Friday, June 25, 2021

The Morphing Role

                            


Matt sat in the comfy chair his partner gave him for his birthday, the event now past the relevance of time.  The chair existed, as did he.  Green. Perhaps, in the end, it would go to the dumpster, and he would go to his casket.  

Six feet under. 

He pondered on which would be worse.  To be once loved and then put into a landfill composed of garbage, never to be enjoyed again, or if he disappeared into the dirt only for his nice clothes to rot, his flesh to be pulled off by hungry ghouls known as worms, slimy and slick.  

A contradiction against reason.

Of course, the couch wouldn’t be cognizant of love or hate nor of its life.  It would only exist in Matt’s mind. Therefore, in the dirt, the memory of the personified couch, the place he sat in on long nights, would disappear from the consciousness of man and be a rat habitat.

Hopefully, it wouldn’t steal the remote with it.  

Not that it mattered.  Matt wouldn’t be changing the channel.

His bones would rattle in an earthquake, perhaps.  Would anyone remember care?  He could roll in his grave with its fake imitation of sleep while they used the phrase, “He’s rolling in his grave.”  

Unlike Kant, Shakespeare, Homer, and Milton, he was nothing. After the words left his tongue, they vibrated in the air, sometimes hitting others' ears with their lower notes and coming back to him with simple acknowledgment.  Most people don’t have anything fancy to say, he knew. Sure, he quoted himself, made puns, felt clever.  The fleshy mirrors showed him their amusement.  

Mainstream books kept the same stories going on in time.  

The detective found the murderer in his own cold blood.

The woman turned out to be a princess now rules her home kingdom far away with some handsome pauper man helping her. 

The man carries the woman up the stairs and makes sweet love to her in the way a woman would want, dream of, while she had to tolerate her husband in real life, a man with an eye for the apple above his reach. 

Then…

A boy beats all odds.

A girl beats all odds.

Good always prevails. There is justice in the world.

Evil fails or is ambiguous.

Over and over and over again. 

The end.

Only an educated princess felt the pea at the bookstore.  The languages she spoke, the riddles she solved, the blossoming world became a flower of culture and prestige.  

But those kinds of people don’t share wisdom with the common man or woman.  They keep ideas in their heads.  Wisdom is a weapon that must be used with caution.  Give the wrong bead off the necklace of knowledge, and you end up being God, chased by the paparazzi, hunted by devils of generations’ past.  Everyone has a dark secret, a passion that keeps them human. 

They find you.

Everyone prays to you with insults.  


You should only know love. Hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil in a lover.

Matt’s thoughts became too deep for him.  His philosophical views on the world didn’t move a soul.   

Why bother? He asked himself.

Six feet under.

I wonder when Randy is gong to come home? Matt pondered.  He loved when Randy was a man first, not some princess dressed in white for a wedding with a rose in her hand, a damsel in distress, calling for a man, calling for cash. The sex was so much better.  As the cum went into Matt’s mouth, he tasted the nectar of the gods.

He’d met Randy ten years prior at work. They filed in a hospital, keeping the records meticulous.  Their flame raised into the heavens.  To Matt, Randy was God as man.  

But what about as a woman?  

As a woman, Randy wore a smile of the sun, lips red and tender, waiting to be poisoned by a kiss. Chemicals danced within both of them.  Her dark skin kept the night of her body.

She touched him tenderly, made him feel alive, made him feel manly and strong.  He entered her vagina then, warm and wet and moved in a way only sex can make you move, the high that other animals, with more respectable mating patterns, laugh at.  

Oh, you think you’re civilized, don’t you?  Climb higher and higher up the tree of knowledge, only to make the branches creak and turn on you, break as you climax then fall to the ground, in the dirt with the worms.  

Dirty.


He went to do the dishes.  His hands began to thin, his hair grew long, a blossoming cherry of red shade, and his body took the figure of a man off.  Down in the nether regions, his manhood was absorbed.  And lastly, his voice changed became a soprano’s.

Randy came into the door.  

A man.

“How was work, honey?” She asked Randy.  

“You know, the usuals.  I put cosmetics on people who have no intention of buying my products.  They sit in the chair, hiding the change in their pockets, their overdrawn debt cards.  They make silly excuses.  Sometimes they try to change into men, but the makeup won’t let them when they are in the role of women.”

“It’s a shame,” Mattie said.  The name in his mind had switched.  “Do you think one day we will ever get past such prejudice?  The world keeps turning, but we don’t seem to learn a damn thing.”

“Have you been pondering again with your silly puns and quotes?”

“And what if I am?”

Randy took a deep breath.  Women could be so annoying and self-absorbed, unable to ask even the most basic of questions. 

I’ll never understand, Randy told himself.  She opened the refrigerator and grabbed a cold beer.  

“You’ve been drinking too much,” Mattie said.

“When you come home from a long day,” he said.

“I work, too! Don’t start that bullshit with me.”

“If you were a woman, you’d understand,” Mattie put “a woman scorned” into her voice.  

“Perhaps I would only understand as a woman.”  Randy plucked a diamond necklace out of his pocket and put it on.  His flesh and bones snapped and transformed.  

Randy thought of the statement she made as a man.  

“I totally get it, honey.  I apologize.  Men don’t understand such things.  Give me a hug. It’s such a cruel world, but at least we have the love of each other.”

Then Randy blushed and said in a whisper, “Do you want to be the man or the woman or should be both be men or both be women. Tasty ways?” 

“Tonight?” Mattie smiled.

“Right now, honeysuckle, I’m in the mood,” Randy whispered, her hair long and free like a wildflower. 

“It’s too bad the government got rid of transgender to keep society’s roles harmonized.  One day, we will end oppression,” Mattie said.  

“I’ll be the man,” Randy said with a slight moan.  She took offer her necklace and pulled down her pants until the garden of Eden grew.  

“Come on, Eve,” a pet name for Mattie.

“I’ve got the apple,” she giggled.

“Let me take a bite,” Randy said as they headed into the bedroom before they lay naked again, two genders that could also be men together.  There were no secrets between them.  

They knew each other.  As they moaned, they said nothing. Pleasure rocked.

In the dirt,

The tree of life grew. 

        Green.

        Six feet under.








Sunday, June 20, 2021

To See, To Be

 Gloria walked into the flowerbed. She didn’t know why they called it a “bed.” Well, she assumed that the “flowers” were supposed to be there but not the other part, the ugly part. The top layer of wood chips manifested as being anything but comfortable or dream-giving. When she walked barefoot on them, she wondered if she were actually a princess or a goddess in a past life. Pain came easily there as pain comes in life when you leave your shoes in the house.

No, I do not want to sleep there, she told herself, strolling along.
I am “restless,” not another word. She sighed. Words followed her wherever she went. If she saw the letters combine and a sound is uttered, inciting them, even though her rosy lips, the words stayed with her for eternity.
Her thoughts dipped down so deeply into her brain.
She paused and then felt an impulse to move. It stung her body.
“Restive” popped out. Many times words assaulted their ordinary parts, twisting meanings around, rudely rhyming. Though in the country where she lived, children were only taught through the third grade, and usually only to read, write, and put numbers together on bills, she mused you learn just by living.
And she couldn’t stop the words from entering her head.
“Restive,” she said out loud. It is the same word as “restless.”
"Or to live at rest."
People complicate the world so much, she figured. Why is the world thicker than a bush with chitchat and gossip?
“Hate” means “hate” and “love” means “love.” The people in the bushes, they made “hate-love” and “love-hate” to sound clever. No one saw these hidden people because so many people couldn’t translate them in a relevant fashion.
Our lifeboats.
You love hate. “Love-hate.” You hate love. “Hate-love.” These were the same expressions.
Hate wins either way in this “vocabulary,” even in the greenest of places of sweet dews ‘morning kisses, sparkling as do diamonds under the waking sun, so golden.
“That’s why it’s better to say to state a situation plainly. You hate,” Gloria mused and kicked a stone.
What do I hate? She asked herself.
Pain.
The cat who ate her cute kittens. The dad who left. The mom who beat her.
“But pain can be washed away,” her grandma once told her. “Love cannot.”
This bothered Gloria in her thoughts, much further along than her classmates.
Hate is pain. Can’t love be washed away, too? She asked herself.
Gloria saw her grandma’s eyes in the bird-feeder, though she had died three days before. No matter how many times she swished her reflection, the water settled and she saw her eyes, the same as her grandma’s.
In that moment came true understanding. She knew her grandma had given her sight.
To love.
It was up to her to use that vision.

Sunday, May 2, 2021

Age at Its Finest



Jessica let the breeze pass through her grey hair, between her weaving wrinkles, whistling tunes.  A wind chime came and went here and there.  The blue sky peered down on Jessica, letting the simple sun share the sky with its companion, not with blithe but with acceptance.  A coolness defied the summer heat.

A few memories rose to the surface of Jessica’s mind.

A child came first, blossoming in a yellow dress.  Jessica smiled at the vision, a younger her.  

“Grandma, can we get a pare from the tree?”

“Only if your grandpa agrees to take you on the tractor.  You know there are snakes in the grass. The grass is taller than you!”  

Jessica recalled as her tall, thin grandma went back to the house, let the cat out ,and shut the door.  The child saw an opportunity, even though she wasn’t to go beyond the first yard.  But in the middle of the field beyond, she knew there was sweet goodness.

She took a cautious first step.

No snakes.

Gradually, a spell of bravery moved her legs faster and faster.  The grass moved away from her as her hands and body pushed it away.  

“I’m the snake!” She said aloud.  “I’m the silly snake who spends all day in the field guarding pare trees from little girls. Well, I’m going to be silly, too.  Then I will be near the pare tree like a snake. They won’t know I’m a girl!”

Her grandpa always told her how much he loved her and her strange phrases.  He took her on tractor rides on Sundays, when he wasn’t too tired from work. His strong muscles and bones tired after a long day.  He drank some “spirits” as grandma called them. There were no spirits on Sundays.  No anger.

She huffed and puffed until she stood at the base of the pare tree. Rotten fruit stuck to her shoes.  Her arms went up but could not reach the fruit.  She looked around for a log or rock that might bolster her up.

Nothing.

A man approached Jessica as she pondered these musings on the park bench.  

“May I sit here?” He asked.  Jessica observed him for a minute, a pale face, cheeks ruby with youth, a pile of blonde hair on his head, like a prized rug. Her eyes matched his, a deep azure hue.  

“Sure.”

“It’s a nice day out, but it’ll be noon soon enough.  They say only madmen and the English stay out at noon.”  His phrase went through her mind, the simplest thought she’d had all day.  

“Well, the Englishmen and old ladies can stay out. Maybe we’ve been banished from indoors,” Jessica said.  

“Banished? What a strange word to use,” the man said.  “My name is Brian.  What is yours?”

“Jessica.”  

“May I ask what you’re doing out here?”

“Of course, I always share my business with strangers,” Jessica’s eyes gently drifted to the ground.  

“Ma’am, I’m sorry.  I didn’t mean that.”

“I know.  So what is a man doing here with such pale skin that might burn?  It’s a wonder the sun hasn’t scorched you yet.  We’re heathens, after all, to tempt mother nature in such a way.”

“I’m on break.  I work in the office building over there.  I’m a CEO.”

“Ah, a big boss then.”

“I guess.  Do you have any hobbies, work, volunteer at centers.”

“Nope, I sit on this bench all day waiting to die.  Sometimes there are butterflies around the flowers.”  Jessica felt a wave of sadness overcome her heart.

“How old are you?” Brian asked.

“I’m thirty-five,” Jessica replied.

“Dear God, what did you do? I’m not perfect, but I’m four-hundred years old.  I get another injection next year.”  Brian scratched his head quickly then gripped the bench, uneasily.

“I refused to make any more bad decisions.” 

“Bad decisions, but companies only punish those who make such choices in life, “ Brian said pridefully.  

Jessica chuckled at the ground.  Brian shifted his body.

“Tell me two bad decisions then.”  Brian’s voice was full of thoughts and confusion.

“I wouldn’t have children.”

“That is a bad decision.  It’s part of your duty,” Brian said.  

“Nah, not if you knew my father and his family. We’re cursed.”  

“But they can alter genes.  We have so many choices.”

“Yes, but I can’t escape being a pariah.  I didn’t want others to know I altered my genes, that I couldn’t naturally produce able-bodied children.  I couldn’t escape the memory of what he did to people.  Even if they changed my past, they can’t change what happened or the people who were affected during the massacre.”

Brian’s eyes flashed, but he could not come up with any defenses in his expressions. Shock.

“Tell me one more bad decision,” Brian challenged.  

“I wanted to walk in the park,” Jessica said, smiling her contumacious behavior or what they felt was rebellious.

“What’s wrong with taking a walk in the park?” 

“I was supposed to report to my second job,” Jessica said, which it appeared Brian took as a confession.

“It’s important that we all work.  Everyone should have pride in being able to reach self-sufficiency.”  Jessica breathed deeply.

“There is no point,” she said.  “I’ll never get anywhere. They would have aged me out regardless.  Gotta make that quota.” 

“But surely someone would have mentored you.”

“You mean brainwash?” Jessica questioned.

“Brainwash? No.”

“Some lives can’t be justified,” she returned.  

“Well, if all you’re going to do is sit here and whine, I can tell you that you deserve being aged out.”

“Really?  Work hard, son, and maybe someday you can make that decision with pride.”  

Brian’s face turned red.  Jessica read his features, a bit of tease went through her mind.  She pushed her long hair behind her left shoulder.  

“Wh-why?”

“You are obviously worthy and will get your shot next year.” Jessica felt uneasy as she said this.  The approaching death bothered her. She figured all living creatures felt this way toward the end or death would be life.  

Hm, she said in her thoughts, there’s no point in living if all life is, is death.

Deep.

“Well, I’m going to leave you now.  All you do is whine.”

“Actually, I mostly sit here and/or walk each day.  Have a nice day and enjoy the finest wine.”

Brian stood up and brushed off his suit.  

Jessica wondered if he’d ever get it.

Intoxication at its best.

Friday, April 23, 2021

Out of the Box — Surprise for Your Eyes!

 Out of the Box — Surprise for Your Eyes!


Sally drove home from her boring job, one that required constant paperwork and filing pages with ambiguous letters on them, none of her business. There are things one shouldn’t know, she reasoned and stuffed them away during her shifts..

As she twisted with the turning road, she let some of her thoughts about the day wander in other directions. It seemed as if Zach didn’t care for her anymore. How could she be so gullible to think he would stay, not a man from the inner depths of a city? She was a poor country girl who had managed only to meet the basic requirement for him to take her to fancy restaurants, to look like a woman of worth: the family jewels.

She moved alone and thought, yes, thought. How many women fall for that? She asked herself.

Shell entered her driveway. She sat on the couch and kicked her high-heeled shoes off. I’ll be educated today, she thought. I’ll know what’s going on.

Like she had a choice.

She clapped and her television came on to the mandatory channel, an annoyance that everyone to deal with before their shows. And everyone was required to watch at least one hour of television a day. In front of her, a blank static passed, forming into shapes. She saw Mr. Smarty with his yellow mustache and grass-colored hair. He reminded her of a vegetable. “Good evening, Sally,” the voice said. “Today we’re going to talk about a chosen topic, relevant to you. As you know, there has been less rain in your area, a moderate drought. Many residents aren’t taking responsibility. Feedback is important to us. Do you “agree” or “disagree” or do you want to think “outside the box,” regarding the idea that government should regulate water consumption during this hardship?

Sally sat back and looked at Mr. Smarty’s eyes. To agree would mean possible dehydration. To disagree would mean twenty-four hours on the topic to clear her mind, and she couldn’t leave her couch with the possibility of leaving her job. To go outside the box, well, that meant… she didn’t even know. People told her to never select that option, a tone of fear.

“I agree,” Sally said. She pushed back her long, blonde hair, her only asset. “Thank you for your answer. Your opinion matters. We’ve found that 99.9% of people agree. We are doing a great job of educating our citizens. Conservation is important.”

Good for them. Her mind hit the reality of Zach again. At that moment, she heard the toilet and sink’s water be quickly cut off. She heard them gargle, spitting up unholy debris.

“Fuck!” she said aloud. Mr. Smarty reappeared. “Excuse me, Sally, have you decided to disagree with the decision. We expect our citizens to be sincere.”

“I don’t have any water in the fridge. I don’t have any money for gas beyond work during this following week. Can I please be allowed to fill a gallon of water up?”

“You disagree. Well, we have programming starting in ten seconds.”

“I hate you! I don’t care what you say. My life is miserable. I barely get paid and now I have to watch a day’s worth of programming, pee my underwear and have no water to drink. You know what, Mr. Smarty?! I chose, “Out of the Box.”

“Well, well,” Mr. Smarty said. “I haven’t had anyone pick that option in a hundred years, what a pleasant reminder.”

“What?” The TV began to shake back and forth violently, starting to spark. Sally ran out her door and threw herself into the dry grass. Not five seconds later, her small house blew up, and a policeman came riding in on a motorcycle.

“What-wha just happened?” Sally asked.

“You wanted outside of the box, huh? Come here, it’s time for your own brand.”

Sally didn’t move her feet.

“I can come to you.” Sally froze in fear as would a deer in the headlights of life and death.

The cop, dressed in neon green took out a brand, waited a second for it to self-heat. The orange glow reminded Sally of a wizard’s staff. He thrust it onto her forehead. It read, “Nothing.” Sally screamed as she burned.

“You will have nothing but an Earth to wander now, beast of burden. Everyone will know that you thought you were in charge, honey. Everyone will see your failure to respect authority.”

“You bear your fate!”

Monday, April 19, 2021

Bed of Thorns

“Shush, we have to treat her delicately.”
“This is a difficult time.”
“Has anyone told her?”
“Who drove her here?”
Maria walked into the sweet-smelling room. She detected fresh roses, and she knew they were red because that’s what Ralph said he wanted. She imagined his long, blonde hair, honey-thick, stud arms, and his impeccable taste in clothing. And cologne.

Recalling the first time they met, she saw him as truly made in the image of God. His face held a warm, golden haze. His eyes radiated like sapphires free from the ground’s prison. For Maria, perfection had no other face.
“Are you taking philosophy 101?” she recalled him asking.
“Yes, and we’re going to be late.”
It was better than never.

Sure, they’d been kids back then starting out in college. They had dreams they would fly, and both fell back to the earth with humble contentment, content because they had each other in innocence, in paradise.

No one could break such tight bonds. Life gives us seasons, and we give life reasons, but human love, love lasted forever in the kisses of souls, in the rewarding breath of a close lover, embraced together and melting in a simmering pot of warmth.

Miracles are miracles because they are divinity’s way of communicating the vast, the undefinable by human utterances, the cosmic at large to a species so simple, childlike in the cradle of the universe full of stars and heavens.

“Where’s Ralph?” Maria asked aloud, just getting used to being blind. She moved her walking stick as she had been directed, still clumsy, running into the hard barriers in her new reality. She would go to physical therapy and learn more. In the meantime, the prosthetic served as a reminder to everyone that she was blind.
“Um, oh I forgot that you lost your sight in the accident. He’s up there, just walk in the aisles, avoid the roses. They have such nasty thorns. And so many of them.”
The doctors had let her out for her wedding day. She didn’t pay attention to much of what they said. The happiest day of her life was upon her. She’d dressed in her gown. Her mother protested a bit, sighed, and walked away.

“Ralph?” She questioned.
A few people whispered to each other.
“How does she not know. Didn’t they tell her?”
“Tell me what?” Maria asked, her voice uncertain.
“Where do you think you are, Maria?”
“I’m at the chapel, of course.” She moved forward until she hit an obstacle, cold and unwelcoming.

A woman came up beside her and grabbed Maria’s hand, rubbing her palms gently after the quick action. She directed it into the perceived fountain below.
She recognized the texture.

“It’s like his hand is frozen,” Maria said back, cautiously.
“Maria, he’s…”
“What?”
“Dead.”

Maria let go of her walking stick, and she fell into a coffin of roses. They bit and scrapped her, and she felt the blood drip out of her body. Unseen voices called out to her and heavy limbs picked her up, carrying her out of the funeral home. She knew without words what had happened.

And she slept on a bed of thorns. 

Thursday, April 15, 2021

Euphorbia, the Assassin

Out of pain, the ground stirs
Pebble part while ways, waves
Of rigid bones… buried curves
With in sand, insane men turn
Body’s hourglass seconds, Time
Flushes, suckles, and deserves
Straight sticks and cruelty rocks
Dendritic webs bold, flames burn
Piercing, a crown of thorns, souls’
Take all to the devil’s tales, turn
Gypsum rose, a high mountain
Blossom, crystals bare in urns
Doses sung by bloody hearts
To dust, succulent poison earns

"And to death, we all return."

                                                                

Sunday, April 11, 2021

West to East


I once believed…
Then everything fell from me.
A westward wind blew,
And the sun withdrew.
Caves called back, howling
Sketches to scribbles drew.
I once believed…
In rules and truth, too,
Measured meanings turned to stone.
One by one, a rock, I threw.
Caves called back, howling
Knowledge to innocence doomed.
I once believed…
In a future beyond morning.
The horizon rises above me now,
Worthless words I choose.
Caves called back, howling
I’d rather be dead than be with you.