Fanon by John Edgar Wideman Page B

mutilation of our world. Nobody asks questions. We've already swallowed the old natural-disaster story and forgotten we've swallowed it—so many stories so many ads ago. We blame the tsunami, nature's bloody tooth and claw, god's will. The new story admits there was nearly a manmade disaster after the natural disaster, but thank goodness for those heroes in charge of the nuclear submarine and its nuclear weapons, thanks to them a tragedy of epic proportions averted at the last instant. Split-screen submarine. The sub's radar, the story goes—a story she translates into her language and he understands in his—the sub's radar picked up at the last split second the unexpected, uncharted, post-tsunami mountain of heaved-up sea floor so rather than ramming it full speed, the craft full-throttled its engines in full reverse, as close to slamming on brakes as
you can manage underwater, plowing a deep furrow with its steel beak into the mushy heap of erupted seabed, a rough landing that flipped the sub on its side but didn't split its steel skin, the accident an embarrassment with a full nonpartisan inquiry to follow but thankfully no fatalities reported so far, just a long, sleek submarine drydocked beneath the ocean, radioing S-O-S-O-S-O-S, while gray wiggly fingers comb the sea, zombie fingers, blades of gray grass rippling where acres of coral of many colors once bloomed, the seascape an evil twin of the lost world we saw just yesterday on the split screen, a scene so Edenesque, Disneyesque you half expected cute talking fish to swim by any second, a pair of them, identifiably female by their miniskirts and painted cupid's-bow lips emitting bubble-pipe bubbles of gossip. If these fishies survived and crossed the split-screen divide, what would they say about the big steel shark stuck in the mud. Would they recall its shadow gliding above them the day of the tsunami.
    Was the submarine accident accidental or part of a plan or cover story for a failed plan. Who knows. Who would tell us if they knew. Gentle stroking soothes Fanon's sweaty splitting brow. How many seconds required for an image to burn into the TV screen. How long after the tsunami's shockwave does news of the submarine wait its turn, submerged no one knows where before it begins its ascent to the surface, toward the news, toward the accident waiting to happen as reported on a sandbar, nature intervening again to rain on man's parade. SOS—Same Ole Shit. Nature flexing its muscles, indulging its mysterious ways. In this corner Man. In the other corner Nature. A mismatch some promoter has dreamed up and hyped and sold to the gullible public. Clever and simple as three-card monte. A simple matter of distracting the player's eye while you work. Pity the poor sub. Pity injured sailors trapped in a metal prison. A hero will emerge to save the day. A good story to seize the public's attention as the tsunami story recedes. Who remembers the tsunami. The
disconnect rolls on, the fog rolls in. Fanon's mind skips off to other pastures, different sleeps, different islands. Mom mopping his brow like she used to mop mine when I had a fever.
THOMAS TEACHES HIS LAST CLASS
    Good morning, boys and girls, sisters and brothers, my likenesses, good morning. Thomas smiles. The sixty-four-thousand-dollar question this morning—are your stories more than words.
    Since stories, whatever else they may or may not be, are composed of words, let's ratchet back and begin with a more fundamental question—are words more than words. If we're able to answer this question, then perhaps we can go forward, or back if you will, and examine stories as a particular case of words governed by the logic or illogic we uncover after we determine whether or not words are more than words.
    Words. There's one. Thomas mimes grabbing it. Gotcha, he says. This specimen,
words,
will serve as well as any other word to establish (a) the inherent nature of words (b) the emergent capacities of words that might