Doug Meet
reads 
Checkmate,
Je t'aime!
avec
Utahna Faith
Doug Meet
reads
Checkmate,
Je t'aime!
Checkmate,
Je t'aime!
avec
Utahna Faith
TO DISTURB SO MANY CHARMS
New York Public Library
staff-only rare book conservancy
September 31, 2019. 8:49 pm
TO DISTURB SO MANY CHARMS
New York Public Library
*Checkmate, Je t'aime!
*Checkmate, Je t'aime!
*This story has no prefiguration, no reference, no epiphany; and because it reveals no ending, it has no
dénouement.
As such, this story is for the telling.
...
An elegant woman, she invented good ones, relaxes; quiet park before her; AND before her too,
her rendez-vous.
She smooths her tightly splayed, blue wool skirt to her knees,
then pushes imaginary strands of
corn- coffee-colored stalky hair from her eyes;
and though there is not hair there, she busily pushes aside
the not-there hair
(to be caught in a false move ... she will never do that).
He, her rendez-vous, surprises her from behind, silent Gucci loafers, his Native footwear.
She revolves and extends her graceful shapely arm, its smooth hand strikes in one dynamic burst, a Nazi, lighting a cigarette; she unlooses the board from his armpit.
They embrace,
then miss-kiss, thrice,
alternating cheeks;
peripheral,
proximate,
recall the Seven Lost Graces
with their cheek-meat faces.
He, her 5-move-ahead rendez-vous,
maneuvers her
windowless
doppelverabredungs, where exist two secrets too beautiful to touch.
Twenty-five minutes on, he SEES
she's got him
mated;
5 moves.
She will extend it to 10.
Just then, she visualizes him
mated;
3 moves, a
bus lane opens in her mind at rush hour.
Then
5 moves are gone in 45 seconds.
5 seconds after,
she topples
his King,
a
15th-century potentate,
she
murders in the park,
a silent coupe de grace,
a draw-for-a-win.
She thinks this ritual, potent, kind, and merciful; thinks it
theirs alone.
"Kill my King, not don't kill me," it's remarkably unexpressed.
Tomorrow she will meet him again, because,
"There is no victory like no victory."
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
| 8 |       | 8 | |||||||
| 7 | 7 | ||||||||
| 6 | 6 | ||||||||
| 5 | 5 | ||||||||
| 4 | 4 | ||||||||
| 3 | 3 | ||||||||
| 2 | 2 | ||||||||
| 1 | 1 | ||||||||
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
Position after 124.Bg7, stalemate[1]
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
| 8 |     | 8 | |||||||
| 7 | 7 | ||||||||
| 6 | 6 | ||||||||
| 5 | 5 | ||||||||
| 4 | 4 | ||||||||
| 3 | 3 | ||||||||
| 2 | 2 | ||||||||
| 1 | 1 | ||||||||
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
Position after 30.Qe2, after 32.Qe2, and after 34.Qe2, draw by threefold repetition[2]
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
| 8 | | 8 | |||||||
| 7 | 7 | ||||||||
| 6 | 6 | ||||||||
| 5 | 5 | ||||||||
| 4 | 4 | ||||||||
| 3 | 3 | ||||||||
| 2 | 2 | ||||||||
| 1 | 1 | ||||||||
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
Position after 121...Rb5+, draw by fifty-move rule[3]
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
| 8 |  | 8 | |||||||
| 7 | 7 | ||||||||
| 6 | 6 | ||||||||
| 5 | 5 | ||||||||
| 4 | 4 | ||||||||
| 3 | 3 | ||||||||
| 2 | 2 | ||||||||
| 1 | 1 | ||||||||
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
Draw. No sequence of legal moves can lead to checkmate.[4]
(Mednis 1990:43)
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
| 8 | | 8 | |||||||
| 7 | 7 | ||||||||
| 6 | 6 | ||||||||
| 5 | 5 | ||||||||
| 4 | 4 | ||||||||
| 3 | 3 | ||||||||
| 2 | 2 | ||||||||
| 1 | 1 | ||||||||
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
Draw. No sequence of legal moves can lead to checkmate.
Petrosian vs. Fischer, 1958
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
| 8 | | 8 | |||||||
| 7 | 7 | ||||||||
| 6 | 6 | ||||||||
| 5 | 5 | ||||||||
| 4 | 4 | ||||||||
| 3 | 3 | ||||||||
| 2 | 2 | ||||||||
| 1 | 1 | ||||||||
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h | ||
Position after 67.f7, draw agreed[5]