We dont see things the way they are we see them as we are

You came to bury him

Yes 

       Hes dead right

I received word he was dying

I stopped at the hospital

He wasnt there

No one informed me he was taken home

He is dead

Correct

You think wed bury him alive

Is that an honest question  or are you trying to tease an honest answer from me

Theres reason why I live across the country from family

Because you separated yourself from us

That wouldnt be true

I was young  but I had my eyes at the seams and they were tentative even before I left

Besides   we have our own lives to live on our own terms 

                   

And those arent terms to be set by anyone other than ourselves
 

Even then there was a lot of cajoling  disparate assessments   and worse  family trying to inhibit or diminish siblings from pursuing their dreams because others didnt share them

Be for something  Not against it

Against it is always easier

No skin in the game

You still dont shaddup

You still have nothing to say

Nothing

I couldnt bribe you for an original thought

Always running at the mouth petulant   Always demeaning

Always waiting for something original

Thats not true

I lied

I quit waiting for something original out of here

I come back to check pulses  hold a mirror to noses mouths to see if breaths will stain them

Always figured one day Id be back to throw the dead wood on a fire

Are we tossing some wood on the fire or was I misinformed  The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated   Twain

 

We dont see things the way they are we see them as we are    Nin

Youre a muthafucker

A read muthafucker  not to put too fine a point on it

Always shoving worthless bits in our faces and troubled that we have no idea what youre talking about

The worthless bits arent   That you think theyre worthless is the problem

Youre vacuous outside the immediacy of your petty concerns   
Myopic

This world is too big and too beauty to be nearsighted in it  or hindered

Hes dead

The End

1239,  Monday, 17  8. 15

0200,  Day-between-Two-Ts,  19  8. 15

It was hard to make them out in the dark

through the windshields   through the side and back windows fogged with breath and other humidities

his eyes were still tinged with the infection of electric light from indoors

he should have negotiated the night earlier

finished the last of his beer stein with his eyes shut

it wouldnt have been odd or even noticed

he sat inside four five strides to the door  facing it  while behind him sexual curiosities were being vetted  cheeks pinched cheeks slapped

and the warming  tepid  uproar  that preceded an orgy  a congregation of flesh 

the room had that smell to it

the door was directly in front of him  around the edge of the table nearest to it

he wouldnt go errant in those steps if he had shut his eyes

           

he wouldnt have gone errant if he were at the back wall and had to walk the width of the hall
 

eyes shut  no matter  he had a knack in the darkness  the same knack that helped him unwind  from inside out  mazes

how they came to him was beyond him

but he recognised them when he was young and used them to his advantage

                                                                                                                               they were critical when he was on point

by experience  honed throughout his boyhood  he reacted to the dark and confusion as second nature  as when winged bats hurtled and fed at night or porpoise found their prey  an animal sonar  cantilevered in a bright dome
behind his eyes   discrete

nobody could tell for looking
 

and while they didnt look  the nobodys clung to him like fleas to a dog  unquestioningly

so many times he had been their silverlining  amid horrific firefights in utter shitstorms  and yet they emerged reasonably intact

he was a silverlining without thought  without gallantry

no medals to be bestowed

time and again he stilled his superior officers hands  who wanted to recommend him  but he insisted  rather  they really ought to chalk up their combined fortunes to Providence

Providence played well 

                                       if God touches or takes you by your arm  who was he to argue

and while he argued Providence  he had no belief in it  it wasnt formed of human grit perseverance or aware-deliberation

he set down his emptied beer and exited the hall

 

he entered the darkness blind  but informed by his other senses

hearing    --  that wasnt right  --   right was what was right for him  

all the cards belonged on the table

smell    --   despite outofdoors it smelled like a clasped room full of cocks

he wasnt surprised when his nightvision glummed back and helped orchestrate his nibble  though drunken walk

through the blued frames of automobile windows  faces were contorted

naked bodies were pressed against them

there were men on men  irascible  violent  cunning  cumming  yanked arms  strangled throats and bulging eyes

slaps on rumps and chests  gripped wrists  and hips

and groaning  cumming  again

outofdoors

                   it smelled of Comet cleanser  fresh-scrubbed bathtubs and toilets

he walked off into the woods beyond

beyond the cauldrons in the cars


                                                        to the safety and Providence dark provided him    

            

1621, Saturday,  8  8. 15

 1037,  Nagasaki Sunday,  9  8. 15

red

he dug the colour red

dug red the way micks celebrate green

and whoever went whichever way

red spoke to him

             like the mountains did  like being immersed in cold clear water

shared with brown  cutthroat trout  and watercress

it lashed him

             like Ulysses to the mast of his unknown ship

as the Sirens song reached his ears  seducing him 

although he was unable to thrash free

then exhausted  his legs collapsed  and he remained strung upright on the knots and binds his crew devised

it abraded him

             like the coal ash and gravel in his Chicago alleyway

fallen  as he ran away from the bigger boys when it was smart to run

  

they never came at him one at a time

 

the dolts  with sudden intellect

remembered their bruises and black eyes by his unfettered fury

                                                                                                               he dug red

as an Aries would

blindly 

 

              lustily

1738,  Saturday,  8  8. 15