can see where the head must be, where the breath of whoever that is under there is gently raising a small portion of cloth. Before long, the companion sits up, removes the sheet. As I was in approach, said the companion, it seemed to me that you were on the verge of slipping into a fine conversation. To M’s disbelief, this companion has been dissected, half of its skin removed from the top of its skull down to its pubis. Following a perfect line of symmetry (the skin from one arm and leg gone too), ropey sinews, muscles, bony points, line up with pristine flesh. The companions bones give off the whitest light M has ever seen, whiter than the petals of a magnolia, whiter than Min’s teeth. Its organs are present along one side of its body. They teem and move in ghastly, dusty light. The bones sticking out of the companion’s head have been sawed off on the dissected side. I want to know what you mean, why you have been multiplying around me these past years. I have given everything to the so-called gods, I cannot return to my home, or to the world of my birth. I have spoken oaths, and read from the holiest of texts. I want to know, but I refuse to believe you are simply reapers. M, begins the fourth companion, the truth is not what you seek, you have known the truth and kept it hidden behind closed eyes for too long. You have entered this mirror, this darkness, this funeral bed, to complete an order. Long have you been leasing your life on fake credit. The companion says his name is Arignotus, the Pythagorean, who once enjoyed a life in divine symmetry ‘tween math and science and the mystical arts. So revered was he, people considered him holy, and forever told stories of his good mirth, his humanity, his magic. He says that long ago, if you ever go to Corinth, find a doorman named Tibius at the house of Eubatides, and ask how I exhumed the spirit and blessed the foundation, rendering it, forever more, habitable. For many years the house had fallen into disrepair. Terrors, phantoms, heart attacks … In short, word of this home reached me, and I offered my services. Against all warnings, releasing every plea, shaking away those hanging from my legs, I hauled my books up over my shoulder and climbed the stairs to enter the house. The sun was setting as I walked in. Scarcely was time remaining for lighting my lamp! I quickly scouted out the largest room, which happened to have a hearth, so I lit a fire and spared my lamp. I sat in the middle of the room reading aloud from my books, and ‘fore long came the spirit. I was reticent. The squalid, long-haired beast hovered over me, blacker than night, the very light from the fire was sucked into him! And I was reticent. It attacked me from every side, seeming to think that I would rise, and run screaming as so many others before me. It shifted into a bull, a lion, a wolf. But I employed an ancient language, pinning the phantom against a corner of the ceiling. Upon its retreat, I made my bed, and slept. The next morning I exited the house to much fanfare. Everyone thought I would be quite dead, having not run away in the night. I hadn’t realized such vigil was going on. I quickly found Eubatides, and told him that his house would soon be clean. Along with him came a few others, for the entire event was so amazing. I went to the corner where the spirit had vanished. From that point, we elected

to enter the basement, and dig into the earth there. Together we found a mouldering body, all the bones together, in order. We removed the body, buried it properly, and the house was clean evermore. What is this, M starts, weren’t you just like the rest? The guise of truth becomes you, full of moonshine and a vain imagination! How do they say it, that gold should become coal? I listened to the tales of Democrites as a child, I am aware of the prize of his disbelief! M, if you don’t believe us, who then would you believe? M summons the strength to tell his own story: I believe myself, what I have completed, and what I have endured. You know Wolfgang’s poem Mr. Disney loved so well. What you may not know is movie-making magic. Sure, the studio employed the services of one sorcerer, for authenticity, for minor budget cuts … To no doubt hedge the limitations of cinema. Nevertheless, I brought the broom to life. I split it, and struggled to stop the two from flooding the Sorcerer’s home, but to no avail. Not because I didn’t know the spells because that was the script. I was the apprentice. That was the story. You didn’t know the spells. But it wasn’t Hollywood, M. What of the lessons you did learn? What of the texts you stole? What of the recital you initiated, the vast preparations to enter this mirror? M hesitates. He thinks of Yin Sid. He struggles to recall yesteryear, to remember a young mouse, decades ago … He reaches for long lost beliefs and glimpses a yearning in his past, long having been an object of utter repulsion. * At the close, certain he is dreaming for the intoxicating in-out of his stream of thought, M sees W’s ghost move close, sitting a platter down on the bed. Upon the platter sits W’s emptied head, bereft of ghastly light, and stinking. W signs with his hands. Go ahead, finish it, says Ub. No one ever sees M again. As the years roll on, the companions propagate within a pube’s degree to the staggering population of mice in the world. (Round campfires spin tales of M’s ghost. Sometimes, the story goes, he bores you with mysticism, revealing how he consumed death in order to realize the icy ambition of immortality. Sometimes he just bums smokes.)

Author’s Note: One recent Disney Corporate Memo re the disappearance of M made its way to me. It is of particular interest. It reads, in part … “… Neither can we continue to consider the absence of MM a sabbatical, nor or an honoring of the board’s request that he take such leave. In fact, every attempt to communicate with him has been exhausted. Though his copies proliferate, the actual MM is hereby presumed “deceased,” pending legal determination, where interests of the company are at stake, insofar as his existing assets remain tethered to the interests of the company, and insofar as such assets afford presence in matters of the board. In such a case, the legal interests of the estate must turn to the survivors. Please offer what you can to the widow, whose duties pursuant to the role of executrix of MM’s estate are now paired with the added responsibilities of having been elected a voting member of this board. Minnie will continue to answer emails, but please do not attempt to contact her by cell phone. Schedule your appointments through Outlook, and three weeks in advance. Thank you for your cooperation. …” Signed, Robert Iger.

St. Louis, MO August 2007

Final Note Lucian’s “The Lover of Lies” frames up M’s search for the meaning of his companions. By this time, M has broken into the archives and removed the mystic texts from the set of “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice.” Pg numbers below reference the text available online at Ancient Library. pgs 3–13 (MM, pgs 6–8) M enters Lucian when he opens the books. Intro. Midas tells a love story, to which M balks pgs 14–20 (MM, pgs 8–10) Pellichus explains his statues, and others. M sees a Gorgon, and Hades pgs 21–22 (MM, pg 10) Demylus goes to Hell for Cleodemus pgs 22–32 (MM, pgs 10–13) Ub & W’s ghosts appear. Arignotus tells of cleansing the house of Eubatides. M recalls “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”