Where is my lady bird singing song now when i am forsaken to wait eternity in hellish bus stations? when i am damned along with the diridon bums who dribble their last drools of sanity down grubby chins as they die in the night under a mountain of crushed aluminum, frail pale bodies laying limp in yesterday's newspaper deathbed, and of course lining their heads, the headlines read: "Berkeley continues to Outlaw Homelessness." Outside, neverending rain how I wish you meant a new beginning but ceaseless, you are this perdition's infernal partitions, dropping like daggers with the sharp ends down and cold to burn immurring us in a grimy gulag of filthy floor tiles and all of us alone, nothing but lost souls waiting for a bus that will never come -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- BLACK HOLES// wet roads reflecting orange street lights, driving down highways in the middle of the night after a good show with all of our friends, sitting around and talking and laughing on the living room couch - white balloons, fresh baked cake, wine. disappearing while listening to "this must be the place"; she gets home and out of her truck and into her bed and doesn't realize i'm gone, she doesn't even remember me at all, because i never existed in the first place. she undresses and gets under the covers, reads a chapter in her book, places it on the night stand, turns her lamp off, and falls asleep to the steady beat of the rain dripping off the rooftop, hammering down on the window sill. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ONE DAY I WILL KNOW [but i probably won't]// One day I will know what goes on in sweaty L.A. apartments. On March mornings when the summer heat has showed up early, reflecting blinding light across car windshields and ringing metallic under a dozen dirty palms sliding down smooth hand rails. The window facing the fire escape is cracked open, there's a dusty fan wedged between. It's blades swirl hopelessly to move the hot air out and the cool air in. Inside, she lays next to her sleeping lover, her head propped up on one fist, a blank face dripping perspiration, staring past an oscillating fan perched on a wooden chair next to the bed. She furrows her brow and in her head she asks it questions. "Should I get out of bed yet?" she says, not moving her lips. The fan blows her brown curls backward and slowly turns it's head away in disapproval. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- NEIGHO POPS// "Macchu Picchu," my dad says to the television set, glowing across the room. I don't understand why we can't turn the thing off during dinner. "What is Tangier?" it says to itself. No. "Macchu Picchu," my dad says again. "What is Honduras?" it says to itself. Again, no. "Macchu Picchu!" my dad yells. "What is Macchu Picchu?""Correct." When it comes to Jeapordy, my dad is mostly right. He prides himself on intelligence, so it makes sense that he's a Naval Intelligence Chief. Across the dinner table he and my mom are now arguing over the steak. Mom says its not cooked enough. Dad says it tastes better more raw, full of juice rather than burnt to a rock hard crisp. "They slapped the cow, now it's ready to eat." He thinks he's funny. I can't even bare to watch him gnaw at his piece of super raw meat, blood red, dripping and soft. My mom takes her pieces back over to the stove and cooks them again in the pan. "Scott, what are you doing?" he asks me sternly, not bothering to lift his gaze from his plate. I resist the smart ass urge of telling him I'm trying to eat my dinner and instead remain quiet. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PHOSPHORESCENTS// "where are you?" "i'm standing by the boar." "the what?" "i'm over by the boar. and the drum. it's really loud, i'm right next to it." "is the drum moving?" "yeah, but i'm right by it now. i'll go stand next to the boar, where are you?" maybe i've seen too many slow-motion movie parade scenes but the moment i catch sight of her across the river of wispy amethyst fabric streaming mid-air illuminated by the bluish glow of man-made fireflies, time seemed to slow down to a complete freezeframe. i run around the head of the parade and when i get to the other side she sees me and smiles and runs at me too. we jump, hug, holding each other tight and long, for the cameras. the rest of the night was for playing with fire outdoors, under gasoline rain. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- UPBEAT DEADBEAT// this music is melting my face off, there's this jungle break beat feel to it and i feel her body go limp, skin slacking and falling onto my flesh. her fingertips claw at the inside of my thigh. her curly locks brush my cheek. i can't hear anything, i can only feel the sound waves blasting from the amps and speakers, bulldozing into me. i turn my neck and see everyone half committed to the music. restrained head nods and toe taps, bodies swerving side to side coated in hesitancy, as if some invisible net has fallen over the crowd and the music has half paralyzed them and half entranced them as they give a weak attempt to wriggle free. i lean forward into her ear. "do you want to go chug beers in the alley way?" "yeah!" i see her lips yell it back but i hear nothing. outside the drunks and the bums are yelling at the night. the smell of greasy food permeates all. traffic floods across and we step hurriedly across main street, amped on volumes of weirdness and the prospect of getting more drunk. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- AT THE PEARLY GATES// i swear the mechanical roar of a lawnmower is the sound of death. i wake up to it every morning as gray sunlight peaks through my bent blinds. that whir of a rusty serrated edge spinning ruthlessly against tall blades of grass. if you close your eyes and listen you can hear each one hacked off and tossed aside with the others. i'm telling you, the first thing you'll hear in death is the end-all sucking of a leaf blower, the blustering screech of a weed wacker, as tired old mexican men with sun beaten faces and greasy moustaches and dumpy hats trim the hedges outside the pearly gates. i throw the blanket off of me and stumble into the bathroom, i can feel the grime of the tile floors beneath my toes. i don't bother with the light because my eyes aren't even fully open. i drop my pants and hear piss hit toilet water. in the mirror above the can i stare at my reflection: cheeks nose mouth twisted and knotted, tired. what an ugly mug. i just now realize i fell asleep in all my clothes - jacket, hooded sweatshirt, oversized flannel, ripped thrift store t-shirt with a bobcat on it. i look down at my mirror dick still shooting out piss into the bowl. i wonder what it'd be like if everyone just walked around town with no pants, just shoes and socks and shirts and sweaters, their dicks and pussies hanging out, scratching their pubes in plain sight. the sound of piss hitting water fills my head. god, what a long piss. i place my hand on the wall in front of me and slack my body a bit. my stomach lets out a rumble. finally the waterfall shooting out of my pelvis stops, i drop the seat and plop my ass down. maybe i should drink less. i feel my insides fall out of me. to my left on the marble sink top is a half finished can of miller high life, the sorry end of a toilet paper roll and a very questionable comb. seriously, who leaves 2 pieces of toilet paper on the roll? i make do and toss the cardboard cylinder into the trash can. stepping out of the bathroom, that all-piercing noise shoots from my neighbor's mower through my window and out my skull like a bullet. it seems like this guy is always mowing his lawn. out on the stoop jane and sarah sit comfy in cushioned chairs recapping last nights events over mugs of coffee, one in the shape of michael jordan's head and the other in the shape of a woman's ass in high jean pants. i look over and see my neighbor smoking a cigarette while wielding the weed wacker. a beer bottle from last night had found its way to his lawn. he turns the wacker off, carelessly picks the bottle up and tosses it carlessly over his head across our drive way and into our yard, still puffing on his cigarette. mary is sitting on the steps squatting forward over something i can't see and beckons me over. she turns toward me, her hands cupped together. i bend down to her as she turns toward me and opens her hands - a small blue bird flits from her palm and disappears off into the gray sky. our neighbor, looking over at us, takes the last drag of his cigarette and revs the wacker back to life. the buzzing grows ever louder. overhead, the pale sun disappears behind the cloud blanket. here i am, i thought. purgatory. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE GREAT UPRISING// i watched the sun go down from the stoop and took a long pull of whiskey straight from the bottle. it burned for a second and was gone. then it was dark. i stretched my long legs down across the concrete steps and stared at my feet until i couldnt' see them anymore. after i finished off the whiskey i chucked the bottle down at the street, a bunch of tiny crystal shards scattered on the black pavement. the sound of shattering glass satisfied me. the next night i watched the sunset again from the stoop, another bottle of whiskey. this big black crow swooped down from nowhere and waddled over to the bottom of the steps. the bird didn't give a fuck that i was there, and i could respect that, but i wanted to be alone. i like to watch the sunsets alone, it makes me feel like that one part in the book the outsiders, stay gold pony boy, you know? cheesy, but i don't care. the sun understood and hung in the air a minute longer until the crow got the hint and flew away. then that big ball of fire eased into its valley bed behind the mountains and went to sleep. the big sleep, what all of us are waiting around for. eye closed my I's. tonight, after all the light was gone outside i went into the house and got online. i logged into facebook and made an event page called The Great Uprising. someone had to do it eventually. i told everyone to invite all their friends. and god help those who RSVP a "no" or "maybe attending." i wonder who will take care of all the babies when we're gone? -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- FALLING DOWN// a transparent surface separating space. a layer of nothing where two edges of reality stop. and our fingerprints fuck it all up, leaving traces of human existence on the empty. we slide the glass up and let our bodies fall onto the mossy rooftop. she wrapped the quilt around her and rested her chin on a baby blue patch with a white lamb sewn on it, her curly blonde hair fell over iceberg eyes as she asked me to pass her a beer. no one is innocent anymore. i cracked one open and watched the cool vapor slip upward into the night as i gave her the bottle. her hands looked smaller than i remembered. as i cracked one open for myself i placed my lips on the cold mouth of the bottle and breathed in the mist, closing my eyes and tilting my head backward letting the liquid slide down my throat and the foam fizz on my tongue. i fell back and let my head hit hard on the shingles, staring up into the void.