The Limp

There were eleven in all, three women and eight men. They all seemed unrelated. Some were tall others not so. Different ages, some overweight. A cross section of what, I couldn’t figure. But here’s the thing, they all limped. I turned and started to walk away from them. I picked up my pace but they were gaining on me. Why couldn’t I walk faster? It was then that I reached the gate. I turned to look back. They were almost up to me and they asked in unison, “Why are you still limping?” Sweating I turned and opened the gate. That was when I woke. The pain in my leg … the pain.

The Dark

It is dark as I slip my way up the isle
sliding and sticking to the old linoleum
I see albino ankles and arthritic knees
(just keep grabbing onto the light)
as I look up it is there like a crack
in the darkness guiding me to someplace else
anyplace but here will do
why am I here—how can I get free

Someone cranks their leg out
I slide back a few paces and land next to
a naked lady who is suffocating from the fumes
another lady who is scantily dressed laughs at us
I abandon them both and continue to go up
and am now covered in the sticky sickeningly sweet
fluid that continues to flow down the isle
will it never end—how can I get free

From just outside the door I see him
blood red and dressed to kill
he waves to me and I make a final jump
out of the dark and the things that cling to me
(bits of bad thoughts and fragments of love carcasses)
dry up and fall off of me onto the sidewalk
I take his hand and we walk for miles into sunshine
Reddleman blazes singsongy: Free from one is slave to another

Saturday Matinee

Mother gave us each a quarter for the show

       and a dime for some treat

my favorite was milk duds

my sisters and I walked about a mile to the theater

serial episodes, Rin Tin Tin or Flash Gordon

we followed them each week

my sisters were older so I walked home alone

it had something to do with boys

I didn’t understand what that was all about.

but it truly disturbed me

not so much about the boys

it meant I had to walk alone

alone past that house

set back off the street

dark shadows, dingy windows

rumors, gruesome stories  

I whistled, looked straight ahead

and thought of Ming the Merciless

Goldfinger

In 1964 I was 6 years old
somehow I found myself
in the movie theater

A large screen with wild images
What is going on?

The image of           The Woman in Gold
has stayed with me

shocked at 6
mystified now
                                The Golden Goddess
it stays in the recesses of my mind
So yes I do remember.

Sticky Floor

Do you remember?

I remember it every time

   I step on a sticky floor in the theater

it was a French film – Eric Rohmer

as near as I could tell

it was about paint drying

I couldn’t understand French

and the subtitles were just confusing

we sat in the back row – murky shadows

and we kissed, it was called necking in those days

kissed until our lips became numb

legs in pretzels

spilled popcorn

and, oh yes, my foot kicking your Coke

the sticky fluid running down

through the rows

Banana Split

Jab it

Poke it

Tear it

Rip it

Cut it

Slice it

Break it

or of course

you can

Split it

It all has the same ending

Banana Split

Banana peel

Peeling a banana

everyone has their own theory about this

I for one follow this procedure every time

jab my thumb nail in the base of the stem

then break its neck by pushing backwards

the separation is clean

then peel downwards each section

but not quite all the way

if any veins are left peel them too

grab the fruit and break it free from the tip.

Then there are the others

the ones that favor a sharp knife

it’s faster but of course more brutal.

Banana Seat

Greg straddles the Banana Seat

Suzy is pressed against the Sissy Bar

I squeeze into the Butterfly handle bars

We rode into the plum scented early evening

Far and Fast we screamed and ranged

Away from our homes

And all the attendant problems

Fearless, sailing past orchards and

Japanese green houses, skimming around

Elementary schools with cement play yards,

Teasing mysterious homes occupied by

Earthbound Ghosts of World War I

It all made sense

Way before the Treaty of Versailles

We children had made peace with our world

Lived in it completely 

and accepted all its weirding ways 

Whoosh

Whoosh – the peloton rounds the curve to the left

the air opening and closing around the group of cyclists

like a huge flock of birds or a school of small fish

all turn at the same moment

then whoosh, whoosh, single riders  

two lost souls struggle to catch up

I stand and watch

an astronomer peering at some distant galaxy

trying to make sense of it all.

Penny Farthing

 

These two sides exist encased in each other
Don't ever take one more serious than the other
To always have a smile is false and belies the truth
Remember: Buddha is an ideal not a man and he too trod dark paths

Why this fear of the dark? This fear of the light?
Both are human — both are God given — both have a place on earth

My brother tells me every face I see is my own!
We are merely reflections of each other
He channels all the light to cover his dark
The police know where He lives and visit with firm reprimands

As He climbs his high wheeled Penny Farthing
Dons his Out of Africa Hat — He pedals firmly away
Without even a glance over his shoulder
Where behind him stand The Women .... Disturbed and Devastated
Left to sweep all his Sub-Rosa Dark
under a carpet of Frail Gossamer Light
With the forgetting wind at his face He smiles and rides on

SJ

We stand on the shoulders

of giants and dwarves and

those others we call normal

in other words we didn’t get here alone,

he didn’t get here alone

those we love, those we don’t much care for

they are us, we are their face

I hold up my iPad

and someone uses it to slice cheese

Santa Cruz and Pain

And Santa Cruz is a kind of a Death with needles that prick your flayed skin
and light up the map with electric red dots that mark all the places you have tried
and gotten no where.
The sun never shines and all the women have iron in their hearts even at the bar after drinks you think you have a friend the next time you see them they ignore you.
The sun never shines and all the men dress like boys in short pants from the Victorian era with sun aged skin covered in tattoos of Micky Mouse and death.
They like each other way more than women and spend hours on the internet looking for herbs to cure impotency.
And Santa Cruz is too cool and they gotta keep it weird and there is so much pressure with that as you  gotta look the same and all be weird cuz weirdos rule and cool people rock and normal is bad and the sun never shines and opiates sprout from babies mouths so mama wont be in a bad mood or for gods sake normal, please not normal.
And Santa Cruz is a pain and a kind of a death for a lady that likes sunshine and tea with girlfriends and men who look like men.

The most normal thing in the world

Someone is shaking me awake

my groggy eyes look down the bed

sometime in the night they moved

     my bed to somewhere in Cambodia

this tiny woman wants to take my vitals

   blood pressure, temperature, O2 saturation.

I rebuild my confidence in the day

oh yeah, Santa Cruz and pain

she straightens my covers

“what’s this” she asks

then she pulls a full urine bottle

from between my legs

slept all night with that there

“didn’t spill a drop” she says, with a smile, as if it was

    most normal thing in the world.