Not every thought that comes to mind can be expressed in poetry. Eventually I knew I would come around to short stories, monographs and things that I couldn't fit into another category. This is the prose section, where I will keep the things I can't qualify as poetry and aren't biographical enough to put in the journal.
Yesterday's coffee, my fingers wrapped self-conciously around the end of my cigarette, I look to the night sky. Scraps of a Dylan tune interrupt the silence I am trying to cultivate behind my eyes, as I determine to save myself the frustration of tuning my guitar and leave it in the corner, quiet and dark, for yet another night.
I wonder where she is now.
Not that it would make any difference if I knew. We were April in Texas; high meets low, hot meets cold, the very air begins to swirl and, before anyone can react, the tragedy has already fallen and all you can do is stare, slack-jawed, at the shards of what used to be an entire city of lives.
And yet, I still wonder.
The bed of the pickup is cool and touched with dew, more moist than damp. The insects, mindless of their ability to destroy this planet, call out to each other through the twilight, each certain that there can only be one mate among the countless multi-millions. And we, assured of our superiority in the food chain, behave no differently than they.
Maybe I'll stay out here tonight. Maybe I'll just stretch out in the back of this truck, fold my hands behind my head, and let my mind drift up to those stars, and to hell with the bugs. Maybe I'll just let ol' Bobby Dylan play around in my head after all. And when the sun rises, and stirs me enough to do something about it, maybe I'll just pick up that guitar and that song will just flow out of my hands like sweet water from a mountain spring.
But I already know the answer to all that. And when the porch light comes on behind me, I know it's time to come back inside. The kids are already in bed, the dishes and laundry put away, and my sweet wife, patient as she is with my wandering mind, is ready for some sleep. We both had a long day.
As I ease myself up out of the back of the truck and start moving toward the house, I indulge myself with one last look up at the night sky. Wherever she is, I hope she realizes it was as much my fault as it was hers. And I hope she is as happy as I am now.
"But I don't like pudding!"
She continued busying herself with the endless tasks that ensure a spot in Better Homes and Gardens as he felt the frustration build. For the love of God, he was 37 years old!
"Of course you like pudding. Everyone likes pudding. Who doesn't like pudding? You have liked pudding since the day I brought you home, after 36 hours of labour. I remember ..."
"Mom," he said, pushing away from the table, failing even to notice the stray CoCo-Bangers that had fallen from the occasional spoonful into his lap. "It wasn't 36 hours. At least, it wasn't 36 hours the last time you told the story. That time it was 28, and the doctor was a malevolent beast who wouldn't give you an aspirin, much less the epidural you so richly deserved. Remember? You told the story last Tuesday, when I was talking about taking the kids camping at Fumblebury National Park for the weekend? I'm still not sure what camping has to do with childbirth ..."
"Naturally you wouldn't," she said, turning on the vacuum and absent-mindedly running it over Muffin, her aging lhasa-apso. Ignoring the suction device as it ran over his back, he continued dividing his attention between the morning soap opera and his favorite toy, a much-chewed vinyl replica of the great American author and songwriter Lewis Grizzard. "What would you know about childbirth? The only experience you have is vicarious, outside of your own nativity, which I doubt you have much memory of. Of course, outside of the doctor (and I use the term loosely), you were the only man in the room."
It had been like this every morning for the past 6 weeks, approximately
five days after she moved in, having left the condo in Ft. Lauderdale,
FL ("You wouldn't be-leive the crowds of rowdy young people there!")
and his sister's house in Maine ("My goodness! It's just so cold
there!"), as well as his brother's home in Twelve Pines, CA ("Twelve
Pines? I only saw eight."). Now, it was his turn. It was no bother,
really, he thought to himself as he made his way down the hall to
wake his wife and kids for school, tripping over the toolbox he
had left just outside the bathroom for the sixth time this week.
Generally, they got along very well. She was more vivacious and
active now at 67 than she had ever been when he was a child. At
least he thought she was. Perhaps she had always been a karaoke
fanatic and student of English Literature and he had merely overlooked
it, between his football games, summer jobs and the demandingly
rigorous social calendar of an American teenager.
He carefully made his way through the minefield of tiny interlocking plastic building blocks and hand-constructed robotic simulations that littered his oldest son's floor. The sounds of the Uilleann pipe drifting from his CD player. The boy always asks for 5 more minutes, and he always gets it from his father, no matter how late they are running. But the five minutes have past, and its time to rise. The aroma of frying eggs, presumably scrambled, drifts into the room for additional encouragement, and the boy slowly, almost painfully, forces himself out from under a tie-dyed comforter.
Backtracking down the hall to the youngest son's room, he was not surprised at all to find the bed empty. Even at almost nine, the boy still tended to wander to his parents' bed in the night, especially when Dad had to work the night shift. He crossed the hall from the boy's room and back into the kitchen.
"... with a Brussels Sprout right in the middle, if you can imagine that," his mother said, as if he had been a willing participant in the conversation. "Or was it an asparagus? I was sure it was a Brussels Sprout. Do you remember?"
"Actually, it looked more like an artichoke heart," he replied, recalling the topic from a prior conversation. Having made coffee previously that morning, he rummaged through the dish drain by the sink until he found a plastic Jif-E-Kwic travel mug. Something about smelling coffee always made him want a cup, even just before bed, which was fine since he was one of those people that drank espresso to slow down. So he found his favorite mug, up in the cabinet next to the rehabilitated jelly jars, and poured another. Then, capping the travel mug against the inevitability of tripping yet again over his toolbox, he wandered down the hall to his bedroom with coffee for his wife.
Snuggled in the bed, oblivious to the hairdryer and television competing for audio supremacy, lay his youngest son, the little prince. He put the travel mug on the night stand and hugged the boy tightly to himself, singing the Morning Song.
"Good Morning to you
Good Morning to you
Good Morning dear son ...
Now get your lazy butt out of bed."
The little prince had his father's almost irritating ability to be cheerful immediately in the morning. "Is Grammy making those thingy-things for breakfast again?" he said, stretching across the pillows.
"No," his father replied, "she's making eggs."
"Daddy, only birds can make eggs," he said, and was soon down the hall and searching for unmatched socks, which was the only way to explain how the boy managed to show up with an unmatched pair on his feet five minutes before time to go every morning.
The man sat, semi-contentedly, watching the morning news, and was soon rewarded by the emergence of his wife from the bathroom, make-up in place, ready to tame a restless and feral pack of three-year-olds into civilized human children over the course of a normal school day. He kissed her and directed her attention to the coffee on the night stand. They talked of mundanities for a few moments. Here was a bill that needed to be dropped off. This was the day for the oldest to visit the dentist, and could he straighten up the living room when he got up this afternoon, since there would be a visitor this evening. They kissed again, and he followed her to the front door and waved as they drove off to their various schools. This was also his mother's cue to drive down to the mall, where she went walking with a group of ladies.
Thus, with the house quiet and still, he made his way to his room and got undressed. Like a warm, friendly hand, the blankets wrapped around him. And soon, the sounds of the daily news still requesting his attention, he faded into sleep.
Note: Here is an exception to my usual rule. The following is a true story, taken from my actual life, unembellished in any way (well, almost). I decided that no one was around to see the event, so I am still safely hidden. Besides, I can't be a morose poet all the time, can I? This place could use a little lightening up anyway. Enjoy!
During a portion of my misspent youth, I was a delivery driver for a well-known pizza-making organization. It was an ideal occupation for a young man, as it combined pizza, driving fast, going to people's parties, and having money handed to you. The hours were good for a young man with no real obligations, since the store generally closed right about the time that the nightlife was starting to happen. The downside, however, was related to navigation.
People love pizza. People from all walks of life. I believe if you went to the farthest reaches of the galaxy, and took a pizza to a race of beings that had nothing in common with humanity outside of the ability to digest the same compounds, and gave them a pizza, they would make you their King at that very moment, after dealing with roof-of-the-mouth cheese burns. Included in the universal love of pizza is people who live in dilapidated mobile homes in the middle of former soybean fields in the rural Southland. People who give you directions like, "Head down State Road 427-B and take a right at the crossroads. When you pass the cemetery on the left side, go further down until you see that sweetgum tree that got hit by lightning a few years back. Now, there’s a dirt road 'bout a good spit down from it. Follow that down to the end, stop at the gate, and flash your lights. If we don't meet you there in about five minutes, go back to the road with the tree, take a right and head toward ..."
You get the picture.
Somewhere between the cemetery and the sweetgum tree I missed a turn, which is how my little Suzuki Jeep ended up in that irrigation ditch. Four-wheel drive is a blessing, indeed, but somehow, in backing up, I only made it halfway over the lip of that ditch. There I sat, balanced in some sort of berm, in the pre-cell phone 80s. There was nothing left to do but cross a different former soybean field and hope the occupants of that particular run-down mobile home had a telephone.
My knock at the door was answered by a gangly, tousled-haired young man in overalls, who confirmed that they did, indeed, have a telephone. As I called the store to let them know my predicament, I noticed the man in the recliner. He was also in overalls, and apparently felt that a shirt would have been redundant coverage. A disheveled mob of greying brown hair sat above a weathered face. He looked over at me and said,
"Marfl nassm rooffl nism bassm rof!"
The younger fellow, apparently bilingual and accustomed to the look of bewilderment I was apparently wearing, said, "He says 'Do you wanna watch rasslin'?'"
About that moment, my supervisor answered the phone, and assured me that there was no need to worry, because they would dispatch someone immediately to deliver a fresh pizza to the Children of the Corn. As for my precarious entanglement, he reminded me that pizza places generally do not equip themselves with tow trucks, and that ours was no exception to this rule of thumb.
As I hung up the phone, the man in the recliner stood up. He was easily the biggest man I had ever seen. Being rather short myself, I am accustomed to looking up at people, but this man was on friendly terms with 7 feet tall, and at least 280 pounds. He looked at me and said,
"Murffl snism nifn durmml?"
The other fellow translated. "He says, 'What's wrong?'"
I explained my predicament to them, which caused the Giant to laugh out loud. It was a huge, resonant, friendly laugh, which I might have shared, had I not been flooded with memories of "Deliverance" at the moment. It was then that I noticed that the Giant had not a single tooth in his head. It occurred to me that this was as good an explanation as any for my inability to understand him, as he did not appear to be an immigrant and I was pretty sure he wasn't an alien.
When he had finished laughing, the Giant said,
"Blussm roffl nassm roffin bluh,"
and headed toward the door.
His translator and I followed, and soon we were all gathered around my car, bent at the waist and looking at the hump of earth upon which it had bbeen wedged. Before I knew it, they had formulated a plan. Apparently the Giant's relaxed exterior belied a keen understanding of physics. Through the Mouthpiece, he explained that he wanted me to start the engine and put the car in reverse. They would stand on the rear bumper, in order to provide additional ballast, thus enabling the rear wheels to gain additional purchase and free me from the current situation. Of course, he said it a bit differently, but the point was made.
That is how I found myself in "one of those moments". There are moments in life that are indelibly imbedded in your mind. I'm sure you have at least half a dozen yourselves. Of all of those images I carry with me, and due to my misspent youth I have more than my share, the one that rises to the top is the image of the Giant Toothless Redneck, leaping up and down on the bumper of my little black Suzuki Jeep in the middle of an old soybean field.
His understanding of physics was well-rewarded that day. My vehicle freed, I gave them the pizza initially intended for the mysterious people beyond the cemetery, and, in the best tradition of pizza delivery drivers around the world, lit out of there like a rocket. To this day, my sons, bless their hearts, have heard this story at least a dozen times, and still ask for it often. But I sometimes wonder if, back in the Southland, in the middle of an old soybean field, there is a Giant Toothless Redneck, with his buddies gathered around him, telling a similar story.
"Murfl nissm grfphn rasm grissl 'My car is stuck' grffn dssl."
And the laughter rolls like jolly thunder.
TOPIC: Imagine yourself ten years from now. Your at a bookstore signing and one of your fans asks what
was it that caused you to write (this or that book/poem/prose piece). What would you say?
It was a cold, wet, sloppy December morning, not unlike most in that particular part of the world. The sign on the front of the bookstore promised the passers-by an intriguing interruption to the annual Christmas shopping routine.
"Book Signing Event"
"Today: 2:00 to 6:30, an Anonyomous Author will be here to sign copies of INSTEAD OF A BUM, WHICH IS WHAT I AM: poetry for those with low self-esteem"
He sits at a table in the back of the store, wearing a well-tailored blue Armani suit, well-cobbled black leather pennyloafers, and a custom-fitted brown paper grocery bay on his head, with thoughtfully-placed holes in the regions of the eyes and mouth. The line of customers, ranging from the merely-curious, through the sensation-seeking, up to the obsessives that have traced his work from the early years, is slowly gaining in mass, and the shop manager is realizing that he may have taken on a bit more than he bargained for.
As he signs, the author, a Mr. E. Poet, thinks to himself.
"I have done many unorthodox things in my life. There was the time I danced around a table in a fast-food resteraunt with pickles in my nose, because a young mother couldn't convince her son to eat as much as she would have liked. I took a ride around the streets of Baghdad in a white linen suit and red checkered shemaugh with Special Operations personnel, because they needed some technical advice. I have run butt-nekkid through the forest and lived on what I could find, just to get perspective for a writing project. But this time I may have gone too far. The Society of Anonymous Authors may well decide to revoke my membership after this."
He sighs to himself, wondering not if he did the right thing, but if, as usual, his timing could have been more carefully chosen.
"Ahem..."
His revery is broken by a school-age girl, roughly 17 by the look of her. "Why does my writing seem to appeal to teenage girls more than anyone else?" he wonders to himself. "What does that say about my writing? Even more, what does that say about me? Do I need therapy? Do I have an inner teeny-bopper, struggling to free herself from the masculine confines of my outer self? Do I ..."
"A-HEM!"
She places a copy of the book on the table in front of him.
"I'm terribly sorry about that.," he says, taking the end of the fountain pen from his mouth, stroking his beard, and glancing at his fingers for any sign that the pen has leaked on his face. "My inner monologue seems to have forgotten it's manners. To whom shall I sign this?"
"No name, please," she says. "I'm going to be an anonymous writer, too."
"Excellent! We can use more anonymous writers. There are entirely too many of those other types of authors, if you ask me, with their names, and their royalties, and their advances. All that 'commerce'." He grimaces, as if, conversationally speaking, he has just stepped, bare-footed, into a large, cold mound of creamed spinach. "Money makes such a mess of things, don't you think?"
The young lady, as he predicted, blanches a bit. "But what about that guy from Primary Colors? Didn't he get a big advance, and a percentage from the movie?"
"Yes, but that wasn't true anonymity, was it? There were a number of people that could identify him from the begining, and he knew that. In that particular case, the title Anonymous was just a marketing ploy. Writers that are truly anonymous either write for free or for cash. It's hard to cash a check as 'Anonyomous'."
"So if you don't get any money for what you write," she asked, oblivious to the growing line behind her, as is fitting for a teenage girl, "why did you write this? Why did you have it printed? Why start this whole fad?" she exclaimed, waving her hand back to indicate the shoppers behind her.
All, including herself, were sporting well-tailored brown paper grocery bags, with thoughtfully-placed holes located near the eyes and mouth. Beyond the book store, the populace was dotted with shoppers in the same attire, and small shops that specialized in the custom-fitting of paper grocery bags and the thoughtful placement of holes in the expected location of eyes and mouths were turning a brisk business.
"The paper bag was never meant to be a fashion statement, or a political statement, or even a social statement," he explained, for what he felt was the hundredth time that week. "The bag was just a means of allowing people to ask me things in person without revealing who I am. Somehow, it seems to have resonated with young people, who feel isolated from society because they do most of their communication at a distance. I don't own a bag shop, or the license to bag design. I don't even get a check for that commercial I did for Anony-Bags. They gave my fee to charity. As for why I had my poetry printed, the first book, "I Feel Like A Pecan Tree (Sappy, Squirrley, and Nuts About You)" was just a present for my wife. It was accidentally put into the wrong pile and got printed and distributed in 17 languages and 43 countries. I couldn't afford to sue, so I decided to let it ride, and it sorta snowballed from there.
"So the only question I can really answer with any authority is why I write in the first place. I write for the same reasons most other poets write. I have all this stuff I want to say, and when I try to say it out loud, al that comes out is 'Buh buh, buh buh buh,buh, buh buh.' I write because I love words. I love how you put them together and they mean something, and then you take the same words and put them together another way and they mean something else entirely. I write because my native language is so beautiful, so maleable, and so precious, like pure gold, that it is a joy to work with it, and even when I make something that looks too much like yesterday's leftover cole slaw, it is still shiny and pretty. Sometimes I write because I have feelings that I can't express in any other constructive way.
"But most of all, I write because I feel right while I'm doing it. In my life, I have felt like a marble in a maze game. You know, like those little cardboard and plastic ones you get from the dentist when it's time to go, because no self-respecting dentist is going to give you caramels, but he wants you to leave feeling good. I have felt, for much of my life, like one of those little ball bearings in the plastic, rolling around with the slightest tilt. When i write, I feel like I have settled into the little spot in the cardboard. I know it isn't forever, but for a moment, I am where I was always intended to be.
"A-HEM," he said, noticing that the now-dozing girl was drooling on the table.
"West Virginia! I was listenening! The answer is West Virginia," she said.
He handed her the book. "That was a good question, and one that I probably should have asked myself ten years ago. Thank you for stopping by."
As she turned to leave, she asked, "Do you still have that website?"
"Yup," he said, picking up the next book. "Same address for almost fifteen years now." He looked up to the next person in line. "Nice bag! Who can I sign this to?"
Another Year Over ...
“Another year over, and a new one on the way in,” he thought to himself as he pulled on his coat. “Each one passes, and I wonder what’s coming up next.”
The new-fallen snow, now about eight inches deep, crunched and squeaked under his boots as he made his way to the barn. This morning, like every day, the animals required a bit of attention. He grumbled about it once in a while, but though he wouldn’t admit it to his crew, he enjoyed this daily chore. A little heavy lifting, a few deep breaths, some flexing of the muscle lifting sacks of grain or wrestling equipment. Those things made a man feel alive, even at his age. The barn was kept clean for the animals, and they, in turn, kept the barn a warm and friendly place for him to visit. Besides, he had a relationship with these animals. It was symbiotic, really. They needed his care and feeding, and he needed their strength, as well as other abilities. Over the years, they had developed a certain understanding of each other. It was almost as if they understood their place of importance in his life.
The barn chores complete, he went inside to address to his crew. After all, it was New Year’s Eve. There were some who would want to celebrate with music and dancing, others that just wanted a warm fire and their wives and children. But no one wanted to be at work. He gathered them for the annual New Year’s pep talk.
“It was a good year. We accomplished a lot, and made some real improvements over last year. And without your dedication to your jobs, well, we couldn’t have made it. You, together, through what you do, have made this world a little better place for everyone. I’m proud to be working with you.
But we can’t be satisfied with where we are now. We can’t sit back and look at the last year’s accomplishments as the new standard to be replicated. The world is a fast-moving place. And before you know it, change comes along, and the cutting-edge that you thought you were on turns out to be the back row of the bus to Palookaville.
Tonight, though, I want you to enjoy whatever celebration awaits you. There is nothing on the agenda tomorrow that can’t wait an additional day, so take the day off, with pay, of course, and enjoy the satisfaction of closing out a year of good work, good effort, and good times. Happy New Year, all!”
Various members of the crew came by to wish him well, to thank him for the day off, and invite him to a few celebrations that he was certain would end up on the gossip mill for weeks after. Politely, he thanked them all, but said that his tradition of watching the New Year come in with his wife would be all the celebration he could handle.
When the last of them had bundled up and taken off for the night, he took the walk from the shop to the house. It was about 3 kilometers, a good walk. Not so far that he was overly winded by the time he got there, but far enough to let him stretch his legs, as well as collect his thoughts, before settling down for a quiet evening at home. His thoughts, as they usually did this time of year, were on change. Technology was moving faster than ever. He didn’t mind change, really, but he was used to doing things a certain way. Maybe it wasn’t the most efficient way of working, but efficiency shouldn’t be, couldn’t be, the be-all and end-all of the business. Process was important. The traditions and methods they had used for years were as much a part of what they did as the end product. It might not be as efficient as the latest methods, but it gave the crew a sense of pride, and ownership of the production process, to do things they way they had been doing them for years.
But there were always some that didn’t agree. They told him he was old-fashioned. They told him he was behind the power curve. And sometimes, every now and then, he felt a little bad that he didn’t care more about the power curve, or about keeping up with structurized marketecture, or whatever the latest fad was. At the end of the day, he liked what they did, and he liked the way they did it, and that was that. It wasn’t that he was so set against change. Change was fine. Change was healthy. But there are some things that should be consistent, if not constant.
He stamped his feet to shake off the snow before going inside. Hanging his coat on the wall peg, he sat on the stool by the door and pulled off his boots. This, he thought for the millionth time, was probably his favorite time of day. He made his way to the den, where his wife was sitting by a small end table, accompanied by a steaming pot of tea and two cups, along with a small plate of biscuits.
“Good evening, Sweety,” he said. She stood, and he held her for a few minutes. They sat near the fireplace and had tea, while she talked about her day, and he his, and they generally enjoyed each other’s company before sitting down to a quiet dinner. Afterwards, they watched the television news, and saw the preparations for celebration of New Years events in various parts of the world.
“Who is that band? The Flaming SnotSuckers? Have you ever heard of them?” he asked. “No, dear, I don’t believe I have,” she responded, not bothering to look up from her needlepoint. “Of course, I’m not much of a fan of that sort of music. I’m more of a BeeGees woman, if you recall.” They both chuckled.
“Seriously, though, look at those people, and how those women are dressed. Do you remember when we thought that nothing could get more vulgar than that Jim Morrison fellow? Then later we thought nothing could get more vulgar than that Twisted Sister group. It seems like every year we think that things can’t sink any lower.”
“Yes dear,” she said, putting down her needlepoint and snuggling close to him. “And every year, on this evening, we have this conversation. You say that the world is going to Hell in a handbasket, and I agree with you. You say that things can’t possibly get any worse than they are, and I disagree with you. You say that after this year you might as well close up shop, because there won’t be any need, and I tell you that you are being ridiculous.”
He looks at her for a moment, and smiles. “You’re right, of course. The more things change, the more they stay the same, right? I suppose that is why I’m in the business in the first place. No matter how weird things get, no matter how crazy the world acts, there will always be children, and some of them are going to be good. If I closed up shop, that might be the end of their very last incentive.”
As they watched the countdown from their couch, he pulled her a little closer and kissed her. “Happy New Year, Mrs.Claus.”