sub-better versions (fake swings)

benny throws another armful of my clothes into the drum and says, ok pass the gasoline. i hand him the red plastic gascan and he soaks the barrel's contents -- most of my wardrobe, some letters, books; the sundry evidence of a near past -- and then we both step back aways.

you want to say anything? he says, a redbird between his fingers.

nope. burn it already, i say.

he strikes the match off his thumbnail and tosses it into the drum; the works erupt. through the warbled air and hissing embers, his rictus grin makes me think i've been played. i like it about benny that you never really know whose side he's on.

there's a crowd down the street milling like geese. benny says he can get us past the line. I'd rather watch the stuff burn but that's not part of the deal. you've got to show her, he says and fake golf swings again. head down, like a shortstop, he mantras. i hate golf. goddamn bourgeois. but i like it when benny does his fake swings.

we go to see the band. they're written up in the ny times magazine so it's all pretension to me and i can't stand them. benny says that nothing a person likes or doesn't like is ever really totally about the thing. i think it's not so complicated. when you hate something, you hate it. it should be like that.

way past last call we leave for nowhere. the fire's burned out and it's colder outside than i thought, even though it's february. it's because we haven't eaten since friday. and also because i just burned all my clothes.

perilous whisky

...The first taste affects all the members of the body. Two spoonfuls of this liquor is a sufficient dose and if any man should exceed this, it would presently stop his breath and endanger his life...
explorer Martin Martin, 1695

deep sea anxiety

i guess all i'm saying is that i wish i had some kind of purpose.

where would you keep it?

keep what?

your porpoise.

no, purpose.

oh.

...

...

i hear the club sandwich here is nice.

agent 289

they don't call it dope for nothin', she says

i'm turning cold blue, but there's one last thing...

let it go benny, you aren't moses. not unkindly she's watching me fade.

don't tell frenchie... the words are softer than breath but she blinks. i wish there was a finer way to hurt her.

would you like to know the secret of the universe? she's teasing me now. i can't tell the difference between the sky and her eyeshadow. her teeth are tiny tombstones.

what do you know about it? my voice is as small as a molecule. i thought you were a bartender.

when she smiles it is beyond anything i ever thought possible.

oh benny, you fall in love too easily. another recrimination stolen from my archives. i hate it how she always knows a little more about everything than i do.

you're like the ugly girl in the playground. you give it away to anyone who comes along. don't you know that it only matters when they can't have it?

words have become ropes now. i suddenly remember every book i've ever read. every letter i ever wrote. clutched tighter by them than any armed embrace. our blinks are slow heavy honey. motes of wisdom hang in the space between our lives.

so long benny. we're the exact opposite of each other, you know that?

she turns about on her heels as quick as a lifespan. i try to breathe her in as she steps away but my lungs are dead fishes. i'm too tired to do this anymore, i realize. i know everything now. I know how wrong and right i am and i no longer care about the dissonance. how people can turn from everything to nothing is no longer a mystery i need to resolve. yes, we are all opposite.

acid eyes

f.w. is telling us about the time he got maggots in his eye. they fell out of an old ham sandwich he scrounged from the alley. it was awful, he said.

i'm only half listening because i'm flashing back to an acid trip i had in highschool. I was with the band, side-stage at the annual Star Search. The Lords of Metal. Right before we went on, Zia had asked me in a whisper if I was dropping chemistry. I had no idea what she was talking about; my grades were straight A's. But everything Zia said to me sounded like 'I love you'. So I said, sure. To be cool. She pale palmed me a mchit and told me to put it under my tongue. After the show all I remember is floating in her pool listening to 'give me another chance'. i never went back to school. which is why i guess we're eating from cans.

disarm you

you gave me a present today and it was unexpected and undeserved.

yes.

so you know that--

--yes

ok.

grasshopper

i sometimes feel like i can't carry a thought through to its conclusion.

that's a terrible thing.

exactly.

do you ever have those times when you're introduced to someone you already know, but you don't want to see them again?

yes.

do you ever have those times where you're introduced and then you have to eat shit just to be socially even?

you can't win.

i know.

needs make maps

i was wrong about Denmark. Let's get that out there first. I need a mapmaker and one that can predict the future as well. Lay out my roads that i might avoid incident. I keep giving up pinball. Especially since it went and got that push-button trigger. Why does God care about posture? I'm not speaking of hunching. I believe we were meant to act on hunches.

fake meat place

why is everyone biting everyone? i have been bitten twice now. and so have my friends*. why?

*not neccessarily twice

erasers and negs

i had the dream again. i'm an eraser. my job is to track and neutralize the 'negs'. these are like proto-humanoid zombies designed by 'scripts' to cull humans for some dark purpose. i have not yet in the dream been able to determine the ultimate design guiding these agents in their nefarious commissions. i have not percieved either the controlling mind behind the scripts and the negs, nor its agenda, though in each occurence of the dream i feel somehow that i am getting closer. the actions of the negs seem to be more panicked, less coherent and discrete. only i seem to be able to identify a neg. i am armed with some kind of anti-matter disrupter. i don't know how i came to possess it, nor the science behind it. it is certainly advanced technology. notwithstanding this opacity, i am an expert with it and the negs have learned to fear me. the scripts -- which seem to be of a more intelligent and malevolent order -- have begun targetting those around me in an attempt to isolate and eliminate me. this last dream i scrambled to prevent disaster but they managed to destroy my house and almost murdered my parents. i cannot explain to anyone what is happening because how could any of them believe me? so i find myself with narrow escapes based on preposterous concoctions. luckily i managed to convince my parents to spend some time up north at the cottage. this safely allowed me to engage in a full-out combat with three separate negs disguised variously as a chauffeur, my boss (who tried to seduce me into complacency. it almost worked!) and my 'best friend' F.W. I suspect they (the scripts) actually terminated these people and replaced them with 'negative replicates'; hence 'negs'. but i can't be sure. i can trust no one. i have found no allies. i don't know how long i can hold out. but what choice do i have? i am the eraser.

300 plus keepers

you'll think i'm crazy but if my dreams of becoming a professional mentalist don't pan out, i may turn to crabbing. i just really like the lingo. and the boat mothers.*

*liar. i reference here television; i am humiliated. deadliest catch.

post christmas cupcake hand grenade

my date's been eyeing my fries and i say, do you want a fry? she says no and then, you know what your problem is? i say, sure.

split marbles

whenever i bend
... down to pick a thing up
and crack fore
heads with you i
know we were meant to
be.

defined by nickels

it's easy to carry around a bottomless bucket, but you can't put anything in it.

majudo

I, demon (negative)

ricky jay is still my number one magician... [xxx]

flow with the go

you don't want
the squeaky chair
at the bar unless
it's in the corner spot.

street chips

jimmy the greek once said that the only feeling that even comes close to the thrill you get from gambling and winning is the plummet you get from gambling and losing.

the unthinkable

the restaurant just opened and they haven't yet put out the rollups. my date whispers, 'there's no one here', in a tone that suggests we're surrounded. the onion rings arrive hanging from a little metal piece of art, which also cups two shallow dipping bowls filled with what tastes like ketchup, shrimp cocktail sauce and horseradish. Our waitress' name is Lex. I make no jokes, though she looks like the type that would open other people's lockers in high school. she's got nothing to say to me either except the basic specials. my utensils are magnetized and i use the knife to draw out some loose change and nails from my pockets. my date is duly impressed.

when we're done rearranging the frites and slaw, i ask Lex to wrap it up and she advises us to do it ourselves. Wouldn't want them to touch my food, she says of the kitchen staff. we depart without leftovers, but i pocket a fork.

Stepping out into the mall is a business of etiquette. Too few appreciate the giving qualities I bring to my pedestrian ambles, but i am always aware of traffic and flow. I am like a river among rocks. So it is a short step to madness for me when oncomers disdain to appreciate the delicate art of passingby. too many times i have tasted murder on my teeth as a parcel or elbow is delivered into my path by an oblivious walker. learn to merge! i choke back the scream. this is what happens in the mall. if you are not a survivor, you should not come here.

not for the first time, my date compliments me on the parking spot i secured. and she is right. it is a fine parking spot. but all things end.

low dragging knuckle fellows

benny says, i realize my problem is that i am fucking jealous of everyone. i can't even remember how it was before. I mean, i never gave a fuck about whose girlfriend it was, or your car or fucking shoes or what the fuck. And now i fucking can't stand it. the world of guys is after my chick and i can't afford to fight them off. it fucking sucks. i should have gone to law school.

that's the truth.

later she's wrapping my scarf around her neck without thanks and she says: i just don't like how you do things.

i think of benny and i think of how i don't like how we do things either.

pictures at 11

steady

steady drinker
unsteady

the weak force

dark matter confides
a truth about us
held tight by the weaker
produced against doubt
lit up like an eyeball
beguiled by gems
stoned pasts and dimensions
ideated by M

varmint and stout