The Sacristy

A pastoral palace
A haven for servants of God
A prep room for the clergyman.
A probationary clergyman,
At his knees in prayer before the lord.

Roars of thunder rattle the room,
Clashes of lightening illuminate,
Through a stained-glass window.  
He is alone,
Father Bernard Benedict,
At the mercy of the lord.

Bernard

Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned greatly,
Questioning his own fate,
never before today.
I am full of fear, Father.
Terrified of what will become of me,
if my betrayal of you progresses.
I’m scared of what won’t become of me,
if I remain loyal.

Father, all I know for sure,
is that I’m very confused,
And I need guidance.
It is a sin to deny thy lord,
in any circumstance,
but it is my own twisted irony
to have doubts and...
To have doubts,
And yet seek your guidance...

The Voice

And just what kind of doubts are you having,
my son?
What is it that you seek?
Confide in thy father,
As you are my child,
My dearest little one.
Unleash your desires,
Unravel your pain,
Lend me your soul.

Bernard

…Father?

The Voice

Yes, my son?
My son,
I’m here.
Speak to me,
All ears are wide,
Wide and open.

Bernard

It is you, isn’t it?
May I see your face?

The Voice

I’m afraid that is not possible,
I’m afraid it is not so.
I do apologize,
My son.

Bernard

Why?
Is my wish not your command?
Is it not your mission,
To aid in my suffering?
Why is it that I cannot see you?
Why is it that I cannot experience you?

The Voice

Because I don’t exist.

Bernard

Just what kind of a game,
Just what kind of a game are trying to play?
Father?
Manifest yourself!
Allow me to lay my tearful eyes,
Upon your entity.

The Voice

...If you insist...

The Storm
Wooshing,
Roaring,
Angrily little clouds,
Zigzags of electric,
Blowing window shrouds.

Maroon Man

Howdy do,
Father Bernard,
Hiya,
Howdy do?

Bernard

Who…
Who are you?
Who are you,
And how did you…
Do?

Maroon Man

I’m him,
I’m him,
He,
Who is I.

Bernard

Father?
Son?
Holy Ghost?
Of any, all,
And everything at most?
Dressed to the nines,
Maroon and Red shoes,
That shine?

Maroon Man

Him?
Him?
Oh, please,
Heavens, no.
I’m merely that,
Other him,
You know,
He who should not be named.

Bernard

It can’t be,
Possibly,
Can’t be,
He,
The monster in my nightmares,
The monster of my dreams.
You’re not…

Maroon Man

Carrying a pitchfork?
Hovering with horns?
I left such things at home.
Silly little stereotypes,
Little legends in the books.

Bernard

What is it that you want from me?
What is it that you seek?
I’m merely faithful to my lord,
Not you, that man,
So foul,
You reek.

Maroon Man

I want to talk about your plans,
I want to talk your pain,
I want to talk your suffering,
Your losses and your gain.
Unleash your lonely grievances,
Unload your pesky thoughts.

Bernard

I don’t condone your evil,
I don’t condone your sin,
Allow me to my thoughts in peace,
And never tread within.

Maroon Man

No,
No,
Of course, you don’t condone me,
That’s why you’re so conflicted,
Struggling and buckling,
about your future,
spreading the good love of faith,
because you’re dead-set on,
not disobeying the almighty.

Bernard

Why,
Oh why,
Why is it that you’re here?

Maroon Man

I’m here to merely guide you,
I’m here to simply help,
My son you haven’t yet seen,
The things that I can do.


Bernard  

I don’t need your guidance,
Not your friendship,
Or your help,
Banished from this House of God,
Exiled from this home of holy.

Maroon Man

Don’t you?
Do you?
I hear you’re at a crossroad,
You need guidance,
You DO need guidance,
correct?



Bernard

Not from you,
Never from you,
I’d rather convert or follow none,
Than worship the likes of you.

Maroon Man

Why is that?

Bernard

Because you’re wicked.
You’re ghastly,
You are the symbol,
of all evil.
You are the reason why there is suffering,
and death in this sinful world.
You construct hate and pain,
and spread it like a virus.
You are a virus.

Maroon Man

Flattery will get you nowhere,
Father Benedict.
You’re merely reading,
A resume,
An eternity of achievement.

Bernard

I don’t care what you have to say,
I can’t indulge you,
I won’t indulge you,
To indulge you,
Is to lose me,
And to lose him.

Maroon Man

From what I can tell,
you’re uncertain of your faith.
Isn’t that correct?
Isn’t that so?
Tell me I’m wrong.

Bernard

No,
Not at all,
Not entirely so.
I know what I believe in,
I know what is so,
I just don’t...

Maroon Man

Just don’t,
what?
Speak!
Release what it is,
That has you in such shambles.

Bernard

I just don’t know,
I just don’t know,
if I want to devote my life,
to my faith.
My faith,
My faith,
Where’s the faith in me?
To devote this life,
To everything,
In terms of he?
I feel this way,
And ache this way,
Knowing full well,
That I will burn in hell,
For feeling this way.

Maroon Man

What is it that you have to sacrifice,
in order to become a soldier of Christ?
What is it that you give,
What is it that you gift?

Bernard

Time,
Time,
And life after time.

Maroon Man

Time, yes,
But there’s more to it,
than just time,
What else are you risking?
What is that you sacrifice?
We both know the answer to that,
We both know it true,
You’re risking freedom, you see,
if you pursue a life of pure faith,
you will never know what the beauty of…
pleasure is like.
Freedom is pleasurable,
isn’t it?
Pleasure,
Fulfillment,
Taking that first sip of bourbon in the morning-time,
Taking that long drag from a burning cigarette,
Truly knowing what it’s like,
to make love to a woman,
feeling every bit of passion and pleasure that…
comes with it.
You lack character in this world
and that’s because you are
unfulfilled.

Bernard

You...
You see right through me,
You see right through my pain,
Every ounce and every air,
Of all that I fail to obtain.

Maroon Man

Even he can,
He isn’t stupid,
He knows these are things you want,
But is he allowing you to do so?
No,
his words forbid such action.
Why?
Because,
all he really wants is recognition and obedience.

Bernard

You lie,
You lie,
and you lie,
You can’t possibly know,
what the lord truly wants.

Maroon Man

Don’t forget,
Don’t you ever lose sight,
I once fought alongside him,
the same way you are now,
and look where it got me,
once I realized that there is more,
more to it than just spreading peace,
and tranquility through him.
True peace is in pleasure.
He hates pleasure.
He craves order.

Bernard

And what makes you think,
that I want anything more than,
peace and tranquility?

Maroon Man

Because you wouldn’t be doubting,
your path to priesthood,
if you didn’t desire the very things,
He tells you not to desire.
Even desiring is a sin, you see.
To him,
desire is greed.
Take some initiative for yourself,
and humor me.

Bernard

I can’t.

Maroon Man

Why not?
You can,
Don’t you see?
I can show you.
I can show you,
Fruitful things.
I can show you all,
That he forbids.
Remember the girl?

Bernard

What girl?

Maroon Man

You know,
You know what girl,
Don’t tell me that,
You don’t remember,
The girl.

The Photograph

A framed image,
A portrait of beauty,
Her,
Gorgeous blonde locks,
A lovely little maiden,
Her,
God’s crafted angel,
Dearly Departed,
Cecelia.

Maroon Man

Cecilia,
She is why you are doing this,
aren’t you?
She died,
Tragically,
Overdosed, even.
A talented musician,
who got wiped away,
because of her desires.
Like blowing out a candle.
You think it was me?
You think it was me,
who took her away from you?

Bernard

Yes,
Yes,
I blame you,
You,
Foul old you,
You’re the reason why she’s gone,
You are the cause of pain.

Maroon Man

Wrong,
Wrong,
Wrong again, Bernard,
It was him, Bernard.
He who forbade,
Pleasure,
Mortality was her punishment,
for seeking such pleasures.
It was him, Bernard.
It’s much too easy,
Too easy to pin the blame on anyone,
but the true culprit.
It’s no coincidence,
that I’m here this evening,
Bernard.
I’ve been watching you,
I know you inside and out,
Better than you know yourself.
Do you now trust me?
We’re waiting, Father!
(beat)
Just as I thought.
You know that it’s better to have loved,
and lost,
then to never have loved at all.



Bernard

****… you…

Maroon Man

Profanity,
Profanity,
Is profanity not a sin?

Bernard

Why are you doing this to me?
Why are you here?
What is it that you aim to accomplish,
Foul, ghostly beast?

Maroon Man

If you’d just humor me,
If you’d just listen,
If you’d just dip your toes,
Into my point of view,
I can give you it all.

Bernard

What is it,
that you’ll do,
if I indulge you?

Maroon Man

You can have her,
She would be yours
for all eternity,
You can have everything,
you desire.
Only if you come with me.

Bernard

Can I talk to her?
Can I hold her?
Can I smell her scent?
Can I taste her lips?
Can I…

The Action

Maroon Man smiles,
Maroon Man nods,
Maroon Man grants,
And twirls his fingers,
At invisible atmospheric dials.

Outside the window,
Stood Cecelia dressed in black,
Bernard sniffs a soulful tear,
His love and lust had come for her,
It had unapologetically come back.

He raced outside the holy place,
And wandered in the fields,
To find his lovely little,
Cecelia May,
Waiting for his warm embrace.

one o'clock in the morning
switch switch clack clack
there's a train and it's streaming swirls of
steamy illumination
clack clack
eyelids drifting; icebergs, somewhere, melting.

there's a part of my brain and it's
it's drifting back to you
you're walking on those steaming lights
palm on palm and eyes on eyes on faces
creased and turned
with curiousity
and the beginnings of devotion

there was a past, storied; perhaps too complicated
and it's faded; I have managed to turn my head
painfully removed,
toward blue jackets being pulled on
blue and maroon
blue and maroon

you're different, and she's absolutely different
I do not know how I missed the mark
(but oh I hope that she does worse)
blue and maroon
when patched together minds of mine
**** backwards and--
I can't feel you anymore, I can only think
so maybe this is better

blue and maroon
he's getting better; he's not perfect in the same way
but you weren't either in a big way
his faults don't rattle my teeth in my head
and blister my fingertips completely out of bitterness
my eyes don't bleed of acid when he strikes an ill-planned chord
you're gone
and I am staring at this train
eyelids drifting
thinking of blue and maroon

dilaw na dyaket ang suot mo noon
habang ako ay nananahimik
hindi makaimik
at pinagmamasdan ang bawat sinag ng dapithapon
na sinasala ng kinulayang bintana
kung saan ay sa aking mga mata na ngayon lamang nakakita ng ganda ay biglang napatunganga

dilaw na dyaket ang suot mo noon
at ang unang naitala
sa listahan ng mga napuna ng aking mga mata at biglang napatunganga na nga

nang dahil sa bawat tupi ng manggas
at bawat kusot ng bulsa ng dilaw na dyaket **** naisipang ipakita sa silid ng mga kaluluwa

mga kaluluwang akala ko ay mabibigyan kong buong pansin ngunit heto, napatitig na rin

ako'y napatitig na rin

napatitig sa dilaw na dyaket mo
at hindi ko mawari kung paano
pero ang dilaw na dyaket **** nakabalabal sa iyong kay liit na katawan ay humihila pababa sa iyong mga balikat
nakakibit
hindi man lang kayang mapaakyat ang iyong pagpapakalálo
napapaliit
ang tikas ng iyong pagkatao

hindi ko rin mawari kung paano
pero ang dilaw na dyaket mo ay para bang napabalabal na rin sa akin
at mula noon, ang bawat tupi ng manggas at bawat kusot ng bulsa ng aking puso ay handa nang aminin na ikaw ay naging isang

anghel

ang dilaw na dyaket mo ay naging iyong halo
at ang bawat tupi ng manggas at bawat kusot ng bulsa nito ay naging mga pakpak mo at ikaw ay naging isang

anghel

ika'y naging
anghel sa aking isipan
marikit na imahe sa aking kaloob-looban
munting sigaw sa buong kalawakan
o, munting anghel ko, nais ko na sanang isigaw:
nakikita mo ba?
nakikita mo ba kung paano kita nakikita?
nakikita mo ba kung paano kita sinasamba?
nakikita mo ba kung paano kita sinisinta?

oo, sinisinta, dahil
munting anghel ko, o, mahal kita
mahal kita, o, munting anghel ko

mahal kita
at ang bawat tupi ng manggas at bawat kusot ng bulsa ng iyong pagkatao
mahal kita
at ayaw kong manatili ka lamang sa isipan ko
mahal kita
at nais kong ako ang magpabalabal sa iyong puso
at nais kong ako ay maging iyo

at nais kong mahalin mo rin ako

ngunit, o, munting anghel ko, natakot ako
natakot ako na
kung ilalahad ko ang lahat ng mga ligaw na alaala ko sa iyo
ay huhusgahan mo ako
kung hayaan kong buksan mo ang aking mga pinto
ay matatakot ka nang makita mo ang nilalaman nito
kung ipakita ko sa iyo ang lahat ng mga tupi ng manggas at mga kusot ng bulsa ng aking puso
ay magugulat ka at lilisanin mo ako

kaya heto, ang munting anghel ko ay nanatili sa isipan lamang
ang marikit na imahe ko ay nanirahan sa kaloob-looban lamang

ang munting sigaw ko ay naging bulong lamang
isang bulong na nagsasabing:
o, munting anghel ko, mahal kita,
o, munting anghel ko, pangarap kita,
ngunit, o, munting anghel ko, natatakot akong sa piling mo'y ako'y madulas
at tuluyang mawala ka.

maroon na dyaket ang suot mo kanina
noong ako ay naarawan ng sikat ng umaga
at ng tawa ng ilang mga kahalubilo't kasama
at naroon sa gitna ng aking sariling mga tawa ay nakita kita
ngunit may kasamang iba

at siya'y ika'y inakbayan
at ika'y siya'y nginitian
at ako'y napaisip nang biglaan
kayo ba?
kayo ba?
kayo ba?

napakwento ang kaibigan ko:
alam mo ba,
ganun na nga
sila na
magdadalawang-linggo na.

hindi naman sa nasaktan ako
pero parang ganoon na nga.

hindi naman sa napatigil bigla ang tibok ng puso ko
pero parang ganoon na nga.

hindi naman sa nadurog ako nang mapansin ko na ang sukat ng maroon na dyaket mo ay mas sakto sa iyo at hindi niya nahihila pababa ang iyong buong pagkatao at siguro ito ay dahil siya ang kasama mo at hindi ako kaya para bang siya na ang nakabalabal sa iyong puso at ang bawat tupi ng manggas at bawat kusot ng bulsa ng kaniyang puso ay napaibig na sa iyo—

pero parang ganoon na nga.

ganoon na nga
dahil kayo na nga

kayo na
kayo na
kayo na.

ganoon na nga
dahil siya ang kasama mo

hindi ako
hindi ako
hindi ako.

siguro kung hindi ako natakot

siguro kung hindi ako natakot na ilahad ang lahat ng mga ligaw na alaala ko sa iyo
ay hindi ka na mananatili lamang sa isipan ko

siguro kung hindi ako natakot na hayaang buksan mo ang aking mga pinto
ay mapapabalabal ko na ang iyong puso

siguro kung hindi ako natakot na ipakita ang lahat ng mga tupi ng manggas at mga kusot ng bulsa ng aking puso
ay ako na'y magiging iyo

siguro kung hindi ako natakot na madulas sa piling mo
ay mamahalin mo na rin ako

ngunit ayan na nga, o, munting anghel ko, natakot ako
at ayan na nga, o, munting anghel ko,
lahat ng ito ay hindi ko na nasabi sa iyo
at ayan na nga, o, munting anghel ko,

baka tuluyan nang mawala ang dilaw na dyaket mo sa buhay ko

maroon na dyaket na ang suot mo
ngunit ang dilaw na dyaket mo pa rin ang nakatatak sa isipan ko
at ang bawat tupi ng manggas at bawat kusot ng bulsa ng dilaw na dyaket mo ay nakabalabal pa rin sa aking puso

aking puso na nadurog, at patuloy na nadudurog hanggang ngayon
nang dahil sa dilaw na dyaket na suot mo noon

dahil sa dilaw na dyaket na suot na ng iba ngayon

Blood dripped from my eyes like tears.
Maybe they were just tears.
It dripped from my mouth and I dug my nails into my palms, wishing it would stop.
Blood began to drip from my palms too.
Something stung my side.
I put my hand to it and pulled it away, now completely covered in red.
Although it was not exactly red.
It was dark, making the red more of a black maroon.
I was drowning in black maroon.
You'd think being covered in blood would be enough to wake me up completely.
But sadly it wasn't.
Laying in half-consciousness, my blanket slowly soaking in black maroon.
Tangling around my legs and around one of my arms, I couldn't get it off.
Suffocating in a wet blanket, crying with closed eyes, wanting to die.
I heard music.
A piano.
I didn't know who was playing, or why, or where.
I stopped struggling long enough to listen, it was happy and loud.
'What is there to be happy about?'
I wondered, no one is coming to save me.
I heard a little girl laughing.
"Play my favourite, James!"
She had an accent I couldn't identify, but her request changed the song.
The music stopped for a moment, then when it started again, it was soft and sweet.
But also sad.
I could feel the music creating cracks in my heart.
Someone was walking towards my room.
I turn so I'm laying on my other side, now facing the door.
A pool of black maroon was spreading on the floor.
My breath stopped as I froze.
No one could ever bleed that much.
The door began to open and she walked in.
She couldn't have been much older than I, tall and so thin I thought she would snap, she walked in with a grace and balance so fine it couldn't have been human.
Then I saw her hands.
Her palms were metal, shining in the light from the hall.
Her fingers each a long thin blade.
I felt my heart stop completely.
I looked up and wish I hadn't.
Her face was so sunken in you could see every bone, her eyes hollow shadows.
She was beautiful.
Until she lunged for me and I heard my own screaming echoing inside me as I sat up in bed.
I was shaken but standing.
But broke when I saw the right side of my face covered in dried black maroon, and the matching stain that covered half of my pillow.

Your truck knows it all
It contains our whole relationship
It knows the beginning, middle and end

I loved seeing those lights
Knowing you were driving to come pick me up
It made me really happy
And sometimes
Even a little nervous
But in a good way

In the summertime
We had the windows rolled down because it was hot
In the winter it was cold
But we'd find a place to park and make it July warm
I almost lost my innocence in that passenger seat

We did so much in that truck
We talked
Laughed
Shared
Kissed
Argued
Cried
Stressed
Freaked out
Held each other
Loved

That truck knows it all
Those camouflage seat covers still hold our passionate sweat
The drooping brownish red ceiling absorbed all our words, feelings and keeps them there
Even today
The plastic in front of the gas gauge doesn't feel as whole without one of my pictures covering it
The center console probably still holds one of my notes
Saying how much I love about you
Who knows, the glovebox still may hold my garter
The lace with a tear on it from prom
When the truck heard you say you didn't care anymore

That truck holds everything
All the feelings and emotions
Maybe not so close to the surface anymore
But it will never forget the stuff you've let yourself unremember
That maroon Chevy still loves me
Even if you don't.

long white knives
that peirce through the
skin
of their prey
first they softly
puncture
thrickles of blood
dripping from the
fresh
pink
wound
then, they dig deeper
slowly
blood runs
faster
as the predator
***** it in
a maroon mess
finally
it lets go
and pulls the once
white teeth
now
decorated in royal red

I think of you in colours that don't exist --
     that's not to say that I don't think of you at all,
          because, of course, technically every colour exists:
Even the ones we cannot imagine,
   Even the ones we cannot see.
Even the ones either side of the spectrum that light up the notes used for money, not music, because the notes used for money
   are
      not
         always
            real.
Even the ones either side of the spectrum that light up the heat of your body like your presence does the room
      and your eyes do my smile
           and your smile does my eyes;
You tell me that technically every colour exits,
   even if we cannot see it,
   even if we cannot imagine it –

For think of it now.
          Imagine in your head a colour that does not exist.
                    Now describe it to me.
Is it a splash of red with tints of a yellowy-blue?
Is it a pinky-purple hue,
    a hint of green, turquoise, maroon, sapphire, olive, violet?
Does it already exist in colours we already have names for,
      have we lived so long that every thought we think is no longer our own,
            every thought we think has been thought of before,
I think of you in colours that don’t exist
   but so has everyone else.

We cannot see it,
      we cannot imagine it.
But if we cannot imagine something that does not exist
   simply because we are confined to describing it
      in the words of an already existent language,
   what does that say about us?
We can imagine a waterfall of chocolate,
       a glass elevator bursting through the roof;
   shrinking potions and growing potions and talking rabbits.
We can imagine standing on the top of a building
      looking out over the greying city lights
            with lungs full of water
            a noose round our necks
            and the sole belief in our heads that we are jumping to fly
We can rewrite the future and make up the past
We can imagine wizards and witches and fairies and goblins
We have unicorns, ******* it,
     we have God.

And yet when I present to you a lover,
   an artist,
      standing in front of you now,
         yearning to make you his canvas,
You are too scared to fall in love,
              too scared to admit that you don’t have the words in your encapsulating little language to describe the things that you feel towards him.
For he does not need language,
   he does not need words.
He will stand here now,
   in front of you,
      and let you grace his collarbones with a diamond noose,
                          crown his withered corpse in a wreath of daisies,
                          dress his bones in slashes of rubies.
He will tear himself apart for you,
     for you,
     for you to watch galaxies flow out of his veins,
  velvet red blood screaming unwritten poetry,
  a torrent of unimagined colours pouring into him and out of him
          and with his one last remaining breath
              and a trembling hand,
he picks up his paintbrush
      and draws you into orbit,
  and like his fingers used to trace your shattered ribcage
    like the keys of an ivory piano,
he traces the outline of your lips.
And at last you draw breath,
         to whisper his name, to whisper your love, and all that remains
   is silence.
And you choke on the air and sound is still
         for all words exist so none can be spoken and suddenly everything
   is black.
And I think of you in colours that don’t exist
     like the wolf howls in lament of the side of the moon he will never see
          for all colours exist, and when I think of you,
there are none.

                                                      *-j.­s.

~
O Painter
with thy own eye
                        would thee
paint me in mine own natural hue
prithee paint me as i am,
imperfections
            and blemishes true

Load thy brush
                      with colors sundry
to maketh yond first pure sweep
across the ****** frieze,
fill'd with pangs of hunger.
paint me as i standeth
                  bethought, in deep

With mine own love and mine own desire,
blurring the edges unclean
with mine own regrets
                  and mine own mental gyre,
in mine own natural age,
               of deep forest green

O Painter
Paint me sinister turquoise,
in lavender and maroon,
combine the amethyst and amber
blend the iceberg
       and the indigo moon.

Paint me as i standeth,
       prithee see with thy eye
a mistress in yond lady plight
Prithee paint me all i am
i cullionly
a mistress in all yond lady might

Paint me in the optimistic
                             silv'r of dawn,
but don’t miss the purple
to shade the bruise
                              of the bygone.
paint me in the sky blue journal

O Painter
Paint me as a unique template
smudge black white and grizzled
merging all the colors of thy palette.
col'r me a rainbow
                            in a rainy drizzle

Paint me tall so yond i standeth
loftier than any mountain
Paint me as a dram bird, delicate
with soft feathers silken

Paint me harmony, as a violin
so yond i can sing thy solitary tune
paint me as thy poetry
         with song and melody
wrapp'd in a cocoon

O Painter
paint me as a dream yond rises
                               in did saturate colors
with a steady upbeat flight awry
tint, a fluttering
             of a quite quaint butterfly

Portray me with endurance
imbue so bold and bright
doth not hesitate
                to depict mine own mind
in profound fuchsia and white.

Useth the colors yond thee would borrow
Thy palette not yet exsufflicate
Paint mine own loss and mine own sorrow
in search of a shade so ******

Adorn mine own heart in glowing garnet
at which hour thee paint mine own love
add a true broken blue shade
of the cloud and the rain above;

Study mine own dry sorrow
                              in mine own soul
useth any shade thee plaited
soften the edges of control
in a tinge of xanthene.

O Painter
Prithee paint me
Mine own passion and mine own spirit
shall has't a crimson r'd hint
mine own remorse and mine own regret
shall reflect an ink stain print

Paint me in mine own eye so true
O Painter
but add a dash of courage too
~

Because I wanted to be the shade of lace
that hugged at my arcs and ridges,
blushing deeper as you peeled it away
from my skin.

Maroon,
because it painted the
the constellation,carefully planted
down
my
spine

and coloured the speckles of tiny stars,
huddling beneath the fortress of my jaw,
while the others were lost,
but cradled safely
in the dimple of my collar bones.

The boy with the maroon sweater
You took her heart and threw it in the gutter

The boy with the maroon sweater
She tried her best but you were always better

The boy with the maroon sweater
She knew you were smart but you were an early quitter

There was a house fire on my street last night …well… not exactly my street, but on a little, sketchy, dead-end strip of asphalt, sidewalks, weeds, and garbage that juts into my block two houses down. It was on that street. Rosewood Court, population: 12, adjusted population: 11, characterized by anonymity and boarded windows, peppered with the swift movements of fat street rats. I’ve never been that close to a real, high-energy, make-sure-to-spray-down-your-roof-with-a-hose-so-it-doesn’t-catch­ fire before. It was the least of my expectations for the evening, though I didn’t expect a crate of Peruvian bananas to fall off a cargo plane either, punching through the ceiling, littering the parking lot with damaged fruit and shingles, tearing paintings and shelves and studs from the third floor walls, and crashing into our kitchen, shattering dishes and cabinets and appliances. Since that never happened, and since neither the former nor the latter situation even crossed my mind, I’ll stick with “least of my expectations,” and bundle up with it inside that inadequate phrase whatever else may have happened that I wouldn’t have expected.



I had been reading in my living room, absently petting the long calico fur of my roommate’s cat Dory. She’s in heat, and does her best to make sure everyone knows it, parading around, *** in the air, an opera of low trilling and loud meows and deep purring. As a consequence of a steady tide of feline hormones, she’s been excessively good humored, showering me with affection, instead of her usual indifference, punctuated by occasional, self-serving shin rubs when she’s hungry. I saw the lights before I heard the trucks or the shouts of firemen or the panicked wail of sirens, spitting their warning into the night in A or A minor, but probably neither, I’m no musician. Besides, Congratulations was playing loud, flowing through the speakers in the corners of the room, connected to the record player via the receiver with the broken volume control, travelling as excited electrons down stretches of wire that are, realistically, too short, and always pull out. The song was filling the space between the speakers and the space between my ears with musings on Brian Eno, so the auditory signal that should have informed me of the trouble that was afoot was blocked out. I saw the lights, the alternating reds and whites that filled my living room, drawing shifting patterns on my walls, ceiling, floor, furniture, and shelves of books, dragging me towards the door leading outside, through the cluttered bike room, past the sleeping, black lump of oblivious fur that is usually my boisterous male kitten, and out into the bedlam I  had previously been ignorant to. I could see the smoke, it was white then gray then white, all the while lending an acrid taste to the air, but I couldn’t see where it was issuing from. The wind was blowing the smoke toward my apartment, away from Empire Mills. I tried to count the firetrucks, but there were so many. I counted six on Wilmarth Ave, one of which was the awkward-looking, heavy-duty special hazards truck. In my part of the city, the post-industrial third-wave ***** river valley, you never know if the grease fire that started with homefries in a frying pan in an old woman’s kitchen will escalate into a full-blown mill fire, the century-old wood floors so saturated with oil and kerosene and ****** and manufacturing chemicals and ghosts and god knows what other flammable **** that it lights up like a fifth of July leftover sparkler, burning and melting the hand of the community that fed it for so many decades, leaving scars that are displayed on the local news for a week and are forgotten in a few years’ time.



The night was windy, and the day had been dry, so precautions were abundant, and I counted two more trucks on Fones Ave. One had the biggest ladder I’ve ever seen. It was parked on the corner of Fones and Wilmarth, directly across from the entrance into the forgotten dead-end where the forgotten house was burning, and the ladder was lifting into the air. By now my two roommates had come outside too, to stand on our rickety, wooden staircase, and Jeff said he could see flames in the windows of one of the three abandoned houses on Rosewood, through the third floor holes where windows once were, where boards of plywood were deemed unnecessary.



“Ay! Daddy!”



My neighbor John called up to us. He serves as the eyes and ears and certainly the mouth of our block, always in everyone’s business, without being too intrusive, always aware of what’s going down and who’s involved. He proceeded to tell us the lowdown on the blaze as far as he knew it, that there were two more firetrucks and an ambulance down Rosewood, that the front and back doors to the house were blocked by something from inside, that those somethings were very heavy, that someone was screaming inside, that the fire was growing.



Val had gone inside to get his jacket, because despite the floodlights from the trucks imitating sunlight, the wind and the low temperature and the thought of a person burning alive made the night chilly. Val thought we should go around the block, to see if we could get a better view, to satisfy our congenital need to witness disaster, to see the passenger car flip over the Jersey barrier, to watch the videos of Jihadist beheadings, to stand in line to look at painted corpses in velvet, underlit parlors, and sit in silence while their family members cry. We walked down the stairs, into full floodlight, and there were first responders and police and fully equipped firefighters moving in all directions. We watched two firemen attempting to open an old, rusty fire hydrant, and it could’ve been inexperience, the stress of the situation, the condition of the hydrant, or just poor luck, but rather than opening as it was supposed to the hydrant burst open, sending the cap flying into the side of a firetruck, the water crashing into the younger of the two men’s face and torso, knocking him back on his ***. While he coughed out surprised air and water and a flood of expletives, his partner got the situation under control and got the hose attached. We turned and walked away from the fire, and as we approached the turn we’d take to cut through the rundown parking lot that would bring us to the other side of the block, two firemen hurried past, one leading the other, carrying between them a stretcher full of machines for monitoring and a shitload of wires and tubing. It was the stiff board-like kind, with handles on each end, the kind of stretcher you might expect to see circus clowns carry out, when it’s time to save their fallen, pie-faced cohort. I wondered why they were using this archaic form of patient transportation, and not one of the padded, electrical ones on wheels. We pushed past the crowd that had begun forming, walked past the Laundromat, the 7Eleven, the carwash, and took a left onto the street on the other side of the parking lot, parallel to Wilmarth. There were several older men standing on the sidewalk, facing the fire, hands either in pockets or bringing a cigarette to and from a frowning mouth. They were standing in the ideal place to witness the action, with an unobstructed view of the top two floors of the burning house, its upper windows glowing orange with internal light and vomiting putrid smoke.  We could taste the burning wires, the rugs, the insulation, the asbestos, the black mold, the trash, and the smell was so strong I had to cover my mouth with my shirt, though it provided little relief. We said hello, they grunted the same, and we all stood, watching, thinking about what we were seeing, not wanting to see what we were thinking.

Two firefighters were on the roof by this point, they were yelling to each other and to the others on the ground, but we couldn’t hear what they were saying because of the sirens from all the emergency vehicles that were arriving.  It seemed to me they sent every firetruck in the city, as well as more than a dozen police cars and a slew of ambulances, all of them arriving from every direction. I guess they expected the fire to get really out of hand, but we could already see the orange glow withdrawing into the dark of the house, steam and smoke rippling out of the stretched, wooden mouths of the rotted window frames. In a gruff, habitual smoker’s voice, we heard

                                      “Chopper called the fire depahtment

We was over at the vet’s home

                He says he saw flames in the windas

                                                                                                                                                We all thought he was shittin’ us

We couldn’t see nothin’.”

A man between fifty-five to sixty-five years old was speaking, no hair on his shiny, tanned head, old tattoos etched in bluish gray on his hands, arms, and neck, menthol smoke rising from between timeworn fingers. He brought the cigarette to his lips, drew a hearty chest full of smoke, and as he let it out he repeated

                                                “Yea, chopper called em’

Says he saw flames.”

The men on the roof were just silhouettes, backlit by the dazzling brightness of the lights on the other side.  The figure to the left of the roof pulled something large up into view, and we knew instantly by the cord pull and the sound that it was a chainsaw. He began cutting directly into the roof. I wasn’t sure what he was doing, wondered if he was scared of falling into the fire, assumed he probably was, but had at least done this before, tried to figure out if he was doing it to gain entry or release pressure or whatever. The man to the right was hacking away at the roof with an axe. It was surreal to watch, to see two men transformed from public servants into fingers of destruction, the pinkie and ring finger fighting the powerful thumb of the controlled chemical reaction eating the air below them, to watch the dark figures shrouded in ethereal light and smoke and sawdust and what must’ve been unbearable heat from below, to be viewing everything with my own home, my belongings, still visible, to know it could easily have gone up in flames as well.

I should’ve brought my jacket. I remember complaining about it, about how the wind was passing through my skin like a window screen, chilling my blood, in sharp contrast to the heat that was morphing and rippling the air above the house as it disappeared as smoke and gas up into the atmosphere from the inside out.

Ten minutes later, or maybe five, or maybe one, the men on the roof were still working diligently cutting and chopping, but we could no longer see any signs of flames, and there were figures moving around in the house, visible in the windows of the upper floors, despite the smoke. Figuring the action must be reaching its end, we decided to walk back to our apartment. We saw Ken’s brown pickup truck parked next to the Laundromat, unable to reach our parking lot due to all the emergency vehicles and people clogging our street. We came around the corner and saw the other two members of the Infamous Summers standing next to our building with the rest of the crowd that had gathered. Dosin told us the fire was out, and that they had pulled someone from inside the gutted house, but no ambulance had left yet, and his normally smiling face was flat and somber, and the beaten guitar case slung over his shoulder, and his messed up hair, and the red in his cheeks from the cold air, and the way he was moving rocks around with the toe of his shoe made him look like a lost child, chasing a dream far from home but finding a nightmare in its place, instead of the professional who never loses his cool or his direction.

The crowd all began talking at once, so I turned around, towards the dead end and the group of firefighters and EMTs that were emerging. Their faces were stoic, not a single expression on all but one of those faces, a young EMT, probably a Basic, or a Cardiac, or neither, but no older than twenty, who was silently weeping, the tears cutting tracks through the soot on his cheeks, his eyes empty of emotion, his lips drawn tight and still. Four of them were each holding a corner of the maroon stretcher that took two to carry when I first saw it, full of equipment. They did not rush, they did not appear to be tending to a person barely holding onto life, they were just carrying the weight. As they got close gasps and cries of horror or disgust or both issued from the crowd, some turned away, some expressions didn’t change, some eyes closed and others stayed fixed on what they came to see. One woman vomited, right there on the sidewalk, splashing the shoes of those near her with the partially digested remains of her EBT dinner. I felt my own stomach start to turn, but I didn’t look away. I couldn’t.

                                                                                It was like I was seven again,

                                in the alleyway running along the side of the junior high school I lived near and would eventually attend,

looking in silent horror at what three eighth graders from my neighborhood were doing.

It was about eight in the evening of a rainy,

late summer day,

and I was walking home with my older brother,

cutting through the alley like we always did.

The three older boys were standing over a small dog,

a terrier of some sort.

They had duct taped its mouth shut and its legs together,

but we could still hear its terrified whines through its clenched teeth.

One of the boys had cut off the dog’s tail.

He had it in one hand,

and was still holding the pocket knife in the other.

None of them were smiling,

or talking,

nor did they take notice of Andrew and I.

There was a garden bag standing up next to them that looked pretty full,

and there was a small pile of leaves on the ground next to it.

In slow motion I watched,

horrified,

as one of the boys,

Brian Jones-Hartlett,

picked up the shaking animal,

put it in the bag,

covered it with the leaves from the ground,

and with wide,

shining eyes,

set the bag

on fire

with a long-necked

candle

lighter.

It was too much for me then. I couldn’t control my nausea. I threw up and sat down while my head swam.

I couldn’t understand. I forgot my brother and the fact that he was older, that he should stop this,

Stop them,

There’s a dog in there,

You’re older, I’m sick,

Why can’t I stop them?

It was like

I hate the dripping dark hollow behind the little wood;
Its tips a cursed maroon with a blood-red heath.
I think I praised and lamented it too soon;
Before seeing its scent; I saw already its stray mystical death.

My crown is torn, outraged by florid winds and scorn;
Like a tangled old roots of the windblown thorn;
I shall feel scanty by my own poetry,
And throw it about, duly, like a static little joke.

I shall let my heart grow dull and illiterate;
I shall not taste joy, no more, in any clear--flowery fate.
I shall seek everything bitter, and not sweet;
Even not pure as the honey of a bee; for it shall be plain.

I shall curve and bend any straightforward light;
I shall harass it, and blind it--as if my ghost’s dead soul is very not here.
Ah, where is but Maud, Maud, Maud, and Maud;
Perhaps she is astray in my memory still, and not by my side.

I feel relieved so soon as glanced at her beside me;
She owns still that full lips like a perniciously tasty moon;
She is adorable like the flower of heaven itself;
She strikes me again when away, and tosses me about when near.

Ah, Maud, Maud, Maud;
Tame me again with thy rain of laugh;
Saint me once more like a fresh young bird;
Come to me now, and return my unheeded love.

Ah, Maud, Maud, Maud;
And kissing her forehead takes me back to that day;
A day of myths, a day of agile swans and storms;
An ornate time of hatred; a whirl of bitter fate; a dust of sorrow.

Ah, Maud, Maud, Maud;
And again I was alive in this tale, with a burning heart;
On one eve of tears, a mischief, and a wan poetry;
I caught about shadows in which there was no soul of Maud.

I could only see the stones, lying ghastly about the fireplace;
Ah, Maud, are you but still haunting those whimsical moors?
Their strange murmurs but I cannot hear;
But still they consume me, ah, I am scared;
I wish they would be gone soon, I wish you were but here.

These storms were amusing but peculiar;
They are bizarre, but intelligent and stellar;
And calling thy name out but breathes into me strength;
Ah, but should I be here, and bear away thy image alone?

Ah, and thou wert in but nymphic and lilac dream;
And my heart was still not massaged by the tender storm;
For it meant thee, and hungered but for thee only;
And in the midst of love had it longed, and yearned for thee.

Ah, where is but Maud, Maud, Maud, and Maud;
Her with her childish eyes and rounded head of bronze,
With her rapturous steps and wild glittering aroma,
With her atrocious jokes, and a wintry secret touch?

But still she was not anywhere about;
She dissolved like one romantic bough of soda;
And within a rough joke, she would be but gone;
And now the storm returned, but I was wholly on my own.  

Ah, and now the striking storm is mounting the earth;
Should I write alone and chill myself by the green hearth?
For I hath nothing to console and lengthen my parched logs;
I shall wait outside and drift about yon wintry bog.

Ah, where is but Maud, Maud, Maud;
Maud with her heart-shaped face and bare voice aloud;
A voice that soaked my senses and craving throat;
Maud but teased me and left me to that joke.

Where is but Maud, Maud, Maud and Maud;
Maud, the goth princess within my ancient poetry;
Who but remained symmetrical and biblical in her vain torments;
Who but stayed sturdy and silent; amidst her anger, and vain fellows’ arguments.

Listen to me. I am but full of hatred.
I am neither a gentleman nor a well-bred;
I, who is just a son of an infamous parson;
A malleable son; with a bleak aura of a putrid spring.

I, one who crafted ingenious jokes;
But interminable as they always are;
I made Maud sit still as I held my woodwork;
While she perched herself on yon bench, gazing at dispersed starry stars.

Maud the shadow in my pale mirror;
At times she ceased at morns, but retreated at night;
On her brother’s sight she fled in horror;
But on mine her smile turned me bright.

Maud was idle, sparkling, vibrant, and tedious;
Her heart was free and not marred by stupor.
She was the sun on my very bright days;
She made me startled; she always left me curious.

Maud the green of the farm, the red of the moon;
Without her everything would spring not and remain odious;
Everything would be bleak and stayed tedious;
Ah, but still I could not own her, though I was her saviour.

I was a farmer and perhaps still am;
Perhaps that’s why her mother ditched me with shame.
Maud said she had not places like home;
Her house was the mere shallow--and gratuitous throne.

Maud came often down and agitated;
Her mood shadowy, she cried and cried too aggravated;
I caressed her back, and placed my palms on her white knees;
She told me stories whenever no-one else would see.

She wanted not to mount the throne;
She giggled often, at our country escapade;
She loved my cottage, she sweetened my thin grass;
Even those apple trees had then her eyes, which sprayed tough, lonely seas of green.

Maud took to hymn and dear children’s little songs;
She was popular always among the talkative throngs.
She would love to dance and wiggle and turn around;
While village pupils gathered to sing a noble sound.

Ah, but when the mirthless prince arrived;
With white horses and swords of a knight;
Maud was swallowed every morning, all through day and night;
Maud was no more seen by my side.

I thought I was not alive, for dreams were unreal;
If they had been, then they I’d have want’d to ****;
But seeing Maud not gave me fretful chills;
I often woke up tensely, within a midnight’s shrills.

Ah, where is but Maud, Maud, Maud, and Maud;
Maud my bumblebee and my delicate little honey.
I kept waiting for her behind the rustic brook;
I fetched my net and fished by my old nook.

Ah, and where is Maud, Maud, Maud, and Maud;
My eyes were still and my chest could no more speak.
I wearily fancied she had been kidnapped faraway;
She would be jailed in a sore realm, and would no more be back here.

Ah, for had she been lost, then I had lost my ultimate pearl;
For there would no more be magic, there would be no more of her;
No-one would so restore my original spring;
Perhaps there would be no spring at all, and I would suffer in summer.

And I would lose anyway--my lyrical, elusive demon;
For Maud had always been elusive herself.
She wore that evil smile and thin laugh;
As I told her tales of fairies that she loved.

As I am fond of magical poetry and dramas;
Maud too used to read them with genuine personas.
She was my epic fanatical little devil;
She liked tropical cold and a faithful Mephistopheles.

I should be Faust, as she once said;
For had I fair hair, yet a bald head;
She said like Faust, I was cleverly amusing;
But to me, like Mephistopheles--she was unusually entertaining.

She danced before me a beautiful ballet;
She was young and keen to levitate as a ballerina;
She crafted me limericks and such fair lines of sonnets;
She made earth my heaven, and my melodies a twin cantata.

Ah, and where is Maud, Maud, Maud, and Maud;
I need my butterfly amongst this wheezy curdling cold.
I need my lover to soothe my chained hysteria;
I need to get out of here, and feed my love with her charms.

Ah, but where is Maud, Maud, Maud, is not she here?
I was then screaming in my solitude, could she but not hear?
I could speak not, no more--sore and wounded by this snowstorm;
I crept sick and weak like a dumb old worm.

She was not even heard of upstairs;
While I was dying here as a roaring beetle.
I hath almost lost all my creative flair;
I felt tormented and neglected and nearly feeble.

Ah, but a story like this is not such a fable;
So at that time I did shun sadness and seek a warm ending;
But indeed, to escape fate the poor were perhaps not able;
And the farmer’s son shall never be a king.

And ‘twas the nobles’ right to be idyllic;
To be deemed far then fairly righteous.
My charms were trivial, and so was then my wit;
My prayers were too parted and despaired; no matter how rigorous.

I kept my work along the countryside;
I toiled all night and behind fierce daylight.
I hoped Maud would see me back one day;
But what I found was to my dismay!

Ah, Maud, for she was now engaged;
To that pathetic creature the cursed morn brought about;
And parties arranged, voices too raised;
The union was now what people had in thought.

Onto my shoulders my head kept sinking;
I killed myself nearly, for my irksome defeat in this rivalry;
A rivalry that failed to transgress vital destiny;
A rivalry I could not even bear to think.

But again, this love had always been everything;
And thus Maud’s union would equal my death;
One night I crept out of my bed;
I had in hand a keychain and a net.

The soldier was infused by sound sleep;
And into Maud’s grand chamber I crept;
Everything was pink and quite neatly kept;
But woke I her not--as I heard her breast breath slowly.

She was tremendous still--in beauty;
Maud in her splendour; so young and free.
Ah, she was free but not free, I fathomed;
I looked at her over and over again.

I looked at her violet bed and comfort net;
Ah, my Maud too ****** and temptingly red.
She was too abundant in her young and chaste soul;
Ah, I could not imagine how she would soon be one else’s.

Long did I stand; ‘till morning streamed back again;
Still I remained unmoved; I stared at my darling in vain.
I jumped startled as the door opened;
And showed me the horror of the Queen!

‘Come, ye’ fool’, she voicelessly instructed;
Her face emotionless as these words emanated;
‘And embrace thy very fate’, to the handcuffs me she directed;
‘For daring look into my dame’s immaculately flawless chamber’.

She pointed thereof--a black gun at my chest;
It would soon burst out and tear my vest;
And even fly me straight to death;
So drifted I, without further haste nor breath.

Those poor soldiers imprisoned me there;
A cellar room at the top of filthy stairs;
I stayed awake only for grief and tears;
And most of the time I laid about sleepless and stared.

I grew skinless as my bones squinted;
And laughed at me with their sordid might;
Flies were about me, bending onto my rotten pies;
And slices of meat left out by sniggering guards.

I hit my head on witnessing Maud’s cold marriage;
‘Twas on a Saturday on the castle’s rain-wetted field.
I heaved myself onto the windowsill and saw;
How the couples were blessed and sent thereby back.

I could not see Maud’s face and fleshy cheeks;
But didst I feel her discarded tears;
Marred and defiled her lovely fits;
Though just those innate, and not out there.

I struck the lifeless paint with my bare palms;
Now the walls were tainted; they smelled like my blood.
Time passed and desire for Maud was never killed;
I’th missed her every day, since then, and perhaps always will.

But my love for Maud was never probable;
I was decent, honest, but indeed not preferable;
I was not even preferable by fate, as thou might see;
Fate who is neither truthful; nor frankly urges us to lie.

I often laid hopeless by the moonbeam;
Until night came and eyesight grew more and more vulnerable.
I waited ‘till it was dark and left to day no more gleam;
Then took my journal of Maud’s jests and read her affable poems.

I turned around--and would disgrace my bed still;
I was plain starved but had no desire to be properly fed;
Of a dream of death I grew instantly pertinacious;
And of my future tomb I grew fonder--and yet rapidly curious.

Ah, but my sweet Maud, Maud, Maud, and Maud;
And deliriously she somehow became pregnant;
But remorse said she kept the souls of two;
And fatefully could not make them both perfect!

I indeed plain prayed for Maud’s survival;
I cared not whose sons they might be;
Ah, but the twins were still sinning babies--as I comprehended,
For they were formed not from cells of mine!

Ah, Maud, Maud, Maud,
And during those last days she was cautiously ill;
And a drive of cholera had again grown widespread;
But she was not maddened; by it she was not marred.

She was sickened by temper still;
And the prince found dead, she grew more terrifyingly ill;
She had a pure heart, so she flourished not over the beast’s death;
Nonetheless, he remained the father of yon sickly offspring.

Ah, Maud, Maud, Maud,
I was duly growing perfectly anxious;
She was to give birth--ah, to those little ignoramuses;
And within a little chord in one or days of two--she would do so.

But without a father to care for her notorious sons;
And even I was locked away, and could not do so;
I was terrified, I was horribly undignified;
To learn this stern reality we were so sullenly faced with!

Ah, not now! I could not too believe my ears!
Maud and her children were dead--they’d been stillborn;
Before they left Maud alone to receive her fate;
Her locksmith would not come; he had another due in a nameless town.

By the time he arrived my darling had gone;
Perhaps she was now shimmering in heaven;
Enchanting her children with her enormous spells;
Narrating stories no plain human could ever tell.

Even in heaven my love would perhaps be famous;
Her tenderness would make other angels jealous;
And angered by envy, they would gather and complain to God;
How an earthly soul could be more vivacious than their heavenly were.

Ah, but where is Maud, Maud, Maud;
Maud and her chain of songs that were never to be broken;
Maud and her familiarity with gardens and blue lilies;
Maud and her immaculate pets of birds that still sweetly sing.

Ah, but where is my darling, my darling, my darling;
My eternal ocean, my hustling flowerbed, my immortal;
My poem, my enchanting lyric, my wedding ring;
My novelty, my merited charm, my eternal.

And now she was longing for her grave, as I’d been told;
For I’d been told by the dimmed torches and fuss and mirthless air outside;
By the endless wandering and the prince’s wails and wordless screams.
Ah, my Maud had now migrated from her life--but attained her freedom!

And he was thus unworthy of being in her heaven;
Her heaven where there would be me, her true love;
And thus he would be glad to greet his fires of hell;
He would marry an evil angel there--and make himself again full.

But I’d be with Maud, Maud, Maud and Maud;
I’d be again with my gem, indefatigable little darling;
Whose voice was unsure, whose poems were never known;
But ‘twas enough that they’d been known to me, her secret--ye’ dearest lover.

So took I, that spinning penchant and a circle of strings;
The edges I matched to the chains on my ceilings.
I braced myself for my very own fiery death;
But again, I’d be with Maud and death would no more, aye, be sad.

Thus the above poem was done by my spirit;
But with the same token and awe of genuineness and wit;
I feel tired--I shall close my eyes, and thus enjoy my heaven now;
For my wife and starlings are all waiting for me to-morrow.

It is now nighttime in heaven;
And there is indeed, no place on earth lovelier;
I gaze into my wife with a loving madness;
Her cheeks sweeter still, than any proudest swiftness.

I shall take my vow of marriage tomorrow;
My proud wife sitting in yon angelic chair by my side.
I shall cradle, then, those white little nuptial fairies;
They are Maud’s children’s, but lithe and gracious and bow to me in chaste mercies.

Ah, Maud, Maud, Maud, she is but all mine now;
I am still surprised now, as sitting by this heaven riverside.
One even grander than the one I’d had beside the lake;
Which I often farmed when I had needs to bake.

Ah, Maud, Maud, Maud, she is a ghost but as ever lively;
We are both dead but she boldly remaineth lovely;
I know she is worthier than serene jewels or mundane affairs;
And still she is worthier all the same, than any other terrific palace--or heir.

Ah, Maud, Maud, Maud, and this war is but all over now;
Thus let us dream dead of the exciting tomorrow.
We shall see life and our children grow;
We shall witness delight--and miracles none ever knows.

Lights dimmed
Red soft lights
Baroque colors everywhere
Like sipping wine in a coffin

Sweet, free, dead.

Like blood pouring out the vains
And it pains but there's no pain

A soft image of you.  Dark ...Slim ..
Distant.

Constantly there
In my head
Constantly out of reach
In my life

And if I can take in this *******, I would.
and if I can make it better, I would.
And if you're disappointed then let it be.  
Cause I made it be .

The rules and regulations put on me.
Renting a few moments of life, and a moment of you is what I need.
A moment I would pay morals for, disappointment for, guilt for.

Work, snakes, frienemies, money *****, white collar slavery, broken family, unwanted love, incapability, mistakes, lost.

But the image of you feels sweet.
A sweet maroon glass of wine
Divine
Mine ...
I wish

When the trees take root in the sky
And the planets rotate in the ground
The black bird sings a song of yellow
And the canary sings the mourning sound

We walk past where the sidewalk ends
And  transparent solid ground we fall
All green color eyes at our finger tips
Hour glass eyes falling past our closed toe call

Everything a dream
What we want things to be
For the attention of it
The reality is the worst
The real me is the worst me

Maroon painted on our sky
Green splashed our sea
Your octopus garden grows
As our river of fire flows
Flying through rock
And climbing over air
The impossible broken
My eyes woken

it wasn’t chaotic.
it was calm and serene,
like the ocean.
the soft pitter patter
of the rain on the roof,
and the cool air it brought.
it was a sip
of freshly brewed coffee,
natural with no additives,
whatsoever.
the gut feeling
of knowing where home was.
and that is how
you came into my life.


the star that shines the brightest
amongst the pitch black sky.
it’s the white cloud that outshines
all the gray and gloomy ones.
the perfect fit of the last piece
to the unfinished puzzle.
it's the warm, fuzzy feeling
of getting into bed
early on a Friday night.
and that is how it was
when I started loving you.


it’s like a deeply cut wound,
one that’s inundating
with crimson colored blood,
having a tinge of maroon.
it induces pain
with every inbreathe
and exhalation.
it manages to have
the appearance of a scar,
yet it still feels so fresh
like a bruise.
and that is how it felt
when you left.


it was filled with haze
and suffocation.
the uncontrollable fast paced beat
of your heart.
Mona Lisa's enigmatic smile,
one that is hardly understood
by majority of the world.
a bite of dark chocolate,
bitter and sweet.
and this is my survival.

In the deepest shade of maroon
The guitar was strumming and smoke was in the still air
The kind of air that only belonged to magnificent summer nights
Everyone was laughing
Passing around a bottle of red wine
Everyone mouths and hearts belonged to everyone
I think you should know that I believe in magic
Long blonde hair was messy in tangles
My Stomach was home to the beautiful knots
Flourished

hints of auburn drift creating a soft cadence against the autumn wind
almost heard in lieu 'tis felt somehow awakening souls buried long ago
giving birth to falling crimson leaves tinged with maroon and gold
abandoned dusty roads transform under enchanting spells cast by fall

burnt orange pumpkins standing solitary on wooden porches threaten to reveal
hidden secrets held by dusk’s luscious cinnamon seasoned air
once fulgent sunflowers begin to slumber softly beneath the harvest moon
whilst autumn’s trance brushes all it touches with honey colored hues

i stand pensive as an amber leaf gently twirling falls to the ground
bewitched by thine supernatural powers; thine gifted artist’s hand
who with one stroke turns to butter amber all that once was forest green
and imbues my soul with thine exalted essence forever ripening

©2016janetaylor

Hello soldier

you enlist today

goodbye soldier

you deploy today

to a well known battlefield

sanity

the enigmas written, engraved

by the lost; the many; the plenty

a never ending maze

your the frontlines

light em up

mess em up

deadly words **** by your fragile, breakable mind

at ease

no

your kamikaze mind

theyre strong

but we're stronger

hit the deck

brace for impact

your going home

no

death or glory

no

glory

fight because its instinct not orders

theyre scourge will prove faulty

we are united

we fight on!

we wont hurt anymore

we are free

in a world of peace, for peace

we stand

together

standing in puddles of our own maroon.

we stand.

Bow down to that maroon sundress,
That claimed many hearts and fame,
Rift aside the mysterious gloom,
Sorry the waves that has gone insane.
Shower the dust of breathing colours,
Wreck my boat of hope,
Glimpse the labels of your cold skin,
Tie me up by your robust rope.
Cut me deep, right my wrong,
Show my endless efforts a parade,
On a fair night, take a leap,
Swim with me in summer lemonade.
So ring the church bells hard and low,
This man had done a sin,
Fire the guns and leave me stranded,
I am high on your love gin.

SMOKE of the fields in spring is one,
Smoke of the leaves in autumn another.
Smoke of a steel-mill roof or a battleship funnel,
They all go up in a line with a smokestack,
Or they twist ... in the slow twist ... of the wind.
  
If the north wind comes they run to the south.
If the west wind comes they run to the east.
  By this sign
  all smokes
  know each other.
Smoke of the fields in spring and leaves in autumn,
Smoke of the finished steel, chilled and blue,
By the oath of work they swear: "I know you."
  
Hunted and hissed from the center
Deep down long ago when God made us over,
Deep down are the cinders we came from-
You and I and our heads of smoke.
  
Some of the smokes God dropped on the job
Cross on the sky and count our years
And sing in the secrets of our numbers;
Sing their dawns and sing their evenings,
Sing an old log-fire song:
  
You may put the damper up,
You may put the damper down,
The smoke goes up the chimney just the same.
  
Smoke of a city sunset skyline,
Smoke of a country dusk horizon-
  They cross on the sky and count our years.
  
Smoke of a brick-red dust
  Winds on a spiral
  Out of the stacks
For a hidden and glimpsing moon.
This, said the bar-iron shed to the blooming mill,
This is the slang of coal and steel.
The day-gang hands it to the night-gang,
The night-gang hands it back.
  
Stammer at the slang of this-
Let us understand half of it.
  In the rolling mills and sheet mills,
  In the harr and boom of the blast fires,
  The smoke changes its shadow
  And men change their shadow;
  A ******, a ***, a bohunk changes.
  
  A bar of steel-it is only
Smoke at the heart of it, smoke and the blood of a man.
A runner of fire ran in it, ran out, ran somewhere else,
And left-smoke and the blood of a man
And the finished steel, chilled and blue.
  
So fire runs in, runs out, runs somewhere else again,
And the bar of steel is a gun, a wheel, a nail, a shovel,
A rudder under the sea, a steering-gear in the sky;
And always dark in the heart and through it,
  Smoke and the blood of a man.
Pittsburg, Youngstown, Gary-they make their steel with men.
  
In the blood of men and the ink of chimneys
The smoke nights write their oaths:
Smoke into steel and blood into steel;
Homestead, Braddock, Birmingham, they make their steel with men.
Smoke and blood is the mix of steel.
  
  The birdmen drone
  in the blue; it is steel
  a motor sings and zooms.
  
Steel barb-wire around The Works.
Steel guns in the holsters of the guards at the gates of The Works.
Steel ore-boats bring the loads clawed from the earth by steel, lifted and lugged by arms of steel, sung on its way by the clanking clam-shells.
The runners now, the handlers now, are steel; they dig and clutch and haul; they hoist their automatic knuckles from job to job; they are steel making steel.
Fire and dust and air fight in the furnaces; the pour is timed, the billets wriggle; the clinkers are dumped:
Liners on the sea, skyscrapers on the land; diving steel in the sea, climbing steel in the sky.
  
Finders in the dark, you Steve with a dinner bucket, you Steve clumping in the dusk on the sidewalks with an evening paper for the woman and kids, you Steve with your head wondering where we all end up-
Finders in the dark, Steve: I hook my arm in cinder sleeves; we go down the street together; it is all the same to us; you Steve and the rest of us end on the same stars; we all wear a hat in hell together, in hell or heaven.
  
Smoke nights now, Steve.
Smoke, smoke, lost in the sieves of yesterday;
Dumped again to the scoops and hooks today.
Smoke like the clocks and whistles, always.
  Smoke nights now.
  To-morrow something else.
  
Luck moons come and go:
Five men swim in a *** of red steel.
Their bones are kneaded into the bread of steel:
Their bones are knocked into coils and anvils
And the ******* plungers of sea-fighting turbines.
Look for them in the woven frame of a wireless station.
So ghosts hide in steel like heavy-armed men in mirrors.
Peepers, skulkers-they shadow-dance in laughing tombs.
They are always there and they never answer.
  
One of them said: "I like my job, the company is good to me, America is a wonderful country."
One: "Jesus, my bones ache; the company is a liar; this is a free country, like hell."
One: "I got a girl, a peach; we save up and go on a farm and raise pigs and be the boss ourselves."
And the others were roughneck singers a long ways from home.
Look for them back of a steel vault door.
  
They laugh at the cost.
They lift the birdmen into the blue.
It is steel a motor sings and zooms.
  
In the subway plugs and drums,
In the slow hydraulic drills, in gumbo or gravel,
Under dynamo shafts in the webs of armature spiders,
They shadow-dance and laugh at the cost.
  
The ovens light a red dome.
Spools of fire wind and wind.
Quadrangles of crimson sputter.
The lashes of dying maroon let down.
Fire and wind wash out the ****.
Forever the **** gets washed in fire and wind.
The anthem learned by the steel is:
  Do this or go hungry.
Look for our rust on a plow.
Listen to us in a threshing-engine razz.
Look at our job in the running wagon wheat.
  
Fire and wind wash at the ****.
Box-cars, clocks, steam-shovels, churns, pistons, boilers, scissors-
Oh, the sleeping **** from the mountains, the ****-heavy pig-iron will go down many roads.
Men will stab and shoot with it, and make butter and tunnel rivers, and mow hay in swaths, and slit hogs and skin beeves, and steer airplanes across North America, Europe, Asia, round the world.
  
Hacked from a hard rock country, broken and baked in mills and smelters, the rusty dust waits
Till the clean hard weave of its atoms cripples and blunts the drills chewing a hole in it.
The steel of its plinths and flanges is reckoned, O God, in one-millionth of an inch.
  
Once when I saw the curves of fire, the rough scarf women dancing,
Dancing out of the flues and smoke-stacks-flying hair of fire, flying feet upside down;
Buckets and baskets of fire exploding and chortling, fire running wild out of the steady and fastened ovens;
Sparks cracking a harr-harr-huff from a solar-plexus of rock-ribs of the earth taking a laugh for themselves;
Ears and noses of fire, gibbering gorilla arms of fire, gold mud-pies, gold bird-wings, red jackets riding purple mules, scarlet autocrats tumbling from the humps of camels, assassinated czars straddling vermillion balloons;
I saw then the fires flash one by one: good-by: then smoke, smoke;
And in the screens the great sisters of night and cool stars, sitting women arranging their hair,
Waiting in the sky, waiting with slow easy eyes, waiting and half-murmuring:
  "Since you know all
  and I know nothing,
  tell me what I dreamed last night."
  
Pearl cobwebs in the windy rain,
in only a flicker of wind,
are caught and lost and never known again.
  
A pool of moonshine comes and waits,
but never waits long: the wind picks up
loose gold like this and is gone.
  
A bar of steel sleeps and looks slant-eyed
on the pearl cobwebs, the pools of moonshine;
sleeps slant-eyed a million years,
sleeps with a coat of rust, a vest of moths,
a shirt of gathering sod and loam.
  
The wind never bothers ... a bar of steel.
The wind picks only .. pearl cobwebs .. pools of moonshine.

charcoal
oxblood
poppy
pomegranate
maroon
cranberry
cherry
creams­icle
orange soda
saffron
lemon
egg yolk
buttermilk
sunflower
olive
forest
lime
mint
ice
blueberry
royal blue
navy
bubblegum
fuschia
salmon
grape
lavender
wine
chocolate
espresso

in a land
sacred & high

boots march in
carrying guns

****** the land
destroying her soul

maroon robes
ignite to the night

huge yellow canoes
float out to the world

can you not hear
all our cries from here?

.some sort of variation: the written and therefore... read... past and present making case... not so... easily... digested... and / or... marketed... when... encapsulated in a video... format... the written and the... much later... read... almost a colour... a pristine relief to masquerade... some sort of purple in a deepening plum of cherry... and giving it a name: burgundy... then again: that's also inquiring to ***** the "matter" with some plum... since when burgundy arrives... it's no maroon... hell no: concerning... fuchsia... burgundy and maroon are not... colour-statements... less... fluorescence... less... all that... otherwise... bothersome... haze and "jazz"...

i tried to sit through: mozart's magic flute...
being broadcast...
locktown: down down down...
          and somehow not out...
what's the half-terrible song
by falco...

   best known when cited by:
bloodhound gang....

i tried sitting through...
this... when genius meets "genius"...
this... one-time when german
took up... concerns for...
their expression of humour...
  the opera: singspiel... opéra comique...
the gods were somehow...
laughing: then... but fickle as they are...
i don't buy into either the joke
or... that... there's a somehow...
or this being... the classical:
           best kept: ortiface...
               rock me amadeus:
                 - 1782: marries constance...
     - 1784: mozart becomes a freemason
      - 1791: mozart composes the magic flute...

when did mozart compose the marriage of
figaro?                1786...
   the hidden depth of elevating
laughter...
        it's the magic flute... though...
but then... all this...
    verb-with-a-past-participle...
    to speak with a "future-past" presence
of a continuum:
              
  i tried sitting through mozart's magic
flute...
           but knowing the history...
this... wasn't... an ode to... the freemasons?
the magic flute is supposedly
magical than... first come first served...

papageno and the glockenspiel...
don quixote and the arrived at...
conquistador windmills...
                  
   i tried to sit through it...
i had to nip off to the bathroom
to play a game of "chess"
and *******...
because... as one has to...
check one's blood pressure...
check one's blood sugar level...
one just has to... *******...
whether there's a lover to be minded...
or... the taboo of *******...
or: inverted choc burning
the yeast buns via the oven
of ****!
                     this solo project:
this dodo project:
was always going to be...
an... irritating foundation stone
of: this is all modern...
the critique too...
hardly anticipating the norms
to be... antiquated and victorian...

          perhaps i couldn't sit through...
mozart's magic flute...
because... i just couldn't...
sit through... that sort of german best kept
secret: humour...
            
opera and the staging of humour...
i can somehow understand the...
solipsistic... autistic focus for stand-up...
comedy...
        singspiel... whenever that was
important...
           stand-up monologue humour
contra: the swizz cabaret...
        some variation of uncle voltaire...
and opera is her...
              loot...
   and all those... teasing at opera:
within the confines of: the suffix:
the opera-and-the-tics!
              
                kommen (sie) die stunde,
     die tag... die jetzt...
          eine jahreszeit...
                       besser gekleidet...

even when not living up to...
lye-v...
              canned laughter...
it's so vell Under's'tOOd...
          the jokes comes with a zeppelin...
and truance...
irritating sound...
the sound of a shattering of mirrors...
an irritating sound...
the sound of... biting fingernails...
an irritating sound...
    eating a ripe fruit like
it does resound...
performing oral *** on a ******...

            company on a tube...
relic of a journey...
  steppenwolf...
                 hessian bride... my most...
lacklustre improv. of retaining...
privy...
           commentary for...
thoese yet to be woken by...
           the... awaiting lost appetite for...
soap opera...
   clinging toward a kept...
routine... like brushing one's teeth...
which... opera per se...
isn't even... remotely... part of;

high-brow injustices of...
                          how will that make
you: yuppy-up...
leverage... a plateau... once more...
for me?

CHAPTER ONE: THE DEMISE OF A YOUNG GIRL SEPTEMBER 1975


I had not seen my father in over two years when he showed up at my mom and step dad's condo. He had a slick knack of disappearing when laws were broken and he was wanted for questioning. He had an even better ability to re-enter when the heat was off.

My father owned three nightclubs in Oklahoma City. His first was the Silver Sword, and then he opened The Red Slipper. After he met his second wife, they together, opened the Jade Club.

All were successful, but the Red Slipper had a reputation. On a rare occasion, my dad would take me with him to open up the place. At first, it scared me. It was so dark in there. But as the lights came on behind the bar, I fell in love with the atmosphere.

Bobby Orr’s hockey stick hung on the wall, along with an endearing note from F. Lee Bailey. At six years old, all I knew was that they were the objects that made my dad beam.

I learned to play pool by standing on a phone book. I watched the colorful smacking ***** bounce around the most beautiful color of green I had ever seen. Chalking the stick was a chore, but after nearly poking my eye out once, I soon caught on.

It was a struggle to climb up on a barstool, but it was worth the effort. I sat at the bar and had lunch: popcorn, pretzels, peanuts and Pepsi.

As I grew older, I saw less and less of him, until he became a stranger, drifting in every once in awhile.  Every few weeks or so, I would come home from school, and see his car in the driveway.

This always shot fear and excitement through me. The air of unpredictability always made me want to ***. Unfortunately, most of the time, we were locked out of the house for a few hours, so I would have to *** in the back yard or at the neighbors. We waited on the stairs for the front door to open. And it always did, by my mom. She usually looked satisfied and serene but other times, I saw dread and sadness on her face.

Ever since I could remember, my dad had been a string of disappointments for me with a few indescribable moments of pure enjoyment mixed in between He could be kind, funny and like a real dad sometimes, that was the dad I missed. I tried to hold onto those experiences, even though he was such a mean ******* most of the time. But mostly, I just didn't know him.

Their divorce became final around the summer of 1972, but that didn't stop my mom from loving him. I don't know why, but she chased him frequently, going out to bars with her friends, trying to get a glimpse of him, and maybe more.

The last time I’d seen my father had not been pleasant. When I was thirteen, he broke down the door to our apartment and went straight to my mother’s bedroom. The noises were terrifying. The screaming, and punching sounds were followed by my mother’s whimpering, begging, groveling.

"How dare you do this to me, Patsy!? And behind my back! You could have at least told me!"

My dad had bailed himself out of jail that night. She promised him she would never seek alimony or child support again. Her lawyer was wrong. It wasn’t worth getting killed over.  

Shortly after, he had to leave the state. It had something to do with a low-level mob deal involving an insurance fraud. Too bad, it involved burning a building with someone in it. My dad became nothing but a memory, which faded away over time.

**

Alcohol and tobacco were constants in my family, so when my older brother, Tim, started smoking at ten years old, I don't remember much protest from anyone. I was seven and when my sister Abby, turned ten the next year, she also started smoking.  All the older kids were smoking cigarettes. I wanted to be cool, so I puked and coughed as I practiced. By the time I was ten, I too, was inhaling properly.  Around that time, I was introduced to *** by my sister's boyfriend. It did help my mood, somewhat, but it wasn't enough.

By 1974, I was using drugs from my sister’s boyfriend. John was a true drugstore cowboy. At first, he committed burglaries, which were easy at the time. There were no sophisticated electronics to stop someone from cutting a hole in the roof of a pharmacy. It took only minutes to pry open the safe that contained the narcotics. Then it took maybe another minute to fill a pillowcase full of every variety of amphetamines, barbiturates, valiums, etc.

It wasn’t long before I graduated to using morphine, ******* and then overdosed on Demerol. My stepfather sent me to a treatment facility in Tulsa Oklahoma, about one hundred miles away from Oklahoma City. The Dillon treatment center didn’t accept clients under age of sixteen but made an exception with me. I was a walking-talking disastrous miracle...or a miraculously saved disaster.

They figured that since I was fourteen, the sooner the better to start my road to recovery. Apparently, they didn’t condone sneaking *** and valiums in to the facility. I was kicked out of Dillon after about a month.

I came back home and laid low. I went back to Hefner Jr. High and enrolled back into the ninth grade. I quietly picked up where I left off, going back into business with John. My job was to sell the safe stuff; valiums, seconols, white bennies, ***, etc.


Summer came; I turned fifteen and had developed a tendency to over test my wares. I overdosed and nearly died in the hospital several times, which had led to my current predicament. Nobody knew what to do with me.

In August, I entered the tenth grade...for two weeks. I was expelled, (you guessed it) for dealing drugs. I was on homebound teaching twice a week with little supervision. My mother worked, my step-dad, **** ,worked, and I was home all day. However, I was not just sitting idly around. I was into enterprise.

**

In September, I overdosed again. I was quickly killing myself and my mother didn’t know what to do to stop it. That is why what happened was not my mother’s fault. But it wasn’t my fault either.

I never figured out how he knew where we lived. My mother moved over at least fourteen times in between the time I was six and twelve years old. Yet, here he was, at our front door, with his undeniable ‘ah shucks’ charm. His modesty was convincing. His timing was incredible. My mother stood frozen, her mouth agape. **** took the lead. He placed himself between my mother and father.

“You must be Gary Don, my name is ****; I’m Patsy’s husband." **** had never met my dad, but he'd heard enough about him to surmise who was standing at the door.

"Um, yeah, I'm Gary Don, it's nice to meet you ****", he said; as he offered a friendly hand shake to ****.

"I hope I'm not interrupting you, I was just in Duncan with my parents and they suggested I stop by and talk with you before heading back west. It's about Susie....

"Yes, Patsy said you called yesterday. We weren't expecting you this soon, but it's no problem. Why don't you come in and tell us what your plans are? Patsy, honey, would you mind putting on a *** of coffee?”

This unfroze my mother and she scurried to the kitchen. I was still in shock at seeing my dad’s face. I retreated to the staircase, but poked my head around and caught him glance at me. I flew up to the landing. I could easily escape up the rest of the stairs to my bedroom.
I was small enough to remain hidden on the landing, and heard the conversation between my mother, my dad and ****. **** was the classiest, most even-tempered adult I had ever encountered. I wished I could stop hurting him and my mother.  

My mother sat down two cups of coffee on the dining room table where my dad and **** sat. As she retreated a few steps back into the kitchen, **** politely probed my dad. My dad had the right answer for every question.

He swore he was a completely different person. He had changed. He had no hard feelings, instead he was back to help. He was remorseful for being an absent father and he wanted to make things right. He was back for a reason. He had heard that I was in trouble with drugs and school and he felt guilty for that. He had the answer to my problems. He was so convincing, so….humble, almost shy.

As I listened, I began freaking out with fear and excitement. I always wanted my dad. The last time I tried to live with him, it didn’t work out; he sent me back to my mother’s after a month. Now my dad wanted me! He wanted to save me, take care of me!

He lived by himself now. He was the manager of The Palace Restaurant/Hotel in the little town of Raton, New Mexico. It was a refurbished hotel, built over a century ago The ground floor was an elegant bar and restaurant. He was making very good money, he paid no rent and he had an extra room for me.

With a population of 6000, it was not a place to continue a lucrative drug business. Also, he would enroll me into the little high school and I could get my diploma. I could work in the restaurant in the evenings where he would keep his eye on me. Then, there was the horse. He would buy me a horse. And on and on and on.

The logic and sincerity of his argument was convincing. So there it was. An hour later, my bags were packed. I was going to live with my father in New Mexico.

That’s how in September 1975, my father whisked me away from my home in Oklahoma City, under the guise of saving me from my own demise. I was stolen and held captive in Raton, New Mexico for what seemed like forever.

My dog, Baron was coming with me, I refused to go anywhere without him. He was a tiny black and tan Dachshund. I got him free when I was fourteen, when I got back from Tulsa. To me, he was priceless. He was my best friend. He couldn’t have weighed more than ten pounds, but his heart was huge.

I talked to him about everything and he consoled me by nodding, and licking me on the cheek non-stop…or he would admonish me through his expressions and demeanor. I had lived with Dachshunds since I was seven, so understood their language pretty well. Baron understood humans better. We developed a rare communication that worked well for both of us.
Herman, our older dachshund had greeted my dad cordially. Baron couldn’t figure this out, he expressed his apprehension. He looked at me and conveyed,

“Well, if Herman isn’t worried, I guess it’ll be Okay, right? Right, Susan?”

I was sorry I didn’t have an honest answer. I did my best to settle him.

“Sure, this’ll be fun, a whole new adventure!”

As we drove West, toward the Texas panhandle, Baron kept the conversation going by his curious interest expressed by wide eyes and attentive ears. My dad amazed him with his knowledge of history, geography, geology, astronomy, world geo-politics, weather, music on the radio, literature, mechanics, religion and countless other topics. I knew he was faking his fascination with my dad. He knew he was doing me a favor.

There was not a dead moment in the air. An occasional “really?” expressed by me was enough to keep my dad’s mouth running. I was thankful for that. It kept my attention away from my jangle of emotions. As we drove through the night, I was conflicted, scared, excited, happy and worried. I didn’t know where I was going, or who was driving me there.

My dad’s jovial demeanor comforted me. He made The Palace sound like the perfect place for his little princess.

When we arrived, it was late, after 10pm., Baron was exhausted. I stood on the corner and looked up. I gulped. The three-story building was like an old gothic castle. It was a huge rectangle with the front corner cut back with a fifth wall about ten feet wide. This provided the entrance with two giant oak doors. Baron was less than enthused by its foreboding appearance. I had to agree.

Dad ignored my hesitation. “Come on, you’re going to love this place!”

He pulled open one of the oak doors, which had to weigh at least five hundred pounds. I was hesitant, but thirsty. Baron’s squirming had started to annoy me. I went forward filled with adrenalin.

The initial entrance was a small round foyer with a domed ceiling of cut glass. It was about six feet round. As I stared up at the beautiful little pieces of color, I heard my dad chuckle.

“See? I told you, there’s no place like this!”

Then I saw the true entry to the bar, a set of small bat winged doors that swung back and forth. He pulled one of the doors back, beckoning me forward. He looked down at me with a tender expression.

“Welcome home, honey, this is home now.”

As we entered the bar, I was dumbstruck. Baron was not. I stepped back in time, to 1896, into The Palace Hotel.

The bar took up half of the first floor of the hotel. It was the most captivating centerpiece of the establishment. The mirror behind the bar was the longest continuous piece of reflection glass in all the states, the brochure proclaimed. A brass foot rail extended the length of the long cherry oak bar A few feet behind was a waist high railing just like the saloons in old John Wayne movies.

The carpet was a deep royal red interlaced with black swirly patterns. Bright golden paper covered the walls. It was smooth and shiny with raised curly designs made out of felt or maybe even velour. God, I just wanted to reach over and run my fingers across it!  

The wall opposite the bar had windows that were quizzically narrow and impossibly tall. Lush maroon velvet drapes adorned them, parted in the center to provide a view of the quaint town just beyond the sidewalk.

I looked up at the ornate ceiling, which seemed a mile above me. It was covered with tiles of little angels that all looked the same, yet different. The angels danced across the entire ceiling until it curved and met the wall. I got dizzy looking at them.

“You can’t find ceiling tiles like that anywhere! My dad grinned. “They’re covered in pure gold leaf!”

I didn’t know what pure gold leaf was, but the word ‘gold’ impressed me very much.

He introduced me to the staff. I l blushed when he said; “This is Susie, my favorite little girl!” I had never heard that before. The whole crew greeted me warmly, all smiles and friendliness.  

I always paid attention when Baron got nervous but I chose to ignore him. I jostled him in my arms. My stern look at him stopped his squiggling, but his look back conveyed that I was clueless.

I, however thought, Okay, I have died and gone to Heaven! I was enchanted. My fascination with this magical setting made me feel happy; I was in the neatest place I had ever seen. I’m going to love it here!

On the first night, my dad led me around the ground floor. The restaurant was as elegant as the bar. To the rear of the restaurant, there was a large commercial kitchen. Off the rear of the kitchen, he showed, me a short hallway to the back exit. To the right, a huge staircase led to the two upper floors of dilapidated hotel rooms. A manager’s apartment had been converted from several hotel rooms connected together on the second floor, just above the entrance to the hotel.

We ended up back in the bar and sat at a table for two. Crystal, the head bartender stayed on for a little while longer after the rest of the staff were allowed to go home.

Sitting at the table, he ordered Harvey’s Bristol Cream Sherry. I had never had Cream Sherry before, but it tasted like candy with nuts and I had no problem going through numerous rounds in a very short time. I was hungry but I was too nervous to eat.

Baron, however, was ravenous. My dad fed him little pieces filet mignon and French bread with real butter. He played cute for my dad, sitting up and begging. He jumped up, putting his paws on my dad’s leg, wagging his tail like crazy.

I was a little befuddled until I caught his sideways glance that said, “I do not like this guy, but I gotta eat, I’m starving. You’re the one falling into his into his trap, not me.”

Ouch. “Baron, sometimes I wish you would shut the hell up.”

After having his fill, he settled into a wary sleep on top of my feet. I never worried about losing Baron. Where I went, he went, period.

I wasn’t aware when the bartender left. The bottle was on the table before I knew it; he kept my glass full. I was five feet tall and weighed 106 pounds. I had a lethal level of alcohol pulsing threw my entire body…and I had my daddy.

I was in a haze. Actually, it was more of a daze than a haze. My vision was

In June this year, designer Masaba Gupta and film producer Madhu Mantena had the quietest of civil ceremonies. It was only when she took to Twitter the next day to talk about the court registry that most people heard of it. It was a move most unorthodox, for a leading fashion designer, especially one who counts several Bollywood actors among her close friends.

At the time, she also announced “a Caribbean wedding in November”.

The destination wedding isn’t happening. But that’s not to deprive us of a grand, four-day affair, the sort that has the most coveted guest list, and is followed with the keenest interest. It will start on November 19, with the bridal showers, will continue with the mehendi on November 20, the sangeet on November 21 and a gala reception on Sunday, (November 22). Expect the works, and guest lists that boast of Bollywood A-listers (Shahid and Mira Kapoor, and Sonam Kapoor are close friends, just so you know).

In short, it sounds like any other grand Indian celebrity wedding. Except, this is Masaba Gupta we’re talking about. As we catch up with her, we get the sense that she’s approached the whole thing with the same minimalism and quirkiness with which she approaches fashion. “A lot of people are invited,” she tells us, “But I’m not going around and talking about my wedding designer or my lipstick, so on and so forth.”

Unlike most Indian brides, she’s not even fretting over the big day, or days, as it were. “When I was growing up, I always saw brides around me under tremendous stress. The pressure to dress a certain way, wear a certain amount of jewellery and make-up... I saw how uncomfortable it was. So I decided that, if I do get married, I’ll be someone who puts comfort first, and then looks at her options for cut, colour, embroidery or jewellery,” says Gupta.

So, in case you do find yourself invited (otherwise, there’s always Instagram), don’t be surprised to see the most relaxed bride, dressed so comfortably that she’d be the envy of any married Indian woman. The idea, she says, is that a bride should “dress in a way that she can interact with people and have a good time herself.”

She’s also taken charge of the whole thing, and planned a non-fussy, non-extravagant celebration. “For me, three vacations is more value-for-money than a mandap with diamonds on it.”

True to her word, for her sangeet and reception, Gupta is ditching the norm of heavily designed lehengas and saris. “I didn’t go into that heavy, couture, bridal space. And I’m the kind of designer who wears works of other designers,” she says. So, her trousseau will have outfits by several other leading designers. “There are a few people who are great at doing certain things. Anamika [Khanna] is great at reception outfits. I can do a cool, quirky mehendi outfit. For a sangeet, somebody more in the Manish Arora or Shivan and Narresh kind of space,” she says.

The designer who’s always stood apart also seems keen to set an example. By not conforming to rules, Gupta wants to make a point. “I do want it to be about comfort, but I also want to change things up a bit. I want to set an example and say that you don’t need to wear a certain colour, a certain type of maang tika; your hair doesn’t have to look a particular way,” says the young designer.

Ask her if this is the (unconventional) dream wedding come true, and she laughs. “I never had a dream wedding. I’ve never visualised anything except clothes. Certainly not an elaborate wedding setup. See, I just don’t want to starve at my wedding. So, my dream wedding is one where I get to eat a meal while everyone else enjoys themselves as well.”

Masaba’s five-point guide to a chilled-out wedding

1) Get people to help out. If you try and look at every detail, you’re going to have a hard time. You may have a great input, but get people to do it for you.

2)People think you should shop for jewellery and clothes much in advance, but I think it should be done as close to the wedding as possible. You’ll have the latest stuff, and your taste might change over time. It’s best done around the wedding, so you don’t regret what you’ve bought.

3) Shoes are important. Make sure you’re in comfortable heels or flats, so you can survive the night.

4) Always test the make-up artist. Don’t just do a demo and leave it; test it through the day. See how the make-up behaves over a few hours, then you’ll know what it will actually be like, because it takes a couple of hours for make-up to set.

5) Receptions should start becoming more informal. You shouldn’t have to have the couple on stage smiling through the evening. I’ve heard of brides getting locked jaws. It’s absolute torture.

How to be the unconventional groom

• Fusion looks work well. If you’re wearing a Jodhpuri or a bandhgala, team it up with Jodhpuri pants. For men who are slimmer, suits do wonders.

• If you wish to be quirky and know you can carry it off, team dhoti pants and a shirt with a really formal blazer and a brooch.


• I love the cropped, ankle-length formal pants men are wearing now. It’s great for a reception.

• You don’t need to wear laced up shoes. Wear a nice slip-on in patent leather or a printed pair of shoes that stand out. So, you can make the whole look black and white, and have a nice pop shoe and make that the focus.

• Don’t be afraid of colours at your wedding. Get over navy blue, black or maroon. On a darker man, a haldi yellow kurta will look fantastic when teamed with an off-white or cream churidar. Even a soft pink in raw silk — it has a silver-pink shine — looks lovely.

How to be the ‘in vogue’ bride

• We’re seeing a lot of shapewear backs. Instead of the flared lehenga, women are opting for the fishtail cuts. Girls are also wearing shararas with big flares that almost look like a lehenga.

• Brides are going minimal. Go for less embellishment, and lighter lehengas.

• The dupatta is being ditched. Either that, or it’s attached. Much easier to handle.

• The choli is becoming more modest. People are wearing longer lengths, which are more fitted; the ‘60s style kurtas with shararas are also in. There’s more focus on the body and shape.

• I’m hoping the anarkali has died. It’s the worst of the lot. And it’s not very flattering. If you’re very skinny and tall, it works for you. If you’re short, you look like you’re lost in your outfit.

• Ditch the trail. At the end of the night, it’s a rag. It’s been stepped on and is *****.

read more:www.marieaustralia.com/mermaid-trumpet-formal-dresses

www.marieaustralia.com/cheap-formal-dresses

I’m thinking now of my childhood
Of Dinky toys and a bright shiny trike
I travelled for miles going nowhere
On that beautiful three-wheeled bike.
It even had a boot on the back
Like a bread bin between the wheels
That I used to fill with books and toys
Only opened to best friend’s appeals.
The bike was bright red and I loved it
I raced round on it every day
Until that time when I was just too big
And the bike was taken away.
I missed that old red tricycle
It had been my companion for a while
But the two-wheeled cycle that Dad got
Soon turned my lips up in a smile.
It was a second-hand bike and quite grown-up
Hand-painted the darkest maroon
And I rode it for miles, this time with my dad
But it’s fun-giving days went too soon.
My next bike was blue, and a racer
Derailleur gears numbered ten
I wanted to ride out again with my dad
But he’d cycled his last before then.
My dad rode a bike for the whole of his life
Yet he never reached fifty-three
When I’m on a bike now, cycling along
I think of him riding with me.

©Joe Wilson – Riding a bike with my dad…2015

CHAPTER ONE: THE DEMISE OF A YOUNG GIRL SEPTEMBER 1975


I had not seen my father in over two years when he showed up at my mom and step dad's condo. He had a slick knack of disappearing when laws were broken and he was wanted for questioning. He had an even better ability to re-enter when the heat was off.

My father owned three nightclubs in Oklahoma City. His first was the Silver Sword, and then he opened The Red Slipper. After he met his second wife, they together, opened the Jade Club.

All were successful, but the Red Slipper had a reputation. On a rare occasion, my dad would take me with him to open up the place. At first, it scared me. It was so dark in there. But as the lights came on behind the bar, I fell in love with the atmosphere.

Bobby Orr’s hockey stick hung on the wall, along with an endearing note from F. Lee Bailey. At six years old, all I knew was that they were the objects that made my dad beam.

I learned to play pool by standing on a phone book. I watched the colorful smacking ***** bounce around the most beautiful color of green I had ever seen. Chalking the stick was a chore, but after nearly poking my eye out once, I soon caught on.

It was a struggle to climb up on a barstool, but it was worth the effort. I sat at the bar and had lunch: popcorn, pretzels, peanuts and Pepsi.

As I grew older, I saw less and less of him, until he became a stranger, drifting in every once in awhile.  Every few weeks or so, I would come home from school, and see his car in the driveway.

This always shot fear and excitement through me. The air of unpredictability always made me want to ***. Unfortunately, most of the time, we were locked out of the house for a few hours, so I would have to *** in the back yard or at the neighbors. We waited on the stairs for the front door to open. And it always did, by my mom. She usually looked satisfied and serene but other times, I saw dread and sadness on her face.

Ever since I could remember, my dad had been a string of disappointments for me with a few indescribable moments of pure enjoyment mixed in between He could be kind, funny and like a real dad sometimes, that was the dad I missed. I tried to hold onto those experiences, even though he was such a mean ******* most of the time. But mostly, I just didn't know him.

Their divorce became final around the summer of 1972, but that didn't stop my mom from loving him. I don't know why, but she chased him frequently, going out to bars with her friends, trying to get a glimpse of him, and maybe more.

The last time I’d seen my father had not been pleasant. When I was thirteen, he broke down the door to our apartment and went straight to my mother’s bedroom. The noises were terrifying. The screaming, and punching sounds were followed by my mother’s whimpering, begging, groveling.

"How dare you do this to me, Patsy!? And behind my back! You could have at least told me!"

My dad had bailed himself out of jail that night. She promised him she would never seek alimony or child support again. Her lawyer was wrong. It wasn’t worth getting killed over.  

Shortly after, he had to leave the state. It had something to do with a low-level mob deal involving an insurance fraud. Too bad, it involved burning a building with someone in it. My dad became nothing but a memory, which faded away over time.

**

Alcohol and tobacco were constants in my family, so when my older brother, Tim, started smoking at ten years old, I don't remember much protest from anyone. I was seven and when my sister Abby, turned ten the next year, she also started smoking.  All the older kids were smoking cigarettes. I wanted to be cool, so I puked and coughed as I practiced. By the time I was ten, I too, was inhaling properly.  Around that time, I was introduced to *** by my sister's boyfriend. It did help my mood, somewhat, but it wasn't enough.

By 1974, I was using drugs from my sister’s boyfriend. John was a true drugstore cowboy. At first, he committed burglaries, which were easy at the time. There were no sophisticated electronics to stop someone from cutting a hole in the roof of a pharmacy. It took only minutes to pry open the safe that contained the narcotics. Then it took maybe another minute to fill a pillowcase full of every variety of amphetamines, barbiturates, valiums, etc.

It wasn’t long before I graduated to using morphine, ******* and then overdosed on Demerol. My stepfather sent me to a treatment facility in Tulsa Oklahoma, about one hundred miles away from Oklahoma City. The Dillon treatment center didn’t accept clients under age of sixteen but made an exception with me. I was a walking-talking disastrous miracle...or a miraculously saved disaster.

They figured that since I was fourteen, the sooner the better to start my road to recovery. Apparently, they didn’t condone sneaking *** and valiums in to the facility. I was kicked out of Dillon after about a month.

I came back home and laid low. I went back to Hefner Jr. High and enrolled back into the ninth grade. I quietly picked up where I left off, going back into business with John. My job was to sell the safe stuff; valiums, seconols, white bennies, ***, etc.


Summer came; I turned fifteen and had developed a tendency to over test my wares. I overdosed and nearly died in the hospital several times, which had led to my current predicament. Nobody knew what to do with me.

In August, I entered the tenth grade...for two weeks. I was expelled, (you guessed it) for dealing drugs. I was on homebound teaching twice a week with little supervision. My mother worked, my step-dad, **** ,worked, and I was home all day. However, I was not just sitting idly around. I was into enterprise.

**

In September, I overdosed again. I was quickly killing myself and my mother didn’t know what to do to stop it. That is why what happened was not my mother’s fault. But it wasn’t my fault either.

I never figured out how he knew where we lived. My mother moved over at least fourteen times in between the time I was six and twelve years old. Yet, here he was, at our front door, with his undeniable ‘ah shucks’ charm. His modesty was convincing. His timing was incredible. My mother stood frozen, her mouth agape. **** took the lead. He placed himself between my mother and father.

“You must be Gary Don, my name is ****; I’m Patsy’s husband." **** had never met my dad, but he'd heard enough about him to surmise who was standing at the door.

"Um, yeah, I'm Gary Don, it's nice to meet you ****", he said; as he offered a friendly hand shake to ****.

"I hope I'm not interrupting you, I was just in Duncan with my parents and they suggested I stop by and talk with you before heading back west. It's about Susie....

"Yes, Patsy said you called yesterday. We weren't expecting you this soon, but it's no problem. Why don't you come in and tell us what your plans are? Patsy, honey, would you mind putting on a *** of coffee?”

This unfroze my mother and she scurried to the kitchen. I was still in shock at seeing my dad’s face. I retreated to the staircase, but poked my head around and caught him glance at me. I flew up to the landing. I could easily escape up the rest of the stairs to my bedroom.
I was small enough to remain hidden on the landing, and heard the conversation between my mother, my dad and ****. **** was the classiest, most even-tempered adult I had ever encountered. I wished I could stop hurting him and my mother.  

My mother sat down two cups of coffee on the dining room table where my dad and **** sat. As she retreated a few steps back into the kitchen, **** politely probed my dad. My dad had the right answer for every question.

He swore he was a completely different person. He had changed. He had no hard feelings, instead he was back to help. He was remorseful for being an absent father and he wanted to make things right. He was back for a reason. He had heard that I was in trouble with drugs and school and he felt guilty for that. He had the answer to my problems. He was so convincing, so….humble, almost shy.

As I listened, I began freaking out with fear and excitement. I always wanted my dad. The last time I tried to live with him, it didn’t work out; he sent me back to my mother’s after a month. Now my dad wanted me! He wanted to save me, take care of me!

He lived by himself now. He was the manager of The Palace Restaurant/Hotel in the little town of Raton, New Mexico. It was a refurbished hotel, built over a century ago The ground floor was an elegant bar and restaurant. He was making very good money, he paid no rent and he had an extra room for me.

With a population of 6000, it was not a place to continue a lucrative drug business. Also, he would enroll me into the little high school and I could get my diploma. I could work in the restaurant in the evenings where he would keep his eye on me. Then, there was the horse. He would buy me a horse. And on and on and on.

The logic and sincerity of his argument was convincing. So there it was. An hour later, my bags were packed. I was going to live with my father in New Mexico.

That’s how in September 1975, my father whisked me away from my home in Oklahoma City, under the guise of saving me from my own demise. I was stolen and held captive in Raton, New Mexico for what seemed like forever.

My dog, Baron was coming with me, I refused to go anywhere without him. He was a tiny black and tan Dachshund. I got him free when I was fourteen, when I got back from Tulsa. To me, he was priceless. He was my best friend. He couldn’t have weighed more than ten pounds, but his heart was huge.

I talked to him about everything and he consoled me by nodding, and licking me on the cheek non-stop…or he would admonish me through his expressions and demeanor. I had lived with Dachshunds since I was seven, so understood their language pretty well. Baron understood humans better. We developed a rare communication that worked well for both of us.
Herman, our older dachshund had greeted my dad cordially. Baron couldn’t figure this out, he expressed his apprehension. He looked at me and conveyed,

“Well, if Herman isn’t worried, I guess it’ll be Okay, right? Right, Susan?”

I was sorry I didn’t have an honest answer. I did my best to settle him.

“Sure, this’ll be fun, a whole new adventure!”

As we drove West, toward the Texas panhandle, Baron kept the conversation going by his curious interest expressed by wide eyes and attentive ears. My dad amazed him with his knowledge of history, geography, geology, astronomy, world geo-politics, weather, music on the radio, literature, mechanics, religion and countless other topics. I knew he was faking his fascination with my dad. He knew he was doing me a favor.

There was not a dead moment in the air. An occasional “really?” expressed by me was enough to keep my dad’s mouth running. I was thankful for that. It kept my attention away from my jangle of emotions. As we drove through the night, I was conflicted, scared, excited, happy and worried. I didn’t know where I was going, or who was driving me there.

My dad’s jovial demeanor comforted me. He made The Palace sound like the perfect place for his little princess.

When we arrived, it was late, after 10pm., Baron was exhausted. I stood on the corner and looked up. I gulped. The three-story building was like an old gothic castle. It was a huge rectangle with the front corner cut back with a fifth wall about ten feet wide. This provided the entrance with two giant oak doors. Baron was less than enthused by its foreboding appearance. I had to agree.

Dad ignored my hesitation. “Come on, you’re going to love this place!”

He pulled open one of the oak doors, which had to weigh at least five hundred pounds. I was hesitant, but thirsty. Baron’s squirming had started to annoy me. I went forward filled with adrenalin.

The initial entrance was a small round foyer with a domed ceiling of cut glass. It was about six feet round. As I stared up at the beautiful little pieces of color, I heard my dad chuckle.

“See? I told you, there’s no place like this!”

Then I saw the true entry to the bar, a set of small bat winged doors that swung back and forth. He pulled one of the doors back, beckoning me forward. He looked down at me with a tender expression.

“Welcome home, honey, this is home now.”

As we entered the bar, I was dumbstruck. Baron was not. I stepped back in time, to 1896, into The Palace Hotel.

The bar took up half of the first floor of the hotel. It was the most captivating centerpiece of the establishment. The mirror behind the bar was the longest continuous piece of reflection glass in all the states, the brochure proclaimed. A brass foot rail extended the length of the long cherry oak bar A few feet behind was a waist high railing just like the saloons in old John Wayne movies.

The carpet was a deep royal red interlaced with black swirly patterns. Bright golden paper covered the walls. It was smooth and shiny with raised curly designs made out of felt or maybe even velour. God, I just wanted to reach over and run my fingers across it!  

The wall opposite the bar had windows that were quizzically narrow and impossibly tall. Lush maroon velvet drapes adorned them, parted in the center to provide a view of the quaint town just beyond the sidewalk.

I looked up at the ornate ceiling, which seemed a mile above me. It was covered with tiles of little angels that all looked the same, yet different. The angels danced across the entire ceiling until it curved and met the wall. I got dizzy looking at them.

“You can’t find ceiling tiles like that anywhere! My dad grinned. “They’re covered in pure gold leaf!”

I didn’t know what pure gold leaf was, but the word ‘gold’ impressed me very much.

He introduced me to the staff. I l blushed when he said; “This is Susie, my favorite little girl!” I had never heard that before. The whole crew greeted me warmly, all smiles and friendliness.  

I always paid attention when Baron got nervous but I chose to ignore him. I jostled him in my arms. My stern look at him stopped his squiggling, but his look back conveyed that I was clueless.

I, however thought, Okay, I have died and gone to Heaven! I was enchanted. My fascination with this magical setting made me feel happy; I was in the neatest place I had ever seen. I’m going to love it here!

On the first night, my dad led me around the ground floor. The restaurant was as elegant as the bar. To the rear of the restaurant, there was a large commercial kitchen. Off the rear of the kitchen, he showed, me a short hallway to the back exit. To the right, a huge staircase led to the two upper floors of dilapidated hotel rooms. A manager’s apartment had been converted from several hotel rooms connected together on the second floor, just above the entrance to the hotel.

We ended up back in the bar and sat at a table for two. Crystal, the head bartender stayed on for a little while longer after the rest of the staff were allowed to go home.

Sitting at the table, he ordered Harvey’s Bristol Cream Sherry. I had never had Cream Sherry before, but it tasted like candy with nuts and I had no problem going through numerous rounds in a very short time. I was hungry but I was too nervous to eat.

Baron, however, was ravenous. My dad fed him little pieces filet mignon and French bread with real butter. He played cute for my dad, sitting up and begging. He jumped up, putting his paws on my dad’s leg, wagging his tail like crazy.

I was a little befuddled until I caught his sideways glance that said, “I do not like this guy, but I gotta eat, I’m starving. You’re the one falling into his into his trap, not me.”

Ouch. “Baron, sometimes I wish you would shut the hell up.”

After having his fill, he settled into a wary sleep on top of my feet. I never worried about losing Baron. Where I went, he went, period.

I wasn’t aware when the bartender left. The bottle was on the table before I knew it; he kept my glass full. I was five feet tall and weighed 106 pounds. I had a lethal level of alcohol pulsing threw my entire body…and I had my daddy.

I was in a haze. Actually, it was more of a daze than a haze. My vision was

Thread knuckles into notches of your spine,
you were mine.
Held down as carotid fought hard,
to keep open your eye.
Staring vivid as clouds overtook.
I can taste you through your musk,
hear the quivering in your thigh.

Stomach acids crawled into your nose,
and petals bloom. Belly aflame,
throat bleat with each beat.
As vision tunneled from expanse
to pinhole spindle of our room.
Bared teeth like a wild animal,
eyes wide with excitement.

If you could breathe a word your smile soon'd fade.
Porcelain comtesse *** undress with maroon'd face.

It all began when someone left the window open.
The love bird cocked its bright green head at the shut door of Woodren’s third floor bedroom, perched on her bedpost. Its bright black eyes glittered, listening for the sounds of Woodren’s footsteps. None came. It ruffled its feathers impatiently; waiting for Woodren to come back with some water for its thirsty beak.
The love bird’s first memory was of Woodren: her clear gray eyes expressing her great happiness through them and not through the tiny curve of a smile on her thin pale lips. Her small white fingers pressed on the syringe gently, and a hot, mushy substance that tasted of apples and bananas went down its throat. The tiny black beak clattered against the plastic syringe greedily. “Aw, you poor baby. You’re hungry aren’t you, my Hoopsie-girl?” she murmured.
She then later taught her baby lovebird to fly with the patience of a mother. As soon as its wings started flapping feebly, she lifted Hoopsie up on the palm of her hand above her head and drew her hand away quickly, teaching the lovebird to fly and landing on Woodren’s soft bed. On cold nights, Woodren would wrap her favorite emerald green scarf around Hoopsie and place her behind the television where it was always warm and sellotape the electric sockets and wires so that Hoopsie was safe.
Woodren never even considered snipping the feathers of Hoopsie’s wings; she would never hurt her darling creature, and snip of its greatest glory. She would comb the feathers with a miniature pink Barbie brush, noticing how blue feathers had started to appear on Hoopsie’s wings and red ones slowly layered beneath the blue as time went by.
Showering Hoopsie was the hardest of all. Aunt and Uncle Palmer had no idea that Hoopsie even existed and revealing her presence would leave both Hoopsie and Woodren with no home. Late at night, Woodren would have to sneak out to the bathroom on the first floor (not on the second floor because that one was right next to Aunt and Uncle Palmer’s bedroom), down the stairs (taking care to step over the thirteenth stair that groaned so loudly), turn on the taps quietly and wash a sleepy Hoopsie with warm water.
Her two youngest cousins often made fun of her for the funny smell that stuck on her clothes sometimes. Linda and Lucy, her bratty twin cousins, asked in their scornful sing-song voices, “Why do you lock your room Woodren? Scared we’ll find all your old ***** clothes under the bed that you wouldn’t let Ma throw away?”
“No, maybe she’s scared we’ll find naughty magazines? If we do, we’ll tell Pa and you’ll have nowhere to stay ‘cause Pa says that type of behavior is sinful and he won’t tolerate it in his house!”
Woodren found it in her heart to look upon her silly cousins as childish entertainment. What did they know of the love she had for Hoopsie? “No, I’m scared you’ll find the monster under my bed and start crying for your Ma”
Linda narrowed her blue eyes, “I’m telling Ma you mentioned Lucy’s fear of the monster under the bed to her face! Besides, you don’t have anywhere else to go. You live on Pa’s charity. Ma said so.”
It was the lowest of insults based on a harsh truth. Woodren’s mother had died of cancer when Woodren was very young and her father followed her mother not a year after with heart grief. Her mother had asked her younger sister to take in Woodren; they were her only relatives and had stopped being fond of her once their own two twin daughters arrived and Mr. Palmer started to have to work harder to feed the six bellies at his dinner table. She just became another mouth to feed.
The only person Woodren got along well with in the household was her eldest cousin, Max. Max rarely spoke in anything but grunts, thought of his two little sisters as annoying brats, refused to say more than two sentences at a time to his simpering mother and loudly obnoxious father and often came and sat in Woodren’s room with his large feet against the wall, stroking Hoopsie’s head in silence. She really was fond of Max sometimes. He could be so thoughtful. Just two weeks before, for her birthday, Max had bought her maroon silk curtains with white birds imprinted upon them. He had even gone further than that and stitched in white thread, “Happy birthday. I love you” a red wonky heart followed and then “From Hoopsie.” Simply imagining him sitting there with a huge, thick curtain holding a tiny needle in his bear-like paws, cursing as he stabbed his rough fingertips and fumbling clumsily made her shout with laughter.
It was Max’s idea to buy Hoopsie a big metal cage and attach it to a branch on the big tree in their garden with a piece of shoelace, hidden among all the green leaves. That way, when Hoopsie sang Woodren wouldn’t have to blast her music and radio at the same time or pinch Hoopsie’s beaks shut when her Aunt or Uncle come to  yell at her if she was deaf or crazy or both. And that way, Woodren’s room wouldn’t have its twangy smell of bird **** and Woodren wouldn’t have to be paranoid all day long at school, wondering if nosy Aunt Palmer had broken into her room and found Hoopsie. And that way, she could leave her window open during the day, trying to rid her room off the nutty, sugary smell.
Max’s room was on the same floor as Woodren, the third floor. Every morning, bright and early before school, Woodren would run with a small lump in her sweater and the keys to her locked room jingling on her wrists to Max’s room. Max would barely acknowledge her as she ran across his room, opened his window and climbed out like a monkey to the branch that pushed against his window sill. She crawled along it with speed and sat there, with her legs hanging down and the branch between her legs, fumbled for the cage door above her head, made sure there was enough water and food to last Hoopsie for the day, popped Hoopsie inside with a quick kiss, arranged the fan-like fresh morning-smell leaves to cover the cage completely and skate back towards Max’s window.
Hoopsie mourned with a few high whistling notes. She hated being away from Woodren during the day- waiting for the moment when the sun was getting hot, and Hoopsie was tired of chatting to the birds in the nearby trees, when Woodren’s sharp little white face with its explosion of frizzy black hair would appear in between the leaves with her happy grey eyes and let her fly around the tree before calling, “Hoopsie” followed by her signature tilting whistle. But for now, and for every morning till noon, Hoopsie would have to wait.
“You don’t think they’ll find her do you?” Woodren would ask Max as she clambered back into his window. It was their daily morning ritual.
“No. Pa told Ma that it’s all about privacy now that I’m a growing-up boy. I’ll lock my door; promise.” He would reply back, completing their ritual.
“Are you still eating lunch with that Ed kid?” he asked, completely breaking their ritual this morning.
“Yes.” She was completely surprised. Not only was Max breaking a routine, Max of all people, he was doing so by asking her a question about her personal life.
Woodren eyed Max strangely. To her, Max was her huge cousin that somehow managed to communicate with a variety of different grunts and hated cutting his hair because of his fear of sharp objects; but to the rest of the school and neighborhood, she knew Max was the “strong and silent” handsome tall boy, every girl’s dream, with his shaggy blonde hair.
“Why?” her gray eyes grew rounder when suspicious instead of narrowing.  
“You don’t have many friends at school.”
“You know I don’t get along with any of them but Ed. I don’t like being friends with people unless I actually like them… unlike all the other girls at school.”
“I don’t like you staying around the Ed kid too much.”
Woodren felt a little glow of affection for Max in her heart. She understood why Max was worried. Ed was unstable with the rest of the world. He did what he wanted to, he said exactly what he wanted to and he wasn’t afraid of anything because he didn’t care what anyone said. He was the kid that the no parents wanted their children to stay near. There wasn’t anything Ed hadn’t done before.
Despite what everyone else thought, Woodren knew that his morals and sense of good and justice were strong in his heart. And when it came to Woodren he was always there for her since he moved to the neighborhood more than half a year ago. No matter how many offending remarks he made, she felt he had become the only stable thing in her life in spite of him being so apt to change. She had learned to depend on him.  
At the breakfast table, Woodren’s gray eyes slid over from Linda to Lucy to Aunt Palmer to Uncle Palmer and rested on Max the longest. Until she had come to look at Max, all four of them were identical in their attractive features and identical in their pinched-up, suspicious and petty expressions glazed over with a courteous mask. Max’s blue eyes, though the same shape as Aunt Palmer’s and the same color as Uncle Palmer’s, expressed a good heart and sincerity.
Her first subject of the day was an art lesson. All she had to do was sit comfortably, a palette with swirls of colors, paintbrushes, charcoals and pencils, a *** of water, and a fresh-smelling page. Usually she drew herself as a monster, or Linda as the devil- disturbing pictures that made people believe she was “talented”. But today, it came to her all of a sudden she’d never done a good, worthwhile painting of Hoopsie. Sure, her tables and notebooks were filled with carvings she’d doodled in class but never something she would want to keep.
She started to sketch Hoopsie on her bed post, eyeing the nuts Woodren had stolen from Aunt Palmer’s snack cupboard. She drew Hoopsie in the big tree and painted a metal cage around her. Somehow, the silver cage ruined the picture completely, making Woodren grimace. When the paint dried, she erased Hoopsie from inside the cage and drew her beside it, her small black feet gripping a twig.
Woodren remembered how elegant birds looked when she looked up into the sky, and saw them with their wings spread out and imagined feeling the wind rush through her feathers and ripple down her head and spine, with a heaven of azure blue surrounding her, shooting through clouds cold and refreshing like a sprinkler in the garden. Maybe that’s what freedom tasted like. She tried drawing Hoopsie soaring in the sky before she realized she’d never seen Hoopsie soar like other birds do, because Hoopsie had never done so.
Broodingly, she packed up when class was dismissed, slowly and thoughtfully. Somehow, that small beginning of a painting had darkened her frame of mind completely. Still ruminating, she headed down the hall way to eat lunch.
“Woody!” Hearing the sound of that voice, she momentarily forget her unease and Woodren’s thin, pale lips spread in a smile even before she turned around to him. Ed was the only one who ever called her that. His oval head was covered in small black bristles and one of his black eyebrows rose as he smirked with his pink lips curving down. The diamond earring in his ear glinted like his teeth did. He caught her eyes with his hazel ones; his eyes were warm and lively.  His mouth formed words that were witty and charming and could always make Woodren laugh.
Woodren put a look of amazement on her face. “You came to school today.”
“What are you talking about? I’ve been coming to school nearly all month.”
“That’s why I’m surprised.”
He hit her arm lightly. A few girls nearby turned around and giggled when they caught Ed’s eyes. Woodren remembered when Ed had first come to school. All the prettiest girls at school kept sidling over to him and batting their eyelashes. Ed had taken one look at the curves on their bodies; his eyes flickered over their face, a little bored, and continued his conversation with Woodren as if there had been no interruption.
It was a mark of their friendship three weeks later when she told him about her family. His hazel eyes had burnt hotly. When he was angry, his voice was quieter, but strained as if the passionate anger behind the words were being controlled with the greatest effort, “People who ruin other people’s happiness on purpose and with joy are just plain evil.” He told her that he hated the monsters that kidnapped children, crippled them, not only in body but mind too, and forced them to beg, far away from those that loved them. Here followed a stream of facts, all said in the same tone that both scared and impressed Woodren.
“How do you know so much about it?” she had once asked him.
He looked at her with an odd gleam in his eyes, “Because I care.”
Now he was looking at her without breaking his gaze, the same odd gleam in his eyes, searching her face. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” She had still been brooding over Hoopsie in a cage, and why the picture upset her so much.
“Woody, tell me what’s wrong.”
Every time Woodren mentioned Hoopsie, Ed would go silent or make an offending remark about the way that Woodren took care of Hoopsie. Over a very short time, Woodren had learned never to mention Hoopsie’s name and though it drove her crazy with frustration, she knew Ed would never tell her reason the why if she tried to pry it out of him. Knowing not to answer truthfully, “I told you, nothing”
“I can tell when you’re lying. Your eyes grow whopping and your mouth pouts to the right.”
“Shut up.”
He looked at her searchingly before giving up with an irritated sigh.
“Come with me.” The chair scraped as he pulled out and pushed the table away from him. His tall frame dwarfed her.
He brought her to the back of the school where teachers and students never went, leaned against the wall and lit a cigarette. “You want to try one?”
“I don’t smoke, Ed”
“Why won’t you even try it?” The tone he used when he was about to state something that began an argument leaked into his voice smoothly, like oil. Woodren opened her mouth to list the damaging things it did to your lungs and heart but his voice had begun in its rapid, silky tone:
“Because society has brain washed you so that if you smoke when you’re a child, you’re a horrible ungrateful creature that will never go far in life. But when an adult smokes, it’s okay. You don’t smoke because people and teachers tell you not to try it. Well I say, **** them. These are the best years of your life. Do what you want, try everything so you can make the choices of your life later with a rounded experience and knowledge. I’m not saying get addicted. You have to be strong if you’re gonna be a risk-taker…” he inhaled deeply and exhaled in a husky voice, “I just thought you always went on about how you were such a strong risk taker.” He blew a cloud of heavy smoke above her head. “Oh, and of course you won’t try it because Aunt and Uncle Palmer said it’d be sin, isn’t that right?” he asked with a tantalizing grin in a mocking tone. He watched her face contort with anger, his hazel eyes dancing with glee. He knew he had hit at the bull’s eyes. No one ever jeered at Woodren’s inner power and then put her on the same note as her Aunt and Uncle.
A sudden snarling sound flared from her. She didn’t have to listen to anything Aunt and Uncle Palmer said… they never did anything worthy intentionally. She knew that. He was just stupid. She swore at him and knocked the cigarette out of his hand with a smart slap before storming away. An amused laugh from behind her made her ears tingle pink.
As soon as school was over, she pushed pass Ed who was waiting for her and ran back home. Opening the front door of the house, she scurried up the stairs to the third-floor and knocked on Max’s door. When she opened it, Max was already holding Hoopsie in his big hands. Hoopsie sang with joy when she saw Woodren.
“Hoopsie-girl” Woodren whistled with a tilting note that Hoopsie identified instantly. Hoopsie flapped over and landed on her shoulder.
“By the way,” said Max, “she must have knocked over her water because it was wet on the bottom of the cage. She kept trying to drink it. She’s thirsty.”
“Oh you silly Hoopsie! Why did you knock over the water? You know I’m supposed to have 8 cups a day?” she pampered the lovebird with caresses and endearing words before hiding Hoopsie in her shirt and running back to her room.
Woodren placed Hoopsie gently down on the bed post

Symbolize no lies and the flip side of white like Anubis
From noobin' to getting a new *****
No birth on earth, not lucid
Off my knees with no assist
**** a trip never lit and still lifted
Used to quit for a bit, but the G too loud I listened
**** boys out my vision
Questioned exsistence, doubts had no limit
2 to run a business
1 of those disposed the closed
Honor roll for being on the role, never missed like a ***
Wished to be what I seemed to be on the screen; so vivid
Regretting lies in this life all the time now I'm fine being just David
Universe seems different
BS all around got me bent
Dead bird, you no fly
Old *****, no reply
Childish, you still whine
You full of it, like a cyst
Cat killa, ask yo sis
Smooth talk, **** that swiss
Made my way without an *** kiss
Money off my wishlist
Summer coming like my ****
Trill kicks, gold wrists, yeah all thrift
Never trust those slick lips
Better off a pugilist
Swollen fist, not a pacifist
No front, my diction real ****
Get you ****** with no diss
Limp **** still leave her lispin'......I'm not even playing

I don't really know if this is cut out for me. I rather go to Colorado in my singing voice* how I wish I was your lover please_ let's respect one another....

Here are the
stage lights
If you cannot
stand the heat
Bud light
Other seasons
The Four Seasons
Sherry Baby

Delicacies
Diva and Don Perion
Dressed
Navy and bloodshot
Eyes maroon
The fire desire
Only made them
Moon up higher
legacy
The voices
appetizer

Pina Colada
Fireworks Bella Diva
Gondola
Sunrise Prima Donna
Between the Diva
Fireworks outside
Of Lady Madonna

(Moonstruck)
Havana
Fireworks at
her breast
hot singer
editorial
Designer Hermes
scarfed $
Diva she raises
money
Fill in her gaps
Gap Navy
So savvy Honey
Oh! Jesus
Another
genius
Fireman
Rifleman
Joplin
Baby baby
Baby

She stepped
away
from reality
What about
me Robin
I am a singer
World became
my Godly
duty
Miss Mom Judy

The music
All trends
addicted to
shopping
Men %% $
Those  Poppins
Pop stars
Robin bob bobbin
along
She's chicken
Avocado
Comando
Chief Fido

Fireworks top
crooks
The safe box
She cooks
crock ***
Aluminum Clad
Potheads
Australian lads
All spread out in
Chickenpox

Egg Foo young
Cream say cheese
Lox Hip Hop
Sugar Daddy
Pops
Collegiate
Quickie talk
((Chatterbox))
The made hit
singers paradox
Calm me, Colorado
Endless voice

Eldorado
Diva had too many
Stars at the sing sing
of Rosy®
At the check coat Sassy
Tommy can you hear me
Her mouth
mento mints

Extreme bossy
Deep-throat
(Juicy Pineapple
Dole) her

The singer sways
all over him
Dancing Glove pole
If this is the
last thing
we ever do

Designed for a
Diva with
Jimmy Choo, it's
not a
better life
for me and you

******* coo
Lana Turner,
Turntable 4 the record_
Tina Turner
What does
loving a Diva
got to do
with this!!

So tramped on
Diva devourer
He's the observer

Maxwell millionaires

Tantalizing tongues
The Canaries
Yellow Solo
Not the goddess the
Diva Luv-a sun
{Ralph Polo]
Little darlings
Vampire
Diaries
The mad
librarian
BLT Diva VIP
The hell of
tinnitus

D=F ****-Fun
in" D"
Devilology
Diva Fireworks
sanitarium
Disney
aquarium

My sign the
Aquarius
So Forestal Crystal
Forest Hills US
open tennis

We are the
champions
The  sexter pistol
wedding ring
Go, Crystal
He compelled her
Divas revolver
Wild thing makes
my heart sing
And his boxers
make me  
so closer

Diva solver
Frenzy firecracker
pleaser
Who is ready to vote
Songs wanted
love pusher

Diva's eyes
  Maybelline
Maybe all lined
Stadium of voices
titanium
The Diva to
be resold

Too many songs
were sold
Wife trophy
Platinum had
a voice tone

Diva Grand
Marnier
He's the
connoisseur
of mouth's
experimental

Mentally
He tricks you
Singing horse
you just know
won't trick you
A singer is like
a horse

Wizard of Odd
Moms many colors
performances
This land is your
land from
California but
the Diva Islands
flipping
Las Vegas

Nothing is
guaranteed
((Lady GaGa))
Your out
Haha
Stay upright
lights down
out of sight

*Brooklyn Blackout
Cake Ebinger
We were eating
Singing and Guessing

Diva sucker
lollipops
Panic at the disco
To run him over
What R the odds
Getting even road
Steven the Cosmos

The singing
highway
project
Robin was
from Bayview
Project
All Adultery
Bills
Clintons Mastery
No Susie
homemaker
Hilariously singing
Shining like the
shoemaker

Sitting at
the pub
She ordered a
hot steaming
Spa voice
The Egyptian
grains
of love sand
Medler
Fergie Google
Ben Stiller
Singer just
pill her
burlesque

So Cher-like
if I could
change back
the time I would
do it anyway
Jumping Diva
Kangaroo  pouch

Too much Diva
Ouch----
Joe DiMaggio
fireworks of *****
Big wiggle
Opera
Marilyn Monroe
The Phantom
Of *** appeal
Propaganda
Blowing off
competition
nails

But__ dying inside
like a deadlight
Sparkle me
*** lights
That voice
signals
"Neon Nights"
ooh la the
Eifel tower
bowed her
Moonstruck
striking
wallet high Kicking
wages
Got her voice back
to be shot in stages

Her revolver
eight days a week
The real voice
never take
for granted

Genie
The Diva Luv
in her SUV
She was still
singing
And he wasted
his
whole
dinner

But I got
my voice back
Singing
She let her heart out
He turned his head
He said  what a stunner

My days seem to be longing someone.
My mornings feel like
I can't go back to anything anymore that I wanted before.
I've been writing about how I feel about a lot of things lately, I dont really know how to organize them.
I feel like meditation has really kept me from punching holes in the wall lately.
I feel like tripping has kept me from overthinking real situations, it's been a while though.
I've been keeping it natural.
There's so much more to everything, I feel like meaning is so expensive these days.
I've lost the concept of options.
These numbers are useless.
I've noticed the moment something catches a persons eye they pull out their phone instead of cherishing at the moment.
Swear words are becoming part of our culture now.
Your memory is worth more.
I'll doubt you if you're material.
Flexing thoughts and not what makes them that way with $20 on social media.
I was just playing around with perception, nothing serious.
I tried committing suicide in social media, but people worry too much and start hitting up my phone.
Funny how if you don't respond to a text they automatically think something is wrong.
Acceptance shouldn't be this easy, but all of a sudden it is for me.
Lately everything seems so spiritual, I'm glad I'm not overthinking things to a negative perspective.
Weekly tests just to give my mom some reassurance.
Trust is on it's way along with a motor.
I scrapped my knees, and this is really weird.
Can't really open up anymore, ears just hear and careness is absent.

I have always been drawn to destruction;
air too thin to breathe-
I carry a pain eyes can't receive.

life and evil are only a letter apart,
and I've come to believe
this was no mistake;

the devil wears sweatpants and a rosary.

he weaves his fingers
through yours tightly
every time he holds you down-

and he shines-
stolen halos line red wrists,
they bang against the drywall-
its four in the morning
and he's come into the room again-
he forever invites himself in

maybe this time God will hear the ringing,
clinging together,
the halos,
the angels
will flee to ****** back
their innocence.
brilliance.

and the motion will cease.
the clouds, close.

claiming "possession"
is out of the question
for he did not seize my soul-
I extracted it, split my skull
all for a taste of the afterlife.

he loves mirrors and other pathways
of reflection;
the evil only seem to love themselves.

I am used to blinding confusion
and bittersweet illusions,
I crave the burn that follows pain.

he likes to leave a mark
beyond scarring the skin,
but I promise,
the worst is within-

life and death are only a day apart
and I've come to believe
I am stuck in between,
and the devil continues,
blissful and free.

Fallen angels
drop from the sky.
Fallen angels mar
the earth with evil
In their eyes.

Human suffering,
eternal greed.
Life’s ending,
laboured breathing.

Fallen angels drop
from the sky.
Fallen angels
Seem white
But lie.
 
I see maroon
caricatures with
tight fists.
They are hell bent and
Insist, through impenetrable mists.

They emerge, unexpected and disastrous.
The world, stunned,
is unprepared for this madness.
 
Guns are blasted,
Knives do slashing.
Fallen angels have lasted
and rise even through ashes.
 
They persist and prevail,
whilst parents are covered in black veils.
They persist and prevail
As their minions hail
the sadness and
waltz in the  madness.
 
Battles have been won,
Heroes have been brave.
But monstrosities
Can never be erased.

“Burgundy sounds more poetic than maroon"
You say, in regards to your sweater.
-I’m just romanticizing it
tossed across
my room

As you push me
to the mattress
and strip me down
passed skin and bones

back to the vibrations
of my soul

Humming along,
are you a muse
or a siren song?

Are you rebirth
or are you just
another little death
of inspiration?

So fleeting.

I hate when you’re leaving,
because it leaves me longing
and pathetic

I’m just the impulsive one
with the most grandiose dreams.
Like I wanna give you everything
from the depths of these
****** up fantasies
With the most
golden ******* intentions

Because you’re the reason for
the ringing in my ear
when I feel like I’m onto something

The reason that the season
starts to make me feel better

So can you just stay
while I romanticize
your sweater?

Her loneliness wears maroon,
                 I am aware," to her yin, my yang,"
mine in deep purple echoes,
                the density that's her, in my presence.
On an island of her own, she sojourns,
                 where there is comfortable room for two.
A happy recluse she is, ruminating,
                 diving deeper in to the sea of consciousness.
What does it really mean?
                  we are wound around a "KOAN", working on it,
wouldn't stop to think,  I flow
                    with the insistent gravitas of the current,
Through her the dense silence speaks,
                     in voices clear,  heard within me.
all beyond words, and in a far more
                     subtle plane, than this existence.