dmseay

you’re afraid of what…what…something past… haunting you…now…here…present…no ability to shift duck dodge…adjust adapt…you’ll be dead soon…

just tell…

what…tell you what…all will be O.K. … good people go to heaven…forever and ever Amen…what…

I’m not in a…

when…

place…

a place…a place…sound like a fuckin’ broad…there’s no time for this…this is…

stop…

up…time is up…

please…

you just got your death notice…an invite from the grim reaper himself…

got it…

apparently not…

yes…got it…

so…so what…me…I don’t care what you do…this life…your life will soon be over…am I clear…

 ….yes….

what’dya want…

ten more years and one more woman…

kidding…

no…you asked…

always about comfort…always taken care-of…

that’s what I want…

O.K. …O.K. …

yes…O.K. …

lying in bed with Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty in my hands…listening to whispers…tales of madness…plotting the next move…

jazz riffs drift from a page…the story of America told…these myths revealed… romantic and pragmatic…if there’s a way it’d be bottled and sold…

beats in Chicago…San Fran…Denver crazy Denver…roaming Iowa fields of gold…bellies whining… throats dry…looking…always looking…in search of truths…

where is that American beauty…of Whitman…Thoreau…Kerouac…tran-scendental blues and beat driven words wandering page after page after page…weeping…laughing…drinking …fucking…making America great again…
only on shelves…only on shelves…rarely experienced these days…romance is gone…tis gone…

lying in bed with Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty in my hands…listening to whispers…tales of madness…plotting the next move…

every night was spent on College Street…over by a library…seemed safe…comforting…very comforting…all those books inside…waiting for morn to come…

a chilled New England autumn…bundled-up in the front seat of an Avenger…a sweatshirt…jacket thrown over backwards…chattering of teeth…

it was night that got me…seeing people…youth wandering into taverns… dollars to spend… lovers to go home with…

a game was played…pretended to be a private-eye on watch for the night…a millionaire’s wife discovered the joys of attentive care…

he wanted pictures…proof of these misdeeds…catch ’em in the act…services paid in cashier’s checks…take no  chances…

one by one they’d come and go ’til closing time…never saw the lady in the picture…supposed cheating wife…another paranoid husband…take the money…

radio turned-on…jazz from Montreal…some crazy form of French tickling my ears…no memories…in the present…i am alone…

and the morn would arrive…sunlight hitting season’s splendor…rays coming through a fogged windshield… empty belly…turning of a key…start of ‘nother day…

we never know the outcome do we…never…changes within seconds…without warning…

in this we take comfort…

kept goin’…walked away from one kinda’ fear into another…always has…least since I can remember…

this constant need to travel…go somewhere…in-search of what…somethin’ better…maybe a second chance…

never the type to stay in one-place… always these calls we’d get from all-over…bizzare places…like Moscow, Texas…Paris, Tennessee…Kukamonga…

they’d talk for an hour or so…an’ when she got off that phone she’d shake her head a few times, What a strange boy, she’d say, A strange boy…,just nod my head..

don’t think he ever knew what he was doin’…completely unaware of any kinda’ repercussions…there’s always repercussions…oh well…
he’ll be back…you’ll see…maybe ‘fore fall…winter…liked ta’ see the leaves change…said it was God’s paint-brush…

used ta’ take me on these long afternoon drives…interstate…backroads…up in Michigan…over in Ohio…we’d just sit there…drivin’…not a word…maybe he was waitin’ on me ta’ say somethin’…I was waitin’ on him…

that’s that..

he’ll be back…tellin’ ya’…might be a year…maybe ten…who knows…but he’ll come through town again…broke as always…

you’ll see…

know one thing…

I’ll be gone…

he just got so jealous…crazy I guess you could say…

yep…I know the type…

he’d never had a woman like her before…easy to talk to…real pretty…very pretty…

blonde…

yes…blonde…

uh huh…

he tried everyway imaginable to make her his…his alone…wanted so badly to be with her…all the time…all the time… liked to listen to her talk…

talk….

yes…just sit there on the couch and talk…hours…listenin’to her past… mistakes…they’d both made mistakes…

right…

and he loved to hear her laugh…real laugh…nothing fake…she got him…knew what he was about…

we often do…

‘spose…this was different…

how so…

hard ta’ say…was…

how’d they meet…

some… computer thing…this friend knew that friend and that friend knew this friend…

small world…

yes…

what happened…

he was this travelin’ troubadour…romantic way of sayin’ a bum…

no…maybe different…

yes…different…

nothin’ wrong with that…

no…no there’s not…anyway…they’d send messages to each other…at night before sleep…in the morning when they’d wake-up…he relied on this…comforted him…

I see…

told her of his love…for her…took a chance…

yea…what’d she say…

she knew…she knew…and she cared deeply for him as well…

but…

yes…but…

what’s wrong…

nothing…nothing…you wanna drink…

you O.K. …

’bout some whiskey…feel like whiskey…

sure…

…thanks…

what…

listenin’…

this is done…finished…and at what cost…this is America…and inside the belly of the beast success is marked by cost and profit…right…

yes…

so…I’ll ask again…at what cost…

hard to tell…

you need numbers…stats…figures…what.. 

well I…

no…no…your gut…it’s the gut you fuck…a guy knows or he does not…take the stacks of paper…the personal computer…and this will be done with…

there are assessments…

yes…based on…

facts…simple facts…

fuck facts…facts do not allow the possible…got it…the possible is beyond what is presented…uh…right…

the numbers give way…

to nothing…to nothing…you don’t like something…change it…with the stroke of a key…change it…

that is…

what…what…a misrepresentation…a fudging of “facts”….

I’m saying…

no…it is giving some poor fuck hope…hope…that he too can survive in the muck…he can attain something…

that’s not…

right…not just…who makes these rules…uh…who…did you…me…the mensch on the upper westside…some fuck in Queens…

O.K. …

O.K. …what…a change in perception…of face…you are either in or you are out and that is that do not ask again…clear…are we clear…

….sure…

give somebody hope…just give it to them…what’ll it cost you…

sat listening to this preacher talk and talk…endless talk…of wrongs…evil in the world…some kind of restitution needed… buy now…

a selling of jesus…promises made if instructions followed…streets of gold…mansions…God doesn’t want suffering…an American prescription…

rewarded…told by a deity, job well done…enter my kingdom, this shopping mall dream…a brand-new body and an everlasting joy…the big pay-off…

and guns are fired…people killed…judgments made…the instant images of death we’ve become immune to…radical Islam…Christian Conservatives…you tell me the difference…

forgive them father…for they know not what they do…

no…they do not…

could’ja tell…

what…

our friend…

yes…

right…

fucker…

yes…

who does he think he is…who…

no idea…

what’s done is done…no more complaints…no more constant babble…fuckin’ old woman…

I know…

and for what…who benefited…did you…me…not on your life…he certainly didn’t…so…the cost right…

right…

this cost the cocksucker dearly…more than a pound of flesh…shekels…a whole line of credit gone…

and for what…

yes…for what…

nothing gained…not-a-thing…not in the long…nothing in the short…a complete loss…

yea..

this is what happens…

this…

this is what happens to men who get sidetracked…no focus…just get-in…get-out…what good does that do…

doesn’t…

bingo…well…good riddens…

yes…

let this be a lesson…

always a lesson..yes Murray…always a lesson…

yes…

separates us from the fucking animals…this ability to learn lessons…

I know…

he did not have that ability…fucking chimpanzee…fucking ape…nothing learned…that’s what we take from this…

yes…

patience Murray….always patience…

and we did not make love…

words…words…words…softly said…listening…listening…

talk of where the soul journeys after…beyond this weigh-station… clearing-house…

cigarettes and red wine…a stain on a white-tee…a cat named El Gato making his rounds…pour another glass…yes…yes…

laughing at foolishness…our foolishness…a kiss…an embrace…her back touched lightly…playful licks…no harm…

music left it’s mark…we sang along…old songs…lyrical poems of promise…passion…somebody who cares…we both wanted someone who cared…

held throughout night…she slept…an occasional brush of blonde hair from green eyes closed…arm around her soft belly…shhh…let dreams happen…

legs entangled…awakened to a touch..morn came upon us….two people…two friends…damn that sun…

and we did not make love…

or…did we…

his needs were catered to…the cooking…castle cleaned…laundry done…stupid jokes laughed at…always placed first…insecurities demanded it…

no empire was built…never a great amassed wealth…crumbs fought-over at Sunday dinners…he’d laugh at two brothers wrestling for a biscuit…piece of bread…anything placed before us…never enough…

what were they thinking…these two…kids playing house…kids having kids…kids…kids…kids…was it ever anything more than make-believe…couldn’t tell…afraid to ask…

and now he sits on a pauper’s thrown…alone…alone…watching television and grinning at other’s misfortunes…miscues…mistakes…just sits there…howling…

i wonder if he knows…gets it…he didn’t win…he did not win…

that… is the punchline…