Sticks

you call em legs

theyre sticks

the flops on her feet were bigger than her thighs or calves

the XL Mens dull washedout blue jean workshirt  open  over the top of her knee-length 

cream and coloured-floral muumuu didnt help matters

she reminded him of a series of reasons why he preferred not attending doctors offices 

ERs or hospitals

she was a terrible offset to the fatty populace wading around outside her hiding door as 
sooner or later those without would be seeking ministrations within

                                                                                                                as she was now

for reasons unknown to him and would remain unknown  --  others could check her 

Facebook  --   and would probably be as frustrated as she was with the medical

footdragging

be here On Time

and Wait 

                                                                                                                                             

--   The doctor will see you now

and Wait in an interior antechamber unseen from outside

                                                                

--   The doctor will see you now

See  the active verb

See  if hell sit down long enough to hear what it is you have to say

look you in the face

not distracted  looking at the floor

the bedside manner of a hooker

--   I love you long time til you dead                                                                                                              

cuz theres always another john waiting in the next room
if you can get that first mornings appointment you wont have to worry sloppy-seconds
those slopped up and squeezed out of a janitors mophead
the graywater that made the Utility Rooms deep-sink retch as it tried desperately to 
pinch its nose shut
--   What the hell is that
 

what the hell it was  was people not really caring all that much for themselves

running roughshod through their lives

until their untied shoestrings or flopping Velcro-straps catch

and theyre dropped hard on their faces

then fingering the ground or the askew crack-in-the-sidewalk

something  anything  other than themselves

for their predicament

their rote excuses echoing

excuses made rote by the assemblies of irresponsible corporations whose bottomline decisions 

are ruled by morally bankrupt individuals

those coddled Business/Finance degree selfish-types

--   I want In  I want Out  and I want it in the shortest time possible

decisions based on premise no higher a vault than a snake could crawl over                

No Offense intended the snake
its been crawling on its belly longer than man- and woman-things have climbed 
frantically into trees or run away to escape its Natural delineations and deliberations
  

or Societies impoverished and impossible Ideals

propped up on the spiny backs of moneymaking snakeoil schemes

                                                                                                         

No Offense intended the snake
 

No

there would be no offense intended

none taken

the snake

wasnt the idiot

it was fine wound in the staff or Rod of Asclepius

from there it watched us

humored

enjoying  Theres nothing better than good oldfashioned American assbackwardness   

it laughed between its split tongue

                                                        --   Assholes   the call was blown back in 1800s

and as America does

it doesnt admit its mistakes

it dismissed the difference

and fell hard for the fraud  the caduceus

it belonged to Hermes  quick and cunning  God of Trade and Thieves and Travelers

His caduceus

if you look

if you pay any attention

it bears two snakes climbing a winged staff

it hissed

the Rod of Asclepius

bears a single snake

according to Greek mythology

Asclepius is the God of healing

a psychopomp  Hermes  escorted souls to the afterlife                                                                                                                  

Asclepius supplicants

you would call them His patients

sought Him to be healed

on the floors of His temples crawled the Asclepiusian snakes  freely  among the sufferers

no cowardly tree climbing or fleeing on frieze  four or eight-legged motion creatures

none

evidently  once you were courageous man- and woman-things

the ritual purifications were followed by offerings or sacrifices to Asclepius   and get this

the snake licked its chops

                                      According to their Means

theres a patently unAmerican concept

                                                                       

often supplicants had to spent a night in the temple  in its holiest place  called the abaton

then in the morning they shared their dreams or visions with a priest

you might call them your doctors

who helped interpret and prescribe therapies according to their visions

it sighed

gasp  pant  or scratch your asses for all I care

then it slithered down the staff and let itself out

Done with the Show

over its undulating back it called out

--   It seems your ancients were far more adept and in tune with their senses and bodies

then youll ever be                                                                                                            

0915,  Tuesday,  29 7. 14

1318,  Wednesday,  30  7. 14

He was a little boy

playing with a garden hose

as little boys do

but what little boys didnt do

was when an adult asked them to please stop what their were doing

that they wouldnt

that they would keep on and on until an adult finally came over and stopped them

had to stop them with violence exceeding their raised voice or an explicit threat

he wouldnt stop

until an adult stopped him

he was a little boy playing with a garden hose

the water always so cold

and he always so unmerciful 

when the other kids cried STOP

he wouldnt

hed go so far as to push the younger or smaller children down a latent fist or with his foot

and continue his torment  his cruel glee  beyond their helpless pleads and tears

hed laugh as they gargled and choked on the water  

gasped for air  

over their sobs he taunted   

Baby!

then an adult

always too late

would enter the yard out through the houses back door demanding what was going on

as if his actions were new

or a surprise

they would have to wrestle the hose out of his unremitting hands

it did no good  or helped  to slap him upside the head

no sooner had the adult stopped the dowsing

reprimanded the boy

and left

hed go around and slap the kids he just tormented

leaving his handprint on their mottled backs or flushed cheeks

their welt and scarlet camouflaged by the welts and scarlets children always sported when having played outdoors

the last he saw that peckerwood that miserable sonofabitch was in-country

and no one was more surprised  --  when he thought the war had stripped SURPRISE 

from him  --  than he

almost immediately he recognized him

some fuckin things never changed

it wasnt hard to recognize a sadist

if youd grown up with him from boyhood

what were the chances 

he was at some luckless villagers caught in a crossfire between VC and Army with a flamethrower   

they were hard luck bastards   just trying to get the hell out of Dodge 

and he wasnt gonna let em

from behind he could hear him screaming above the jet and gout of twisting flame

Ya fuckin gooks! fuckin gooks! worthless pieces of shit!

he could almost have wished he had a dollar for every time he heard that in-country

snarled at either North or South

                                                      over the roaring accelerant and androgynous flames  

he screamed STAND DOWN SOLDIER

then                                                                                                                                  

by the shift  the attitude of his head  he knew he had been heard

there was a POP in the flamethrower as he stopped . . . and  slowly  he  turned  towards  him . . . the flickering blue nozzle gasping

hesitantly pointed down . . .

and then . . . that . . . smile . . . slowly breaking on his blackened sweaty face

as it did 

years passed

in the sodden yard

the cold clear water flowing from the hose into the long green Midwestern grass

that . . . smile

a  long  eerie  silence  stretched   out  between them

                                                                            over the snake hiss of the flamethrower

over the lazy floating flutter of thin bamboo ashes

like those of Fall leaves he burnt in the street gutter when he was a boy

                                                                           over the whimpers and unearthly sounds

death rattles and choking moans

over the pungent smell of petrol burned flesh

that  long-toothed  white  smile

over it                                                                                                                                                   the dull eyes crinkling  honeyed by his cruel glee

as the flamethrower came up and began to spout

his bullets slapped him in the chest and belly    he exploded into a rage  an inferno

whose concussion threw him onto his back

                                                                        the tanks  creased and penetrated  blew 

an abject fit  and fire

which seemed always to have burn unquenched inside him

nineteen years old                                                                                                                          half-a-world away from home                                                                                                            doing a thing that should have been taken in hand then

so that now

it might never have had to happen

he felt real bad

and then he didnt

2356,  Sunday,  27  7. 14