klondike kate

shakey with beans

scrunched up napkin
walnuts and pecans
plus spinach clipped in chopsticks.

.38 special

even though it's one year gone, he still talks about it. i want to say to him that there's other things, that at forty-one, come on, he ought to be able to get on with it. but he can't. he's a wreck. pisces. it's like they're asking for it.

anyway, what's a friend's responsibility after a certain age? i mean, i have my own debacles to manage. but the dude is losing his shit.

folding laundry?

no thanks, i can't handle that stuff.

i shouldn't. it keeps me in the house.

it would make me vomit.

maybe you didn't know how to do it. were you swallowing it?

i don't remember. probably.

coincidental jam jar

that world beyond droll

...i'll go if you pay for my ticket.

how about you buy your ticket and if you decide you like it there, i'll reimburse you twice over.

so obviously you know it'll suck. in which case, i really fail to see why i would go.

well, look at it like it's a gamble. you like to gamble?

sure. but not on bad bets. although, what's to stop me from just saying i like it there, even if i don't?

you're telling me you're of such weak moral character that you'd dissemble for $100? like some swindling mudlark?

fine, big words. does ricky jay know you're stealing his act?

guilty. so what do you say?

let me get this straight: i buy my ticket. i tell you i like the place. you pay me back double. and no polygraph. no wonder reno killed you.

think about it this way: if you get there and it doesn't knock you out of your dirty grey sneakers, then $1000 or 1000 times $1000 won't ever change the fact that ____ ____ _____ because obviously you're ______ ____ ______ __-____ ______ of the morlocks. I'm speaking to you as a friend.

i have no idea what you're talking about.

so you're in?

the kindness of fists

believe me! i tell you i have
only best intentions.

but the results are killing me.
are there any other choices?
those with means see meanness,
complacency that deserves no pity

ask me to the hot show
you can't understand
my antipathy, you think
i am maladjusted. de-looped.

this isn't so. there is
more at play than you know.

but what choice is there for
an average fellow?
just to shake and stir in
locked closets. to endure
accusations, a-poetic arrows.

nope. better beaten by knuckles
than dithered among soft,
mediocre pacifists.

from a motel 6

she's listening to schubert on the tv. sonata in 'd', she tells me.

how do you know that, i ask?

because it tells you on the screen.

what's your favourite tv radio station?

channel 476. it's the nature station. it's just the sound of thunderstorms and birds and wind and things.

the sound of things. i like it.

now i'm listening to a partitas. i don't even know what that is.

how do you spell it?

partitas.

gambling with cats (plus wells)

i swear i need to get duke some valium. he's licking at his fur so hard there are bald spots. i think he's got massive anxiety.

cats are a crapshoot. hey, did i loan you The Time Machine?

No. ... wait a minute, you have a time machine?

aimless through bushes

please give up (you're no good)

I know I saw you today.

I don’t care if

I wish ...

stars aren’t exactly available

these days.

gathering concern

just before sunset, sunshine finally shows up. almost three hours late. alone.

she slides in across from me at the picnic table and roots around in her purse; all pastey and shakey curtained by liquored-out hair.

'so, where is he?' i finally have to ask.

'not coming.'

'not coming. this is unbelievable.'

she gives me the sideways death stare.

'what went wrong?'

'you don't want to know. light?'

no. i quit.'

'i liked you better when you smoked.'

'what's the difference?'

'all the eye contact.'

'you know, there's an envelope to all this. to their patience.' i try to make it even-handed, 'everyone is aware you're under pressure sunshine, but there is gathering concern...'

no reaction unless you count the predictable stonewall. a heavy silence crept over the deserted parkette. mastering my panic ins't one of my strengths and she knows it. i crack as per usual.

'we're fucked now, you realize that? it's complete calamity. are you registering this sun? please, tell me what you think my options are.'

'yes!' flourishing a found match she ignites her 100. 'don't be so dire siggie. it makes you unattractive. life is a comedy remember? you used to say that.'

'please, just tell me what went wrong. tell me something i can tell them.'

she laughs. 'tell them it was food poisoning.'

sunrise seven ago

(world of darkness)

"Damned reborn from the Thousand Hells, the Kuei-jin dance a razor's edge between enlightenment and the powers of the Demon. At the dawn of the Sixth Age, will these vampires redeem the world or feast upon it as it dies?"

ground and pound

i mean, who wants to be beaten to the brink of death?

it's not who wants to be beaten, it's those that want to beat.

but someone has to be the loser...

but the great thing about it, about those guys, is that no one ever believes that they're going to be the loser.

that's sort of the sadness of the whole thing. ugh, it's barbaric. men are such animals.

ha. women aren't?

we don't beat each other to the brink of death for entertainment.

no, you starve yourselves to the brink of fashion.

E.B. has a girl to set you up with.

no.

(be calm) how involved are you?

god, the corners i bang into i deserve.

if you can't write it, you don't know it.

i don't think that's true. what if you can say it?

[redacted]

you can really edit things to death.

yeah, nothing is ever complete.

so you retract the premise?

no, i deserve my pain.

bundling (board or otherwise)

i'm on the trail of the bundling board. what is it? why is it? what greater significance might it have? was it victorian? quite likely colonial. i first heard it mentioned on deadwood. i could google it. but i'm taking a break from looking things up. i'm not against learning. i'm against faux learnin'. whatever the fuck that means. jesus, the quality of my thought is diminishing as i think about it. i should maybe stick to linking to smarter things.

so, a bundling board, basically a wooden slat, was used to physically separate two people laying together in the same bed. when seth bullock's wife -- previously married to his brother, who was killed [fighting the comancheros in Texas] -- arrives in deadwood he installed a bundling board along the median of their bed. she says to him at the end of episode 14 that she removed it. this further complicates seth's burgeoning relationship with alma garrett, a recovering opium addict whose claim he reconnoitered. ha.

bundling (no board) as a practice was the convention used by unmarrieds when no other option but sharing one bed was available to them. it simply means to sleep together with all your clothes on. this i think would be a perfect abstinence campaign these days. not that i'm for it, abstinence. or against it. i suppose you can make a case for anything. i just mean that bundling would be fine angle to take. old is new again, right?

malevolent rubble

this morning i was walking to work when a chunk of cement fell from the sky and landed right in front of me. i could taste the dust it was that close. i felt it whoosh by my head an instant before it crashed down on the sidewalk and for that split second i thought it was a bird dive bombing me. but then the crack sounded and the fragmented bits scattered around and i totally got all shaky and, once across the steet, i had to lean underneath a shop doorway to pull myself together. was it an ambush? i heard no rustling on the rooftops above. there were no dodgey silhouettes. was it just failing architecture? i don't know. but coupled with the dog that attacked me two weeks ago, i'm terrified of what's gonna happen next. things come in threes, right?

amended, april 12: i fully suck. basically i should have just fucking said: today, a chuck of concrete fell from above, narrowly missing caving in my skull, and crashed onto the pavement in front of my nearest foot. that's it. that would have sufficed. fucking over-writers. hate them, hate myself. ha.

the lethargists

one afternoon, back in '88, I was smoking outside the school's cafeteria when a couple of kids wearing burgundy berets and fu-manchus* sauntered up to me. i expected they were trying to score some hash. i'd been empty since f.w.'d got pinched six weeks previous and was ready to put them off. instead they said, 'are you benny craft?' I was and still am, so i nodded and they said, 'some of us are meeting tonight at the kingsway billiards. we think you should come by.'

i had no idea who these cats were. Jameson Collegiate Institute held about 800 kids, not including the evening adult courses. i knew most of them either from river parties, classes or my extracurriculars, but these ones i'd never seen. i said, 'who are you guys?'.

'i'm thurston and this is siggie.' the speaker was the shorter of the two and the prescription intensity of his buddy holly spectacles presented a frightening, owlish cast. siggie was a real tall knob. like if larry bird was a grocery store bag boy instead of an all-star nba genius. neither of them once took their hands out of their overcoat pockets.

'do we know each other?' i asked, as it dawned they might be [xxxxxx].

'i doubt it,' thurston said and his partner shrugged an ambivalent. 'Just be there. Nine o'clock.' They turned and crossed away over the football field. I smoked the rest of my navy cut and watched them take the tracks across the river.

'what was that all about?' my lab partner becky locks spoke to me through lighting up a smoke.

'don't know. something about meeting at the pool hall tonight. you know those guys?'

she exhaled, 'never seen them before. i don't think they go here.'


*only the berets were burgundy. the fu-manchus were normal colours.

titles are easy

this isn't how it happened:

she exhales and says, i'm very close to spitting in Pat's eye. If I didn't already. Pat looks at me and says: women are like the [self-censored], man. did i ever tell you that?

yes you have, i say. it's good we're among friends. pat's presentation has humour, but it's dangerous. he pitches his cigarette and the rest of us do the same. some old boogie woogie is playing as we come back inside.

there's two of them hipsters at the end of the bar. they're in the middle of him lobbying her for a new beginning. he's pushing his porkpie cap back on his head, like he's fed up. she catches me looking at her and sends it right back at me. i was in a richer place than usual tonight and even there, people have drinking problems.

meanwhile, Pat's arrayed a slew of booze against any possibility of a functional tomorrow. I know he's got no money and i look this at honey and she mouths, i only gave him bar scotch.

then he tries to tip his tip-out. she pushes it back to him. everyone promises each other how great they are.

all these fucking human tragedies, she says to me in particular, and bangs down a round of carbombs. what am i supposed to do with love like this?

pajanners logo

calamity jones

you sure how to fuck shit up for yourself, don't you?

seems that way.

what excites me the most about your self-destruction bent is how creative you are about it. you're like the ricky jay of disaster.

thanks. that means alot.

well, be seeing you.

yeah. see you.

terminate the pan

...the problem of other minds

we're both at work on the phone, talking low, when she asks, 'how do other people's minds operate?'

'i don't know,' i say. 'you should ask the Philosopher that question.'

'i mean, how many containers of thought can your mind hold? at the same time? do you ever think about that?'

The Meridian's display says we're going on 53 minutes. I want to say, of course i think about that. I think about shit like that all the time and it's totally driving me crazy. i want to say how sometimes i almost know everything. but i know she'd recognize it as hollingshead, who said it better than i ever will. i honestly think i'm going insane these days.

i say, 'i think i'm going insane.'

'you know what our problem is?' she tells me, 'it's that we consistently confuse our gifts for limits.'

'isn't that just another way of saying we want what we don't have?'

'i'm making us an appointment with the astrologist, okay?'

'what about the tenth planet? have they incorporated that yet? am i still a pisces? what good can come from astrology anyways?' i sound more desperate than i thought i was.

'oh shit,' she says. 'i got another call. call you later.'

(it's like saying) neils bohr was good with numbers

i keep hearing that heart song in my head, magic man. and though it's got nothing to do with magic, i'm obstinately using it as the soundtrack for my imaginary conjuring career. naturally, when one makes a statement like that,.

trying hard to avoid lifting more lines from Larry David...

the truth is, i'm not really qualified to write or talk about very much at all. there is a modern phenomenon, or maybe pandemic is the better word, in play. it's the idea that if you've read something, perhaps a critical review of a concert or a biopic of a well-regarded writer or painter, there is a tendency to pass this knowledge off as though you actually gained it through some direct experience with the subject itself.

see the ornette coleman review...

so what do i say about ricky jay? obsession does not beget coherence; it tends to further obscure the subject. drowning in proximity or whatever. my learning is like sunshine through rippled windows.

picsces: our blessing and curse. instant understanding and empathy. the ability to free associate. no idea or concept or emotion exists as a constant for us. BUT, we find it impossible to stop time long enough to completely encompass and codify our ideas. this lack is an ultimate frustration. so we lash out. keep trying to make nothing into something.

(ricky jay!)

.

the favourable lie

ok. today's the day i break out the clubs for 2006. as i mentioned at the end of last season, this year my in game focus will be to become a wedge assassin around the green. i will have NO FEAR! i'm sick of giving up strokes because i yip my pitches and chips. it feels like when you realize you've locked your keys in the car.

also, I have set the following goals, though not neccessarily as ordered:

1) control the rage.
2) practice relentlessy.
3) break 100.
4) reduce handicap by 6 strokes.
5) predictable fade.
6) get lessons.
7) shotmaking.

man, can't you just feel the excitment!?

we are ratios

i'm almost too tired to write anything. but tonight i was in the market and with it raining and the fight i got in, i figured i had to try a little at least.

actually, this is impossible because i don't really remember anything. except that she bit me on the face, and that's the most action i've had in a while. also, it seems i have a large rip in my pants.

small case

so i'm trying to pour f.w. into a cab but he's resisting rescue, plus he's devolved into paranoid maniac mode.

'you're mocking me! i know you're mocking me!'

'i'm not mocking you. you make good sense. but it's time for you to go home.'

he's giving me the patented anxiety glare: 'you know how i am! i just can't take that kind of misappropriation in public. they just shouldn't be allowed to represent like it's first-hand knowledge when they weren't even born then!'

i lean over to the driver's side window and tell him the address. through the rearview, i catch his eyes flicker between f.w. in the backseat and me. still he takes the bill i'm offering.

'you only think you know the pain!' f.w. yells* out at a strolling uptown couple. oncoming headlights glint off his waxy skewed lenses. 'how the hell are you supposed to buy a suit on sneaker wages!?'

their pace didn't change. utterly no reaction. as if they knew we would all be leaving soon anyway.

i say, 'f.w., inside voices dude.' then to the driver, 'he won't puke, don't worry.' he looks resigned.

just before i close the door f.w. whispers: 'you'll never see me again.'

he was both right and wrong.

the ladder and the gutter

--then the union was locked out, remember?

that's right. i left for ethiopia that day i think. was that the 26th?

the 26th, yeah. i think so... because of 'forgone collisions'.

ha. i forgot about that.

...

...

she saw how he was looking past her. he glanced at her crossed arms and pale hands.

--are you?/have you?-- they both started and stopped. he shaded his eyes against the long fall sunshine.

i heard you've got a show in the market.

she brightened and softened, yeah. how'd you hear?

you know, i'm around. he meant it as in neighbourhood news, but she took it as an offer and her eyes hit the pavement.

well, it was good to see you.

yeah, you too.

coffee pot sunday III

skinny bitch duel

can't buy a fight

amazing christian magic

it just dropped (it didn't break)

groper and dirty c had a big plan but it was derailed. typical. actually not so much derailed as forgotten and slept through. still the perogies, dead like me, and the seven drink selection turned out to be nice.

past, the porch

i will probably stay

'dude, i gotta get the hell out of this place.' benny's hunched over, looking around his shoulders, sloshing his stout into his shirt cuffs. he's got that frantic look and i really don't have the patience for him tonight.

'let it go benny, you're not going anywhere.' sometimes when you're sick of someone you just push their buttons automatically.

his eyes glow like pinballs and he pulls out his exacto knife. 'that's the problem f.w. I'm not going anywhere.'

honey sees this happening from behind the bar but we both know benny's just dramatic. she's still in love with him i can tell. he doesn't even notice her anymore. it drives her crazy. i can't stop thinking about her, but i'm not benny and that's that.

'you guys want to do a shot?' honey says and bangs down three tumblers in front of us.

'how about a car bomb?' benny looks at me and i shrug sure. it's all going to turn out the same again anyway.

latino kings II

last night i saw the gangster again. i tapped him on the shoulder to say hello, remember me and he almost cut me with an industrial exacto knife. quickly, i showed him the magic trick and that defused him. close call though.

life is great

i'm thinking while i'm running out of the hospital that no matter how much blood i lose, i won't be sorry. it doesn't take long until i'm shaking and i have to lean against this lady. immediately she starts yelling something about warren beaty or the cops so i force myself into the future. i don't know what god's plan is for me, but i'm happy for anything i can use.

way to ruin it

your reach is as good as a spill right now. i can tell.

watch it. i'm a magician.

no you're not.

yes i am.

yeah, one trick.

ok, bring me a diet coke.

carbombs?

i'll meet you there.

(for these two kids, there was never any reason for reason. they never saw an ugly moon in their lives.)

come on put it on (take it off)

[redacted]

you don't belong (and then you did)

-don't make me reget this benny.

even now she made me nervous.

-just let me show you my magic trick.

-oh god benny. get serious. everyone's sick of you.

ill between naps

we'll [***] blackberry.

high enough to concentrate

[no] going mobile

i was thinking, the payphone is like the vinyl of telecommunication.

good one. have you read that DFW article, about the inhumane murdering of lobsters? how the hiss you hear when you drop them in a pot of boiling water isn't just air escaping, it's the lobster's death cry?

no. you really have to be something to worry about lobster screams though.

i guess. why do you think there are so many boxers nicknamed 'sugar'?

maybe it's because it's the 'sweet science'.

yeah, maybe... maybe it's standard appellation for fighters named 'ray'.

maybe. there's no 'sugar bob', or 'sugar carl'?

um, not that i know of anyway. oh wait, there's a sugar shane. he's a contender i think.

huh. so, have you seen your crush lately? you talk to her yet?

no, not yet. i think i should just kidnap her iraqi style.

you're so good sometimes with your language. i have the feeling that it would work for you. the kidnapping thing.

you're a medium. and by that i don't mean average.

you're gifted and by that i don't mean retarded--

more less

the latino kings

you wouldn't know he was a gangbanger. the kings cap just made me figure he was into basketball. maybe because of the artest trade. but then he showed me his tattoo and it was clear that we had completely different takes on the meaning of shooting percentages. i knew he thought i was chickenshit. but i changed his mind. that's my talent.

old reliable

les is telling me about how the guy promised to meet him outside the bar on March the fourth. Les says how he got there and waited almost 8 hours, but the guy never showed up. he was supposed to have provided a lunch and a guitar. Les isn't stupid, and even though you'd see a loser - just saying the truth - he isn't any different from you or me. i would have waited there too.

in the tall grass (rock crawlers unite!)

grasshopper was hopping to work early one bright blue morning when he heard his name being called.

hey grasshopper! grasshopper! wait up!

it was tiger! normally, tiger didn't pay much attention to orthoptera, but today was a different kind of day. he'd been hearing some things and was determined to clear it up.

grasshopper paused pre-hop. His first thought upon seeing tiger bound towards him like a vicious, giant candy wrapper was: oh shit, what did i do? grasshopper had a guilty conscience at the best of times, and even though he couldn't recall any transgressions against tiger, he realized that with all his heavy drinking of late, anything was possible.

Tiger's tongue lolled out like a wet kite as he pounced up to grasshopper. Whew, he says. Glad i caught you. I've been calling your name since the drinking hole.

sorry, guess i didn't hear you. what do you need tiger? grasshopper tried to keep his antennae from trembling. nothing is as scary as talking to a tiger when you don't know his agenda.

i heard you've been talking shit about me grasshopper. i want to know why?

oh no way! i would never do that tiger! he really said it like he meant it, but grasshopper knew full well that deep down he was a shit-talker.

look i don't care, just. stop. it. tiger growled out each word like a bite apiece. He leaned down tighter and tighter to grasshopper until his warm big cat breath almost destroyed the arthropod on the spot. or else i'll remove you and your chicken legs from existence, tiger snarled. his clover claw paw raised, blocked out the sun. grasshopper prompty fainted.

when grasshopper came to, it was cobalt dark and he just perceived mantis lurking over him.. wha- what are you doing? he said scrambing back, still woozy from his encounter with tiger.

mantis clucked and clicked his mandibles. shhh my pet, don't speak. his spiney forearms extended like lovers towards grasshopper's thorax. crazily all grasshopper could think at the moment of his death was: 'the dude abides'.

but! just then mantis hissed and rotated his eyeballs 180 degrees. Bats! he screamed and grasshopper felt hot fur whoosh by him and mantis was gone.

christ, what a brutal day, he thought to himself. i've got to [cut down on the] drinking.

dumb it down

i say break it.

then i'll have to fix it.

well, otherwise you're staying out here and freezing.

what would i do? put cardboard over it? i don't think i have any duct tape.

just make up your mind already.

ok, you break it.

fine.

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

nebraska on queen

Benny’s all bummed out I can tell. I know it’s about the girl, but he would never admit it. it's why i like him. I say, let’s go have a drink at the spot and he lets on like he won’t but he always does.

crassus and the steamcleaner

whether or not crassus ever said "it's good to have goals"* i do not know. I sort of figured he'd have uttered a few bon mots in his time. i mean, pompey had 'who needs laws? i've got guns' and of course caesar with 'men believe what they want' (i paraphrase here, having limited knowledge of latin). so crassus had to have something. maybe it was more like, "watch out for your rivals". who knows. after all, we're talking about a guy who had molten gold poured down his neck in the deserts of mesopotamia. so anything is possible.

anyway, i only picked up on crassus because i wanted to give my appliances a feeling of belonging to something more than just the run-of-the mill society grid. i figured if they felt imbued by the spirit of the roman triumvrate or had a sense of 'the will to power' and all that, it might energize their performance around the house. that's all i meant with the crassus line.

my bissell

is my new favourite thing. bissell is a brand. they make steamcleaners. specifically, the 12 amp proheat powersteamer. even though if you pressed me, i would rank it second behind my washer and dryer for most loved appliance; large or small. I count washer and dryer as a single unit. much as we commonly consider the oven and stove as one. nonetheless, my new excellent 12 amp proheat powersteamer steamcleaner has, thanks in part to the warm weather, overtaken spaceheater as a top contender in the MLA race. in the sub-category of 'small' it has to be number one. i love all my appliances, of course. but i think it makes it more interesting if you have contests for (and between) them. like crassus once said, it's good to have goals.

the culprit

i spotted the culprit
under the sink
stolen morsels
clutched by pink paws.
old fat slow cat
you are not earning your keep

bad analogy

why do you hate me?

i don't hate you anymore than a cat hates a mouse.

so now i'm a mouse?

that's not what i meant. i meant, we're just pre-disposed to this dynamic. it's our vibration. a relationship is like matter. it needs to move to exist. and what we've got here is a dead gravitron.

you're such a jerk, you know that? for a short guy, you'd think you'd be more thankful. and by the way, i thought you said motion is illusion?

look, you can't fight strings. i accept my strings. you're going to have to come to terms with that. get mad at particles if you want, see what good it does you.

let's see what good ripping off woody allen does you.

fine.

fine.

thin gin

another morning meddle
unsigned editorials
scolding, jealous elements
plague her days
with darts and slaps
as if to say
your words today don't
satisfy. but
they're not for you
to claim.

dark stars

i named your wrists
in bed you insisted on
further installments
we could not invent

shit makes bliss

loving you was
like picking flowers
in a war zone

back on the bottle

-you imagine yourself better than you are. it's a typical modern delusion.

really? wow, did you just come up with all this?

-mediated accomplishment appears easy because it disguises the effort. the genius of televised achievement is-

look, mcluhan; sorry to interrupt, but i'm really not interested in talking right now. i'm sure your ideas are great, but i just came here to have a drink and enjoy some empty space. i'm not trying to be rude.

-asshole.

looking up at guitars

awesome or the problem of other minds

it's f.w. calling, the display tells me so. it also tells me i've been sleeping for nineteen hours.

-yeah.

-dude! what happened to you? you disappeared after the van caught on fire...

-the what?

-someone lit the econoline on fire and it spread to the club; three fire trucks came. we were evacuated. a blonde got trampled. it was the insane! she was ok. benny took her home. you don't remember any of that?

-i don't remember. there was a fire? where was i?

-ha. it was awesome.

hud bannon

dunk it stamp

one time there was this kid named stamp and we were up on the schoolhouse roof waiting for him to come along. when he did, we dropped a melon on his head.

once, stamp was saying how he could dunk. so we said, sure show us. he did. he took it to the rim and he dunked it. then he pulled up to showboat and shouted stamp!' but as he went to shake off it, he lost his grip and took three of his front teeth out on the rim on the way down. blood everywhere.

another time becky went to take a drink from the 26er or SoCo and she cracked a piece off her tooth. she spits it out on her hand and goes, 'hey there's a piece of rice in the bottle!'

under white

these rumpled cold sheets
only darken bright dawns
a cotton-swathed coffin
thin gin headaches and arms
all our corners now banks
all those colours bled grey
flaunted failsafes and foolproofs
cast adrift our mainstays
so like perseus* we wreck
our love's temples and halls
let loose mischief and chance,
embrace panic and loss
i've made envy in beds
and sure haunted old haunts
been snarled by harlots
and like pan left to wont
there's no future in lovers
our shared friends fall away
drifting lonely in rivers
plaintive reeds that remain

the fat

every June at my highschool, the seniors were allowed to put on a party on school property that traditionally was known as "the fat". No one really knew where the name came from, or if it meant anything. obviously it could have referred to mardi gras' fat tuesday, but there was never any confirmation of that. Some people, including my mother, thought it was a nasty acronym. though she'd never come out and say it, i figured moms must have thought it meant "fuck all teachers" or something equally youthful. for some reason, she believes that if the initials of your name spell a word, it means you are destined for good fortune in life. only recently did i find out that the mother of my hero, donald e. westlake, also holds the same superstition.

anyway, the best fat was probably the 'olympig fat' of 1990. all fats had to be themed and they began with a series of day-long events, culminating in the friday night 'fat dance'. basically it was an excuse to hang out by the river, get loaded and run amok through the school. for the olympig fat we staged a mock series of olympic-like events. i can't remember them all that well, but among the highlights was the one that involved duct-taping niners to the cafeteria wall and wagering* on who would stick the longest. the contest proved to be an impressive display of duct tape's power. The longest taped person lasted the whole lunch period. we had to cut him down though because he was slipping through the tape to the point where it had noosed around his windpipe and he was turning purple.

*normal school rules didn't apply during the fat.

louisiana purchase

last night i learned that you can't eat as much meat as you think you can. especially when it is smothered in truffles and unpasteurized cheese. however, i would like to point out that sometimes the journey is more important than the destination and this is true also with hamburgers.

parking break cave

peruvian silver, 1968

f.w. calls and says: i just found out about the rat king! look it up on wikipedia!

this feels like straying from the plan, but i do. and it's astonishing.

melba toast

benny was always too proud of that olds. when he had to give it up, that pretty much wrecked him. he really had nothing by the time we got to him. all that was left were the wheels and his crazy old lady. so you couldn't blame him for loving the car; it was a classic ride. hulking four barrel, four speed, dual exhaust, 455 cubic. like a big fucking orange gorilla. we busted him up bad before he agreed to let us take it off his hands. we even had to look at his girl a bit.

of course it would have been better for everyone if he'd just cried himself to sleep after that. lesson learned and all. don't cross the cooperative. but not benny. puckish little fellow.

m theory

jaws

right in the wrong spot

guys, let's just put it back, ok?

here we go again...

for chrissake beans, will you stop with the put it back business. we're in way too deep now for that.

i just don't get why we even needed this thing in the first place. you never said anything about it when we agreed to the plan. what's so important about it anyway? i'm telling you, i've got a bad feeling...

everyone just settle down. benny'll be back in an hour and then we'll start the thing up and get it to f.w.'s garage and then we'll figure out how to deal with the cooperative.

and if benny doesn't come back? what do we do then? what do we do then!?

shut up beans. that dope's got you paranoid. just do it like we said, no one gets hurt, and we'll blow through it like smoke through a pipe.

look, f.w., maybe beans has a point. why don't we just leave the thing here? no one will know it was us.

we can't. benny said we need this thing. otherwise everything is for nothing. all we have to do is just sit tight and wait for him to come back. alright?

benny's not gonna' come back.

jesus christ. shut up beans! shit. why don't you go wait in the car or something.

there are no sparticles...

benny and f.w. as they prepare to eat their take-out meals

Alright, get ready to lose.

It’s not a competition, man.

Sure it isn’t. You know, that’s your problem dude.

What’s my problem?

That’s your problem. That’s why you’re not going anywhere. You don’t get that everything is a competition.

Take-out food is a competition? How are we keeping score exactly? Biggest mouthful? Fewest chews? Most efficient heimlich?

You see, you mock because you don't understand.

Well, maybe we’re just different. You ever think about that?

No. We’re all the same. Until you learn to accept that, you’ll always be a loser.

How come you seem to know so much about me?

You know, while you sit around all day thinking about black holes and gluons and the meaning of nothingness or whatever the fuck it is you think about, I’m out there fucking getting laid and making money and getting it all set up. Why the fuck do you think you’re so unhappy all the time?

I’m not.

You totally are. You’re a fucking drag all the time these days. And you know why?

I’m sure you’re going to tell me.

Fucking right I am. Because you’re not getting fucking laid is why. When’s the last time you had sex?

I don’t know.

You don’t know? You don’t know. How can you not know? You know when’s the last time I got laid? Right before I fucking came over here.

Sure you did.

Fuck off. Look, remember that last girl, whatshername?

Yeah.

What do you think she’s doing right now?

Getting laid.

Exactly. And what are you doing right now?

Not getting laid.

So you see my point young grasshopper?

Yeah, I guess I do. You're saying that everything is meaningless without love.

Jesus christ, you really are an idiot.

billet in time

a featherless affair

pickled and cute a
duke among drunks
no egrets, he would say
by the side of blue pools
no egrets in my heart
they've all flown away.

the unplayable lie

-what am i supposed to do here? benny swiped at some loose twigs and weeds with his wedge.

he and f.w. were standing deep in a tangled copse alongside the fairway of the eighteenth. birds were chirping. They were staring down at benny's titleist that had rolled up against what looked to be the decomposing body of a middle-aged greenskeeper.

-how long do you suppose he's been here? f.w. sucked on his golf tee, evaluating the corpse.

-the more important question f.w. is, Can i consider this an unplayable lie?

-don't you think we should report this? i mean, it is a dead body.

-sure, we'll report it, after the round. i could break ninety.

-you are having a good round.

-good? it's unbelievable! did you see that fade on 15? and the birdie on 12? i'm on fire here. fucking dead body. i'm still counting this round towards my handicap.