too soon

 

            he hadnt a word for itshe had no cluehe hadnt    not until this very moment

he was enlightened   intrigued

                        the charred sweeps of her absence that ran across his eyes hid his shadow in its folds

it finally revealed itself revealed its  palpable  existence

       this thing  was the thing that came between them

that interrupted her

rather it interrupted his affection for her                           

it wasnt another woman
                    despite many warm spontaneous touches  subtle   issued with kind words with looks that felt like stroke of an eyelash
                    perhaps innocently
insignificant          

though quietly pregnant  pregnant   as when a rose begins unfurl in the soft yellow sunlight

not that he was moved or could be moved 

she thoroughly enthralled him  enticed him

  

                                 and he was too dumb and blind and insular to be affected by a touch a look

a suggestive word   

                                                              

what they shared he called Love

she inspired him satiated him  

she tipped him with her voice  whether it was sung through the pale air or a mimicry tatted on the words she sent him in texts and efemales
                  but at this very moment

she was interrupted

and who had interrupted her

was her past selfwas who she was had been during timethe months when he last saw her

he tried to carve out time for them

                           but every time he gamely fashioned it she shot him down  and shot him down late

four times he left gifts at her locked door

                                while she was on the other side of it        

she said she was too unwell to open it

he could have smashed itwent through it if he wanted 

                                          his violence was there

his violence always attended him

but what would that have purchased him

it would have given him nothing other than the stark admission he could take what he wanted 

                                                                                                          

one didnt take Love                              

he didnt want to take it

he wanted her to give it freely

if she wouldnt

why would he want it

she wasnt now who she was

he had no control over that

he wished he had

he didnt believe in wishes

his happiness now was the memory of her 

1906,  Twosday,  14  3. 17

2353,  Day-between-Two-Ts,  15  3. 17

1406 days remain or less

                             Eh

                                he didnt grasp the gravity of doubleheaders and rearenders until a working grrl (Go on  not a whore   a model a crazy successful model from New Jersey) patently arrested his adolescent notion of ball

her doubleheader wasnt anything of the kind that Ol Ern cherished sprinting out onto Wrigley Field to take his place at first and as he went cried Lets play two!

YES! he howled with mad delight Play a doubleheader!

but that was before the ridiculous money and wholesale greed gripped professional sports  when he could take a bus and transfer to another when he could pay entrance off a paper route and cutting grass and could take a seat above first base because Ernie Banks played first  as it eroded he wasnt surprised  he got the fiscal arguments  its cash underpinnings  they would turn the buck the people paid and boyishly shrug say it wasnt them say its what the market would bear

in his estimate the market was stupid

it was a simple propositionif he couldnt afford to go to the games  shivved  that intimacy cut away  hed also turn his back on its television broadcasting

he went cold turkey and never looked back

later it amused him  he laughed   and then he laughed harder and louder and gayer when he considered it in the light that it always seemed the Bible had a witty comeback  . . when I became a man I put away childish things

sports were run by moneyed forever Peter Pans and the public or market was a pliant addict and fiend

he could hear Vonneguts simple refrain  And so it goes

                                          and boy did it

Ah  Linda

that crazy New Jersey model

she was the first among his many trysts who rocked who shook out the sheets snapped them in the blue fresh air and yanked him out of his notion of romantic sex

she owned that years Vette  a cherry red convertible 

a condo on Miami Beach

6’2”

short cropped blonde hair 

legs that went on forever
                       and when he found forever he lapped and gobbled and sucked until she came in his face(who knew a woman could do that) 

she spun out from under him pushed him onto his sideonto his back and before the fluttering drapes the sliding glass door opened onto her eleventh floor balcony she went at him like a happy dog at a bone

she gnawed and sucked and knowingly backed off just in time again and again  she shoved her fingers up his ass and played with him at her pleasure until she let him cum gaspingChrist!

with a sly smile she swallowed and licked and took every bit he had to offer 

when he went to sit up to go after her in turn she slapped him flathanded on the chest pushed him back down growling Im not done yet  then like a serpent she slipped back down between his legs and rubbed his rubbery cock between her cheek and hand then kissed him suckled him took him with her other hand and rubbed him against her cheek and throat across her face hid her eyes behind him like a blindfold  she made enticing sounds in her throat  mewed  and when he hardened she grasped him like a mike  and while looking him in the eyes she whispered I love  sucking your cock   I love   licking your balls   I  should shut up  she smiled impishly a child at her treat and began giving him head again

doubleheader

the rearender followed  as much him as her  lubed by her second ejaculation smeared on her ass with his face and clinging to his cock he gently penetrated her   she panted swallowly   panted and pushed back against him to fill her

fill her  filling her he thrust with abandon(Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate – Looks about right -- Abandon all hope, ye who enter here)

Oh brother  sister    have abandon

1300-ish,  Monday,  13  3. 17

1027,  Twosday,  14  3. 17

1408 days to go or fewer

he hadnt held a pen in his hand for more than a week(it might have been his reason  or possibly his excuse) 

Aah  Thats better   he found a red ink pen in his bag

                                            nor had he penned a word outside the state of California(a state of mind) in more than seven years

seven   long   years

an internment 

           a determined self-exile

he felt alienfelt a creeping blue realisation  the longer he remained in California the things he thought he knew -- he believed immutable –shifted morphed stood up on their hind legs jabbed their thumbs at the air willfully walked away

hopeful theyd catch a ride

it didnt matter where

they would contend with what came

as he was selfassured he would contend with this trip

                                                                   T R I P

he tripped  tripped and fell

fallen  you get up brush off your hands and knees get going again

he hadnt planned anythingplanned on anything

     

                                               nothing

nothing

he was improvising

his sister had a quasi-plot

to her  struggling  a third bout of cancer  

everything was quasi

she joined him in the realisation of living day to day to day to day  then every day when retiring was a conquest

her days were existential

his were existential only in surviving his wifes death somewhat intact   wounds  deep  unseen

her quasi-plot was to visit the city

a city he was born in and wandered in his youth but over the last forty years he entered only twice during the daylight

he remembered things more than recognised them

they took a train into the city

six of them

        his sister her husband their daughter a nephew and his daughter(she made the trip possible  cajoled him)

six small ants in a very tall city playing off pheromones that twisted and helixed and folded on the wind that compelled them together and singularly

the lake effect affected them

they walked and talkedthey wound around and around meddled and broke clustered in threes four abreast paired reformed formed each had time alone with everyone

they took a fine lunch in the Tribune Building Howells and Hood(John Howells and Raymond Hood architects – “to design the most beautiful office building in the world” – accomplished)

afterwards they forged through the bracing cold wind to the lakefront and Navy Pier

he was a boy when he was last there

the pylons were rickety and tarred its planks scarred bolted in place and between them yawned just far enough to terrify him

he imagined he could fall between them into the cold water below and drown

drowned and become fishfood bothered him

being enclosed bothered him

ash was in his future

even then

he laughed at his remembered terrorhe hadnt been terrorised since his first few weeks in-country his first tour before his first firefight  terrorised he might run

it was oddly nice to recall that once he could be terrorised

he put the pen down

after 1800 in Illinois,  Day-between-Two-Ts,  8  3. 17

1026,  Monday,  13  3. 17

1409 days remaining or less