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Do not enter if you can't read between the lies |
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Alternate
Viewpoints
Sixteen, Hot and Bright
The summer he turned sixteen and got his first job, he also got drunk. She called him at work, and filled him with light. His friends showed up with a bottle of vodka. The light burned hot. He went to the pet store and bought two fucking hamsters. No, I mean the hamsters were fucking. He took that as a good omen. He’d just fallen in love with Roxy.
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Lydia's Pubes (posted at the Synchronicity of Indeterminacy in response to a photo . 2:47 PM, July 06, 2007)
Lydia waited for the growth spurt promised by her family’s aging physician. More like witch doctor. At nineteen, and only four feet tall, her beautiful head outsized her waifish body like a toddler’s. Sensitive nipple nubs remained in their pre-pubescent glory promising everything, capable of nothing. She sported a magnificent head of hair, and her snatch was similarly endowed, saving her from bobble-headed freakdom. When naked, her muff brought symmetry to her body. Fully-clothed was another matter.
Most men took one look at her and expected a denuded crevasse, another victim of Brazilian deforestation, a barren salute to unacknowledged pedophilia, a futuristic and time-saving wave goodbye to clitoral pathfinders of yore. They were dumbfounded by her bush, didn’t know what to do with it, and removed hair from their tongues with an internal shiver. Or they just didn’t go there.
“Your eyebrows,” her lover said, taking her onto his lap to rock her, their amatory prelude, “gave you away.” His breathing quickened, and he adjusted her seat so that they were both comfortable. The rocking resumed. “My eyebrows?” “You remained the same, but for your hair here,” he stroked her long hair, and followed the arch of her brow with his thumb, “and here.” His fingertips glided down her face, barely touching, down her nascent nipple buds, and came to rest on the springy bed of her bush, thick and lush as if fed by a secret spring, a magic elixir.
Her lover’s fingers threaded the hair there, working it apart. Lydia’s head tilted back, her eyes slits in a face filled with desire. Her thighs, jump-rope tight, parted. “There it is, my lovely, the bud within the sage, the pearl of your womanhood.”
A woman. Yes.
LA MúSICA
Country western los mariachis soul jazz salsa opera blues, the blues, reggae hip hop and radio pop the song is love the beat is longing the rhythm is lust the story is loss it’s in my brain it twists my body a gaping need my hole to be filled now a slow desire pulses in my skin looks out from weathered eyes sheltering the music hot and deep within.
Appeared in N.O.L.A. Spleen in 2004.
The Journal of Modern Post is no more, but in it's heyday it printed real, and perhaps not so real letters. My letter is real, and formed the basis for a creative nonfiction piece, The Tattoo Lady, Mother and Me.
Mother's Day Greetings from an Old Beau ---- 2004
Thank you. I think. Funny you should think of me on this day of all days. When I was with you, motherhood was the last thing on my mind. That's not true I did have a lot of theories about it. One or two of those theories survived the field test. Motherhood has been flesh and blood, in-and-out, and all-around, but you know I like adventure.
Sorry to hear about your Mom's accident. How's she adjusting to Tejas? 90-years old. Wow. Your Dad is still around, too, isn't he? Tell her Happy Mother's Day! What's your new wife's name? Is she still real jealous? Did you wish her a Happy Mother's Day?
Yeah, my Mom is the same. Still a tough nut. She was out driving recently, probably on her way to buy dog food at Wal-Mart, and lost her way. Finally got herself to my brother's. You would have thought he'd guided her to his house telepathically to hear her tell it. It's astounding how well-loved he is. She goes on and on, and I agree with her hoping that will put an end to her soliloquy, but it just energizes her. The man can do no wrong.
I try to engage her with heartwarming stories of my children, her only grandchildren, even put them on the phone to take the heat off me. Once when they were little she launched into a story of a dog we owned, which they didn't even remember, and how I got rid of the dog. I'll never forget their innocent eyes sweeping up to me for confirmation. "I didn't get rid of the dog, Mom. I had her put down. Remember? I was running a business, trying to find a sitter, and the dog had cancer and the runs, and Brad was starting to walk, and he'd step into dogshit all the time?"
Silence. She exhales, bites her words. "Yeah, I'm glad you killed the dog. It might have suffered," she says, making her point in that reverse-logic bordering on evil way she's perfected.
I glance at the boys the word killed shining in their eyes. "Euthanized, Mom. Not killed. Would you rather your grandson play with dogshit?"
"Dogshit never hurt anybody," she says, and the boys start giggling. Thank God. Teenagers now, they ask me if I miss my dog-killing days. The dogshit episode has become a fond Grandma tale for them.
Grandma, the wolf. But does that make me Little Red Riding Hood, still trying to please with my little basket of goodies? Pitiful stuff at my age.
Still, I call her every weekend until it gets to be too much hearing about what a magnificent son my mother has, or the Tattoo Lady. Mother's latest freaky friend has tattoo's all up and down her arms, across her chest, encircling a vast abdomen, and traveling down her dimpled backside. The Tattoo Lady, her dead husband, her incarcerated son, and the recently released older son are a textbook testament to the marginal perpetuating themselves into future generations: alcoholism, I.V. drug use, prostitution, body piercing, jail time, truant grandchildren and dog-fucking.
Not the Tattoo Lady, but a close relative. Apparently, it happened in an abandoned car in the yard. Not sure if it was up on blocks. Tattoo Lady was taking a stroll and saw her son in the car with the dog. Later, not sure how much later, she and Mom strolled by the same spot, and Tattoo Lady casually mentioned the incident, as if the car is now a memoriam to bestial trysts.
"Was the dog okay?" Mom asked the Tattoo Lady.
"I don't know," Tattoo Lady said, shrugging her shoulders in what I imagine was a who-knows-what-dogs-really-think way.
"That's disgusting, Mom," I said, after she told me the story. "Don't you know any nice people?"
"They're all dead," she said.
I guess I'll get an update next weekend.
How's your brain thing?
S
A SYRIANA CHEAT SHEET:
I trekked out to Santa Monica for an 11:15 a.m. showing of "Syriana" last week, and it wasn’t just for the $2 discount. Since I have a weakness for older, whiskered, and slightly rotund men, I couldn’t miss seeing a pudgy George Clooney. One is never sure if these men are retired academics with a penchant for undergraduates or if they’re spooks still not ready to come in from the cold. In "Syriana" we have Clooney playing the "maverick" C.I.A. agent Bob Barnes, who is near the end of his career. Then there’s the economist (Matt Damon), the Pakistani kid, the black lawyer, the good Prince of an oil-rich emirate, the C.I.A., the oil tycoons, and the lawyers. The first five provide a complex tapestry, often working at cross purposes. The last three do their best to act as if they run the world. By the end of the movie, I was convinced that they do.
Bennet Holiday (Jeffrey Wright) is a black attorney with a prestigious Washington law firm known for issuing one line invoices to the Saudi government for "thirty-five million dollars." He’s not yet a partner, and has no personal life. He’s assigned the due diligence on a merger between two mega-oil corporations. Will the black man be sacrificed? Clue: he plays the game well enough to tell his client, good old boy, Texas tycoon, Jimmy Pope (Chris Cooper), "We have to have the illusion of due diligence," and, even more chillingly, "We need another body." "Call me Jimmy," the capitalist says, shaking his hand. Then, they have barbeque. Bryan Woodman (Matt Damon), is an economist advising Prince Nasir (Alexander Siddig). Nasir is the youngest son , and although the most qualified, the least likely to succeed his father. His fatal flaw is that he’s an ideologue who won’t cooperate with American oil interests. At the other end of the spectrum is a young, unemployed Pakistani laborer named Wasim (Mazhar Munir) who is wooed by radical Islamists (one of whom looked suspiciously like Spike Lee, but that would be one twist too many). The peripheral players all manage to fit neatly into their archetypes: the C.I.A. decides to sacrifice Clooney. Although he has few friends in Washington, Clooney still has the right stuff and corners the big shot lawyer played by Christopher Plummer, who has one of the best lines in the movie: "In Washington, you’re innocent until you’re investigated." The oil tycoons all hunt and fish and reminisce about their youthful days wildcatting the oil fields of Texas. Nobody messed with them then, and just because the oil is now located in someone else’s backyard halfway around the world, they don’t understand why they should change their tactics. The most fascinating story is Wasim’s. He’s poor, uneducated and unemployed. He’s treated like an oil company pawn, and a Saudi pawn. The political rhetoric of the Islamic recruiter is couched in religious terms, so it apparently doesn’t occur to Wasim that he is their pawn, as well. The madrasa offers peace and focus in a complex world. I understood the lure of regimentation and obedience not only for Wasim, but for the thousands of unemployed youth in our own country who sign up and ship out to Iraq when few other choices are available to them. "Syriana" is not an easy movie. It demands that you pay attention. There will be loose ends. Go with a friend. Hash it out over dinner. Print out my cheat sheet and take it with you. |
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