I’m talking to him and I notice the second hole in his left ear. He’s attractive and talking to him is a pleasure; and his ears are perfectly invisible to me until I notice. The visible part of the ear, the auricle, is a normal, fluted, funnel narrowing to a canal but beneath it another aperture also ends in darkness. My words enter him through the first hole; he replies with a smile that suggests he comprehends but doesn’t necessarily agree. Whatever he hears through the second hole is additional to what other people hear and, in addition to, what comes out my mouth.
gnommero is an ongoing publication assembled by Sarah Tripp. gnommero presents artists and writers responses to Italo Calvino’s series of published lectures, ‘Six Memos for the Next Millennium’. The second issue carries works responding to Calvino’s memo on ‘quickness’ produced by: Jenny Brownrigg, Chin Li, Neil Davidson, Simone Hutchinson, Conal Mc Stravick, Rebecca Wilcox, Kathrine Sowerby, Ruth Barker, Anthony Schrag, Eona McCallum, Louise Shelley, Kathryn Elkin, Darren Rhymes, Rowena Easton, Thomas Walker, Jessica Potter, Giles Bailery, S_and O_ and Sarah Tripp.
Sarah Tripp contributed the short observations, ‘7 consecutive moods’ and ‘The second hole in his left ear’.