Gaspar Martinez : S.O.S. — Save Our Souls

S.O.S. — Save Our Souls

They are trapped, but they keep moving.

To places where things overlap. Time stretches and folds. People drift without fully arriving. Feels like Istanbul at night: streets layered over other streets, bars open late, animals watching from corners, bodies passing between alertness and sleep.

Sleepwalkers cross it constantly — a waiter, a nun, a couple. Some walk naked. Some walk blue. Some walk twice, leaving a second outline behind them. A late-night bar, a cab passing by. People argue softly. Others kiss. Someone laughs too loud. Someone says “fucked-up” and means it. An art critic sits alone, counting faces, trying to decide which one is real.

Outside, animals observe. A blue dog, a night cat, a purple cow, a golden duck, a puma, a tennis wolf. A black chicken, a drying chicken, a frog eating a bat. They have seen this before. Someone feeding the pigeons.

Feet think on their own. Hearts try to build shelter. Faces blur, split, tie themselves into knots. A man rides another man’s head. A woman stands half inside a window, half outside. Someone is pissing. Someone is washing up. Someone is having sex in a hospital and pretending it’s normal. Rules appear on walls: don’t smoke in the house, stay away beer, no change. Nobody follows them.

Some souls are tired, dream of monkeys and tigers, some dream of being famous, others whisper good riddance.

Arguments happen everywhere: on trains, in taxis, before marriage. They never resolve. They shift. A soft argument becomes another argument, then two friends, then liars, then silence.

God is in the toilet. Twice. No one is surprised.