Up In This Cut

[This is the chaptered footnote for a dialogue that takes place in my novel
“If You Cut It It Will Grow”. Throwing you straight in, a few sentences before the footnote, the hero asked about getting up in the victim's "cut". The dialogue that ensued was going this way:]

Textural Tourettes tempts me to swear something out loud but I swear I have no opinions of this girl yet so I swallow it. Nerd Tourettes tempts me to say something stupid like “As in, ‘Let’s get up in each other’s mental cuts. The Temple next to our forehead being related to the PIE tem for “cut” like the templates to everything, the temples we hinge it all on, the temperature change my body experiences when it gets within 100 yards of yours, the smooth tempo I wanna execute this all with, the temptation the temptation the temptation, and all the those French temps wasted arguing all this’.”
drive, drive, drive.
I avoid one set of Nerd Tourettes but couldn’t hold back the next wave:
“And like the Indo cum Latin ‘cut’ comes from, –“
“Time to shut up, faggot. Wait, did you just say you came?!”
ram, ram, ram the retort home.
“Sker cum caros, from which we get –“



[The chaptered footnote picks up here:]



Embarrassing only because my timing was off. Not off like pink off, I mean pure off, careless (from the Latin “caro“ for “flesh and blood“, soulless). My reasoning was on though. Where do I begin? Well the whole ordeal happened in the night, cut off from the day via twilight, which comes from when “two lights” trade places. The Italian “sera” for “evening” comes from the same Proto Indo-European (henceforth PIE) ser root as “serrated”, it was cut off from the day creating two pieces from one making our day now “even”. Think about “pairing off” and “paring off” which are related to “par” for “even”. Things are balanced (bi-lanced, two cuts) when they’re split, hence we prepare all things to be separated. Are we in concert (“with separation”) here or do you find all these cuts disconcerting, Melissa (yes, even though it wasn‘t she in that bed when I slipped with the “cut“, it was she I was separated from and she I‘m trying to separate towards)? Maybe this is a good time to look at the subtle difference between the Greek “di” prefix and the Latin “bi”. “Di” has the sense of “in two” which when mutated to the “bi” in Latin lost its sense of what it was cut off from and became simply “two”, but two is just a singular “two“, it‘s a one like any other number, Mel -- just like a million zillion zillions is just >>> one <<< million zillion zillions. Therefore, to add to two we have to cut one and keep it; an addition is a separation. The diet that keeps us alive is a separation (from the Greek diainysthai “to take apart”); that is, if we digest it at all (“to carry apart”), and are you, babe? I read this in a digest, which you won’t be surprised collects info. A serrated knife has notches like the noche, the nacht, the notte, and the night, all niches cut off from the day creating this nook tonight (leading us to nigh? Nay!) for us to make two from one (or at least the act of making two from one) like the child from its ma. In PIE, when one and two were still synonyms, ma meant both “early” (still evident in “mañana“) and “late” (in “mature“) like the figlio (“son” in Italian, from the Greek filo for “thread“) and the file that cuts your nails down at the salon. The thread is that the cut is the thread, and philo in Greek was love, Melissa, uh-oh. Our kin are all cuts, even our kings (related through the Old English cynn for “family, race” like the English “stirp” for “family, race” from the Latin “stirp” for thread, related to the scarlet cloth “stammel” so named because it is blood red from all these cuts). Oh, you don‘t wanna be my princess, just my ol’ fashioned girl? “Folk“, from the Semitic for “divide”, is also therefore cut from the same stone, be we slivers of silver cut off or not) crusading (from cutting “caro“) against basilisks (the “little king“ in Greek); makes sense since the Kaisers, Czars, et al all come from Caesar, the king cut out of the womb. A “real” was a small Spanish coin the tradesmen once relied upon, and hence “is it real?” became “is it actual?” and as those with the most of these actual things were the nobility, we came to call them “regal”. A coin comes from the Latin “cuneus” which was a wedge cut from metal. These reals became so standard they became regular, and we are all cut from royalty in a million ways then -- even me, Melissa, even me! “Carl” comes from the Old Norse for “freeman” (the ultimate separation word, comes from the PIE *prijos for “beloved“: “If you love somebody, set them…”) because that Latin “caro” for “flesh and blood” became synonymous with breaking free, tearing apart (this is where we find real charity, real care). This makes Charlemagne (Carolus Magnus) the cut upon cuts. That Frank (frankly regal is the real truth) knew about the tangibility of cuts! France is seen as the true border of Roman and Northern tribes (despite other Latin words having already been put into use for regions further out; there are always borders beyond borders, walls beyond walls, so take yours down already, Mel!). “Beyond the Pale” may refer to Irish land free from British dominion, but all of its functions are Roman. A “palus” in Latin was a series of stakes used as a fence; some hypothesize a connection to the idea that it kept the pallid out. “Pole” comes from the same root and brings us to the other edge of Charlemagne’s empire, Poland. Polish claim their name comes from polijane, which means “field dwellers”, but to the King of the Holy Roman Empire the stark never-ending steppe was its own sort of fence (think "nowhere to run to" style Siberian gulag) and hence a competing etymology -- lack of border is border. It borders on another border, the Ukraine, which means "border" in Russian. Denmark was the northern border in the time of Augustus and though the root of "Den" is subject to much debate, it is generally agreed that the "mark", like "margin", comes from the PIE mereg for "boundary" -- beyond which is Scandinavia, literally "cut off"; from the same Proto Germanic skit that gave us not just “shiver“ and “shake“ and “shift“ and “shit” and “science” and the science of shit and shitty science and the cut of the cut off of, but also “conscience” -- to be with me is to be “with cuts“, even you got ‘em, Mel, even you. Every cut has a cut within too and hence the Italian state “Le Marche” literally means “the fences, the boundary” of Rome. Every cut also has a cut without as well, and hence all the marquises, marchesi, and marqueses caught fighting out of bounds, the borders bordering outside their bounds. Francon was an unrelated Old Germanic word that meant “lance” -- which brings us back to “palus” which brings us back to France: the country established with so many borders it’s become borderless, more subjective cut than objective cut. And that Franc in Old French meant “free, cut” (If you love someone, they are already free, cut ‘em in like they do in Spanish with the cutting “caro” derived “acertarse“ for “to pull close, cut in“ like “cerrar“ for “to close“ meaning “cut the cut“). The palus brings us back to the point at hand though. This is about skin, that cut cutaneous, and after all I wanna bone your brains our for now and forever, Mel. “Skin” was first used as “animal hide” and comes to us from the PIE sken, “to cut off”. “Palus” not only like my pole I wanna separate you with (just a little), but also like the Latin “pallo” for “robe” which I wanna separate from your body which comes from the Latin “pelle” which is your skin that separates us from each other and the Latin “scrotum” which was also a robe separating my little Latin “palle” (“balls”) from all of us. A “bully” was once a friend you would go “balling” with (from the French “boule” for “balls“, the fuck bully became the fuck buddy), so take this lightly if you think I’m coming off too crude, but “crude” also comes from that Latin “caro” for “flesh and blood” because there is no escaping these cuts and cuts and cuts that bind and bind and bend us together (same roots! “twist“ and “two“ too), Melissa. No, think of being bound to them, in all senses of the word “bound” -- as headed away from them as we are tied to them. Thai the country even means “free” in Thai even though it sounds like “tie” to us. We are all bound through and threw. “Spouse” comes from bound, and the pledge they make to each other comes from the French “pleige” for the cut out incarcerated “hostage“. If it seems like I’m too focused on things that bind, read the subtext -- so much of language is focused on countering the cuts, but it just falls short with cutting more cuts. Hell, country itself comes from the Latin “contra”, it’s its own antonym; and the “barrio” deep in the center (from the PIE kent, for “prick, cut”) of its city comes from the Arabic for “open country”, huh? This is where the logic of trying (from the Old French “trier” for “cutting off”) to separate takes us in a place where we are all already held together through these cuts and all I can see are cuts and all I can see are cuts and butts. In fact, Melissa, if I referred to my “scrotum” in the days of Vulgar Latin I’d be referring to my whore, my bitch, my “piece of skin”, my “animal hide”. Anything made of such blood and cuts is gonna bleed into each other; me to you, you to me, no way around it. That’s right, I jerked off to your cleavage today, the cleaved part between your tits. Cleaved is also its own antonym, mon amour, and that’s cool too because in my mind I cleaved those tits together with my sticky (from the branch, the “stick“, that’s been cut apart from the tree, another auto-cutting auto-antonym) jizz. Yesterday it was the crack between your butt cheeks butting out away from you. Cleaved them closed too. When I say something boring and unpoetic like “I wanna have sex with you” believe that I’m hearing the Latin “secare” for “divide”, the cut between the sexes (which makes “dissect“ another separation of a separation). Ah, you fucking prude, Melissa, what the fuck? Forget the “C” word, you even object to innocuous words like when I ask if I’m getting a piece of your “tail” tonight. “Tail“, from the french “taillie” for “cut off from“; a word so dry (so close to “seco”, in Latin “secco” was “dry”, the water “cut out of“) they use it in math for “tallying”, along with its dry friends “average” (from the Latin “habere” for “have”, it was the goods damaged in transit cut out of the final trade; what we “have“ and no longer “have“) and “absolutes”(from the Latin “absolvere“, to “set free, separate“); and “tail” in Latin was once “penis”, yet if you ever said you want a piece of my tail I wouldn’t feel cut off from you as you do from me. Melissa, if god willing you’ve had the patience to read this far, please allow me an aside to the exhausted reader for a brief (from the Latin “brevis” for “short” which comes from the PIE sker for “cut”; same root as the “court“ I would destroy you in if ever you took me there on this ish‘) ounce of time (from the PIE *da for “separate”) who may not understand why I’m so preoccupied with proving that our cuts are cut from the same thread cut from the cut the ancients cut up in just to get you and I back cutting up in the same cut again {and reader, do you believe some people can hear better when they’re not listening? Well this decree (from the Latin “de” for “off” + “cernere“ for “separate“, another fantastic double cut, from the same root we got “discern” from because our vision blurs unless things are clearly cut apart, and related to the “ex” + “cernere” of “excrement” your intestines are working at discerning you from now), if it works, is designed not just at getting her back, but at passassinating that fabulous flabulous ass of hers. That’s right, I’ve stockpiled so much jizz waiting on this conflicted chick, that if in fact I do get her back in the sack I’m going straight for that ass, the cut inside, behind, between, beneath, and on top of the cut. I’m invoking all the tormented pain (from the PIE pei for “hurt”) that was once attached to that word “passion” and as I rip mine in I will be elating at the ripples (diminutive of “rip”, little cuts; same PIE rei root for “to cut” as “row“. To “arrive“, from the Latin “ad ripum”, by rowing atop the ripples is to cut the cut on the cut) that roll around that meat seat of hers. Yummm. What, now I’m losing even you too, dear reader? You think I’m crossing my bounds? Well I think you’re bound to the cross then (as bloody and full of separating cuts as that same “caro“ “cross“ comes from, but also as bound and coagulated as the crust and crud and the curds separating from the whey. You think I should keep some things secret (from the Latin “se” for “apart” + “cernere”, another cutting cut), some things private (from the Latin “privatus” for “cut off”)? Right, well you and Melissa can just keep believing in your cuts removed from cuts then while I continue on with the other readers agreeing with everything you say while yet you deny us still. The only promises I ever make are the ones based on the Latin “promittere” (to “send away”) from whence we took the word from. Ciao, all my promises are public missiles because they would be anyway. As she is the public, I hope she just heard all that without directly listening.} So reader, I have no choice but to return to the ancients to prove my point because my point is as ancient as it gets, yet it seems that those with the most respect for the ancients are the ones typically furthest from this ancient point. Like this: The Romans called Cleopatra “the key to the fatherland”. Melissa hears that as “the Queen who opened Egypt up to the West”, but “key” is related to the cutting “cleave“. Ok, so the deeper delving Melissa might then suggest that by calling Cleopatra “the key” they were creating (from the Latin “crescere” for “grow” from the PIE ker related to the PIE sker for “cut” because to cultivate is to eventually cut as all cultures cut themselves off; like Ceres the dwarf planet cut off from some prehistorical kaboom; from Ceres the Roman goddess of growth and cutting; and from cerebellum, cut off from the rest of the body like the “skull“, house of “skill”, from the Proto Germanic skaljo for “separate“, the thing that holds our “smarts“ like it did in Old England when it was “cutting“ wit, or our “intelligence“ like it did in Old Rome when it meant “to pick out, cut“ and will forever cut us “clever“ of course with “creations“ from the cutting PIE sker) a double entendre -- Cleopatra’s also responsible for politically cutting the fatherland up, the cleaver of the Patra. But what sort of stinging stain the Victorian era has left on our dames, those frigid years but a blip on the Watcher’s watch when they tried cutting themselves off from further cuts they were already cut off from, what a damaging duh. It’s a fucking triple entendre! To “chiavare” (the act of keying) in modern Italian is slang for “to key someone, to fuck them“, which we know Cleopatra did to at least two keys of another Fatherland. I say Keyopatra! No, that’s where history ends for Melissa. No dick in history for Melissas. I mean, people may have been dicks in history for her, but world altering events all hinging on the groin, no way, she can‘t let herself make that leap; the core current (from that same cutting PIE ker) of human conquest and crisis (from the Greek krinein for “separate”) can’t be pulsed by matters of the heart. Well a “macho” was a small Spanish hammer, related to the cutting “mace“, which came from the Latin “macchiato” which is a stain that cuts across another color. “Alcohol” comes from the Arabic kahal, “to stain”, which they also picked up in Spain. “Mix” and “Mescal” are from the same root, which is all to say that the mixed logics of our base and earthly pursuits, Melissa, simultaneously cut across and mixed into every massive decision (from the Latin “de” for “off“ + “cadere” for “off”, another cut on a cut) ever made. Thank god. We can size the history of events up with incisors (from the Latin “in” + “cadere” for “into the cut“; contrary to my long-windedness here, same cutting root as “concise”), Mel, and I’m comfortable keeping the bit a bite, hiding in the tanned hide, housebound as the husband who‘s shed his shed for the inside outside in. No, I’m not shirking my responsibility, Mel. C’mon, let’s build something solid together. Let’s build a tall dungeon (from the Old French donjon for “tower”) and a high moat (from the Middle Latin “mota” for “mound“) with a deep wall and paint (from the PIE pek for “cut”) our house back down to the ground again. C’mon Mel, let’s build that romantic dream house (from the same Germanic roots as “hide” and hence “skin”, in particular the piece I wanna “hose” you with) in the Tuscan hillside and call it our “casa” from the Latin “castrare” for “cut off” because all these stifling walls are set to castrate me like the word for married in Spanish, “casado”, blocking out the sky (same PIE *(s)keu cut root as “skin“), trading cielo for sealed ceiling so the only clouds we’re left watching are our cut cuticles. You think I’m seeing what I wanna see, Mel? “Hogar” is “home” in Spanish, yet “ahogar” is “to drown” in Spanish, they’ve got the metaphor flanked. But this cut must be cut from something! This cut must be cut from something! Fine, let’s return to the cut we began in: if the night was cut off from the day then let’s return to the day. I’m opening the curtains (like the “short” and “court” type cut) just to be certain (like the omnipresent “cernere” cut) to let the sun in. In German the day is a “tag” like the Latin “tagliare” for “cut” like the “tailor” who cuts away in his Spanish studio, the “taller”, as each tick cuts a tock that cuts another away. The tag on the back of your shirt tells us which “cut” you are even though when you’re “tagged” in the playground you’re “it” -- the cut is thing -- which is exactly where I feel like I am with you, Mel. I feel like it’s lunch break (from the Spanish “lonja” for “a slice”, lunch is therefore another slice in the cut). If you push me down because you have a crush (cut to bits) on me and I break my shin (from PIE skei for “cut”) I will need a splint (from PIE *(s)plei for “cut”), or a cut for my cut. If you keep stabbing (cut) me with these sticks (cut) I’ll needs stitches (cuts), or cuts for my cuts, c’mon quit it already! The day is as cut with cuts as the night. The label on that tag of yours is from the Old High German “lappa” for a strip of “cloth cut and hanging off”, related to your labia hanging off of you. Cut your clothes on or cut your clothes off, we’re all cutting to the same cut. Like that strip of cloth as its own antonym just about to come off when you strip if you find me strapping enough (you know only women used to be strapping?!). Like that slip (from the Middle Dutch “slippe” for “cut, slit”) you slip in and out of. Or if I’m lucky, like that “lace” that comes from “lash” which of course cuts. Like the “garment” cut from the Old English spear the “gar” which still cuts, baby. Like your “bra” from “brace” because it makes things stiff from the Greek sterphos for “skin“-- all sorts of “separated pieces” stiff. Like your scarf cut from cloth that cuts the biting wind, all I can see is a tatter I wanna tear off so I can scarf you down. Like your collection of purses from the Greek byrsa for more cut “skin” you dig your lipstick out of and purse your pus (Irish for “lips“, which just gets me thinking about other lips that sound like pus) all I can see in the day are cut trappings of scraps trapping us in. Remember that Cleopatra? The Latin “clavis” that gave us “cleave” cleaved itself in two when it reached Iberia, creating not just “llevar” the verb you would need to “wear” all these cuts, not just the second meaning of “llevar” for the “cut away from” I’m gonna do with all your society scraps that scar my libido, but also the “llave” for the “key” both Julius and Marcus Antonius keyed her with. You think I’m being sarcastic (from the Greek sarkazein for “to cut off the skin”)? Well the key keeps appearing. A “clavel” in Spanish is a carnation, the flower named after the color of blood; and, yes, a clavelita is slang for a…look, I’m just trying to articulate that “articulation” (from the Latin “articulatus” for “separating into joints“) is a cut to make things clear; that when I say “cut” I’m as cut with you as I was when the PIE *wi meant I was cut “separate” from you; that when I say “cut” I’m as cut with you as the lost origins of cut are cut from, amidst, and into all of us.