Congregation

As featured in Mycelia, Issue 4 (Winter 2020/21)

I vaguely remember watching some survival TV programme when I was young that taught, by some biology, if you want to hear better in the dark when you can’t see you should open your mouth – in the hopes of ‘hearing’ predators or enemies instead. I’m reminded about this when I go to the park late at night, when it is almost pitch-black.
When it’s quiet and dead
I catch myself with my mouth hanging open, not gaping but slightly ajar …
O 

It occurs so naturally that a junk leaflet could be slipped into my mouth without me knowing. I’m not intentionally trying to hear better, I don’t really suspect danger, my body is just ... reacting.
O   My mouth feels like   O   but it’s probably more like  e    a littleee opeen.
At this specific spot – when I’m the first one there or if there’s a lull in attendance – every wee sound is a potential terror. It’s the park making noises, its flora and fauna, not men.
 
I become still   e   and my tepid breath seeeeps and creeeeps out. A wee draft from my lips. I wait, hang around, and focus on the sound of my shoes crunching on the ground because, when I move, this is all I hear, like this walking is so loud in comparison to anything around me. But if I’m still I …
e

Leaves hiss, soil rustles, trees squeal.
 
My head tilts around slowly like a possessed doll turning to look at the camera with glassy eyes. The bones in my neck have become wooden and their creeks are audible too. jut jut around. Turn, bobbing. Left, Right, 180. Spine becomes metronomic. Met ro nom ic. Suuuuuucking in air, sucking. Sstop. e
 
Is it the primal instinct of being scared of the dark – excited, tickled, thrilled, frightened, aroused – that makes these night patches of parks so complimentary? That fun of fear and horror whets the appetite. That some threat of danger and unknown gets you hornier – harder.
O

And, after some meandering to the peak of the park where most of the city’s lights stud the skyline (what an image: it will forever resonate and penetrate me), I creeeep back to the carnal ground.
 
Then, as if awoken by moonlight or the strike of a clock stamp on their phone, men come in numbers.
 
They collect, dotted around. A composition appears. Standing motionless like totems, only moving to try and see in the dark. And, as if serendipitously, on a night of 20-degrees there is lightning. No sound of thunder, no wind nor rain, nothing harsh, just soft flashes of light from a purple sky. In practically pure mauve the light intermittently flashes through black silhouetted branches above, and glorifies them in detail as criss-crossing matchsticks. The quickness of the light doesn’t reveal anyone or anything else. We are all still shadows. No one acts surprised or scared. f l a s h.
e!
Does Mother (?) Nature cosmically feel these queer smudgings of lust and say, ‘hi’?
Or is it only me that is in awe of these rhythms and is in joy from this taunting? It reactivates us, as we shed from our wooden totemic skins. Legs burst out from poles and we teeter as faceless figures.
 
The men weave in and out of this muddy and seedy playground, brushing by each other for clues. This land slightly undulates, a carved out ditch, the most popular entrance being an up and down to get in. And in the dark you walk through here slowly, steadily but not stiff, not quite skimming feet over the ground but not lifting high either, so as to be aware of the trips twigs dips roots squelches gravel stones leaves acorns. All while scanning this transformative den. Even the possibility of stepping on dog shit doesn’t enter your mind. The torch on your phone is discouraged.
 
There is a sacred ritual here. I do not dare disturb it with my pen nor camera. It is opposed to documentation and identities. Levels of anonymity must be respected. I must recollect these feelings later. I would rather trip and fall than be held accountable for the intentional projection of artificial light. You could think of this space as a church, a library, a crime scene, or any construct that requires etiquette. And I learn this etiquette, adhere to it, wonder how it came about, shuffling around, in and through. No sudden movements. No talking, a whisper if you must. A congregation.
 
The park holds so many more histories, dangers and desires that I do not know of, and some I maybe only hear about elsewhere. A battlefield. How bizarre that the entrenched gendered force of Mother Nature could be aware of our modern rituals. With her lips pursed shut, she would see us in the dark, and listen, waiting to pounce on both the curious and the promiscuous alike. A branch squeeeks and creeeeks. She’s looking at the beguiled men that always return.
 
How bizarre is it that, come twilight, men who stake a claim to an unsheltered space which is completely public, consider others (women/hetero(the unengaged)/children) as unwelcome intruders. Is it even queer at all? Is it not what men have always done? Bizarre that they (we/I/(I participate)) have their own entrenched gendered space for corporeal ritual, hovering in unchoreographed formation to slime through possibilities of looking, touching lust grope kiss pull push tweak wank suck stroke caress rub cup brush lick neck lost locking: intertwining breeath on neck breeeaath. Neeeeeck    Hehhhhh    Eh  

e       e