In My Little Room

In my little room, the emperor removes his robe and we chat about the mechanics of winning an election. “I came, I saw, I conquered,” he says. When the moon comes out above the dilapidated warehouse, he asks me the profundity of going to the moon and back again to the same ghetto room. If it pleases your majesty, I say, the gods make the ghettos. “I am King,” says the emperor, “I shall have no gods.” And he shakes, nearly spilling his oolong tea. When he has calmed down enough, I drop two lumps of sugar into his cup. He marvels at my calculus book and integration theory and digital watch. “Had I one of those,” he says, “I would have timed my crossing of the Rubicon at eighteen, and what barbarian woman would not have given herself for that!” He yawns imperially over my utensils, books, and cot and asks me to cross the Rubicon with him. And I nod while doing tax equations for his majesty because the hour is late. He is delighted with the hot chocolate that I make on a hot plate and, after making a rough estimate of the roaches on the wall, he sleeps on my cot as any sovereign would. I rattle my typewriter like a machine- gun all night, partly because it is my habit, and partly to protect my friend, the emperor. For though he has crossed the Rubicon with the bravest of men, he has yet to sleep a single night in the ghetto.