Riddle of the Blackbirds Commentary

[permetaform]

So I've always wanted to do a commentary on one of my fics and what with the meme going around and.

Yes, I'm weak.

Dedicated to linaelyn for the you-know-what. ::GLOMPS::

Title: Riddle of the Blackbirds
Fandom: OUaTiM
Disclaimer: don't own and not making money.

"Our extent in space, as well as in time, goes only as far as the blackbird goes..."
~ Helen Vendler (On Extended Wings: Wallace Stevens; Longer Poems)

Am using that quote for a summary; it came from this site which has some marvelous analysis of "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird" that pretty much NAILS my interpretations of it. (warning: it gets a bit long-winded at times)

As much as I would like to take credit for it however, I'm not the first one to use this poem in fandom. I know of at least one other fic written with the poem as backbone which is Thirteen Ways by Sinope

It's Snape/Lupin and I love it much. Wonderfully written and it's the opposing spin of a relationship fic, of all things, set in a War!HP-verse that makes all the themes complicated and beautiful.

Hopefully, tho, this fic was different enough in themes and the use of the poem's themes to justify it being written, if only in a different fandom.

(btw, you'll probably notice me rambling on about themes quite a lot in my LJ and my feedbacks; I LOVE it when they interssect and dissect and reset again and again into different combinations of complications that just makes my heart happy in the worst way)

---

The sunlight was pale, the curtains were beige, and even though the walls were technically a sickly off-white, it could've just as well been monochrome. The man leaned a hip against the table, carelessly skidded his sunglasses towards the middle. He has a practiced aim.

The image of the room is based on the picture from slodwick's The Picture is Worth a Thousand Words Challenge, which you can see at the end of the fic. (I *over*shot by ~1000 words, dear LORD I think that's the first time this happened.)

This was actually one of the last sections to be plotted; I'd only realized later that without *some* context the fic might fall apart. Otherwise, the sections would have seem like simply a loose handful of drabbles connected by Sands.

Not that it *isn't* per se. Only that I needed some way to shake *apart* the handful again, because it's also the fact that the drabbles isn't connected by Sands.

With the leather doctor's kit clunked on a chair, the nylon garment bag sagged on the bed, the Beginner's Spanish-English dictionary clasped against a white slip of paper; with these he identifies himself.

Okay, major major thanks and love to linaelyn for coming up with "doctor's kit" and "garment bag". I had no frigging clue what to call the things and it's MUCH clearer here after her beta.

(heh, *Beginner's* Spanish-English dictionary, ::snicker and imagines wee!Sands::)

~1: townsperson

He's seen the man strolling his claim down the streets, garish pale to the land's golden brown reds. The gringo moves like one striking ownership, with the threat of an American's power.

Heh, partially affected by this one bit from And In The Darkness:

He knows what that means. He knows Lady Mexico and her defiant challenge, caked with yellow mud and hints of black oil and fucked both ways, American businessmen cuntwise and homegrown cartels up its back door. (Sleep lightly in Mexico, Agent Sands.)

I LOVE that paragraph, that paragraph's like my baby and I'd spent ages trying to get it to scan right and it came from several discussions I've had with one of my chicana sorority sisters and from my Energy Resources class.

(ie. oil in Mexico that they're fucking bound and *determined* not to let fall into the hands of the US because the American businesses already control *so* much of Mexico. Even if they sell the stuff though a secondary source, you *know* it's going to get back to the US somehow and no bulletproof jacket is going to be able to help any President that *does* sell it because he's gonna be murdered in his sleep by his maid or hacked off by his butler or shot by his own frigging army [/political discourse])

This makes his teeth ache; and he realizes that he's clenching his jaw.

He doesn't look the man in the eye because he's heard of the bodies left behind. He believes the tales even though he hasn't seen any himself, because he knows there are ways to hide these things. And he knows, with a look over his shoulder, that the strange American is the least of his worries.

He believes, and is defined by his beliefs, that the land will set things right again.

This was also inspired by conversations with that sister, who spoke of the massively un-materialistic perspectives of the people, how personal effort and ambition was felt to less be able to change anything, and how they entrust their lives to God.

But, as he looks at this leech of a tourist, he finds he doesn't know when.

This was added in afterwards because of a need for transition and a feeling that it didn't scan well enough to do without. It also makes it more parallel with 13:townsperson

Among twenty snowy mountains
The only moving thing
Was the eye of the blackbird.

2: cucuy

"...or are you a MexiCAN'T?"

Cucuy snarls and they both hold themselves thrummingly still in each other's personal space like a challenge, their wills scaffolding their bodies in place where otherwise it would wish to crumble in on itself.

Love that part. They both seem so full of nervous energy, I couldn't help but add this in.

Cucuy knows broken when he sees it. Such things resonate because like meets like and he knows wanting to take up space instead of being taken, he knows wanting to be striking

LOVE this pun! LOVE IT!

instead of being unheard, he knows wanting to be something other than small and to scrawl his own dramatic line across the sands.

It's too much to say that he's sympathetic; it is recognition, silent acknowledgement. No use for complaints when what had happened to them happens still; it's how the world is. He wonders, idly, how old Sands was when.

urg. That took ages of revision...still not happy with it. =P

His eyes slide along the boy-figure in yellow, biking by, and he makes a note in his mind.

It won't be too hard to find where he lives, Cucuy thinks.

Yeah, I'm gonna rot in hell for contemplating non-con with Chicle. ::covers eyes:: (But hey, you can't say that it isn't effective...[/slytherin])

I was of three minds
Like a tree
In which there are three blackbirds.

Originally I'd planned Jorge with this part, but it didn't work for various thematic reasons. So it ended up making Cucuy more...twacked? than I'd originally seen him which lead to the revelation about a possible past for him.

3: belini

The world doesn't go flat unless he gets too close, so he takes care to keep things at a distance, to see them properly.

Mehphht. Oh the trials of 1-D vision! =)

What he sees today is ludicrous, a boy-child playing Spy with his back undefended and with hands soft and empty. Or perhaps Sands thinks to stab him with a butterknife? Belini hid his sneer with an easy smile.

It rankles, that Americans think so little of Mexico that they send this boy to represent them; and Belini must indulge the child because of his powerful parents. He tells Sands a story to pass his time and, truly, no nanny has been paid so well to weave the folktales.

I didn't get this until I watched the dvd again, because dude Belini *totally* didn't take Sands seriously, snarkity snarked all the way...

And that is all he'll feed Sands: tales, myths, and legends.

::grins:: and you are what you eat.

Everything important he'll keep in his head and Belini grins at the irony and feels safe in his knowledge.

::giggles:: oh the irony.

The blackbird whirled in the autumn wind
It was a small part of the pantomime.

Kabuki Shadow plays, wot?

4: waitress

She sees the American in black coiled in the chair,

And linaelyn NAILS it in her comments...

and she's afraid to approach, but does so anyway. She replaces a waiter that displeased this man who tips well, comes often, and controls his territory with a half-cocked gun. Retaliation means that more men disappear and the ground seems to quake as he walks and.

In Mexico's warmth he is cold and he is powerful and he makes her shiver and nervous and.

She spills the coffee, dark and oily and steaming and hot, and apologies cough out of her mouth like blood and her fingers try to absorb the boiling wetness and her nails try to claw it out somehow and she looks into the man's eyes and--

*BANG*

::makes gun with hand:: ya'll know what scene this is right? cool, just checking. =)

A man and a woman
Are one.
A man and a woman and a blackbird
Are one.

It was a toss-up whether to make this section Ajedrez or the waitress until
1) I realized that Ajedrez *needs* to go after HQ and
2) I realized which scene I would be describing if I made it the waitress...
5: jorge

Sands is not quite famous in the intelligence community for being a loose cannon. (he is not 'particularly' famous for near failing his psych exam and he is not 'really' famous, and this in careful whispers, for slipping things away from under HQ's finger) He is not the first, on all counts; and he is not the only one who wants out.

Jorge thinks that eccentricity is all part of the job description sometimes (often), a specific mentality in the business with a prediliction towards trenchcoats, (voices),

Jorge amuses me, he does. Near as eccentric as Sands I would say...I wonder if he ever checked for reception on his metaphorical wire tap,

can you hear me now?

heh =)

walkie talkies, and sunglasses and the specific feel of Death's cold flat edge on one's skin (like a living-metal kiss).

This has various meanings which I'm trying to imply all at once; one of the meanings being "live metal" in respect to blades that aren't blunted. (You can hear the term used a lot in the PotC DVD commentary regarding stunts.) I'm not sure how well the multiple meanings carried through, but left it in anyways because hey, *someone*'s gotta get it.

Sands may want out but Jorge knows that habits would've sunk deep by now (wire trap, and sprung), and you can never really release yourself.

He watches how obsessively Sands tries to play others on their leashes and how tightly he tries to rein himself. (tries) And Jorge knows (guesses) that none of them, none of the brilliant ones (and he could admit that of Sands), can control their own bounds.

The best you can do is exchange handlers or, perhaps, find a new one somewhere safe.

::coughRestraintcouchcough::

I do not know which to prefer,
The beauty of inflexions
Or the beauty of innuendos,

::snickers childishly:: ahem.

But really, I LOVE the user of the double entendre (ie. puns in a toga) and abuse them mercilessly whenever I can...

The blackbird whistling
Or just after.

6: HQ

You KNEW I had to do this after the wallpaper...

It has become an issue; his missions are completed, but his methods are crude and laughable.

Too much of their resources have been bled out to haul his operations straight, into some semblance of stability. Which he insists on accrediting to his own skill.

They are never quite sure how much he believes his own ego. They are never quite sure if he truly believes his schemes are hidden from them. But they are sure that they'd never let him north, near Alaska's pipelines;

Thank god for deleted scenes!

Sands is like a match and they'd rather he burn out than be anywhere near the oil.

So he's been stationed in Mexico, a post which doesn't require a delicate touch; the country is already well trained, at heel. And if it

::coughAjedrezcough::

slips from the leash?

It will be regrettable, to be sure.

Icicles filled the window
With barbaric glass.
The shadow of the blackbird
Crossed it, to and fro.
The Mood
Traced in the shadow
An indecipherable cause.

7: ajedrez

Little Sheldon takes her, she thinks, like it's something rarely given and she?

She takes it with a coyote grin.

pun-tastic!

Barillo believes in the old ways like most men and despite being his daughter she is still viewed as little more than a woman. This shadow performance with Sands plays out a glorious golden tale where he manipulates and controls and schemes and she is powerful and respected and revered, and they both escape with none the wiser.

But that? It is a dream. She is the token female, for the AFN; she is a decoy, for her father. She lets herself be a convienient hole and a pretty face and she listens to Sands' charming story.

argh, I still want to fix this bit up somehow more. but yeah, only in the story that Sands *created* for her did she have any chance of recieving recognition, but I can't very well let *her* say that...

She wonders where Sands fucked up that he wants to run so badly. She imagines too many plates set spin and shattering under him too many times.

But this is how it will go, he insists: the plates will spin to a balanced stop, the cartels diverted, their countries confused, and they will be off somewhere safe. Them. Plural. She doesn't understand why; she has been cold to him for all their acquaintaince and still he says he would share this with her. She, of course, doesn't believe him.

He spins such pretty dreams, but she remindes herself of the truth.

This was the line that started my writing this section actually.

Ah, Ajedrez you jaded Slytherin you.

She reassures herself that her father will never betray her.

*snerk* though he does forget about her at inopportune moments...

She tells the doctor where to stand.

::cackles:: heh, sorry, I really really love this writing style of innocent gutpunches, I abuse the style too much but hey, practice, ne?

O thin men of Haddam,
Why do you imagine golden birds?
Do you not see how the blackbird
Walks around the feet
Of the women about you?

8: barillo

It would be laughable if it wasn't so annoying. This agent of the U.S. has all the markings of a spoiled and pampered heir, someone who has never known difficulty.

Barillo will change that.

Hated writing Barillo because he's for the moment hopelessly tangled up with Barbossa and NO THAT DOES NOT MEAN WHAT IT SOUNDS LIKE, AND SHUSH YOU! ::swats at lasergirl69::

At any rate, much love to my beta's who'd encouraged me to keep it as is because I swear I'd probably otherwise would have gone insane.

I know noble accents
And lucid, inescapable rhythms;
But I know, too,
That the blackbird is involved
In what I know.

I'd actually wanted also to put this with Nicolas, but then I realized that it fits well for both and would make a lovely transition; which in fact in turn colored the way I wrote and edited the other sections as well.

9: advisor of the land

This was actually the last one to be titled because for the longest time I'd thought that the guy was the VP or something. ::more hugs to beta's:: I really like how it turned out and linaelyn nails it again...

The only reason he sleeps at night is because Machiavelli's words gives him pardon. (Because a sitting president is much like sitting fowl.)

Lame duck, it is.

He wonders how others fare. He's heard of this agent, from here and there, who controls more of Mexico than he himself does and isn't that just rank.

Pun, isn't it? ::grins and ducks::

(The man absorbs all that is foul and fetid and runs the fecal mess slimy-smooth.) Having him around, Nicolas feels clean in comparison. His hands feels less crackled with blood and the vomit he can't keep down isn't for himself. (Everytime a coup occurs his stomach revolts too, and it reassures him.)

Really really pleased with this whole part. Really.

History will repeat, and new powers rise up. (And the generals never know how to run a country, so Nicolas' duty is to live.)

[/poly sci lesson]

Generals. And cartel. The sour taste grows even now and he thinks that if instead this Sands becomes Mexico, it will not be so bad.

::grins:: remember my Sands discussion? I'm referring to the part towards the end especially...

When the blackbird flew out of sight,
It marked the edge
Of one of many circles.

10: one right nut

Origially would have been Three Witnesses, but then I realized that there was only TWO cartel guys and wasn't I just stuck in a hole? but oh! right! the crushed left nut guy! And thus the title.

and. ::scratches back of head:: heh. ::ducks head:: another pun.

He will always feel a phantom pain, left there after Barillo's daughter ripped his sack in half and tore out the left side.

'cause you know, Ajedrez DID threaten that earlier in the movie, and the left nut at that and dude. I wonder why it's the *left* one specifically that pisses her off...

Any mention of torture makes him wince, and realize again how his underpants are just a little too loose.

He stares at the stumbling man and feels his lack and knows from experience that they don't usually get this far after having their eyes scooped out. Or any other body part for that matter.

And it's only the eyes; they should collect him. Ajedrez Barillo

::coughMexicocough::

will come to claim this man again.

She'd

::coughMexico'dcough::

left him intact after all.

::snarkity snark snark:: and cue the irony! =)

At the sight of blackbirds
Flying in a green light
Even the bawds of euphony
Would cry out sharply.

'cause, y'know, those are his balls.11: chicle

He feels vaguely as if he's following Don Quixote, but he gladly squires for this bone pale pistolero.

He's old enough to understand the breaths of dead and death and dying that float through the plaza and is too aware that they are hemmed in as much from the guerilla fighting, down on every block, as from this blinded man's will and stubborn hopes.

Don Quixote like Joxer the Mighty like Agent Sands, except he's not, heh.

He is not exactly afraid of dying because he is already dead. He has helped this man the cartel maimed, he was spared when he was used as shield, and he is probably now known to them.

And y'know, spared *once* and the cartel knows that the kid is *important* and it allllll goes down the drain.

Three walking dead by the end of this fic. Betcha can name them all by now. =)

He was told to run, but he will stay nearby, because he has nowhere else that he needs to be.

I'm especially pleased with the phrasing in that last bit:

because he has nowhere else that he needs to be.

(instead of 'to go' or just blank or etc.), it's a small little thing but details, y'know?

His Don fought to find the windmills and doesn't quite succeed as such, in this tale;

Love the legend, love the spoofiness of the legends in that legend, and do'oh! if Sands doesn't exactly live up that that particular legend ::pats the gringo-kitty:: I'm sure he doesn't mind anyways.

also: cartel=giants=windmills ::much amused::

but he watches the downed man still breathe through the dust, and he can't help but count it as victory.

Gawd but the conjugations in this last part were fickle to finagle. 'cause it's not as if Sands *won*, exactly, but yeah. =P

He rode over Connecticut
In a glass coach.
Once, a fear pierced him,
In that he mistook
The shadow of his equipage

This caused the total "lightbulb!" moment for the Don Quixote metaphor. ::pats self on back::

for blackbirds.

12: el

He is not fully sure how he'd aquired this foulmouthed compatriot, who crashes headfirst into things with no sense of bounds and awkward, like something newly born and stumbling, throwing himself against walls and El and other immobile objects,

::snicker::

like a toddler that has no better sense.

He knows that Sands have long since been jaded, so the lack of self-preservation cannot be from not knowing how. He distantly wonders why part of Sands seems to want to die; because all considered, eyes are not so much. He should know.

::pets El::

But. Perhaps the lack of them is enough to tear a mind apart. That, he thinks, must be prevented. So he systematically hauls Sands together again, pressing meager patchwork bits of spirit back through his skin, breathing in what life he could imitate, and chaining Sands to him with silver.

Voila! Subtext, if you want it.

(sidenote: I've always liked Sands/El as a designation for the pairing because it sounds like a dance or something...sanzelle? but yeah)

He pockets first the heart, because that was not for him to give. He fully believes that Sands would have preferred it without, anyways.

But he plans to ask the man, when they next wake up, just to satisfy his curiosity.

surrrrrre El...call it that.

The river is moving.
The blackbird must be flying.

Pistoleros on the move--whoa! watch the bullets!

::grins::13: townsperson

Revamp of 1: townsperson, aaaaaaaand we come full circle...

He's seen the men striding along the streets, and at times he can’t tell them apart from the mirages, swaying like a storyline, merging with the landscape.

There is a song in the winds.

He doesn't look the men in the eye because (eyes are missing) they are both dead. He believes the tales even though he hasn't seen any himself, because he knows there are ways that legends travel. Sometimes, even, on foot.

::snickers:: too much pun.

He knows that perhaps he might worry a bit less now.

He believes, and is defined by his beliefs, that the land will set things right again.

It has started that stanza, in any case.

It was evening all afternoon.
It was snowing
And it was going to snow.
The blackbird sat
In the cedar limbs.

~
The white slip is filled, rolled up, and burned. (He grimaced; El-Jingle-All-The-Way got the wrong papers. Again.)

The dogeared dictionary is marked with highlighted typos and commentary and there is copious advice scrawled in green around the swear words. It's to be a gift.

wee!precocious!Sands with the pretty pens!

The expensive garment bag contains five cheap t-shirts, all airy cotton and vulgar ink. The leather doctor's kit contains a bloodless arm and a bloody fork.

And what have we learned here, boys and girls? ::looks around hopefully::

And even though the sunlight was weak and the curtains were drab, and even though the walls were a sickly non-color, it doesn't matter. Sands can't see it himself anyway.

And he never did trust other people's descriptions.

::bows to circe_tigana and ignited for the fork::



[end]

---

author's notes: the answer is "NONE OF THE ABOVE."

But what is the question? ::grins::

Below is the scene that I was imagining, except the room in my head is a lot more yellow and less brown. Ah well.


So, thank you once again to all my beta's 'cause ya'll are lovely and supportive despite my moments of self-pity/doubt and frustration with the fic. I love you all. ::snogs mightily:: Thank you's to the fandom for being just wonderful. And many many thanks to my spellcheck, 'cause I'm just horrible like that. Ta! =)

credits: Much MUCH love to linalyn, inkbug, and lil_neko who beta-ed and supported and inspired like whoa. Everything in grey font is from Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird (Wallace Stevens). The fork is from circe_tigana and ignited. The room-image is from slodwick's The Picture is Worth a Thousand Words Challenge...though I violated the word limit by about a thousand words...::covers eyes::

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