V 3

V

IF I FORGET

 

It was a dry wind, hot... 
...it 's a desert, get over it.

There was blame enough to go around without doubt, no need to dredge up...

...more wind?

What do you want of me?

I would settle for some relief from this heat.

A bar?

If you insist.

I do.

Make it a double..

You just make that up?

Wha's at?

A double...like we're on a date.

Let's ramble over to the Dew Dodge Inn, mama.

Seriously?

Too much? Which part?

Every word was creepy.

Okay then let's snap back to reality. We got a problem. So no more blaming. We need to focus on getting out.

Which way is out?

The moon rises in the east and...

That's the sun.

Don't be fucking with me

Believe what you will, but no way am I following you.

No, you're right. I'm fucked up. Took me some time...

If you're fucked up, then we're fucked up – in the morning we'll know...­

then we'll bake like an "all-knowing jerky".

Yes we'll know...bake and be baked at the same time.­

As we drifted in that sunken drunken state, sound fades and melds, as abstract as the chandelier spinning wildly when it's only a ceiling fan sounds drift in and pass through. It was in this in-and-out that I heard some shouts - some music some car some anger some crying, some screams and then I heard nothing as I raised rocky from my bed and made my way to the window. Through the glass I  saw only my reflection, so I cranked the window open. It was a pleasant night. The kind of night when people take to the streets. I assumed then it was just part of the passing parade of fools like me even in a town this size. Bars let out, drunks make their way home. Alcohol and emotions...all kinds. Some amorous, some plain pitiful... Lust prevails. Gunsmoke lingers. Sometimes anger boils out, and shit happens. Most nights, shit happens. Hardly a night when shit don't happen. But now that I could see the street and hear more clear, there was nothing. The night winds were kicking in. Nothing but off-duty bar crews on the street and they went quick like roaches scattering. And then Silence. Except for the screams echoing in my head. I had heard something, foggy noggin and all, I did hear it.

In my brain tumbleweeds were now rolling across a decaying road. 

I shut the window and made my way to the sofa for a nightcap to silence...while the scream continued to resonate. I tapped the meager remainder the bottle had to offer.

I passed out as the table drifted away from my reach, and the floor slammed into my face. Plastered. I don't know when she left. She took advantage of the opportunity. Not a bad one-night stand. Not a bad night's investment, meager as it was, she slipped out penniless. I had nothing to steal, yet still wondered what she stole?

Two twisted, thirsty, days later I was pretty low on dough. The Office attendant, and off-duty janitor, was not in a mood to negotiate. I insisted that I speak to the real Manager.

“No you don't...” came his reply.

I had to believe him, I could read his face and it's message. I blank stared out the window, fucked on Lonely Street.

Had to get out. The screams, I thought I'd leave behind but, my mistake. I made a shady deal, that's all you need to know, but legit enough to justify. I managed the cash to stay for a while, finally negotiating successfully with the attendant, while I still dealt with the screams. I am not obsessed by the screams, even though they haunt me, I can move on. I am capable. I am just unable.

V

SLIVER

His world burst with the prick from a thin sliver of reality, popping the complacent timidity and sending him into a wild whirlygig which lasted for years. It was a cacti revelation – an “ouch” and an irritant, then an ooze, draining, then a hazy-spin, before collapsing. Collapsing, too, in the doubting he would resurface. 
 

The silver needle withdrew, bloodless, but nurse applied pressure just the same.

Can't be too careful. If you spout in the next half hour, apply pressure and bandaid.

If I spout?
 

I was going through the steps but it was a slog. 
I didn't believe "the half-of-testing"....achieving what?

Were there an end target, something to achieve, I might believe, but the best they could promise was 'back to my old self'. Which I very much didn't want. Who would? 
Short of a miraculous transformation, there was no point. I chose my own road and opted to shoulder my burden rather to succumb to some sycophant who's willing to drain me, or some public agency, dry.

V

Fade Out

she was weeping 
I was sleeping
but awoke
while lying 
there bleeding 

she startled
and screamed
not expecting 
to see me
breathing

I assured her
I was fine
but I lied

bullets... >>>>
            grazed my shoulder
                ... pierced my gut,
                       and nicked my spine
                   
                     
                                        [[[[[ freezing ]]]]]


I told her to run
no need, twice
she was wealthy
this whole mess 
unhealthy
the only thing 
lingering
was her 
smell

 A nice earthy touch 
for the finale's final fade-out.

  

V

Soon 2 Barren

Off-spring from 

some fertile streams

dammed in Springtime

when blossoms bloom,

as they supply forage,

but, forgotten

and downtrodden
foliage.

It was worse 

in the late Fall

when things fall

to rot 

Winds whipped and rustled the fading gold,

so soon to turn brown, tumbling down,
diminished.

 

Most gone barren,

while others cling to

their lingering grace,

a furtive glimmering.

A futile fight simmering
then takes place. 

 

Now nude they await

winter's chill,
uncloaked 

black entangled bones
of barren branches

silhouetted dark

shivering

stark

as if in a globe

within a snowy infinity.

So frigid...

so fucking profound.

She's dead now 

...belongs in the ground

unjudged, 

unbridled, 

and free

of this misery.      

 

V

The Local Kid

I believe it was the summer of …it was August ’57…that’s right…Durocher was driving us crazy. The Dodgers were right down Hoover at The Coliseum, so of course I’d take the bus right down, or go over to Vermont or Western. I still remember the Red Car. I’m a young guy, footloose and fancy-free…Maybe take in El Cholo on the way down and have a Margarita or two. Maybe the third one, and sure, a real senorita would take me home and jump my bones. To hell with the pennant race that night.

Judging by my deplorable shape at the time, I was due for some righteous “you-know-what”. And I didn’t resent a one-night charity one bit. We all use what’s readily available. Our flaws become our assets because that’s all that’s left...after a time we blur the line.

Dodgers didn’t get here ‘til 58. That’s your flaw.

You sure about that? What’s my flaw?

You’re stupid and in “woise” shape you ever been in.

Scully was calling the game. It was damn hot for an evening game. Creeping up into the nineties, Vinnie would say. It was that hot. Creeepin’ up inta the 90’s – Downtown! Hotter, still, in the Valleys.

“People are passing out in Pasadena even.!”

“Can you imagine?”

Hell in twenty minutes I could have a beer in my hand and sittin’ next to a babe…a starlet…right behind the screen in left.

So you went.

Every chance I got. I’d climb to the top of the stairs…take a beer…all the way up… and look out over the rim. Used to make my knees buckle, looking down, so I looked North toward the city and the hills. Downtown the sky hung brown. A Lid on the city…smog just stewing in the heat… makes for beautiful sunsets and Wally Moon was coming to bat.

Musta been somethin’ in those days.

You bet.

How’d they do.

They won.

How’d you do?…don’t tell me…struck out three times.”

“Two. I mean it was so hot women were taking off their clothes!”

“You living a fantasy existence or what?”

“Hey, I saw tops comin’ off. Brassieres out in the open.”

In your dreams. What was the score?…on the field.

Now I don’t know. I’m confused about the date…I thought it was 57…you say 58. So maybe I got games confused. I remember a Moon shot, and Hodges had two doubles….I think it was 7-5, Dodgers.

Against who?

“I knew you would ask that…don't recall.

Let it go.

I was just reminiscin’….Meeger! Vince Meeger pitched. Big strapping kid, throw a ball through that brick wall…

From out in the Valley.

No kiddin’.

“Van Nuys,” says the guy in the booth behind them. We’d forgotten about him. Seemed to know his business.
"..signed a local kid. A 'comer'. I played ball with him.”

“No kiddin.”

“High school?”

“High school, Jr high, little league…growin’ up…”

“Nice guy? Seems like…”

“He was mean. Always was. Schoolyard bully. You wanted him to fail…”

“Maybe that was his flaw.”

“Meaness.”
"Murder on hitters..."

“Oh I hear he grew remorseful as he got older. Married that nice girl.”

“Heard that too…”

“His Dad used to be a plumber. Tough old bastard. Made the kid work-his-way. They put my Dad’s water heater in....still got it...”

”Makes him quite the celebrity, your Dad.”

“Ha! Don’t think he don’t know it! He’d always brag about it when he gets drunk. Which was daily. Vince Meeger's old man put in my hot water heater when we first moved to the Valley!”

You ever go to the Old Coliseum games.”

Yeah, the old man would take me to a few. Then they moved up on the hill. The old man did not agree with the Elysian Park debacle. A political payoff, he’d say. Politicians in O’Malley’s back pocket. Ex- Marine tossed out on his ass. Working people. Poor people. After that we stopped going.”

“He disowned the Dodgers.”

“I'd say 'distanced himself'...Except for radio & Vinnie. And the boys on the field…We’d sit in the backyard. That was the house over on Third, before we moved to the Valley.’

“Everybody moved to the Valley at some point.”

“Pretty much.”

V

Buffalo

It was like shipping butterflies to Buffalo in the wintertime. You know they wouldn't all make it, but your money is in the freight, no matter how fragile. It gets delivered. No matter the outcome. It was none of your business. You're business is in the delivery. You need the dough, and they're going to die anyhow. Short lifespans... 

So who's to say what the difference of a few days or a few degrees makes in their lives?

But it's a lifetime, nonetheless, snubbed out before it's time. Or is it finally just due and finite? 

Is it yours, or mine, to say?

So there I was with a basket of butterflies headed north. The basket was bequeathed. More to the point, the butterflies were bequeathed. Bequeathed to a humorless, melancholy, old matron, with no sense they were coming.

It was his wish...his wish that I “set them free in the midst of her moldy, miserable, little apartment... and leave. Just leave...”

It was his joke. Whether it was either sick, sweet, or twisted, and I've battled with each.

Savannah to Buffalo on the slow train. 

Stopping....at......every..........stop.....along....the....way.

I wondered how many I would lose. If I had the caboose, I had a chance, with a potbelly stove, but no. 

Would this be some kind of futile reckoning? Would I arrive with a basket of dismembered bodies? Wings turned ashen, and bodies, mere speckles of dust. And what do I do then? Scatter dead butterfly parts, yell 'be free!”, collect my money, then flee? That seems a mean trick, no matter how irascible the old biddy.

Once we left the station in the dead of night, I tried to stay alert, but I fell asleep quickly. It was the monotonous 'chugga-chugga' and the click-clack in the rails..., and the soft trill of butterfly wings.

 

I slept for several hours, with no intention of doing so. But regardless of intention, I awoke to the sun's glare, staring at an open basket on the compartment's floor. More so, the butterflies were  free.

Flitting about the compartment at will. Here, there, overhead, and under seats, everywhere.
 

It was then that the conductor came around to collect tickets, and you can imagine the panic when slid the door, 

Me: “No! Can't you see? We can't possibly...”

He: “But sir, I need your ticket, and passengers will be boarding at the next stop, and frankly speaking, we

don't have much room...and the room we possess must consider as 'humans-over-butterflies:" !

M: Can't you see my predicament? If I open this door...you'll have butterflies, roof to floor.

H: You have precisely ten minutes until we arrive at Porter. Best be putting it to good use and get busy.

Then the conductor went about his ticket-collecting-business, but his ticket was punched if he didn't deliver the goods. All would be for naught, and damn, did he need the money.

When the conductor returned, he slid the door ajar with gusto, and out flew the last ten or so. Most were swept out the narrow corridor windows, which were left open for the air. From there, who knows who made it, and I was too weary to give chase to those few that remained.

Forget it, who is going to miss them...

As for the rest, Thank God I wore a cap and was able to cup the bulk of them. I was grateful for who I had.

You did well to get with what you got through."

I suppose I did, but why did I feel responsible?