And They ©

And they lived in a mountainous
forgotten place -
where days and nights
passed easily between them,
and the slow moving shadows of their bygone-selves
were cast onto sepia colored lawns.

They lived in a place
where their bent and private lives
found them stooping beneath apple trees,
to collect into their aprons and pockets,
apples that had tumbled back to earth.

In summers,
they wore July’s jacket of heat,
and on their large and covered porch,
they drank iced tea,
and fanned themselves
with folded crossword puzzles.

In the evenings,
in wooden chairs,
they rocked themselves -
while the sound of faraway screen doors
snapped shut against their frames,
and they listened,
as sounds floated away like lonely ghosts.

And together, in tenacious tandem,
they moved from room to room
from baths to meals and then,
to bed and back again.

And they danced this dance for fifty years -

she in her light and leading step,
and he in his clumsy footing.

Merry Christmas Pops ©

The man kept his elbow on the bar and leaned forward into his cigarette. White smoke spread and rose ceilingward the way a drop of black ink may sink and dip into a glass of clear water. The man wore a heavy red coat with fluffy white trim. He kept his coat on as he sat at the bar. He pulled his elastic-strapped white beard down below his chin and loosened the enormous black belt that buckled in front and served no useful purpose, buckled or unbuckled. The man talked to the barkeep and to other people, but mostly he talked to the barkeep because there were so few other patrons at this hour. The man was a little drunk, but it was okay to be drunk he thought, because he had worked hard and it was over now, and he could get as drunk as he liked with the money he had earned.

The man tapped two fingers on the bar in front of his empty glass.

“Another,” he said to the barkeep.

The barkeep kept his back to the man but looked up and spoke to the man’s reflection in the mirror.

“It’s nearly two Pops, you sure you want another?”

The man looked away from their reflections and tapped his fingers on the bar-top again.
The barkeep carried away the man’s saucer and empty brandy-glass. He returned and wiped the bar clean in front of the man and set out a new clean saucer. In the center of the plate he placed a full glass of brandy. The man put his cigarette down on the saucer and lifted the brandy to his lips. He pushed the saucer and the cigarette away and set the brandy on the bar.

“Come on Pops,” the barkeep said, “it’s Christmas eve, I wanna get home too.”

The man grunted and pinched the cigarette between his thumb and first finger. He tapped the cigarette with his middle finger and flicked the spent gray-white tobacco into the saucer. The more the man drank the more taciturn and disagreeable he became.

“Look Pops, I got a wife and kids at home.”

“You open ain’t you?” The man asked.

“Well yeah Pops but everybody’s gone home now but you.”

“That don’t concern me.”

“I know Pops, but it does me.”

“I got money and you got brandy, that’s all the concern I got.”

“Sure Pops, I get it, but there are lots of other bars open with brandy.”

“But I’m here and you’re here and you’ve got brandy.”

“I could walk you out and show you a fine bar with fine brandy.”

“Bring me another and I’ll think about it.”

“Why don’t you go home and go to bed Pops?”

“Ain’t got no home, ain’t got no bed.”

“Well you can’t stay here all night.”

“Wasn’t planning to. Bring another.”

“No Pops, I’m closing now. Get it? I’m closing up.”

The Barkeep brought a glass of water over and set it down in front of the man.

“Here, drink this,” the barkeep said, “it’ll keep the morning from being so difficult.”

The man pushed his lit cigarette deep into the glass of water so that water spilled out and slopped onto the bar-top. The water-darkened ashes separated from the cigarette and dropped downward and settled in the bottom of the glass. The cigarette rose and bobbed horizontally then, as though it were clinging to a friend, hugged the side of the glass.

The man stood and fished about in one pocket and then another before finding money to pay the barkeep. He held himself steady with a flat palm against the wet surface of the bar. With his free hand the man tossed a few dollars onto the bar. Neither the barkeep nor the man bothered to count the money; it just lay there as an obvious thing that had come between them.

The man turned to go. In his large, black and unsteady winter-boots, the man walked carefully towards the street.

“Merry Christmas,” the barkeep said to the back of the red coat with fluffy white trim, “Merry Christmas, Pops – it’s me.”

Adria ©

Adria came in through the side door where the kitchen opened onto the flower garden that surrounded the patio. The house had been in his family for generations, but now it belonged to her.

She thought about the man and how he clung to his immaturities like a silver trout caught on a taut line. She laughed and remembered how he often used fish guts to fertilize the flowers in the garden.

 

For too long she’d fought him as he pushed his rotting ways,

into her soul,

and tattooed his icky thoughts into her head.

 

She gently closed the door and leaned back with her flat palm pressed against her exit. Her open palm smeared a mud-red shadow of guilt across the door’s solid-white theme.

 

Like sense bedewed upon an imbecile,

his eyes grew large and wide at her first strike.

 

Although he was planted deeply, into her family’s tree, she realized how the shallow ground of his generations was now free to push out the weed that he’d become.

 

No longer would his sick ideas drip,

into puddled pools of idiotic lineage -

where his drunken calloused feet once stood him,

like a troglodyte,

in the sludge,

and stink,

of his own stale genealogy.

 

Satisfied to be rid of him, but now without emotion, she laid the knife on the kitchen counter and began washing the blood and earth from under her broken and tender fingernails.

 

 

While Riding a Bicycle ©

The cemetery was at the top of a plateau and from this side you had to climb a slow path beneath thick trees to reach the summit. Sunlight shown through the trees and lit the path in bright patches. Railroad ties crossed the path every ten feet or so. The wooden ties made it easier to walk up the path, but they made it considerably more difficult to bike over, so I pushed the bike up the hill to the cemetery.

At the height of the hill the trees were cleared away and you could see across the cemetery to the main entrance where a wide arch that rested on stone columns spanned the width of the street. There were no cars coming through the entrance and there were no cars in the cemetery’s parking-lot. The street and the parking-lot were covered with rust-colored leaves. The leaves were matted to the road and it appeared as though they had not been driven over. An arched sign above the street read “God’s Acre”.

The cemetery was surrounded by shrubs that you could smell through the trees before you could see them. A breeze rolled over the crest and carried the scent of the shrubs down to meet you on the way up. All cemeteries have the same smell and the smell is of Buxus. It is a fine and solid odor that reminds you of antique things. It is the sweet aroma of the living and it always makes you nostalgic for simple childhood things that you can never have again. The shrubs were called Boxwood shrubs and a gardener must have kept them trimmed with flat tops and straight edges. There were openings in the hedge so you could walk from one part of the cemetery to another. Sometimes the opening had a little swinging gate in it or a grapevine-covered trellis that you walked through. The grapevines had dried and twisted twigs hanging in them that were easy to pluck out and toss aside without much thought.

Most of the grave-markers in the cemetery were flat, marble slabs that lay only a few inches above the earth. One of the markers was tall and obelisk shaped and stood in forgotten stoicism over the flat markers. The flat markers were dull and weather-worn and seemed to lie peacefully at the foot of the dopey obelisk. The obelisk must have felt foolish standing for so many years above simple slabs that only yawned up through the centuries. The obelisk was chipped and beginning to crumble and showed signs that it would someday lie with the slabs, and then, for the markers, all things would be equal, above and below the earth.

There is never much to do in a cemetery except read the plaques and enjoy the silence. I leaned my bicycle against an ocher maple and then carefully I walked through the even rows of markers. I looked for the oldest plaques and looked to see who had lived the shortest life and who had lived the longest life. The oldest marker was dated 1759 and it was on the edge of the path near the tree. I imagine it was a different cemetery in 1759 and that the tree was not here then. I decided that maybe other trees were here in those days and that made me feel better because, I thought, how sad it is to be buried in a cemetery with no trees.

I collected my bicycle and walked in the direction opposite the leaf-covered parking-lot and away from the arch that hung over the main entrance of the cemetery and I headed back onto the path that came out of the woods.

Going back down the path was easy enough but the ride on the bicycle was bumpy and you had to lean back and work the bike’s brakes carefully so you did not bounce about too much and lose control of the bicycle. The railroad ties were nearly hidden by the fallen leaves and you had to guess at where the ties ended in order to bike around them without slipping from the path. The edge of the path dropped down about a foot and to slip down would not have been such a great accident but it was better to avoid it just the same.

You had to cross a wooden bridge to get to and from the cemetery. The bridge stretched across a smooth shield of creek where the water was most shallow. The creek was at the bottom of the path and its water was always shallow and clear but in the fall it was also frigid. If you put your hands into the water, to turn a stone or retrieve an old bottle-cap, the water would numb and harden your fingers nearly instantly.

The bridge had good solid planks that made the bike’s tires stutter and tremble when you rode over them. Riding across the vibrating bridge was the sort of thing you did not mind circling back to do again, even if others were watching, which they were not.

Coming fast down the path and rumbling quickly over the bridge made the bicycle’s tires and the bridge hum together like old friends. The cold and sharp air pressed your face until there was nothing left to do but to laugh and to feel fabulous about the world around you – and sometimes, while riding a bicycle, all you want is to laugh, and to feel fabulous about the world around you.

Beat Nick ©

His head was tilted back against the seat of the cab. His mouth was open. His eyes were closed. His confused face could be seen as the cab passed beneath lighted things. His face also grayed away as common things cast charcoal shadows that buried him in the cab’s darkness. He sat dumbly in the back of the cab and inhaled smoke from the marijuana cigarette he held in his bloodied hand. The cigarette spun a silky stream of smoke as he breathed out a heavy blow of silver smog. The cab continued forward below the sound of jazz and neon lights. Nick wondered whether he had misremembered a fall he had taken or whether he was mugged in the alley behind Sonny’s Blues.

He believed the younger generation was better musically but he was too tired to think that they were actually capable of this. They had words earlier but had they done this to him, beaten him and taken his music? He thought perhaps they had but he knew, that possibly, it could all be in his head.

He had dreamt of playing well – but hadn’t they all. He knew he was beat and that he had already played as well as he ever would, and it was better than they would ever play, or was it – he couldn’t be sure. Maybe their music was better. Maybe that is why they had fought. He seemed to recall that their ideas were fresh and that their music was groovy and that he enjoyed it. He dreamt of playing well – or had he already thought that.

He thought he had taken a pretty severe beating and when he had gotten into the cab he asked the driver to take him home or to the hospital, he could not remember which – and he did not care now for one location over the other. His confusion brought great geographical challenges that he did not care to consider. He decided that when the cab stopped he would step out, and knowing then where he was, he would know what to do. He did not trust his judgment now, but knew he could trust himself in his earlier decision.

Nick kept his head back so he did not bleed into his lap and wondered if he would die here amid his arid dreams or if he would live and wake and play again. The trumpet was gone and all the sheet-music with it. His trumpet could be replaced, but the music could not.

He staggered from the cab when it stopped and he knew immediately that he would be fine. He would be fine because he was home and being home meant he was not beaten as badly as he had feared. He would go to bed now and in the morning he would buy a new trumpet and start writing the music again, because after all, it was all in his head.