Sending my kid down that hallway
clad only in his underpants and socks
wasn’t the hardest thing I’ve ever done
as a parent, but it was close.
He looked so small
as he walked away from us.
He was staring down at the IPad
and I was glad for the distraction it brought.
He walked willingly, if not a little blindly into the unknown.
The O.R. nurses led the way, chattering away to selective ears which
listened primarily to the beeps and boops of “Plants Vs. Zombies”
or some such nonsense.
We kissed his forehead and said we’d see him soon.
He muttered a goodbye and swiped his finger left to right
setting a trap for the next digital enemy.
We waited in a very comfortable, yet uncomfortable room;
with strangers and their concerns and cares thickening the oxygen
I was trying to breathe.
There was coffee and doughnuts, cereal and milk.
We ate breakfast on Styrofoam plates and out of paper cups;
we waited.
When it was done we were told how it all played out.
The surgeon spoke of it in the same way my mechanic
talks about replacing a head gasket,
only with about 1000% more confidence;
like it was literally no big deal at all.

We were both either in the right or wrong place at the same time, the old codger in the straw hat and I.

And, I’m not looking to write, tell, or think of any other stories about my mother, whom had died.

Nevertheless, here we are at the FastGas on Frederick Avenue.

And, as he pays for fuel he starts telling the clerk and myself about the trouble he has with numbers.

“I just lost my wife of 47 years,” he says.

“I’m sorry to hear this,” I reply.

“I remember looking at the clock in the kitchen just after she had died. I couldn’t read it.”

“Hmmm…”

(Because I couldn’t think of anything better to say.)

“It was like it didn’t make sense anymore. It was like nothing made sense anymore.”

I could relate, but didn’t say so.

“Yeah, I’m 74 years old, and if I died tomorrow that would be just fine.”

“You miss your partner fiercely, yeah?” I asked rhetorically.

He nodded reverently and handed the clerk three $20 bills.

“I don’t know what pump my van is on and all I did was pump til it stopped…
Take whatever you need for us to be squared up.”

The lady behind the counter did as she was asked.

The codger thanked her, collected his change, turned to leave.

“Your partner will wait for you. You still have some stuff to do here for awhile.
It’s okay that numbers don’t make sense anymore. It’s okay if a lot of **** has stopped making sense. You’ve got people that’ll steer you right, I’m sure.”

The clerk nodded.
I winked at her.

He nodded, sighed, stepped into the cooling air outside.

I stopped to light a cigarette.
I smoked and thought about how, in spite of everything, it all still made sense.

When I looked up, all that was left of that old fellow’s van was a plume of exhaust.

Even that made sense.

At least I hoped so.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2019

Guy told me that he was sure that Michael J. Fox and I had the same disease.
He wanted to know why I wasn’t shaking and convulsing all over the place.
Was it because of some new medication?
I tried my best to explain the differences between Cerebral Palsy and Parkinson ’s disease.

None of it seemed to make much difference,
and that,
in itself,
was okay too.

Guy was apologetic,
not for getting his information wires crossed,
but for my troubles as he saw them.

“Man, I’m so sorry that you have to live like that.”

I told him that it was what I was used to,
that it wasn’t that big a deal.

“Man, I just think it must be so hard.”

I told him that it was not easy some days,
that it was what I knew though,
that I was okay,
doing my thing,
just out seeing a band play
some music.

Something must’ve gotten through whatever haze he was in,
because he began to apologize for talking to me
about what he called,
my problems.

“No, sir.”
“A question is just a question. It never hurts, it only helps fill in the gaps.”
He said that he was sorry anyway.

I told him not to worry about it.

He asked if I liked the band that was playing later that night.

I told him that I did,
very much indeed.

He said that he wished he had a ticket,
but was trying to hear whatever he could
standing out in the cold,
next to the tour-buses,
smoking.

I finished my cigarette,
said I was going back inside.

He apologized,
‘for bothering me’,
he said.

“Nah,
you make the world
more interesting”,
I said.

And,
it was
true.

*
-JBClaywell
© P&Z Publications 2019

I wish I could explain it to you, but I can’t.
You’d have to walk around with me for a month
or so for it to make sense,
to seem like a real thing.
Sometimes, it’s not even real to me;
but it’s my life and
I’m the one walking around in it,
so there it is.

In the fall and winter,
particularly around the holidays,
it gets worse.  Some days,
especially during the last two weeks
before Christmas,
it gets really bad.

(Why do I think it’s a bad thing?)

(Is it?)

(What is this about?)


They come at me like zombies
when they see the crutches
and yet I refuse to blame my Cerebral Palsy
for what they do.  
Really, I believe that they’d show up anyway.
I think that they, and I to a degree,
feel some sort of cosmic pull
toward one another.

The drunks come to me.

(the developmentally disabled too.)

They tell me stories of how they ended up
in the same place that I am.
They tell me that they know also
that our paths were supposed to cross.
They tell me about their relationship with God
and how Jesus loves them in spite of their drunkenness
(or impairment.)
They tell me how blessed we are to have met.

That one always leaves me flummoxed.

All I wanted to do was eat a tenderloin and some fries.
All I wanted was a cup of coffee or a beer.
All I wanted was to occupy a small bit of
grey space for a couple of hours.

These cohabitates,
these space-stealers
always go straight for The Bible.

They talk of rapture
And the wholeness that I’ll
find in The Kingdom of Heaven
and I want to tell them that they’ve
taken some of that wholeness for
themselves, but I can’t.

I always say: “Thank you.”
And speak to them in
bumper-sticker platitudes;
telling them that we’re all
making our own ways
down our own paths.

And, it’s true, but I don’t want
to have to say it.
I don’t always want to believe it.

(And, I don’t always.)

I wish I could tell them that I want to be more like them,
to work in a factory,
lift the heavy stuff;
to work steadily on the line
or over the road,
inside the grey spaces
with more time to think,
to be quietly oaken
and iron.

*

-JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications

We seek a mystical awakening
this time of year.
We seek a star to follow,
so as to find a place in the desert,
a small oasis,
someplace to be born,
reborn,
born again.

Here,
where I am,
where you are,
the Earth is warming,
the weather patterns have changed to such a degree
that December doesn’t feel right anymore.

But,
the evenings are crisp enough
that you can put on a coat
and
walk for a while;
looking at the sky,
finding a star,
following it.

Christmas is a construct
based on Pagan winter rituals,
festivals attributed to the fact
that a wintertide torpor is descending;
that we know that the spring
will lead to a period of return upon the investment
in our ability to survive the harsh season ahead.  

The Christ-child is a symbol of ourselves as we wish to be,
full of hope,
a new life,
a sacrifice,
a suffering here and there
that will likely take place in either small or large ways
in the coming year.

The Three Wise Men
and their gifts
are a symbol
of the passage of time
and
the pleasantries we hope that The New Year holds for us.

What a perfect year for The Spirit of The Christmas Season.

In 2020 have we not been
as helpless as a swaddled babe?
Have we not felt far from home,
despite being locked inside?
In 2020 have we not made sacrifices of
ourselves in an effort to play our small part
in saving the world?

No?
Not really, huh?

It’s a nice thought though.

Being reborn,
being brought back
to a place in our lives
where we know how to demonstrate more kindness,
more tolerance,
more empathy than we did perhaps
in a time that wasn’t so long ago
that we cannot see it’s aftermath,
feeling residual impacts on lives,
our own
and those closest to us.

The fact of the matter is this:

“Merry Christmas”
“Happy Hanukkah”
“Joyous Kwanzaa”  

do not make up for anything.

We have to demonstrate
the spirit of these salutations
on
every other of the 364 days of this,
the next, the next,
and the next
years.

Not to mention
all of the subsequent years after that.

Look,
I’m no saint.
I’ll struggle right along with the rest of you.
Yet, we have to try.

Because,
during this year of unkindness,
of selfishness,
of hatred,
of entitlement,
of judgement…
I still saw the opposite of all these,
which allowed me to see,
even moreso,
one of the finest sights I could have wanted
to see during this decline
of civilization
known
as
2020.

I saw hope.
I saw it in all of your masked faces,
I saw it in the face of the lady who
bought me a bag of gas-station popcorn.

I saw it in the face of the gentleman whos
pizza slice I paid for one afternoon.

“I got you,” I’d said.
“Really?” he asked.
“Yeah.”
“Is that all you're getting?” she asked.
“Yeah”
“Can we add his charges to mine?”
“Sure.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”

Everyone said:
“Thank you.”

Yes,
Really.

I’ve got you.
Now.
and
in
2021.

No kidding.

Together.

Let’s go.

*

-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2020

The Christ was waiting
for a bus
on a street corner
in Heaven.
It wasn’t a big deal,
but an annoyance;
His car was
in the shop.
Because,
even in Heaven,
an oil leak is
a pain in the ***.
The Son of God
whistled as he waited.
The song that he whistled,
just so happened to be,
“Ring of Fire”.
For no particular reason at all,
it had been stuck in His head
all morning long.
As The Redeemer whistled,
and waited,
one J.R. Cash
was just dropping
his car at the shop,
for a quick oil change,
in what must’ve seemed
like divine providence, but
probably wasn’t.
Not one to sit still
for very long,
The Man In Black
set off for a brief stroll
instead of staying put
in the shop’s waiting area.
Spotting Our Lord,
at the bus stop,
The Highwayman
strode up and put forth
his usual introduction;
“Hello…I’m Johnny Cash.”
he said.
“I know who you are, Johnny!”
replied The Lord.
“I was fillin’ in for Pete
the day you passed through
The Gates, pal.”
J.R. nodded, and said;
“Yes sir, I remember now;
September 12th 2003.
You and Your Daddy had
let me have quite the run.
I thank You for that.”
The Savior, replied,
“Sure enough, John.
We always do what We can…
Hey, what’re you doing here anyways?”
The Man In Black grinned;
“Aw, nuthin’, I just seen that You was here
waitin’ for the bus.  
I thought I might offer to
walk back to the shop with ya,
an’ maybe offer a lift to get ya goin.”
The Lord smiled up at Johnny; squinting in the bright sun,
“Sure thing, Sue.  I’ll take it,
lets go.
They’re pulling a gasket on My Nissan anyway,
I’ve got nothin’ but time.”
“Okay”, replied J.R., “Let’s head back;
I’d bet they’ve got my Lincoln topped off by now.”
The Man In Black fired up a Lucky Strike
with a black Zippo lighter.
At the sight of this, The Lamb chuckled;
“Sue, you’ve been doing that since you were
twelve years old.”
He paused a bit, shrugged,
and asked;
“Hey, could I get one of those?”
Johnny handed one over,
and the pair set off back toward
the shop.
*

-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications; 2015

I guess I caught the ****.

I always thought I might.
Ever since this whole calamity started,
I thought I might end up with it.
I figured that it was just my kind of luck.

The Mean 19 came home to roost.

We were lucky enough to spit it out
14 days later.

It might not even matter,
apparently boredom
&
the greater good
don’t sit well with very many folks.

‘Mandate?’
‘What kind of ****** **** is that?’
‘I want a ******* cheeseburger!’

So,
here they come,
out into our careful weekend wars.

Our mission,
clandestine.

Theirs,
to be casualties before the first round
is fired.
They crash the party,
as loud and overbearing
as a congress of baboons.

They’ll make sure this lasts forever.

‘He brought back football, you know!’
‘Made a lot of us real proud!’

Really?

Well, I’ll be a fly on ****,
or
the head of The Vice President of The United States;
whichever you prefer.

How we howled!

All the while, some 22 y/o marketing genius saw
dollar signs in an investment of fly-swatters
with our team’s logo on it!

‘It’s a liberal-on-the-attack conspiracy’
they cried!
‘Those Socialist ******* knew that fly would be there.’
‘I bet they’d been training flies for months.’

Go ahead,
shout from the rooftops.
Let everyone know what you’ll wear or won’t wear,
how you’ll vote,
how it won’t matter if you do,
or don’t.

For God’s sake,
forget everything you’ve ever been told
&
just shut your stupid mouths.

Cast your ballots quickly and quietly,
then cast yourselves
into the sea.

You’ll never win anyway,
it’s not in the cards.

The deck is stacked against
the likes of us,
&
THEY cheat better than
we could ever hope to.

Go to sleep.
Wake up.
Go to work.
Come home.
Cook dinner.
Eat dinner.
Clean up.
Watch some TV
or
*******.

Nothing really changes anyway.

After all,
there’s no more Van Halen,
is there?
So,
you might as well…

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2020

Give the horses sugar cubes.
Give the eagle a salmon.
Give the monkey a ripe banana.
Give the donkey a carrot.
No one knows what any of this means.
Trust me, I don’t either.
You can say that these lines are deep,
you can say that these lines are shallow.
I assure you that they’re neither.  
I’m writing to understand the roar in my skull,
to quell the torrent that whips my brain.
I’m writing these words outside of myself;
if I don’t make time to write them down,
they drive me insane.
Into this notebook the ink must flow,
like blood coursing through my veins.

Without paper,
ink, and pen,
surely I’d be wracked with pain.  

I write them down onto this pulp,
I read them from this page.
For I, myself, am a Thunderbird,
I offer my life onstage.  

It is this art inside myself
that I must give away.
To everyone and nobody at all,
I give myself away.
I give everything I have
and am,
to being a storyteller,
a poet,
a husband,
a parent,
a good man,
a friend,  
or just me…

Jay

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2020

He poured himself
just the smallest
bit of coffee.

The remainder of
last night’s ***,
really.

It had sat on the
burner all night,
was now dark,
thick, ink-like.


He’d fallen asleep
in the chair after
she’d left.

The angry words
sang in the air,
whippoorwills in
his dreams;

his sleep challenged
by their flocking;
his feelings.

It was snowing
when his eyes had
finally shut themselves
against the dawn of her
departure.

As he looked at
the front steps,
the new snow fell,

(just the smallest bit…)

filling in the
footprints of her exit

with finality.

*
-JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications

There is little notice
of the eddies of leaves,
trapped and circling
in the corners
of
chain-link.

Stepped on slices
of white bread;
blackened
banana peels
litter the walkways.

Someone has fed
the prison mascot,
a vagrant cat,
a volunteer mouser
for the state
of
Missouri.

A sergeant kicks
the little mound
of dry food,
sending it skittering
into the dewy grass,
wasted.

There is a pale pink
to the sky.

Leftover sunrise.

Hopefully, other eyes see it too.

“Single file lines into the chow-hall, gentlemen!”

There is little gentleness here.

It’s contraband.

Chewed to pulp,
spat where needed.
A poultice.
An ointment.

Made from the last of the marigolds,
The Susans who’s black-eyes
have healed to a bruised yellow.

Pockets full of pink sky,
cool air,
sober hopefulness.

Stepping gently
into the
caged morning.

*
-JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications 2020

At this point,
life feels like
A table set for
20.

There’s only
one
lemon ****.

Everyone wants
a piece.

Someone’s going to end up
with a mouthful of blood.

(Spitting out teeth.)

Chew,
while you still
can.
*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2019

“Maybe if you wrote
like a cop when you’re
putting in service notes,
you wouldn’t waste
so much time.”
I’m told.

Maybe that’s right,
but it feels wrong
not to invest some
of what I’m good at
into these people’s
lives.

I’m good at telling stories.

And, I do tell their stories,
replacing words like ‘said’
and ‘told’ with dryer lint
like ‘stated’ or ‘observed’.

Regardless, an investment
is made, a story is told;
most days there’s not
enough story left for me.

Maybe, if I gave less
than a *******,
I’d have some *******
left for my own stories,
but the notebooks lay
empty,
my skull’s usual roar is
silent.

That silence deafens, depresses.
But, I care enough about the story in the
service notes to give more
than
a *******.

*
-JBClaywell

©P&ZPublications; 2016

Dear Magenta,

I hope this letter finds you in better spirits than I.  It has only been three days since I was allowed pen and ink. I have spent the last two days trying to decide what it was that I wanted to convey in this message.
Once I decided, I spent most of today locked in my room beginning and destroying this letter.
The floor is littered with scraps of paper, upended preludes.

There is so much to tell you; beginning is near impossible. We will do our best, I suppose.

I want you to know foremost that I have never hated you. I want you to know that I only wanted to see our project to it’s inevitable end. I wanted to be done with you, I wanted you to leave me to my own devices for a while, I wanted to be able to refresh myself and renew my spirit. You, my antagonist, should have allowed it. Alas, you’ve always seemed to be ignorant of my need, or to have other plans altogether.

It is a clever ruse that you have put together. You would speak to me of my own betterment. You would tell me that you were only trying to strengthen my resolve, to make me somehow improved. And how I believed you! How I wanted it to be unfeigned!  And, I do wish ever so that your efforts were pure. But, where you see me, you see a buffoon, no doubt!

What a folly you have made.

I am aware of you now. My eyes are open and my mind fairly screams with indignation.

I need you to know that I will not bend to your supplanted misgivings. You will not continue as you have these recent months. My confidence is returning and no anxiousness shall impede it.

I know now, and have always known, that I am capable, and intelligent. You may find me unconventional, perhaps even unsavory, but I know that my intentions are pure and my efforts are honest and more importantly, well received!

Now, you must also know that I know what to expect! When the time comes and you are confronted with my malcontented behaviors; you will project a moue and cry foul.  I can almost see it in my mind’s eye!

And, honestly, I’m looking forward to it.  But, please do try to maintain a level of composure that is redolent of your years on this planet.

With an unfortunate level of superciliousness,

Obsidian


-JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications

with gnarled tooth
and broken jaw,
it all gets stuck
in my ******’
craw.

with aching back
and twisted knee,
there’s little use
left of me.

the raven will come
and pluck my eye,
minutes after I
lie down
to die.

*

-JBClaywell

© P&ZPublications

The desire to make the rest of these words rhyme
Is immense!
Alas, I cannot do it.
All I can do is read Frost’s
iambic pentameter and wonder
just what has become of Lola C. Edwards?
It’s her tome that I’ve purchased for two bits
at this decrepit, yet beloved thrift shop.

The book became hers, according to her inscription,
in the year 1970.
Now, it belongs to me in 2014.
I bought it because it’s The Complete Poems of Robert Frost;
the same that resides in my father’s library
and was greedily scanned by my hungry eyes and inspired mind.
But, what happened to Lola, some years ago?
Was it the cancer? Did it consume her bones?
Was she surrounded by loved ones?
Was she all alone?
What else but death could force her to relinquish such a text?
Surely, she couldn’t have done so willingly.
Her estate has been sold.
Her knick-knacks dusted and boxed for their final voyage to The DAV.
Turned over to uncaring brutes that couldn’t care less about
her beloved crystal cake plate, now shattered, or the book
that I hold in my hand today.
Lola C Edwards shares her life with me.
Every time I open this compendium,
I shall celebrate her, this beloved stranger!
Because, we are alike, she and I
in that we have chosen the road less traveled by,
and that has made all the difference.
*
-J. Claywell
©P&ZPublications; 2014

The doors to the office
are locked up tight.

The receivers are off
their hooks tonight.

We’re out in the streets
practicing our long division.

The time has come;
gotta make the hard
decisions.


Which side are you on?

Why are we choosing
to glorify a man or
woman, in their
victimizations or
victimhood?

Doing so,
it doesn’t do
anyone any
good.

We allow or encourage
victims to swim in the
**** of their victimhood,
never to come out on the
other side clean?

Am I the only one
who sees this as mean?

More than that,
I find it obscene.

We are making nobody
equal.

This is just another
spike in our collective,
divided skulls.

What makes this
all that much worse,
like a ******* curse;
is that the culture wars
are the only battles
left to be won.

Sow what you wish
to reap.

Reaping kindness,
and willingness
to treat each other
and ourselves like
sons and daughters,
mothers and fathers;

there’s no place more
for this culture war
cannon fodder.

Fox News, god-dammed CNN
pointing out everyone
else’s sins.

They quit looking for any
battle to end;
Hell, they just push the buttons
and the next one begins.

Stay offline,
don’t feed these *******
swine.

Don’t use Face-crook,
they sold the book
a long time ago.

Feeding junk food
to our minds.
Fueling our egos;
leaving us to wonder
where all our time
goes.

The **** bluebird’s
not much better,
defaming our collective characters
in less than 140 letters.

Read a book instead,
lean into the pages
return to your own
thoughts,
exit these New-Millennial
Dark Ages.

We are one people,
we’re of all colors,
of every class,
maintaining our
collective humanity
shouldn’t be such
an unknown
pursuit.

Here we are,
divided,
trying to
feed one another
our own rotten fruit.

Check your personage
at the gate,
it’s already too late.

Or, is it?

“We The People” will
sell and buy us
like cattle going to
slaughter.

They’ll buy the mind
of every son and daughter
in the name of the mighty
dollar.

Taxes, student loans,
medical expenses,
freeloaders or front-loaded
*******, killing ourselves
with AR-15s outfitted with bump
stocks designed to bump stocks and
bonds, gluing our politicians hands inside the
pockets of the NRA lobbyists.

(Look what I did! I’m part of the problem!
Long divisions?
There are other ways
to solve
them.)


Ban it all and band together,
go to the party with the ugly
Christmas sweaters;
instead of badges worn by elephants
or *******.

No more.

Say it loud.

Say it now.

No more long division.

Care and carry the one.

Lift each other up,
enough is enough.

Sign the letter,
the petition,
the promissory note.

With Love,

The Remainder    

*


-JBClaywell

© P&ZPublications

The rat-terrier
that I’d loved for
over a decade
has been dead for
awhile now.


Sometimes I miss that dog.
Sometimes I miss cigarettes.

My America is now
the go-to destination
for the suicide-bomber
or
The Mass-Shooting Machine


All of this national abomination
has become all too normal.
&
why is any of this
at all attached,
in any way,
to our
Easter-Sunday-Church-Going
morals?

Tragedy,
a travesty,
trustworthy humans.
-untrue-
mistrustful,
unworthy misogynist,
malcontents
lacking empathy.

Unpaid checks,
no gravity -
a lacking of grateful
hearts.


Our ears destined,
designed, dedicated to hearing
only the hurtful,
instead of the healing.

On the take -
take or be taken
fake or be faking-
make or be made-
scapegoated,
goaded into submission
leaving
us wondering
just what,
exactly is so bad
about hate.

I mean everyone’s doing it these days;
and no one seems to be doing it wrong.

Maybe that’ll change
once we’re on our
deathbeds.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2021

I was never interested in the kind of love that takes place in the daytime. I always wanted love that hid in the shadows, because as wonderful as love can be, and often is, it hurts.
I never wanted love that could see me bleed.



Love is soft, kind, holds your hand on the porch.
Love sits with you on the swing, in the park.
Love is candlelight, chocolate, a nice dinner.

Love is holding hands and nevermind
that palms are sweaty.
Because that love is new and
nervous, and hopeful.

That love is exploration, new touches,
electric tendrils caused
by kisses on the earlobes,
on the back of the neck.

Love is an evening stroll
that leads to *******,
waking in a bed that isn’t yours,
but a bed that feels safe enough
in the grey light of the pre-dawn.

And, anyway, isn’t it exciting?

This new place, this new person,
this new experience.

Love is conversation over a cup of tea,
a light breakfast, some good bread.

Love this new, this fresh, this exhilarating
won’t last, it can’t last, it’s too rich,
too many calories, too much sugar.

A love like this one is a mocha frappe.


The love I wanted was a 2:45am bedtime,
maybe a little hungover.

Maybe I’d been somewhere I shouldn’t’ve,
maybe she had.

The floor was littered

with unanswered text messages,
with missed calls that fell out
of my pockets like loose change
when I took my pants off and
hung them on the back of a chair,
too lazy to put them in the laundry.

Love that survives in these gray spaces,
maybe it’s real, maybe not, maybe it’s
mutated, adapted into a primordial
survival ignorant animal.

Love in the gray space, in the shadows,
in the storms, survives or dies,
but you, not it decides.

*


-JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications

Matt and John sat at John’s kitchen table,
it was 5’clock in the morning,
there was plenty of time
but there was none to waste.
John was glad that Linda and his daughter
were still upstairs asleep.
He was glad too that Matt was driving;
no one knew the streets and alleys better.
John thought that Matt was a bag of hammers,
but he was loyal as hell, kept quiet most of the time,
was brave to the point of stupidity, and drove like a bat.
John got up from his chair;
poured another coffee.
Matt nursed a beer.

Everything they needed was in the mini-van;
an innocuous thing lifted rather smartly from
a long-term parking lot near the airport.

Pistols not shotguns, John had insisted.
Matt’s argument was simply that shotguns
were scarier.

John lit a cigarette and sipped some
coffee.

First National would fall.
John was sure of it.
He and Matt would leave
that bank’s lobby with about
3 million dollars strapped to their backs;
they’d lose the bulls, skate by the house,
pick up the girls, and be California-bound
by the time the fast food joints
stopped serving breakfast.

On the other side of town,
the police barracks was alive
with activity.
Two old-school throwbacks
Det. Luke Richardson and his partner,
Det. Mark Gonzalez, had gotten
a tip.

A greasy little stool-pigeon
named Hector had said
the word was that Johnny Dunn
and his raw-wired cousin, Matt,
were planning to take down First National Bank
on Friday, the first of the month,
payroll day.

They’d been leaning
on Hector for a couple
of months,
finally offering
him a knockback
on a B & E pinch
that they’d held
over his head like
an anvil.

Hector squawked
for immunity on that one
as well as
state’s evidence
regarding chatter
he’d heard about
the bank job.

Their gear was set,
vests cinched tight,
shotguns in the car.
Their service pistols cleaned,
oiled, and loaded,
with one in the chamber.
Holdout pieces strapped
to their ankles.

It was about 6:45 am,
First National’s drive-thru
opened at 7:30.
The lobby would open by 9,
but staff would be in the building
by 7;
tellers making sure their cash-drawers
were customer-ready.

The two detectives left
the briefing room,
strode the short distance
to the motor pool,
started the car…
the radio crackled
to life…

static
All units this is Control
static
We have a silent alarm triggered
for a 211 in progress
at 14th and  Carver Avenue
static
First National Bank
static

Mark was behind the wheel,
Luke flipped on the siren,
it blipped then began to wail.

The Gospel was being written.
All units, saints and sinners,
were on the move.
*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications

What a shame it is
that we spend most
of our time these days
committed to standing
on unloving
ground.

Instead of loving
our neighbor as
ourselves,

we seek unfettered
validation,
no matter our
own candid transgressions.

Our minds are full of stolen
ideas,
like eggs from the nests of eagles.

We spend our nights measuring wolves.


*

-JBClaywell

© P&ZPublications

From Journal: September 2019

Some things are simply a matter of midnight melancholy while others are a direct result of the full moon. Sometimes a wish gets made mid-sneeze, mid-yawn, or mid-sentence, getting somehow ruined. Who really understands how all of these things work? I know that I don’t. I probably never will. But, I keep trying. Don’t we all? One way or another.

Some nights have teeth, fangs that sink into flesh. Other nights sing sweetly. No one really knows which night that the given day will lay upon their doorstep.

What most people tend to forget is that they can almost always exercise at least a modicum of control. This is neither fate nor destiny.   It is simply life and it happens to us as much as because of us. This line of thinking is easy to let slide. I try my best to remember.

Apologize when you must. Never say that you’re sorry for something that is out of your control. Be as kind as you are able. Make your mistakes. Learn from them. Hell, just learn. Keep learning.

We’re all out here, following our own humanity around. Like something we keep on a leash. We walk beside it. All of it is lost art. A sonnet. A painting. Something Michelangelo or Aristotle left abandoned in their basement.  A statue, somehow alive. It scratches its ***** and ***; giving its fingers a sniff. It won’t look you in the eye, but neither will it apologize for being what it is. It may very well be more human than you.


Soundless, except for my clicking. Alone. Walking the streets of Downtown. I parked at The Corby and just walked. Today was noisy. People talked to me at every turn.

Earlier today, I was at a bookshop. A lady and her young daughter stopped me. The little girl just had to know all of my ‘why’s’. (Why do you walk like that? Why do you use those things? What happened to you?) I really didn’t feel like going into it, but I couldn’t see any way out of it either. The little girl was earnest as hell and her mom seemed fairly insistent. I felt like I was on display, a lesson in a classroom. However, I couldn’t get the chip to stay on my shoulder. I don’t like being that way anyway. It’s a drag. People mean pretty well most of the time.

As a side note: Pops saw much of this interaction and sat in the van looking rather smug. He looked like he knew that he had raised me right. He did so, but I really wanted to be a **** right then. I don’t think he’s ever seen that much of ‘the thing that happens’. He liked it way more than I did. The lady made her daughter thank me for answering her questions. I felt like an employee.

Lots of depressive times and thoughts. Most of these are still tied to the passing of my mother. I’m not really angry these days, just frustrated. Nothing except home time seems like it’s going the way that I want it to.  
Something needs to change and I’m not sure what it is. I want to do something different. I want to do something that doesn’t force me to care about others so much. But, even that feels wrong. I love doing what I do. I love people. I like the distance though. It keeps me even. I need distance a lot. I’m no  good if I have to go for long periods making people feel comfortable or whatever you’d call it. I get wound too tightly and have to get away.


-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2019

My new winter
coat is black.

It is as black
as a starless
night sky.

Yet, now there
are smudges of
dirt on the ends
of my sleeves.

My coat has hung
on the back of a
chair today.

As I lunched
at a small counter,
eating fried eggs and
hash browns,

someone must’ve stepped
on the sleeves of my coat
and left bits of their own
day behind.

The other day,
I’d asked my wife
to wash my coat
because it had gotten
dusty.

So, she did.
And, out it came
from the dryer,
thick and warm
obsidian.

Now,

I see those smudges
and I think of them
as clouds that race
across a midnight sky.

Like me,
like The Earth,
spinning,
always on the move.

*

-JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications

This town gives small gifts
if one drives down the proper
avenues or alleys.

Joe Rubidoux couldn’t have fathomed
some of his village’s future
backward advances.

With a fondness, perhaps misguided,
the soul-forming streets, rife with potholes
full of memories and busted tie-rods are
sought.

This sour Saint speaks
as the miles
of moonlight slide by and play
their personal history slideshow
just below the visor.

It is thought to turn left;
heading down 4th,
to where the wire baskets
were filled with hand cut potatoes,
and the bellies of barnyard birds
were plated up for joyous devouring.

Sadly, those baskets are hung to rust,
and those worn tables and vinyl seat cushions
are home to things more wild than the eyes
of the boys that ate gizzards fresh
from hot grease,
sopping it all up with white bread.

The sky begins to purple,
like the clover in those abandoned lots
near to where the coal trains still chug
down the line.

Places that made a man
are passed,
remembered as though
part of someone else’s
life.

The yellow paint and brown shutters
of that chopped-up duplex bring a sigh
that is as heavy as the coal cars that clatter by.

The need for what was,
what had to be,
is discussed
and proven to be for
good and all.

Because the man
behind the wheel
lives inside this municipality
seeing not mediocrity,
but marvels that reside
unnoticed as the miles
and miles of moonlight
continue to slide by.

*
- JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications; 2017

the miracle
of a little
girl rising
from her
wheelchair
is
such
a rare
thing
that all
else
perhaps seems
ordinary,
maybe even
meaningless.

it is not.

miracles
are everywhere
and inside of
everyone.

Look!

You’ll see them.

in every sunrise
or
cotton cumulonimbus,
in every hummingbird
or the flour-covered
apron of that lady
who works at the
bakery.

there are miracles
in the eyes of
every child,
sparrow, leopard,
or
squirrel.

This line is miraculous,
as miraculous
as you.

*
-JBClaywell
© P&Z Publications 2019

I always want
to stay out late
and look for the untold
stories of this community.

Little tidbits of
conversations that
I’m not part of.

People are stories,
phrases,
thoughts,
ideas,
dreams.

They are moments
and memories that
they’ve collected.

I only eavesdrop
so as to borrow
briefly.

Perhaps, their happiness;
mayhap their loneliness,
to see if it matches

the
set
that
I
carry.

*

-JBClaywell

© P&ZPublications

You have to get it right.
Except for when you don’t.
It’s okay to have ****** it all up.
Just don’t live there.

Mistake.

We tried.
We had an opportunity
to do some taking.
We missed.
It happens.

I have to remind myself
all
the
time.

*
-JBClaywell
©PZPublications 2019

Whether you believe it or not,
my original arms dealer was
a Buddhist.

He armed me to the teeth
with a desire to destroy
the darkness
of my teenage thoughts
by firing bullets
filled with ink
into those wretched silhouettes,
turning them into
poetry.

He sent me,
filled past full
with bluster and
*******,
to the mustiest
den on Felix Street.

But, I couldn’t stay.

I hadn’t quite lived enough;
I’d learned even less
despite being so well
weaponized.

Instead,
I’d find The Black Box,
staying there until
The Paper Moone would
rise above my horizons
and that large sergeant
would offer me more ammo
from the armory.

We fired tracers down those alleys
until the shells were all spent.

We pause now to reload.

The Buddhist’s ordinance
is expended.

Little has changed
despite everything
being different
than it was when we first met.

Now,
the firing range
is nested by
Thunderbirds.

We are well-armed.

*
- JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications; 2017

There he was,
Nathaniel,
working his spot
at the coffee shop.

I knew without asking
that he never liked being
called Nate.

Hell,
that’s why it said
Nathaniel
on his name-tag,
right?

I was feeling a bit spurred,
maybe a little raw,
for reasons which escaped
or  
I’d let run away,
who knows?

I should’ve been downright
jolly.
The holiday season hadn’t been
too terrible so far,
I had a burrito, the sauce,
a Cherry-Pepsi.

My notebook was open,
the pen was clicked,
ready to go.

The first bite is always the best.
Those flat-top grilled
piggy-guts are the bacon
that never gets eaten,
unless your in the know;
and I am.

Yet, it wasn’t mood-improving
even while it swam in the green chili
tomatillo wonders
created by:
The Sauce.

So,
after I’d chewed
&
swallowed...

“Hey Nate!
How’s it going?”

“I’m good.
I saw you come in.
I was wondering if you were
planning on ordering something
from here.”

Ah!
There it is;
a little bitterness
just for me.

“Yes, Nathaniel,
I plan on getting a coffee
after I finish my dinner.
Is that okay?”

He never said anything else.
He simply went back behind the counter.

I ate my food,
drank my soda,
felt a bit guilty.

Ol’ Nate hadn’t done
anything to me.
He’s only trying to make
his own way,
same as everyone else.

I threw my dinner-trash away,
approached the counter,
ordered an Americano,
(light and sweet)
paid,
sat back down
to write.

The drive-thru line
was going all-out.

Tonight,
Nate would have all the nickels he’d need.

In the end, our sourness
toward one another
was pointless,
meaningless,
outside of my own
stupid meanness.

Seasonal Affective Disorder
it’s called.

We,
Nathaniel and I
parted ways as patron
and
barista.

We don’t have to be friends.
No Christmas cards.
No presents under the tree.
Only coffee, cash,
a silent,
more patient,
poet,
working, writing,
sipping coffee.
Reasonable.
Silent.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2020

Walking the nighttime streets
of this city.
Been doing this over half my life.
I’ve never worried about
the clack-clack-clack
of cerebral palsy’s
aluminum appendages
serving as dinner bells
for whatever wolves that
The Joe might den.

Bring ‘em…

drug dealers,
republicans
democrats or
the deranged…

It never mattered.

Broad shoulders,
a pretty mean
stink-eye,
&
being held upright
by a pair of elongated
billy-clubs
seemed always
enough of
a deterrent.

The wolves
are out of their
dens
tonight.

(I, among their number.)

So many
that the neon
howls.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2018

We often hang up
phones without saying
what the person
on the other end
wants to hear.

More interested in
coffee and sinkers
on our way out the door;
beating the rush hour
traffic into downtown,
late for work.

Choosing resolve over
conviction, no trump cards
in this particular deck.

Massachusetts Street,
Lawrence Kansas, 7pm.

There’s a man sitting quietly
across from where I am.

He is alternating between purring
like a cat and making **** noises
at passersby and otherwise muttering
to himself.

He is drinking an iced tea from the
café and chain smoking

I am smoking a cigarette myself.

Every moment or so, we make
eye contact and I can see different
galaxies in his eyes.

Knowing, doubtless that he vibrates
on a different frequency that most
everyone else.

(I try to love him anyway.)

There are only minimal variances
in the code,
but these microscopic differences between us,
they bear so much weight that the scales crack.

Our circles are too small.

Shh…

The Honeybears are here.




*

-JBClaywell

© P&ZPublications

We are lost.
Gone.
Tomorrow arrived,
we were not ready.

The future showed up,
we showed our ***.

Since we couldn’t
have the anti-gravity
boots,
the city in the
clouds,
or
free healthcare for
everyone,
we settled on the 24-hour
******* tapas bar,
turning it into an
all-you-can-choke-down
affair.

We called it progress.

We don’t need smart-bomb
drone strikes
when we’ve got
over-loved,
under-disciplined,
entitled church-mongers
inside our Wal-Mart,
maskless,
during a *******
global pandemic.

Not to worry though,
Jesus surely has the wheel.

Ah, who am I kidding?!

Jesus isn’t ‘up there’;
he’s down here
making sure
we can still have celery
and
strawberries
to forget about
in our refrigerators.

They’ll go limp,
like our overused
out-of-touch-with-reality
peckers.

Maybe then we’ll
be a little less inclined to
**** everything
up.

Not to worry,
the anti-anti-*******
industry means
more than having a stable
means means.
You know what I mean?
Is that mean to say?

It doesn’t ******* matter
because it’s true.

We march, we riot,
we loot, we get shot,
or
we shoot.

Where in all of this remains our
fundamental humanity?

Is it still on the altar?
Still hanging from the cross?

Doesn’t really matter,
does it?
The dollar is the boss.

At what cost though?

How do we pay what we owe
if we don’t know who the debt belongs to;
who holds the promissory note?

Is it a blood debt?

It sure feels like it
these days.

Who,
in the end,
really gives a ****?

We’re paying on credit anyway
&
horrors abound as the massive
massacre moves ever onward
toward some unknown
finish line.

Not to worry.

We’ll figure out what we need;
what we’re after;
who’s the master,
who’s the slave.

It all comes out in the wash.
The Blood of the Lamb
or Uncle Sam.

Not to worry.

As long as we’re clocked in,
everything will
be just
fine.

*  

-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2020

We have not fallen
in love with the second
coming of November,
but she is here
nonetheless.

How sad it is
that she is so
drunk on her sister
April’s wine
that all she can
do is weep her
frozen tears,

wail her chilled
misery,
ruining this year’s
garden already.

I would like to
be warmer,
no doubt,
but

this return will
be short lived.

So, while November
is here again,
I’ll pour her another
glass of her sister’s
best vintage,
join her on the porch
and offer her one
of my
cigarettes.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2018

It is Sunday, 7:45am.
The oldest child is scuttling around the kitchen,
I can hear toaster-pastry wrappers
being torn asunder.
Staring at the ceiling fan, with its dusty blades,
my arm extends above my face, my hand separates the pages
of the very first Longmire mystery.
No words have been read for several minutes.
Putting the insurance agent’s business card between the leaves,
the book finds the nightstand.
I roll to face my wife.
Propped on an elbow, I look, rewind a handful of memories and know
I’m in the right bed, in the right place, and am grateful for that knowledge.
That isn’t to say that I’ve never pondered other beds, other ceiling fans;
androcentric honesty with myself  proves otherwise, of course.
The adorable high school chubster, crystallized into the stately blonde;
what would it be like, staring at her ceiling fan, lying stickily next to her, trying
to drum up conversation?
I cannot imagine.
Or, the raven haired stunner, with her perfect imperfections;
she steals my breath with every glance, at every venue, every time,
yet, despite the ease with which I can imagine her polished toenails
stabbing the air beside my ears, I cannot imagine her ceiling fan,
nor can I imagine the effort needed to assist her to an aura of comfort
inside her own skin.
So, here, in my home, in my bed, with my wife;
propped on my elbow,
I look at her
and I am glad when she adjusts her position,
her snoring intensifies momentarily
and she chuffs some morning breath into my face.
Dismissing the smell, I am mesmerized by her
fairy saddle of freckles. (I count them. Eighty five.)
I am enthralled with her unruly strawberry-blonde haystack,
the paleness of her skin, the fullness of her lips, and the fullness
of my heart for her.
A minute passes and I have replayed some of our most memorable
moments under this bedroom’s ceiling fan.
Sure, they’ve been sweaty, sticky, and such;
but they’ve given way to some of the best, most honest,
and most vulnerable conversations of my life
and they’ve given me the best people I’ve ever met,
or played a part in making.
Like the blades of a ceiling fan
my thoughts can turn,
my eyes might wander,
but my heart will always
come home.

We are made
of time and decisions.
It is not destiny
that guides us
nor
fate that stirs the winds
which fill our sails.
It is time,
alongside the very choices we make
which define us, create us.

Molecules, atoms, electrons.
Matter. Space dust. The very cosmos,
the time-space continuum.

Time.

We, our very selves
are the product of a singular
moment.
Even if that moment
is or was not as sweet
as we might wish it to be
or have been for ourselves
or  
those who put movement
and
momentum into our
very creation;
we
are
made
of
time.

Life,
once that particular
clock begins to tick,
is ultimately our own.

How we react to
what happens
along the way
is that which makes an individual’s life
what life is.

These are the terms and conditions.
These are the rules.
They’re always changing.

Eventually, time’s up.
Food.
We become food for worms.
Time moves on.
Without us.
The tree grows.
We feed it.
The sun rises and sets.
We don’t see it.
Time passes regardless,
heedless to our absence.

Would to doom.
Gone too soon.
No fork. No knife.
No spoon.

By light of the moon,
stillborn youth.
No more lies,
only truth.

Until
the end
of
time;
undecided.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2020

I’d like more
than one death knell,
I’d like a
personal
bottle of lightning,
that I’ve caught for
my very own.

I’d give up that
little **** of a
rat-terrier if
it could,
somehow,
transmogrify
into a wolf
or
a panther.

I’d like
a jet-black
Camero,
with tires
made of fire
and seats made
of smoke.

I think that
a little toxic-waste
is good for you.

(keeps ya sharp, yeah?)

I think
that a man,
a woman,
hell,
any human
worth a ****
ought to be able
to ride into battle
on a goat, a *******,
or a *******
llama

and

know in their
hearts that they are the master
of their own destiny.

It’s a rough sea,
it always will be.

That’s life.

Be sad,
mad,
a little depressed,

but,

stay here,
because there’s
kielbasa sandwiches
with mustard and
onions.

There are people
that love you,
there are books,
songs,
flicker shows
to see.

The sharks bite,
the octopi might
squeeze,
the rays might sting.

None of it means
anything,
if you don’t…


Take off the floaties
and swim.

*
-JBClaywell
© P&Z Publications 2019

Lima beans.
Canned asparagus.
Polished stones.
Lint I've collected from the dryer in my home for the last month or so.
Wheat pennies.
Buffalo nickels.
Loaves of pumpernickel bread.
Bone-handled pocket knives.
Names of those whom my family have loved,
buried,
long dead.

Most of these things,
I’ve no problem with.
Some I remember fondly,
some I collect,
some I eat,
others don’t really matter at all.

We enjoy the things that we enjoy.
While we’re here,
we do our best.

Most everything else is insignificant,
of little consequence in our lives.

Certainly less so, than our children,
ourselves, neighbors,
our friends,
our husbands,
or
our wives.

Why then, dear ones,
do we natter and fret so much?

We hem and haw,
wring our hands
stressing over things like
lunch,
a mask,
or
inequality in society,
usually blaming
The Orangutan currently occupying
The Oval Office;
certainly occupying more
than his fair share of our
collective consciousness.

We’ve forgotten how to forget,
how to let it go, doing the best
that we are able,
where we are,
with what we have.

We must remember
ourselves,
our values,
our votes.

Because,
apathy
or laziness
lost 2016
for all of us,
whether we believe it
or not.

So,
I plan to remember,
emphatically,
unequivocally,
unimpeachably,
who I am,
where I come from,
what matters to me more
than anything else.

One
One
Zero
Three
The year,
two-thousand
twenty.

You are you.
I am I.
We are we.

History,
our legacy,
our democracy,
our liberty
is at stake.

These reside
in our hands always,
being more important than
canned asparagus,
polished stones,
or
a pocketful of wheat pennies.

Specifically,
especially so,
on
eleven-three-twenty-twenty.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2020

I peeled the orange whole,
the bitter pith,
the stinging juice,
pulled into sections
eaten one
at a time.

I thought of my new office,
my new filing cabinet,
full of offender homework,
headed for the shredder.

I couldn’t help but read
some;
just a glance now and then.

The bitter pith of justice served,
the salty tears of regret.

The oranges I’ve seen
scattered on the yard,
they remind me each
of a life made hard,
difficult by way of choices made,
more and still by prices paid.

I saw a letter written from father
to infant son,
the pages spoke of deeds
never undone.

“We were drunk.
his daddy said,
“there was an accident
...and, I’m sorry son, but mommy’s dead.”
“I’d ruined our lives on a single night,
I’m doing my best to make it right.”

Like the peel of the orange,
that letter’s no more,
&
that boy’s daddy paid
what was owed.

He’ll never have his son’s
mother back,
but,
from what I read,
his heart wasn’t black.

Daddy made an error,
in a terrible way,
spending some time
in prison grays.

*
-JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications 2020

it is strange
to look into the
mirror of our
upbringing,
and
start a staring
contest.

we looked at us
for a few hours
and
these turned into
days
faster than we
realized.

months passed,
then years,
and still we stared on,
into this mirror of
ourselves,
of our lives
and
our own devising,

our own separate
togetherness,
like wheat and chaff,
like milk
and
cream.

it has been akin
to a quickening,
a molting
a rapturous unbecoming
and
all the while,
a rebirth.

the decades will
continue
racing by,
and
elope with what is left
of our eyes.

we will be left
stumbling in the dark,
yet seeing
everything.

*
-JBClaywell
© P&Z Publications 2019

Move the chains,
shift the paradigm
in such a way
that it might shift
tectonic plates,
alter the *******
coastline!


Change the channel,
alter your state!

(shift, alter, change!)

So,
what now?

Cut ties with
all your life’s
toxicity?

What’s that look like?

Under the covers?
Staring at a screen?
Petting your cat?

Paddling
the online ocean
of lazy lies.

It’s safer to swim with sharks.

At least their teeth are honest.


*
-JBClaywell
© P&Z Publications 2018

Typing out the stings of bees;
the songs that dead crickets
sing with broken wings…

I write next to a pastor,
railing on the teachings of
The Christ and all I can
think of is the sea of amniotic
fluid that flew across the room
and splashed my sister-in-law’s
shoes.

(yielding babies born still)

Where was god
when we needed him?

All we had was each other
and twins we’d never meet.

*

-JBClaywell

© P&ZPublications

We talked,
my lover and I,
about this illness,
this virus that
has us all locked
inside our homes,
hoarding toilet paper,
hand-sanitizer,
hamburger.

We spoke of
my mother,
the challenges
that she and her husband
struggled with,
how they bested her
on the beginning
of her 71st lap,
barely started,
never  allowed to
finish.

“I’m glad she’s not here for this.
It would be so hard for her and your dad.”
says Angela.

I nod,
wondering how
in-home dialysis
would’ve worked out.

“I am too,”
I agree after a pause.

She’d overcome enough,
paid her dues
long enough
to pass
this pandemic by,
not sheltering-in-place,
instead,
breathing easily
as an afternoon stoll
across the face
of The Universe.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2020

I need you to stay with me.
I need you to understand.
It’s not just this room,
but me,
when I’m inside of it.

You.
You’re the only one with
a key.

You.
Not me.

I only have the room.

And, you.
I have you.

But, sometimes your key
doesn’t fit the lock,
so all there is
is the room and
what’s in there
waiting for me.

Most of the time
it’s just work stuff,
frustrations that fade
by the lunch hour.

Sometimes it’s these
****** crutches,
this crooked spine,
the soreness of the
knees and ankles
that I’ve been born with.

Sometimes, the room pitches or
sways.

Haunted.

By the ghost of my mother,
her love,
the smell of her kitchen.

By the ghost that my father is not,
yet.
That day will be here soon enough.

I’ll be locked in this room.

The lock will be broken.

No one will have a key that works.

The room will be ablaze.

The only thing that will save me

is this pen
and
paper
not yet burned.


*
-JBClaywell
© P&Z Publications 2018

Penelope is sitting at the kitchen table.
She has a large manila envelope spilled
out across the red plastic surface.

There are about 50 blank greeting cards,
the fronts of these have pictures of butterflies,
palm trees, puppies, strawberry patches, assorted
flowers and birds, and artist’s renderings of quiet places
in nature.

Penelope is writing things down on a yellow legal pad
and contemplating the art on the fronts of the blank cards.
Penelope is working.

About once a month, the Renaissance Greeting Card Co.
sends one of these manila envelopes full of blank cards for her
to ponder.
Sometimes while she ponders,
she drinks wine.

Other pondering sessions require ginger ale
or coffee.

She tells me that the wine is the best lubricant for
the ponderings of wholesale sentiments and she writes
one down on her legal pad.

When she has turned each blank into, what she believes to be, a
suitable greeting card, we will sit together and number the blanks
with black marker, I will type up the sentiments and match them to their
corresponding blank, we will stuff these into the supplied return envelope
and mail the whole mess back to Renaissance Greeting Card Co.

A few weeks later, Penelope will receive a check in the mail.


I am in the bedroom.
I have a little corner desk set up in there.
On this desk, is a typewriter, an ashtray, and a tennis ball.

Sometimes, if I run out of ideas, I’ll chuck the tennis ball at the wall
and catch it on the return bounce for a while.  
Usually, I drink coffee while I do the chucking, sometimes it’s
whiskey.

I write stories about bank robberies, diamond heists, or other
tales of daring do.

Sometimes I write prose poems
about what Penelope and I do
on a Wednesday afternoon.

When I have enough of these to fill a manila envelope
or two, I send them off to various editors/publishers of
magazines/rags I have found that serve a particular
audience for these sorts of writings.

Sometimes I get a check in the mail,
sometimes I don’t.

But, there’s always another Wednesday afternoon.

*

-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications; 2016

The local mall now has a Spenser’s Gifts;
I remember that place fondly as Al and I
make our way.
It’s where I sneaked a peek at Samantha Fox’s ****
for the first time,
saw my first **** ring,
wondering why anyone would want one.
I bought my first Metallica shirt at a Spencer’s;
spending twenty of my dad’s dollars.
Spencer’s and Record Wear House
were sanctuaries;
my escape from what my classmates
took for normal.
I took my son into that store
so that he could see the X-Men hats
and Deadpool shirts, the banana and pickle
pens caught his eye,
but I had to point out one more.
“What’s that one?” I asked.
Alex made a face, but in the end
he did what any 14 year old boy should,
he chuckled.
I took him in that store so that we both
could escape.
Earlier he walked the mall
a good fifteen feet ahead of us.
We stopped for ice cream.  
He chose a soda and wouldn’t sit with us.
It took a second, but
I figured him out.
He was trying his teenaged self out;
testing his wings.
As we walked, he’d wave at classmates
and be either sturdily ignored or given a cursory nod.
It was obvious that he wanted so much more.
It pained us, my wife and I.
So, I took him into Spencer’s gifts
in an effort to remove some of his innocence and awkwardness.
It may not have been the wisest move,
but at least, for a moment,
both of us felt peace.

-JB CLaywell
©P&ZPublications; 2014

What a luxury this is,
to **** indoors,
when what’s out there is so oppressive,
in so many ways.

Let us speak to one another
of our shadow-lived lives.
We’ll use words of romance,
reverence, street-toughened
prideful parlance.

We’ll speak openly, shamelessly
of ******* outside.

This phrase seems to be
the only applicable euphemism
for a life spent tripping over corpses,
seeing swarms of golden bees buzz by our brains,
the fatality of their sting
as yet unknown to us.

We’ll smoke awhile,
speaking of our children as well.
We’ll pretend that we give a ****
what their future holds, knowing all that needs to be
known happens in the immediate,
the now.

(The next score, the next hit, the next left-handed dollar,
the blood-blackened sky,
ruling
reigning,
******* outside.)

Still,
we speak sentences,
bits,
set-backs full of ‘do as I say, not as I do’,
fully expecting to protect everyone
but ourselves,
all the while continuing to
**** outside.

Finally,
we end up here;
the now here,
nowhere.

This place,
with it’s all-too-honest
hallways where we can lie
and deny that we did it to ourselves,
our children, our families.

We know,
that poverty and parenting
play their respective,
inter-generational roles.

Yet,
in the end,
each of us has at least a modicum of understanding
that there are alternatives
to the ineffective intellectual
toilet-bowl mentality
that keeps us
******* outside.

*
-JBClaywell
©P&ZPublications 2020

Earlier this week I spoke of some days
I’d rather forget.

I shared benign versions in the hope
that it is seen that the world is as good
or bad as you want to make it.

I’m reminded that sometimes
the ignorance of youth plays a part,
and you’re in bed with a stripper who’s shaking,

sweating, and stops breathing now and again,
and you’re holding on tight as she snores, moans,
writhes, and howls.

Because, you want to be in love with her
and you want to run screaming from your own apartment.
because nothing you’ve ever done,
no life you’ve ever lived,
the call center,
the furnished room,
the phone calls to your parents
when the bank account is down to pennies
has ever prepared you to lay next to someone
who’s all jacked up on some kind of dope
that you’ve never heard anything about
except for the stuff that you’ve seen
in movies or on TV, but that’s all
******* isn’t it?

And, you hope that you don’t wake up
next to a dead body,
so you don’t go to sleep at all,

So, that’s off the table isn’t it?

And, you make coffee and write
in your stupid notebook
about how much you think
you’re in love with this  doped up hyena
in the sack with you,
just because she let you rub up on her *******
a handful of times and you’ve run your fingers
thru her bush a few times.

And, you think that’s where love starts
but you don’t know a ******* thing about love,
but you’ve passed over a handful of $20s because
she says she’s broke and hungry and that’s what someone
who loves someone does.

You’re too ******* stupid or naïve to realize, to know
that the dough buys the dope and that she ***** some
of the other customers for the same thing she gets from you
w/o the ***** and w/o all of your foolishness, your *******.

And, the morning comes and she’s still alive, so are you,
and so is everyone else.
And, you wrote her a love poem in that
******* notebook of yours.

So, you ask her if she wants to hear you read it,
and you really mean it, you really want her to hear it,
to love it, to see that she means something to your foolish,
child’s heart.

But, she laughs at you,
puts her clothes on,
grabs her bag,
and walks out the door.

*

-JBClaywell

©P&ZPublications; 2016

to drink from
the river of
kindness that
flows all around
us is the goal.

to do the same from
the incoming tides
of hate is unthinkable,

undrinkable.


to have lost all
threads of faith
in: ‘We The People’,

but to have a circle
of friends to envelope
with love and compassion,

allows one to regain a
measure of faith in: ‘We, the people.’

there is a division.


it need not be black or white,
rich or poor,
left or right.

it need not be the elephant
or the ***.

there is only humanity.

(kind or unkind.)

unkind people can be
shown kindness.

Ignorance is easy.
Hate is hard.

we will not overcome.

(we’re too selfish.)

we certainly will not overthrow.

(we’re too soft for revolution.)


really, the only way that this gets better
is with pockets of ‘We, the people.’

you, and you, and you, and you.

(and me too!)

doing the best they can
with what they have
where they are.

trust that a little
kindness can go really,
really far.


*

-JBClaywell

© P&ZPublications

I smiled at her and she got upset,
climbed into her boyfriend's truck,
and wouldn’t look at me.

Just before this,
I'd watched her,
with my poet's eye,
hang up the receiver of the pay-phone  
I'd parked in front of.

The smile,
then,
on her face was huge,
remarkable, in fact.

It made her not-so-pretty face
absolutely radiant,
so I took note,
smiling back.  

Whomever she'd spoken to  
had obviously,
and with great  
purpose and verve,
bestowed that smile  
unto her with verbiage.

And, so I took it away.
I hadn't meant to.

Perhaps it was the fee  
we'd both been obliged to pay,

for this story  
to be  
born.

I remember being young
and not feeling much
like a person,
but more like a shapeless,
formless, amalgamation
of emotion and thought
that barely made sense to
myself,
couldn’t possibly make sense
to anyone else.

I remember that very odd,
stilted,
self-awareness lasting the
whole school-day,
the whole school-year.

Sometimes,
at home,
while the record player
hissed and crackled its way through
a stack of 45s,

I’d feel a “pop” and become
something more akin
to human,
less apparition or automaton.

I’m more or less the same
now as I was then.

My arms and legs are held
in place by the pages of
beloved books, photographs
of my children,
the feel of my wife’s fingers
pressed into the small
of my spine.

I still go ghost now and again,
sitting in a room,
in the back of the house,
the albums on their shelves,
or spinning faithfully,
the texts that surround.

“Pop”

Really, I can almost hear
the realness of myself as I expand

into a more artful being.

I’ve learned something.
I’ve become something.
I’ve attained something.

I’d rather, for the most part,
be in front of people,
than with people.

When I am with people,
I don’t know how to behave,
I become anxious,
a visitant version of
myself.

In front of people,
I am comfortable,
content,
contained inside
of my own
art.

None the worse
for preternatural wear,
I’m allowed
to
pop.

*

-JBClaywell
© P&ZPublications 2018

water comes hot from the tap
for the first time in what feels
like a century.

the cup is rinsed, letting it fill
and overflow, the warmth runs
over swollen, arthritic knuckles
held there for a few minutes more

despite the rising mercury,
the water rinses stale coffee
and pain away

the powdered creamer
like the dust of ground bone,
is added and the black blood
of truth becomes chocolate
and is that much more palatable
like the day.


*

-JBClaywell

©P&ZPublications; 2016