The Commentary is On

poetry, oh noetry!

2007-10-16T00:15:00.001-05:00

no alcohol
no drugs
included in the wreck

included
alcohol
no no wreck
in the drugs

the wreck in
alcohol
drugs
included no no

drugs no
wreck in
the no alcohol
included

What?
It's a detail oriented job, the publicist said.

2007-08-11T18:03:00.001-05:00

Joel saw her again at the office holiday party. The angular blonde had situated herself into the middle of the boy's club. Like a lounge singer in the middle of her act, she sat upon a desk with hips tilted forward and shoulders sagging back. A hand staked her place behind her while the other twirled a cigar. Her hair was down for the first time, swinging in pale ripples down her spine. Her eyelids were heavily lined. She looked like some old movie star. Kim Novak or Tippi Hendren. When he managed to catch her eye, he ducked down into his drink and shotgunned it. She laughed, puff-puffing on that cigar. It was absolutely foul and the conversation was worse.

Later, she was coming out of the bathroom with pink-tinged eyes and a sniffling nose. She hadn't been crying. In a brazen move that was more alcohol fueled than anything else, he caught her in the crook of his arm and thumbed away the streak of cocaine edging her cheek. "Careful," he laughed. "There'll be pictures later."

"Fuck the pictures," she crowed as arms wrapped around his neck. Fingers twirled at the piece curl at the nape of his neck. He needed a haircut, but lacked the ambition to wrestle with a mirror and pair of rusty scissors. She melted against him and he could smell her perfume. It was a strong, spiced scent. Almost a men's aftershave, almost Earl Grey tea. He had an erection. "What's your name?"

"Joel."

"How come I've never seen you before?" She said with a suspicious wrinkle of her face. Corie was older than him, but that didn't seem to bother either as they stayed awkwardly clinging. Her hips ground against his, but there was no music. She sniffed his collar. "You smell good though. How old are you?"

"Twenty-five," he lied. "You?"

"Twenty-nine," she countered, wide eyed.

"Actually, twenty-four."

"Thirty."

"Twenty-three. It's a final offer, but I'm very mature for my age."

"Thirty-one. Fuck!"

"I'll drink to that," Joel proposed as she was dragged by a hip to the bar that had been set up.

2007-06-16T20:28:00.000-05:00

It wasn't that she wanted to die. She was just exhausted of this place, the weight of gravity. The thought had first occurred to her when she was at the coffee shop at the corner of the street she lived on. It was a bustling, familiar place. The sort of shop where she could take off her shoes and curl her feet against the cold planks of the floorboards. How many feet had curled here? How many feet would? The building was over two hundred years ago. Fifty years had been spent as Cafe Marie. Her bladder was full, but she couldn't move. She was too busy watching around her. The barista shaking the aluminum milk canisters to check their fullness. The arch of a purple orchid tickling the bowed head of a woman as she worked on the crossword with a friend. To her left, a couple was on their third date. They were familiar in the way that their bodies casually curled in to one another -- they had sex before -- but not familiar enough for silence. Their chatter filled her head and saved her from those thoughts.

I can tell you're in your head a lot, the man said.
Yes, I need to be in contact with my intuitive intelligence. I realize the whole opposites attract thing? She whished loudly, hands separating. Bullshit. Bullshit. You have to have common ground. Astrology, for example. We're Scorpios. The same sign.
The man nods knowingly.

It was time. There was no point in living here anymore. She would miss her beautiful apartment and the slippery scarves that hung off her bed frame. These were not real things anymore. Her true home was fifteen minutes away in a modern district full of beautiful new homes. Her husband had designed the house with his best friend, an architect. Aemilia Handler. She was Aemilia Handler now. She had been married for seven months to Benjamin Handler of Mamaroneck, New York after a whirlwind courtship and elaborate wedding. Ben was in international law. He hated clutter and couldn't understand the brilliance of Edith Piaf. He enjoyed Charles Mingus and played tennis on Saturday morning instead. He wanted to move to Vietnam. They speak French there too, he reminded her as they lay in their uncluttered white bed and laid their head down on simple white pillows. White, white, white. Their house was completely devoid of color save for the spots where she had been. A red scarf. The brilliant turquoise of a hand purse. He was constantly picking up heels in every color of the rainbow.

The couple next to her were too agreeable with one another. No, she retracted her previous opinion, no they had not had sex yet. They wanted to though. Badly. Aemilia smeared her hands over her thighs and watched the silk of her skirt spread thin over skin. She still couldn't see through it.

Ben was a good husband. He bought her beautiful things and took her on lavish trips. He traveled with her. They went to India, to Moscow, and to Bali. It wasn't the same. In a movie theatre in Berlin, he recoiled when she tried to unzip his trousers.

What are you thinking of, he said one night as they laid in their bed. He looked up over the black frames of his eyeglasses to her. It aged him. He was already ten years older than Aemilia, but looked more like twenty. Was his hair graying around the temples?

Nothing at all, she said. It was a lie. There was plenty on her mind. She was two months late. It was imminent now. Last week, she had snuck into baby shops and touched all the strollers and cots covetously. She had sniffed the powdery collars of coats with peter pan colors. A baby was good. It was time for a baby, she thought. She was almost thirty. It was time. Now, reality sank in. She slept poorly and imagined all sorts of terrible scenarios. She would forget her baby in supermarkets and shivering in its plastic tub. Ben would hire a nanny to watch the infant because his mother could not be trusted. Her mother? She knew nothing about girls and everything she knew about boys was inappropriate. There wasn't a maternal bone in her body. An appointment had been made this afternoon. She would take care of it and he would never know. Ben, oblivious and sweet Ben. Ben, who kindly requested she not smoke in the house and said nothing when he found cigarette butts in the sink or stubbed out on the lip of her tub after a good soak.

Impossible. How can you not think about anything?

Easy. See -- She stared vacantly at him until he laughed and smeared a palm over her delicate features. Fingers skimmed down her neck, her shoulder.

Later that night, he would bury himself atop her and she would watch him as he rocked and rocked. When he came, it was silent and yawning. She stared down the dim glint of his mouth to his molars. For a moment, he was someone else. She sniffed at his neck and saw Holden in the corner of the room. Watching, watching.

She blinked and she was a week forward again, sitting inside the Cafe Marie. Aemilia realized that she had been staring forward and attracted the attention of the man in front of her. He was old enough to be her father and looked like everyone else's with his pale hair flopping over the vee of his receding hairline and ruddy skin lined. Norwegian, she thought as she looked away. A hand cupped her neck and she stared at the floor. Her bladder ached fiercely now, but she couldn't bring herself to go to the bathroom and face the thick cotton pad shoved between her thighs still. The pain was gone. The entire process had been a brief, hazy thing. A twilight scraping. If she had loved her husband or the knot of tissue inside her, she would have been ruined. Instead, Aemilia was inconvenienced.

Never again, she thought as she crossed her legs and squeezed down the muscles of her pelvis.

She debated leaving a note. In a way, she owed some sort of explanation to Ben. It was only fair since she was taking away his wife. Still, what was there to say? She took out a pen and a sheet of paper. It was the sort of thing that one read about in the Reader's Digest. Today, we remember the tragic story of Amelia Handler ( Of course, her name would be spelled incorrectly. Neither the readership nor the editors of Reader's Digest had the imagination or classical background to know her name as anything but a typographical error to correct.) who had been forgotten by society. Show kindness on those around you. You never know who is writing their suicide letters in the fifty year old Cafe Marie on Rue Savoy...

Ben,

I'm tired. I'm absolutely wiped out, sweetheart. Please water the iris. They're my favorite, after all.

Your wife,
Aemilia.

Papa and Dad,

I'm about to do the most fucked up thing I've ever done. I'm not afraid though and I want you to know that there's nothing that you could have done to change this. I'm just exhausted and ready to try a new shell. Let's talk about something we've never talked about before -- The afterlife.

I know I was raised an atheist, but none of us believe that we're just animate worm food. It's just a change of scenery really. I'm not afraid to leave because I know that I'll see you again and soon. I give you full permission to berate me for the next ten years or so's worth of dream-time. I've got the time to spare.

Some housekeeping: Take care of my irises. I don't think they'll survive the heat and humidity of Vietnam and honestly, Ben is a lawyer not a botanist. They're the one bit of clutter that I was allowed. As for Ben, he'll take care of himself. He's heartier and very eligible. Concerning my music and any intellectual work, Papa I know this isn't legally binding but try your damndest to get the rights to everything. And? I don't know. Do whatever you want.

Lastly, thank you for the beautiful childhood and life. A girl couldn't be luckier than I was.

See you soon. Let's meet in Versailles. I'll be the one with cake.

Aemilia.

Holden,

I doubt you'll ever read this, but I'm wrapping up loose ends and why the hell not? I don't have face to save anymore. So, here it is: I really wish you would have loved me. It's not as if you would have saved me or anything dramatic. More than likely, I'd still be writing you a letter today had you loved me. Guilt is tiresome, darling. Don't bother with it. Still, just the same. Goddamn, how could you not love me?

You're the one person outside my parents that I feel ever really knew me. It sounds so fucking cliche, but it's true. I haven't had multiple orgasms since the last time we fucked. Congratulations!

Now, honestly. If you get this, then you should know that I bequeath to you certain personal affects that you may either collect or gladly ignore:

1 silver lighter with the initials ABP etched on the front
1 gently used tube of Chanel Red lipstick
1 silk scarf with yellow and red poppies printed across it, circa 1952
1 copy of Henry James Wings of the Dove (1st ed.)

At least take the James novel. It's worth a goodly amount of money.

So right. I think this is a much better good-bye than our last. It's the sort to be satisfied with. Afterall, I had the last word.

I love you. I love you.

Aemilia.

She waited until Ben had left for work before drawing herself a bath. Ever since their wedding, she had stopped taking piano tuning jobs. Her work was reduced to eight months -- four in the spring and four in the fall. In the next room, she had placed her worn album of Puccini's La Boheme on. It was tragic and full of great crescendos. Poor Mimi, she thought as her foot dipped into the steaming hot water. She winced at the burn and felt her skin ripple uncomfortably. Poor Mimi.

It took coaxing and some time before she could fully immerse herself into the water. Her cheeks were pink by now and the hollow of her collarbones sweat out heat. A purging, she thought as her hair was pinned high atop her head. Her face was bare save for a defiant streak of red lipstick. Eyeliner and mascara would run, but it wouldn't do to die without a bit of color on. The razor was antiquated in its appearance, but not rusted. It looked like a flat, palm-sized anvil. She touched it to her tongue and let its edge prick the pale pink tip of it. It didn't hurt and her blood was tangy and sweet. She sucked on the wound and hummed along with her opera.

She cut herself without knowing. It was a sharp slashing motion down the line of her forearm done without flinch or thought. She simply had to do it. The wound burned like fire rather than felt like a ripping tear. Curious, she thought as blood pooled quickly up. It was a wondrous rush. Her arm was slick and orange. When she gripped the razor with the wounded arm, it nearly slipped from her fingers. Her palm opened up on its heel as she grimaced and attempted to focus on working the faulty hand. The cut on her left side was weaker, a clumsier and more painful line. She submerged her wounds and felt water breaking through the quick work of her body. The water turned pink, then orange. A sunset that wavered and turned black.

She waited for a light, but it never came.

Aemilia regained consciousness four days later. It was the drugs that had been pumped into her elbow rather than the extensive injuries she had inflicted that kept her subdued and trapped in a gray haze. It felt like an hour had passed, but she knew it was longer from the crackled feel of her lips. Her tongue was like a patch of cotton. When she opened her eyes, it was to the stern stare of her father. Michael Donovan looked like Rasputin with his dirty, magician's stare. He was both furious and frightened. A part of him wanted to smother his daughter as she laid in her helpless state. It felt only right to finish what she had left undone.

Aemilia's eyes took their time focusing, but it was soon clear this was no dream. Her mouth opened and she croaked out an indecipherable sound. She wheezed once and swallowed the dust in her throat before trying again. Oh fuck, she managed finally.

You have no idea, Aemilia. No idea how right you are, Michael said before leaving the room. If it was solitude that she craved, she had it now.

Ben came that evening. Michael must have told him that Aemilia was awake, but sedated. It felt safe to enter the lion's den while she was still more or less strapped to the bed. She was in a psychiatric hospital now. They had transferred her to the private setting the evening after she stabilized.

In contrast to her wild man father, Ben was clean shaven and smelled delicious. His after shave was bergamot and mint. It burned the inside of her nose and made her smile.

Why didn't you just tell me that you were depressed, he said after they had sat together in silence for twenty minutes. He didn't touch her. He could scarce look at her. Instead, he stared at his hands were his cellphone was turned over and over again. They took comfort in their own space and gestures. Aemilia's was more limited with her arms strapped down. She tapped her fingertips against the thin mattress.

I wasn't depressed, she said. I was tired and bored of this body.

Of me?

No, she said. Of me. Well, and maybe a little bit of you but a little bit of everything too.

He looked away and she sighed at his profile. It was strong and handsome. Aemillia fixated on the cleft of his chin as if it was a feature that he had grown overnight. Her forehead wrinkled and brows cinched close together. She hummed, puckering her mouth and wondering how she ever let herself marry a man with a butt chin. I'd like if you left, she said.

Something unfinished, but hanging there. Fiction meets its maker.

2007-05-15T10:39:00.000-05:00

She was an average-shaped girl. In this town, that meant she was invisible. Her hair was a muddied streak of red and brown, licks of goldenrod. The roots of it were a fawn-brown. She must have been blonde as a child and he imagined her still slipping and telling everyone that she was naturally blonde. Things had changed though. Beneath the constant rotation of dye, her hair had darkened and turned ash. She'd be gray by forty, but her reliable comfort stayed. Her posture was terrible -- that curve of her spine and slouched shouldered-pose over her book. Stellan watched as she meticulously peeled back the protective plastic layer that covered the thick hardback. His chin buried into the tops of the hands spread out in front of him on the desk. His eyes didn't waver, but when her's did they realized that their eyes were the same watery blue. Back home, fifteen hundred miles away, the girl's mother had a picture that documented this color. It was a sea at storm, all rabid froth and wreckage. The frame was an ugly brown with a black sooty streak in the middle of it. Her mother claimed that she had lit the picture on fire when she was younger, but no recollection past that story exists otherwise. It's an interesting idea though. She likes to think that she is capable of damage. In a way, she is. The color of the paperback lifts as the plastic is shredded away.

"Why do you do that?" He asks finally, but not to her surprise. She shrugs and continues to let a rippling piece of plastic feed up from the book. The cover feels waxy beneath. When she hits the snag, the silence strung between them is broken like a chain. Creak! Creeeak! The girl grimaces and Stellan's head lolls. His knuckles bury into his cheek now. He is most handsome like this. When he is lazy and at rest. He's something from an old neoclassical painting. He is more real than real with his curling hair and sensitive mouth. He has the look of someone who will not live long and must make up for the lack of time with beauty. Unlike her, he begs to be noticed. She resents that. Creak! Still, that would not keep her from fucking him in the book stacks that loom behind them. Creak.

After a moment, "I have to. I started and now I have to finish. I think I'm done but there's always a little piece curling up from the paper."

"Do you start everything you finish," he asks.

"No," she replies in a firm tone. Her mouth is soft though. She's grinning over and shaking her head at him as if they are sharing a private joke. He seems to perk beneath that look. She is not beautiful, but there is a kind and gentle quality to her. Then again, she might just be polite. Stellan props himself back upright, an elbow is anchored into the table and his fist smears up against his ear. He watches the conscious spread of her hands over the book. She resists picking though she wants to. He wonders what else she picks at. Is it a nervous habit?

"What's your name?"

"Kim," she says. Her eyes crease with a polite smile. They look like the moon. Happy and bent at the corners. Her teeth are symmetrical and straight in their pose. She waits for reciprocation.

"I'm Stellan."

"Nice to meet you," she says with a nod. It is a response that is familiar and well used in this country. He doesn't know how to respond and smiles dumbly. His head nods as if he agrees. Yes, it is nice.

Nevermind the man behind the curtain -- a term in review.

2007-05-15T10:36:00.000-05:00

This blog was initially conceived as my semester-long project for an experimental writing course in ... What else? Blogging. It's been an interesting ride and will continue to (maybe!) be one. Eventually this blog will undoubtably devolve(?) into a filing cabinet for the bits and pieces of things I've been working on.

I'm not one for surveys, but this one struck me as interesting because it combines music and the classic points in story-based entertainment (for lack of a better definition.)

So, here's how it works:
1. Open your library (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod, etc)
2. Put it on shuffle
3. Press play
4. For every question, type the song that's playing
5. When you go to a new question, press the next button
6. Don't lie and try to pretend you're cool...

Opening Credits:
Moving like a Train - Herbert

Waking Up:
Swamp – Talking Heads

First Day of School:
They Never Got You - Spoon

Falling in Love:
We were Sparkling (Haruki) – My Brightest Diamond

First Song:
The Last Time – Gnarls Barkley

Fight Song:
Over and Over (DFA Remix) – Hot Chip

Breaking Up:
Punchup at a Wedding (No no no) - Radiohead

Prom:
Closer - Travis

Life:
Don’t Take My Sunshine away - Sparklehorse

Mental Breakdown:
Children of the Revolution – T.Rex

Driving:
You Will Always be the Same – Ryan Adams

Flashback:
Whoo! Alright – Yeah.. Uh Huh – The Rapture

Getting Back Together:
Downtown - Peaches

Wedding:
What’s the Frequency Kenneth? - REM

Birth of Child:
Playboy Mommy – Tori Amos

Final Battle:
Freak Out (Gold Chains Panique Mix) – My Brightest Diamond

Death Scene:
Red Rabbits – The Shins

Funeral Song:
Don’t Dream it’s Over – Crowded House

End Credits:
You Can Call me Al – Paul Simon

Bloopers:
We Were Lovers – Bloc Party

Saturday Night

2007-05-07T22:26:00.000-05:00

I'm sitting around the house and my mom's watching her favorite show on the tube. She's got the volume up too loud again but I don't have the heart to tell her to turn it down. Nobody tells Donna Kid what to do, you know? It's not cos' she's scary and intimidating like some of the girls around here. It's the opposite actually. She's so sweet and nice that once you do you end up feeling like the most rotten creep ever. You see my mom's the greatest girl in the world.

Sometimes I bring kids over and they see my mom sitting on the couch with her knitting and they're like, "Gee Bill, who's that?" I hate it. When people call me "Bill" I have to stop them right there and say, "Look pal, the name's Billy."

Only serial killers and carnival workers are named "Bill" in my opinion and I'm definitely neither. For the record, my name is Billy. I'm none of the following: William, Sweet William, Bill, Billy-boy, Billy-willy or "Hey Retard!" You got that? Okay, so about serial killers -- I've only killed one person and that was totally for a film. Meaning fake. The only reason why there was any real blood involved in my last film is because the broad asked for me to punc hher. I don't know what it is with girls and hitting. Maybe if I had a sister, I would know but I don't. It's just me and my mom Donna. But, I've gotten off track -- So, I'll br bringing someone home and they'll see my mom on the couch and ask who she is. I've just got to look at them all crazy for a moment. "Who the hell do you think it is," I gotta ask. While my mom tells me to watch my language, they just shrug and say they don't. They wouldn't either.

My mom's a real looker. Back in her day, she as a Georgia peach. She got a crown and wore a real nice dress and everything. She still has the wave and smile. I have a picture of her on my dresser from those days. I used to think she looked like Glenda the Good Witch from The Wizard of Oz. Now that's a real movie. Not like the trash they show nowadays at the Cineplex. Thank you L. Frank Baum and Victor Fleming, too.

Anyway, people don't know what to make of it but as soon as my mom puts on the charm and starts heating up a can of soup or some leftovers, they're sold. Everyone loves my mom. Everyone does and if you say you don't, you're a rotten liar. It's cute how she'll put out bowls of soup for everyone, but me. When she does, everyone's all, "Gosh Billy, aren't you gonna eat?" By then, my mom's already pulled out a Hershey's bar from the icebox and told me not to break my teeth on the chcoolate.

"I only eat candy."

When I say that everyone nods like they understand. Nobody understands though. I can tell. It's why people get real uptight when I'm like, "Hey, want to spend the night?" and they're like, "I dunno. Want to come to my place instead?" I don't get it. I mean, we've got a real nice apartment in a good part of town. Usually I get mad and tell them to forget it. You've got a problem with my ma, and you've got a problem with me. It really ruins the mood. I have to excuse myself out of to the fire escape to smoke a cigarette or something.

Gosh, I really wish my mom would turn down the television. It's making such a racket and I can hardly hear myself think at all. I'm working on a scrip to my very own film. Sure, I like working for Fred or Joe or Nancy, but I've got a lot of potential I think. I mean, I've got all these ideas and Ma's already said to me that if I want a camera I should really just got out there and buy one. I told her I'd let her have a part in my first film. I'm writing her this really great part about a faded beauty queen with lots of ex-husbands. I think she'll like it. She's got a swell speaking voice. It's just like all those old movie-star girls in the films she likes to watch. I like Hitchcock myself -- especially all those blondes and close-ups of their trembling, waxy faces and big liquid eyes during the scary parts. It's so sick. If a bird was gonna come and peck at my eyes, I sure wouldn't be standing at the window like Tippi Hedren did. After that birds movie, I started wearing sunglasses a lot more.

People tell me I'm real handsome in them. Sometimes I think that beauty's a lot like the chocolate bars that Ma freezes. Everybody talks a lot, but they don't really know for sure what they think.

The television set's really got to be turned down. I throw my pen at it and my mom looks up from her knitting and shakes her head. She's got that look on her face that says I better straighten up. I love that phrase: straighten up. Good luck lady. All I can do is smile and lean over to kiss her cheek like a gentleman.

Now for something completely different...

2007-04-30T21:38:00.000-05:00

Reflections of a Thirty-five year old Character Actor (a found poem)

I think, even though it's so awful
My first crush was probably on Hot Lips.
But do you want to know,
Seriously --
What was my porn?
Barnum and Bailey's Circus program.

A creepy lady.
And I --
six years old.

She was all sequined,
total camel toe,
some retarded hat,
a whip.

I remember looking at her
literally bossing around poodles --
rainbow-colored poodles.

"That's incredible."

It was an awakening moment
when I was a kid.

Hot Lips, in short order from there.

(thanks to JT, MLP, and Bust)

--

To e.s.

They said you were doing so well.
You showed up once, a few months before.

The same as you ever were
Shy-smiling with your hair in your eyes
Wearing that poor-fitting white suit.
White -- or more like cream?
It was an ancient, pitiful suit;
worn in the pants and knees

Jen bet Charlie that you'd split a seam
the way you sat hunched over your guitar
on the ratty carpet of Dan's apartment.

They said you were depressed,
as clinical as it sounds.
You didn't leave your apartment for a week.
When you did something else lingered in the air
amidst the cigarette dust.

Sara suggested we start checking all the familiar spots
between your fingers and toes;
like a criminal.

You put away your white suit and funny checkered tie;
the Converse stayed until the very end.
It was the last sight of you:
those knotted laces and the canvas fray.

That was the day that music died
There are no levees in Texas.
At least not where I live.
There as cheap wine though
Crumpled cigarettes, and a couple of your tapes, too.

No one spoke when you started playing again.
We tried to find a meaning in the lines;
some grand farewell or fuck you to the world.
We tried to find signs of life with all its meaning
to try and make sense of our own, existing confusion.

The next day, your mom came over to say hello.
Tucked over her arm was that white suit in a plastic bag.
I tried not to see the similarities between it
and you in the morning after
the EMTs wheeled you down the stairs.

She told me you had always been a good boy, a smart boy.
That it wasn't your fault, some failing of her own.

After she left we thought back to that night --
No one could have ever guessed that the stitches split would be yours.

Two stab wounds in the chest:
because it's one for the money,
two for the show.

7:30 AM

2007-04-23T13:03:00.000-05:00

I sing to the motherfucking body electric, you think as you hit your third mile. By now, all you're running on is your will not to go home. There's something frightening about expectations -- his and yours. You don't know how you'll feel when you see him still tucked up in your bed, asleep like a child. He was right, he does look like a painting. A Klimt, he's lost in his hair and tipped in gold leaf. A Picasso, he has more angles than you can count. It takes you a moment to see him as he is. A Van Gogh, the bedsheets are swirled with the motions that your bodies made together. You don't know how you'll feel when you come home and he's gone. It's not an anonymous no-name encounter like everyone thinks you're only capable of because you're young, you're handsome, and well, most of all, because you're a man, too. You think this all as you hit your third mile because it just happens to be the first good weather day of the year and that may or may not be a fateful coincidence. March fourteenth, two-thousand whatever.

It'll take another two miles for you to give up the guise and go home to face whatever it is that you have waiting for you there. It'll take another mile for you to acknowledge that a part of you secretly hopes he'll still be there. Right now, you're just coasting along on aching legs with a hangover between your ears and sweat crawling down your spine. It feels like a finger. Tickling, trickling. You should have stayed in bed.

It was dark when you woke up for your morning run. Five a.m. comes early regardless of circumstances hinged to the hour before or after. It was dark and you were scared of the body that wrapped around you like a vice. He had that wonderful slippery, sleep quality that makes everything softer. The wrap of his biceps, the sour of his sweat. He had flopped onto his back, arms spread and waiting. He smacked on the dialogue of his dreams, but none of it was coherent. A foreshortened Christ figure, hands dangling off the bed and feet twitching together. You drew the sheets back over his waist for modesty's sake and kicked yourself for it. What's the point? What is ever the point though? You question this every day because you are a well-oiled machine that runs on necessity. Want is a foreign concept. Even now, after you've processed want into being, you wonder if it's worth it or if you are on the slippery slope towards wasting precious time and energy. You worry about the future because for once, there's something on the radar that might just stick.

Is this what you really want? And need -- How about it? It's been years since you've needed somebody. You've done just fine on your own and its dangerous to add in that variable of another body... No, another person with wants and motivations. Another person who you know needs movement and the constant rotation of new things to see and do. Can you possibly sustain the interest of someone like him? If you can't, how will you handle not being that shiny new thing? Will you throw a tantrum and dissolve into a pathetic mess like before? You don't want to think about it, but you've been here before.

That's when you realize that you've detoured and left the shaded overhang of the park. Your apartment is in the distance and you imagine you see his blinking white body flickering in movement from the window. A lighthouse signal. There are rocks everywhere and you're going to need it as you ease around mothers with their three wheeled jogging strollers and newly brought out patio furniture. You smell morning smells. Fresh coffee. The sugary tang of doughnuts and other breakfast pastries. Diesel fuel from the rumbling garbage trucks. Sweat.

You stop only to unlock your door and fling it open. He's standing in the middle of your kitchen, sheepish and holding a mug. In your absence, he's showered and figured out the mechanics of your coffee maker. He's wearing one of your striped towels like he belongs. Maybe he does. You look just as caught as him, red cheeked and trembling with the lack of movement.

"I can't survive without a cup of coffee and a shower," he explains. It's the small things that keep him going, you realize. Your theories and concerns begin to receed to basic, more manageable ideas. He is young and bright in his towel. His smile wraps around the coffee cup. It is inquisitive and twitching with a private joke.

"Good morning," you said and the words don't quite fit. Still, they're there and they're all you've got to offer.

( alt: we do not know all we know)

2007-04-10T10:24:00.000-05:00

It’s not an unusual event to walk into a bookstore with no exact purpose other than to browse and pick up a book off the New Release table. People gravitate towards the new, intriguingly packaged novels and sift through them for the synopsis or some line that strikes. It’s easy. There’s no motivation or goal other than to view. Then it happens all of a sudden and it feels like magic. You find yourself holding a book that must be bought. There’s no telling what it will be – an attractive book cover, a perfect sentence, a compelling storyline – but you’re hooked and the book is quickly bought and packaged in a plastic bag.

Sometimes you even have no clue what the book is about or who the author is.

was: annales nomadique, a novel of internet.

I didn’t know if the book was a novel or a volume of poetry. It wasn’t until I began it that I realized it was a literal novel of internet. The reader is thrust into an informational sea and left to pick out points of interest and knowing. Its a great, episodic mismash of language and culture, story and slogan. There are bits of dialogue, of information, and blink-and-you –miss-it narrative. The book is almost visual as its read. One can see all the color and shape succinctly described within the text. Rather than write something of my own, I’m going to share the best thing I’ve read all week:

I’m going to tell you what happened, eh? Bobbie gets it into his head to go out in a girl’s dress over Doc Martens 8-eye Union Jack top cap black high boots on the second day of the Stampede, promenading through the pancake breakfast with a white Smithbuilt on his head, and everyone is laughing and giving him the high sign or the finger, eh, but all in good spirits, when out of nowhere this weekend cowboy sticks him once in the gut with a shiv and runs away through the crowd, people running after him, leaving Bobbie clutching himself and looking embarrassed about how the blood’s spreading through his fingers and across the belly of his chemise like a dark crimson azalea. RCMP guy comes back winded from running but with the cowboy in cuffs and asks, is this him? Bobbie cannot say by then so they roll him away on a gurney but just when they’re closing the doors this girl jumps in saying she’s his wife and plops down in the jumpseat next to him, and when he gets out two days later after observation they move in together, just like that; she’s the sticker’s by now ex-girlfriend, see, and she tells Bobbie the way she sees it is she owes him her love because of what her boyfriend has done, and they live with each other for three years like that until she has a baby, then they get married and have two more kids, and she still tells him how sexy he looked that morning in that dress and with the garnet feather on his hat and how the scar is like a ruby under the skin of his guts. (was, Michael Joyce)

Part II

2007-04-03T10:28:00.001-05:00

Paris.

Aemilia felt her nose pressed to some proverbial glass. She was the outsider looking in. This was her routine. Every Friday evening, the close collective would gather inside the neighborhood pub and occupy a corner booth. Bodies spilled out from the vinyl seat covers and filled loose chairs. A smoke screen quickly built up from cheap cigarettes with their quick burning paper and ash spittle.

“She’s apolitical,” Claude said with a hand pointing to her. “I don’t know how you can be with someone so indifferent. No offense, Aemilia.”

“None taken. And it’s complacent. I’m complacent,” she said through a thin grin. It was the worst response that she could have given. Adam’s arm was oppressive in its pull across her shoulders.

“Don’t listen to him. He wants to fight. Always with the fighting,” Adam snorted with a shake of his head. He said nothing about his girlfriend’s lack of ambition. It was better not thought of. His drive was to create. The sight of her kneading bread and sweating over the large industrial oven was enough to reassure him that maybe, in her own way, there was a form of the same want within her.

Claude was not so easily convinced. He could see past the flour in her hair and burns over her forearms to know where she came from. Aemilia was little Marie Antoinette. Fragile. Decorative. Slouching back in the booth, he sucked hard on the filter. “Maybe,” he said in a rush of gray smoke. “Maybe I just look at people like your girlfriend in wonder and think: You! How can it be that it is you who is on my back every day? Helpless as a baby. Complacent.”

“No one is on your back,” Adam groaned. He leaned in close and buried his nose against Aemilia’s ear. Arms wrapped her up and he felt her rigidity. It was his defense that seemed to string her tight. He watched the transformation in the glass that stood across from them. “Should we go? Let’s go.”

“I’m leaving. Next week. I’m going to visit my parents.”

Adam’s features creased with surprise. It was news to him. He stared at her and made no attempt to feign indifference or knowing. Aemilia took his pause to slide out of the booth and step over the tangle of bodies. He followed quickly after with coltish legs and jerky movements. He tripped over a bag, but caught up with her at the door. “When were you going to tell me?”

“I’m leaving Tuesday?”

“And it’s Friday! Do you have your plane tickets?” He opened the door for her and watched her slip out. Her head nodded. Yes, of course she had her tickets. “I’ll drive you.”

“Louis said he would.”

“Why are you doing this? Are you leaving because of me?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Aemilia said. Her tone was measured and decided. It was enough to make even him convince himself that every word she ever said was true.

Part I

2007-03-18T16:46:00.000-05:00

Note: This is two for the price of one.

Paris.

Aemilia Prior had a sneaking suspicion that this was not her life. She sat at a table for two with her forearms pressed against the top and hands laced easily together. Across from her, inside the modest red-tiled kitchen, Adam Baptiste attempted to drain water from spaghetti noodles. Steam rose from the metal colander and fogged his glasses. He was blinded. She could not see the shape of his pale hazel eyes; only their marbled brown-green color. When he grunted and pushed black frames up his forehead, she laughed into the hands that were brought up to her crooked grin.

"Don't laugh. I still have that picture of the fat pony that you drew," he mumbled into the roar of the faucet. He drenched the noodles with cold water to separate them. She let him and peered around the apartment for sign of the sketch. He had threatened to frame the childish scrawl of limbs attached to a round body. A horse.

His flat was a riot of spilling loose leaf and canvas bolts. Large prints of Basquiat and Haring decorated his walls. An easel sat wedged in front of the narrow door that led out to a welcome-mat sized patio. It was winter and snow had piled up on all the windowsills. It was too cold to paint outside. Everything smelled like turpentine and paint, dust and paper. They were all familiar, good smells. It was one of the reasons why she could come over. It reminded her of home.

He did not. Adam was an inverse with his coffee-with-milk skin and hair twisted into tiny dreadlocks. He was bohemian and ratty in a stretched out oatmeal cardigan spotted with ink and paint on the large square pockets. His jeans were a tragedy. His feet were bare. When he grinned, his teeth were impossibly white and straight. He had his French father's sharp features and the full mouth of a Nigerian mother. He laughed without reason. A happy man. No shadows or torment. Hands were capable as he stirred the marinara sauce with a wooden spoon.

"What are you thinking?"

Her head snapped back to face him and she shrugged. Fingers nudged at the messy knot of her hair. They pulled out the curled strands of hair that itched at the nape of her neck. "I don't know. Nothing at all, I suppose."

"You looked very far away."

"Maybe I was," she said with a tilt of her mouth. The line of her upturned nose wrinkled.

"Wine?"

"Oui."

"In the fridge," he said with a thumb nudging to the small icebox behind him.

Aemilia lifted from her coiled spot on the chair and padded across creaking floorboards into the cold press of tiles. Her toes curled up in chilled shock. She grabbed the wine off the lighted shelf and brought it over to the cabinet. The drawer beneath was pulled open and she lifted out the silver bottle-opener. The corkscrew was coaxed out from the pocketknife compactness of the opener. She stabbed metal into the stopper.

"Benoit called. He is putting together an exhibit of 'Young Paris' and he wants me to put some stuff in. Apparently, our shabby-chic is all the rage," he snorted with a shake of his head. "It is terrible that my poverty sits in other people's mansions."

"When you have wine, how can you be poor?" The label was cheap, but good. She sloshed wine into a set of glasses and held up one for him to take. Her cheek pressed up into the pucker of lips that met it. "Are you going to participate in the exhibit?"

"I don't have much choice," he said before swallowing back a sip of the wine. "Let me paint you."

"No thank you," Aemilia laughed. A hand lifted to cup the sharp jut of his jaw. Thumb streaked lightly over his dark skin as her head turned. "I couldn't stand to sit still."

"That's right. Busy, busy Aemilia Prior. How long did it take me to convince you to stop working and go out with me?" His head ticked to the side in a teasing motion and he tapped at his chin. Free hand cut off the gas and blue flames died from beneath the pot that sauce bubbled inside.

"Six months," she mumbled.

"Six very long months," he agreed with a nod. "And let's not even get into how long it took me to convince you to spend the night. Now look at you -- Here on your own volition. I think you could sit still enough for me to paint you if you wanted to."

"Maybe I don't want to then." She shrugged and stepped away from him. Aemilia slouched against the doorframe and let her head loll. Eyes stared out over his gritty landscapes. He was obsessed with texture. All his paintings rolled up from the canvas in thick, messy ridges of acrylic and paper layers beneath. His hands folded over her hips and tugged lightly at the hem of her t-shirt. There was still flour in her hair and she smelled like vanilla and butter. A baker's smell. He buried his nose in her hair.

"Don't be mean," he said. A hand slipped beneath her shirt and sprawled over her belly. His palm was as warm as her stomach and comforting in its sprawl as fingers spread apart. "I won't make you sit for me, but I have one more request..."

She took a sip of her wine and head tipped up to stare at him.

"Move in with me." He kissed her temple, her ear. "If you hate this flat, I'll find another. Move in with me though. You have half your stuff here anyway. It's time."

"It's time?"

Adam nodded and his hands wandered higher. It was time for him. They had been dating over a year. She crashed out on his couch or bed more afternoons than not. The tops of ledges and counters were littered with her hair elastics and stubs from purchases made. She deflected in what he could have considered an answer as she slipped from him and pulled t-shirt from her skin. The material was cast aside as fingers curled into her palm. Dinner was forgotten for a fuck that occurred halfway between the kitchen and the bedroom. As her spine hit the plaster in a repetitive thudding, she tightened her legs around his hips and buried her face into his neck. Aemilia wandered -- a million miles away, across sea and the impermanent dots of islands between. New York City in her ears, summertime humidity on her skin.

Being there

2007-03-06T12:12:00.000-05:00

I’m having trouble dipping into the creative center of my brain. By now, I’m pressed against the deadline that I’ve set for myself and I’m feeling that familiar pressure build. This is usually the place that I get the best and most of my writing done. Still, I falter. I can’t pick on an image that sticks. Instead, I get shreds of details and passing characters. Like this:

In 1959, Charlie Armstrong was discharged from the United States Army. On his way out, he made one last stop at the army post exchange. There, with the contents of his back account, he bought twelve pairs of pants and four dozen pairs of socks. The clothes were sturdy cotton and though simple in cut, well made. He didn’t look back.

In his brief stint, he had seen enough. It wasn’t the close calls of warfare and all its horrors that had left an impression on him. He was never deployed. Still, it was the men around him that seemed to leave a mark on him.

And that’s it. Who is Charlie Armstrong? I know where he came from, but the story still remains.

I get asked, “How’s it coming?” from the next room and feel a sense of expectation to produce this great new, finished piece. Eventually, I will. The thoughts in my head will be cannibalized and stitched into different pieces. Charlie Armstrong is up for alteration. He could turn up five years from now as a little girl orphan in an army surplus jacket. That’s how writing is for me. There is no formula, no magic moment to set me off. Instead, I wait until I can write, then I write.

I’m going to use the example of Charlie Armstrong to illustrate how I write five hundred word stories. The first step is to get an idea that is complete and not too sprawling. Generally character portraits or vignettes about daily life work best. Anything spanning time and place gets complicated. Still, it can be done. You think of your story and then write it completely out from start to finish.

In 1959, Charlie Armstrong was discharged from the United States Army. On his way out, he made one last stop at the army post exchange. There, with the contents of his back account, he bought twelve pairs of pants and four dozen pairs of socks. The clothes were sturdy cotton and though simple in cut, well made. He didn’t look back.

In his brief stint, he had seen enough. It wasn’t the close calls of warfare and all its horrors that had left an impression on him. He was never deployed. Still, it was the men around him that seemed to leave a mark on him.

This is 109 words. For this example, the story should be fifty words. The next process is editing. I’ll cut out and reorder things so that I’m left with the intact, albeit (sometimes) different, image. The first things to cut out are generally adverbs, needless adjectives, and any transitional words. It’s up to the writer to decide what is important.

Charlie Armstrong was discharged from the army. On his way out, he made one last stop at the surplus. He bought pants and socks. The clothes were sturdy, simple, and well made.

He had seen enough. Not the close calls of war, but the men around him. He didn’t look back.

Fifty-one words. Generally, stories end up being a word more or less. Rather than try to find an article to erase out, I leave it. It’s close enough to count as fifty. What’s left behind tends to be more succinct and direct. Gone are phrases like “seemed to be” or “looked like.” Everything is forced to be.

The quiet

2007-02-27T12:40:00.000-05:00

Greene was an island located off the coast. Not counting the ferry ride – which came only on good weather days – it was a good ninety minutes away from the nearest inland city. The shore was rocky and unforgiving. Some left, few ever came in.

Noah and Mary Ellen Shepherd moved on the island during July when the weather was good. They had few things. Noah carried his typewriter beneath an arm. Mary Ellen was a beauty. She reminded the townsfolk of what a woman ought to look like. What was most striking was her laugh. It was clear and ringing like the church bell. Not that the Shepherds went to church.

When Mary Ellen had first come to Greene, she had tried to start conversations with some of the women in town. They were all faded, callow girls. When she complimented them on their dresses, they had stared at her as if she spoke another language. Requests for help and recipe advice had likewise gone unacknowledged. Mary Ellen was alone. Noah was no help either. He was busy with his new novel. Fifteen, twenty hours of the day were spent at the typewriter.

It was the quiet that disturbed Mary Ellen. She could already feel what would be an endless winter settle. It crept up in and became real. It was bitter and blue, hungry for warmth. It became her companion. It spoke to her in the voice of a little girl, soft and sweet. It giggled.

“It gets lonely up here,” Mary Ellen said as she hugged her elbows. August brought in endless gray days and cold nights again. “Don’t know how you can stand all this quiet.”

She looked down to see the lost girl, but there was nothing to see. She heard footsteps. Mary Ellen turned and began to follow the sound. She stepped into a puddle of water. It soaked through her heel. Water pooled up from the floor in small, kidney-shaped piles. Footprints. They were clear up the stairs.

The pipes groaned in the ceiling. She could hear water running.

Noah didn’t know how long the water had been running. It could have been hours from the stiffness of his joints as he stood up from the desk chair. It could have been five minutes. Why he was compelled to check on his wife was unknown. He grunted with irritation as feet hit the tiny puddles of water that littered the ground. When he hit the second floor, that was when he saw it. Water rolled from the space between door and floor. It continued to spill over the floorboards and itched towards him. His feet splashed as he opened the bathroom door.

Mary Ellen, wide eyed and mouthed, lay in the bathtub. She was a fish beneath the water. Her hands strangled the lip of the tub. He reached into the water to pull her up. She was lifeless.

That was when he heard it – the sound of the little voice, that girlish cackle.

Weekend portrait

2007-02-20T13:01:00.000-05:00

Happy Birthday. You’re thirty now. That means you’ve got to be accountable for your actions. The past decade was a freebee. Everyone knows that and that’s why the bars and clubs are packed with pretty young things on the prowl. You drink too much. You freeze to death outside with a cigarette in hand and miserable look on your face. Behind you, the brick façade is shaking. The open and shut of the door lets music sneak out. You realize that you don’t know what the hell any of the innuendo means. You can guess, but there’s no point in it.

Later, you’ll bring home a girl who’s much too young for you. She talks and talks, but really that’s not why you brought her over. Still, you smile and pour a little juice in your vodka. The vodka is cold and crisp. It’s gone syrupy from a shelf life spent in the freezer. Vapor fills your lungs when you steal a sip before shoving it back into the fridge. It makes your heart hurt. The glasses go warm on your counter.

When you pass out, it’s like the outro to an old cartoon. Black fills the periphery and zooms in. The girl becomes a pinprick of skin. A blink and then she’s gone. You wake up in the morning only to find that she’s cleaned out your wallet and taken your copy of The Great Escape.

You retreat back into bed, draw up the sheets over your head and trick your bruised brain into thinking its night. The muscles pulled taut at temples begin to loosen. Sleep slackens you. The hours pass quickly. You’ve got clothes waiting two blocks down at the cleaner’s. Your refrigerator is empty. Your house is slowly becoming a pit. These are things for tomorrow though. The phone rings in the other room, but you let it go to the answering machine. The voice is cool and impersonal. You have reached…

“Jonathan, its Mom. Just calling to wish you a happy birthday, honey! I’m so proud of you. You’ve really got yourself together…”

A pillow drowns out the maternal pride. You don’t want to hear it and feel the disappointment that comes from being a total sham. You don’t know who you are, but up until now you haven’t had to think about it. Things are different now. You’re older. Everyone’s expecting a little bit of wiser too. You roll over and sleep for another hour.

You’re too old to be out with this crowd, but that doesn’t stop you from pulling on a shirt from the pile and shoving feet into shoes. By the time you leave your apartment, all the buildings around you are closed for the night with their grates drawn. You see your reflection in the glass behind them: a square viewfinder for your nose, your chin, and part of an eye. You’ve been chopped up. You are a sum of your total parts and it’s not looking good, baby.

We are stitched together now.

2007-02-08T12:03:00.000-05:00

It is winter and I am curled up in the narrow bed of my girlfriend. Lying close, we are heat-sticky and naked. A scar spreads over her shoulder like a leech. It is from an old boyfriend, she told me. It was a party. He was drunk. The beer bottle shattered before either of them knew what had happened. Twelve stitches. I kissed that scar. I would never be that careless. That scar was before me, but it reminds me of how one day I will be a memory just like it. She has taken a job in London and I have become the old boyfriend.

We promise to write every day, and do. I begin planning a trip to visit her, perhaps even to relocate. There is no money for it, but we write to forget. After awhile, we adjust. That is when our letters become infrequent. There is no desire between us anymore. There is no need to escape. The letters stop.

Years pass and my girlfriend becomes a stranger to me. My memory of her is unreliable. Only goodness remains.

When I am thirty-eight, I meet Holly. She is nothing like my girlfriend. I cannot say exactly how, but I am sure of it. Our memories paint over the old. I cannot seem to remember anything at all about my girlfriend. I propose.

When I am forty, Clarissa is born. Pink plastic has takes over the house. I trip over toys and wipe noses. I become Daddy.

One afternoon, Clarissa and I are left on our own. We play strange made-up games that involve running and bossy commands. She is four and imperious. I have left the morning cartoons to run as background noise and the children's programming fades into the afternoon news report. We are ignorant of this until the sound of explosion rattles us out of our dream. I twist around to see smoke billowing from a subway somewhere. Clarissa yelps and stares. I slap a hand over her eyes but she strains to see between my fingers.

Out of the darkness, a body staggers out. She is limp and pale. Her face is smeared red and black. She falls to her knees and a set of paramedics sweep her up. I know that woman, I realize. Her face is not one to be forgotten, I think while knowing that I have done exactly that. Then, I remember. All the goodness rushes back to me:

Snow gathers on the windowsill of the dorm room. We are pressed chest-to-back. I can feel her heartbeat. The scar on her shoulder is flushed pink. It happened before they knew what hit them.

Clarissa wrenches away and tumbles back against a case. The vase that sits on one shelf topples down. In flight, it shatters. There is blood on Clarissa's shirt. She is stiff with shock. Her eyes are wide and betrayed. How could I be so careless?

Twelve stitches become the scar that sits on my daughter's shoulder.