I.

One night at the Troubadour I spotted this extraordinary girl.

So I asked who she was.

‘A professional,’

That was my introduction that on a scale of one to ten

there were women who were fifteens—beautiful, bright, witty, and

oh, by the way, they worked.

Once I became aware,

I saw these women everywhere.

And I came to learn that most of them were connected to Alex



II.

She had a printer engrave a calling card

that featured a bird of paradise

borrowed from a Tiffany silver pattern

and,
under it,

Alex’s Aviary,

Beautiful and Exotic birds.



A few were women you’d see lunching at Le Dôme:

pampered arm pieces with expensive tastes

and a hint of a delicious but remote sexuality.

Many more were fresh-faced, athletic, tanned, freckled

the quintessential California girl

That you’d take for sorority queens or future BMW owners.





III.

The mechanism of Alex’s sudden notoriety is byzantine,

as these things always are.

One of her girls took up with a rotter,

the couple had a fight,

he went to the police,

the police had an undercover detective visit

(who just happened to be an attractive woman)

and ask to work for her,

she all but embraced her

—and by April of 1988 the district attorney had enough evidence

to charge her with two counts of pandering

and one of pimping.

For Alex, who is fifty-six

and has a heart condition and diabetes,

the stakes may be high.

A conviction carries the guarantee of incarceration.

For the forces of law and order,

the stakes may be higher.

Alex has let it be known that she will subpoena

every cop she’s ever met to testify at her trial.

And the revelations this might produce

—perhaps that Alex compromised policemen

by making girls available to them,

—perhaps that Alex had a deal with the police to provide information

in exchange for their blind eye to her activities

—could be hugely embarrassing to the police and the district attorney.

For Alex’s socially correct clients and friends,

for the socially correct wives of her clients and friends

and for a handful of movie and television executives

who have no idea they are dating or

married to former Alex girls,

the stakes are highest of all.



IV.

Alex’s black book is said to be a catalogue of
Le Tout Los Angeles.

In her head are the ****** secrets

of many of the city’s most important men,

to say nothing of visiting businessmen and Arab princes.

If she decides to warble,

either at her trial or in a book,

her song will shatter more than glass.





V.

A decade ago, I went to lunch at Ma Maison,

There were supposed to have been ten people there,

but only four came.

One of them was a short woman

who called me a few days later and invited me to lunch.

When I arrived, the table was set for two.

I didn’t know who Alex was or what she did,

but she knew the important facts of my situation:

I was getting divorced from a very wealthy man

and doing the legal work myself

to avail lawyers who wanted to get a big settlement for me.


Occasionally, she said, I get a call for a tall, dark-haired,

slender, flat-chested woman

—and I don’t have any.

It wouldn’t be a frequent thing.

There’d be weekends away, sometimes in Palm Springs,

sometimes in Europe.

The men will be elegant,

you’ll have your own room

—there would be no outward signs of impropriety.

And you’d get $10,000 to $20,000 for a weekend.





VI.

The tall, slender, flat-chested brunette

didn’t think it was right for her.

Alex handed her a business card

and suggested that she think about it.

To her surprise, she did

—for an entire week.

This was 1978, and $20,000 then

was like $40,000 now,

I knew it was hooking,

but Alex had never mentioned ***.



Our whole conversation seemed to be about something else.



VII.

I was born in Manila

to a Spanish-Filipina mother and German father,

and when I was twelve

a Japanese soldier came into our house

with his bayonet pointed at us,

ready to do us in.

He locked us in and set the house on fire.

I haven’t been scared by much since that.



My mother always struck me as goofy,

so I jumped on a bus and ran away,

I got off in Oakland,

saw a help-wanted sign on a parish house,

and went in.

I got $200 a month for taking care of four priests.

I spent all the money on pastries for the parish house.

But I didn’t care.

It felt safe.

And the priests sparked my interest in the domestic arts

—in linen, in crystal.



A new priest arrived.

He was unpleasant,

so on a vacation in Los Angeles I took a pedestrian job,

still a teenager,

married a scientist.

We separated eight years later,

he took our two sons to another state

threatened to keep them if I didn’t agree to a divorce.

Keep them I said and hung up.

It’s not that I don’t have a maternal instinct

—though I don’t,

I just hate to be manipulated.



My second husband,

an alcoholic,

had Frank Sinatra blue eyes, and possibly

—I never knew for sure—

had a big career in the underworld

as a contract killer.

Years before we got serious,

he was going out with a famous L.A. ******,

She and her friends were so elegant

that I started spending time with them in beauty salons.

They were so fancy,

so smart

—and they knew incredible people,

like the millionaire who sat in his suite all day

just writing $5,000 checks to girls.



VIII.

I was a florist.

We got to talking.

She was a madam from England

who wanted to sell her book and go home.

I bought it for $5,000.

My husband thought it was cute.

Now you’re getting your feet wet.

Three months later,

he died.

After eleven years of marriage,

just like that.

And of the names in the book

it turned out

that half of the men were also dead.

When I began the men were old and the women were ugly.



IX.

It was like a lunch party you or I would give,

Great food Alex had cooked herself.

Major giggles with old pals.

And then,

instead of chocolate After Eight,

she served three women After Three



This man has seen a bit of life

beyond Los Angeles,

so I asked him how Alex’s stable

compared with that of Madam Claude,

the legendary Parisian procuress.

Oh, these aren’t at all like Claude’s girls,

A Claude girl was perfectly dressed and multilingual

—you could take her to the opera

and she’d understand it.





He told me that when she was 40

she looked at herself in the mirror

and said

Disgusting.

People over 40

should not have ***.

But She Was Clear That She Never Liked It

even when she was young.

Besides, she saw all the street business

go to the tall,

beautiful girls.

She thought that she never had a chance

competing against them.

Instead,

she would take their money by managing them.





X.

Going to a ****** was not looked down upon then.

It was before the pill;

Girls weren’t giving it away.

Claude specialized in

failed models and actresses,

ones who just missed the cut.

But just because they failed

in those impossible professions

didn’t mean they weren’t beautiful,

fabulous.



Like Avis

in those days,

those girls tried harder.

Her place was off the Champs,

just above a branch of the Rothschild bank, where I had an account.

Once I met her,

I was constantly making withdrawals and heading upstairs.





XI.

We took the lift

and Claude greeted us at the door.

My impression was that of the director

of an haute couture house,

very subdued,

beige and gray, very little makeup.

She took us into a lounge and made us drinks,

Whiskey,

Cognac.

There was no maid.

We made small talk for 15 minutes.

How was the weekend?

What’s the weather like in Deauville?

Then she made the segue. ‘I understand you’d like to see some jeunes filles?’

She always used ‘jeunes filles.’

This was Claude’s polite way of saying 18 to 25.

She left and soon returned

with two very tall

jeunes filles,

One was blonde.

This is Eva from Austria.

She’s here studying painting.

And a brunette,

very different,

but also very fine.

This is Claudia from Germany.

She’s a dancer.

She took the girls back into the apartment and returned by herself.

I gave my English guest first choice.

He picked the blonde.

And wasn’t disappointed.

Each bedroom had its own bidet.

There was some nice

polite conversation, and then



It was slightly formal,

but it was high-quality.

He paid Claude

200 francs,

not to the girls

In 1965, 200 francs was about $40.

Pretty girls on Rue Saint-Denis

could be had for 40 francs

so you can see the premium.

Still, it wasn’t out of reach for mere mortals.

You didn’t have to be J. Paul Getty.





XII.

A lot of them

were models at

Christian Dior

or other couture houses.

She liked Scandinavians.

That was the look then

—cold, tall, perfect.

It was cheap for the quality.

They all used her.

The best people wanted

the best women.

Elementary supply and demand.



XIII.

She had a camp number tattooed on her wrist. I saw it.

She showed it to me and Rubi.

She was proud she had survived.

We talked about the camp for hours.

It was even more fascinating than the girls.



She was Jewish

I’m certain of that.

She was horrified at the Jewish collaborators

at the camp who herded

their fellow Jews

into the gas chambers.

That was the greatest betrayal in her life.



XIV.

She was this sad,

lonely little woman.

Later, Patrick told me who she was.

I was bowled over.

It was like meeting Al Capone.

I met two of the girls

who worked for her.

One was what you would expect

Tall

Blonde

Model.

But the other looked like a Rat

Then one night

she came out

all dressed up,

I didn’t even recognize her.

She was even better than the first girl.

Claude liked to transform women like that.

That was her art.

It was very odd,

my cousin told me.

There was not much furniture

and an awful lot of telephones.

“Allô oui,”



XV.

I had so many lunches

with Claude at Ma Maison

She was vicious.

One day,

Margaux Hemingway,

at the height of her beauty, walked by.

Une bonne

—the French for maid

was how Claude cut her dead.

She reduced

the entire world

to rich men wanting *** and

poor women wanting money.

She’d love to page through Vogue and see someone

and say,

When I met her

she was called

Marlene

and she had a hideous nose

and now she’s a princess.

Or she’d see someone and say

Let’s see if she kisses me or not.

It was like

I made her,

and I can destroy her.

She was obsessed

with “fixing” people

—with Saint Laurent clothes,

with Cartier watches,

with Winston jewels,

with Vuitton luggage,

with plastic surgeons.



XVI.

Her prison number was

888

which was good luck in China

but not in California.

‘Ocho ocho ocho,’ she liked to repeat

Even in jail, she was always working,

always recruiting stunning women.

She had a beautiful Mexican cellmate

and gave her Robert Evans’s number

as the first person she should call

when she was released.



XVII.

Never have *** on the first date.



XVIII.

There will always be prostitution,

The prostitution of misery.

And the prostitution of bourgeois luxury.

They will both go on forever.



“Allô oui,”



It was so exciting to hear a millionaire

or a head of state ask,

in a little boy’s voice,

for the one thing

that only you could provide

It's not how beautiful you are, it's how you relate

--it's mostly dialogue.



She was tiny, blond, perfectly coiffed and Chanel-clad.

The French Woman: The Arab Prince, the Japanese Diplomat, the Greek Tycoon, the C.I.A. Bureau Chief — She Possessed Them All!



XIX.

She was like a slave driver in the American South

Once she took a *******,

the makeover put the girl in debt,

because Claude paid all the bills to

Dior,

Vuitton,

to the hairdressers,

to the doctors,

and the girls had to work to pay them off.

It was ****** indentured servitude.



My Swans.



It reached the point

where if you walked into a room

in London

or Rome

as much as Paris

because the girls were transportable,

and saw a girl who was

better-dressed,

better-looking,

and more distinguished than the others

you presumed

it was a girl from Claude.

It was, without doubt,

the finest *** operation ever run in the history of mankind.



**.

The girl had to be

exactly what was needed

so I had to teach her everything she didn’t know.

I played a little the role of Pygmalion.

There were basic things that absolutely had to be done.

It consisted

at the start

of the physical aspect

“surgical intervention”

to give this way of being

that was different from other girls.

Often they had to be transformed

into dream creatures

because at the start

they were not at all



Often I had to teach them how to dress.

Often they needed help

to repair

what nature had given them

which was not so beautiful.

At first they had to be tall,

with pretty gestures,

good manners.

I had lots of noses done,

chins,

teeth,

*******.

There was a lot to do.



Eight times out of ten

I had to teach them how to behave in society.

There were official dinners, suppers, weekends,

and they needed to have conversation.

I insisted they learn to speak English,

read

certain books.

I interrogated them on what they read.

It wasn’t easy.

Each time something wasn’t working,

I was obliged to say so.



You were very demanding?

I was ferocious.



It’s difficult

to teach a girl how to walk into Maxim’s

without looking

ill at ease

when they’ve never been there,

to go into an airport,

to go to the Ritz,

or the Crillon

or the Dorchester.

To find yourself

in front of a king,

three princes,

four ministers,

and five ambassadors at an official dinner.

There were the wives of those people!

Day after day

one had to explain,

explain again,

start again.

It took about two years.

There would always be a man

who would then say of her,

‘But she’s absolutely exceptional. What is that girl doing here?’ ”





XXI.

A New York publisher who visited

the Palace Hotel

in Saint Moritz

in the early seventies told me,

I met a whole bunch of them there.

They were lovely.

The johns wanted everyone to know who they were.

I remember it being said

Giovanni’s Madame Claude girl is going to be there.

You asked them where they came from and they all said

Neuilly.

Claude liked girls from good families.

More to the point she had invented their backgrounds.



I have known,

because of what I did,

some exceptional and fascinating men.

I’ve known some exceptional women too,

but that was less interesting

because I made them myself.



Ah, this question of the handbag.

You would be amazed by how much dust accumulates.

Or how often women’s shoe heels are scuffed.





XXII.

She would examine their teeth and finally she would make them undress.



That was a difficult moment

When they arrived they were very shy,

a bit frightened.

At the beginning when I take a look,

it’s a question of seeing if the silhouette

and the gestures are pretty.

Then there was a disagreeable moment.

I said,

I’m sorry about this unpleasantness,

but I have to ask you to get undressed,

because I can’t talk about you unless I see you.

Believe me, I was embarrassed,

just as they were,

but it had to be done,

not out of voyeurism, not at all

—I don’t like les dames horizontales.



It was very funny

because there were always two reactions.

A young girl,

very sure of herself,

very beautiful,

très bien,

would say

Yes,

Get up, and get undressed.

There was nothing to hide, everything was perfect.



There were those who

would start timidly

to take off their dress

and I would say

I knew already.

The rest is not sadism, but nearly.

I knew what I was going to find.

I would say,

Maybe you should take off your bra,

and I knew it wasn’t going to be

beautiful.

Because otherwise she would have taken it off easily.

No problem.

There were damages that could be mended.

There were some ******* that could be redone,

some not

Sometimes it can be deceptive,

you know,

you see a pretty girl,

a pretty face,

all elegant and slim,

well dressed,

and when you see her naked

it is a catastrophe.



I could judge their physical qualities,

I could judge if she was pretty, intelligent, and cultivated,

but I didn’t know how she was in bed.

So I had some boys,

good friends,

who told me exactly.

I would ring them up and say,

There’s a new one.

And afterwards they’d ring back and say,

Not bad,

Could be better, or

Nulle.



Or,

on the contrary,

She’s perfect.

And I would sometimes have to tell the girls

what they didn’t know.

A pleasant assignment?

No.

They paid.



XXIII.

Often at the beginning

they had an ami de coeur

in other words,

oh,

a journalist, a photographer, a type like that,

someone in the cinema,

an actor, not very well known.

As time went by

It became difficult

because they didn’t have a lot of time for him.

The fact of physically changing,

becoming prettier,

changing mentally to live with millionaires,

produced a certain imbalance

between them

and the little boyfriend

who had not evolved

and had stayed in his milieu.

At the end of a certain time

she would say,

I’m so much better than him. Why am I with this boy?

And they would break up by themselves.



Remember,

this was instant elevation.

For most of them it was a dream existence,

provided they liked the ***,

and those that didn’t never lasted long.

A lot of the clients were young,

and didn’t treat them like tarts but like someone from their own class.

They would buy you presents,

take you on trips.



XXIV.

For me, *** was something very accessoire

I think after a certain age

there are certain spectacles one should not give to others

Now I have a penchant for solitude.

Love, it’s a complete destroyer,

It’s impossible,

a horror,

l’angoisse.

It’s the only time in my life I was jealous.

I’m not a jealous person, but I was épouvantable.

He was jealous too.

We broke plates over each other’s heads;

we became jealous about each other’s pasts.

I said one day

It’s finished.

Sometimes I look at myself in the mirror and say:

Break my legs,

give me scarlet fever,

an attack of TB, but never that.

Not that.



XXV.

I called her into my office

Let us not exaggerate,

I sent her away.

She came back looking for employment,

but was fired again, this time for drugs.

She made menacing phone calls.

Then she arrived at the Rue de Boulainvilliers with a gun.

She shot three bullets

I was dressed in the fashion of Courrèges at this moment

He did very padded things.

I had a padded dress with a little jacket on top.

The bullet

—merci, Monsieur Courrèges

—stuck in the padding.

I was thrown forward onto the telephone.

I had one thought which went through my head:

I will die like Kennedy.

I turned round and put my hand up in a reflex.

The second bullet went through my hand.

I have two dead fingers.

It’s most useful for removing bottle tops.

In the corridor I was saved from the third bullet

because she was very tall

and I am quite petite, so it passed over my head.



XXVI.

There were men

who could decapitate,

****, and bomb their rivals

who would be frightened of me.

I would ask them how was the girl,

and they’d say

Not bad

and then

But I’m not complaining.

I was a little sadistic to them sometimes.

Some women have known powerful men because they’re their lover.

But I’ve known them all.

I had them all

here.



She will take many state secrets with her.



XXVI.

I don’t like ugly people

probably because when I was young

I wasn’t beautiful at all.

I was ugly and I suffered for it,

although not to the point of obsession.

Now that I’m an old woman,

I’m not so bad.

And that’s why

I’ve always been surrounded by people

Who

were

beautiful.

And the best way to have beautiful people around me

was to make them.

I made them very pretty.





XXVII.

I wouldn’t call what Alex gives you

‘advice,’

She spares you Nothing.

She makes a list of what she wants done,

and she really gets into it

I mean, she wants you to get your arms waxed.

She gives you names of people who do good facials.

She tells you what to buy at Neiman Marcus.

She’s put off by anything flashy,

and if you don’t dress conservatively, she’s got no problem telling you,

in front of an audience,

You look like a cheap *****!

I used to wear what I wanted when I went out

then change in the car into a frumpy sweater

when I went to give her the money she’d always go,

Oh, you look beautiful!



Marry your boyfriend,

It’s better than going to prison.

When you go out with her,

she’ll buy you a present; she’s incredibly generous that way.

And she’ll always tell you to save money and get out.

It’s frustrating to her when girls call at the end of the month

and say they need rent money.

She wants to see you do well.





We had a schedule, with cards that indicated a client’s name,

what he liked,

the names of the girls he’d seen,

and how long he’d been with them.

And I only hired girls who had another career

—if my clients had a choice between drop-dead-gorgeous

and beautiful-and-interesting,

they’d tend to take beautiful-and-interesting.

These men wanted to talk.

If they spent two hours with a girl,

they usually spent only five or ten minutes in bed.



I get the feeling that in Los Angeles, men are more concerned with looks.



XXVIII.

That was my big idea

Not to expand the book by aggressive marketing

but to make sure that nobody

mistook my girls for run-of-the-mill hookers.

And I kept my roster fresh.

This was not a business where you peddle your ***,

get exploited,

and then are cast off.

I screen clients. I’ve never sent girls to weirdos.

I let the men know:

no violence,

no costumes,

no fudge-packing.

And I talked to my girls. I’d tell them:

Two and a half years and you’re burned out.

Save your money.

This is like a hangar

—you come in, refuel, and take off.

It’s not a vacation, it’s not a goof.

This buys the singing lessons,

the dancing lessons,

the glossies.

This is to help you pay for what your parents couldn’t provide.

It’s an honorable way station—a lot of stars did this.



XXIX.

To say someone was a Claude girl is an honour, not a slur.



Une femme terrible.

She despised men and women alike.

Men were wallets. Women were holes.



By the 80s,

if you were a brunette,

the sky was the limit.

The Saudis

They’d call for half a dozen of Alex’s finest,

ignore them all evening while they

chatted,

ate,

and played cards,

and then, around midnight,

take the women inside for a fast few minutes of ***.



They’d order women up like pizza.



Since my second husband died,

I only met one man who was right for me,

He was a sheikh.

I visited him in Europe

twenty-eight times

in the five years I knew him

and I never slept with him.

He’d say

I think you fly all the way here just to tease me,

but he introduced me

by phone

to all his powerful friends.

When I was in Los Angeles, he called me twice a day.

That’s why I never went out

he would have been disappointed.



***.

Listen to me

This is a woman’s business.

When a woman does it, it’s fun

there’s a giggle in it

when a man’s involved,

he’s ******,

he’s a ****.

He may know how to keep girls in line,

and he may make money,

but he doesn’t know what I do.

I tell guys: You’re getting a nice girl.

She’s young,

She’s pleasant,

She can do things

she can certainly make love.

She’s not a rocket scientist, but she’s everything else.



The world’s richest and most powerful men, the announcer teased.

An income “in the millions,” said the arresting officer.

Pina Colapinto

A petite call girl,

who once slid between the sheets of royalty,

a green-eyed blonde helped the police get the indictment.

They really dolled her up

She looks great.

Never!

What I told her was: ‘Wash that ******.’





XXXI.

Madam Alex died at 7 p.m.

Saturday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center,

where she had been in intensive care after recent open heart surgery

We all held her hand when they took her off the life support

This was the passing of a legend.

Because she was the mother superior of prostitution.

She was one of the richest women on earth.

The world came to her.

She never had to leave the house.

She was like Hugh Hefner in that way.


It's like losing a friend

In all the years we played cat and mouse,

she never once tried to corrupt me.

We had a lot of fun.


To those who knew her

she was as constant

as she was colorful

always ready with a good tidbit of gossip

and a gourmet lunch for two.

She entertained, even after her conviction on pandering charges,

from the comfy depths of her blue four-poster bed at her home near Doheny Drive,

surrounded by knickknacks and meowing cats,

which she fed fresh shrimp from blue china plates.



XXXII.

She stole my business,

my books,

my girls,

my guys.

I had a good run.

My creatures.

Make Mommy happy

Oh! He is the most enchanting cat that I have ever known.



She was, how can I say it,

classy.

When she first hired me

she thought I was too young to take her case.

I was 43.

I'm going to give you some gray hairs by the time this is over.

She was right.





XXXIII.

I was fond of Heidi

But she has a streak that is so vindictive.



If there is pure evil, it is Madame Alex.





XXXIV.

I was born and raised in L.A.

My dad was a famous pediatrician.

When he died, they donated a bench to him at the Griffith Park Observatory.



I think that Heidi wanted to try her wings

pretty early,

and I think that she met some people

who sort of took all her potential

and gave it a sharp turn



She knew nothing.

She was like a little parrot who repeated what she was supposed to say.



Alex and I had a very intense relationship;

I was kind of like the daughter she loved and hated,

so she was abusive and loving at the same time.



Look, I know Madam Alex was great at what she did

but it's like this:

What took her years to build,

I built in one.

The high end is the high end,

and no one has a higher end than me.

In this business, no one steals clients.

There's just better service.



XXXV.

You were not allowed to have long hair

You were not allowed to be too pretty

You were not allowed to wear too much makeup or be too glamorous

Because someone would fall in love with you and take you away.

And then she loses the business



XXXVI.

I was pursued because

come on

in our lifetime,

we will never see another girl of my age

who lived the way I did,

who did what I did so quickly,

I made so many enemies.

Some people had been in this line of business

for their whole lives, 30 or 40 years,

and I came in and cornered the market.

Men don't like that.

Women don't like that.

No one liked it.



I had this spiritual awakening watching an Oprah Winfrey video.

I was doing this 500-hour drug class

and one day the teacher showed us this video,

called something like Make It Happen.

Usually in class I would bring a notebook

and write a letter to my brother or my journal,

but all of a sudden this grabbed my attention

and I understood everything she said.

It hit me and it changed me a lot.

It made me feel,

Accept yourself for who you are.

I saw a deeper meaning in it

but who knows, I might have just been getting my period that day!



XXXVII.

Hello, Gina!

You movie star!

Yes you are!

Gina G!

Hello my friend,

Hello my friend,

Hello my movie star,

Ruby! Ruby Boobie!

Braaawk!

Except so many women say,

Come on, Heidi

you gotta do the brothel for us; don't let us down.

It would be kind of fun opening up an exclusive resort,

and I'll make it really nice,

like the Beverly Hills Hotel

It'll feel private; you'll have your own bungalow.

The only problem out here is the climate—it's so brutal.

Charles Manson was captured a half hour from Pahrump.



I said, Joe! What are you doing?

You gotta get, like,

a garter belt and encase it in something

and write,

This belonged to Suzette Whatever,

who entertained the Flying Tigers during World War II.

Get, like, some weird tools and write,

These were the first abortion tools in the brothel,

you know what I mean?

Just make some **** up!

So I came out here to do some research

And then I realized,

What am I doing?

I'm Heidi Fleiss. I don't need anyone.

I can do this.

When I was doing my research, in three months

I saw land go from 30 thousand an acre

to 50 thousand an acre,

and then it was going for 70K!

It's urban sprawl

—we're only one hour from Las Vegas.

Out here the casinos are only going to get bigger,

prostitution is legal, it's only getting better.





XXXVIII.

The truth is

deep down inside,

I just can't do business with him

He's the type of guy who buys Cup o' Noodles soup for three cents

and makes his hookers buy it back from him for $5.

It's not my style at all.

Who wants to be 75 and facing federal charges?

It was different at my age when I

at least...come on, I lived really well.

I was 22,

25 at the time?

It was fun then, but now I wouldn't want

to deal with all that *******

—the girls and blah blah blah.

But the money was really good.



I would've told someone they were out of their ******* mind

if they'd said in five years I'd be living with all these animals like this.

It's hard-core; how I live;

It's totally a nonfunctional atmosphere for me

It's hard to get anything done because

It’s so time-consuming.

I feel like they're good luck though....

I do feel that if I ever get rid of them,

I will be jinxed and cursed the rest of my life

and nothing I do will ever work again.



Guys kind of are a hindrance to me

Certainly I have no problem getting laid or anything.

But a man is not a priority in my life.

I mean, it's crazy, but I really have fun with my parrots.



XXXIX.

I started a babysitting circle when I wasn't much older than 9

And soon all the parents in the neighborhood

wanted me to watch over their children.

Even then I had an innate business sense.

I started farming out my friends

to meet the demand.

My mother showered me with love and my father,

a pediatrician,

would ask me at the dinner table,

What did you learn today?

I ran my neighborhood.

I just pick up a hustle really easily,

I was a waitress and I met an older guy who looked like Santa Claus.



Alex was a 5' 3" bald-headed Filipina

in a transparent muu muu.

We hit it off.

I didn't know at the time that I was there to pay off the guy's gambling debt.

It's in and out,

over and out.

Do you think some big-time producer

or actor is going to go to the clubs and hustle?



Columbia Pictures executive says:

I haven’t done anything that should cause any concern.

Jeez, it's like the Nixon enemies list.

I hope I'm on it.

If I'm not, it means I must not be big enough

for people to gossip about me.



That's right ladies and gentlemen.

I am an alleged madam and that is a $25 *****!

If you live out here,

you've got to hate people.

You've got to be pretty antisocial

How you gonna come out here with only 86 people?

That's Fred.

He's digging to China.

You look good.

Yeah, you too.

It's coming along here.

Yeah, it is.

I wanted to buy that lot there, but I guess it's gone?

That's mine, man! That's all me.

Really?

I thought there was a lot between us.

No. We're neighbors.



He's a cute guy

He's entertaining.

See, I kind of did do something shady to him.

I thought my property went all the way back

and butted up against his.

But there was one lot between us right there.

He said he was buying it,

but I saw the 'For Sale' sign still up there,

So I went and called the broker and said,

I'm an all-cash buyer.

So I really bought it out from under him.

But he's got plenty of room, and I need the space for my parrots.

Pahrump will always be Pahrump, but Crystal is going to be nice

All you need are four or five fancy houses and it'll flush everyone out

and it'll be a nice area.

They're all kind of weird here, but these people will go.

Like this guy here,

someone needs to **** him.

I was just saying to my dad that these parrots are born to a really ******-up world

He goes, Heidi, no, no; the world is a beautiful garden.

It's just, people are destroying it.

I’m looking into green building options

I don't want anything polluting,

I want a huge auditorium,

but it'll be like a jungle where my birds can really fly!

Where they can really do what they're supposed to do.

There were over 300 birds in there!

That lady,

She ran the exotic-birds department for the Tropicana Hotel,

which is a huge job.

She called me once at 3:30 in the morning

Come over here and help me feed this baby!

Some baby parrot.

And I ran over there in my pajamas

—I knew there was something else wrong

and she was like

Get me my oxygen!

Get me this, get me that.

I called my dad; he was like,

I don't know, honey, you better call the paramedics.

They ended up getting a helicopter.

And they were taking her away

in the wind with her IV and blood and everything

and she goes, Heidi, you take care of my birds.

And she dies the next day.

She was just a super-duper person.



XL.

I relate to the lifestyle she had before,

Now, I'm just a citizen.

I'm clean,

I'm sober,

I'm married,

I work at Wal-Mart.

I'm proud to say I know her. I look into her eyes

and we relate.





I got out in 2000,

so I've been sending her money for seven years

She was…whatever.

Girlfriend?

Yeah, maybe.

But ***, I tried like two times,

and I'm just not gay.

She gets out in about eight or nine months

and I told her I would get her a house.

But nowhere near me.

I didn't touch her,

but I'd be, like...

a funny story:

I told her,

Don't you ever ******* think

about contacting me in the real world.

I'm not a lesbian.

Then about two years ago, I got an e-mail from her,

or she called me and said, 'Google my name.'

So I Googled her name,

and she has this huge company.

Huge!

She won, like, Woman of the Year awards.

So I called her and I go,

Not bad.

She goes, 'Well, I did all that because you called me a loser.'

I go, '****, I should've called you more names

you probably would've found the cure for cancer by now.



XLI.

No person shall be employed by the licensee

who has ever been convicted of

a felony involving moral turpitude

But I qualify,

I mean, big deal, so I'm a convicted felon.

Being in the *** industry, you can't be so squeaky-clean.

You've got to be hustling.

Nighttime is really enchanting here

It's like a whole 'nother world out here, it really is

I’m so far removed from my social life and old surroundings.

Who was it, Oscar Wilde, I think, who said

people can adjust to anything.

I was perfectly adjusted in the penitentiary,

and I was perfectly adjusted to living in a château in France.



We had done those drug addiction shows together

Dr. Drew.

Afterward we were friendly

and he'd call me every now and then.

He'd act like he had his stuff together.

But it was all a lie.

Everything is a lie.

I brought him to a Humane Society event at Paramount Studios last year.

He was just such a mess.

So out of it.

He stole money from my purse.

He's such a drug addict because he's so afraid of being fat.

He liked horse ****, though. He did like horse ****.

This one woman that would have *** with a horse on the internet,

He told me that’s his favorite actress.

Better than Meryl Streep.



XLII.

The cops could see

why these women were taking over trade.

Girls with these looks charged upwards of $500 an hour.

The Russians had undercut them with a bargain rate of $150 an hour.

One thing they are not is lazy.

In the USSR

they grew up with no religion, no morality.

Prostitution is not considered a bad thing.

In fact, it’s considered a great way to make money.

That’s why it’s exploding here.

What we saw was just a tip of the iceberg.

These girls didn’t come over here expecting to be nannies.

They knew exactly what they wanted and what they were getting into.

The madam who organized this raid

was making $4 million a year,

laundered through Russian-owned banks in New York City

These are brutal people.

They are all backstabbers.

They’re entrepreneurs.

They’re looking at $10,000 a month for turning tricks.

For them, that’s the American dream.



XLIII.

If you’re not into something,

don’t be into it

But,

if you want to take some whipped cream,

put it between your toes,

have your dog licking it up and,

at the same time,

have your girlfriend poke you in the eye,

then that’s fine.

That’s a little weird but we shouldn’t judge.



She was my best friend then

and I consider her one of my best friends now,

because when I was going through Riker’s

and everyone abandoned me,

including my boyfriend,

I was hysterical,

crying,

and she was the one that was there.

And, when somebody needed to step up to the plate,

that’s who did, and I have an immense amount of

loyalty, respect, and love for her.

And if she’s going to prison for eight years

—that’s what she’s sentenced for

—I’ll go there,

and I’ll go there every week,

for eight years.

That’s the type of person I am.

. 'as for those poets, only the perverse follow them. do you not see that they go too far in every direction and say things, which they cannot do?' (ash-shu'ara / the poets 26:224-226).

call them what you like,
the Huguenots,
for all i care...

   you always side with
the "heretics"...
  
   given that, "said" heretics
retain some cultural value
relativism of other cultures,
namely in the form of
depiction -

    since why would, "the word"
be deemed holy,
    ****-naked,
                rather than donning
a bikini of "iconoclasm"...
         when words... are at
the meat-market of copyright -
what with © coca cola?

                 sunni islam would have
never allowed sufism...
  but Farsi does...
  and will continue...
since no Iranian will bow
before an Arab within the schematics
of history...

          Sunni Islam, it's Wahhabi sentimentality...
so why persist in signing
the Adhan?
   why not speak in a honing like
drone sentiment of plain speech?
i thought all music was banned?
the current Adhan is a form
of music... isn't it? BAN IT!

    you never side with these Sunni
muslims, exploiting Bangladeshi labor,
you side with the heretics of Iran...
these *******, i can at least respect...
  
      no fast cars, convenient ongoing
cultural insurrections -
   Sufism...
       Afghan women's poetry,
and all that much closer to Hindu mysticism...
    
yeah... "islamophobia":
but only against Sunni Islam...
   but Shia Islam?
   no problem...
   i could stomach these peoples
like i could stomach the in-between
of the Turkish variant -
no ideology - simply, pure, power throttle...

i could make a great Janissary -
with a Turkish barber...
         for a great trim of hair and beard...
i'd cast a shadow on some
obscure chocolatier of Brussels
who thinks himself a politician...

     but there are certain aspect of Islam
i am willing to tolerate...
   what happened to the son in law
of Muhammad, namely, Ali...
was raw ******* kicking...

               promises, promises...
no promises...
           Shia Islam, as an European,
i can tolerate, Turkish Islam, i can tolerate...
Turkey is incrementally shy
of being treated at the 2nd variant of Iran...
at least with Iran, we share a history
via the insurrection into the ancient
texts through Greece...

  come to think of it...
whenever i listen to
matta's song echo babylon...
i start feeding myself goosebumps,
reminding myself
of Cyrus... Nebuchadnezzar...
and the dim-wit that was
   Belshazzar...

always siding with the heretics...
if not on economic groundwork,
then at least motivating,
rather than monetizing an idea...

and the Shia muslims are...
    one way or another...
   unlike the gluttons of Dubai...
the barbie dolls of postage stamp
"proof" of progress,
in size, and worth...

   Sunni Islam would have
never allowed poetics to remain
a viable form of expression -
the Persian tradition that is,
far beyond the western concern
for a comment section...

         Shia Islam allows patronage
of the arts, notably poetry,
without concern for monetary
funding, it, at least, doesn't prohibit it...
given the pride of the Persians...
Sunnis and their continual quest
for finding water...
    sure... poetry is pointless within
such restrictions of
existential concerns...
    but... given the current, civilized
establishment?
   sky-scrapers in *******
sand dunes?

         the qu'ran should have
forbidden the architectural ambitions
equivalent to the tower of babel
being erected, in environments,
that could never sustain said projects...

    and who originally spewed the term
islamophobia?
Sunni Islam...
        i never liked this strand of belief...
i hate the Sunnis like
a Shia partisan...

p.s. it's called patriotism is America...
but nationalism in Europe...
    you sure that's not a synonym?
Europeans can't be patriotic,
and Americans are never nationalistic?

...

   well: how could i ever convert to islam,
i do enjoy the adhan from time to time,
"sorry", but i do...
  i can't help it:
if i'm a sucker for pop songs,
i'm also a sucker for the adhan...
   crusader songs, templar songs become
stuffy after a while...
and last time i checked:
     there were the northern crusades
against the baltic people:
notably prussians, lithuanians...
with that cushion of: mediating the
escalation of war by the polacks...
coming from the east:
  last time i checked the mongols
didn't reach leipzig...
               buffer zone people...
and what of the ottoman onsalught
of vienna 1529: the ****** winged hussars
won the charge...

so, coming back to heidegger... aphorism 26
ponderings IX... how am i to not be
the historical animal?
         perhaps in german, in germany
i might become a non-historical animal,
to begin: anew, but with a terrible
past to hide, to negate...
   i could do that: if i were a german,
speaking german, in germany...
but i'm in england:
            i might have some roots in
Silesia, but it's "hard" to not be a historical
animal, an "animal" with a sense of time,
i.e. a future a past a present...
esp. under the english conditions
of: the biological animal momentum narrative,
like a tsunami, like an earthquake...
ripples throughout...
              i can't move forward with
the english championing darwinism every
single ******* step of the way...
why can't they hide darwin like the polacks
hid copernicus...
given the motto: copernicus -
who moved the earth, and stopped the sun...
why wouldn't i escape into history
if the current biological reality is:
(a) a yawn... the cruel nature of per se?
   the courting of pigeons on a t.v. antenna...
pigeons get rejected all the time,
lesson learned, he bows and bows,
coos... expands his tail feathers upon
the bow then folds them... she flies away...
repeat...
    (b) i can't escape being a historical
animal in the way that what the current
facts are being repeated have encountered
a whiff of Chernobyll...
              history is inclided to answer reality...
biology? not so much... not from what i've
seen and heard...
             truly a schizophrenics disney dream:
to walk among the newly insane feeling
like the only sane among them...
beau-ti-ful!
                   well... given the current criteria
of being bilingual as being synonymous
with being a schizophrenic...
           magic!
                    
   now the crescendo...aphorism 24
ponderings X:

              the word designates, the word signifies,
the word says, the word is (heidegger)...

i found that you can only write
"philosophy" with a neat, fixed vocab. regime,
clarity of boundaries...
    quadratic events in vocab.:

i.e. the reflexive: yourself, himself, itself etc.
and the reflective: your, self....
                       his, self...
                                  it, and the self...
                    ergo? atheistic scissors,
  the two articles, indefinite and definite
                                 a / the "self"...

i'm not playing "identity politics",
when i say that only two peoples ever managed
to sack Moscau... the mongols and the polacks
with the help of lithuanians,
"identity politics" only happens in
post-colonial society, akin to the english,
i'll speak the english,
but i will not be a cucked indian of
the former raj: i will eat the fish & chips,
i will eat the sunday roast,
   i will eat the english breakfast with great
delight...
            but i will not do what these former
colonial masters expect of me:
integrate at the expense of making my
mutterzunge into hubris!
stubborness contra pride...
                hard to tell the difference...

and why do i like heidegger so much?
i'm not into the ad homine arguments...
my grandfather, was, a communist party member...
so?
       i like heidegger... because he appreciates
poetics, i like that poets can share the same
values as philosophers,
thanks to heidegger: we have been requested
back into the republic...
if plato and islam didn't like us, hanging around,
some offshoot german thinker / promenade
enthusiast like used enough to,
i suppose: ban the theatre puppeteers...

i am not playing identity politics...
biological reality is not enough...
but archeological reality?
       can you really advance to counter?
i was born near:
Krzemionki Opatowskie, a Neolithic and
early Bronze Age complex of flint mines
for the extraction of Upper Jurassic (Oxfordian)
banded flints...
  personally? i don't believe in
the African genesis conundrum...
i believe "my" people originated from
the Indian sub-continent,
as, associated with the complex:
Indo-European categorization of language;
i'm still to see an African phonetic
encoding system, beside the hieroglyphics...

i, was, born, there! i'm not a displaced
post-colonial debacle between former master
and former slave...
i have: roots... i'm not ******* up to the fish & chips
brigade with a friday night's worth of curry...
i cook my own curry,
and by god: it is the food of the gods...
i'll give the blue indians that counter...
but sure as **** not the worth of mead
or whiskey...

if they only tolerated themselves,
sure, learn the english language,
but know this much:
           english is the modern lingua franca...
it's the language of economics,
forget the natives, too ignorant to learn
either deutsche or française:
island-folk...
                what else, what other attitude?
even the russians are like:
that land of the weirdos? the idiosyncratics?
yes, we know that land...
the only "thing" that shelters the english
are the h'americans, the south africans,
the australians etc.,
  sure as **** the scots aren't sheltering them...
and, mind you?
   if the i.r.a. really wanted to plant
a bomb?
   a real bomb? they'd revert from speaking
any english to begin with... resorting
to revising their usage of gàidhlig:
ga-id-hlig... gaelic...
   like the welsh, stubborn people, proud people,
retaining their Çymraeg...
celt: said kelt...
the glaswegian football team?
       Çeltic... not: keltic...
  borrowed from the greek: sigma (ς: cedilla to ****)...
   wow! all the particulars in the english tongue!
guess it would take an ausländer to spot them!

U-21 european championships,
england versus romania:
                           a magnificent match...
the youngsters playing better football
than the oldies in their mid to late / early 30s...

i'm trying to tolerate Islam,
               it's not in my nature...
            hell... i enjoyed visiting a turkish barber
shop, i still have an unflinching opinion that,
the turks are the best barbers in the world...
but...

              this quote, is going to **** you:
same aphorism / pondering (24 / X) -


*** fight videos - count dankula...
you know what i'd love to do to these little
snarky *****?
the french revolution isn't enough...
n'ah, them hanging, is not enough....
ever heard of the butchers' hook?
                 it's also callled close-up fishing...
imitation hang-man...
   you insert a fishing hook...
and you let the sweeney todd ****** dangle...
on a hook, rather than a noose...
lords of salem come your way?
i'd rather the snarky teen hanging off
a fisherman's hook than dangle
like some lynched ******...
beside the suffocation,
i'd like them with a fisherman's hook entombed
in their hard palette...
         i don't want them hanging...
what am i? a sadist?
  i want them on the fisherman's hook!
when suffocating without a broken spine absorbed
by the neck isn't enough!
  fisherman's hook gallows is a
masterpiece... of suffering...
  most certain...
  when cheap comedy is being towed...
making fun of bums, or homeless people...
the current society is so welcome
to bypass all the "adventures" of Loki...
but akin to the lords of Salem...
burn!? such a limitated imagination!

ah... right... digressing...
        the reflexive / reflective quadratic...
language - only if speech  has acquired
the highest univocity of the word does it
become strong (enough) for the hidden
              play of its essential multivocity
(as withdrawn from all "logic"),
             of which poets and thinkers alone
are capable, in their own respective modes
and their own directions of sovreignty.

we do live in a time of a lost sense
of dialectic, since we do not live in a time
of etertaining dialogue,
perfectly sensible opinions,
that's all we have...

                       if one of these snarky *******
came up to me...
they'd get a chance to experience a rubric
of 4, knuckles...
what's 189 centimeters in empirical?
6ft2...      oh!
                   see where imagination takes you?
and here i was: thinking i was without it!
butcher's hangman...
oh, not so easy...
                  
                fame by no association to fame...
just the tears of parents who raised their children
to be nothing more than rugrats...
annoying gnat like bothersomes;
and nothing quiet special to be associated
with weimar berlin...
     just, these,
   h'american mall onlookers
with pwetty-guy-for-a-white-fly-mentality,
as borrowed from californian
1990s punk;

re-used ****** losers.

mad-hatter's fraction: 10/6....
      0.666...
      well: to the given extent:
1.666666(7)....
     1, 0, /6,
no number is divisible by 0,
every number, divisible by 1:
is the same number...
    mad hatter's 10/6...

   re-used ****** losers...
i like that phrase...
        7 for every 6, 7 for every 6...
until the 0. fraction comes
a 1.: exponential serf of 0...
0 being the multiplier...
          
         i really am growing a beard to less
don it, but rather to experience
a relief from patience...
war robots?
the first non n.p.c. game...
i like that, very much...
      and when i did:

you know my first experience of
love at first sight?
the younger sister of my then girlfriend...
****** up ****...

love at first sight is a terrible phenomenon...
i was nearing 18, she was barely 13...
i was dating her older sister...
but it was love at first sight,
the trouble with: love at first sight:
it doesn't lie...
it tries to lie...
          but it can't lie...

   paedophilia? a bit... untouched bodies
though... bodies of people who were
never supposed to touch...
i once said to a fwend:
well wouldn't it be ****** up if i touched
her?
   she's a muse, which doesn't translate
into vacating her as a busy body
worth of a touch, does it?
     if only my old friend samuel said
otherwise:
sylvester "contra" tweety:
my first girlfriend...
but her sister?
         i was nearing 18, she was about 13...
love at first sight...
untouched, cradled, unscathed...
and so she remained...
   until she did what every girl would
have done...thank god she remained
a figment of my imagination...
   rammstein: rosernrot...
    
           i have seen love at first...
such a load of ******* that it had to be
the younger sister of a girl i was dating...
and the **** that i had to be 18 and see
was just beginning her teenage transition...
the world unfair i grant
the most justifications... as being
the (just - unnecessary adjective) arbiter...

love at first sight becomes a forbidden love...
love at first sight was always a forbidden
love...
           and the sort of "love" that achieves
a perspctive of change that doesn't
translate into old age...
love at first sight is soon translated
into a love of affairs closely associated
with middle-age disenfranchised
state of affairs...
i.e. to love again...
            how else to feel relief from
having lost both one's inhibitions
               as well as one's ambitions?!
in the conundrum of the mortal
"question" of the continuum being
preserved?

You should all be running
There clocks are singing
There cracks are screaming
The horizon one hundred yards away, So
you should be running
Firing your energies, feel the cannon fodder, straight from the Howl
Down past the credence
Up & over indulgence
In the bright earnest face we all so fear
My mother's eyes show me
My father's will teaches
Because his words go
Up, down and up and down and straight & die
& through and ground
Reaching time reach the audience
Reach out for bleachers where watch
tictoc right American preachers
1,2,3,4,1,2,3,4
Me junction, the merger, our mental *******
Me ******, me scared
Me changing like canon fire
Right! To the ocean, deep deep depths
To think think future
TicTicTicTicTicTicTic
a clock there is singing
Showtunes for theme songs, church bells
Notify
Defcon 12 falling tanks off me shelf
See the mad red carnation
Shot at the pieces in eclipse of today
I keep going when I still have nothing to say
The drapery dying the godbirds still flying
I will never know what comes next
But I've got influence
& I'll need congruence
To empty a vault full of universal need
I want to be running
I'd wish you were running
The stitches, the fabric, sewn loving care
Like the landscaping, keep you warm
I've stolen from homeless
I've stolen from men
I break all the precepts
My breathing's from them
I steal all their oxygen
Whenever I breath Me harmony
Me stretching Me arm reach no peace
I see the world over
the oceans are strange
There's volcanic lightening
& men in white coats
I don't eat, I don’t sleep
I walk for them, should running
out there should running
We feel for the riches
We feel for the dying
Cancerous limp-ation, now windmill's orchestration
Shoes stuck in mud with laces together
Women see lightening when held through the weather
The war, land the peace is
The dynamic tension
The balance in pieces
With eyes up to heaven
Who cares if we're dying
We're all one
One what
I accuse you of calling the charlatan, ****
One bread piece obtuse cause
the sandwich is dying
Do you think that's normal?
Do you think that's abstract?
Boys crying because their teachers have fears
From the past make it last
What is wrong with your peers
Hold together mold together
Find out what's next
Feeling perplexed
Run run run you silly little girls
There's no sense in hiding the rest of the world
We've got one thing in common
And one thing is this
We've all got timing for HIGHER CONSCIOUSNESS
Hold together, mold together
Cry together scream
the bonding is no place
for a welcome machine
Then
What do we do
What do we do
What do we do
What do we do?
End swimming, out running
Over fencing, out running, Break walling, out running
Down clouding, out running
Fall like jumpers, run like dying
Out through planetary & temporary adrenal-line
Sleep when men in white coats
Them start walking
They march, they country
They apple of eden & run when the men
in white coats, they lay sleepin
The world is a mountain
the people they range
Look at these weirdos, make them say change
Educate the many use mindscreen no strife
The point of the riddle
Eternal solvation
We are confused with the mental *******
I'm ******* I'm sorry I'm scared
There's isolation in landscape
Something sounds like prepared
Listen to wordplay
try to find the right light
there's air in the landscape...
Cool to the touch
(a few beats)
1,2,3,4
Say ******* with metaphor
(a few beats)
I've got words, I've got wisdom
I watch movies
There's motion, just grab it
Keep going
You should be running
You should all be running
The world is going to start at any second
You should be running

1
five moons for earth
sometimes I wish
dear moon
sometimes I wish
the earth had five moons
and all so positioned
we can see
one every night and then in twos and in threes
never four (just so for mystery’s sake)
and then all five
all in perfect alignment once a year
just three nights so
and then we’ll all here on earth
go ga ga ga
or moo moo moo looooney
those nights and go crazy
and climb up trees and enact our ape ancestry …

and don’t you be jealous
I asked for four others;
I just want more of you –
just never seem to get enough of you


2
I see you moon
I see you moon
this cool autumn morning
you sing over the river and trees
and you are supported
by your belly-dance troupe of stars




3
ah poor moon
ah poor moon
you're just hanging around
and through no fault of your own
you attract all these weirdos
these lunatics
and the vampires and the blood-******* bats
and the sleep-walkers and murderers
and the flesh-eaters
(the moon made me do it!)
and the lunatics
and the werewolves
and even stock-pickers
and wild women who want to **** Orpheus

O poor moon
you're just about your own radiant business
and all these freaks put it at your doorstep


4
dear moon, you will understand
darling moon
dear moon
do not be offended
we have stripped you
down to rock and a plain face
and we show pictures of you
in black, gray and white;
and though a writer of verse,
in this verse,
I strip you of your romance and aura;
be not angry
for after all,
you will understand,
we are children who come after
Galileo
and Neil Armstrong



5
Li Po, the moon and me
You know
lovely moon
Li Po
was drunk
and he paddled out to you
seeing your reflection
and he jumped in to the lake
embracing you in the waters
and so he drowned;
but,
you know
loving moon,
I will not come to you thus;
instead you know my time
and you will drown
in the lake shadows of my quiet


6
in praise of the moon
I will not sing you a song of praise
O gentle moon
there are too many modern people around
too many enlightened minds tonight
they reckon they don't need your light;
there are too many elect
and too many going to Heaven
and if I sang in praise of you
they will throw their Blessed Books at me
and they will say
'You moon-worshiper, you go to hell!'
(they fancy words like idolator)

O so most divine moon
O godly moon
O most sacred moon
I shall not sing in praise of you;
there are too many bloodthirsty wolves around


7
was it you, mooon?
cold moon
I am sad;
was it you,
distant moon,
who made me so
tonight?


8
you are there moon
you are there moon;
I thought you were not
and I went to sleep
and I sighed: "She will not come, not tonight;
she has some other lover";
and I went to sleep
and then much later now I wake up
and you've come, out there
and your light full within my room
and your fingers on every cell of my being



9
you witness my dying
you witness my dying
as you see my life, my hopes and desires
and all my embarrassments
and my achievements too,
dear moon;
O quiet presence,
O radiant presence all one's life;
and what do you look at these days
in my life
darling moon
what do you see?
you who have seen the child grow old
and you hang out beaming by the window
patiently
to see one more death
to add to the countless you witness
since the day you came

10
M for Man, Money and Moon
M for moon
M for Man
M for Money;
and at last Man has seen the moonlight
and now they know
Man can make Money out of the Moon

11
Moon, I hear you are moving away
Moon, I hear you are moving away
Why moon, are you moving away?
Don’t you like your neighbor
earth so blue and green
and earthlings so adorable?
Did you not come so near
to get to know your neighbor well?
why then are you moving, moon?
maybe you’ve come to know us well
I hear you’re moving slowly,
so slowly your neighbor doesn’t notice;
how considerate of you
Anyway, I’ll be gone before you

You slowly walk down the avenue of normality
Ignoring the side streets and oddly placed alleys

Change, you feel, is strange and unnerving
You stay straight and narrow, no veering or swerving

You look at us weirdos and our strange machinations
you speed up your pace with much trepidation

You're so busy keeping to the road that's more traveled
that you are completely unaware that it's turning to gravel

You're walking alone, and the road has all but decayed
the streets that you passed up, now bustling highways

Your fear of the odd and peculiar, the offbeat uncommon
has led you to become alone, forlorn, and unwanted

Everyone's different
Everyone's weird

Everyone has secrets that no one will hear

You wanted to be normal, and normal you are
now you're a minority, among the bizarre

Somewhere in your wardrobe, I'd be willing to bet
There's a t-shirt probably bearing the silhouette of Che Guevara

He was revolutionary, yeah, he wore a cool hat
But behind the design I think you might find it's not quite as simple as that

Che was a bit of a homophobe, Che was a bit of a homophobe,
I think... apparently.. who knows?
Che was a bit of a homophobe, Che was a bit of a homophobe

This is my song in defence of the fence
A little sing along, a anthem to ambivalence
The more you know, the harder you will find it
To make up your mind, it, doesn't really matter if you find
You can't see which grass is greener
Chances are it's neither, and either way it's easier
To see the difference, when you're sitting on the fence

Somewhere in your house, I'd be willing to bet
There's a picture of that grinning hippy from Tibet - the Dalai Llama

He's a lovely, funny fella, he gives soundbites galore
But let's not forget that back in Tibet, those funky monks used to **** the poor, yeah

And the Buddhist line about future lives is the perfect way to stop the powerless rising up
And he tells the poor they will live again, but he's rich now so it's easy for him to say

I'm taking the stand in defense of the fence
I got a little band playing anthems to ambivalence
We divide the world into terrorists and heroes
Into normal folk and weirdos
Into good people and ****'s
Into things that give you cancer and the things that cure cancer
And the things that don't cause cancer, but there's a chance they will cause cancer in the future
We divide the world to stop us feeling frightened
Into wrong and into right and
Into black and into white and
Into real men and fairies
Into status quo and scary
Yeah we want the world binary, binary
But it's not that simple.

And your dog has a bigger carbon footprint than a four wheel drive
Yea your dog has a bigger carbon footprint than a four wheel drive
And your dog has a bigger carbon footprint than a four wheel drive
And so does your baby, maybe you oughta trade HIM in for a Prius-
ROCK!

I'm taking the stand in defence of the fence
I got a little band playing tributes to ambivalence
We divide the world into liberals and gun-freaks
Into atheists and fundies
Into tee-tot'lers and junkies
Into chemical and natural
Into fictional and factual
Into science and supernatural
But it's actually naturally not that white and black

You'll be
Dividing us into terrorists and heroes
Into normal folk and weirdos
Into good people and pedos
Into things that give you cancer and the things that cure cancer
And things that don't cause cancer, but there's a chance they will cause cancer in the future
We divide the world to stop us feeling frightened
Into wrong and into right and
Into black and into white and
Into real men and fairies
Into parrots and canaries
Yeah we want the world binary, binary - 011101!

The more you know, the harder you will find it
To make up your mind, it doesn't really matter if you find
You can't see which grass is greener
Chances are it's neither, and either way it's easier
To see the difference
Cause it's not that simple...

Another night of television hell I was in the middle of a hell of a block.
And withoout the funds my usal cure of hookers and *******  wasnt a open
road so to speak.

I was lost I wondred the streets like  ****** in need of a john.
When through the darkness it appearded a well lit haven in the middle of
a thoughtless storm.

The cinema cafe drinks and films  hmm from looking at the marquee seems
there wasnt much to choose from .
It read like a preschooler had puked apon the board.

There were sequels, and prequels,  gay vampires that walked around in the day,
Weirdos who flew around on broom sticks and loads of treenage **** minus the ****.
Dear lord! I had to get to the bottom of this problem.

The pimple faced kid at the booth asked me in a squeeky yet firm semi manly
voice can I help you sir?
Yes my dear crater face whats with this **** you call films here ?
Umm I dont make em sir there just whats popular.

The greezy faced hampster had a good point in what he said that is.
cause other than that I had no clue what he was working with really what do you think
I am some kinda pervert?

Let me ask you something do you like this **** you sell tickets to?
**** no dude its garbage for halfwits and retards  and some people from Canada.
Who the hell wants to see that **** from twilight  play snow white?
Let me ask is that a adult film?
Duh no ******* we dont show thoose here.

Would you know were I could see thoose films?
Im doing some umm research on human sexulality  it involves alotta big words
which i cant spell so i'll spare you the details  just point me in the right direction
and nobody gets hurt.

Dude they havent shown thoose kinda movies in theaters for years.
Oh yeah and theres this thing called the internet once is way better than writting on your
cave walls.
Kids there really great *******.

After some back in fourth who gives a **** or really reads this ***** banter.
The man with the pizza face finally hit his limit.
Look *******!
I dont make the **** ,I dont watch the ****!
If you gotta problem take it up with the studio exects in Hollywood.

You gotta point there sparky give me your keys!
What! No.
Give me your keys or else.
Or else what grandpa  your gonna hit me with your walker.

No you silly *******.
Or else I'll shoot you.
Ya see young man that should wear a iron mask.
You may have a I Phone
But I have a handgun  and  that always wins the debate no hand em over.

After a brief moment of the little ******* ***** crying and begging for me not to **** him.
Really he watched to many TV shows I wasnt gonna **** him besides.
Im allergic to prison and it wasnt even a real gun what a *******.

I was off in my borrowed car  to the land of bad ideas and great **** jobs.
A place more fake than barbies dream home minus that dickless tool she always
hung out with  not that I played with Barbie's but she does have some really kickarse *******
and im a big fan of ******* hell what great writer isnt?

It was a drive that seemed to take forever  but finally i pulled up to the front gate
of Warner Brothers studios.
The little weird looking gate keeper looked at me and said .
can I help you sir.

Yes please direct me to your leader strange gaurd troll.
Uhh sir this is a closed lot only people with passes can enter.
Well what if i know the secret word?

Who told you about the secret word?
I had him with that one.
These Hollyweird vampires couldnt have enough brain power to
keep some pass on them.
Okay whats the secret word sir?

I had to think deep and from such a shallow mind that was asking alot.
What could it be it had to be something that rang true like snorting a line of
coke of Katy Perry's  ***'s.

Dear lord I had it.

Brad Pitt ***** donkey *****.

The man looked at me in utter shock  I wasnt sure if he was gonna let me pass
or try to pull me out my slightly worn odd smelling borrowed car.
Alright sir it's lot 69 hahaha  yeah I know im demented.

Right next to the lot there filming Winds Of Change **** The Musical!
Staring Johnny Depp and Bogo the ***** chimp.
****** i wish i wasnt busy  that chimp seemed like he had a good head on his shoulders.
Well when he wasnt jerking off and eating bannans while throwing his poo.
What a talent indeed.

I found myself in the studio people running every which a way.
It was total confussion   seemd like no one had a clue what the hell they were doing.
Hey ******* shouted some weird little man in a chair who the **** are you!?.

The little red haired man must truely be dellusional.
How could someone not know Gonzo?
Well sir just who the **** are you? I replied.

Well im Ron ******* Howard *****!
Hmm never herd of you are you a director or something?
What!!!
Ever hear of Andy Griffith  or Happy Days?
Oh yeah your that little dork that hung out with that cop yeah what a snitch.
I was playing his son *******.

Dam well seems this ginger finally explained to me why that man always had him around
it all makes sense now i just thought he was some kinda pervert.
Course seems like he had picked up some bad habbits from that Fonzie guy
never trust a man who calls the restroom his office but what a man does with
another man in a ***** restroom for plesure or profit is his own bussiness.

Look *******  what the hell do ya want?
Lets start with a gallon's of nothern light maybe some top shelf hookers some good music.
Maybe a couple hits of some lets say nose candy maybe turn off the lights and see what happens.
Im just saying sometimes ya gotta let nature take it's drug filled course.

Im not talking bout from life dip **** i mean what the hell are you doing here?
Oh **** sorry there  carrot top.
I wanna see the person in charge that green lights all this remake **** you souless
morons put out and call entertainment.

The little red haired devil was silent as he explained to me no one ever saw the
studio head it was like meeting Santa Claus or ****** or being in the pressence of a unicorn
really whats the diffrence.

He warned me of the dangers of meeting such a great mind yet like I do with
most people I simply shook me head and agreed much like i do with
women im trying to sleep with duh like I care about her tweenty seven cats.

Finally after learning I wasnt taking no for a answer he lead me to a room
And in this room was a screen and apon the screen appread a face.
Who dare question the mighty head of the film studio!!

The voice was loud  still it had that comfoting quallity that you just have to love in
a windbag *******.
Umm me.

You well who the hell are you?
Duh ******* im the long winded ******* writting the story.
Oh well what the **** do you want?

Sir I wanna know what the hell's wrong with you people.
Look im a drunk but i could never be drunk enough to pay a fortune to watch half the **** you call entertainment between remakes and films based on gay *** stories about vampires
and dudes who run around the woods calling themselves werewolves.

You mean you actully saw twilight?
The voice asked me on the verge of laughter.
Duh i see a bunch of hot chicks  going anywhere im following without asking
much like the mindless drones that watch that ****.

Sir your a sad sad man.
The strange face on the screen vanished out from the curtan appeared
what looked like *** it was Bugs Bunny !!

Bug's!  
What's up gonz?
****** i always knew you were real much like Fergie and spanish fly.

Gonzo i know half this **** ***** but its because mindless idiots love studip ****.
Look you were once a popular writer and you cant even spell.
Ouch now go ahead mighty furry samuri.

Ya see whatever makes money we put out and really stupid young girls much like your teenage
wife love that **** and being perverts like yourself wanna get laid you'll take them to that ****.
Bugs are you saying it's all about money?

No **** *******.

We talked drank watched backroom casting couch tapes of early starlets like
Harrison Ford no wonder he was so good with that whip.

It was magic minus the  money loving **** mouse that'll sue your ***.
Bugs I gotta ask you a deep question?
Shoot there Gonz .
Is Mickey really just a cross dresser calling himself Minnie?

You are messed up in so many ways Gonz.
We laughed swapped ***** stories  like the time Bugs slipped
Daisy some ****** and got a ******* in the magic castle  while goofy watched.

What the **** is Goofy?

Gonz .
My furry amigo said to **** if I know.

Untill next time kids stay crazy

And remember if you wish apon a star  ya better make sure to whom thoose copy rights
belong to truley are.
Cause thoose rich ******* will sue your *** .

Cheers

                               FIN?

We are all different
But some are more different others.
The Asian lady who cant't stop drinking her tea
The perverted Iranian who has not one wife, not two but three
The strange fella who makes noise as he walks
Probably harmless but must have a woman that he stalks
The bodybuilder who talks to no-one unless in trouble
Trying to grow a goatee but looks like daft stubble
Always the computer buff who knows how to hide his secret sites
If we knew how to access his stuff he'd soon enough take flight
The chubby man who's wife we believe is Thai
Most British girls just turned him away, well at least he tried
Then there's the cheeky sod who says he's wheelchair bound
Comes out with some screamers but no one utters a sound
And how could I forget the older lady who's divorced three times
You didn't know that? Oh you'll find out down the line
And then there is me who I think to be plain and normal
But God only knows what they say about me, nice and informal?
Not from this lot

An Office Full of Weirdos

JJB

“The side of her head is shaved,
isn’t that weird?”
Afraid to admit my attraction,
I nodded in agreement.

And in a low voice
I responded with,
“yeah, weird…”
Yet again he pointed out,

“Look at her septum piercing!
Doesn’t she look like Benny the Bull?”
I looked away. Under my breath
I said, “I think…she’s cute.”

My friend turned
with simpering eyes.
“Really? Cute?
You’re a ****** too.”

I looked up, “I’m not weird.
I just think she’s pretty,
that’s all.”
He scoffed,

“Nah man, you’re really weird.
Tattoos and piercings aren’t attractive,
they’re weird but I guess weirdos
are attracted to other weirdos.

Flustered, I looked up to him.
“So what?  Punk rock is pretty.
At least I’m not a pretentious ******* like you.”
And with that, I left him there.

© Matthew Harlovic

A rest stop outside of Richmond VA.

The sun is bright and annoying as **** as usal the woman pull's up  in a brand new Mustang
cherry red gleams in the parking lot.
She's living the life but hey sometimes when ya stop to take a restroom break ***** happens.

Halfway back to Carolina me and my loyal hetro companion Bone.
Are doing what two full blooded American men would do riding like bats outta hell
going through this womans cd collection Alanis Morrisett dear lord man do they hand these ******* out as soon as they get there periods?

But isnt it ironic dont ya think?
Flying down the interstate music blasting beers gathering on the floor like brainless ***** at a
Justin Bieber concert.
I gaze into the rearview only to come to realize like weirdos in a schoolyard we are not alone.

Looking at from the backseat appeared to be some sort of old ****** in a diper hey ***** but whatever
floats your boat jesus these flashbacks are getting to be hell.

My amigo slash  fellow tripper of the light fantastic was in  a trance already
into track seven you oughta know the brainwashing was a ******* dam lesbian **** front!
Even I was fighting the urge to go to the lilth fair and stop shaving but the fellas
were so against the natural look oh snap.

Bone dear lord snap outta it were not in a movie thearter!
Sorry Gonz what the ***** up ?
Well my mexican amigo I belive theres a little perve dwarf in the backseat that or that acid
crazy Larry sold me really is kicking my ****.

Looking at me like most do with that strange since of hey should i just get out here
or go with the trip he looked for a second.
Silent in a awkward sense like when my prom date caught me masterbaiting in her closet the night befor
hey it looked better on me anyways  yeah dont ask.

Bone finally spoke you crazy ***** it's a ******* kid **** we stole a ******* kid were so ******.
Jesus we had both been so safe how was i gonna explain this i thought deeply then finally
took a detor from my usal insanity to do something i seldom do.
Think.  

Well Bone looks like were gonna have to get a abortion.
It's already born *******.
My deep thinking and total drunk amigo made a good point it would get kinda messy.

Well maybe we can check it's collar or drop it in the post office box or even a dumpster
hey dont knock it thats where momma gonzo misplaced me strippers there so care free
and total ***** im just saying but enough  bout Katy Perry

Dude are you totally ****** nuts?
It was at that moment the little bald man began to cry.
Bone calm down cant you see your upsetting it Jesus wheres my manners give him this.

Gonz dude it's my last one.
Bone had a point but this little hairless doorstop needed to take the edge off so
the beer was his.

Miles passed as we thought what to do but with this little jumping bean
it wasnt gonna be easy getting into the ******* or getting him a fake ID.
course we could always say he was that dwarf from Austin Powers
But hey even I had some morals the poor little ******* had it bad enough let alone to be connected
to Mike Myers im just saying.

The ride to grandma Gonzos chop shop proved to long for my two drunken companions hey it was past Bones bed time after all he starts drinking at 6 am  .
I gazed down apon the little amigo as he slept so peaceful must have just had a ******* ahh memories.

Then Bone finally came to Gonz what the **** dude I told you stop cuddling with me people are gonna talk!
Like they havent already just go with it and yes I am happy to see you.
After a brief fight and some make up hugs and cookies mmm cookies and ****** harassment it goes togather like poetry and misery winning.

Gonz where the hell is the kid?
My friend seemed concerned I wonder did these two have something going on
yeah maybe that was it hmmm never trust a drunk or a bald headed dwarf in a diper
but grandpa wasnt all that bad.

Gonz wheres the baby !
The sound of the car being crushed made it hard to hear yet still I could here jagged little pill
playing ranting bout what true ****** men were amen to that sister.
Jesus that Canadian ***** died hard!

  Gonz !
Finally I snapped outta my trance oh yeah that dwarf dont worry he's in the trunk.
The trunk! The ******* trunk!
Hey dont worry I left him some beer and penuts jesus man calm down must been his time of the month.

Bone was frantic like when he herd there wasa beer truck overturned on the interstate.
Tears rolled down his eye's once like any good friend i did what all true men do when a bro is crying.
Video taped it and put it on you tube to laugh my *** off later.

Gonz how could you ?
Bone he's in a better place now whats wrong?
You killed him how could you destroy such a innocent thing.

Dear lord I know my pinto is old but it's far from a deatn trap well okay it kinda is but relax
see i popped the trunk grapped the little hamster by the leg held him up high
he's fine a little stinky hey if he cant hold his  ***** thats his issue.
Btw where do we get feed for this thing cause im almost outta dog biscuts?

After Bone finally stopped being such a drama queen Jesus that album had some strange powers.
We were off with are little stinky drunken friend brothers bent on sharing experience
and drugs and maybe some strippers hey kids are chick magnets im just saying
I should have stole one ages ego.

We laughed we cried we found out dipers can really get filled up .
He sometimes it's best not to hold everything in.

And as are money flew from us like braincells from a ******* shoot.
I called the smartest most rational person i knew Richard Shepard.
Who after cussing me for waking him up at 3 in the morning finally explained
it all to me Jesus who ever knew thats where babies came from.

So there we parted togatehr the three amigo's
Man what a party hey Bone?
Dam right hey Gonz i got the stamps on his forehead help me get him in the
post office box.

And after a brief moment like my mind are little amigo was gone
Outta are lives.
We stood there silent.
Hey Gonz wanna go back to the *******.
Amigo all i gotta say is **** yeah !

And like that we were off to more adventures that rambled on for hors till ya want to strangle me or take me home and keep me like a demented perverted puppy that although seemed cute
if petted would just **** your leg.

A week later

the woman sat there with little wahtever the hell his name was in his high chair.
Harvey get the camera I think he's gonna say his first word.
The two parent's so excited  come on whatever the hell your name is say it it.

The little rascal grinned from ear to looking at the object of most means thoughts
I belive the proper term is *******.
Building up the strength from somewhere deep inside.
His parent's so excited and happy he was gonna talk also  hahaha im not right.

Finally little whats his name spoke
****!  ****! ****!
His parents stunned I told you frank not to cuss around him.
I didnt and my names not Frank *****!

***** you I told you your family's ****** up side would ***** everything up.
Yeah couldnt be the total ***** side rubbed off either huh?
It was like a scene from the Waltons.
Little whats his name speaking his first word  two parents
cussing each other out it's so holesome reminds me of home.

Untill next time watch your kids cause theres some bad influences out there
unlike my wholesome ****.
Stay crazy Gonzo