The Ginger Man - J. P. Donleavy [35]
"Ekke."
"My navel's sexless and flat and doesn't collect And these are funny little things to kiss. Do you like it ? "
"More. I tell you, more's the more."
"And in your navel too."
"For God's sake, yes."
"And there? It's got a funny smell. It's tiny."
It's such a long pleasant night I hope I can remember this when I am suffering. Her gentle fingers. Sweet substance of girl, alone and damp and loving me and moving over me, over me and over, covered safe with her heart and each other's thighs, my head gone away, tickling teasing, curling hairs and hood of smells and flesh and salt taste like swimming. I live in such a house of cracked concrete. I ride to town on a crazy trolley to Trinity with the rest of them and now bury my head in the round white pincers of a stranger's thighs. Her hands are going down my legs. Tear the cartilage islands from my knees and I'll wobble forever after in the streets. Her dark head bouncing on the yellow candle air. This threnody in my scarlet skull. The laundry girls are standing on pots of steaming clothes, pounding them with thick Celtic ankles and doing a strip tease. I see them all out there and we laugh, he ho ha, the pulse of it and the country girls, naked for the first time in their lives, falling into the tubs and suds, slipping, flapping, slapping their obese bodies. It's holiday. The bestial bedlam. And he, me, raised his holy hand and told them to shut up for a minute so as to arrange them in ranks and give each a green garter of shamrocks to wear on the left thigh so as not to be criticized by the Bishops for nudity. Out now, the kip of ye. Into the streets, Dublin's fair city where the nude are so pretty. You look like the oblate and your rumps too. Strike up the band. He led them through the streets. At the Butt Bridge they stopped and the nice gentleman led them through the line, "I Left my Heart In An English Garden." The word spread quickly through the city that there was a touch of the nakedness on the roads. Pubs emptied. And the million farmers' sons and others too, on bicycles to see these fine shapes of girls who were of stout build
Chris's willowy fingers dug into his thighs and hers closed over his ears and he stopped hearing the soup sound of her mouth and felt the brief pain of her teeth nipping the drawn foreskin and the throb of his groin pumping the teeming fluid into her throat, stopping her gentle voice and dripping from her chords that sung the music of her lonely heart. Her hair lay athwart in clean strands on his body and for the next silent minute he was the sanest man on earth, bled of his seed, rid of his mind.
10
With two tomes under the arm walking out the back gate of Trinity College. Bright warm evening to catch the train. These business people are bent for their summer gardens and maybe a swim by Booterstown. On these evenings Dublin is such an empty city. But not around the parks or pubs. It would be a good idea to pop onto the Peace Street and buy a bit of meat I'm looking forward to a nice dinner and bottle of stout and then I'll go out and walk along the strand and see some fine builds. For such a puritan country as this, there is a great deal to be seen in the way of flesh if one is aware and watching when some of them are changing on the beach.
"Good evening, sir."
"Good evening"
"And how can I help you, sir ? "
"To be quite honest with you, I think I would like a nice piece of calf's liver"
"Now, sir, I think I can see you with a lovely bit, fresh and steaming. Now I'll only be a minute."
"Bang on. Wizard..'
"Now here we are, sir. It's a fine bit On a bit of a holiday, sir ? Nice to have a bit of fresh meat"
"Yes, a holiday."
"Ah England's a great country, now isn't it sir?"
"Fine little country you have here."
"Ah it's got its points. Good and bad. And hasn't everything now. And here we are, sir, enjoy your holiday. It's a nice evening, now."
"A great evening."
"I see you're a man of learning and good-sized