In the Fall, when the temperature of the Bay would drop and the wind blew ice, frost would gather on the lawn near Henry Oldez's room. It was not a heavy frost that spread across the paralyzed lawn, but one that just covered each blade of grass with a fine, white, almost dusty coat. Most mornings, he would stumble out of the garage where he slept and tip toe past the ice speckled patch of brown and green spotted grass, so to make his way inside to relieve himself. If he was in no hurry, he would stand on the four stepped stoop and look back at the dried, dead leaves hanging from the wiry branches of three trees lined up against the neighbors fence. The picture reminded him of what the old gallows must have looked like. Henry Oldez had been living in this routine for twenty some years.

He had moved to California with his mother, father, and three brothers 35 years ago. Henry's father, born and raised in Tijuana, Mexico, had traveled across the Meixcan border on a bent, full jalopy with his wife, Betria Gonzalez and their three kids. They were all mostly babies then and none of the brothers claimed to remember anything of the ride, except one, Leo, recalled there was "A lotta dust in the car." Santiago Oldez, San for short, had fought in World War II and died of cancer ten years later. San drank most nights and smoked two packs of Marlboro Reds a day. Henry had never heard his father talk about the fighting or the war. If he was lucky to hear anything, it would have been when San was dead drunk, talking to himself mostly, not paying very much attention to anyone except his memories and his music.

"San loved two things in this world," Henry would say, "*****, Betria, and Johnny Cash."

Betria Gonzalez grew up in Tijuana, Mexico as well. She was a stout, short woman, wide but with pretty eyes and a mess of orange golden hair. Betria could talk to anyone about anything. Her nick names were the conversationalist or the old crow because she never found a reason to stop talking. Santiago had met her through a friend of a friend. After a couple of dates, they were married. There is some talk of a dispute among the two families, that they didn't agree to the marriage and that they were too young, which they probably were. Santiago being Santiago, didn't listen to anybody, only to his heart. They were married in a small church outside of town overlooking the Pacific. Betria told the kids that the waves thundered and crashed against the rocks that day and the sea looked endless. There were no pictures taken and only three people were at the ceremony: Betria, San, and the priest.

Of course, the four boys went to elementary and high school, and, of course, none of them went to college. One brother moved down to LA and eventually started working for a law firm doing their books. Another got married at 18 years old and was in and out of the house until getting under the wing of the union, doing construction and electrical work for the city. The third brother followed suit. Henry Oldez, after high school, stayed put. Nothing in school interested him. Henry only liked what he could get into after school. The people of the streets were his muse, leaving him with the tramps, the dealers, the struggling restaurateurs, the laundry mat hookers, the crooked cops and the addicts, the gang bangers, the bible humpers, the window washers, the jesus freaks, the EMT's, the old ladies pushing salvation by every bus stop, the guy on the corner and the guy in the alley, and the DOA's. Henry didn't have much time for anyone else after all of them.

Henry looked at himself in the mirror. The light was off and the room was dim. Sunlight streaked in through the dusty blinds from outside, reflecting into the mirror and onto Henry's face. He was short, 5' 2'' or 5' 3'' at most with stubby, skinny legs, and a wide, barrel shaped chest. He examined his face, which was a ravine of wrinkles and deep crows feet. His eyes were sunken and small in his head. Somehow, his pants were always one or two inches below his waistline, so the crack of his *** would constantly be peeking out. Henry's deep, chocolate colored hair was  that of an ancient Native American, long and nearly touched the tip of his belt if he stood up straight. No one knew how long he had been growing it out for. No one knew him any other way. He would comb his hair incessantly: before and after a shower, walking around the house, watching television with Betria on the couch, talking to friends when they came by, and when he drove to work, when he had it.

Normal work, nine to five work, did not work for Henry. "I need to be my own boss," he'd say. With that fact stubbornly put in place, Henry turned to being a handy man, a roofer, and a pioneer of construction. No one knew where he would get the jobs that he would get, he would just have them one day. And whenever he 'd finish a job, he'd complain about how much they'd shorted him, soon to move on to the next one. Henry never had to listen to anyone and, most of the time, he got free lunches out of it. It was a very strange routine, but it worked for him and Betria had no complaints as long as he was bringing some money in and keeping busy. After Santiago died, she became the head of the house, but really let her boys do whatever they wanted.

Henry took a quick shower and blow dried his hair, something he never did unless he was in a hurry. He had a job in the east bay at a sorority house near the Berkley campus. At the table, still in his pajamas, he ate three leftover chicken thighs, toast, and two over easy eggs. Betria was still in bed, awake and reading. Henry heard her two dogs barking and scratching on her bedroom door. He got up as he combed his damp hair, tugging and straining to get each individual knot out. When he opened the door, the smaller, thinner dog, Boy Boy, shot under his legs and to the front door where his toy was. The fat, beige, pig-like one waddled out beside Henry and went straight for its food bowl.

"Good morning," said Henry to Betria.

Betria looked at Henry over her glasses, "You eat already?"

"Yep," he announced, "Got to go to work." He tugged on a knot.

"That's good. Dondé?" Betria looked back down at her spanish TV guide booklet.

"Berkley somewhere," Henry said, bringing the comb smoothly down through his hair.

"That's good, that's good."

"OK!" Henry sighed loudly, shutting the door behind him. He walked back to the dinner table and finished his meal. Then, Betria shouted something from her room that Henry couldn't hear.

"What?" yelled Henry, so she could hear him over the television. She shouted again, but Henry still couldn't hear her. Henry got up and went back to her room, ***** dish in hand. He opened her door and looked at her without saying anything.

"Take the dogs out to ***," Betria told him, "Out the back, not the front."

"Yeah," Henry said and shut the door.

"Come on you dogs," Henry mumbled, dropping his dish in the sink. Betria always did everyones dishes. She called it "her exercise."

Henry let the two dogs out on the lawn. The sun was curling up into the sky and its heat had melted all of the frost on the lawn. Now, the grass was bright green and Henry barely noticed the dark brown dead spots. He watched as the fat beige one squatted to ***. It was too fat to lifts its own leg up. The thing was built like a tank or a sea turtle. Henry laughed to himself as it looked up at him, both of its eyes going in opposite directions, its tongue jutted out one corner of his mouth. Boy boy was on the far end of the lawn, searching for something in the bushes. After a minute, he pulled out another one of his toys and brought it to Henry. Henry picked up the neon green chew toy shaped like a bone and threw it back to where Boy boy had dug it out from. Boy boy shot after it and the fat one just watched, waddling a few feet away from it had peed and laid down. Henry threw the toy a couple more times for Boy boy, but soon he realized it was time to go.

"Alright!" said Henry, "Get inside. Gotta' go to work." He picked up the fat one and threw it inside the laundry room hallway that led to the kitchen and the rest of the house. Boy boy bounded up the stairs into the kitchen. He didn't need anyone lifting him up anywhere. Henry shut the door behind them and went to back to his room to get into his work clothes.

Henry's girlfriend was still asleep and he made sure to be quiet while he got dressed. Tia, Henry's girlfriend, didn't work, but occasionally would put up garage sales of various junk she found around town. She was strangely obsessed with beanie babies, those tiny plush toys usually made up in different costumes. Henry's favorite was the hunter. It was dressed up in camouflage and wore an eye patch. You could take off its brown, polyester hat too, if you wanted. Henry made no complaint about Tia not having a job because she usually brought some money home somehow, along with groceries and cleaning the house and their room. Betria, again, made no complain and only wanted to know if she was going to eat there or not for the day.

A boat sized bright blue GMC sat in the street. This was Henry's car. The stick shift was so mangled and bent that only Henry and his older brother could drive it. He had traded a new car stereo for it, or something like that. He believed it got ten miles to the gallon, but it really only got six or seven. The stereo was the cleanest piece of equipment inside the thing. It played CD's, had a shoddy cassette player, and a decent radio that picked up all the local stations. Henry reached under the seat and attached the radio to the front panel. He never left the radio just sitting there in plain sight. Someone walking by could just as soon as put their elbow into the window, pluck the thing out, and make a clean 200 bucks or so. Henry wasn't that stupid. He'd been living there his whole life and sure enough, done the same thing to other cars when he was low on money. He knew the tricks of every trade when it came to how to make money on the street.

On the road, Henry passed La Rosa, the Mexican food mart around the corner from the house. Two short, tanned men stood in front of a stand of CD's, talking. He usually bought pirated music or movies there. One of the guys names was Bertie, but he didn't know the other guy. He figured either a customer or a friend. There were a lot of friends in this neighborhood. Everyone knew each other somehow. From the bars, from the grocery, from the laundromat, from the taco stands or from just walking around the streets at night when you were too bored to stay inside and watch TV. It wasn't usually safe for non-locals to walk the streets at night, but if you were from around there and could prove it to someone that was going to jump you, one could usually get away from losing a wallet or an eyeball if you had the proof. Henry, to people on the street, also went as Monk. Whenever he would drive through the neighborhood, the window open with his arm hanging out the side, he would usually hear a distant yell of "Hey Monk!" or "What's up Monk!". Henry would always wave back, unsure who's voice it was or in what direction to wave, but knowing it was a friend from somewhere.

There was heavy traffic on the way to Berkley and as he waited in line, cursing his luck, he looked over at the wet swamp, sitting there beside highway like a dead frog. A few scattered egrets waded through the brown water, their long legs keeping their clean white bodies safe from the muddy water. Beyond the swamp laid the pacific and the Golden Gate bridge. San Francisco sat there too: still, majestic, and silver. Next to the city, was the Bay Bridge stretched out over the water like long gray yard stick. Henry compared the Golden Gate's beauty with the Bay Bridge. Both were beautiful in there own way, but the Bay Bridge's color was that of a gravestone, while the Golden Gate's color was a heavy red, that made it seem alive. Why they had never decided to pain the Bay Bridge, Henry had no idea. He thought it would look very nice with a nice coat of burgundy to match the Golden gate, but knew they would never spend the money. They never do.

After reeling through the downtown streets of Berkley, dodging college kids crossing the street on their cell phones and bicyclists, he finally reached the large, A-frame house. The house was lifted, four or five feet off the ground and you had to walk up five or seven stairs to get to the front door. Surrounded by tall, dark green bushes, Henry knew these kids had money coming from somewhere. In the windows hung spinning colored glass and in front of the house was an old-timey dinner bell in the shape of triangle. Potted plants lined the red brick walkway that led to the stairs. Young tomatoes and small peas hung from the tender arms of the stems leaf stalks. The lawn was manicured and clean. "Must be studying agriculture or something," Henry thought, "Or they got a really good gardener."

He parked right in front of the house and looked the building up and down, estimating how long it would take to get the old shingles off and the new one's on. Someone was up on the deck of the house, rocking back and forth in an old wooden chair. He listened to the creaking wood of the chair and the deck, judging it would take him two days for the job. Henry knew there was no scheduled rain, but with the Bay weather, one could never be sure. He had worked in rain before - even hail - and it never really bothered him. The thing was, he never strapped himself in and when it would rain and he was working roofs, he was afraid to slip and fall. He turned his truck off, got out, and locked both of the doors. He stepped heavily up the walkway and up the stairs. The someone who was rocking back and forth was a skinny beauty with loose jean shorts on and a thick looking, black and red plaid shirt. She had long, chunky dread locks and was smoking a joint, blowing the smoke out over the tips of the bushes and onto the street. Henry was no stranger to the smell. He smoked himself. This was California.

"Who're you?" the dreaded girl asked.

"I'm the roofer," Henry told her.

The girl looked puzzled and disinterested. Henry leaned back on his heels and wondered if the whole thing was lemon. She looked beyond him, down on the street, awkwardly annoying Henry's gaze. The tools in Henry's hands began to grow heavy, so he put them down on the deck with a thud. The noise seemed to startle the girl out of whatever haze her brain was in and she looked back at Henry. Her eyes were dark brown and her skin was smooth and clear like lake water. She couldn't have been more then 20 or 21 years old. Henry realized that he was staring and looked away at the various potted plants near the rocking chair. He liked them all.

"Do you know who called you?" She took a drag from her joint.

"Brett, " Henry told her, "But they didn't leave a last name."

For a moment, the girl looked like she had been struck across the chin with a brick, but then her face relaxed and she smiled.

"Oh ****," she laughed, "That's me. I called you. I'm Brett."

Henry smiled uneasily and picked up his tools, "Ok."

"Nice to meet you," she said, putting out her hand.

Henry awkwardly put out his left hand, "Nice to meet you too."

She took another drag and exhaled, the smoke rolling over her lips, "Want to see the roof?"

The two of them stood underneath a five foot by five foot hole. Henry was a little uneasy by the fact they had cleaned up none of the shattered wood and the birds pecking at the bird seed sitting in a bowl on the coffee table facing the TV. The arms of the couch were covered in bird **** and someone had draped a large, zebra printed blanket across the middle of it. Henry figured the blanket wasn't for decoration, but to hide the rest of the bird droppings. Next to the couch sat a large, antique lamp with its lamp shade missing. Underneath the dim light, was a nice portrait of the entire house. Henry looked away from the hole, leaving Brett with her head cocked back, the joint still pinched between her lips, to get a closer look. There looked to be four in total: Brett, a very large man, a woman with longer, thick dread locks than Brett, and a extremely short man with a very large, brown beard. Henry went back

Where are your wings now?
How can they save you now?
Left alone, barely able to stand on your own two feet.
You walk a thousand miles down a dirt road
finding hunger along the way.
You drink a gallon of water for the first time
so everything in the world stops and leaves you breathless.
You can't believe the feeling of pain and dwell in sorrow
over something, you can't control.
You set the world on fire but never knew how to use a match.
Now you're a nomad dreaming of meeting someone who will help you put out the flames
but instead, everyone glares at you while walking around in their ashes.

And if you knew what you know now nothing would have changed,
and everything would be in its place.
You wish to undo what has been done
but you have a heavy soul
surrounded by mountains and oceans.
So let the sun die down
and let the morning pour in hope of anew to come.

You used to be a beautiful angel
but now your grace has been ripped out.
Now you're a human
with ***** feet,
a hard soul,
broken wings,
and scarred and cut skin
you wish to just be left behind.
Let the wind take you and lead you
across the winding roads,
into the hands, you solely search for to help and to hold.
The only hands that can make you feel whole and holy,
even without a halo.

I followed him down the trail until we got to the mouth of the mines. The life and energy of the surrounding maples and birches seemed to come to a still and then die as we walked closer, closer. The air was cold and dark and damp and smelt of mold and moths. Delvos stepped into the darkness anyways.
“Well, girl, you coming or aren’t you?”
I could see his yellowed tobacco teeth form into a slimy smile as I stepped out of the sun. It was still inside. The canary chirped.
“This tunnel is just the mouth to over two hundred others exactly like it. Stay close. Last thing I need this month is National Geographic on my *** for losing one of their puppet girls.”
“Delvos, ****. I have two masters degrees.” He rolled his eyes.
“Spare me.” He trotted off around the corner to the left, whistling.
“I survived alone in the jungles of Bolivia alone for two months chasing an Azara’s Spinetail. I climbed the tallest mountain in Nepal shooting Satyr Tragopans along the cliff faces. In Peru I…” Suddenly I felt the weight of the darkness. In my blinding anger I lost track of his lantern. I stopped, my heartbeat picked up, and I tried to remind myself of what I did in Peru.
I followed a Diurnal Peruvian Pygmy-Owl across the gravel tops of the Andes Mountains, no light but the Southern Cross and waning moon above. I am not scared of darkness. I am not scared of darkness.
I stopped to listen. Somewhere in front of me the canary chirped.

When I first got the job in Vermont I couldn’t have been more frustrated. Mining canaries? Never had I ever ‘chased’ a more mundane bird. Nonetheless, when Jack Reynolds sends you on a shoot you don’t say no, so I packed up my camera bag and hoped on the next plane out of Washington.
“His name is John Delvos.” Jack said. He handed me the manila case envelope. “He’s lived in rural Vermont his entire life. Apparently his family bred the canaries for the miners of the Sheldon Quarry since the early twenties. When the accident happened the whole town basically shut down. There were no canaries in the mines the day the gas killed the miners. His mother died in a fire of some sort shortly after. The town blamed the Delvos family and ran them into the woods. His father built a cabin and once his father died, Delvos continued to breed the birds. He ships them to other mining towns across the country now. We want to run a piece about the inhumanity of breeding animals to die so humans won’t.” I stood in silence in front of his deep mahogany desk, suddenly aware of the lack of make-up on my face. He smiled, “You’re leaving on Tuesday.”
“Yes sir.”
“Don’t look so smug, Lila. This may not be the most exotic bird you’ve shot but the humanity of this piece has the potential to be a cover story. Get the shots, write the story.”

“Do you understand the darkness now, Ms. Rivers? Your prestigious masters degrees don’t mean **** down here.” Delvos reappeared behind the crack of his match in a side tunnel not twenty yards in front of me. He relit the oily lantern and turned his back without another word. I reluctantly followed deeper into the damp darkness.
“Why were there no canaries in the mine on, you know, that day?” The shadows of the lantern flickered against the iron canary cage chained on his hip and the yellow bird hopped inside.
“I was nine, Ms. Rivers. I didn’t understand much at the time.” We turned right into the next tunnel and our shoes crunched on jagged stones. All the stones were black.
“But surely you understand now?”
The canary chirped.

When I first got to Sheldon and began asking about the location of the Delvos’ cabin you would have thought I was asking where the first gate to hell was located. Mothers would smile and say, “Sorry, Miss, I can’t say,” and hurriedly flock their children in the opposite direction. After two hours of polite refusals I gave up. I spent the rest of the first day photographing the town square. It was quaint; old stone barbershops surrounded by oaks and black squirrels, a western themed whiskey bar, and a few greasy spoon restaurants interspersed in-between. I booked a room in the Walking Horse Motel for Wednesday night, determined to get a good nights sleep and defeat this towns fear of John Delvos tomorrow.
My room was a tiny one bed square with no TV. Surprise, surprise. At least I had my camera and computer to entertain myself. I reached into the side of my camera bag and pulled out my Turkish Golds and Macaw-beak yellow BIC. I stepped out onto the dirt in front of my door and lit up. I looked up and the stars stole all the oxygen surrounding me. They were dancing and smiling above me and I forgot Delvos, Jack, and all of Sheldon except it’s sky. Puffing away, I stepped farther and farther from my door and deeper into the darkness of night. The father into the darkness the more dizzying the stars dancing became.
“Ma’am? Everything okay?”
Startled, I dropped my cigarette on the ground and the ember fell off.
“I’m sorry, sir. I was just, um, the stars…” I snuffed out the orange glow in the dirt with my boot and extended my hand, “Lila Waters, and you are?”
“Ian Benet. I haven’t seen you around here before, Ms. Waters, are you new to town?”
“I’m here for work. I’m a bird photographer and journalist for National Geographic. I’m looking for John Delvos but I’m starting to think he’s going to be harder to track than a Magpie Robin.”
The stars tiptoed in their tiny circles above in the silence. Then, they disappeared with a spark as Ian lit up his wooden pipe. It was a light colored wood, stained with rich brown tobacco and ash. He passed me his matches, smiling.
“What do you want with that old *******? Don’t tell me National Geographic is interested in the Delvos canaries.”
I lit up another stick and took a drag. “Shocking, right?”
“Actually, it’s about time their story is told.” Benet walked to the wooden bench to our left and patted the seat beside him. I walked over. “The Delvos canaries saved hundreds of Sheldonian lives over the years. But the day a crew went into the mines without one, my father came out of the ground as cold as when we put him back into it in his coffin.”
I sat in silence, unsure what to say. “Mr. Benet, I’m so sorry…”
“Please, just Ian. My father was the last Mr. Benet.”
We sat on the wooden bench, heat leaving our bodies to warm the dead wood beneath our legs. I shivered; the stars dance suddenly colder and more violent.
“Delvos canaries are martyrs, Ms. Waters. This whole town indebted to those tiny yellow birds, but nobody cares to remember that anymore.”
“Can you tell me where I can find Mr. Delvos and his, erm, martyrs?” The ember of my second cigarette was close to my pinching fingertips.
“Follow me.” Ian stood up and walked to the edge of the woods in front of us. We crunched the cold dust beneath our feet, making me aware of how silent it was. Ian stopped at a large elm and pointed, “See that yellow notch?” Sure enough, there was a notch cut and dyed yellow at his finger’s end. “If you follow true north from this tree into the woods you’ll find this notch about every fifty yards or so. Follow the yellow and it’ll spit you out onto the Delvos property.”
“Thank you, Ian. I really can’t begin to tell you how thankful I am to find out where to find this elusive Mr. Delvos and his canaries.”
“You don’t have to,” he knocked the ash out of his pipe against the tree, “Just do those birds justice in your article. Remember, martyrs. Tell old Delvos Ian Benet sends his regards.” He turned and walked back to the motel and I stood and watched in silence. It was then I realized I hadn’t heard a single bird since I got to Sheldon. The stars dance was manic above me as I walked back to my room and shut the door.

The canary chirped and Delvos stopped.
“This is a good place to break out fast. Sit.”
I sat obediently, squirming around until the rocks formed a more comfortable nest around my bony hips. We left for the mines as the stars were fading in the vermillion Vermont sky this morning and had been walking for what seemed like an eternity. I was definitely ready to eat. He handed me a gallon Ziploc bag from his backpack filled with raisins, nuts, various dried fruits, and a stiff piece of bread. I attacked the food like a raven.
“I was the reason no canaries entered the mines that day, Ms. Waters.” Delvos broke a piece of his bread off and wrapped it around a dried piece of apricot, or maybe apple. I was suddenly aware of my every motion and swallowed, loudly. I crinkled into my Ziploc and crunched on the pecans I dug out, waiting.
“Aren’t you going to ask why?”
“I’m not a parrot, Mr. Delvos, I don’t answer expectedly on command. You’ll tell me if you want.” I hurriedly stuffed a fistful of dried pears into my mouth.
Delvos chuckled and my nerves eased, “You’ve got steel in you, Ms. Rivers, I’ll give you that much.”
I nodded and continued cramming pears in my mouth.
“I was only nine. The canaries were my pets, all of them. I hated when Dad would send them into the mines to die for men I couldn’t give two ***** about. It was my birthday and I asked for an afternoon of freedom with my pets and Dad obliged. I was in the aviary with pocketfuls of sunflower-seeds. Whenever I threw a handful into the air above me, the air came to life with flickering yellow brushes and songs of joy. It was the happiest I have ever been, wholly surrounded and protected by my friends. Around twelve thirty that afternoon the Sheriff pulled up, lights ablaze. The blue and red lights stilled my yellow sky to green again and that’s when I heard the shouting. He cuffed my Dad on the hood of the car and Mom was crying and pushing her fists into the sheriff’s chest. I didn’t understand at all. The Sheriff ended up putting Mom in the car too and they all left me in the aviary. I sat there until around four that afternoon before they sent anyone to come get me.”
Delvos took a small bite of his bread and chewed a moment. “No matter how many handfuls of seeds I threw in the air after that, the birds wouldn’t stir. They wouldn’t even sing. I think they knew what was happening.”
I was at a loss for words so of course I blurted, “I didn’t see an aviary at your house…”
Delvos laughed. “Someone burnt down the house I was raised in the next week while we were sleeping. Mom died that night. The whole dark was burning with screams and my yellow canaries were orange and hot against the black sky. That’s the only night I’ve seen black canaries and the only night I’ve heard them scream.”
I swallowed some mixed nuts and they rubbed against my dry throat.
“They never caught the person. A week later Dad took the remainder of the birds and we marched into the woods. We worked for months clearing the land and rebuilding our lives. We spent most of the time in silence, except for the canary cries. When the house was finally built and the birds little coops were as well, Dad finally talked. The only thing he could say was ‘Canaries are not the same as a Phoenix, John. Not the same at all.”
The canary chirped, still only visible by the lanterns flame. Not fully yellow, I realized, here in the mines, but not fully orange either.

When I first walked onto John Delvos’ property on Thursday morning he was scattering feed into the bird coops in the front of his cabin. Everything was made of wood and still wet with the morning’s dew.
“Mr. Delvos?” He spun around, startled, and walked up to me a little too fast.
“Why are you here? Who are you?”
“My name is Lila Waters, sir, I am a photographer and journalist for National Geographic Magazine and we are going to run an article on your canaries.”
“Not interested”
“Please, sir, can I ask you just a few quick questions as take a couple pictures of your, erm, martyrs?”
His eyes narrowed and he walked up to me, studying my face with an intense, glowering gaze. He spit a mouthful of dip onto the ground without breaking eye contact. I shifted my camera bag’s weight to the other shoulder.
“Who told you to call them that?”
“I met Ian Benet last night, he told me how important your birds are to this community, sir. He sends his regards.”
Delvos laughed and motioned for me to follow as he turned his back. “You can take pictures but I have to approve which ones you publish. That’s my rule.”
“Sir, it’s really not up to me, you see, my boss, Jack Reynolds, is one of the CEO’s for the magazine and he...”
“Those are my rules, Ms. Waters.” He turned and picked back up the bucket of seed and began to walk back to the birds. “You want to interview me then we do it in the mine. Be back here at four thirty in the morning.”
“Sir…?”
“Get some sleep, Ms. Waters. You’ll want to be rested for the mine.” He turned, walked up his wooden stairs, and closed the door to his cabin.
I was left alone in the woods and spent the next hour snapping pictures of the little, yellow canaries in their cages. I took a couple pictures of his house and the surrounding trees, packed up my camera and trekked back to my motel.

“You finished yet?” Delvos stood up and the memory of his green and brown wooded homestead fled from my memory as the mine again consumed my consciousness. Dark, quiet, and stagnant. I closed the Ziploc and stuffed the bag, mainly filled with the raisins I sifted through, into my pocket.
Delvos grunted and the canary flapped in its cage as he stood again and, swinging the lantern, rounded another corner. The path we were on began to take a noticeable ***** downward and the moisture on the walls and air multiplied.
The canary chirped.
The lantern flickered against the moist, black stones, sleek and piled in the corners we past. The path stopped ahead at a wall of solid black and brown Earth.
The canary chirped twice.
It smelt of clay and mildew and Delvos said, “Go on, touch it.”
I reached my hand out, camera uselessly hanging like a bat over my shoulder. The rock was cold and hard. It felt dead.
The Canary was flitting its wings in the cage now, chirping every few seconds.
“This is the last tunnel they were digging when the gas under our feet broke free from hell and killed those men.”
Delvos hoisted the lantern above our heads, illuminating the surrounding gloom. All was completely still and even my own vapor seemed to fall out of my mouth and simply die. The canary was dancing a frantic jig, now, similar to the mating dance of the Great Frigate Bird I shot in the Amazon jungle. As I watched the canary and listened to its small wings beat against the cold metal cage I begin to feel dizzy. The bird’s cries had transformed into a scream colder than fire and somehow more fierce.
The ability to fly is what always made me jealous of birds as a child, but as my temple throbbed and the canary danced I realized I was amiss. Screaming, yellow feathers whipped and the entire inside of the cage was instantaneously filled. It was beautiful until the very end. Dizzying, really.
Defeated, the canary sank to the floor, one beaten wing hanging out of the iron bars at a most unnatural angle. Its claws were opening and closing, grasping the tainted cave air, or, perhaps, trying to push it away. Delvos unclipped the cage and sat it on the floor in the space between us, lantern still held swaying above his head. The bird was aflame now, the silent red blood absorbing into the apologetic, yellow feathers. Orange, a living fire. I pulled out my camera as I sat on the ground beside the cage. I took a few shots, the camera’s clicks louder than the feeble chirps sounding out of the canary’s tattered, yellow beak. My head was spinning. Its coal-black eyes reflected the lantern’s flame above. I could see its tiny, red tongue in the bottom of its mouth.
Opening.
Closing.
Opening, wider, too wide, then,
Silence.


I felt dizzy. I remember feeling the darkness surround me; it felt warm.

“I vaguely remember Delvos helping me to my feet, but leaving the mine was a complete haze.” I told the panel back in D.C., “It wasn’t until we had crossed the stream on the way back to the cabin that I began to feel myself again. Even then, I felt like I was living a dream. When we got back to the cabin the sight of the lively yellow canaries in their coops made me cry. Delvos brought me a bottle of water and told me I needed to hit the trail because the sun set early in the winter, so I le

stands alone today and tells a story to clouds
(putt putt)
the worst has happened at the days end
and the frozen orange Gallon
like ice has chosen to now become hand
all in all more or less
3.78lbs put in plastic wrap.
stands alone in the dollar market surrounds with fleeting thoughts sometimes forgotten
today at days end lost while
****** sun at times lost in ******* ******* snake movie
pouring into the retina of the brainless child
o mi babbino mi caro,  past is the skating rink of hell but
knock yourselves out in deep perpetual insanity of whats, hows and neverminds.
ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooosallyc­an be adisappointmentsometimesbutwestillloveherbecausesheis just whatwe callfamilyandfamilyissoimportanttoidentifyoneselfinaworldofchaosc­alledearthoooooooooooooooooooooooooo
computer glitch and error of the metaphysic naiveté of the skating rink of hell near the ******* ******* snake movie in the story of the white trashed oppressively personified virgo at the dollar market holding a gallon of orange juice that costs more than $7.65 because it's apparently organic and thereby magical.

how do you know (when a broken human can be fixed)


https://hellopoetry.com/poem/2644586/how-do-you-know-when-a-human-is-too-broken/

supermarket checkout line, so lazy broken down dressed,
I’m probably arrestible for disturbing the peace,
my haired piled, and held together by a broken clip,
makeup at home in
a drawer labeled ‘why bother’
my t shirt, don’t please look too closely,
yesterday’s coffee spillage outline
only mostly gone,
and the skinny jeans that felt inappropriate
ten pounds ago,
now looking semi-completely ridiculous

is this a tv show?
wallet, a twenty and a single,
who knew a pound of ground blue mountain
cost the better part of the the twenty
in that case no need for a gallon of milk
and *** a box of chocolate frosted donuts
silently slid far far away,
evidence of a guilty plea of irresponsibility resignation

short $2.42 (cut up the credit cards)
and no convenient pit to fall into
when the teenager cashier snickers,
when a sam elliot voice says here ya are,
stammering a no, a thank you, and thinking getaway direction

truck safely, made it,
knock on the window
sam elliot soundalike is a lookalike as well
standing outside with my wallet in hand,
two heads taller than my ex-petite figurine

more stammering ******* could I look any stupider

but inside a piece of brown shopping bag torn
with ten whole digits
I’ve never seen prior to this disaster
saying call when you want to return my $2.42

turns out he got, no, he is glue and paste,
an eraser man for fine lines and sad times,
and a lasso to keep me held together,
a pocket red handkerchief hanging half out
of his back pocket, never without, calls it his tear catcher

pulled out that too tight blues-blouse
from back of my closet
that still complements my complexion,
wear it ever time that day rolls around

just dumb luck ain’t much of an answer
so I’ll rephrase, dumb luck is in the everything
cause his number was 917-242-2424
and he is a gambler in matters of the heart

bust his ***** when he says he’s a lucky man,
reply he ain’t got no luck at all
compared to me on that daft day

and every daft day thereafter
I glue his lips shut to mine, no escaping,
and paste a new $2.42
into his wallet
when he is sleeping mine,
no erasing our lines,
just redrawing them deeper and finer,
just making sure my
dumb luck is working overtime

I followed Delvos down the trail until we could see the mouth of the mine. The life and energy of the surrounding birches and sentential pines came to a still and then died as we left the trees shelter behind and walked closer, closer. The air was cold and dark and damp and smelled of mold and moths. Delvos stepped into the darkness anyways.
“Well, girl, you coming or aren’t you?”
I could see his yellowed tobacco teeth form into a smile as I stepped out of the sun. It was still inside. The canary chirped in its cage.
“This tunnel is just the mouth to over two hundred others exactly like it. Stay close. Last thing I need this month is National Geographic on my *** for losing one of their puppet girls.”
“Delvos, ****. I have two masters degrees.” I pulled my mousey hair up into a tight ponytail. “I’ve experienced far more fatal feats than following a canary in a cave.”
He rolled his eyes. “Spare me.” He trotted off around the corner to the left, whistling some Louis Armstrong song.
“I survived alone in the jungles of Bolivia alone for two months chasing an Azara’s Spinetail. I climbed the tallest mountain in Nepal shooting Satyr Tragopans along the cliff faces. In Peru I…” Suddenly I felt the weight of the darkness. I lost track of his lantern completely. I stopped, my heartbeat picked up, and I tried to remind myself of what I had done in Peru. The mine was quiet and cold. I wiped my clammy, calloused hands on my trail pants and took a depth breath.

In through the nose. Out through the mouth. This is nothing. I followed a Diurnal Peruvian Pygmy-Owl across the gravel tops of the Andes Mountains, no light but the Southern Cross and waning moon above. I am not scared of darkness. I am not scared of darkness.
I stopped to listen. Behind me I could hear the wind cooing at the mouth of the mine.
Taunting? No. Reminding me to go forward. Into the darkness.
I shifted my Nikon camera off my shoulder and raised the viewfinder to my eyes, sliding the lens cap into my vest pocket. This routine motion, by now, had become as fluid as walking. I stared readily through the dark black square until I saw reflections from the little red light on top that blinked, telling me the flash was charged. I snapped my finger down and white light filled the void in front of me. Then heavy dark returned. I blinked my eyes attempting to rid the memories of the flash etched, red, onto my retina. I clicked my short fingernails through buttons until the photo I took filled the camera screen. I learned early on that having short fingernails meant more precise control with the camera buttons. I zoomed in on the picture and scrolled to get my bearings of exactly what lay ahead in the narrow mine passageway. As I scrolled to the right I saw Delvos’ boot poking around the tunnel that forked to the left.
Gottcha.
I packed up the camera, licked my drying lips, and stepped confidently into the darkness.

When I first got the assignment in Vermont I couldn’t have been more frustrated. Mining canaries? Never had I ever ‘chased’ a more mundane bird. Nonetheless, when Jack Reynolds sends you on a shoot you don’t say no, so I packed up my camera bag and hoped on the next plane out of Washington.
“His name is John Delvos.” Jack had said as he handed me the manila case envelope. He smiled, “You’re leaving on Tuesday.”
“Yes sir.”
“Don’t look so smug, Lila. This may not be the most exotic bird you’ve shot but the humanity of this piece has the potential to be a cover story. Get the shots, write the story.”
I opened the envelope and read the assignment details in the comfort of my old pajamas back at my apartment later that night.
John Delvos has lived in rural Vermont his entire life. His family bred the canaries for the miners of the Sheldon Quarry since the early twenties. When “the accident” happened the whole town shut down and the mines never reopened. . There were no canaries in the mines the day the gas killed the miners. The town blamed the Delvos family and ran them into the woods. His mother died in a fire of some sort shortly before Delvos and his father retreated into the Vermont woods. His father built a cabin and once his father died, Delvos continued to breed the birds. He currently ships them to other mining towns across the country. The question of the inhumanity of breeding canaries for the sole purpose of dying in the mines so humans don’t has always been controversial. Find out Delvos’ story and opinions on the matter. Good luck, Lila.
I sighed, accepting my dull assignment and slipped into an apathetic sleep.


After stumbling through the passageway while keeping one hand on the wall to the left, I found the tunnel the picture had revealed Delvos to be luring in. Delvos reappeared behind the crack of his match in a side tunnel not twenty yards in front of me
“Do you understand the darkness now, Ms. Rivers?” He relit the oily lantern and picked back up the canary cage. “Your prestigious masters degrees don’t mean **** down here.”. He turned his back without another word. I followed deeper into the damp darkness.
“Why were there no canaries in the mine on, you know, that day?” The shadows of the lantern flickered against the iron canary cage chained on his hip and the yellow bird hopped inside.
“I was nine, Ms. Rivers. I didn’t understand much at the time.” We turned right into the next tunnel and our shoes crunched on jagged stones. All the stones were black.
“But surely you understand now?”
The canary chirped.

When I first got to Sheldon and began asking about the location of the Delvos’ cabin you would have thought I was asking where the first gate to hell was located. Mothers would smile and say, “Sorry, Miss, I can’t say,” then hurriedly flock their children in the opposite direction. After two hours of polite refusals I gave up. I spent the rest of the first day photographing the town square. It was quaint; old stone barbershops surrounded by oaks and black squirrels, a western-themed whiskey bar, and a few greasy spoon restaurants. I booked a room in the Walking Horse Motel for Wednesday night, determined to get a good night’s sleep and defeat this town’s fear of John Delvos the following day.
My room was a tiny one bed square with no TV. Surprise, surprise. At least I had my camera and computer to entertain myself. I reached into the side of my camera bag, pulled out my Turkish Golds and Macaw-beak yellow BIC, and stepped out onto the dirt in front of my motel door and lit up. The stars above stole all the oxygen surrounding me. They were dancing and smiling above me and I forgot Delvos, Jack, and all of Sheldon except its sky. Puffing away, I stepped farther and farther from my door and deeper into the darkness of Vermont night. The father into the darkness the more dizzying the star’s dancing became.
“Ma’am? Everything okay?”
Startled, I dropped my cigarette on the ground and the ember fell off. “I’m sorry, sir. I was just, um, the stars…” I snuffed out the orange glow in the dirt with my boot and extended my hand, “Lila Rivers, and you are?”
“Ian Benet. I haven’t seen you around here before, Ms. Rivers. Are you new to town?” He traced his fingers over a thick, graying mustache as he stared at me.
“I’m here for work. I’m a bird photographer and journalist for National Geographic. I’m looking for John Delvos but I’m starting to think he’s going to be harder to track than a Magpie Robin.”
Ian smiled awkwardly, shivered, then began to fumble with his thick jacket’s zipper. I looked up at the night sky and watched the stars as they tiptoed their tiny circles in the pregnant silence. Then, they dimmed in the flick of a spark as Ian lit up his wooden pipe. It was a light-colored wood, stained with rich brown tobacco and ash. He passed me his matches, smiling.
“So, Delvos, eh?” He puffed out a cloud of leather smelling smoke toward the stars. “What do you want with that old *******? Don’t tell me National Geographic is interested in the Delvos canaries.”
I lit up another stick and took a drag. “Shocking, right?”
“Actually, it’s about time their story is told.” Benet walked to the wooden bench to our left and patted the seat beside him. I walked over. “The Delvos canaries saved hundreds of Sheldonian lives over the years. But the day a crew went into the mines without one, my father came out of the ground as cold as when we put him back into it in his coffin.”
I sat in silence, unsure what to say. “Mr. Benet, I’m so sorry…”
“Please, just Ian. My father was the last Mr. Benet.”
We sat on the wooden bench, heat leaving our bodies to warm the dead wood beneath our legs. I shivered; the star’s dance suddenly colder and more violent.
“Delvos canaries are martyrs, Ms. Rivers. This whole town indebted to those tiny yellow birds, but nobody cares to remember that anymore.”
“Can you tell me where I can find Mr. Delvos and his, erm, martyrs?” The ember of my second cigarette was close to my pinching fingertips.
“Follow me.” Ian stood up and walked to the edge of the woods in front of us. We crunched the dead pine needles beneath our feet, making me aware of how silent it was. Ian stopped at a large elm and pointed. “See that yellow notch?” he asked. Sure enough, there was a notch cut and dyed yellow at his finger’s end. “If you follow true north from this tree into the woods you’ll find this notch about every fifty yards or so. Follow the yellow and it’ll spit you out onto the Delvos property.”
“Thank you, Ian. I really can’t begin to tell you how grateful I am.
“You don’t have to.” He knocked the ash out of his pipe against the tree. “Just do those birds justice in your article. Remember, martyrs. Tell old Delvos Ian Benet sends his regards.” He turned and walked back to the motel and I stood and watched in silence. It was then I realized I hadn’t heard a single bird since I got to Sheldon. The star’s dance was manic above me as I walked back to my room and shut the door.

The canary’s wings and Delvos stopped. “This is a good place to break our fast. Sit.”
I sat obediently, squirming around until the rocks formed a more comfortable nest around my bony hips. We had left for the mines as the stars were fading in the vermillion Vermont sky that morning and had been walking for what seemed like an eternity. I was definitely ready to eat. He handed me a gallon Ziploc bag from his backpack filled with raisins, nuts, various dried fruits, and a stiff piece of bread. I attacked the food like a raven.
“I was the reason no canaries entered the mines that day, Ms. Rivers.”
Delvos broke a piece of his bread off and wrapped it around a dried piece of apricot, or maybe apple. I was suddenly aware of my every motion and swallowed, loudly. I crinkled into my Ziploc and crunched on the pecans I dug out, waiting.
“Aren’t you going to ask why?”
“I’m not a parrot, Mr. Delvos, I don’t answer expectedly on command. You’ll tell me if you want.” I stuffed a fistful of dried pears into my mouth.
Delvos chuckled and my nerves eased. “You’ve got steel in you, Ms. Rivers. I’ll give you that much.”
I nodded and continued cramming pears in my mouth.
“I was only nine. The canaries were my pets, all of them. I hated when Dad would send them into the mines to die for men I couldn’t give two ***** about. It was my birthday and I asked for an afternoon of freedom with my pets and Dad obliged. I was in the aviary with pocketfuls of sunflower-seeds. Whenever I threw a handful into the air above me, the air came to life with wings slashing yellow brushes and cawing songs of joy. It was the happiest I have ever been, wholly surrounded and protected by my friends. Around twelve thirty that afternoon the Sheriff pulled up, lights ablaze. The blue and red lights stilled my yellow sky to green again and that’s when I heard the shouting. He cuffed my Dad on the hood of the car and Mom was crying and pushing her fists into the sheriff’s chest. I didn’t understand at all. The Sheriff ended up putting Mom in the car too and they all left me in the aviary. I sat there until around four that afternoon before they sent anyone to come get me.”
Delvos took a small bite of his bread and chewed a moment. “No matter how many handfuls of seeds I threw in the air after that, the birds wouldn’t stir. They wouldn’t even sing. I think they knew what was happening.”
I was at a loss for words so and I blurted, “I didn’t see an aviary at your house…”
Delvos laughed. “Someone burnt down the house I was raised in the next week while we were sleeping. Mom died that night. The whole dark was burning with screams and my yellow canaries were orange and hot against the black sky. That’s the only night I’ve seen black canaries and the only night I’ve heard them scream.”
I swallowed some mixed nuts and they rubbed against my dry throat.
“They never caught the person. A week later Dad took the remainder of the birds and we marched into the woods. We worked for months clearing the land and rebuilding our lives. We spent most of the time in silence, except for the canary cries. When the house was finally built and the bird’s little coops were as well, Dad finally talked. The only thing he could say was “Canaries are not the same as a Phoenix, John. Not the same at all.”
We sat in silence and I found myself watching the canary flit about in its cage, still only visible by the lanterns flame. Not fully yellow, I realized, here in the mines but not fully orange either.

When I first walked onto John Delvos’ property on Thursday morning he was scattering feed into the bird coops in the front of his cabin. Everything was made of wood and still wet with the morning’s dew.
“Mr. Delvos?”
He spun around, startled, and walked up to me a little too fast. “Why are you here? Who are you?”
“My name is Lila Rivers, sir, I am a photographer and journalist for National Geographic Magazine and we are going to run an article on your canaries.”
“Not interested.”
“Please, sir, can I ask you just a few quick questions as take a couple pictures of your, erm, martyrs?”
His eyes narrowed and he walked up to me, studying my face with an intense, glowering gaze. He spit a mouthful of dip onto the ground without breaking eye contact. I shifted my camera bag’s weight to the other shoulder.
“Who told you to call them that?”
“I met Ian Benet last night, he told me how important your birds are to this community, sir. He sends his regards.”
Delvos laughed and motioned for me to follow as he turned his back. “You can take pictures but I have to approve which ones you publish. That’s my rule.”
“Sir, it’s really not up to me, you see, my boss, Jack Reynolds, is one of the editors for the magazine and he...”
“Those are my rules, Ms. Rivers.” He turned and picked back up the bucket of seed and began to walk back to the birds. “You want to interview me then we do it in the mine. Be back here at four thirty in the morning.”
“Sir…?”
“Get some sleep, Ms. Rivers. You’ll want to be rested for the mine.” He turned, walked up his wooden stairs, and closed the door to his cabin.
I was left alone in the woods and spent the next hour snapping pictures of the canaries in their cages. I took a couple pictures of his house and the surrounding trees, packed up my camera and trekked back to my motel.

“You finished yet?” Delvos stood up. The mine was dark, quiet, and stagnant. I closed the Ziploc and stuffed the bag, mainly filled with the raisins I had sifted through, into my pocket.
Delvos grunted and the canary flapped in its cage as he stood again and, swinging the lantern, rounded another corner. The path we were on began to take a noticeable ***** downward and the moisture on the walls and air multiplied.  
The lantern flickered against the moist, black stones, sleek and piled in the corners we past. The path stopped ahead at a wall of solid black and brown Earth.
The canary chirped twice.
It smelled of clay and mildew and Delvos said, “Go on, touch it.”
I reached my hand out, camera uselessly hanging like a bat over my shoulder. The rock was cold and hard. It felt dead.
The canary was fluttering its wings in the cage now, chirping every few seconds.
“This is the last tunnel they were digging when the gas under our feet broke free from hell and killed those men.”
Delvos hoisted the lantern above our heads, illuminatin

they meet at hospital locked unit for torture victims undisclosed site no unauthorized access their condition experiences high risk public relations for war effort mainly patients seclude themselves in anxious solitude when not in anxious treatment they will remain under strict government surveillance until war is over at which time another administration will determine their resolve

she graduated from Stanford with Masters in 9 languages employed jointly by Hachette Livre and Random House Mondadori publishers United Nations attaché interpreter translator then Special Forces Black Ops

he graduated P.H.D. from M.I.T. in political military economic social information infrastructure systems tactical behavior strategy campaign employed by private security contractors consortium assigned to unidentified location

her captors splayed arms legs to table force fed 1 gallon ***** down throat 2 gallon enema without anesthesia sewed shut eyelids **** sphincter then starved rat inserted in ******

his captors blindfolded handcuffed victim prepare beheading live internet feed decide instead shackle him to wall douse gasoline ignite water hose scorching body 3rd degree burns then apply nail-gun through testicles ***** dowel to temporal lobe

act 1 scene 1

small unused visiting room 2 gray couches end table with lamp vase of plastic flowers

HE sits in wheelchair severe burn scars to face scalp body memory loss hoarse raspy voice stiff protracted body motion

SHE under continuous psychotherapy supervision patient suffers severe PTSD shaky submissive prescribed modified combinations of 13 medications (Prozac Adapin Vivactil Nardil Desyrel Wellbutrin BuSpar Klonopin Vistaril Neurontin Inderal Catapres Seroquel) administered twice daily

HE i brought you bacon strips in napkin from breakfast

SHE (eyelids flutter hands tremble) thank you but you keep it (pause) you know i used to be vegetarian

HE i know i look monstrous get over it there’s a real human being trapped inside this mutilated mess

SHE i i i can’t talk (pause) don’t know what to say (pause) after they sewed me up they ripped me apart shoved rodent to gnaw my insides (pause) skinned cooked made me eat it

HE you’re still alive aren’t you quit your whining show some gratitude stop being such a big baby

SHE how dare you ******* accuse me you’ve got you’re ****** **** nerve

HE i apologize please forgive me i’m not myself since the injuries i’m desperate for diversion pain management escape from excruciating pain nightmare thoughts i still endure

SHE who’s the big baby now

HE please help me overcome this consuming terror distract me with your loveliness please be my muse

SHE i’m no healer what do you mean be your muse

HE inspire me open yourself up to me arouse feelings beyond my suffering

SHE i’m useless look at me i’m a basket-case

HE spread your legs let me see

SHE what! you’re rude blunt disgusting

HE show me your cooch you got ***** hair?

SHE oh god you are so ****** creepy repulsive (pause) and I’m not a very hairy person

HE come on darling work with me stroke me relieve me

SHE i don’t even want to think or know about it go take care of it yourself

HE i’ve tried i can’t stay focused i see my disfigurement then get sidetracked i can’t get myself off

SHE all i am to you is a piece of *** you brutal *******

HE you could show a little tenderness maybe nurturing fix what’s broken give it up to me girl please i beg you let me do you or do me

SHE i was informed your ***** is shredded testicles disengaged

HE who told you that it’s a lie my ***** are maimed yet intact my **** still gets ***** granted it’s not a pretty sight keep your eyes shut

SHE (body twitches) you want power over me

HE ***** power i want some release i want you in control you in charge of my ******* please be my curing goddess

SHE (looks away) i don’t trust you

HE what’s not to trust i’m a pitiful casualty of war just like you we weren’t born like this but we’re both now doomed useless pathetic

SHE you could try being more polite civil congenial perhaps if we were friends first liked each other and you won my sympathies but you’re so forceful intrusive

HE war does that to a person

SHE please make an effort

HE you mean if i talk nice you’ll consider

SHE i will take it into consideration

HE i think you’re pretty more than just pretty beautiful

SHE i’m shattered damaged wrecked ruined

HE i see beauty in your face figure beauty in your words reactions

SHE i’m afraid to let anyone inside

HE i’ll be real gentle i promise

SHE i’m scared

HE yeah i’m scared too scared i’ll shoot blood instead of *****

SHE shut up

HE help me please find a way back to myself a way to accept love respect you

SHE hmmm uhhh since you phrase it that way i’ll think about it i’m not promising anything just considering (pause) ok? (pause) how would we go about doing this?

HE we used up our free time today they’ll be searching for you begin picturing in your mind how you would like it done imagine feeling loved protected

SHE (eyelids waver) help me learn slow how to do this dance

HE every step of the way

SHE thank you see you tomorrow

Decisions
Eanie meanie minie mo
one can not decide like so
your past is gone, let it go
eanie meanie minie mo

We think they were childish games to play
yet it tells our future each and every day

Its a 50-50 shot
you could go ether way
But there is no turning back

One step in the wrong direction and you are done for
Because the key was thrown into the ocean that could only open the locked door behind you

Like hot lava
A playground game
If you stumble off the side and landed in that hot firey pit of lava you were done for

That ocean where the key was thrown into has turned into a nasty green
The waves and seaweed churning under the dark stormy sky
This is not a message in a bottle but more of a lost man at sea

Every stepping stone could result in a broken heart
A bruise
A forgotten friend

One wrong decision could cause a prodigy to die

Like ******
His Mother almost got an abortion
Her family told her over and over to just go through with the pregnancy
She probably tossed that decision back and forth in her mind
But her family won the match

If she had decided to go against her family I wonder where society would be today

Would there be dozens of Einsteins?
A million Madonnas?
Would there be a cure for all the cancers?
For the common cold?

Every judgement is a puzzle piece
Every step you take back or turn in the unexpected direction is another step towards your fate

Everything matters
If you had gotten one more gallon of milk you wouldn't have run out so you wouldn't have gone to the store and meet your best friend there so you wouldn't be going to that Zumba class

Then you wouldn't have met five of you new best friends and your husband

All of that for a jug of milk

There are times in life
when a man needs change,
And I don't mean,
dimes and quarters.

Remember when you
were just sixteen,
Driving all alone, solo,
in your old man's Buick?
All the windows down,
radio music blaring,
Your bare arm draped
out over the side of the door.
to better exhibit your bicep.

Hell mister, no doubt,
you were ten feet tall,
the king of the road.
Ever wish you had,
that feeling back again?

Cars were always my thing.
I owned some Detroit
Muscle, Full blown Chevy,
Firebird 400, Chrysler Hemi.
Smoked some tires and
went to Court a time or two.
Of course all that was long
ago in my fitter youth.

When I became a Yuppie
I acquired a Poodle Puppy,
a Porsche and a MGB.

But the ***** does turn.
and so then, did I,
And my road got,
a little bumpy.

Along came marriage,
then a baby carriage.
And a big house
In the Burbs.

Then came a progression
Of Volvo Station Wagons,
to Soccer Dad Mini Vans,
to large SUV's.
All for hauling,
any number of things.
Kids and dogs, strollers,
bikes, kites and scooters,
Fellow car poolers,

And less we forget,
"Pulling" things too.
Boats, RV's, Utility trailers,
and all nature of landscape,
gardening, and general
shopping paraphernalia.
Little League Teams,
Drooling big dogs,
Papier Mache Volcanos.
Home Coming Floats,
Once even a Goat
You name it, I hauled it,
Or pulled it!

Years rolled by,
eventually the Kids
flew the nest, got married.
And low and behold,
The wife and I split,
Each going our separate way.
No one's fault, just grew apart.
The thinly veiled allegorical
Previous Patriarchal
arrangement became,
A whole new start,
A workable self allegiance
to just one.

Soon once more, I was the MAN.
I ran out, bought a **** boat
But not having the kids around,
Soon sold it, having found out,
that alone, I was not a water sport.

I caroused around, dated women,
got my pockets picked,
learned a few lessons.
Fell in love, fell out again,
Took a few pretty good blows,
Right on the chin,
Even some down lower.

Round about then,
An Epiphany kicked in.
Remembered my most,
ennobling, happy events,
behind the wheel,
driving Dad's Buick.

As I stepped on the lot.
There was never doubt,
There was only one choice,
I just had to have that,
Little VW Bug Red Racer.

Nothing like your Mother's
Beetle, the engine's up front,
Not stuck in the trunk,
And man it produces over,
200 Big Time Horsepower
Not to mention,
Lays rubber in three,
Of six gears.
Getting all the while,
33 miles per gallon.

Receiving additional help,
from a sweet Turbo Booster,
Just like a big, Indy Track Bruiser.

There's 19 inch racing
tires and alloy wheels,
They look so cool,
Spinning in motion.

Dual stainless steel exhausts,
And best of all,
a cool collapsible,
Convertible top.

Rack and Pinion steering,
Handles like a sports car,
Yet still offers a backseat
To take my Grandkids,
out for a spin.

Dude, it's got,
All the bows
and whistles!

Top Down Driving is such a thrill,
Makes me feel sixteen again.
The open road, the sky above,
The wind blowing thru my hair,
what there is left of it.

Perhaps the only thing that
Could possibly make this
Driving experience greater,
Would be to speed down,
The road, going eighty,
Behind the wheel of my
Little Red Racer,
Completely **** naked,
And of course all the while,
Feel the wind in my hair.

I don't know, I'm too old,
To call this a mid life crisis.
But on the other hand,
Maybe the acquiring of
This little red sporty car,
Has something to do with,
Those Testosterone shots I'm taking.
I'm even thinking, of dying my hair,
naw, lets not get crazy!

Wake up in the morning, clock says 8:23. Step into the kitchen, feeling that something is missing.
Open the fridge, Outa milk??? How could this beee?! I went to Sam’s Club - he stocked me up extra plenty!!!
I need to make a dash to the store, but if I get on the bus, this could take an hour or more.
So I quickly dress, not at all to impress. Just throw on my clothes and head out the door.
Standing outside in a panic, I start scratching all over my body like an addict.
Cereal and milk, I gots to have it!
Leaving me no other choice, I hop on the bus. My hands are shaking, making me look like a fiend.
Then I notice Bomb-Shell Betty, the ’98 prom queen, sitting in the back not looking so pretty.
I remember when she was going steady with TEDDY GRAHAMS - dude used to give me his answers to all of the math exams.
Sitting in front of me are four ladies who go by the names of FRUITY PEBBLES, COOKIE CRISP, HONEY COMB, and SUGAR SMACKS.
Who are they fooling??? Never skipping a beat, they are always getting their KIX turning TRIX on 126th Street.
They are quite the lovely bunch. I believe their **** is going by the name of CAP’N CRUNCH.
I am feeling kinda desperate today, thinking about spending time with FRUITY PEBBLES, but she only takes cash, and all I have are CHEX.  
My impatience is starting to run thin cause all I can think about is running in the store and grabbing a gallon of milk.
Then the bus stops… Who can it be? Oh, it’s my old neighbor, Tom Foolery.
He has a mouth full of chrome and wears ten pounds of jewelry.  With tattoo-covered arms, he enters with his pal, LUCKY CHARMS.
The two sit next to the 126th crew.  They are spitting game - that is really lame.
They are bragging who is better at shooting hoops. They just sound like a bunch of FRUIT LOOPS.
So I chime in and say, “I can eat more RAISIN BRAN than any other man throughout the entire land without going to the can, and if you don’t believe me, just ask my POPS!”
They look at me with complete shock.  Not a word to be heard, they turn around.  I sit there in silence, feeling like a big nerd.
Bus stops again.  A pale man enters on in.  He is tall and thin, wears a brown suit, and has a funny grin.
He looks kinda scary but seems ever-so-merry with his hands locked with his BOO BERRY.
Finally!! Through the glass I can see the supermarket is slowly approaching, and all I can say is, Yippy Frickin Skippy! Bout time.
Just before the bus stops, I jump out the window and drop to my knees, kiss the ground, and scream, “Hallelujah!!!”    
In the front of the store stands General Mills, recruiting potential cereal box models.  He asks, “How ya doing?”  I mutter, “What’s it to ya?”
I run towards the back where the much-needed milk is shelved.  I grab me a gallon and head to the check-outs.
Aisle one has no one in line, so this is a clear sign that things are starting to turn out just fine.
Then suddenly I see a white sign with black ink stating, Chex not Accepted…..
LIFE can be a *****!

you met a girl who
cried raindrops,
tasted of champagne and regret but
oh did she love so hard
i never got a chance to feel how soft she could be
i was too busy drinking in her mahogany eyes and
lightly tanned skin-- by the gallon, gulping
trying to get air in between sips like
an aged merlot she was
timelessly magnificent.
i swear to you
she had the sun within her,
could shine so bright but
a single cloud could wash it all away,
dim her, shroud her
in stringy clouds of despair i swear
i would've done anything
to burn away those clouds.
-a.c.b

A few hours after midnight; the world is fast asleep.
Alone and cold do I wander. Like a nightmare do I creep.
With the intent of nothing I sit and watch the street.
It’s a week after Halloween and my shoes are on my feet.
I near my house, I think I’ll shave, (My chin has an itch.)
But at my feet upon the ground a color doesn’t fit;
Black on black with a spot of white doesn’t sit quite right.
You’d think they’d be more careful, ornery little gits.
Yet here at my feet, some candy lies plainly in my sight.
I stop to stare and wonder, and my brain does a nervous twitch.
 
So here I am; with a piece of candy that might have mange
Meanwhile my mind is discovering a whole new range
For all the pain we go through, to keep the world nice,
 Nothing anyone does ever seems to pay the price.
I’ve got a new hybrid car, gets 50 to the gallon plus it’s electric.
And when I finish a snack trash is out the window. Are we epileptic?
I mean you’ve got to be kidding me, who can say that they are not
A miserable little hypocrite? World is full of betrayal and lies.
Filling with anger, righteous and hot, I feel a change in my soul.
I’ll be better! I’ll change the world or the two of us will sever ties!
The earth will follow my example and we’ll hold to higher goal.
Give me a few years and then lets see what we’ve got!
 
I hold onto the fantasy for a while, sad to let it slip.
But the truth does sink in and reality has a tighter grip.
Even if I spoke who would listen? One cry in a thousand’s not so great.
I’m not saying we shouldn’t try, to resign ourselves to our fate.
I’ve never been a pessimist, just a realistic optimist you understand.
If you want change, aim for what you can hold in your hand.
Think you can bring about world peace, think you’ve got the might?
Try to keep peace in your town, or your block, or home without a fight.
I stand and think to myself one more Sucker here and there,
Isn’t going to change a thing. If ten men vowed never to let themselves repeat
Their mistakes, the next day a chance would come, one would stand,
Nine would shudder and forsake him. Alone he’d return to his seat.
I step away and head home. I return my thoughts to the matters at hand.
Like my homework; a poem and some calc. I’ve still got to lose some ****** hair

The recipe reads:

2 and 1/2  ounces dedication
To 3 pounds *******
To a gram of work
To a ton of cheating
To a tablespoon punctuality
To a gallon procrastination
All with a base of
Genetic Luck

Success,
Success,
**** this

What's the big idea
Of having to succeed?
I don't need to succeed,
Not by your standards.
I write my  own formula
For a successful life.

One
Bitter
Shot
Of
Not dead, Yet.

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?

The smell lingered long after she had called the ambulance, after she had scrubbed the bathroom tiles back to a pristine white, after she had thrown out the ******* mangoes he had hid in the closet. For days afterward, she avoided the bathroom, showering the best she could in the old porcelain sink they had installed in the spring when he was able to keep fresh flowers in the kitchen vase. Those days, she would come home to jasmine and broken plates, marigolds and burnt biryani, pigeon wings and torn paper. Some days he was snake-quiet. Other days, his skin was fever hot, his limbs flailing to an alien language, his head tilting back, ululating.
Every day she would carry his soiled clothes into the laundry room, ignoring the thousands of whispered comments that trailed behind her. “Look how outgrown her eyebrows have become” as she strangled the hardened blood out of his blue longyi. “Look how her fingernails are yellow with grease,” as she beat the sweat out of his white wife beaters. “Look how curved her back is” as she hung his tattered briefs to dry in the small courtyard. The sultry wind picked up the comments as it breezed by her, carrying them down the road to the chai stand where they conversed until the wee hours.
Today, there is no wind. The coarse sun has left the mango tree in the back corner of the courtyard too dry, the leaves coiling inward. She picks up the green watering can filled with gasoline. The rusted mouth leaves spots on the worn parchment ground as she shuffles over. Her chapped sandals leave no impression. The trunk still has their initials, his loping R and V balancing her mechanical S and T. They had done it with a sharp Swiss Army knife, its blade sinking into the soft wooded flesh. “Let’s do it together,” he urged, his large hand dwarfing hers. A cheap glass bangle, pressed too hard against her bony wrist, shattered.  
Now, her arthritic finger traces the letters slowly, falling into grooves and furrows as predictable as they were not. When had they bought it? Was it when he had received the big promotion, the big firing or the big diagnosis? Or was it farther back, when he had received the little diploma, the little child or the little death? There was no in-between for him, everything was either big or little. Was it an apology tree or an appeasement tree? Did it matter? The tree was dying.
Her ring gets stuck in the top part of the T. He had been so careful when he proposed. Timing was sunset. Dinner was hot rice, cold milk and smashed mangos, her favorite. Setting was a lakeside gazebo surrounded by fragrant papaya trees. She had said yes because the blue on her sari matched the blue of the lake. She had said yes because his hands trembled just right. She had said yes because she had always indulged in his self-indulgences. She slips her finger out, leaving the gold as an offering to the small tree that never grew.    
She pours gasoline over the tree, rechristening it. Light the math, throw the match, step back, mechanical steps. She shuffles back through the courtyard as the heat from the tree greets the heat from the sun. She doesn’t look back. Instead, she is going up one step at a time on the red staircase, through the blue hallway, to the daal-yellow door. These were the colors he said would be on the cover of his bestseller as he hunched over the typewriter for days on end. Those were the days he had subsisted only on chai and biscuits, reducing his frame to an emaciated exclamation mark. His words were sharp pieces of broken glass leaving white scars all over her body.  
She remembers his voice, the deep boom narrating fairytales. Once upon a time, she had taken a rickshaw for four hours to a bakery to get a special cake for his birthday. Once upon a time, she had skipped sitting in on her final exams for him. Once upon a time, she had danced in the middle of an empty road at three in the morning for him. Once upon a time, she had been a character in a madman’s tale.
Inside, she takes off the sandals, leaving them in the dark corner under the jackets they had brought for a trip to Europe, never taken. Across the red tiled floor, she tiptoes silently, out of habit. From the empty pantry, she scrounges up the last tea leaf. Put water in the black kettle, put the kettle on the stove, put tea leaf in water, wait. On the opposite wall, her Indian Institute of Technology degree hangs under years of dust and misuse.
Cup of bitter tea in hand, she sits on the woven chair, elbows hanging off the sides, back straight. Moments she had shot now hang around her as trophy heads on cheap plastic frames. A picture of them on their wedding day, her eyes kohl-lined and his arm wrapped around her. A picture of them in Kashmir, her eyes full of bags and his arm limp. A picture of them last year, her eyes bespectacled and his arm wrapped around an IV pole. The last picture at her feet, her eyes closed and his arm is burning in the funeral pyre. No one had wanted to take that picture.      
A half hour later, a phone call from her daughter abroad. Another hour, a shower in the porcelain sink. Another hour, dinner, rice and beans over the stove. Another hour and the sun creeps away for good. It leaves her momentarily off guard, like when she had walked home to find him head cracked on the bathroom tub. The medics had assured her it was just a fall. Finding her bearings, she walks down the dark corridor to their, no, her bedroom.
She sits down now on the hard mattress, low to the ground, as he wanted it to be. She takes off her sari, a yellow pattern he liked. She takes off her necklace, a series of jade stones he thought was sophisticated. She takes off the earrings he had gotten her for her fortieth, still too heavy for her ears. She places her hands over eyes, closing them like she had closed his when she had found him sleeping in the tub, before she had smashed his head against the bathtub.  
In her dreams, she walks in a mango orchard. She picks one, only to find its skin is puckered and bruised. She bites it only to taste bitterness. She pours the gallon of gasoline on the ground. She sets the orchard on fire and smiles.

The day had entered the twilight time I heard an old train whistle I surrendered to the call of far
Away and I found myself back in time it was Saturday the family was going to town to the
Weeks shopping we parked in the alley past the feed store it was the way we started out we
Walked past the entry where we kids would go in on Easter to get the two free chicks then
You would go back to the bins and buy the fifty cent bag of pellets the fun involved the box with
The light the fruit jar that turned upside down with the lid fixed with indentations that as the
Chicks would drink and throw their heads back the water would bubble down like a water
Cooler little yellow fur ***** what a treat and delight but we would go in the big wide door that
Held the giant stand up scale with the great face and the smell of grain with a thin dust film on
Everything all of that and get your weight to how great was that back out in the sunlight dad
And I would go to Jims for a hair cut we all practiced cutting through stores you could go up the
Alley right beside Woolworths but what fun was best was parking behind Ben Franklins walking
In through the outer supply era and at the back of the store were the fiber barrels with the pink
And vanilla wafers they were a penny and I always got one of each at the barber shop the comic
Books were stacked high and the men were always having a talk fest and Jim whistled a tune
That was just as good as the theme of the Andy Griffith show we did a little bit of Mayberry all
Of us standing in the dark alley beside Rudow’s grocery waiting for them to do the weekly pony
Raffle I never won but I had access to the laker’s pony it was a good thing we had hard enough
Time feeding ourselves and the dog well we did have twenty seven at one time on the farm it
Was the A&P; for groceries run back home put them away and then go out across the drive set
In the shade as a family and eat A&P; Jane Parker Apple pie you would think it was desert at the
Green house restaurant on Market Street in Frisco where all the waiters wore tux’s know this
Was the time of grape Mogen David wine that was fairly priced in the family size jug but there
We set with a five gallon white plastic bucket with blackberries fermenting well dad must have
Already been tipsy that bucket had weeds other debris I won’t hazard a guess of what it was
But let me tell you the cloth on top didn’t help much I used to make a joke about espresso and
That strong Cuban coffee my complaint was it tasted like Wan and his mule was still inside well
This homemade wine hot long brown weeds I don’t care how country you are some things are
Better left alone like going out to our friends and have a meal they would put the milk in this
Big blue greenish half gallon right from the cow there would be lines moving around an oh yes
Don’t forget the snapping turtle we ran over and almost knocked me off my seat and those cars
Were heavy well quick as a country cook could do it turtle stew yum wants some excuse me
Folks As long as these people have a front yard full of grass I’m good you eat a while then chase
Lighting bugs now that’s what belongs in a jar and Like Dan Ackroad said in the movie and their
Butts light up well I didn’t have time to mention Tanners show uptown Sad Sack army show
With Jerry and Dean Gordon Scott as Tarzan they didn’t give the warning don’t try this at home
Or on the way home because in bums jungle where the bums all hang out between trains yes
There were vines on the trees but I don’t think Tarzan let go and rolled in the undergrowth that
Was filled with poison Ivy well Gordon never got to go from Tarzan to the mummy all white
With Copperas lay in the car across the street in the car like a dog with flees while your family
Is in the Home town café eating and the best part getting thrown out of the pool but I have a
Season pass well least climb a tree watch the fun and then a scene from the horror flicks of
The Day a little kid and his mother walk under the tree mommy mommy there is a monster in
the Tree and you wonder why I write I tore out of the tree like a cat possessed I ran over and
Hid in the big pavilion with the invisible man well that’s my home town how about yours

2 cups of insecurity
4 ounces of comparison
1 cup of dinner not eaten.
5 cups of a mind in shackles
6 tablespoons of incomprehension
2 ounces of oblivious peers
3 cups of dinner not eaten.
3 teaspoons of phantom numbers
2 cups of anxiety
4 cups of mirrors smashed to bits
1 pint of self-hatred
4 cups of dinner not eaten.
1 tablespoon of depression
6 ounces of anger
2 pints of hopelessness
3 cups of self-inflicted scars
4 teaspoons of ribs in the mirror
5 cups of fainting on the stairs
1 gallon of dinner not eaten.
6 cups of grieving families
4 tablespoons of words unspoken
3 teaspoons of tears unshed.
2 cups of dusty belongings
4 gallons of friends never made
3 teaspoons of kisses never stolen
a lifetime of words left unsaid.

Melt insecurity and comparison and mix thoroughly with dinner not eaten. Mix a mind in shackles, incomprehension, and oblivious peers and add three more cups of dinner not eaten. Crush phantom numbers and anxiety and sprinkle over batter. Take each piece of mirrors smashed to bits and poke them carefully through self-hatred. Mix with four more cups of dinner not eaten. Melt depression, anger, and hopelessness and spread them thoroughly throughout the batter. Meticulously place self-inflicted scars visibly on top of the mixture. Cover with ribs in the mirror and fainting on the stairs. Mix with one gallon of dinner not eaten. Haphazardly toss in grieving families, words unspoken, and tears unshed. Mix with dusty belongings, friends never made, and kisses never stolen. Gather a lifetime of words left unsaid in a separate container. Take it outside and bury it. Do not mark the grave site.

Death leaves a heartache no one can heal,
Love leaves a memory no one can steal. ~ Author Unknown
~~~~~~~~~~~
It rain heavily on the river in Kerala the next morning
I think it was a sign of things to come,
I remember our walks by the water

The warmth of the sun as it dampen your hair
this brought out your winsome boyish smile
as you playfully tossed a small pebble into the water
It became an instant Kodak moment for years to come:
We were so in love with nature that summer

I remember every moment how we held each other hands
Your loving touch, your kiss, your blue eyes
So trustworthy was I: Your lies were accumulating.
and my foolish heart was pumping harder and harder

Like a gallon of water in the desert heat: you made me fell in love with you
your love for me was like a battlefield and I were the unexpected enemy

I am still very fond of my captor, I smile from ear to ear- each time it rain heavily in Kerala
If you know your enemies and know yourself then you are on top of things:

Until death leaves a headache no one can heal: Quote:
And love no matter what: leaves lasting memories.

Get out of my heart
Get out of my head
You're not what you thought you were once
And even then you weren't that
Beauty is within
And without
And you're rotting
Rotting from your exterior to
Your core
You are a rotten apple, not a bad seed
Do you know how much sewage water it takes
To contaminate a glass of drinking water?
A drop
You're a gallon, baby
A gallon of sewage
Tons of nasty
Packed into eight ounces
Of Falsehood
So keep faking
Maybe someday, you'll find soemone else
Some other idiot who, like you, has no respect
For themselves
Or others
Or society
Or humanity
Or progress
So keep up your act
Act well your role
For you are our ***** STD
The thing we never want to hear about
But that reminds us of how much
We want better for ourselves

Under the old house
cast in conglomerate mix
the cataract window
and cracked sill
broken joists
and cross beams
wringer wash
and saddle set

A draw string light
brings life
to the corner bench
fowler toads
and fingerlings
jitter bugs
and dazzy vance
dirt planks filled
with mason
crown classics

Buggy whip
and whippletree
shelved on the
chopboard
tackle and mucks
stacked at the back
horseshoe and jack rod
bend the pike pole
a sawhorse placed
for the Martindale push

Gallon jars
and growlers
prepped
for the taking
ropes and reins
for transport
and fest
goggle eye
jumps the flyer
setting up nicely
for the
Haldimand town fair

It's June, 1967.
Nature, still lying through
Parsley green teeth,
Breathes the last of spring,
Hints early summer warmth,
Pre-July's cicada whine,
August's heat and wind.

Crops, still tender green
Quiver beneath a humid sky,
Under a glowing sun.

Bicycles amuse our early lust
To soar untraveled ground,
Entering lazy summer's ennui,
We scan a hawk riding drafts
On the edge of our hill.

Dust, drifting up the graveled road,
Five miles below us,
Piques our interest,
Causes the dog to raise his head.
He ***** an ear
Toward a sound we cannot hear.

We hear gravel slapping rocker panels
Before the traveler's roof rises into view,
Catch our breath as the engine slows,
Start running for the house.

A stranger's arrived,
A traveling salesman,
Better than an aunt
Only stopping in for tea
And woman talk.

Dad keeps his welding helmet down,
Repairing broken things.
The hired man inhales his cigarette,
Acts disinterested.

My memories linger on the past....

Salesmen brought the latest farming gadgets:
Additives for fuel and oil,
Battery life extenders,
Grain elevators and fencing tools,
Produce and livestock products,
Lightning rods and roofing,
Chrome-edged cultivator shovels,
Insurance for everything:
Fire, water, wind, hail.

Pitches came without exception:

"Top o' the morning! Looks like you're busy.
Don't want to take your time."

"Looks like you could use some welding rod,
And I have something new for you to try."

"Have you used chromium additive in you livestock salt?
Guaranteed to put on weight and protect from bovine
Tuberculosis!"

"Say, have you heard about the effectiveness of a new
Insecticide called DDT? I've got a sample gallon here
For you to try. Works better than Malathion!"

Dad, eventually intrigued, began the slow dance
Of dickering, haggling over this thing or that.
Most salesmen, closing in for a ****,
Hadn't grappled with my father.

At noon, deals still in the air,
My mother called the men,
And we all trudged in to wash,
Waiting in line at the tub,
Scrubbing with powdered Tide
To remove the grime and grease,
Drying on the darkening towel,
Finding a seat at the table.

The salesmen expected the meal
As though it were their right,
A standing invitation:
Stop in at noon,
Make your pitch,
Sit at table,
Close the deal after.

We boys sat and listened
To man talk.
Eyes wide, we marveled
At gadgets,
Wondered at Dad's parleying,
Winced at the deals he drove,
Commiserated with squirming salesmen
Surely made destitute by Dad's hard bargaining.

In retrospect,
I know the game was played
On two sides,
That the battery additives
Bought for five dollars a packet,
Even with the two Dad finagled free,
Cost about five dollars for everything,
Returned forty-five and change
To the smirking, full-bellied salesman
Who left a cloud of dust on his way
To supper a few miles down the road.

I have my grocery list in my hand,
a pack of razor blades
a gallon of bleach
a bottle of *****
an egg
I have my grocery list in my hand,
but I am listless.

Sometimes I crack a smile
when my dog wakes me up with his kisses
Sometimes I make eggs
for him, of course,
I would never waste them on myself
With this list, I'm gone
I make my dog eggs and me a bath
For me, bleach, *****, razor
soon to be listless no more
I open the bottle and welcome the burn

Soot blackened fruit of economic glory,
the rolling steel contraption of sacred convenience
propelled from graveyards of putrefied fuel.
Flatulent streams of gaseous, stinking voidance
naught but a cockroach could ever hope to breath.


"A Buck eighty-three per gallon!
**** son, I remember when
Five dollars filled my twenty-gallon tank!
Corporate *******, gouging the sainted American soul!
How dare they abuse the Holy, Consuming Masses so!

That's not the righteous American Way."


Plucked from a tree
nurtured from a poisoned pool,
the maître de serves us with sumptuous flair
the glistening metal fruit of demanding fools
basted in Gaia's own sweet, dark blood.
With greedy flourish we consume and selfishly devour
till the piper appears demanding just payment.

Then we scamper towards the door
pointing greasy, crooked fingers,
as we scurry away with ne'er a simple gratuity.
The entire world pays for our
selfish deeds
and petty needs
for ivory seeds.
A corporate corrigendum stricken from the ledger
with a well-placed bomb, or two, or three.


"Five dollars!
Crap, that's what those haughty Europeans pay!
But I'm a proud American!
I'll yell, I'll scream, and maybe whine just a bit!
I may even e-mail that **** crooked fool in Congress.
I have rights proclaimed by God's own gift of dominion.
I am preserving what's just, only right!

The glorious American Way."


"A chicken in every ***", was once the dream of all but a few.
Now greedy spoiled children; we thoughtlessly proclaim,
"Two cars in each garage is just, and rightly due."
****** all ****** beauty that crosses our path
partial redemption lies in one simple truth.
Not all the world has yet to gain, “Our Precious Way”.
For if so, the pitiful scraps of beauty that still remain
would quickly be consumed in ******, hosted by fattened fools.


"Over ten dollars a gallon!
That's a blasted crime!
**** Politicians
their hands are bloodied black!
Twenty hours of work per week
just to fill my trusty Cadillac!

Consumption is The American Way"


Even a naked primitive, scavenging the forest floor
instructs his children better then we.
"When death's own serpent
lies coiled 'neath a beautiful fruited tree,
ignore the tempting orbs
for their price must and will be paid."

Alas, for us it may be too late.
We lay trapped within a corporate circle of death,
our children inherit a scarred and barren earth.
Will they thank us or curse our very graves,
Or even remember what once was, "Our Way?"


"OK kids, it's time for bed.
Yes little Susie, tonight's story was true
whispered from Grandfather's own lips.
Once long ago, in a glorious lost day
when fuel cost just ten dollars per unit.
Just think of that, one tenth of what it cost today.
Now go to sleep, and tighten those masks.
Oxygen cost money too, nearly five bucks per litre.
Those **** politicians, we should have learned
when we had a choice and air was still free;
memories from a faded time of make believe.

The good old, American Way."

© S.Loeding
All Rights Reserved

Third weekend in July
I love canoeing out on Northwood
Lake, early morning hours melting
into the pines, as I head toward the
island where the wild blueberries
lie. Tiny morsels, abundant and packed with
the taste of summer and beepollen and freshwater
and snow. Minnows nibble my toes, each one
a solid worm for the biting, as I slowly
fill a one-gallon jug, berry by berry,
to use for breakfast pancakes and
Belgian waffles cooked golden from
the waffle iron. Some of the ripest
berries plop into the lake. I swipe
them up before bass or sunfish
see them; always leaving the
green berries behind.
Pausing to taste some, they
split between my incisors;
I marvel at the flavor
while a loon’s haunted red
eyes stare at nothing.
Blueberries split like
relationships
occasionally do,
sour at times, always
leaving a taste on your
palate. Families, young
lovers picnicking on the
beach lake, confused couples;
they branch off, moonlight
silhouetting their outlines;
silent elegy softly blossoming
downward as their paths skew.
They won’t cross again.
My jug filled, I oar
back to the dock,
ears filled with
humming of birds,
insects, boats;
brimming with
the bream from berries
splitting apart,
and the intense
silence of blueberry
picking in late July.

Anyone notice this
That in my own fathers time it was 31 cents a gallon for gas now all of a sudden they tell you its demand for gas that's why all is going up in price but I've come to learn that government has an unlimited supply of everything us 'regular people' aren't getting
Scammers.

the gallon of arizona green tea that you only drank a fraction of.
the salt and pepper potato chips you meant to eat, but only did so in the dream i had last night.
the unmade bed that was still unmade when you flew back home, the one i still cannot bring myself to make.
the dyed green hairs i keep finding around the house.
the way you always pronounced 'mosquito' as 'mosk-it-toe' on purpose, and how you pronounced my cat's name 'sullumun' instead of 'solomon' on accident.
the partially closed closet door from the morning i drove you to the airport.
the faint smell of your sweat on my pillow left because of your hyperhidrosis.
the flannel you wore and the longsleeve shirt you doused in your aftershave, that is three sizes too big for me to realistically wear.
the empty taco bell cups in my car from your fourth day here.
the empty shopping bags from our impromptu mall trip.
the polaroids you really wanted to keep, but we couldn't find when you packed.
the pieces of you that you never meant for me to keep that i keep piecing together as though, like an alchemist, i could make you appear again though i cannot, and you are not here, you are gone.

I might have told you some of these things,
If you were alive.
 
You had an amazing body from the moment we hit seventh grade.
Your ***** just sat, round and high,
Your ******* pointed straight outward,
Like a freak of nature, or an action figure.
Cheering at football games
Girls hated standing next to you because
You peeled their boyfriend’s eyes from their skirts to yours.

One summer night on Garrett’s roof,
After making turkey sandwiches at two in the morning,
******* the fumes in your thin lips,
Watching the smoke twist in the air
In front of your ice blue eyes,
And your white blonde hair,
We talked about ***.
About how it’s ****** up
      how it is so much harder
For girls to have *******.

Then I dated Jesse,
After you.
We were 16.
Sometimes I think about the night I told you I was sorry,
In the parking lot by the river.
Your breath smelled like Doritos and cherry *****,
You fooled around with your pink shirt
Telling me it was ok.

We talked about our secret handshake.
We talked about how you used to want to be nicknamed cupcake,
We talked about the time we had a séance.
Age eleven bringing back ******,
On your screened-in porch,
Warm air swayed the candle flames,
Crickets in the darkness around us,
Suddenly,
A biker knocked over your trashcan in the ally.
 
You are dead now.
But you did it.
 
Sometimes I’ll eat too much,
Or *****,
Or smoke half a pack of cigarettes,
When I think about you.
One night last summer I ate an entire half-gallon of vanilla ice cream,
Alone in my kitchen.
My stomach felt sick for three days.
 
I walk the trail behind your house,
The one where you think you started your period.
The first place we ever smoked ***.
I talk to the trees about you.
When the wind blows the branches
And the dry leaves sound,
In that gentle shudder,
Along the cold ground,
My skin prickles,
And the hair on my arms rises towards the sky.

We had a color you and I.
You were a tantalizing white, vibrant yet subtle. You had the power to magnify everything because of that silent manifestation you comprise when a drop of any other shade was splattered on you, making it incredibly vivid. You were what poets used as muse for there was nothing purer than the flawless white of that glorious spirit yet you were neither dumbfounded nor disappointed by it.


I was a disaster-prone black, ill-fated yet beautiful. I made the light seem brighter, more picturesque; a comparison for better accomplishment. I came out at night to walk the terrors of the hours of darkness, untouched because of this gloomy soul. I was what the holly book prohibits to touch, to indulge all sensations because to drink from me was to imbibe a gallon of sin.


Sadly, beauty and unpleasant have a curious way of finding each other. I don’t remember which of us found the other first; if it was I who saw you shine from miles away or if it was you who found me huddled in a corner.


We were gods you and I. we created a love that transversed worlds. We shamed Orpheus and Eurydice. We disgraced Torin and Keelycael. There was nothing more powerful than the passion we twisted and at the same time nothing was more potent. We came from different places, you from the havens and I from the shallow depths of hell; and everything we made became a freak of nature.   


 We created the color gray.


We created the color gray from our undefeated essences. We made an unremarkable and unloved color from our insurmountable selves for the reason that we were too prideful to give up each other and at the same time ourselves. We made an abhorred thing because we were never meant for each other.


I realized when I saw you walk away, that last dreadful night, the white in you was somewhat fazed and I looked in the mirror that same night to see the darkness in me leaking. There was a little bit of gray in both of us. That was when I realized we stole pieces of each other.


Yes, my love, we made a color gray.

Dear Self,

For you it is November 9th, 2016. Despite all odds, Donald Trump is president. Mike Pence, governor of your home state of Indiana, is his VP.

You are 17 right now. You were born into a world run by George W. Bush. You spent your whole childhood hearing your parents yelling at the tv, angry at the Texas governor in the White House.

You grew up in Obamanation. You saw months of “YES WE CAN” and “CHANGE” stickers going up, and a magnet your family still has get put onto your refrigerator. You heard your mother’s sigh of relief when Barack Obama was announced the 44th president. That was half your lifetime ago.

You spent the last year following the campaigns. You were not surprised by Hillary Clinton running again. You “felt the Bern” of the somewhat radical Independent candidate previously unknown to you, Bernie Sanders. You laughed off the wild reality tv star Donald Trump’s campaign.

Months went by. Bernie and Hillary were fighting hard leading up to the primaries. Republicans slowly started to drop out. Big names like Jeb Bush, Mike Huckabee, and Chris Christie left the race. Bernie didn’t do good enough in the primaries, which was upsetting to most of your friends, your older brother, and your mom, who all voted for him. Ted Cruz fell off, defeated, in May.

It was down to Hillary and Trump.

You followed the comments made at their rallies. On their social media. You heard a lecture about the election from Josh Gillin of Politifact at Indiana University over the summer. You won an award for an opinion piece you wrote on Trump. As the election day grew closer, you watched every presidential debate. You analyzed them in class.

Last night, you stayed up until 4 A.M. to see the results of this election. You sat through excruciatingly slow interviews, political analysis, and different predictions. You couldn’t turn away from the blue and red maps, the aggressively American backgrounds, the anxious masses.

The tired tv hosts were right, it was a nail-biter.

As Trump gave his victory speech, you wept.

You wept for the months you spent wishing this wouldn’t happen. You wept for the 1920’s suffragettes, for the descendents of MLK and Cesar Chavez, for the Orlando victims. You wept for me. The people I joined. The people who will join me.

I am dead.

You learned in your final moments that homophobes look like normal people. They are not all rednecks with beer guts wearing ten-gallon hats. They are more elusive than that. They can be dressed smart. They can have friendly voices. Familiar names and faces.

A friend of a friend of a friend of a friend killed you. Someone you live near. You might have passed them in a car. In the mall. In the school hallways. It was someone that people you knew,  knew. You probably could’ve gotten their Twitter handle if you had heard their name before.

You were killed in a city that VP Pence had once stood in.

People tried to learn about your killer. Were they someone you knew? Someone who just went crazy? Someone who couldn’t handle who you held hands with?

You were too young, the local news anchors said. Your school administration said. Your mom said.

Mike Pence didn’t say anything at all.

Your friends didn’t say much. They cried. They withdrew. They wore baggier clothes. They bought switchblades. They washed “*****” and “ladyboy” off of your tombstone. They wondered about joining you, voluntarily and not.

The school newspaper’s headline: DEAD AT 17.

No one thought it would happen to you, except you. You stayed up late at night, imagining your funeral. The first thing you did in the morning was practice for your wake. Every time you left your house, you were a dead man walking.

No one  believed this more than you did.

The news anchors said it was just one of a string of murders. People said it was an isolated incident. Your friends said it was a hate crime. Your mom said it was the worst thing that  ever  happened to her.

There was no question that you were gone, even when they found you- chest jumping. There was only one thing to wonder: who was next?

Not an if, but a when.

I hope the when is  never.

All my love- to you and everyone else,

Yourself