originality is an illusion

pantysock

Opening line.
"What's your favorite Tom Cruise movie?"
Followed by
"What's your favorite Matt Damon movie?"
Not to be undone by
"What tv show is the best to spoon to?"
He slides over a couple barstools towards me.
"I need your advice."
He hands me his phone to read his text messages.
"Now she's the girl I want to spoon with and talk about Pan Am. When we broke up, i was making 28 thousand a year. I didn't have enough money to pay for my self esteem. I want to be able to pay for her mozzarella sandwich.I hate the bitch. I went to the reunion and call her fat. Not that she is. I don't believe in being fat. If your fat, your lazy. I mean look at me. I'm not fat. Do you know how handsome I am? I wanted to tell her, 'you look comfortable.' But i love her. I mean it was great. She's the girl i want to sleep with 4 years from now. She's the one I want to spoon up with her and watch "Love Actually." We hung out, all night you know. I kissed her than jumped off the train. It was so "When Harry meet Sally. She loves me. She's engaged, but I know she loves me. I mean, I told her I loved her! This is my point. I go out. I can get any girl in here. I'm the best dancer in here."
At this point he demonstrates his dance move, The Pencil Sharpener.
"My point is. I can make the girls come. AHHHHHHH. I'm tired of that. I mean I can pick my my nose with my tongue. I've got a medium sized penis and a great tongue. I'm not a pussy. Have you seen my biceps. I can sleep with anyone in here. Are those glasses real? I hate pretty girls that wear glasses, ugly girls I don't even talk to them. I get chicks because i've got great bone structure. I'm the best dancer in here."
Demonstrates the Skinny Jeans Dance.
"I won my 6th grade Dance contest. I peaked at 12. I work in finance but i want to work in skinny jeans dance. Have you seen my biceps? It really sucks when you family wont pay for your cellphone anymore. I mean, whatever. Get a tattoo on your tricep, they wont talk to you anymore."
The tattoo reads, "On Eagles Wings"
"I can sleep with any girl in here."
Demonstrates the Sprinkler dance.

“What is this self inside us, this silent observer,
Severe and speechless critic, who can terrorize us,
And urge us on to futile activity,
And in the end, judge us still more severely,
For the errors into which his own reproaches drove us?”

-T.S. Elliot

Tell me all the things you’ve done I would like to know
Tell me how you like yourself and what you think id like to know
Tell me about your ghosts
Tell me what I’ve missed
and
I wont tell you
I wish you were someone else

running on empty

She leans against the bar rubbing the end of a plastic sword against her gums. With the tip of her tongue she feels the remnants of a crudite adhered to a rear molar but resists the urge to pick the aforementioned spot with her sword. Too far back and mouth too open to escape the notice of the lone businessman four seats down ordering a single malt scotch.

She raises her glass. The bartender nods spritzing a chilled glass with absyinthe. She wonders when they started bottling Sazerac, as a Rye, not the cocktail. She undoes the top button of her blouse, revealing the lacy bra that cuts into her underarms, but the cleavage it provides is worth it.

There is nothing special about her features. Broad forehead. Eyesbrows plucked, shaped, but growing out. Just a hint of bags under her eyes. Her smile is faint, almost non-existent. She has been training years for this, the expression of nihility.

Her drink arrives. She takes a sip. She counts 416 seconds between each sip. The idea is to calm the nerves by introducing subtle well-timed amounts of alcohol. Not to have it take effect to quickly.

She watches her fingers trace the lip of the glass. “ 241, 242, 243,244…” and thinks of the illness within her. An illness so deep that it does not reside in muscle or bone. Far fr beyond the prodding of fingers or questions. “356, 357, 358…”

She catches a glimpses herself in the brass edge of the bar. A woman drinking alone in a hotel bar. Desperate or a professional? What marks the difference? Both know more or less how to have a good time. One picks up the check the other always has taxi fare home.

The bar will eventually fill up and she will be surrounded by the buzz of conversation. It is a noise that interrupts, that separates, that isolates. Not one of them will recognize her from the film of which they speak. One or two will acknowledge her, as a fixture, with a glance or a nod of the head. But not one of them has anything she needs.

To rise above the clamor she takes another sip of her cocktail and collapses deep into herself, ”1,2,3,4…”

fear

i am afraid
afraid of things
dark strange dangerous difficult and deep
so i float on the lukewarm waters of mediocrity
peering into the abyss of an impenetrable forrest
the waves chaff push and pound
trying to awaken this frozen girl
every movement that seems to bring her closer to shore
has a violent recoil
driving her further from the precipice
she clings to a fantasy
sucking pleasure from the crannies of his mind
rather than surrender to the secrets of their bodies
fiction and fantasy can not fail to produce physiological heat and hardness
words sometimes bring climax
there is another story
told with fingers and toes
is it necessary to deny anything?
i see myself
running through
dark strange dangerous difficult and deep
where the clash and tension of the adventure
heighten my sense of life.

Distance

Light is my constant companion. Often, my only companion. Its' variations inspire a shifting of perspective, and I never loose sigh of the possibilities. I get lost in the vacuous landscape of the dark loosing the dimensionality of here and now. A simple deviation from linear traces of light and shadow and I am lost, infinitesimally small, and the road I travel disappears. To keep myself grounded I create lists.

The distance between front door and home:
3 landings and the steps between seven seven two. (I never count past 7, double back and start again)

The distance from door to bodega: 1 verse 1 chorus
“Tie yourself to me
No one else
No, you're not rid of me
Hmm you're not rid of me

Night and day I breathe
Ah hah ay
Hey, you're not rid of me
Yeah, you're not rid of me
Yeah, you're not rid of me
Yeah, you're not rid of me”

Bodega to subway:
A list of white foods: eggs hard boiled, rice, cream of wheat, cream of rice, milk, cream, salt, rice noodles, vanilla ice cream...

Distance from one hour to two:
Things to do today

Distance from hour 2 to hour 3:
Things I did not do yesterday

Distance from hour one of work to hour six
lips teeth tongue toe kiss nape touch stroke whisper lick look at be looked at smile struggle surrender
a replay of words stroked and to be stroked stitched together with desire

Distance between starting and finishing this:
1 cigarette, 1 smuttynose.

Distance between then and now:
immeasurable

OCD

Daniel Rossen “Saint Nothing” is coming out of the machine… single speaker…. Soft and unobtrusive. Just to keep me company. Like the pets I don’t own. (Cats make me sneeze, dogs make me sad, too many hours spent solo.) A glass down to it dregs off to my right, just within reach. A bottle three quarters full that makes me smile. The ashtray, ceramic with two compartments, one for my glass whose base is to wide to balance, and a sidecar printed with the words Sip N’ Smoke somewhat obscured by a single butt and a charred match. I light the spliff I learned to roll just the other night. My left leg is crossed over my right. Chin balanced between thumb and forefinger. I’d prefer a different configuration but the desk is awkward and illfitted for comfort. Outside my window, the night collapses beneath concrete clicking heels and the wind whipped laughter of smokers in doorways of overcrowded bars. The heater hisses in the bedroom as footsteps of neighbors fade down the hall. And it is as simple as that. Painting the moment I last thought of you.

submerge

Water is two parts hydrogen one part oxygen. Cold on the surface scalding just below. Birthday cake bubbles, a bottle recalled then emptied into the cascading stream of a tub half full. I hate baths but enjoy being submerged, blending in to my background, inconspicuous. Watching the world from below. Frank flying, a glass of wine balanced precariously on the lip of the tub… I am here. This is now. I exist. Hold. Count. Never higher than seven. Seven seven two. Choke. Swallow. Hold.

Jumping the fence of the local pool, not my neighborhood, my fathers. Early morning. Maroon speedo, one piece. With the rising sun I avoid the stares and jeers of children I will never get to know through the long summer months to follow. Floating in the depths far from the surface watching the leaves skirt amongst the clouds.

Three four. A gasp swallowed. Five six. Exploding. Seven. Surface. Breath.

Legs up the wall, tiled and cleaner than I. Bubbles parting collapsing cresting. I stare at a black dot on the wall crowned by the shadowy remnants of a crucifix long since vanquished. Listening to the drip drip drip imaging the conversations in rooms next door.

“All the superheros listen to their mommies.
”
“No!
”
“Superman listens to his mommy.”
“No!
”
“Spiderman listens to his mommy.
”
“No!
”
“The Power Rangers listen to their mommies.
”
“No!
”
“Batman listens to his mommy.
”
“No!
”
“And do you know why all the superheroes listen to their mommies?
”
“Why?
”
“Because they're good boys.”
“No!”

My imagination sucks. Sip of wine. Submerge.

My heart reverberates with footfalls of a neighbor. One should never sleep with ones neighbor, not the case here, but it has been. Another street another corridor. Listening to the click clack clatter knowing that he is home but far out of reach once it has become clear that you are yet another’s 2 am call.

I wonder where frank is? Maybe he’s escaped through the crack I left him behind the succulents. I lick my spoons too clean and rinse my glasses when finished. What reason has he to stay?

H2O

bubble bath. I wish it was deeper. And claw footed. Not adhered to the wall with monocrome tile. Lying on my arms i submerge listening to the ping, splish, trickle of voices slittering through the pipes. I imaging them as a whisper against my bathroom door, "May I come in?"

But its only a fly who keeps me company though this bottle of wine. I've named him Frank., for no reason really, other than he will die here, in my home, so I thought he should have a name. Frank.

Interstate 510. Exit 1B. New Orleans. I have no tub. No shower. Just a bottle of water, a toothbrush and the sideview mirror. Objects are closer than they appear. "You have to leave tomorrow miss." I offer him a rocket dog, he’s on duty, parking attendant, but it is New Orleans, so he tosses the cap and takes a swig. "Tomorrow," he repeats as he walks down the ramp. In the morning the curtains will part in the windows of the hotel across the way... i'll lie here in the bed of my truck and watch them towel their hair, plant kisses on the nape of a neck, and stare blankly into the horizon. I am invisible to them. Have been for years.

I first discovered this power in preschool. But more on that later.