The Alley Men

I have an evening secret... 

Under a rhyming street light.

live alley men who come apart

Like broken parts, Like wheels that come unwheeled

Minds astir, crazy, unwell, mad city birds fly ahead

I have an evening secret, I stop at the alley and take a breath..

my mind a bit astir, but no broken parts, and the wheels still wheeled

the devil cries inside, compels me...

I roll bye in defiance of the sorcerer's mind

Not yet ready to walk inside the rhyming alley

To sing Psalms to an atheist's Spirit

Not yet ready to walk within an alley's tears and madness

Space and Time

Do you know fallen sons who

fade away

into the silent movie of

whirring reels

of crazy minds 

of backlit flickers eliding space and time

backbeats and rhythm disappear

The band is gone

Projected words between quiet scenes

The band is gone...

Do you know clowning fathers who

cry alone

Eying final credits of their fallen sons...

who ride the whirring silence of space and time

Veins

Each day from work my muscles are torn,

my eyes are weary like heavy weights

my belly is fat, but my stomach is empty...

just like the empty kitchen shelves 

and the blank cold air in my fridge...nothing there but sticky food stains and dead celery...

only a last waxy sleeve of salt crackers... a hollow plastic jar of peanut butter...almost as empty as a beer can... I'm too tired to go to the store...to go get takeout...junkies prey on old working men who walk slow and alone... the crackers will keep me going...the last swabs of Jiffy sticking to the roof of my mouth...even my lips are tired...68 and stocking shelves...the only reason they hire me is cuz labour is in short supply..."I don't want to end up like that old loser"...is what I overhear.. the part time high school kid says so...

Then don't drink so much...and don't treat your wife like she don't matter and she takes the kids 30 years ago and walk's out on you and your crappy apartment and minimum wage job....68 and stocking shelves...sitting on a tired couch, eating crackers and peanut butter looking at Peloton commercials on a 16 inch flat screen...barely able to lift the remote...barely able to fill the bathtub with warm spinning water...

I drop my old, fat body in a half-soapy mess of drowning thoughts...what happens if my arthritis gets worse...what then?...disability pension...not enough money for rent...no more money for booze...homeless

I guess I'm better off than the junkies...they prey on old men...I wonder what goes through their veins...if its painless...the needle tearing the skin and muscles...I wonder if they know its night when the opioids damage their brains...what is high?...what is low?...supposed to rain tomorrow...damp weather makes arthritis worse...the doctors say they don't know why...I wonder if junkies get arthritis...if their arms hurt in the rain...

Butt Gas

                                                             -I-

Sometimes snow streaks from a maddening sky....

Sometimes a maddening sky weaves streets of snow...

                                                                                     -1+1=2-  

 A crazy man...I exited my apartment...pushed by the bland hand of nothingness...nothing but the view of a whirling winter from a single room window...I wanted to touch the cold...I wanted falling snow to touch me...I needed to walk away my numbness...to restore my life like a colour photo retouched by memories...

A small table outside an out of business hamburger joint was empty. I sat there and faced the street...and talked to myself. I exhaled a jumble...a jangle of words that did not stay...that did not build sentences...only crazy random talk...Nothing cathartic...just moist human mouth steam billowing against the cold.

Then she appeared. I thought she was there...I thought she was real...I didn't see an apparition...Or did I?...a female vision in tattered white linen with a sunken shallow face atop a body of hard thinness...forlorn lips that got muted by life but were too sad to kiss...vulnerable, but not against the cold...oh, no...did I create her with my jangled, mangled mouth words...did I create a suffering ghost lady out of vowels and madness...?

"Love tore us apart!" She cried out, her right hand pointing to the sky, her eyes fixed on me. "We loved each other too much. Then he melted like a candle and died. I still hear his voice, see his face. I search inside a hopeless truth. He's gone."

I wanted to say sorry...loss is tough...I've known suffering, too...I hope I can help...but all I did was exhale crazy, jangled words...and she was gone...disappeared in between what I wanted to say...and what I couldn't...

I ambled back to my apartment. I opened a can of mixed beans, and ate them quickly with a plastic spoon. I lay under my covers and tried to sleep early for the night. With my knees pulled up near to my chest I erupted loud gas from my butt. I thought of her...the lady in linen...I could talk straight now...I wanted to say I was sorry I melted like wax...but I didn't die...I wanted to say I was sorry we both slipped into madness...I searching for streaks of snow... she searching for woven love that tore us apart.

 

Time after Time

It was three in the morning when I got a call from a friend:

 

"SC, I got mortality on my brain. I can't sleep. I do internet searches, and I can't sleep."

"What do you mean?" 

"I look for old friends, people I've known and I find they are dead...cancer...heart attacks...suicide...I don't know why sometimes. I feel bad. I feel bad. I wish I could go back in time. Say sorry for the things I've done. And say sorry for the things I didn't do. I know we get older. Some day it'll be us."

"Sure. Someday it'll be true," I added wearily.

"You know, once I heard a writer interviewed. He said you honour people like a fighter who's been beat down to the mat. You lift yourself off one knee and fight some more. That's how you honour their  memory, you struggle for life as much as you can."

"Sure, sounds right," I yawned.

"SC, you know what's real. The sound of the trumpet, like a dying man. He plays jazz against time..."

"Sounds wise...but I got to go to bed...work tomorrow." 

 

I hung up and slept under the dead of night, till the alarm clock rang. I lifted myself off one knee and made my bed...and thought of an old friend, my indifference gone...dancing like a dying fighter time after time...