Three Ghosts

Gordon Matta-Clark died young. And he died in an amazing way

Gordon was a good friend of mine. And he was a sculptor. One of his most well known works was called Splitting, in which he sawed a suburban house in half. He was a minimalist, and there was a lot of advanced theory about why he cut houses in half. Although, none of the theories talked about his parents' divorce. Or what happened one day when his twin brother jumped to his death out of Gordon's window

When Gordon got sick, he decided to make his death very social. And so he invited his friends to come to the hospital. And he had only 24 hours left to live. The length of time that his system was breaking down. And he decided to spend this time reading to his friends. And when he died there were two lamas on either side of him. And when he stopped breathing they began shouting into his ear. Now, the Tibetans believe that hearing is the last sense to go. So after the heart stops, and your brain flatlines, and the eyes go dark, the hammers in the ears are still working. And so they shout instructions from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, also called 'The Great Liberation Through Hearing'

And they yelled "Gordon! You're dead! You're dead now!" And they say "You see two lights, and one is near you, and one is far away. And don't go to the near one - go to the one that's far away..." And so on, and so on, and so on, and so on...

I've seen three ghosts in my life now. And the first was Gordon. A few hours after he died. He appeared on the back porch of the commune I was living in. 'Every love story, is a ghost story.' (Ghost story, ghost story.) Said David Foster Wallace