did you know there's a place in your very own city where you are not welcome at all, where people would curse your name if they knew it? did you know that some wrongs can never be put right? when bread goes stale, it's stale. if you burn your toast it's burnt. some things can't be fixed. they have to be burned and all memory of them purged.

i guess you could say we were in a slow burn. the well was dry but the tides were high.

it's a matter of pride. please turn off your vehicle. corruption must be reported.

25 June

Funny Farm

There is a house out along the dusty farm road that does not conform. Through the massive gray door and to the left is a parlor where the ladies sit in their floral print summer dresses, sipping tepid cups of tea through downturned lips. In the hall, the children tear by, swinging their skinny arms around the post to turn up the stairs. They go round and round, down the back stair and through the kitchen in an endless race, their gasping faces frozen in the sheer delightful terror of the chase. The yard behind the house is a lumpy field of clay bearing only the hardiest weeds. A middle-aged man is stuck in the ground there, buried up to his waist. Each morning, his boy brings him a bowl of water, a razor, and an orange. He shaves, pours out the water, eats the orange, and places the scraps of peel in the bowl. Sometimes a robin perches on his shoulder or tries to build a nest in his hair. Beyond the yard is a pond into which extends an ancient wooden dock. The master of the house, smoking calmly in his striped swimsuit, paces the dock in the evening. Once an hour, he lowers himself into the water and kicks furiously, all the while clinging to the splintered pier. He hauls himself out after a while and resumes his pacing. A beautiful girl lives in the attic of the house, or so they say. She brushes her long blond hair from morning to night, stopping just once to scribble a note, fold it into a plane, and toss it out the window. Usually it simply falls to the ground, but sometimes, it will catch a gust of wind and glide out over the yard, coasting between the thorny branches of the locust trees at the pond’s edge before landing with a soft plit in the brackish water. If the master could swim, he might push away from the dock and carry himself with broad strokes out to that floating plane. He would bring it back to the dock, shake himself dry, and read the note: Come back to me.

the answer was at the bottom of a green glass bottle. or an orange plastic one. the answer was in a baggie. the answer was in an aluminum can. the answer was in a roll of paper. the answer was on a microchip. the answer was in the ether. the answer was in his soul. the answer was on ice and under wraps. it was on the tip of his tongue.
the answer was a capsule. it was a drink, it was a powder. it was a cloud of smoke. the answer rolled down his throat and drifted into his lungs. it entered his blood and his brain. the answer filled him up. it took him all the way. the answer was amnesia.

if only he could remember the question.

egon schiele, conversion












i look outside on a stormy day and see a tornado moving slowly up the street. the buildings all seem to be tire shops with plain, smooth glass and concrete fronts. the tornado pauses and draws closer to each door before continuing on. i stand waiting for it to come to my door and ask myself anxiously, just where am i supposed to go?

48 years old, balding on top, knock-kneed, beer gut, creased forehead, gray-blue eyes, gold watch, bloodshot contacts, dry elbows, three silver fillings, button-down shirt, fading brown parted hair, trimmed nails, shaved smooth, some twinges in his chest when he felt nervous.
or ashamed. he had pulled into the empty parking lot of a motel. the faded walls were peeling, one dim light on in the office, too early for any of the regular traffic. he turned off the engine, sat perfectly still listening to the radio prattle on unconcerned. when the noise in his own head grew too loud, he switched off the radio and pushed back his seat, leaned over and buried his face in his hands.
the accumulations of a guilty conscience had finally breached the flood walls of his soul. it was the first clear sign he had had in many years that he had a soul. he had often wondered why he couldn't feel... anything. now that his cowardice had wasted a life before his very eyes, he felt all too much. he knew he could have stopped it. but he had just watched it happen. ah! what wouldn't he give to start over, go back, apologize, forgive, repair, erase? to soften his hard heart.