Trouble Gotta Eat

You know... he’d say,  when you are weak, you are welcoming trouble. It finds you. Hears you sobbing…it’s got an ear out for that whimper in the night like some little baby boy afraid to go out into darkness and leery of the day without your mother. It prowls for you... 
    Eat away your soft belly. 

ez

     ETCHING - JAIL CELL

V

ORCHID

– the pale cream lavender and yellow speckled throat – the foggy velvet drape – the long low bow of it’s draft – it reminds me, the line, the grace of her neck, along it's soft and subtle arcing to a lobe so delicate, itself a blossom, seeking my light kiss of adoration and the whisper of her name

A BLACKER CAT...

A blacker cat walked the block on the far side

It’s tail tall and straight

Like a periscope

Above it’s agitated gate

Flickers the air

Head swivels

nerves twitch

Out in the open

Is not it’s favorite place

Alley cats don’t go that way

Give them a long, dark, dirty canyon

Walls to rub ‘gainst all day

Free to roam at night

Hunt the rat

which he prey

You don’t see him

on the si-walks

Come out to play

Deeper thoughts run down my dark alley

They run away

Like it or not

They just run away

And I can’t call

because

I got no say

because

Out in the open

Is not my favorite place

Either.

-   E.Z. EATON ‘10

I’m sitting in an alley, right below my window, talking to E.Z. EATON, the "Back-Alley Laureate" himself. 
A crime has brought us together. Simultaneous. Something I thought I had heard and something he swears to have seen – an apparent murder in the alleyway below my window – which is same alley EZ called home when he felt like it. I say 'apparent', but he saw it and I heard it. Murder.

The police have taken our statements, the body, and the car in which she was killed. So we sat, each reflecting on the night’s events. Lingering. I realized I had a choice to go back inside, and 
EZ did not.

Are you a man of faith, there, EZ? Is that what got you through all you been through?

Nah. Jesus don’t belong here.

Why’s that?

This is a tough neighborhood.

How many tough guys you know have been nailed to the cross?

This here alley is for hard scrabble. Cold–hearted survivors. He didn’t survive.

We’re still talking about him.

You’re still talking about him. I’m too busy surviving.

Some might say you are not surviving.They may suggest that maybe you are just in the process of extinction. Erosion. Obsolete loser. Game over. Look around and tell me you actually survived.

We all in the process of extinction. If I am still here,  then I am surviving.

There was a long pause in our conversation at that point, as  he pondered it.

So what brought you, Here...?
The question, stark as it was...I regret my lack of subtlety, and it seemed to strike him like a punch, but he barely flinched. It was his reality. Drunk, he laughed and let his guard down. Then he Moaned caustic".….what happened….?I was a foolish philanderer. One drunk Doc...Drowned in his own shame...


and then he quickly diverted back to the present:

"I saw what happened."

Whatd’ya mean?

 (When it gets real quiet, I hear things randomly, deep within the cortex, like a distant station broadcasting on an erratic  signal. Right about now my head is playing the audio from a televised football game. High energy announcer and crowd cheers in the background. Occasionally a whistle blows and the fans react.)

I saw what happened here tonight...

Look around!

He did. Then threw his empty pint hard across the alley and it shattered against the brick wall opposite.

I did not survive. I am a lost soul.

And that is why Jesus belongs here.

Then you might as well bring the whole fuckin crowd down here. Confuscious, Bhudda, Rimbala Muala….Jeeesssussss!!!!!! Get down here and save my ass! 

“We down here already!”  , a voice came from deep in the alley,“...we just too drunk to walk that far.”

“You and me both brother!”

“Well I guess you fucked man!”

“I guess you right, Brother! I guess you right!” he thought a second, shook his head, and chuckled to himself, “That Jesus is one funny dude.”

APPLE GREEN PAC

Out there in the field at the end of town at the beginning of fields stood a tall man erect but broken, leaning hard against a post that weren’t there hoping for some support even if based solely on a hope – he leaned and he hoped he did not fall over.

A car, it was a Packard, big and green like an apple. Round and shiny like it was just polished. Pulled up to the man and stopped confidently with nary a tick of dust in the air. The erect man, he bent as though beckoned to do so. The assumption would be that the stranger needed directions was lost in the sticks and was seeking a highway.

The two they talked for a quite awhile. Their conversation seeming to pick up some steam as the lean man he leaned well within the open car window and created some agitation, like he might have even gotten a hold of the driver. The car swayed from behind as the driver shifted his weight away from his attacker, the car shifting with him listing to the left.

What is between two men is only between the two men and it is best to mind your position, less you find yourself in the middle. I do know when the lean man disengaged himself from the vehicle, he looked much the worse for wear, like he was stricken, but then I don’t know these facts. I was not there, to hear me tell it.

Man disappears from his repossessed farm. Is that out of the ordinary? Isn’t his obligation to do so? It’s the law. 


But he never showed up anywhere after, and that was the crime.

SEETH

Anger boiled like a thousand snakes poured into the cranal cavity and capped shut, his brain slithered with pent up fury, host to a most hateful commotion. The pistol, the key, the liberated, spiteful glee. I have a gun, the snake chorus hissed, I have a gun. You do not rule me now, you do not abuse me now, you die from your excuses, your excesses, your power chokes you off, gag on the ferment of your ridicule, I am the avenger, I am not your fool, I am not insolent, nor incapable of capping your dense cranium with a round of hot titanium.

YELO CONVRT

Up ahead, appearing quickly around a curve before 

darting around another, was a yellow sports car, low 

slung, tight gripped, it dashed and curved hard, then 

dashed again before disappearing. It was a wicked 

ride dancing on the edge of elation and extinction. It 

was a convertible but I could not see the driver, too far 

and too fast. I counted maybe eight curves before I 

lost it. Over the next grade I was offered a view of long

straight down-slope with no yellow dot or red tailed

light in sight. Whether it broke the sound barrier over 

the far horizon, or simply made a turn onto a side road, 

I did not expect to see it again. There were other

things to occupy my mind at the moment. I tried to 

piece the trail – the roads - the web. I was getting 

sucked into something. The convertible was just a 

distraction. Then it struck me. James Dean died up 

along this stretch. Driving just like that, no doubt. Hard

 and high on the edge of his headlights. The light was 

failing in the shadow of the hills and I wondered to 

myself if I might come across a shattered yellow heap 

around the next corner then backed off the pedal just a

 bit to assure I didn’t join it.

On Exhibition

Angels At  The Exposition

The headline read

Not meant to be biblical

Angels referred instead

to the dancers at the  Expo Club

on old Montreal Road outside of town

Half way to Hankrum

on the northbound fork                                                                        

Up to port

It was fading on yellow rag

Something in a chest or a drawer liner

But folded and neat and creased

ever so carefully around the advertisement

Precious little Victorian etchings

cherubic chubbies donned each corner

and one cupid drew a bow

lower center, just above the address

out there on Old Montreal Road

What was it?

How did it go?

An angel in reputation

exposed on exhibition

such a display

with little hesitation

for the extreme exuberation

of the gentlemen

in rapt attention

Out old Montreal Road

 at your discretion

Only at The Exposition

Join us won’t you?

                                    
Your Loving , Angela

I was compelled to do so.

Took the directions as told

But time and wind have claimed the road

And Life, it seems, has called Angela home