Boxes

I am. I am awake.
I have a confession.

When my elder sibling died I was four. He had been nine or more.
I saw him die. I saw him dead. I saw him in a box.
I looked on his grave for hours. Our house overlooked his graveyard. I could see his grave, his name, from my bedroom window. We remained for years. Now my mum and dad are gone I survive, as does his grave, as does my window.

When he died a voice came in my head. I am sure many people know how I mean. I called him my second voice, also known as om. om speaks and I hear him - he became a leader for me, also a companion. He gives me rules, how I should behave - do’s and non-do’s.

I should say I like rules, I admire rules. And I have always enjoyed logic. I like seeing how odds and ends can harmonize.

I have always had a fondness for placing paraphernalia in boxes. You may have heard of Joseph Cornell. I have been a fan of his ever since I saw his work in a book in a local library – bric-à-brac in boxes and glass covers. I have many boxes, some boxes inside boxes, full of miscellany – shoes, coins, bones, scraps of fabric, shells, pebbles, cheap jewels, badges, hair, and so on and so on.

I work, or have worked, for a box company – ‘in-house design of bespoke new packaging for business needs’. I am a supervisor and work from 9 and end by 6. I have a rigid schedule and one unspoken policy of om was of never infringing on my schedule (for example, proposing I end by 4).

A new person began in my box company a few weeks ago, a Polish man called Feliks. We had a raillery, a camaraderie which may be surprising considering a language barrier. In breaks from work we shared coffee and cake. Once he gave me some poppy seed cake his wife had made. Such seeds reminded me of puzzles where you join up numbered marks in sequence. From early on I considered Feliks in possession of an absorbing face. He seemed very calm, admirably so. He also seemed an enigma, an air of a wolf, dark eyes like lakes.

On Friday previous, I was scheduled on a panel of speakers for a conference on packaging, held in a gallery a few miles away beginning from 9. I was picked as a chairperson. As you can imagine my being on schedule was crucial for a successful conference. I was very nervous. Regardless of my nervousness or maybe because of my nervousness om gave me rules. I imagine he was shaking me up, issuing me a challenge.
Dark clouds were assembling above.
As soon as I saw such clouds om said, “umbrellas are disallowed”.
I planned on hailing a cab. However, when I approached a crossroads near my house om said, “you shall avoid hailing a cab”.
So I walked and walked and I ended up arriving in said gallery soaked in my skin and way behind schedule, a good hour I’d say.

I was in a grand room, a big hall lined by expressionism on all four walls. I moved up and on a kind of podium and faced my audience, bedraggled by rain and perspiring as well. I summoned any public speaking skills I could manage and delivered my address on boxes. I began badly because I received an order - “you shall avoid saying ‘box’ or ‘package’” – and said rule landed me in an awkward pause which seemed endless. I fixed my focus on a Kandinsky I recognised and somehow reversed my quandary, drawing conclusions I had made no plans on saying, arriving finally on: “a cardboard chamber holds and also houses – for your belongings we have ... a HOME!” Applause followed. Why I improvised such a conclusion I have no idea – I suppose I was knocked off my plan – and kind of makes me laugh. As I finished my speech my gaze landed on Feliks who was on one end of a row near a wall.

I heard om say, in a whispery curling voice, “place Feliks in a box”.

I shuddered when I heard such an order. I froze and blinked and rubbed my ears. I was filled by dread. An image of his wife making poppy seed cake flashed before me regardless of me never having seen her. Bizarrely, I imagined her in a yellow larder.

I was all laughs and smiles during proceedings following my speech, a welcoming face for all who had come. I wore a mask all day long. When people began ebbing away I moved over by Feliks and in a jovial way proposed a drink. He agreed and rang his wife from a payphone. We were joined by a few colleagues. However, by 9 me and Feliks were alone and from our discussion I discovered he had a fondness for books. I made a claim of possessing numerous Polish works including rare copies of Czeslaw Milosz (who I’d heard of winning some prize). I proposed he see my house and borrow a volume if he so desired from my shelves. Spurred on by alcohol he acquiesced. As we rose om said “you may now use a cab”. So we did.

Back in my house, I opened my door and ushered him in, finding a glass of gin for us each. I was anxious my lie (concerning my supposed Milosz books) would be exposed and so I led him down in my cellar quickly saying I had a myriad of curios he may be impressed by. Indeed, he was very responsive and he perused my boxes closely all over. He especially liked a wooden domed box (from Syria) in which I had assembled pieces of polished rock. Finally, he reached my phone box, a normal old red English phone box. He proceeded inside. I saw him and knew I was doing how I should.

om spoke again: “make him unconscious, keep him in your phone box”. So when Feliks emerged again I bore down on him holding a heavy lead box and I pushed him back inside my phone box behind glass. While he was unconscious I manoeuvred my phone box in a corner of my cellar so as my phone box’s door faced my cellar wall - when he woke up he would find leaving impossible. I wedged cupboards and big boxes around and so minimised any chance of him moving my phone box from said corner. I even found some black emulsion and brushed some over all visible panes of glass. I was worried of noise – however my cellar is a box, so he was in a box in a box.

Before bed om said “no cocoa”.

I keep imagining him in my phone box and chewing on a piece of poppy seed cake from his bag.

I am awake, looking up on my bedroom ceiling.

I have confessed.

I am unsure how I should proceed. I need some guidance, some order. I have had no rule for a few days now. Should I run away? His wife will surely come looking for him.

Should I release him?

Maybe my elder sibling has finally gone. Whichever way, I will go on honouring him, how he specified: “never use my name’s beginning”.

I hope he will come back soon.