No Sense in Figurin’ on When

“Just look at him. Standing under that same fucking lamp post like nothing’s going on.”

            Steam like Spirits eschewed from the hood of Dick’s rusty-not rustic- 1985 Mustang. Ice, melted to slush in the off-warmth of the day, nestled into the bosom of the street-curb, solidifying in the chilled night air. John strained his eyes trying to make out the kid. The lamp was flickering as they approached, but died when they killed the engine.

“Can’t get him into the light, can we?” Asked Dick, fooling with the heater. “I like to look at their faces.”

“It’s all the same shit to me.”

“Same shit.”

            The kid leaned on the lamp post, lit up a cigarette, and tapped his knees together. Beyond that, it was hard to make out his face. Had the light not gone out, and the only light been the distant lamps reflecting off of green dumpsters and the side panel of a grey impala, they would have been able to make out his face, contracted and wrinkled in the cold, wind-whipped and sun-blasted (leaving an irregular, patchy tan like a Pinto whose Maaco paint job had seen one too many years), with a pair of eyes painted a dark brown melancholy; a visage carved from out of adolescence, which looked much like James Dean…post mortem.

“Turn on the radio won’t ya, Dick.”

“Speakers blown out.”

“When’d that happen?”

“Dunno. No since in figuring on when.”

“Not like it matters much.” John mumbled in exasperated tones, stretching his arms back, interlacing each finger, cracking every bone, smiling in satisfaction, his eyes squinting in the pleasure of a good stretch. But it would have mattered, had he turned on the radio, which was set to some phony radio-vangelist who would have said thirty minutes of bullshit, rapping around a single line that would have saved John’s soul. Still, “Probably best to keep quiet.” He thought. “Whaddaya make of this kid, anyway?”

“Dunno.”

“Just stands in the dark, waiting for cars to come by.”

“Standing,” he breathed,  “…waiting.” Waiting just as they waited. Breathing just as they breathed. Though the kid, alone, would occasionally respond to a slowing Jetta playing techno music, and perform and intricate performance with his and the driver’s hands. “It’s too damn hot in here.”

“You know what Joe says?”

Dick didn’t give a fuck what Joe said.  But he gave John an appeasing, “What does Joe say?” as he tapped his fingers slowly on the dashboard; tadadadum…tadadadum…

“Says the kid ain’t got no folks. Whaddaya make of a sonnovabitch kid ain’t got no folks?”

“Sad story.”

“They’re all sad stories.”

“Same shit.”

John and Dick watched the kid from the comfort of their steaming ‘stang. They smoked cigarettes and wiped the grit from the corners of their red eyes, though they were red for different reasons. Dick was allergic to cigarette smoke, and his eyes would burn and water every time that he took a puff. John had insomnia, and got about five hours of sleep a week. It was easier after a drink and a smoke, but he was dyspeptic, and the drink would irritate his bowels, so he only drank in private. This was a problem, because he felt like a drunk, drinking alone.

“Did you bring the camera?” John asked.

“I got the camera. In the trunk.

“Well that’s not gonna help us much is it?

“Seat folds back.”

“You gotta think sometimes, Dick.”

“I’ll hold your cigarette.”

“Forget it. It’s almost burnt down anyway. How am I supposed to move around back here with all this shit on the seat? No wonder this car smells like wet socks.”

Dick’s mind was elsewhere. Like machine with a primary function, he maintained locked on what he was programmed to do. Blood, like oil, flowed through his veins to fuel the engine of his heart, which ignited a system made to do one thing without conscience; one thing without repercussion; one thing guided by nothing but his own stock coding to survive, thrive, enterprise, and be the last one standing—standing on a pile of obsolete predecessors.

“Here’s the fuckin’ thing.”

“Just step into the light you little shit. Just step into the light…”

 

Snap. Shot.

 

            The eye is such a complex organ that scientists have yet to develop a comparable device to mimic the capabilities of the original organ. The beauty and intricacy of the retina, the pupil and the iris—the versatility of a lens that can focus in a deep field and a shallow field, in crisp, vibrant color. No physical human capability—no individual talent—can replicate the delicate precision of the eye. All human kind has to attempt to replicate the ocular miracle is a camera–(a lens and a mirror that must be manipulated by hand) that strange device-that fascinated John since he was a child.

John used to photograph beetles that he found under piles of fence posts that his father always intended to put up. Rollie-pollies and pincher bugs were a favorite subject. He made a pinhole camera out of a Pringles can, black electrical tape, and oven paper. His jaw would slump as he stared through the spy-hole, observing the inverted, black and white, blurry version of the world in front of him. In order to see through the pin-hole camera, however, he needed light. So he would take a jar, gather the bugs from the shaded mud under the fence-posts, and transplant the bugs to a sunnier spot; to a slab of concrete in the front yard. On this slab, John used to lay out the six or seven bugs he caught, get out his camera, and excitedly stare at their movements, save for the ones that died along the way.

He would stare longer at the dead dung beetles and pincher bugs, in awe of the stillness that he had yet to achieve, not understanding the finality of their stillness; not understanding the pain of suffocation or the confusion of entrapment, the blinding burning eruption of light forced upon nocturnal sensors magnified by the concave glass jar; magnified by time; time lost, time illuminated, breathless, daunting, foreboding, diminishing…

 

The kid felt heavy in his converse as his thirst demanded that he find something to drink. His throat was like a an introverted cactus. As he swallowed, the needles would scrape against the soft skin of his esophagus, and no descending liquid he could provide could soothe the gashes created by those needles. So he gave in, walked from his parched desert of darkness, and stepped into the light.

 

“What now, John?”

“check his pockets.”

“Kids pockets are empty.”

“Check his jacket lining?”

“The thing’s got guts all over it.”

“I said do it!”

“Got gloves?”

 

“Here… Whaddaya make of this orphan now? Ain’t got no hair on his chin. Scrawny arms, smells like the back seat of your car. D’ya think he was figurin’ on getting’ plugged today?

“…”

“You think he saw our car?”

“There’s nothing in the jacket.”

“What if he saw our car? Knew we were here? Was just waiting for us to come over? Do you think he recognized us?”

“I don’t recognize us.”

“Don’t any of them recognize us?”

“Little bastard’s got at least three G’s sewn into these pants.”

“How many people have we done now?”

“Split it half?”

“How many?”

“Fifty.”

“Fifty…”

“Fifty percent.”

“I’m done.”

“It’s getting light out.”

“Kid’s got three G’s and still don’t shower.”

“Put him in the trunk.”

“Hehe…Kid smells like piss.”

“Put him in the goddamn trunk.”

“Do you even know what he did?”

“I don’t give a shit what he did. Stop laughing.”

“S-sorry. But I just ain’t killed a kid before. It’s just funny to me.”

“I’ll pop the trunk. Get it together.”

“Never killed a kid. Never really pulled the trigger. You know, Dick? Come to think of it, I always just sort of watched. You’re apprentice you know? If you really think about it. This shit ain’t my fault, if you really think about it? It’s all you isn’t it…It’s all you… I ain’t done shit. Just along for the ride………Kids, ya know. Goddamn kid. Stay home! MAKE MONEY! Could’ve had something. Punk little orphan bastard sonnovabitch… Goddamnit you’re a stupid kid…Stupid fucking kid, John.

 

Snap. Shot.

I Don’t Know Why This City Sleeps

With a buzz and a bust I must bus home.

 

Windy Wendy went wearily wobbling.

Wobble windy and wear all white.

White Wendy wipes wet water.

Water so wet. Wet water wet.

Wendy weeps and sleeps in a city steep.

 

A way to air the airables again and again.

Again aghast a ghost a goon.

Airily the airy air, is heir to heirs of eerie air.

All together Avery.

Avery a voracious adventurer.

 

Bit busy to bust open the bust.

Bury the bust and bustle of bust.

Bustle of bust buying busty-busted busts.

Buzz, beep, boing, bonkers.

Billy bounces off the banister.

Andertholic Neanderthal. Under all is in-aliable.

Against the adjunct age of angst.

Angst is against all afflictions.

Afflictions that age with addictions.

Annie is aged with addiction.

 

Again again again again.

A gain again against all gains.

All gains are gained away in a way.

A way is a way if a way is a way.

Amber ain’t at all ahead in her head.

 

Busted again. Buster gets the bust.

Buster’s bust is busted.

Broken busted bust of buster?

But Billy clubs barely busted her.

Billy clubbed Buster and busted her.

 

Idolatry is ideally idol.

I don’t idolize idols.

I dulled out idols of eyeballs.

Eyeballs see idols and idle.

Ida has idle wide eyeballs.

 

Mustard is musty.

Musty mustard must be.

Must be musty mustard.

Make me my mustiest mustard.

Manny makes mustier mustard.

 

Busy bastard burying bags of bananas.

Bonkers bastard, but bought a bag of bananas.

Believe it. But bananas are bonkers bastards.

Burying bananas…so bonkers.

Bob – the old bonkers bastard – gone bananas.

 

Hell in a hand basket.

Handheld basket of hell.

Held hands in a hand basket.

Hands held in a basket in hell.

Helen, had handy hands held hard round a basket in hell.

 

I don’t know why this city sleeps.

A Portrait Of John McCain

Courageous as a kumquat if kumquats are courageous.

Would you could you will you won’t you? Won’t you don’t you

Will you won’t? If a lion is alien, his stance so ostentatious,

Would he call us Friends F-R-I-E-N-D. friend E-N-D friend, round two.

Around you too many two’s are too you, to you and I-

Dol I, doe-eye, do I? I do. Not you.

Suffice to say the ice decays. The ice decays suffice the si-

Zed, Zero, Zen Zune, Zroom Neurooom Boom.

Take a stance askance romance.

Romance the dance and take the chance.

One wife, one woman whoa wowowow, what?

Can Palin play if Clinton lays? Palin pays McCain:

McCain McCan McTrust in-McSperience.

Decay today the ice decays suffice the ice today decays.

And shorten and shorten and shorten and shrink.

Raise hands, give a hand, no hands giving a hand in Hanoi, handkerchief chief.

IV oh me, we need IV. 

 

McCain died in office today, and a wolf-killing neo-con took hold of the reigns.

 

A giant alliant allied to the giant. We die we lie today we die. Today we die if today we lie, oh aye-di-daye-di-daye-di-daye-di-daye-di-daye-di-daye. We die if today. We die, we die, we die, we die we die we die. When we die we know they lie they lie to die and die.

and when the wind is when we win who wins when wind is when we win and “the answer my friend is blowing in the wind.

 

And if the polls are told to stroll,

Surround the ostentatious droll.

Southern drawl is drawn in all.

In all we see the southern drawl.

All in all is all we are. all we are is all in all we all know all are all. in all if all in all is all. in all. Altogether all in all. All my love is lost in all; is lost in Medicare and all. In Medicare and Medicate and medicine and Mediwar and Medimight and medical and get the medic soldier.

 

Telegram:

Selling souls to save stop save the selling of souls stop stepping up soul selling for salesmen stop salesmen sell souls for soles stop the souls of soles are sold in Saipan stop stop stop stop S-T-O-P

 

My country ‘tis of thee sweet land of thee and ’tis.

McCain Smiles:

Friends,

My country, right or wrong. 

For Gertrude Stein

Stein, how so? Stein how? So so

Stein. So stein so. So what, Stein?

How quick ma makes money.

Melancholy ma. Melancholy Money Ma

Ma quick marry Money.

POW-MIA Stein, where P-O-W M-I-A?

She is so quick so she so quick.

So quick POW-MIA Marry merrily modern merry.

Silence to serendipity.

Serendipitously silent.

Silently slip serendipitously

down the stairwell.

How is Stein so how is Stein so How is Stein so so

No longer singing serendipity.

So no longer singing quick.

So no longer singing.

So no longer so no so so so sssssssss.

Flair up and up end up in flair. End up in flair

And flare indubitably and indubitably.

Indubitably dutiful to Stein so dutifully indubitable.

Indubitably Stein. In so as so Stein, how so?

Indubitably Stein.

 

The Elevator

            Mr. Price kept looking at the little scrap of binder paper with the curious note on it.

It will be a good day, Mr. Price

 

When he woke up that morning, his jet-black hair in a net, and his monogrammed silk pajamas shining in the sunlight through the Biltmore window, he was, in fact, in a good mood. “But who the fuck put this note in my shoe?” He scratched his head, yawned wide, and was abruptly interrupted by a knock on the door.

            Christ-all-fucking-mighty, he thought. “Come in.” He said.  A fat old nurse in a flower-print dress with a nametag that said Eliza stepped through the door pushing a cart full of spray bottles with green liquids, clean white linens, and gray-blotched washcloths.

            “Good day, Mister Price.” Mr. Price grunted a response as he took his brown wallet from the bedside table and stuffed the piece of paper behind a picture of a young girl where his ID should be. She was a beautiful brunette girl, almost eight years old, and she was sitting on the ledge of a water fountain. A smile played across her lips, but her eyes were as intense as her father’s.  

                                                Love you, Daddy.

 

            “That’s a lovely ring, Mister Price. Are you married?” Eliza was getting a set of towels and washcloths from her cart for the bathroom when she had noticed the ring on his finger as he set his wallet on the table and cracked his knuckles one by one like little chestnuts.

            “No. Not any more.” He went to the window and looked out onto the world. The sun shone too bright for his half-woken eyes, so he shut the blinds. With the sleeve of his shirt, he polished the ring on his finger. Normally, his lips would be pressed tight together, his thick brow furrowed, and the crows feet beneath his eyes would be like rivers of shadow that flowed into the lake of his blackened eye. But when he polished his ring, his mouth hung just a little bit slack-jawed, and the furrowed brown became one deep in concentration. After the ring shined to his satisfaction, he began to get dressed.

“Listen, did anybody come into my room earlier this morning, or last night?” He asked.

            “I’m not sure Mister Price.” She walked into the bathroom as she spoke. “Will you be staying with us another night?”

            “No. Have my bags sent down.”

            “You will not need them, Mister Price.” Said Eliza. Mr. Price almost missed it. His shirt was halfway over his head and his pajama shorts hung round his ankles. Through his shirt, he felt the ring on his finger, twisting it with his thumb and middle finger.

            “Excuse me?”

            “It will be a good day, Mister Price.” That was it. He walked to the bathroom.

            “What’s going on here?”

            “Is there a problem, Mister Price?” asked the nurse as she pulled back the shower curtain to scrub the tub.

            “Yes. Yes, in fact, there is a big problem. I did not ask for anybody to come into my room last night.” Mr. Price was inches from Eliza, but she kept going about her business.

            “Please, relax. That would make things so much easier for us?”

            “Who is us?”

 

                        Dee-dee-da-da, dee-dee-da-da, dee-dee-dum-dum-dee

 

            Mister Price looked at the name that flashed across the screen of his cell phone, then opened it and shut it abruptly, the sound of plastic clapping against plastic echoing in the bathroom.

            “It’s going to be such a nice day.” Said Eliza as she made her way toward the bed. “You’ve come as far as you need to go.” She threw the sheets and blankets off of the bed and began replacing the sheets with fresh linens. “The bed will be fresh for you tonight, we guarantee that.”

            “Get it through your fat ugly head, Woman. I’m not staying another night!”

            “Today is to nice of a day to go running, Mister Price.”

            Mr. Price pressed Eliza’s hand against the bed as she folded the sheet over, and he looked her straight in the eyes. “Where would I run?”

            “There’s no place to run around here Mister Price.” She pulled her hands away and continued bustling about the room.. “It’s always too cold. Too much traffic.”

                        Dee-dee-da-da, dee-dee-da-da, dee-dee-dum-dum-dee                       

 

“Jesus Fucking God All mighty!” muttered Mr. Price.

“Don’t abandon him too, Mister Price.”

                        Dee-dee-da-da, dee-dee-da-da, dee-dee-dum-dum-dee

 

Mr. Price turned off his phone and ran out the door, over to the elevator, stopped suddenly, and ran back to the bathroom, grabbing his comb from the black toiletry bag on the counter. He combed his hair as he ran back down the hall.

            “It will be a good day, Mister Price.” Eliza said as soft as ever.

            “Bring my bags down.” He shouted from the hall.

            “You will not need them, Mister Price.”

            “Fuck off.” He said, as he ran to the elevator, combing his hair, his pressed white shirt untucked, his belt undone, his pants unbuttoned. Impatiently, he pressed the DOWN button over and over and over again until finally, a small bing announced the arrival of his departure.

The door opened, greeting him with the quizzical stares of a beautiful woman and a little girl, about eight years old, with brown pigtails. His heart jumped through his chest and he stood, unable to enter the elevator.

            I love you daddy

 

“I’m sorry, I left something in my room.” Said Mr. Price.

“We’ll wait for you.” Said the woman.

“You don’t need anything from back there.” Said the little girl as she stepped out from the elevator and took his hand. He was powerless against the force of her little grip pulling him in. The door closed, and he looked at the ceiling, remembering his appearance. He tucked his shirt in, and, though he was much taller than either of them, he felt two inches tall.

 

                        IT WILL BE A GOOD DAY MR. PRICE

DEE-DEE-DA-DA, DEE-DEE-DA-DA, DEE-DEE-DUM-DUM-DEE

                        i love you daddy

 

The little girl let go of his hand and he reached into his pocket. She nuzzled her head into her mother’s side as she tussled her hair, smiling down at her.

           

                        DEE-DEE-DA-DA, DEE-DEE-DA-DA, DEE-DEE-DUM-DUM-DEE

 

Again, Mr. Price cut off the phone call.

“Avoiding someone?” asked the woman. Mr. Price pretended not to hear the comment. He watched the lit-up numbers as they went down, floor by floor. He felt the little girl’s hand on his own, and looked down to see her holding his hand up to her mother.

            “Look, Mommy. His ring is just like Daddy’s.” The woman nodded, and then looked at Mr. Price.

            “Married?” she asked. Mr. Price pulled back his hand and stuck it in his pockets.

            “It’s just an old good luck charm.”

            “Does it work?” asked the little girl?

            “No.” The elevator stopped and an involuntary groan escaped Mr. Price as perspiration speckled his forehead. The woman and her daughter stood silently, smiling, content. Mr. Price took his hand from his pocket and again twisted the ring on his finger. He pressed the emergency button repeatedly.

            “It’s okay to be scared,” said the little girl. “But you don’t have to be.” Her mother picked her up with a little bit of a groan and straightened her dress. “It seems like you’ve already let go of so much, you might as well just set yourself free.” Said the woman. Mr. Price kept staring at the elevator door. “I just want out of here.” He moaned.

            “She’s pretty, Mommy.” Mr. Price turned to see that the little girl was looking through his wallet at the picture of his daughter. The scrap of paper fell to the floor.

                        It will be a good day Mr. Price

 

            The woman took the picture from the wallet and ripped it to little pieces. “You will not need this, Mr. Price.”

            “What the fuck is your problem?” said Mr. Price as he lunged at the woman, grabbing at her blouse. She did not move, and he could get no control over her. He struggled and grappled with her while her daughter just smiled. She again grabbed his hand and pulled him away. Mr. Price collapsed on the floor of the elevator, and looked up to his reflection. He saw the tears streaking his face, and the tufts of hair sticking up. He wept and pleaded, “Get me out of here.”

            “Don’t cry, Mister. It’s such a good day.” Said the little girl, who had begun bouncing up and down, making the elevator shake. DEE-DEE-DA-DA…the girl took the phone from him, and turned it off. Mr. Price whispered, “You’re just like my daughter.”

            “You will not need her anymore.” Said the little girl. Then the lights in the elevator went out, and the little chamber was filled with the sound of a child’s laughter, and a Man’s tears.             

A Romantic Wad on the PAvement

Eye Candy Lover
Discoverer of the Krystal Nacht, cherry popped
Cradle rocked
fantasy man in a pile of white fright
manifest powder chanced louder and prouder
than the average scared mind; un-sublime mime
fulfilling crime’s prime, dropping dimes
on love’s seclusion for a polluted mascarade…
It’s all a parade
what I’m getting at is bubbly-blonde backstage betty
wants Ken for his car; white fifty-four chevy
dance in trance to artificial love’s lukewarm arabian melody
that everyone knows the rhythm to,
while missing out on lyrics from language
anguish
sex is hexed to bless tex-mex
next a reflex test, chest mest…
By the bullet of passion

the bars of the cage of man bore woman
the womb of a witch switched on the legacy of sin
which trickled the devil to level, embezzle
with tousle and trestle making sense of illusion
a global pollution
I write the allusions, you draw the conclusions
the fusion you and this man give up
to the pre-nup sup-
position. The politician separating kids through submission
subtraction, addition, addiction,
commission the soul to role, scroll and fold
under pressure or Cash like Johnny
lose chips to flips. Bloods crypts, poison sips
roofie slips, whips, hips jerk and work
to the rhythmic schematicism of the stand-up’s cynicism…
Control, extol, house-poll, re-roll, bowl
and the whole of life is lips,
tits, midriffs, and skoal…
A romantic wad on the pavement.
It’s all the same thing.

Cereal with Water

 

 

That’s the breakfast that I had the morning I woke up on the damnable day. I was just comin’ down from a bad case of ‘cocaine blues’ and forgot to go to the store the previous day. So water and Cheerios filled my aching belly. It tasted like soggy card board, felt like it too. High in fiber and nothing else. I ate it out of a cup with a fork because everything else was dirty. As a matter of fact, I think the fork may have been too. Any way, I tossed those into the building pile of dishes and dirt as well, and went into the bathroom. Snorting a line off the linoleum, flicking a roach off the mirror and watching it drown in the sink, I gave myself a good once over. First, a glance at the old pallet. My eye was swollen and blue, with reddening around the edges and some yellow shit right in the corner. I braced myself and wiped off the yellow shit, and looked at my nose. Luckily, it was numb, because the sight of the gash through the right nostril would have caused it to sear. So I wiped off the dry, crusty blood, and turned on the faucet, cupping my hand to scoop out the cock roach. I took a crusty towel and rinsed my face, then ran a comb with missing teeth through my hair. Looking at my own grill, I wasn’t much less worse for wear. My left canine and my right front had disappeared, and, feeling around with my tongue, I found that I was missing half a molar as well. Once again, it had paid to be high.

I’d have to get that tooth fixed, so I figured I’d squeeze into a dentist, give her the old once over, and see what we could do about pulling it. Then I thought, “fuck it”, and pulled it myself. I ditched the tooth and scratched my scrawny, white arm. It was okay, but I was missing my shirt. And my pants. So buck naked, I made my way across the hotel room, and into my hamper where I found some torn up blue jeans and a wife beater. Itwas blood stained, but I didn’t care. Blood stain are pretty fuckin’ tough. Then I found my Jean Jacket, and a broken cigarette on top of the T.V. I lit the cigarette, dawned the jacket, and walked out the door, where I was jumped by I don’t know how many sons of bitches, and beaten unmercifully.

The next thing I knew, my Jacket was gone, and I was shoeless. There was now a burn mark in my previously healthy arm. The fuckers got me with my own cigarette. I made out the bunch runnin’ down the street, so I started runnin’ after ‘em. I liked those shoes. They didn’t know that, clipped to my boxers, was a box cutter.

I finally caught up to them. They were sniffin’ lines in the alley, so I crept up quietly, real still like, and gut one by the neck, blade to their jugular, and I said “I’ll be takin’ my fuckin’ shoes back.” And they gave me my fuckin’ shoes back. So I let the guy go.

Cereal with water: That’s the breakfast I had the morning I woke up that damnable day…And when I looked in the mirror, my eye was swollen and blue, my nose was slit open, my teeth were shit, and I had a cigarette burn on my arm.

I called her Katie

 

    

      I called her Katie. History would call her nobody, but I will always remember her as everything. Katie was beautiful: long brunette hair, dark brown eyes, and milk white skin. Cliché? Maybe. But clichés are ideas synonymous with dreams, emerging time and time again because they are the things that all men yearn for. Katie was my cliché; the sort of woman you had no choice but to believe when she said everything would be all right. I know. I believed her.

      She put a gun to her head on a Friday night. On a Saturday morning, she pulled the trigger. My story is of the night we shared in between.

 

Friday Night

…………

      Desperate; that’s the overwhelming sensation that encompassed me as I hiked along that filthy road where I yearned to find the substance that made overcoming desperation a simple task. It was a gray evening, and mired men sauntered along the sidewalk with agony in their eyes. Six of those men had what I was looking for. One of them had the best. One had the cheapest. Coin Flip. Spin in air. Heads. The good stuff.

      I drained my pockets and gave him my jacket. It was cold. A pair of blue jeans and a stained white T-shirt was all I had left in the world. As the chill bit my neck, mocking the absence of my warm, worn leather jacket, I rummaged around my pockets for a cigarette: nothing. But I was not on the kind of street where lack of a fresh Nic-Stick was a problem. Haggle with the homeless, stomp the pavement and comb the walk, journey to a back alley and check a ghetto-rigged ashtray. Bingo. Menthol. Not my favorite, but enough to warm me up. Could be worse; could be slim. Fuck Virginia.

      Back down the boulevard. Katie wasn’t waiting for me, but she sure as hell would be happy to see me, and I would sure as hell feel the same. Beating the pavement as the sun fell on the city; I puffed away and thought ahead, pensively. Two days from my last razor, and God only knows how long since I’d showered. But encompassed by the grit and grime of city life, I knew I was a badass, a real Punk motherfucker with a Nic-Stick and a blade. I got to her street and waited for the sun to set. I bummed a little smoke off a passerby in exchange for my empty wallet. What would a guy like me need a wallet for anyway? Once again, I delved into my pockets, and this time, came up with a crumpled rollie. I bedded the smoke and lit it up. Minutes later I’m flyin’, but I’ve got my eyes on the yellow tape and I’m going in for the win.

      Her front door was falling off the hinges, so I did it a courtesy and knocked on the frame instead. A thump on the floor and I wondered what the hell was going on. Thump, thump, thump…thump. Click, slide, pop, twist… “Hello?”

      I drew the vile from my pocket and a smile crossed her face. The door was wide open and I stepped in. To my recollection, we’d never actually been formally introduced, but that night she would become the only woman whom I have ever known.

      She was trembling as we tramped up the stairs. They creaked and yearned in agony as we ascended. I had never been in a two-story shack before, but it didn’t matter. In no time she had pulled out a couple lick sheets and I proceeded to line the paper with the mind-expanding liquid that I had come to depend on for tranquility. Three…two…one…BLISS! I looked at her for two seconds before leeching onto her lips and tasting her sweet tongue, somewhat metallic with a prevalent force of nicotine. The more time went by, the further we went. More sensually, sexually, sinfully…until there was nothing left for us to do but regain our strength. And in that time, we replenished our poisons and went again until we couldn’t possibly continue. Katie was the woman of my dreams; laughing and moaning while I stared at her in Technicolor bliss. It was impossible for me to think of anything else. I hoped to be dead when all was said and done, because I couldn’t be more content with my life. I accepted the wage of sin. In a moment, that sin was going to take the guise of beauty.

      We sat on the floor, dressed in sweat and grit, and she began to speak. She spoke in such a sweet and innocent voice that it was impossible to imagine that she could be the same girl that I had just been with. Yet I heard the terrors beneath her composure.

      “Before you came here tonight, I was sitting in that corner behind you, with a gun in my mouth, ready to end it all.”

      I hardly fathomed what she told me; how much she had opened up to me. I was lost and dazed, and I said nothing.

      It began to rain outside.

      “Let’s go.” She whispered. Then she sat up and walked down the stairs into the front yard; still naked as the day she was born. I followed suit, but I put my pants back on first.

      When I stepped outside, she had nearly forgotten I existed. She just danced in the rain. Drops, Steps, Thunder, Twirl, Slip. She laughed and rolled in the muddy grass as I sat on the porch, and was happy. I searched my pocket for another Nic-Stick, but let it pass. I was happy. No cravings…just happy. I still don’t know whether it was the night air, or the way she moved, but I felt warm. She was like a gossamer curtain in a storm: violently blowing about in phantasmagorically, but never losing its elegance.

      Finally, she ran back inside, and I walked behind her. She fell into her bed, and I collapsed beside her. Mud stained my jeans and cloaked her blankets, but it didn’t matter. My eyes closed and I fell into a deep, deep, sleep.

 

Saturday Morning

…………

      She sat in the corner of the room with a quarter-sized hole through the back of her head. The black six-shooter lay in her icy, limp hand. Sweat, mud, and blood blanketed her tender, white skin and meshed into her long, dark-brown hair. In one night, as I watched her dancing in the rain, I saw the first glimpse of beauty in my barren world; a world I used to welcome with open arms, which I finally realized was a world that I was trapped in. If I had come that night searching for lust, than what i found was entirely different.

      The paper read, “Sixteen year old drug addict commits suicide while parents take vacation.” I was twenty. Nothing about a funeral, but I wrote her an obituary and sent it in. The spelling was horrible and I had no picture or date of birth, but they published it word for word anyway.

      I still drink, smoke, and experiment. I still find myself with a gun to my head on the colder and damper nights. But I will still die happy, thinking back to those hours between nine o’clock on Friday night, and eight o’clock on Saturday morning before I opened my eyes, when I had been in the arms of the only woman I will ever love.

 

I don’t even know

Eye Candy Lover
Discoverer of the Krystal Nacht, cherry popped
Cradle rocked
fantasy man in a pile of white fright
manifest powder chanced louder and prouder
than the average scared mind; unsublime mime
fulfilling crime’s prime, dropping dimes
on love’s seclusion for a polluted mascarade…
It’s all a parade
what I’m getting at is bubbly-blonde backstage betty
wants Ken for his car; white fifty-four chevy
dance in trance to artificial love’s lukewarm arabian melody
that everyone knows the rhythm to,
while missing out on lyrics from language
anguish
sex is hexed to bless tex-mex
next a reflex test, chest mest…
By the bullet of passion

the bars of the cage of man bore woman
the womb of witch switched on the legacy of sin
which trickled the devil to level, embezzle
with tousle and trestle making sense of illusion
a global pollution
I write the allusions, you draw the conclusions
the fusion you and this man give up
to the pre-nup sup-
position. The politician separating kids through submission
subtraction, addition, addiction,
commission the soul to role, scroll and fold
under pressure or Cash like Johnny
lose chips to flips. Bloods crypts, poison sips
roofie slips, whips, hips jerk and work
to the rhythmic schematicism of the stand-up’s cynicism…
Control, extol, house-poll, re-roll, bowl
and the whole of life is lips,
tits, midriffs, and skoal…
A romantic wad on the pavement.
It’s all the same thing.

Saved From Iniquity (By the heat of the Gun)

            My

                                

 father used to say that I would be the death of him. I knew he meant it. It was one of the few things he would reiterate in his sobriety.                  “You’d better wash the blood from your hands now Jackie, because you’ll have no shame when it’s over.”      

I often wondered what he meant by that. He would be sitting on the porch while I sat inside the house, below the broken window nearest him. I didn’t like him, but found solace in his immediacy. The bad men, the outlaws as they were called, never brought the inkling of mortality to Cisco’s mind. I was the child he conceived, and I suppose he figured that the one he brought into this world should be the one to take him out. That was human nature, but most parents would never dare take it as far as he did. 

      My father was not a religious man, but he knew he had a soul. A soul that I unwittingly condemned the night I shot him…

      Life’s ostentatious elixir speckled across the floorboards and the walls. It oozed out of my father’s mouth and created a strange geography of fault lines in his lifeless eyes. His existence was wiped clean by the boring of a .38 caliber fissure through his forehead. There were two other living beings in the room: Mary, the only woman whom I had ever grown to trust, and the man who had taken my father hostage by gunpoint in the defeat of the night, and handed me the contrivance which delivered my father from iniquity.           

      This man wasn’t desperate; he was too good, too surgical and mechanical in his craft to be desperate. His hardened face and rough composure detracted from his good qualities: his beautiful green eyes; the gateway to a soul which had been cast away long ago; eyes that were no longer alive, but mere pretty pictures hung on a mildewed and rotten wall. His hair was soaked and his clothes were damp. Was it sweat? No. Callous men never sweat. Even his gun trickled with the mysterious moisture. None of this deterred from his image. He was a professional, and he knew how to make sure his presence would not soon be forgotten.           

      I wish I could say that the room was pitch black and that everything was chaotic. I wish I could say that I was shaking and horror-stricken, too. But it would all prove to be fallacy. My father met his demise in a brightly lit room accompanied by his son, and the love of his life; neither of which shed a tear. We all knew who would be gone by the end of the night, but I was the last to admit, despite being the one who pulled the trigger.       

      The twisted man with the pretty green eyes held my father round the neck and calmly iterated that not one person in this room really wanted to live. He put the decision in my hand to choose which one to euthanize. Beautiful Mary calmly sat down and straightened her silk blue nightgown. I’ll always remember how composed she was that night. It was her poise that led me to pull the trigger. It was the knowledge that everything would be all right and that someone would be there for me no matter what. But the man was right. Not one of us really wanted to live. The only one I felt remorse for was Mary.           

      Mary, who had traded in her husband’s blood for the love of her life, was about to see love lost by the hand of the child she had promised to raise. Finally within me, I felt a hesitation. More thoughts. Thoughts about my father: a loner; a snake in the grass whose agenda bore no room for the normal trappings of life. My childhood of stacking barstools and sleeping in rags was the best he could offer me. Had he not been my father, I would have hated him. But I saw something redeemable in him. I wanted him alive…for Mary’s sake.

      I aimed at the twisted man and pulled the trigger. But unexpectedly, the bullet sinned and went straight through my father’s skull. Blood spattered face and hands of the twisted man as my father fell to the floor. The twisted man released the hammer and returned his gun to his jacket pocket. He took a handkerchief from his black lapel, walked to the sink, and cleaned himself up. Then he smiled at me. His eyes searching my soul to see that he had done his job. Then he patted my shoulder. I raised my gun and pulled the trigger again, but nothing. Again! Again! Again! Again! I should have known: One bullet and a warped barrel. A shoddy tool the S.S. wouldn’t deem fit to use.           

       He slowly made his way over to Mary, sweet Mary. He kissed her on the cheek as she stared longingly, lovingly at her child-hood love. I went wild with instinct and fury! Like an animal, I leapt upon him, one hand around his throat and the other continually smashing his face. I spit, kicked, grabbed, grappled, bit, scratched and screamed until I was sure that he had passed out in his agony. Mary did not move. I grabbed the gun from his lapel and shook him until he was awake. I stared into his eyes and I fired. Again! Again! Again! Again! Again! I watched that sickeningly beautiful color drain from his eyes and threw the gun across the room. Finally, I fell upon the floor. I didn’t cry. The floorboards welcomed me with as much warmth as it did the blood that coagulated between us. The remains of a monster to the left of me, and a twisted killer to the right of me. Mary laid a blanket over me and lay down beside me. At last I felt free.            

      No matter how beastly my father was, I would always remember that not all monsters come from beds and closets, and not all horrors are bred from the depths of hell. My father was right. I never washed my hands of that night, and I have never once regretted my actions.