It ain't all pizzas and cream

The Girl Next Door

 

I got a room for nine dollars a day. It had a steel door that made a heavy final prison-like sound when it closed. I had a job proofreading at a medical journal and no TV. I told myself I'd toughen up here. Lose weight. Get disciplined. Eat right. Instead I did the opposite, I blew apart like a firecracker. There was this little porn mag at the time called "Gallery" that featured The Girl Nextdoor Contest where guys sent in nude photos of their girlfriends. Each month the mag picked a winner and brought her in for a professional photo shoot, then published the best pix and put her on the cover. I liked that because the women were real. Almost none had had their bodies surgically altered. These were women one could meet in the supermarket or the park. My daily routine during that time was a painful mixture of meds, work, writing, and liquor. I'd wake up hungover and start my day with a Compazine, Zantac, vitamin, aspirin, Coke and a blueberry muffin. If that stayed down I showered, dressed and went to work. The worst of the hangover usually cleared by lunch. Then I ate, worked some more, walked home, had some kind of dinner, and began writing. I gave myself a couple of hours sober writing time each night, after which I'd go out drinking. If I had a few poems written I was happy. After a few weeks, when the stack of finished poems started to mount up, I'd get out my dog-eared copy of The Poet's Market for that year and decide where to send them. My poems were a lot like those girls in Gallery: naked and raw. I sent them out in fat little envelopes, each with a self-addressed stamped envelope. Then I waited.  Every time I received an acceptance letter, I wrote more, drank harder.  When a set was returned rejected, I sent them out the same day to another editor, another magazine. By the end of the year I had 19 published poems and a bleeding ulcer. It was worth it. 

Double Bogie

We'd been drinking the night before and I didn't know the town. In the morning I was sick, sicker than the others, and when someone suggested we go play miniature golf, I was too addled to refuse or argue. We piled into someone's car and drove out to this little course behind a mall. It was August and hot. I felt as if someone had tied a plastic bag over my head. The 18 greens were punctuated by dragons and windmills and bowlegged farmers who tried to sweep your ball aside. As the others played and noted down their scores with their stubby pencils, I could feel the water pour out of me. I became dizzy. Nausea set in. I looked around. There was no shade, nothing. Then I noticed a narrow strip of grass, real grass, over by a fence where someone had planted flowers. I wandered away from my friends. and found a tiny gardner's shack, and there, almost out of sight behind the shack, was a hose. I found the valve, turned the handle, and said a small prayer. Water sputtered out, hot at first, then cool and steady. I put the nozzle over my head and drenched myself, pausing only to drink from the flow before repeating the process. Slowly I began to feel the life creep back into my body. The dizziness and nausea vanished. When I returned to my group, I'd missed two holes of golf. 
"Jeez," someone said, "you look like shit." 
"Par for the course," I said.

Separation

 

At 10 a.m. she came knocking
at the entrance to my cave. 
"I know you're in there," she said.

I was in there, in a darkness
only bears and bats understand.
"Jervermerner," I said.

I let her in. She was wearing
a denim skirt and lavender blouse
and smelled like fabric softener.

"You promised me a walk," 
she said, and raised the room's
lone shade. "And open a window!"

It was the 13th anniversary
of my 13th suicide attempt
and I'd spent the night re-enacting.

"Get your pants on," she said,
"you promised we'd go out today."
I struggled into a pair of jeans.

We spent the afternoon walking
thru the city. I could barely see, 
could barely move my feet.

"I think I have to throw up," 
I said. "Go ahead," she said, "I'll wait."
"No," I said, "it's passing, I'm ok."

She talked about our cats, 
her parents, the bills, the job,
and some new band.

When we got back to my place
it was dark. "I have to go," she said.
The lawyers took care of the rest.

Crack

I remember once being so drunk I let a friend talk me into going to a crack house with him. The lookout immediately pegged me as a cop. Luckily I had a forty with me. "Cops don't drink Midnight Dragon," I said, and raised the bottle. That seemed to do it. I was in. It wasn't really a house, it was more like half a house. The rear of the old brick structure had collapsed, but enough of the front remained to shield the crackheads from an open street view and the drive-by lights of the police. My friend said, "I'll be right back," and vanished down a hall. Ghost faces hovered above glass pipes. When coke burns it has a particular smell, a little like an electrical fire, that settles not in the nose, but in the throat. People spoke in whispers if at all. Then a guy walked up and asked if I needed some ass. "Seven dollars," he said, "young too." I didn't see a woman. "She ain't here," he said, "I'll take you to her." I figured he had his sister chained to a radiator in the basement. That, or I was about to get rolled. It didn't matter either way, I didn't have seven dollars. As I pushed past him and stepped heavily into the street, my friend reappeared, high and nervous. "Got what you needed?" I asked. "Yeh," he said, "let's get the fuck outta here." I drained the last of my forty, then we did.

Far from Luck: The Kirkus Review is in!

Check out what Kirkus Reviews says about my first collection of poems and photographs.

Shadow Play

 

Behind the screen
real life is happening.

While we sit out here, 
munching our popcorn,

Lovers twist in hotel sheets, 
guns blast, cars peel out,

Trumpets play, drunks fall,
the jailed curse, cities burn.

Back there, someone is weeping
beside a hospital bed.

Can you hear her?

 

How Time Flies

 

I had this one-room place 
that overlooked the supermarket 
loading dock. I trash-picked 
a card table, the folding kind, 
to serve triple-duty as a dining table, 
desk, and night stand. 

To be sure I made it to work, 
I kept an alarm clock at the corner 
of the table nearest the head 
of my bed. 

In summer, I slept 
with the windows open, and at dawn 
the alarm would go off like a nail gun 
through my hangover. 

More than once 
I swatted it from the table 
and out the window into the alley 
below. Later that day I'd buy 
a new clock, and the cycle
would begin again. 

I don't remember how many 
clocks met their fate 
on that alley floor 
before I lost the job, 
the apartment, 
or both. 

But the janitor surely must have 
marveled at the sight: 
all those shattered faces 
staring up at him 
as if he were God.

Why I might have to withdraw my support for the President

I think we can agree that the "War on Drugs" has been a failure. Unless its aim was to incarcerate over 1% of the population, waste valuable resources warehousing millions of non-violent inmates, and have no real impact on the ease with which almost anyone can obtain street drugs. (I just bought a bag of weed while typing this.)  

So, given that this silly program has failed to do anything but jam courts and pack penitentiaries, WHY is the DEA still using battering rams and shock tactics to storm homes? And WHY, when DEA gets the WRONG address and terrorizes an innocent family (including an 11YO girl), does the Justice Department (President Obama's Justice Department) continue to stand up for these tactics? 

If you're just catching up, read this.

That gave me time to snort a few lines offf a hooker's ass. Yummy.

OK, so here's my problem. The police are already out of control in America. If you need proof, check Youtube. And the DEA is like the police on steroids. So where is the oversight? When do we try something else? 

Now, I generally like the President, but if even HE hesitates to tell the DEA that they've crossed the line, who WILL? Who else has the power or desire to jerk the leash on these guys? 

No, I'm not voting for Romney. But unless I get some sort of explanation on this issue, I may be writing in a candidate. Like Henry Chinaski. 

 

Honey, I'm home.

Got an email from a high school pal a few minutes ago. He was wondering where I've been. Since I've been right here, I can only assume he was speaking in terms of this blog. Sadly I let the blog fall into arears and Typepad shut it down for awhile. Since I've been posting most of my work (poetry and photos) on Facebook, I let the blog slide. Apologies for that. 

So, for those of you who follow me here but not on my other social media sites, here's a quick recap on what I've been doing...

POETRY

Here are a few of the pieces I've been working on.

PERFECT

We all want to deliver that perfect line.
To a lover as he leaves. To the in-laws,
the collection agent, the guy who stole
our parking spot. We all want words

To leap to our defense and dispense
the killing blow. At the right moment
to go for the throat and leave the bastard
who hurt us choking on his own blood. 

But that's not life. That's every movie 
we've allowed to be our mentor. That's 
Double Oh Seven with a martini in one hand 
and a Walther PPK in the other. 

Just a little too precious, a little too posed,
a little too perfect, a little too rose,
a little too shiny, a little too flounce,
a little too smug and a little too bounce. 

Life is kneeling beside the hospital bed 
of someone you love. Life is a convincing 
forgery. A one-armed boxer. Life is herding 
frogs. Life is pushing the car home.

Life is arriving alone in a strange town 
on the 3 a.m. Greyhound with seventeen dollars 
and two smokes in your pocket and praying 
for the strength to start over.

 

§    §    §

 

THE WEDDING

Even years sober, the drunk 
inside me is alive 
and well. He follows me
everywhere. 

Like last week
we're at a friend's wedding
(he's drinking bourbon,
I'm drinking water)

And he says, "Ice sculptures
are like the deathbed
of someone who's made 
his peace."

He's always saying things
like that. I congratulate the bride
and groom, 
while drunk me

Gets a refill
and the giant swan
at the middle of it all
melts slowly into heaven.

 

§    §    §

 

THE WEAVERS' SON

Childhood never fit him 
well, like a sweater 

woven in haste
and more for its stripe

than its size. He squirmed 
around, tugging

at the sleeves of himself.
In that twisted garment 

was an old man
sipping bourbon

by a fire, longing
to be elsewhere. 

Just imagine the faces 
of his parents, 

when first they saw 
him, the words

dropping like needles
from their mouths.

 

§    §    §

 

PHOTOGRAPHY

A few from the streets...

George

Ramon 

Derek

§    §    §

 

THE FAMILY