JIMMY LINGUINI

 

It was hokey music, coming from a dive bar in San Leandro…and, if you know San Leandro, you know.

If you do no not live in S.L., imagine a lonely bar in hell, with, maybe, six crazy-ass customers brooding over too many drinks at too early an hour with time and crime on their hands and minds. The Potential Horror…. What have you stumbled upon? Whatever it was, I found I fit in.

I was supposed to meet some guy…some Johnny Luigi…Linguini…I dunno, but he was supposed to approach me. I waited, and I waited, and I had a few. You can’t go into a bar and order coffee. Not this bar. So, I drank, and waited, and the more bored I got the drunker I became. It should be noted, however, that I am an excellent drunk…barely detectable, under most circumstances, and this was one of those.

Johnny…Jimmie…whatever, he didn’t show and I had nowhere to go. I surmised that food would do me some good, so I paid my tab and ambled (…or stumbled…it’s a matter of perspective) …over to the Mexican place across the street. Dinner hour was almost over so the place was nearly empty, which is just fine in my book. Waitresses, trying to “total out”, they want your order; cooks ready to shut down, they want you gone. So, I got me a nice fat burrito, and I got it pronto. One might question the meat at this late hour – I mean, how long did it sit in the kitchen? – but I don’t care. Quick and efficient is okay by me. I ate quietly, and chewed my food carefully, as the crew shut down, turned up the lights, and stacked the chairs…all but mine. When I was done, my plates disappeared pronto, and the check was on the table. I asked for a coffee, and laid down a twenty. I sipped quietly while the crew finished up. We would walk out together. I bade them all a goodnight, but they were all too busy being gone to notice. The street emptied quick, and then it was…empty.

The flicker of the small neon window sign was the only thing animated, it's red cast called to me. A nightcap could do no harm, and, actually, it was still early.

V

The Shame

 

It was a moment : 

I found myself in a chain dance…snake dance…whata’ya’call it?

I played along…
the whole thing 
being Rachel’s Ass, 
and how I wanted to grip it...
grasp it…
hands on hips, 
but sliding down, 
mounds so round 
and I’m a hound… 
what?
…you gonna judge me?!

So bound to mount 
Rachel at first opening, 
but the opening-was-closing, 
Destiny deals a deadly hand, 
Produces a Man, 
that comes 
and takes 
her away.

 

-The Shame.

V 

EVERYTHING BLUNTED

 

Rory had lost the lust in his loins. The fire…the drive…his flame was extinguished. Rory couldn’t roar anymore.

 

Pills were the cause, fuckin’ pharmaceuticals, gripped him by the testicles and sucked them dry, over time. 

It wasn’t Rory’s fault, but deep inside, he felt it just might be some whacked retribution for the countless extra-marital affairs he had conducted. But those were all behind him…not that he had a choice.

So he settled-in with Joyce, and they tried to make a life of it. Joyce grew apathetic with age and menopause, so there was no real tension between them, good or bad…sexual or otherwise. There was just a plain, dull, and painful resignation - a 'partnership’…coexistence.

The ‘painful’ aspects are dealt with pharmaceutically, as well, and, of course, they blunt the root. There is no cause...no effect. Everything blunted…isn't that what you wanted?

V

TRAPEZE

Above it all

Chalk, grip, fling

Gaily he swings

But failing to grasp

A tampered trapeze...

The untimely release

Forgetting the netting

Faith unforgiving

Inviting the vetting

Sloppier sleeves

Tattered dressings

Billow down

While below,

stands Blinky,

Helplessly.

The frown

Painted on,

but real terror

in his eyes

and while panic erupts,

curtains are drawn

on the crumpled,

...and the clown

No, Blinky’s not crying

Just shedding a tear

An artist lies dying,

and for Blinky,

                     
                …too near.

V

BLESSINGS

 

Dear Lord, please send a body to occupy, as mine has seen troubling times. I do not require anything luxurious. I would be fine with practical… Inconspicuous, is okay. 

Hell, anything this side of uninhabitable, would be considered a luxury. 

My shell is cracked, my bones are wracked, and I just can’t go on. 
Oh, I know I shouldn’t, but what can I do?…crawl to the curtains just to pull myself up? I can’t do that. 

And the sirens? Are they passing or coming here?…for who?

Oh, hell’s-bells, let it be me, just this once, I promise you…if they could stop, just this one time? 

It would be a blessing.

V

LOCKED DOWN

Avril Tennet went out of his way to be a good neighbor. He was casual and cordial, never cut any corners when it came to welcoming neighbors. Then, too, he offered people their privacy. A neighbor should feel safe in their solitude, and he respected that. His obsession was simply their safety.

Don’t remember which came first…patrols, or Dorothy leaving? I believe it was  the former. Come to think of it, she threw up a big stink about it...so, yes, the patrols came first. I never took them serious, not at first, but the responsibility grows upon a man…it mounts him…and before you know it, you’re ‘covering nights’, stretching the hours, making double sure it’s locked down. Sometimes it called for going out in the dead of night, ‘cause a guy can’t sleep until he knows his neighbors are safe. It happens. Sneaks up on you.

Since Dorothy left, taking ‘Binks’ with her…don’t…let’s not get into that…well, it’s been very quiet around the house. Four years now, and nothing has changed. Nothing.

Table is still set…

So, it’s good to get out and take some pride in the neighborhood, smell the desert air, fresh with winter.

With winter your breath is vaporous, your body steams with the heat it emits. Frost is in the air, and, Neighbors tend to huddle inside, all cozy and nice…

Precisely where he liked them.

V

ON THE DIME

 

It wasn’t the height of despair, it was the depth.

And yet, what silly giddiness arises from the bludgeoning? 

Take the blow, take a bow, madness prevails, if not for the pain.

The pain you bear so painlessly, pleasurably caressing each crushing punch...

Salute.

Take’s one, on Take-One, to nail it every time,

and you, my friend…even as the nails shred,

have nailed it on the Dime!

Hasn’t always been that way. Then, you blamed ‘the other party’ for your transgressions. And it’s been a millennium ago, but still fresh in the mind…it’s mind over matter…matters of heart, broken to taters.

Where’s the shame, who’s to blame,

and, is there life hereafter? 

V