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the physics of sorrow
I’m standing there, and my
grandfather is standing
there, the two of us in one
body.
Whoosh, a hand grabs the
cap off my head. I’ve reached
the sorcerer ’s little table.
Easy now, I’m not going to
cry, I know very well what
will happen. Now there’s the
sorcerer’s finger coming out
the other side of the cloth,
man oh man, what a hole. The
crowd around me roars with
laughter. Someone smacks
my bare neck so hard that
tears spring into my eyes. I
wait, but the sorcerer seems
to have forgotten how the
rest of the story goes, he
sets my torn cap aside, brings
his hand to my lips, pinches
his fingers and turns them
and, horror of horrors, my
mouth is locked. I can’t open
it. I’ve gone mute, the crowd
around me is now roaring
with laughter. I try to shout
something, but all that can
be heard is a mooing from
somewhere in my throat.
Mmmmm. Mmmmm.
Harry Stoev has come to the
fair, Harry Stoev has come
back from America...
A husky man in a city-slicker
suit rends the crowd, which
whispers respectfully and
greets him. Harry Stoev—the
new Dan Kolov, the Bulgarian
dream. His legs are worth a
million U.S. dollars, someone
behind me says. He puts ’em
in a chokehold with his legs,
they can’t move a muscle.
Well, that ’s why they call
it his death grip, whispers
another.
I c lear l y imagine the
strangled wrestlers, tossed
down on the mat one next to
the other, and start feeling
the shortage of air, as if I’ve