God cannot be found in Whitechaple nor on the decaying streets and bug-eaten bungalows of Treme-Lafitte. New Orleans and London are similar in many ways, despite what one might think. True, there are no sweat-inducing peppers in a shepherd’s pie, and the humidity presents itself in vastly different degrees, but sin is likewise cheap and readily available on the banks of the Mississippi and the Thames. And it is not as if sin were ever discouraged on the dim oil-lit streets of either.
+++++There are hand-hewn human gobbits of varying sizes afloat in both rivers, each making their way to the Atlantic, and the oft-infected whores on those similar streets reek the same and bleed the same. One can not differentiate between the filth-crusted orifices of either species, be they dusky or pale. Both female specimens leak their drawers full with the swirled pudding of many men. Coupling with either often renders a rutting university man’s member puss-dripping and bent.
+++++The carriage ride from Goward’s Godless college east along the river to Whitechaple in the grey, gray Godless gloam takes but an hour. The northwest journey from the university on Saint Charles avenue to the negro-infested streets of Treme might require a few additionall ticks of the clock. The thick disgusting brogues of the the Scott and the Cajun drivers are similarly ignorant and incomprehensible, but these crude fellows know why a young man might make the journey and proffer no prying inquiries and pass no discernable judgment. Both are wont to evince a knowing grin when informed of their destination. Perhaps their scepters bend and drip likewise.
+++++The available cutlery is similar, and Mr. Liston’s keen surgical instrument is equally effective in either locale and may be concealed easily beneath a drab Ulster wool. The Liston’s blade measures four and one half inches in length. An English harlot’s heart lies no deeper than two inches beneath her breastbone. An American mawk differs only slightly. The heart of an Atchafalaya turtle may beat for many minutes, or even hours, after resection, while the pump of a slain whore of any location stills immediately.
+++++When removed and laid upon the brick or cement and measured for length or circumference, or held in the palm and shown to the lamp, the organs of each differ but little, excepting of course those parts suffering from morbidity or obesity, the later more common to the Negressess of the states, presumably from the more robust Bayou table fare.
+++++The two cities and the two universities are bound by the universal natures of mankind, by his wanton desires, his dark thoughts and his brutal tendencies. The lecturers at each revered institution recite rote and self-serving humanistic and utilitarian drivel, each pedagogue cloistering his beastly nature beneath a cloak of pleasing platitudes and pretty lies.
+++++The constables and sheriffs of each nation hold the victims of violence as guilty as the perpetrators. The economic divisions and delineations ensure this truism. Perhaps the racial divide is a broader chasm in the unreconstructed Confederacy than is the class chasm in the Old Country.
+++++It is true that the slaughter of a dozen girls of the African diaspora is scarcely noteworthy compared to the five undercounted conical tramps gutted in Westminster. Make no mistake, the authorities in each scene enjoy their little jokes and jests at the expense of the slain. Only the murder of a virgin is a real tragedy in either locale, their value being far above rubies. The value of a prostitute disappears as soon as her sheath grows cold.
+++++In fact, one might rightly feel as if he is undertaking a dirty yet necessary task in disposing of such human refuse, even if one might take too much pride in the act and the aftermath. Perhaps it is the severity of the act that renders the act noticeable. A cleanly-throttled trollop would likely garner no or scant concern in any city of any size, while an tart eviscerated from cunny to chin is a scandal. I fail to see the difference, but it is this difference that necessitates my departure, but one place is so like the other.

[Image Credit : Photo by Dan Meyers on Unsplash]

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Alan Caldwell

Alan Caldwell has been teaching in Georgia since 1994 but only began submitting writing in May 2022. He has since been published in over two dozen journals and magazines, including Southern Gothic Creations, The Backwoodsman, You Might Need To Hear This, The Chamber, Heartwood Literary Journal, Rural Fiction Magazine, Deep Wild Journal and many others.

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