300 make up post: Probiscuous Girl, rough draft

Am I throwing you off?

Nope

Didn’t think so.

How you doin’ young mozzie

The blood that you pumpin’ really drives me crazy

You don’t have to run away like that

I’m a life-sucking insect not a goddamn bat

If you looking for a girl that’ll drink you right

If you lookin’ for her at dusk with a light

Were you the one who buzzed by my eye?

Guess I'll find out by the end of the night

You expect to just slip it in me?

Well just a heads up, my ex is a bee

All I can do is try, gimme one try

What’s the problem I don’t see no deet on your thigh

I be the first to admit it, I’m curious about you, you seem so innocent

You wanna get in my skin, get lost in it

Boy I’m tired of chasing, let me suck for a minute

Chorus:

Probiscuous girl

You nose what you want

I’m all alone

And you’re sucking my blood

Probiscuous boy

You best be feeding me more

Make my blood sugar spike

What you waiting for?

Probiscuous girl

You nose what you want

I’m all alone

And you’re sucking my blood

Probiscuous boy

You best be feeding me more

Make my blood sugar spike

What you waiting for?

Verse 2:

Blood is red

Hey you’re kinda cute

That other guy’s is dead

‘cuz I sucked his juice

My antennae are going berserk

Where you at, we gotta make this work

Come chill with me in my stagnant pool

You know I’ll be there to wipe up your proboscis drool

They call me daddy

Long legs, in fact

Yo don’t fly away

Damn, that’s super whack

I'm a big girl I can satisfy myself

But if I get hungry I’ma need your help

Pay attention to me I’m not flyin’ to be stealth

I want you on my skin

So does everybody else.

Baby we can we take it slow

Pump in pump out, you know how it goes

If you with it girl I can take you down low

I’ma get a red koolaid blood sugar high

Chorus:

Probiscuous girl

You nose what you want

I’m all alone

And you’re sucking my blood

Probiscuous boy

You best be feeding me more

Make my blood sugar spike

What you waiting for?

Don't be mad, don't get mean

Hey Don't get mad, don't be mean

Ironic

Two weeks ago, David’s mother collapsed at Jean’s house. They took her to the hospital and found that she was extremely anemic and had some other complications. She hadn’t told anyone of any feelings of tiredness, weakness, or pain. She hated going to the doctor, or seeing anyone other than family, really. Honestly, she wasn’t a brightest ray of sunshine. She was self-absorbed, hypocritical, vapid, and losing her little sense of lucidity. She had spent her entire life trying to look twenty years younger than her real age, and ironically, she may die twenty years younger than she should.

Grave (sic)

Peter craved things. He when he became thirsty, he didn’t just want water, he craved it. When he was tired, he didn’t just want sleep, he craved his bed. When he listened to music he didn’t just choose tunes based on his mood, he chose them based on his cravings.

A craving comes from a deep recess inside our reptilian brains. A craving takes something that we might otherwise merely want, and makes it something we need.

It treats all things as objects of desire. When Peter met Melinda, she was an object. Far from masochistic; he simply needed her.

Profiteroles

Heat the milk and the butter, watching the tiny bubbles tickle the sides of the pans. Quick! Add the flour and stir like crazy. Mmm smell that hot butter. Then, this is the complicated part. Take that beautiful ball of dough off the heat and get a powerful whisk out. Crack out your eggs all at once, and whisk! Whisk, man, whisk! Make those eggs disappear! Stab the yolks, meld the bright and pale together. It will be goopy. Pipe those babies out and bake. Careful, they’ll toy with your emotions. Rise and fall. Poof and collapse. Fickle, delicious things.

Gawad Kalinga

Authenticity in all them tip cities writhes among masses of trash domesticities.
Subtle homes among the rubble, trouble bubbles poorly huddled
Helter-skelter shelters fall and falter in stormy water.
A life of dirt is all a flirt with random mirth, inevitable death or hurt
Filthy hands rubbed “clean” on milky jeans, obscene they glean with silt and teem
With grime, disease, no ABCs, all food taken to please the hungry mouths of capital greed.
A spark of hope parks in the dark before daybreak; GK awaits.
Building more than a community, add immunity; impunity.
Remix forlorn for phoenix reborn.

I Am Almost There

            This is very difficult to write when I am dizzy just sitting up and my eyes hurt, the computer screen is not healthy for me right now. There’s a delay between my mind and fingers and I keep typing the wrong word (like “write” instead of “right”). Why is grammar suddenly so difficult? Come on one hundred words, have I reached you yet? I am almost there. But I have run out of things to write, and my head feels like that of a ten year-old. Actually no, it feels like that of someone wondering if they will get better.

What It Takes

            It takes a real artist to see a stuffed squirrel and mount it in a gumball machine.
            It takes a real scientist to see people in molecules and vice versa.
            It takes a real dentist to operate while watching a football game with back turned.
            It takes a real guru to speak by tugging one’s beard.
            It takes a real marmoset to migrate to Yugoslavia and back.
            It takes a real school bus to lose itself in a mental maze of journey and introspection, and ultimately come out of the tunnel.
            It takes a real writer to write this drivel.

Frenglish

“J’aime la pamplemousse.”

“Don’t speak in French. You only speak in French when you’re saying stuff you might be serious about, but may be joking about as well.”

“That’s pourquoi je say things en Français.”

“You’re crazy, you know that? Bizarre. Just bizarre.”

“Oui. It’s vraiment zarbi.”

“Are you even French?”

“Peut-être.”

“Goddamnit, Louise.”

“Oh Tomas, ne t’inquietes pas.”

“It’s Tom, or do you have yet to learn my name after three years?”

“Bof! Stop, you are tellement dramatique. Souviens-toi que je t’aime.”

“Well, I at least understand that one.”

“C’est la verité ma pamplemousse. And that’s all you need.”

Mirror, Mirror Part 2

Thursday:

He looked into the mirror: “I’m ugly.” He went off to work, passed through a drive-thru coffee store, but they didn’t have any more sugar. “That’s probably better. I don’t want to be ugly and diabetic.”

Friday:

He looked into the mirror: “I’m ugly.” He went off to work, and wore his normal business clothes even though it was casual Friday. “What’s the use? I’m sure my clothes are ugly anyway.”

Saturday:

He put his glasses on. He looked into the mirror.

“Hey, I don’t look half bad!” He smiled, went for a walk and appreciated the world.

Mirror, Mirror Part 1

Sunday:

He looked into the mirror. “I’m ugly.” He went to church, and prayed to God to be made more attractive.

Monday:

He looked into the mirror: “I’m ugly.” He went off to work, asked Elaine out and was rejected. “It’s probably because I’m so ugly.”

Tuesday:

He looked into the mirror: “I’m ugly.” He went off to work, and he spilled some sauce on his pants. “This will only contribute to my ugliness.”

Wednesday:

He looked into the mirror: “I’m ugly.” He went off to work, and got promoted. “It’s probably because they feel sorry for the ugly guy.”

Plaque is whack

“Brush your teeth. It’s cool.”

My daily shtick is made of this—this one, two, three, this a, b, c

I brush my teeth, inspect my feet. Clear scrutiny is strictly key

Get those gums, floss those cracks, no one wants that goopy plaque

Say it with me. Ha-li-to-sis. Pretty atrocious, riiiiiiight?

Orbit, Wriggly, Double bubble, just these alone? Double trouble.

‘Cuz the sum of gum is clearly none and what’s the fun in being bum?

Who wants fakes, for heaven’s sake? Sure, it can be the fairy’s take

But gosh darn and sigh, ugly be the toothless guy—just FYI

Masquerade pt 2

The carriage was cushioned and comfortable. There three other people—masked, of course, and it had only been about ten minutes when they came to an abrupt halt.

“Excuse me, this may seem silly, but do you know where this carriage is taking us?” she asked.

“To the landing dock,” replied the man to her right. His had on a very elegant boar mask.

“Are we here, then?”

“Not quite. I believe this is where we are supposed to shift.”

“Shift?”

“Yes…shift.”

Anne was thoroughly confused.

The man sighed. “Notify Boris. We have one of the guests in here by accident.”

Self Control

Classic trail mix contains salted nuts (usually peanuts and almonds, and cashews(ew)), raisins, and M&Ms. The way to eat trail mix is to take it piece by piece. Peanut, M&M, raisin, almond, raisin, M&M. Never eat two of the same in a row. Another way is to take a sample of each—a little bit of peanut, a little bit of M&M, and a little bit of raisin. Completely balanced and delicious. The perfect ratio of nutty, rich, and fruity.

Ah, screw it. I’m just going to eat all the M&M’s and leave the nuts and raisins for some poor sucker.

Library Creatures

            I have been there and seen the library creatures. I know you may martyr me for acknowledging their existence, but I must explain it. They sit amidst rows of books, devoid of interaction and translucent skin soaking in the glow of their computers. I tried to look into their eyes, but a film had glazed them over. Their fingers shake or twitch and they communicate with low, yearning moans. I am forced to conjecture that the only peril they pose to human beings is in the surreptitious taking of choice study locations. This is what I have seen while journeying.

Henrik

            Henrik sat down to write a fictional story. The characters were dynamic but the plotline was static; he dropped his pencil in a panic. The setting was dull though the pages were full, nothing of interest came out of his skull.

            Henrik then sat down to write a nonfictional story. He scratched his head as he tried to remember things his mother had said, but mental cobwebs ruled instead. The story was bland, nothing too grand, because of the march of time’s sand.

            Henrik sighed and tried to write a poem. Meter forgotten, rhyme schemes begotten, he finally found nirvana.

Social construct: Marriage

Lipstick on an alligator pays to make her really hate the
Date she’d take to wind her fate along their fingers six to eight
She slain her bait and flayed the crate but hey she’ll mate before too late.

Berate, before ablate she,
Ate a pepper steak free,
Of MS glutamate, the
Chemical of late, greed
Strikes a freaky chord with hoards of bored humanity it lords
amoured over our stores of moral codes and memory

The alligator and her man tie knot to scaly claw and hand they
Walk down aisle and into car
And honeymoon Jamaican swim-up bar.

Lost and Found

I lost my wallet today. I stood up really fast and panicked a lot, but somewhere in the back of my mind there was…I cannot even call it hope, it was brute determination to believe that the wallet was somewhere obvious. It had to be in some incriminating spot from the very recent past. The car seat, under newspapers on the kitchen table, my jacket pocket, the seat that was still warm from my frenzied panic. It had to be right in front of my nose. I had never wanted to feel like an idiot more than at that time.

Bragadocious mafaka

Our rap is badass. It’s G. It flows like a gushing stream of urine after you’ve been holding it for an hour: easily. It’s precise. It’s playful. It’s French.

It’s in fucking French.

I don’t even speak French. Well. But I can rap it. And so can you.

We rapped it so well that French speakers can’t even understand it.

We wrote lyrics so tight translators can't translate it.

We used a beat so bumpin that basses can’t even deliver it.

We’re better than everything you’ve ever heard.

We are kings.

We are champions.

We are legends.

We are god.

Just One Of Those Conversations

“You’re frivolous, the way you wear your pants so low.”

“You’re ludicrous.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I never said thank you.”

“I didn’t think you did. In fact I’d be surprised if you did.”

“And that is exactly why I did not. Hold on, we’re going in circles right now.”

“Once again, not surprising.”

“Are you expecting me to say these things?”

“Perhaps.”

“Is there no way I can surprise you?”
”Oh you surprise me in more ways than you know.”

“But not with what I say?”

“Well...Not really. You say the things I expect.”

“Monkey! Handlebar! Styrofoam! Kilts! Confucius! Noodle! Crybaby! Flavor!”

Cloud

People eat cloud food because they are cloud food. They eat what they are because what they eat is what they are after they eat it. The way to be what you are when you eat what you are is to be what you eat when you are it. Clouds are made of fluff and pomp thus cloud food is made of cloud pomp and fluff and those who eat it pomp fluff in clouds and waft and glide but don’t tract or decide. That that does does what what’s will will be that which is eaten. Verily, forsooth, cloud.

Third Floor

Looking out a window, I can see
Many different things below me
Looking out a window, I find
Several things are on my mind
 
For example, I just saw a child in a green shirt running by the fountain with a stick in his hand.
 
What a surprise
My mind flies
My insides cry
For summertime
 
I can’t wait to go back to the farm, all this time spent on the third floor of a library, rubbing my nose on the pages of musty books is giving me that dangerous drowsy feeling.
 
But soon I’ll leave when June can breathe

Sonnet! Ready, Set, Go... (And Also, Apparently, A Bonus Haiku)

Where have all of the good times gone?
The basketballs, small cars and back lots;
Just once I wish I happened upon
Those times again before they rot
From my memory, lost and left
Don’t leave me all alone, bereft
Of an opportunity to be
With those skies and friends, to see
As myself, today, things back then.
Oh to feel the force of a crush
On what’s-her-name, the head rush
Of being there in my skin again.
But I’ll think myself lucky instead
At least it remains inside my head.
 
Sputtery recall
Stopping, starting all the time
Memory beauty

Means, No Motives

Dusty afternoon, sweaty cops and zipped body bag.
Three gardeners whisper in a flowerbed.
Detective and hysterical wife stand by pool, pistol in the deep end.
 
Police station, concrete room.
Detective talks to each gardener through a translator.
Wife sits in, tear-streaked makeup.
She accuses each one; each time bursts into tears.
“They were all such good workers!”
 
Detective’s notes:
Suspect 1 – means, no motives
Suspect 2 – same
Suspect 3 – saw the pistol on a shelf in the house
 
Wife questioned.
“Must have been Raúl, Suspect 3.”
Detective squints, asks about her relationship with her husband.
“Boring, really.”
 
Guilty.

The Coughing Song

Cough, cough, cough. Hacky hack, hack

I feel like gnomes are playing hacky sack

I tell them to stop pounding my back

Cough, cough, cough, hacky hack, hack

But they’re deep in my lungs, those porous sacks

And I can’t ignore the tickle, like the hair of a yak

Cough, cough, cough. Hacky hack, hack

Wow I’m a pro, I’ve really got a knack

It comes with practice, a training track

Cough, cough, cough. Hacky, hack, hack

But this phlegm kinda sucks, I’m feeling a lack

Bring on the meds, gimme the whole pack

Cough, cough, cough. Hacky, hack, hack.

Masquerade pt 1

The satin gown did not fit her well, but she strode into the ballroom with lilting grace all the same. She looked around. There were maybe fifty people, of which she recognised none.

“Anne! How are you darling?”

A woman dressed head-to-toe in black velvet wrapped her elbow-length gloves around Anne. Bewildered, she hugged back.

“Well, so wonderful to see you! Must go mingle. Ta ta!”

Anne found it harder to remember how she got here. The carriages came in droves now, whisking people off in silence. She was curious and sceptical, but she hopped in one all the same

Life As A Slug

            Life as a slug must be pretty interesting. You move slow and leave your slime behind so that someday, when you’re far from where you started, you’ll look back and see the paths you’ve traced. Can you comprehend it when you see a bird fly past? Or do they simply move too fast? Life as a slug must be methodical. As you approach a plant it grows slowly larger and slowly bigger until you are underneath one of its leaves. Down there in the dirt, shaded from the heat of the sun, you think of only where you find yourself.

Choooooaaahhhh

            The mailman circumnavigated the town of Cedar Junction each morning before anyone was awake. One day as the sun rose in an icy sky he saw something he had never seen before. Inside the mailbox at the Martin residence was a noise. It came out into his face in a steamy whisper: “Choooooaaahhhhh...”

            That night he repeated it at the tavern and the bartender repeated it to his ailing mother. Each time it came out quiet, in a visible vapor. It caressed the old woman’s face and filled her droopy ears; then, for no real reason, she chuckled to herself.

A Face At Hand

She rubbed and rubbed her swollen, allergy-smothered eyes until they came out in her hands. Eyelids, eyelashes, and all. It didn’t hurt, it was merely bizarre. She was looking back up at her empty face. She tried again, rubbing her nose with one of her free fingers. It, too, came off onto her hand, this time on the right palm. Well, there was only one thing remaining, she supposed. And with her thumb, she rubbed her soft lips vigorously until they became part of her left hand. Interesting, she thought. And she went to face the world on her hands.

The Obelisk

The obelisk stood alone. It didn’t know a time when it didn’t. Stand alone, that is. It felt lonely and unfulfilled. What’s the meaning of its existence if it’s sharpness was for nought? It yearned to pierce anything, but mostly the sun. The spherical demon that pounded down day after day, its rays penetrating even the darkest parts of the obelisk’s black marble. Sometimes, the obelisk tried to see the sun as a positive force. A strengthening mentor of sorts. No. It couldn’t be. The obelisk stood alone. It didn’t know a time when it didn’t. And it never would.

Switching Gear

Don’t look at me like that. It’s not that I don’t love you anymore, it’s just…well, there are better options out there. Bigger openings. I’ve found that you can be a little narrow. And it’s such a bother to have to carry you around with me everywhere. I can’t even latch you on to something else to make it more conducive to how I work. I need flexibility and something that doesn’t make such a fuss if I drop it every now and then. I’m going to bequeath you to my little cousin. He’s still young and has much to learn.

A probable musing of what happened at a certain university’s commencement at a certain recent past

Look at those filthy individuals. What do they call themselves, again? Oh right, pro-choicers. The only choice they’re making is against life. Gosh darn it. I mean, goddamn abortionists. They can get away with murder! What’s next! You just watch. They’re going to sneak into your homes next and cut the life out of your children under your very noses—with a coat hanger nonetheless! Who even thinks about using some apparatus used to hang clothes to…oh I don’t know, scoop out a developing life like the bottom of an ice cream carton? Anyone who supports this is evil. And probably black.

Fierce

Jeremy F. McLaughlin stared at his toes. They wiggled ferociously. He furrowed his brow in consternation and peered across as the boy sitting two inches in front, facing him. The boy was also wiggling his toes. They were battling.

Who would win the toebattle? No one knew. All bets were off. This is because no one knew how to win a toe battle. There was no contact, no discernable goal, and no appropriate discourse to moderate. One simply wiggled one’s toes.

It was all in the mindgame. Jeremy won. Then he wrote a book about his success and made millions.

A Door Near Me

            I’m looking at a small door handle and it’s gold and dented; now I’m looking at the door itself which is white and has four rectangular sections indented into it. They are not all of equal length. The door stands slightly ajar at the moment though there is no one entering or exiting. I can see through the crack where the hinges are but the only thing I can discern is that it looks darker in there. When I try to push it closed, I can’t quite reach from my chair, so I think about standing up to do it.

Hysteria

            When Jimmy finally strolled into the command room, eight stolid thugs were waiting with noroblasters trained on his forehead. The robot warlord rose from the floor in a cloud of compressed steam and said, “Well ya finally made it.” Jimmy pulled out his six-shooter, Texas-style, and said, “Y’all messed with the wrong man.” I began wondering at this point if I had come to the wrong place. Jimmy tugged his cowboy hat’s brim low. The starship’s engines were a rhythmic thud beneath the steel floor. Suddenly, gunshots! Now music! Strobes! The greatest disco dance party of all time had begun!

The Objects Around Me

            The objects around me speak when I listen to them. They are everywhere; I step on them, I step around them, I sometimes notice them and sometimes don’t. Staplers, couches, curbs, paint, bouncy balls – you know, objects. I am Neruda, stooping around with reporter’s pad and scribbling pen saying “ah” and “yes” and “I see.” They speak to me and to everyone. Some are crass and I avidly transcribe their florid curses. Some are simple, some the most effusive philosophers I have experienced. My shelves sag beneath dusty mounds of notepads, bearing the weight of the objects’ everyday words.

Grapefruits

            Everywhere we looked, bright grapefruits sat like endeavoring Buddhas in the dewy grass. The pensively interlocked branches above our heads were completely barren and the leaves looked haggard, as if they had just returned from an unexpectedly long crusade. Peeling open a grapefruit, diamond-clear juice cascaded out. Before long, butterflies with luminescent green wings had enfolded us into a shimmering cloud, and one by one perched on the opened grapefruit like eager pilgrims finally seeing the object of their prayers. And what an object it was. When we had finally each eaten a slice, our tongues danced like eloquent fireflies.

Trash Talk

I said: “I can hit any tree on campus from the top of Hoover Tower. He spends all his time going to class and sleeping. Everyone knows I’m the unchallengeable ruler of the disc golf course, tonight I will prove it.”

He said some yadda yadda about picking up his prowess from wily legends.

I said his legends were decrepit has-beens and challenged them too.

We were tied after seventeen holes, and so was one of the legends.

I threw my disc into a tree and lost by two strokes.

It’s an interesting situation I now find myself in.

Reunion

I remember laughing about belly buttons and sunglasses. I remember your pool and summer and sweat. I remember going to the movies on a Friday night, getting popcorn with extra butter, and a large icee we could never finish. I remember making a birthday cake for my dog made of peanut butter and dog biscuits. I remember your striped sweater that kept coming back to you no matter how many times you left it behind. I remember seeing you finally after years apart for the first time. You wore the striped sweater, and had the same horrible posture.
“You’ve changed.”

Cutlery: A Play

Spoon: I like you.
Knife: Why stay so far then?
Spoon: I’m afraid I’ll get hurt.
Knife: Psh. I’ve seen you around with those forks before.
Spoon: That’s different. We can still…spoon.
Knife: I see how it is.
Spoon: Please understand.
Knife: I can change.
Spoon: I just don’t—
Knife: --think I can bend.
Spoon: I’m sorry. You’re not silver enough.
Knife: I’ve done it before.
Spoon: And you snapped. It won’t happen.
Knife: Whatever. I’m just too edgy for your kind.
Spoon: I guess.
Knife: Just wait. I’m gonna find myself a sassy little whisk and you’ll see.

Guest Post: Mary-Ann Ortiz-Luis

Don't patronize me by telling me you have gone out of your way to spend time with me. I'm not a chore nor an obligation. I will not grant you bragging rights to your friends to highlight your kindness. I'm not your neat little package you tuck under your bed when it's convenient only to be rummaged for when it so pleases you. I'm either in your life or I'm not. I'm either integral to you as carelessly running your fingers through your hair or nourishing your empty stomach. Or I will not be part of any of it. Not one bit. So spare me the humiliation,.

Ice-istential Creamisis

I have transformed into a bulbous being with a soft, furry skin and insides that are delightfully fresh and icy. I am certain that I am a mochi. Green tea, to be precise. I must find a mirror to confirm the results, but there isn’t one. Doubt clouds my delicious brain. What if I am not in fact, a mochi? What if I am just a peach? Or a tennis ball? This existential crisis is unbearable. But wait! I know in the core of my ice cream heart that I want to dance. And only mochi know the mochi dance.

Derivations

            The key got stuck in the deadbolt after the door was open and when I couldn’t get it out it was the last straw, I was so close to being back in my house. SOL. Scream Out Loud.

            I left the door swinging and reread the letter in my pocket. My friend’s handwriting from Africa, all about entire villages sprawling dead. I nosedived into the couch. COL. Cry Out Loud.

            My girlfriend had told me she had to leave me, she wasn’t sure why, well maybe now I could be free to chase Beyonce. LOL. Hah. No. What a day.

A Bird!

            Wriggling squiggling through dark damp dank dirt coiling roiling around smooth and rough soil carving tight tunnels towards clumps lumps of rich reactions that recreate molecular fractions resonating and sprouting around the dirt like flirtatious compositions floating in position soaked by the rain swallowing water wallowing up into water soil mixtures drenching globbing earth sobbing swimming up and up and up muddy mess surrounds sliding slippery on all sides gliding sighing smooth spirals and still up up up to the surface bursting out among stalks and sights slick with wetness witnessing with feelings the freeing air

            Look out! A bird!

By chance

Philippe sighed. It had been six years, four months, one week and two days since he’d eaten baklava. But there, glistening on the other side of the glass in this tiny bakery sat a fresh tray of honeyed glory. He could still feel the overpowering sweetness drenching his tongue, the subtly crisp crunch of pistachio and filo filling his mouth; the scent of warm air, laughter, and home.

He was now in a very different place. The streets outside were busy, and the afternoon stretched on like a mirage; but this wasn’t home. He bought a square and bit down.

Wookie On Earth

            If I were Chewbacca, I’d go to my classes, raise my shaggy arm, and discourse in guttural ululations the similarities between health care systems and the Empire.

            If I were Chewbacca, I’d sit down at lunch with platefuls of sausage links and wonder if any of the wonderkids around me had a seed of control of the Force lurking in their unsuspecting minds.

            If I were Chewbacca, I’d show up at a party and immediately all the girlies would stop grinding with their sweaty frat boys to run their hands through my mane while I thought of cantinas on Tatooine.

I Wish I Were a Pelican

I wish I were a pelican

So I could stand at the edge of the dock

Overlooking the rocking water

Like an old, jaded sailor

I wish I were a pelican

So I could scoop down low

And grab the scintillating sparkles

That coat the ocean’s surface

I wish I were a pelican

So I could perch on the sand

The grains between my feathers

Satisfying beyond all belief

I wish I were a pelican

So I could talk to you, squawk to you

Tell you, you’re not so bad yourself

And maybe, maybe we could fly together, one day

The Heat

The heat is a welcome change to the cold that has been seeping through my veins. I am undergoing a transformation of blue to red. Or at least a vigorous pink. It tingles as it melts the icicles that have crystallized in places I never thought I would feel again. It’s warm. I’ve forgotten how warm it can be. And with it comes movement and suppleness. I can bend without fear of cracking. I can breathe and it feels like the hearth, on which I have been trying to thaw my soul for the last century. Thank you, thank you.

Secret Worlds

            First time I kissed her was on her tiny front porch in between the warm house and the lawns, streetlamps, and rain. We kept finding ourselves in in-between worlds like that. On a roof, between the stars and the earth, we could exist as if we were the only two beings in a secret world.

            We’d explore our latest universe. Sometimes it would be small, about the size of my arms around her. Sometimes it would be enormous, bigger than either of us could comprehend, and we’d both say we were incredibly lucky to have found one another in it. 

ten tens

When is a raisinet not a raisinet? Once it’s eaten.

She posed. He focused, exposed, developed, retouched. She became famous.

The last place you will ever look is the cemetery.

Meat combo pizza pockets combine accessibility with flavour. Insert jingle.

For sale: adult lowrider tricycle with sound system. Never ridden.

They thought, “Gay.” He wasn’t. She was. Lasted three days.

Sarah like Sam. Sam was taken. Sarah didn’t care. JERRY.

Sharp pincers zoom metal lace straight towards zippered drip places.

Her thumb clicked. It was broken, after all. From Nintendo.

The concept of the last word is a farce. See?

Musings Over A Plate Of Fish And Chips

            Fry with ketchup, fry with tartar sauce, fish with tartar sauce, but never ketchup on fish. Naturally – a fish doesn’t know what a tomato is. Maybe we could adapt the tomato plant so that it could grow under water. Whole plantations on the ocean floor when the dry land is all being used for cities and strip malls. Rednecks become wetnecks; seasons are irrelevant. I imagine great movements would clamor for a complete return to the waters from whence we sprang millennia ago. Would it be devolution or a return to our roots? And where would the farmers go next? 

The World

            The world, now that’s a big place. You got oceans, you got continents, you got the atmosphere. All of it spreadin’ out in a hundred directions, a hundred reflections, and you just got things everywhere. I mean just look at a map, man. Things everywhere. I don’ know bout you, but I sure feel better knowin’ that Eustis Maine exists out there. It’s real, physical, lyrical, know what I mean? Only thing is, unless I’m standin’ on Eustis it’s just an abstraction, just a contraption. Only thing real is the patches my feet touch down on. Still, the world’s real.

The Umpteenth Try: A Play

Announcer: Ladies and gentlemen, the fourth try.

[Crowd cheers.]

Branius [screaming]: Godmaker! Since I last stood here I have been to the end of the earth!

Godmaker [placed on a round dirt island in a miniature lake, sitting on a wood chair]: Three words, then.

[Branius is outraged, but collects himself.]

Branius: Infinity. Murk. Clamshell.

[Godmaker shakes head slowly.]

Branius: Wh-

Announcer: Ladies and gentlemen, the umpteenth try.

[Crowd reaches for peanuts.]

Timothy: Please?

Godmaker [scratching his arm]: This time, a defense. A lawyer’s defense.

Timothy [clasping his old hands]: Please.

Godmaker: Anything else?

[Silence.]

Godmaker: OK. Perhaps next try.

On The Same Level

The moment I walked in my room, terror seized my entire body. There was a wasp the size of my teacher’s face mole, buzzing around frantically in circles. It was big, black, and heinous. And it was in my room, and it was accelerating. I remained still. Could it smell my fear? Did it know I had never been stung before? Now, it was banging up against the window ferociously. It just wanted so desperately to get out as much as I wanted it out. And so I opened the window, and let it buzz along into the spring sunlight.

Some more 10 word stories

1. Chew. Swallow. Chew, chew. Swallow. Take a walk. Wait…Poop!
2. Mom said to make real friends. The teddy bear winked.
3. She fell. Arms in a cast. She met broken-leg-boy. Destiny.
4. The star saw the earth and fell down in ecstasy.
5. I wrote chapter one. Things still in progress. The End.
6. It found the sweet spot. The bastard sucked me dry.
7. Can’t sleep. Rum and milk. Now, I’m drunk and awake.
8. She shouted. He nodded. She left. The deaf man cried.
9. Tiny Tot crawled into the cupboard. In there, unimaginable possibilities.
10. How am I like a goldfish?! Wait, what’d you say?

Kelly, Just Like Me

            Kelly came out a tadpole in a green pond. All the tadpoles swam in contented circles.

            Kelly became a frog and pulled herself onto land. She learned to catch flies with her tongue and listened at night to the gravelly croaks of bullfrogs.

            Kelly thought of the green pond when she saw two mother frogs fight over a place to lay their eggs.

            Kelly gave in one night to a bullfrog.

            Kelly liked to swim, closing her eyes on the surface of the water. But soon she was filling with eggs and fighting for a laying spot of her own.

EndBac

She sprayed EndBac compulsively. If it could kill germs, it could do anything. Kill bugs, kill odors, deodorize armpits, clean sheets, the lot. EndBac was sanitization in a can. She thought.

But then she started getting welts all over her body. Her hair turned orange. Then she turned into a tiger. Wrong. She did not turn into a tiger. That would be stupid and pointless. But the EndBac did bleach her hair and burn her skin.

So she went to the doctor and told her what happened. Yes, it was a female doctor. Then the doctor turned into a unicorn.

Correlation ≠ causation

People assumed he had something to say. He just stood there looking expectant. The sky grumbled dissent with a passive-aggressive overcast pall. It spat a few plips on the pavement, but not enough to darken its color or change the air’s smell.

And still he stood. Microphone at chin, elbow crooked meekly, eyebrows raised in helplessness. More and more busy commuters gathered. If he were actually speaking, no one could have cared, but this was strange: a mute with a megaphone?

He coughed a little. People waited. He burst into tears and the sky opened up.

Everyone got wet.

Some get super powers, I get...

I was walking down the street one day when a truck carrying toxic waste swerved to avoid hitting another car. It toppled over like bulky cartons of milk. Except they were metal. And they hurt. Glug glug glug, toxic waste spilling all over me. Except I didn’t die. I woke up in the hospital. An anomally, I heard the doctors murmur. I tried to prop myself on my elbows, but instead of feeling the sterile hospital sheets under them, they thrust up into the air. I was all of a sudden aware of my body. And my head…was on backwards.

Just keep driving

It was four o’clock in the morning and I was driving these hooligans across the bridge to the city.

“RAGE! RAGE ON THE FREEWAY!” My friend stuck his head out the window.

Goddamnit. I had already been up for 42 hours and wasn’t really sure if I could handle driving over a large body of water on a flimsy piece of suspension-held concrete.

“LET’S GET SOME MUSIC ON IN HERE!” My friend starts dancing violently. He’s riding shotgun.

Just keep driving. Eyes on the bridge. Don’t pay attention to his dangerously close hip thrusts. It’s all good. Live a little.

Where Did It All Come From? Why Is It Here?

            Sometimes I go to the supermarket down the street and wander the aisles without a cart. Soon, even the plasticky hues of packaging look savory. Food is heaped in plethoras everywhere I find myself, from the stacks of fresh baked bread in a back corner to food from every continent frozen into position in cardboard boxes. All around me people walk down the aisles chatting through their cell phones, never seeming to see any of the delicious treats that their hands automatically feel out. I could spend fifteen lonely minutes looking through little plastic windows at peanut butter-filled pretzel pillows.

Fiction

            The sun fell slowly out of the window, leaving his desk in dark monochromes. Still his pen scratched the wanderings and ruminations of his main character, and with each twist in the plot the imagined man grew. He wrote of old men rooted into the sides of mountains and seductive women swaying in wheat fields.

            Finally he closed his desk and stumbled into the moonlit streets. Around him the street lamps towered into flaming torches and from a side street a dark woman emerged. He squinted and exclaimed, “I have just written you.” “I know,” she said, touching his collar.

Deal Breaker

Whaddaya say, Jonesy? I say we go down there and just do it. Once and for all, ya know? Whaddaya say? And then after that we can just go down to Rudy’s and have a pint with the fellas. It’ll be like nothing even ever happened. Aw c’mon Jonesy, don’t poop out on me now. I’m gonna hafta slap ya ‘round. Your father would be so proud o’ you right now. Don’t you wanna make your old man smile in his grave? Goddamnit, Jonesy. Don’t do this to me. Don’t make me do it. I don’t want to—[gunshot[. Godfuckin’ damnit.

Value of chickens

Let’s say you get some use-value out of the chicken. It can be direct, like eating chicken wings or indirect, like eating a wolf that ate the chicken. Or it can be non-consumptive, like chicken-watching as a hobby.

Maybe it’s non-use value. Like you are just really satisfied knowing that chickens exist in the world, even if you won’t ever use one. Or maybe it’s nice knowing you have the option to use it or watch it.

Or maybe the whole universe doesn’t revolve around humans. Nah. If you can’t eat, watch, pet, or play with chickens, there’s no point.

To Cure Cancer

            Harriet’s grandmother died from pancreatic cancer, so she decided to dedicate her life to finding a cure for the disease. She got to medical school before running out of money. “Be a nurse,” people said. “It’s much more practical.” She nodded and found a job at her hometown hospital, but she wasn’t motivated there. Her thoughts instead wandered to finding a way to shrink herself to do hand-to-hand battle with cancerous cells. A man recovering from a stroke found this out and asked her, “Why have a dream only for the sake of having a dream?” Aghast, she shrugged.

Sweet Thins

Multiple grains of goodness
Texture of baked deserts
And the ability
To placate the salt sensors
Of my insides
Those are the wheat thins though
And you
Pretty girl
Are my sweet thins
When we snack together each day
My sweet thins
Through the stars and sun’s return
Your lips are the salt
My body may have lost
And the yellow box
On my desk
Lists every ingredient
Like each was immediate
Grainy and good
Is what’s inside there
And outside in the air
Our words spin around
And around
And around
Around
Sweet thins
Swim around
In the air

Insert Cause Here

I’m gonna dance for 98 hours straight until I have to hold my eyelids open with toothpicks!
I’m gonna run fifty miles until my legs give out, I fall and I shave my kneecaps on the asphalt!
I’m gonna strut my stuff down the runway until the spray tan and five layers of makeup disintegrate my skin!
I’m gonna eat as many burgers and milkshakes as I can in four hours while trying super hard to suppress my gag reflex!
It’s gonna suck!
But remember, everything is for charity!
And if you support my cause, it’ll all be worth it!

Chill Out, Dude

“Hey dude, we should probably get going soon.”
“Yeah, I just need to get my jacket, hold your horses.”
“The horses aren’t rearing to go, it’s fine go get your jacket.”
“Whoa, what’s with all the hostility?”
“What? I’m totally calm. What are you talking about?”
“There’s really no need to raise your voice. Just chill out.”
“I’m completely chill. Will you please just go get your jacket already?”
“You don’t sound chill.”
“Goddamnit—“
“See! Profanity! You are so not chill.”
“SHUT UP and go get your jacket!”
“Okay, okay. Sheesh. Have you considered anger management?”
“Well, I will now.”

Remorse

Everyone was a whole lot nicer than Tom had imagined. This comforted him a little bit. After all, he was here. He was a normal guy from a normal city who had a normal job and well maybe having a wife in a vegetative state wasn’t so normal. And yes, that’s probably why he ended up here. He never thought of it that way, though. It seemed like an interminable sequence of events, the last culminating in his heroic (figurative) pulling of the plug. Well, there were worse places to rot away for the rest of your life, he supposed.

Lyrics

When the midnight looks all right
When the noontime takes flight
When your hands are the color
Of nuclear waste
 
Over the steeples and
Over the preachers
Over the beagles and
Over the sleepers
 
The miracles are under our feet
The miracles are underneath our feet
 
The nations are breaking scales
The banks can’t move the snails
Cuz everyone’s hands turned green
And you don’t care in the least
 
Into the corners and
Over the mourners
Around the borders and
Over the groaners
 
The miracles are under our feet
The miracles are underneath our feet
They are underneath the ground