Category: Fiction

The Works of Man

The bible says somethin’ about the Holy Spirit leaving the earth near the last days…how hard it is for man after that.

That’s what I thought of when I saw her…

Her face was black and not even blue, just broken and taped back together…

She couldn’t even wince from the pain of walking, she was stiff like our grandfather…and stood like a crow bar.

She was 25.

When we left the hospital, we went to get her things. From the garbage excuse of a trailer, he was supposed to be at work…

But I guess that’s how these things and men and the way of young love goes…

They’re accountable for nothing…not even an 11 dollar an hour job.

I remember her clothes had black patches of sweat and mold in them.

They smelled of cigarettes

The kitchen table was dirty from the residue.

The place smelled of that smell you only get from a broken refrigerator…

I opened it just to make sure ,

There in the center of all that rotten was last nights box of take out…

“Ugh What the hell…”

I had to find the bathroom and quick

There were holes in the wall all the way down the hall…I turned in to wash my face….

The shower was black and molded

The water was off…

I kicked the lid to the toilet open

Before I started vomiting

It hit me in the face like a train

No water

Packed full of shit

——

Why the hell did she stay here?

He kicked her around and around

——-

He came stumbling in angrier than a starved dog…

Knife in his hands

Gun in his belt

I grabbed the knife by the blade and kicked him across the room

He took off in his car, but didn’t make it far…

He wrestled for a while with the locals and kicked a few down

He drew his gun

And started cursing about my sister and how he owned her

There was a fence he had crashed into

A tamping pole or rod leaning against it

I picked it up and ran it through his foot

“Shut up for once in your life.”

He cried all the way to jail.

I kept thinking about that verse

All of her hurts

Why men do what we do

And what kind of man

Can live with that?

Maybe it’s a different kind of evil…

My father killed men in the war

And his father too

I thought about that as I set another charge on a tree.

——

He was spitting and cursin’ as we brought him down in the thicket.

“You can’n’t kill me! They’re gunna fine out ‘bout it! Yew stupid idgit! She’s MINE I will have what’s MINE!

Married before GOD and everybody ! “

“Oh I’m not going to kill you…God might…but I won’t …the wolves might…but me? I’m just going to hurt you…if you die…it’s up to a higher power than me…now the sheriff, he’s gonna think you ran again, You know, like you did my sister…when you made her run and you played your little hunting games?….you better run…”

I raised my gun…and the headlights…

He made it a few paces I guess…

The last I heard were some obscenities

Then I charged the blasts

the trees exploded around him

I thought about her and the Holy Ghost and the war and the 4th of July…

Hindsight never sleeps

– all of these streets were crowded

– money never sleeps

– the markets will never crash

– in this economy?

It’s difficult for people to grasp eternity

Because all they have-all they’ve experienced, is now…

– you think you have something to offer humanity? You don’t have anything. . . They’re hungry for a shortcut to happiness… and I can give it to them. A life without discipline. Without goals, without effort. Just do whatever whenever however, for as long as ever. But quickly. The day before yesterday.

The devil sat back in his chair…the bar was empty…this was our third meeting…

There were no cars on the street…

No chill in the air…

No ice

I rolled my sleeves up…

Drank my gin

– look, I’m a salesmen, like you, I make deals… I made one a while back…a guy wanted to be the biggest president in history…

– I don’t think this is what he had in mind…

– he’s going down in history isn’t he? He should of read the fine print. Hell, he should’ve read period.

– if you’re confident enough people believe anything…

– the old rules don’t apply, the game is changing. I’m collecting souls. You still think there’s hope for these people? They made their beds. How’s yours?

– I sleep fine.

– are you sure? That’s not what she says…you do see her don’t you? Tell me, how is she?

“She” was a figure who appeared in my door…every night…since I was a child…I would wake up and she might rush toward me or float away.. this tall dark figure…or she might just be mumbling over and over again something I could never break.

I ignored this statement

– there’s a changing of the guard, I still believe in people, in free will, in peoples ability to change. And to choose, so yes…I think our tomorrows are better than today.

– you really don’t learn do you…if you give people the option to grab what they want now? They will take it. People don’t change. Even if it’s against their best interest. They will gratify today and suffer tomorrow. They like to feel like they have options, so they come and go and change their minds a lot, but they are really just circling around their individual grave… never accomplishing much, never really loving, never really growing, just talking. Loudly, about nothing, just themselves. And the world suffers.

If I can keep them distracted and self indulgent, they will gather and fight and self destruct. Arguing about nothing. Consumed with themselves. Feeding this appetite. It’s almost more than even I can take. I hate this whore of self. She drinks the blood and has no discipline no plan…you do know,she’s older than any of us…she’s been here since the beginning…I don’t know, I might have to kill her.

– I didn’t think you had it in you.

– I’m a guy with a plan. That’s why I need you. I can’t do it without souls. I need a statement.

I drank the rest of my gin…

When I set my glass down he was gone.

I looked down to see an envelope…

I put it in my coat…

It was raining.

The streets smelled like sewage.

The city wasn’t pretty.

It reminded me of how I felt inside.

Sketches from the heart of this wasteland

Oh where have

You been?

April your lips I have found

Your whispering voice

Echoes through the emptying streets

Of this town

Your shifting feet

Echoes through these trees

——-

And I saw

I saw it all fall

The world that we built

All that we had invested

Burned right in front of us

Is it enough

To keep us warm

When the winter comes?

How many ?

How many ?

——

The Joker dances in the streets

The street worker moves to the internet

The trees let go of all that they are holding

The grass grows

And it doesn’t consider us

The ocean crashes in

Whether or not I’m there to perceive it

——

And I wonder

Whether

They build their guns

They build their ships

They scheme their games

Building us up

Just to cut us down

——

Will our blood flood the empty streets

Whether we hold our breath

And pray for the rain ….

Will you even remember my name

——-

Hurl your banners

Your worst fear

April

You’re here

Now tell me my worth

Tell me my name

I’ve tasted your lips

Now show me the cards

Tell me your name….

Tell me the prophecy

Tell me

Who sketches the heart of this wasteland

——-

And in the valley

In kitchen

In the mountains

In hospital bed

In the living room

The rich

And the fallen

The guilty

The innocent

April turns her face

And we all hide our tears from this place ….

Storms

Feel this rain

Here in

The in-between

Shed these clothes

All of these

Designs

These expectations

—

Taste your skin

Your lips again

Legs over my shoulders

Memorize your body

I can still taste your lips

—-

Her eyes

Burn right through me

Her lips

Pull me

Back to her bed

I went down

To her alter

She’s the only God I’ll ever need

Burn right through these expectations

We have all night

Here in these storms

This lightning

This rain

This sweat

Our flame

I’ll stay here

memorize your body

Until you come apart

Until you come

The Mill

The Bar.

“What’s up stoopid.”

Tara sat down across from me, her brown hair blocking the clock on the church across the street. Fortunately , part of the sun as well.

“What is that brain working on now? Who brings a book to a bar anyway?”

I stared. what do you want Tara?

I had to admit, it felt weird coming back home…the mills closed. Empty buildings, like coffins, waiting for their dead or a hotel with empty floors…just shadows of memory.

Tara smiled, lit a cigarette,

You know, you have to be 21 now.

Hey, we‘re all older.

She laughed.

I closed my book.

Asking myself why I came back home…but I really, already knew.

Maybe that was what bothered me.

Tara hadn’t changed that much. She had a way of moving through the weights and the hard moments. Seemingly unscathed.

I was not so lucky.

I took a breath. Feeling flashes of my childhood walking past me in the street.

Yellow Room (haunted October)

It was raining sideways

The night I died

I remember

The basement

Built above ground

The concrete floors

The open walls

The cold

The 45 acres of woods

Black bears

And deer

Eating

The curly horned monster

Wandered the woods

Only when the fog came out

They said he gathered up children

And brought them back to his house in the woods …

His raven flew ahead and spotted his catch …

The night I died

The waters rose in the creek

A tornado climbed the mountain

The curly horned monster

Stood in the pasture

A wide eyed owl

Sat outside my window

All night

Staring at me

Beside the yellow room…

I heard the witch

Walking in the hall

Her laughter

As she smiled

In the corner of the room…

Aces

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What are you
afraid of And
why do you shake?
Is it demons
from the past Or the shadows
in our wake?
He folded the paper
Put it in his pocket

He watched
The bodies turning in the moonlight
Hanging at the cross roads
Hung for everyone to see

There in front of the church.

blood running down the roots of the tree

He’s older now, but he remembers

As everyone gathers at the alter…

The dust still sticking to his shoes…

I met him when he was older. His hands shaking, as he told me…

What he did at the docks…

Shooting a man for seven hundred dollar bills because he only had five.

He said you never forget the light leaving their eyes…

The things you do just to fit in.

Keeps you up at night….

We like to think we changed

But it wasn’t that long ago.

It was only yesterday.

Photographs

Just as time will fade the paint on the corners of the front steps, chip the glass on the coffee cup, Slowly dry the ink in the pen, slowly age the man.

It will slowly chip away at love.

Tough words or tired bodies when we were young, we used to say everyone else just settles….

Now we barely talk anymore

Somehow we don’t even look at each other and it’s just okay.

For days on end we pass each other without anything other than a silent resentment.

When do you know you’re reading from a script that’s killed you off?

Occupying a movie set that’s packed and left…

Does her mind know, or is it her heart?

Does he know? Or is he so far removed that he believes everything is fine

At status quo

What’s the point of signaling a flare

You’re like two ghosts haunting the same house in different centuries

There’s nothing here anymore

It’s all cold

It’s all empty

And no one knows why..

Any cold drafts are blamed on the weather…

Cold County #1

Somewhere over Lick Skillet

Nine pm

It’s hotter than the drive thru at McDonald’s on Sunday. The Screen door slammed as he was leaving, Everyone saying their second goodbye for the evening.

The older man walking him to his car. Extending the conversation to the front yard.

He smiled again, and said goodbye, backing out of the driveway. Checked his speed as he made his way down the mountain. The road twisting ahead of his vision.

He was thinking of how peaceful it really is, up in the mountains. Just to drive, the trees, the way they change color in the fall. He rolled down his windows, letting his hand ride the night air like he did when he was younger. Reaching for the stars.

His radio went to static, strange, must be the satellites. He glanced again at the sky, this far up you were away from the city and could see just about any constellation if, you know what to look for. Or thought you knew what to look for. Most people just made things up to keep a girl looking at the sky while they were focused on other things.

Odd thing out…

The stars were gone…

A perfect patch cut out

He pulled off the road onto the bluff.

Lights flashed passed his car from off the side of the mountain.

He checked his phone…the signal was gone

It seemed as though this repeated itself three times.

Driving endlessly, yet still under the dark spot. He stopped his car again. Getting out, he held his phone out, hoping for a signal.

That was when he felt it…

First he saw the clock on his phone flash

Nine pm

He had been driving for hours it felt like,

He had even used half a tank of gas….

It happened so fast

It was like a nightmare in his head…

The strings of a piano being plucked

He could feel them closing in all around him…

Coming from out there

From everywhere

He couldn’t see them

But they were there

Moving

Like shadows

Between the trees

And he could feel their long hands

Reaching for him

Grabbing him

Pulling him down…..

Into the blackness….

The patch in the sky.

Cold #4

“Most people never die suddenly. Your body spends years sending you warnings. A man of 55 dies and it’s a tragedy, yes. But not a sudden one. Habits, They can be read like a timeline. We ignore Doctors and keep on with our lifestyles. One day the body just … runs out of road. You want to live healthy? Start talking to your  Doctor when you’re 28, before you start falling apart.” 

Janice was examining a body on the table. All of the lights were off in the room. None of the computers were running in the background.  It was quiet. It had been swept clean from budget cuts. Making it easier to hear her through the phone call. 

” So when I tell you, this body. These bodies. They shouldn’t be here. I mean it. These cells. Agent, They’re billions of years old.” 

She stood up straight. 

“Infected with Virus. They’re reproducing through bacteria from the site. I’ve never seen anything like this.”

– what do you mean from the site? He could feel the pressure in his gut. He was suddenly aware of the limited space of his Bronco. Driving back to the site where they found the hunters and the Coyote. 

“I mean,” Janice was saying…

“- I don’t know how, maybe it was dormant deep in the earth. Somehow, through rising tempatures. These cells, they’re awake. Infecting the water. All of the wildlife in areas red and yellow? Infected. Our hunter had a good hunting day. And was infected as well. Passing it to others. And then you have the water and the town.”

– so this is a virus? 

“Unlike we’ve ever known. This is older than anything we’ve ever seen.” 

He pulled to a stop. Hanging up the phone. The area was on fire. As men were putting up road blocks. 

“What’s going on here? We need to close this area and quarantine these people…”

“Baldwin, I can’t just quarantine an entire area like this. The paper work alone- listen, It’s State Property. Slotted for fracking next year. It’s already in the budget. And you know just like anybody else… that money is already spent. No refunds.  We’ll torch it. And restrict the area. That’s the most we can do.” 

“People have died. And will cont-”

“Hey, we’ve already sent in the report to the Feds. It was imported food and big pharma.” Nothing else. You did a good job. Let it go. 

He couldn’t believe it…

And thought again of Janice’s words…

No one just dies suddenly. It builds up slowly overtime. We just ignore the warnings.