“I’m here to disembody you” she’d said.  She was extremely beautiful, in fact, she seemed to embody an ephemerally ethereal beauty, or perhaps, ethereally ephemeral.  They were very different things although, under the circumstances, very strong contradictions seemed essential.

The term “disembody” seemed unpleasant at best, regardless of the fact that she was impossibly beautiful, so he’d said, “disembody seems a rather unpleasant thing, is it anything like death?”  To which she’d answered, predictably, “yes and no”.  Then she’d tried to explain.

“Death is understood, or perhaps, more clearly, misunderstood, as a permanent state.  Something unique as it only occurs once, at least on a personal basis.  Disembodiment is clearly different.  Confusing it with death, it’s understood by most, or more clearly, misunderstood, as something irrevocable.  The mistake is understandable given how poorly ‘time’ is understood.  And not just by mortals (who don’t really exist) but even by most immortals, … who do, … Do exist I mean.  Or perhaps not.”

“So” he’d replied, unable to think of anything else to say, “… disembodied?”

“Yes” she’d replied, seeming happy, an even more beautiful smile on her even more beautiful face, “exactly so”.

“So, are you ready?” she’d asked, we really need to begin the process”.

“Process” he’d asked, again a bit flummoxed?  “And which process exactly would that be?”

She seemed a bit impatient then, what with looking at her watch every couple of seconds, a worried expression on her even more beautiful face, and had replied “well, your disembodiment of course”.  Then she’d smiled, again looking even more beautiful, as if that were possible, and said:  “You needn’t worry, it won’t hurt at all although it’s admittedly a bit tedious at times, … well … usually.”

For some he reason, he’d wondered how the word “flummoxed” was spelled.  For some reason, it had seemed vitally important.  And it was.  Or perhaps it wasn’t.  He usually didn’t have a problem in making up his mind, indeed, if anything, he tended to be too impulsive.  That may have been why he’d found himself in the state he was in, the word “state” seeming much more accurate than the word “place, for some reason.  Then, for some reason, he’d become fascinated with the nature, meaning and use of the term “so”, which they’d both been bantering around.  It seemed quite bereft of meaning albeit not of importance.  At the moment, its importance had seemed transcendental and he’d had a strong impulse to use it again, but he hadn’t wanted to seem inarticulate.

Still, he just hadn’t been able to think of anything else to say, except perhaps, for the word, or perhaps the term, “disembodied”, but that term had (in that particular now) made him quite nervous.

The exquisitely ephemerally, ethereally beautiful, or perhaps, ethereally ephemerally beautiful woman had stood staring at him, tapping her left foot on the ground, definitely impatiently, and had exasperatedly said “well?”  Or perhaps, more accurately, had asked “well”, and he hadn’t had the slightest clue as to how to reply.  Actually, he hadn’t really wanted to reply, he’d just wanted to stare at her.  But he’d known that staring was not polite, regardless of how impossibly beautiful someone might be, so he’d picked up his courage, and in spite of his fear, he’d said, or perhaps asked is a better term: “so, hmmm, disembodied?”

“Yes” she’d said.  Then, kindly, as if she’d grasped the state in which he found himself, she’d continued “let me explain, you seem confused.  Most people are.  About everything.  Almost always, but especially with respect to just what ‘disembodiment’ implies, or perhaps, what the term ‘disembodiment’ expresses would be more accurate”.  Evidently, linguistic accuracy was very important to her, and yes, she’d again become even more impossibly beautiful.

“So, disembodiment” he’d repeated.  “Okay, ‘shoot’!”  Then he’d almost immediately, perhaps immediately, rejected his choice of metaphors (shoot) but it was too late, there was no way he could have taken it back without calling unpleasant attention to his dilemma.  He’d liked metaphors, liked them even better than he’d liked similes, but, he’d always realized he really didn’t understand allegories though he hadn’t a clue as to why allegories had any relevance to what he’d just been thinking.  He’d wondered how and why he’d become sidetracked in that direction, but just for a second.  She’d continued talking and he’d lost his concentration and had no idea what she’d said, but again, she’d been getting more and more beautiful, so much so that he’d been getting dizzy, and in fact, now that he’d thought about it, he’d been feeling a bit faint, quite a bit faint in fact.

“And so” she’d concluded ….  That damned “so” again he’d thought, just what the hell did it mean, then he’d immediately regretted his choice of the metaphor “hell”, even if he’d only thought it, or at least he thought he’d only thought it, he’d certainly hoped so.  …. bodies are temporally permanent vessels” she’d continued, although words hadn’t seemed to matter to him anymore “… vessels which we transients occupy collectively with others, not permanently of course, rather, only for a time, and our departure does not necessarily imply the termination of the vessel.  Others enter it and assume experiential occupation for the time period allotted to them to do so, while those departing move on to other vessels, sometimes in concert, although rarely so, usually becoming parts of different experiential collectives.”

He’d looked puzzled but, amazingly, even though he didn’t seem quite conscious, he’d seemed to understand.  He was not really dying, he was just moving on, his term completed.  Kind of like graduating from elementary school and entering middle school but not quite high school or college, and certainly not graduate school.  Then a flood of questions seemed to have entered his mind, entered it on their own volition, entered his mind or whatever it was, all at the same time, questions such as:  “will I retain my current gender, will I have a gender, will I become one of those transsexuals or non-binary people, whatever that was?  Will I be old, young, rich, poor, Caucasian, indigenous (well, everyone was some sort of indigenous or other), or Asian, or Black.  Will I be human, or even animal he’d wondered, or “what if I enter a plant, or a rock”.

He’d sort of looked around, seeking the … whatever she was, or whatever she’d been, but she was no longer there, and then, he’d realized he was in a sort of dream state, he wasn’t there either, wherever there was or had been.  He wasn’t anywhere.  But he didn’t know if it was because he was in bodily transition or because he was just having a weird dream.  But she’d vanished and strangely, even though he’d recalled the “increasing beauty phenomenon”, he hadn’t, for the life of him, been able to remember what she’d looked like, or was it “for the life of ‘himself’”, then he’d again regretted his choice of metaphors, that time with respect to the phrase, “the life of” (he tended to second guess himself quite a lot as you may have noticed), and he’d wondered just what the “hell” life was and, again upset at his choice of metaphors, and totally, completely and irretrievably flummoxed, he’d ….
_______

© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2024; all rights reserved.  Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution.

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen).  Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales.  He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, an intermittent commentator on radio and television, and, an occasional contributor to diverse periodicals and publications.  He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies).  However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony.  He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.