2023.02.20
Ustedes los jóvenes están en la edad exacta de la desesperación. Yo nunca me sentí más acabado y viejo que a los veintitantos. Decía 'ya me pasó la vida y no hice nada'. Pero estoy aquí para decirles que no: tienen un chingo de tiempo [You young people are in the exact age of desperation. I never felt more done and old than in my twenties. I'd say 'life has passed me by and i did nothing'. But i'm here to tell you that's not true: you have a lot of fucking time]
This improv of "two sides of a pisatchio being pulled apart fighting to protect the pistachio" reminded me of this prose work I posted 20 years ago:
PEAS
"Wait!" cried the last two peas in the can. My hand stopped its arc to the garbage.
"What do you want?" I asked them, the two peas that clung in the slivery cylinder.
"We want out."
"What do you care? You're peas."
"That's right. We're peas. What is there for us but the fork and the plate? How can you deny us our place on the plate? We've lived on the vine, huddled in our pod on cold nights, striving away for greenness and roundness. It's all been in vain if you throw us away."
"I didn't know peas had feelings," I said.
"We do," they replied, "and this is our moment. We have nothing higher, no krishna, no green goddess, no madonna of the vegetable garden. This is our calling, no other, the climax of sun and rain and humus, green energy pushing through our vines, this is us, this is what we are. We are the peas."
"How can I help?" I asked them.
"Give us butter and salt," they said, "and maybe pearl onions."
"You know you'll be eaten." I said.
"Yes."
"Does it hurt?"
"No one knows," they answered.