Doctor God

Doctor God

                   I wasnt quite sure I heard him right I had already walked past him he was at my back

he muttered

                   but I was quite taken astonished  I felt  I felt I needed to hear from him if I heard him right or incorrectly

I turned and walked back

--   Excuse me

--   Yes

--   I didnt mean to   I cant say I was interloping  obviously youre alone by yourself  but if I may  did I heard you correctly when you said

Doctor God

--   You did

--   Hmm

--   I agree its worth a hmm  Though  probably worth hundreds thousands tens of thousands of hmms  If I conflagrated it even more Id be ridiculous

--   Did you coin it

--   Who coins anything any longer  A monkey at a typewriter might have coined it  Ive heard tell that with enough time a monkey  a chimp  personally Id like to think a bonobo  could randomly type the Bible

Theyre more peaceful  I believe

Am I correct

--   Ive only recently heard extended talks about bonobos  though I believe you are correct  I believe chimpanzees are considered more   aggressive

--   I wonder if you sat a human being down at a typewriter  given enough time  if they could write the Bible

word for word

--   I think a human being would be prejudiced 

Human beings are that

Probably the Old Testament word for word

But  if I may  if we could return to your   conjecture

Doctor God

--   It wasnt a conjecture  An admission

Ha  An ejaculation OH God

Doctor God

Sounds like a superhero  a comicbook hero  or character

A turtlenecked  or whitecollared freak trodding the night streets of Gotham or Second City

before LA became the legitimate Second City by population

All that weights gonna help it fall off into the ocean

Though I cant imagine a superhero in LA

All the costumes are being worn

--

--   Cat got your tongue

--   That was quite a barrage  I was trying to keep up

You gave me more than a bit to gnaw on

 

Digest

--   Sometimes its best just to swallow

Ive heard tell

Look around us

People are swallowing it all the time

You hear what White House aides did

If you didnt   its precious

I forget the gathering  the President was to speak to the Press the Media  They had nameplates to assign where News Sources were to sit

  

Major media mind you  NBC News  CBS News  CNN News           wait for it               

                                                                                                                                                  Fox

As I said  people swallow shit all the time

And worse 

                   they dont even know it

Whoever thought that street corner tabloids supermarket checkout trash would ever reach the airwaves  Somebody drove a spike through the heart of the Seal of Good Practice and cut off its head 

--   Youre not suggesting I swallow yours  are you

--   Comon  You dont strike me someone to swallow anything unless youve chewed it to bits

No I dont

--   Good  That affirmed  tell me more about your Doctor God

--   Doctor God  Sometimes some things just fall in your lap  out of the sky  and theyre yours

Aint nobody gonna try and wrestle it from you  And you cant give it away either

  

Evidently he found out in real short order where the rest of the staff fell

Theyll take the blind affirmation of sinning and confessing tithe lighting votive candles offering penance  but try and spin that around  take down a mantle you didnt make

NADA

Hemingways Nada prayer

--   What fell in his lap

--   A Swift tethered Gulliver  Lilliputians burden to bear 

Should have had the ambulance keep on going 

                                                                            Nothing to see here 

 

Calling Doctor God  Calling Doctor God! 

Why not call Doctor Moe Doctor Curly Doctor Larry

 

The patient was a picture of health  except he was comatose

                                                                                                   Comma – toast 

a pause a respite a Modern Day Rip Van Winkle maybe a Sleeping Beauty waiting on a kiss from a prince

Anyone kiss him yet  Anyone?

I suppose it couldnt hurt 

                                        not for what medical science couldnt do for him

Vitals  Labs  A picture of health

                                                   that couldnt be wakened up

--

--   Same old cat got your tongue

--   So   staff was calling him Doctor God

--   I think   I think  that was my moniker   
I brayed Doctor God

Man is an incomprehensible animal

Somebody also said that  Im sure

--   Yes  That I think someone else did say

Though not an improbable comparison

My apologizes

                        Your words fell in my ear and got the best of me  Thank you for allowing me my curiosity

It was a revealing  interesting conversation

--   Worthy of the Seal of Good Practice

--   Yes

Worthy of the National Association of Broadcasters  even if they dont abide by their Practice any longer

                                                          2223,  Twosday,  10  2. 15 

1919,  Wednesday,  11  2. 15 

he couldnt say he ever saw a bigger hawk

itd been hanging around for better than a month

                                       seemingly every morning

it straddled its roost in the uppermost branches of the huge redwood growing out of a neighbors yard four or five properties down brightly greeting them as they sat side by side on the sofa having their morning coffee

he had written his granddaughter who he convinced that they had elephants living underground in their yard of this new friend of theirs who was so large that even the elephants were refusing to come out and play    they didnt do so until after sunset

  

he wrote her  “as usual, our friends the elephants are smart, and alert . . . ” so she didnt worry that the hawk might fly off with an elephant in its talons

though he seemed big enough to eat a whole elephant

this morning  opening the blinds  the hawk wasnt in the redwood

hed grow so accustoming to have his coffee with the hawk and her  that its absence was like him not kissing her good morning before rising out of bed or her forgetting to put half and half in her coffee and not realising so until after she sipped it

                                                                                                                it was untoward

almost uncomfortable

--   I wonder where the hell he got to this morning

--   I havent any idea where she might be

of course the hawk would be male to him and female to her

he rolled his eyes playfully at her

--   Hes huge

--   She is

their dialogue needed bookends

he rolled his eyes again

--   Im just saying I suppose  Im missing THE hawk this morning

he was tossing crumbled bread for pigeons   offering a small neutral token

--   I miss her too

--

--

--   Yeah   Okay

I hope HE comes back before we finish our coffee

--   Maybe she has indigestion from eating an elephant   Or cant get off the ground

--   Oh no you didnt  Oh tell me you didnt say what you said

she laughed   --   Did I say THAT out loud

I didnt mean it

--   Its too early in the morning for comedians babe

Just saying Im missing our hawk

--   Youve grown attached to it  havent you

--   A wee bit  Yes

Very elegant  Suppose though its never too early in the morning to appreciate elegance 

 

Or perfection

--   No  Its not

sitting side by side  facing out across the livingroom the diningroom  looking out through the paned sliding glass doors into the gulf of their yard and over their neighbors descending yards  they looked into the sea of blue air  reefs of undulating trees  and errant schools of birds lone turkey vultures swimming  as they had their coffee and talked

the doorway to the kitchen was over his right shoulder

a slab of fresh sunshine shone through the doorway painted by the kitchen window opposite it
 

it splayed itself on the brief partition wall separating the livingroom from the diningroom

  

if it wasnt for this bright exhibition at his peripheral he would have missed it

like a vampire at your door asking you to welcome them into your home  and then waiting very patiently for you to grant them permission to enter

it probably wouldnt have entered their home either

its first pass was a blur  he caught it out of the corner of his eye

he was superior when things attempted to blindside him  or  as in this case  entered through his peripheral  subtly visual things had patent with him  and he noticed them over an blatant item staring him straight in the face

he was notorious for looking through things

Its right in front of your face . . .  were the aggravated rejoinders when he asked

Have you seen my book  My pen  My keys
 

In front of your face . . .   their irritation tightly woven

Which he then matched with a coequal emphasis  Have you seen my fucking head?

Im not asking to irritate you Im just not seeing it  You know me

they did know him  Scarce things enticed him  Obvious bordered on blindness  and oblivion

he saw things on the other side of people  than seeing the people in-between

though it never seemed to matter much to him

but  

    the instantaneous blur across the fresh sunlight piqued him  ---

while she knew him to become separate from conversations  not hear her  a pet peeve of hers

it was everyones pet peeve when it came to talking with him

It was rude  he admitted

but  inevitably  he captured something

and shared it with them

otherwise  they wouldnt have seen without him    by themselves

he gained a generous latitude by sharing  in lieu of his despotic adversarial rudeness

  

Yes  You can call it what you will  But it is despotic  It is tyrannical

 

Youre getting carried away with yourself

No  You ought to try it on for size

I will   I will when you share something in kind with me

there was never a comeback  though  it still didnt alleviate that he was rude

and then  Why  typically was tendered

Why

his only answer  abysmally  was  Whyknot

yes  they knew he spelled with a k

another pet peeve he stoked among his family and friends

You must really love me

I do

Otherwise Id kill ya

Kill me

but when it came to talking about getting away with murder  blood didnt stick to him

                                                     ---   the fresh sunlight piqued him

the blur appeared again  more distinct   darker

the third time it was keenly etched  nearly enveloped the whole of the sunshine slab 

but it didnt pass
              the shadow ran across the livingroom wall and circled to the ceiling batted around the overhead light fixture  shot under the transom into the diningroom  careened over the diningroom table  down though its legs  through the legs of the chairs  up towards the face of the sliding glass doors

                                                      and through its shadow he saw an identical  smaller  shadow against the panes  the symbiotic pair ran up the routered pane bevel its planed face down the bevel across the glass floe up the next bevel its face down the bevel across more imperfect glass  and again  until it ran up the wall to the ceiling moulding and then raced back out of the diningroom  nearly hovered  then streaked down the hall towards the bedrooms and bath
                              the shadow   somehow    separated from the hawk

 

she was speaking

somehow she didnt see its graphite wildness

through the rooms

across the ceilings walls and floors

vying  to escape its unexpected confinement
trying desperately to find its rightful place

the last he heard her say  an astute elaboration  discussing her utter fascination with how blood flowed from the heart to the brain and throughout the body  its remarkable tenacious circulation and it taking but a slender minute to circulate entirely

which  rightfully
was as amok as the hawks freeform shadow flying throughout the inside their home

finally the shadow tiring ceased its mad flapping and found refuge  and breaths  roosting atop the white wood frame of a coloured macro photograph of California poppies hung in the livingroom on the partition wall in line with the now fading slab of sunlight

it made sense that it had

the macro of the poppies defied realism and abruptly moved one to appreciate how abstraction formed in Nature seamlessly

watching it  he returned to her voice  still not really hearing what she said but anxious to politely interrupt and draw her attention to the hawks shadow

 

but before he could a hawks cry pierced the room from outside

--   Did you hear that  she asked

--   Hes back

--   Shes back

--   Hes here

Now

--  Wha

--   There atop . . . 
his eyes moving to the abstract

her eyes deftly following     

                . . . but with the cry  the shadows fabric began to release  drizzle down across the face of the photograph

he stopped  didnt complete his sentence

--   Did you see that  she asked

--   Wha

--   On the poppies

--   The poppies

his heart beating madly

--   It looked like  nuts    it almost looked like   a bird   bits  remnants   a bird   swooping scattering down the wall

--   Oh shit  You saw

--   You saw it

--   Ive been watching it

--   What was it

out through the sliding glass doors the huge hawk appeared in a beeline from above their house towards the redwood
it arched  took altitude  then deftly alighted on its uppermost bough

they both made out its shadow climb the facets of the redwood foliage beneath it

2115,  Monday,  9  2. 15