Pearls Before Swine
There were certain ones he loved, and these he wanted to follow out into their world, (a world he thought he comprehended from his heights at the front of the classroom) to follow their thinking, their striving minds, their careful attention to sentences and themes in their papers, their richness, sitting like fruit about to burst in their ripe skins, and after sleeping with them in his office, or after coffee in his apartment, he regretted not having more lives, more selves, each of which could dis-attach itself from him, an amoeba, and treat each girl as wonderfully and perfectly as only he knew he could; to start lives with them, to accompany them in journeys intellectual and physical, to stay with them as they moved to cities, laughed in café’s, walked in parks, amassed small home libraries, sat out on their decks in the spring and summer, planted flowers and tomatoes in the planter boxes along the rails, finally married (him) and had children, whose rich life he would enrich further, as perfect father (wise father, owning this vast and endless store of patience, of pedagogy, of the dark solidity and timelessness belonging to all great fathers, those things he exuded as well, to the students in the classroom, his eyes bent across a higher plain they longed to see) perfect husband, as perfect as only he could be, guiding them (the girls, the many girls) wisely through toward towered death (and toppling those towers, showing them death as a small door in the stone to a cool darkness from which the outside rubble was cleaned away and understood, and then moved away from) which they faced with the dignity and equanimity of those that have satisfied life, of one happy to leave it for the next: this he wanted, as he dressed quietly, showed her out (which one now? Yes, the one with the dimple. It was these particularities that he loved, the little details, the incredibly erotic nature of being let into the difference of this one and that one, a stand, in the woods, of tall naked trunks, all different) and endured her hurt and abusive stares from the back of the classroom (with the sad knowing worldliness of a man who has learned to submit himself to the rules of fate, and of time) her averted eyes in the hallway, and her knowing look as he talked to the next girl after class, commenting on her paper, arranging to meet, so that she walks by and blurts, “He doesn’t give a shit about you, he’s just swine!” and runs from the room, blushing, hurt and amazed into a choked laughing pride, leaving him completely shocked at her total mis-apprehension of his nature, and his motivations, as the next girl moves closer, wanting to find out for herself.
Matthew Zanoni Müller was born in Bochum, Germany and grew up in Eugene, Oregon and Upstate New York. He received his MFA from Warren Wilson’s MFA Program for Writers and teaches at his local Community College. His work has appeared in various magazines and journals. To learn more about his writing, please visit: matthewzanonimuller.com.
