dmseay

There’s somethin’ ’bout you that I can’t place my finger on…and it’s botherin’ me real bad…like I should know you…but I don’t…seems like we go back a ways…maybe back to when we were kids in Arkansas…or was it Tennessee…back when the grass was all wet with dew and the November air was chilly…back to when we played football at recess and it was the blacks against the whites…did I know you then…did you used to intercept my passes that I threw down field just before the teacher blew her whistle….I think that was you…think so…

And I used to see you on the school bus sittin’ in the back…droppin’ you off in your neighborhood way on the Southside of town…there were cars put up on blocks in your front yard and a mean old dog tied to a tree…barkin’ it’s fool head off every time that bus turned the corner…you used to lift up a rusted old coffee can on the front porch and grab a key to unlock the front door…I always wondered if your mom was home…always…

You never saw where I lived did ya…not much different from where you stayed…just an old trailer park on the West side of town…pick up trucks with the windows cracked on em sat in driveways along with American flags and old Dixie flyin’ in the breeze…weren’t no coloreds in my neighborhood…just poor white trash tryin’ to make a livin’ somehow…guess just the same as you people were…workin’ at factories and garages…car wash places and grocery stores…fast food joints…moms and dads tryin’ to eek out a livin’…had mouths to feed…birds in a nest waitin’ to be fed…just waitin’…

Feel like I should know ya…but I can’t remember…can’t place ya…maybe you just remind me of someone…some kid I knew in grade school…somebody I used to play football with at recess…blacks vs. whites…

This too shall pass…,he said to her as they sat quietly at the bar…jukebox played an old song by Buck Owens…then, Pancho And Lefty, sung by Willie Nelson…he hummed along…didn’t know all the words…just the tune…

She put out her cigarette and turned to him…the old man she called him…turned to him and said…,you think it’s over ‘tween us…,the redhead took another swig of Seven and Seven…,I mean…you say this too shall pass…but I don’t know ’bout that…seems things just get crazier and crazier…,she lit another…last one…crumpled up the pack and moved it to the edge of the bar…,I mean…how can you keep on forgivin’ me…lied to you…cheated on you…I’m real sorry…,he took a swig of beer and nodded his head…it wasn’t the first time…

I look at this way…,the old man said…,always know what you’re up to…figured it wasn’t ’bout love but about a physical need…wish I could help you with that…but the cancer got me…or the radiation did…either way it don’t work no more…makes me feel like half a man…,she placed her bony fingers on his shoulder…,you’ll get it out of your system…,he told her…,you will…I’m willin’ to wait…

You’re a good man…

I’m a lonely man…I need you ’round…and if that means…so be it…that’s what you get for marryin’ an old man…,he motioned to the bartender to pour another round…

Well…yes….this too shall pass…this too…,she leaned into him where her slim waist grinded on him just a bit…kissed him…

Yeah…this too shall pass…

He’d sit for hours listening to old jazz albums as the skies outside let down rain…soaking the rust colored trees…mums on the back porch in colors of gold…rust…purple…and yellow stood straight up in their pots taking in the cool water from God’s eyes…

Were they tears of joy or pain that flowed from Jehovah…tormented by his creation…or well pleased that once again the seasons had changed…hard to say…hard to say…

And he couldn’t decide either…the same way he couldn’t remember the day of his baptism…so long ago…back when he was a kid and Jesus was feared…billboards warned him of the second coming…asking…,ARE YOU READY?…

But for now it was the jazz that saved his soul on this dark Autumn day…It was Oliver Nelson and his band…whoopin’ and hollerin’ with horns and drums…and loud prayers lifted up by the players…prayers of rejoicing…making sure that the soul was touched…touched…

His certainly was…

look at you…

yeah…

are you happy…

is anybody…,she smiled…tossed her hair back over her shoulder…,some I think…some are happy…

you…,he took a swig of coffee and a bite of cherry pie…red filling got in his gray beard…she took a napkin and gently wiped it off…

yeah…I have my bad days like everybody…but in general I’m happy…,shrugged her shoulders…played with the fork by her oatmeal muffin…didn’t have any intention of eating it…

I don’t see a ring on your finger..,he said…,figured you’d get married again…some professional…a lawyer…something…

No…I’m seeing someone…but…never do I think of marrying again…I do just fine on my own…he has his life and I have mine…less messy that way…,she smiled…sipped her coffee…,what became of you…,she asked…

You’re looking at it…

Where do you sleep at night…

Under bridges…homeless shelters…

Do you have any money…,he shook his head…she began to fumble through her purse…put a twenty in his greasy palm…held it…like she used to…back when they were young…,I’m sorry it’s not more…it’s all I have on me…we could go to an ATM…,he shook his head…said it was fine…

They looked at each other…for a brief moment they looked at each other…made contact…,I gotta get going…,he said…,you take care of yourself…

You too…

I look out my windows at trees turning green to rust…yellows…gold…another year over…soon the calender will change…as have I…

A tooth pulled…body aches…gray streaks in black hair…colds are caught easily…pissing my life away…the beginning of the end…the final stretch…

And winter will come…none of us can avoid it’s grip…blackened skies…overcast days…the mystery that it is…mystery…

Hope I see spring…

She didn’t know what hit her…a note left years ago sayin’…,stepped out for smokes…,he never returned…

Some say he left her ’cause she was cheatin’ on him with a preacher…a wild charismatic man with stories to tell and a golden tan…other women had been with him too…’least that’s what they say…all of em married…lookin’ for somethin’ they weren’t gettin’ at home…some romance…held while they’d sleep…woken in the middle of the night with a kiss… that’s what they said…that’s what they said…

No…he took off in his pick-up and headed down South on 41…goin’ through Terre Haute…wantin’ to see the place of his birth…wantin’ to touch the grass he knew when he was a kid…forget all ’bout bein’ grown-up for a change…left his insurance business all behind…took a little cash with him…and drove to Arkansas in the middle of the night…the air was cool…it blew through the vents…

His daddy was the same way…he took off in the midnight hour as well…he’d drive all over the country…through the Rockies…out to Arizona…spent time in Texas too…they found his body in his truck along the highway…momma said…,just bury the son-of-a-bitch…

And now he’d wind up the same way…body found in old Dixie with crows flyin’ ’round it…hawks…buzzards…never made it back to his place of birth…gave up on that notion…funny how it runs in the family…

what did you call her…some kind of name…some kind of derogatory term…you were insulting her…making fun…I remember…said it when she wasn’t ’round…couldn’t defend herself…said she was a whore…an old whore who gave up years ago…that’s what you said…that’s exactly what you said…

and I remember I used to follow her ’round town on Friday night’s when I got paid…trackin’ her down as she walked along Division Street…walked with a limp…and had on that brunette wig that was always a little off…crooked…I’d watch her pick up johns as they drove by…get in the cars and gave em head over in the church parkin’ lot…a place where all sins festered…ten minutes later they’d drive her back to Division Street to get in a car with somebody else…went on this way til the sun came up…til the birds chirped in the early mornin’ breeze…

she used to count her money over at the Pollack bar next to the Post Office…six o’clock in the mornin’ and she’d be in there with the construction workers…mailmen…drunks…junkies…whores…drinkin’ shots of cheap vodka and Malort…cans of Old Style…screwdrivers made with orange drink…smoke so thick…couldn’t breath in the joint…

I don’t see her ’round anymore…the woman you called an old whore…wonder what became of her…probably wound up dead…maybe she took off for another town…maybe like Mary she found her Jesus…some man saved her soul while the rest of us are stuck here on Division Street…just wastin’ away…just wastin’ away…

The train whistle blew…and then there was silence…an eerie kind of silence that one only experiences past midnight in a small town where the stop light blinks a cautionary yellow throughout the night…

Train whistle blew again…and again as it rolled on…some slept right through it…dead tired from a day’s activity…standin’ on a factory’s floor…sellin’ used cars…pumpin’ gas…baby sittin’ kids that your sister Gina had ‘fore she was done with high school…people workin’ on a Monday afternoon and into the night with purple skies hangin’ over head…your brother Bobby snorin’ away down the hall…sometimes his breathin’ gets cut off and you’ll hear him sputter ’round a bit but don’t be alarmed…he ain’t dead yet…just dreamin’ away the hours on Trazadone…takes four or five of em to get to sleep…meanwhile that yellow light keeps blinkin’ off and on…

The train whistle blew some more…I got up and started a pot of coffee…couldn’t sleep…thinkin’ of you…been years now since you passed-on…died of a heart attack early in the mornin when it was dry outside…summer’s heat made all the grass hay and the stars would come out at night and form the little dipper…we called an ambulance but it took so long to get to us that you just went and gave up…an old semi putin’ on air brakes could be heard through town…you were pronounced dead there in our livin’ room…crickets chirped outside…

Then there was just silence…old lonesome silence…no more trains blowin’…no more diesels rollin to a stop at the yellow light…just quiet…

Has it always got to be so quiet…

he’d sit in his room and wait for her second coming…she’d left him years ago…round Christmas time when the cold had set in and everyday was overcast…black and white…like an old photograph…

looking out windows…he could see the Mexicans goin’ into church and cars cruisin’ down Dewald Street…girls walkin’ home with backpacks and old women pushing grocery carts…kept wonderin’ if he’d see her…that woman who came into his life and made a mess of it…made him think of love and family…’bout settlin’ down…gettin’ a trailer on the outskirts of town…she made him think that way…

and one day she told him in a note left on the counter that she was movin’ on…said she wanted to be free after all…free to leave when she wanted to…free to pick up and go without any extra baggage…just her by herself…alone…that’s what she wanted…

so…everyday he’d sit by that window in his rented room and wait for her second coming…he’d look out and watch the trees change colors…see the sun burn out after a long day…catch the moon’s glow in the midnight hour…

he’d wait…he’d wait…we’re all waiting…one day she’ll show up…one day…

what was it you were sayin’…

’bout what…

somethin’…you were goin’ on ’bout somethin’…

was I talkin’ to you…

think so…or mumblin to yourself…somebody’d wronged you…done somethin’ to you way back…

was I talkin’ in my sleep…

nope…I came in and you were talkin’….looked at me and continued talkin’…had you seen a ghost…

no…no ghosts…no spirits…I don’t know what you’re talkin’ ’bout…you make these accusations…like I’m crazy or somethin’…talkin’ out loud to myself…

ain’t nothin’ to be ashamed of…people talk to themselves…all the time…you just seemed angry…that’s all…

I don’t recall me talkin’ to myself or you or anybody else…

sure…OK…we’ll leave it at that…

thank you…much obliged…you didn’t see anything…didn’t hear nothin’…

no…I did not…not a word…

not a word…