hardbound, hard lived, against the rails, she wrote of gaps & pressure, of shifting place & possibly the error of momentum; how were we real like this? she said,
all i can feel are gaps and pressure from where the gaps should’ve been.
all i can feel – i can feel nothing else, this is it in its totality, everything is this feeling
are gaps – empty spaces, absences in a sequence, things in a row then suddenly not, but resuming again; gaps do not happen in isolation, they can only by noticed in a crowd
and pressure from where the gaps should’ve been – pressure from things that are there now, non-space, filled space exerting, pushing back or on, things that do not belong.
there should be nothing there but instead, instead, instead.
Monthly Archives: July 2008
the ghost of it
the ghost of it, remember. it lingers. the crack through the glass, racing towards the lips. we smiled then, as all things. the pitch of a staircase too narrow to navigate. she told me the children were sleeping. were they mine, i ask, to this day. echo this, hips on parchment. hands pressed into a mirror at dusk. i turned suddenly and she had me. and the rain, the steady rain.
lack of
don’t make a habit of it. of trailing through the dark, through the bushes with spider webs tangled around your waist and pine cones snagging your collar. don’t make a habit of waking up out this nightmare and into this fantasy life you are living with an elegant wife and bouncing two children. it is the night that strays you, makes you a vampire, a junkie, a zombie, the lack of sunlight, the lack of life, these long hours into silence where the streets are draped with nothing, no one, not a single fucking sound.
the idea is, to build the bankroll
the idea is, to build the bankroll and unfortunately you’re going to have to do it slowly, dollar-table by dollar-table. you have no choice because you were reckless and impatient.
now sit with the clowns and bear with the show.
in due time having your due
sometimes you want a lazy day, i day full of nothing. what did i do today. i was kind to my daughter and i was also cruel. i am always kind and cruel. to everyone. even the newborn. even my lover. she has suffered the most of all. why do they stay? why haven’t they abandoned me? or is it just a matter of time, is it all in due time.
but there are days like this
but then there are days like this, quick and meaningful, sudden rush off to the beach, haphazard collection of towels and diapers, right there within minutes, waves pounding the shore, and my daughter and i in the thick of it, my wife feeding my son in the sun, and an incredible serenity between each fearsome lapse of the tide.
cracked until not dreaming
and how does madness begin, how does the fear strike you. middle of the night, flash-rush, sudden children straight into certain mortality, death death death and a pair of nines, i swear i screamed for the first time in months, and she was afraid to touch me and i didn’t want to be touched, just tossed and turned the rest of the night, every hour, on the hour, cracked until i no longer dreamed.
ridiculous bad poker
i don’t know what is but since july 4th, after playing heads-up with pops, my poker has been terrible, bad timing, bad read. it’s like i’m just throwing punches against bricks and i can’t stop.
just an asshole
there are times i am utterly appalled by myself. it’s like a switch, a jekyll hyde, and boom, i’m the biggest asshole there is.
cultural accural
ride back home yesterday, old black man driving an older cadillac eldorado on the highway. not in the best of condition, faded red, some of the seams a bit pried apart. those things get what, 10-15 miles per gallon? just getting into the fours and seven dollars on the gallon predicated by decade’s end, how is this thing even on the road to begin with?
how does an object accrue value in a culture?
the stereotype: blacks and big old cadillacs. the man was well into his fifties, fairly fit, thin with the windows rolled down. the car, not well maintained, not necessarily a status symbol. not new and not made to look shiny. so something else, a keepsake. keepsake of what?
when that model was released, it had to be what, late sixties/early seventies, which puts the driver just being born, maybe pre-teen. he might have seen it, but never drove it. typical ownership of that car, up until the gas crisis of the mid-late seventies, maybe ten years. again, puts the driver anywhere from pre-teen to teens, if his father owned one.
and what did his father do that he would need a big ole cadillac to redeem him? what kind of work was available for blacks during that time? custodians, janitors, etc? would explain the caddy, the need to put your sweat into something big and bold and beautiful.
or did someone he admire own such a car? did his friend lend him the car for a date?
on and on it went like this, until the potato was asleep and the banana too and even the wife passed out to the drone of my meanderings.