SMALL THINGS
The day recedes
And all seems right
Seduced as I am
By Twilight’s caress
And a fly’s eternal buzz
I sit wholly content
In my backyard kingdom
Awed by small things
And for now
I am complete
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Sunday, June 03, 2007
THE REGULAR CROWD SHUFFLES OUT
The light inside Billy O’s Pub appears as dim as the hopes of the regulars who line the U-shaped bar, totally focused it would seem on dissolving away their past, present and future. My wife Jane and I shuffle through a puddle of vacant gazes and seat ourselves in a burgundy-vinyl booth just beyond their misery. Gray, duct-tape patches hide drunken wounds and untold tales of conquest, real and imagined. It’s eight-thirty on a Saturday night and I’m feeling invigorated and strangely at ease as we join our world to the pub’s reality.
Neil Young warbles from the jukebox, “See the losers in the best bars, meet the winners in the dives,” and as I casually observe my fellow patrons I can feel the truth of his words flowing through my membranes. There’s no deceit here tonight, just the raw edge of being human and frail. Each secret that lingers needs only the right question to set it free, the burden of proof entrusted to the one brave enough to inquire. A woman obviously snake-bit by time and destiny rests her right elbow on the bar, her hand poised like some 1950’s matinee idol and cradling a smoldering cigarette. No one cares enough to ask her to extinguish the smoke.
A younger man approaches her, leans in close and says something. He waits for a few seconds, then leaves, brushing by us beneath a quick smirk of embarrassment. The woman takes a long drag and stalls before exhaling, automatic and despairing, as if she’s done, one way or another, with everything she set out to do in her life. I watch her rise, semi-amazed at whatever unknown motivation pushes her unsteadily after the younger man. As she wobbles past us I choose to see her closer to her beginning than to her ending. Without asking I know her deepest truth, that she is or once was someone’s daughter.
Jane and I have journeyed out this night to see our friend Chris perform with his band in the dingy yet comfy confines of Billy O’s. As the band straggles in and begins to set up I sense the first glimmers of change swirling through the pub and its crusty denizens. I know they’ve seen this before—-their “home away from home” is a frequent venue for bands who play music they don’t care to listen to-—but still, I sense a sadness pervading their world, that they are powerless to stop the temporary onslaught of tonight’s festivities. There’s no struggle looming on this horizon, just the simple dynamic of one world replacing the decline of another.
By nine-forty the band is ready, having robustly tuned-up for the ten o’clock start. Those lost souls who populated the premises when we first arrived have been replaced, save for the few too imbibed to move or even care, by a transient crowd of groupies and the mildly curious. A blush of possibility pervades this new crowd, though I detect in them the same underlying vulnerabilities already excavated and exposed among the pub’s more faithful clientele.
At ten o’clock the band begins their first set, too loud and perhaps too deep for this weary point in time. And Chris sings of things I’ve seen here tonight, of those other realms that are perhaps more genuine then that which we proclaim as our one, true certainty. Jane and I, now perched like aged voyeurs along the mirrored back wall, have witnessed the passing of the guard tonight, when the regular crowd shuffled out.
My head swims gently from the combined effects of several Newcastle beers and a certain spontaneity I can’t identify. I close my eyes, intent on absorbing the epiphany at hand. And suddenly I realize that maybe the regular crowd already knows something I’ve been chasing my whole life…that it isn’t about “this” or “that”…it simply is what it is.
The light inside Billy O’s Pub appears as dim as the hopes of the regulars who line the U-shaped bar, totally focused it would seem on dissolving away their past, present and future. My wife Jane and I shuffle through a puddle of vacant gazes and seat ourselves in a burgundy-vinyl booth just beyond their misery. Gray, duct-tape patches hide drunken wounds and untold tales of conquest, real and imagined. It’s eight-thirty on a Saturday night and I’m feeling invigorated and strangely at ease as we join our world to the pub’s reality.
Neil Young warbles from the jukebox, “See the losers in the best bars, meet the winners in the dives,” and as I casually observe my fellow patrons I can feel the truth of his words flowing through my membranes. There’s no deceit here tonight, just the raw edge of being human and frail. Each secret that lingers needs only the right question to set it free, the burden of proof entrusted to the one brave enough to inquire. A woman obviously snake-bit by time and destiny rests her right elbow on the bar, her hand poised like some 1950’s matinee idol and cradling a smoldering cigarette. No one cares enough to ask her to extinguish the smoke.
A younger man approaches her, leans in close and says something. He waits for a few seconds, then leaves, brushing by us beneath a quick smirk of embarrassment. The woman takes a long drag and stalls before exhaling, automatic and despairing, as if she’s done, one way or another, with everything she set out to do in her life. I watch her rise, semi-amazed at whatever unknown motivation pushes her unsteadily after the younger man. As she wobbles past us I choose to see her closer to her beginning than to her ending. Without asking I know her deepest truth, that she is or once was someone’s daughter.
Jane and I have journeyed out this night to see our friend Chris perform with his band in the dingy yet comfy confines of Billy O’s. As the band straggles in and begins to set up I sense the first glimmers of change swirling through the pub and its crusty denizens. I know they’ve seen this before—-their “home away from home” is a frequent venue for bands who play music they don’t care to listen to-—but still, I sense a sadness pervading their world, that they are powerless to stop the temporary onslaught of tonight’s festivities. There’s no struggle looming on this horizon, just the simple dynamic of one world replacing the decline of another.
By nine-forty the band is ready, having robustly tuned-up for the ten o’clock start. Those lost souls who populated the premises when we first arrived have been replaced, save for the few too imbibed to move or even care, by a transient crowd of groupies and the mildly curious. A blush of possibility pervades this new crowd, though I detect in them the same underlying vulnerabilities already excavated and exposed among the pub’s more faithful clientele.
At ten o’clock the band begins their first set, too loud and perhaps too deep for this weary point in time. And Chris sings of things I’ve seen here tonight, of those other realms that are perhaps more genuine then that which we proclaim as our one, true certainty. Jane and I, now perched like aged voyeurs along the mirrored back wall, have witnessed the passing of the guard tonight, when the regular crowd shuffled out.
My head swims gently from the combined effects of several Newcastle beers and a certain spontaneity I can’t identify. I close my eyes, intent on absorbing the epiphany at hand. And suddenly I realize that maybe the regular crowd already knows something I’ve been chasing my whole life…that it isn’t about “this” or “that”…it simply is what it is.
Friday, June 01, 2007
CRY UNCLE
Chauncey lays in bed enduring yet another unwanted free-fall through the muddle of faded memories and vanquished hope. Sparse remnants of his radically brilliant father evaporate into the dark shadows of his dreams. He blinks at his dingy, yellowed ceiling, hoping to spot the first traces of random intervention arriving to rescue him from the day’s impending obligation.
He staggers from bed and glimpses a younger image of his father as he passes the vanity mirror, then continues unsteadily to the toilet and the day’s first piss. He aims into the water and senses his hunger for the simple diversions of life’s innate functions. As the last few drops fall he feels his despair and loathing return.
A forty-something version of his father stares back as he brushes his teeth. Chauncey automatically counts thirty strokes for each surface as he carefully maintains the proper angle of attack, just like dad had taught him in that other lifetime.
It’s funny, he thinks, how things become gospel, as if there’s only one correct way to brush teeth.
He spits into the sink, still weary from the night’s unrest.
Chauncey pulls on his pants, then sits numbly on the edge of his bed to slip on his socks and shoes. He contemplates the collective weight of each seventy-five minute drive to his father’s new residence, the ‘Gentle Estates Senior Care Center.' And for the umpteenth time he replays the lies he and his sister had shared, that “it’ll be best for dad,” that “one visit per week is doable,” that somehow “things will be okay.”
And he also remembers this…That last Sunday morning the head nurse had called to say, “Your father was found naked except for one white sock, fetal and sobbing beneath the word “Uncle” smudged on the wall with his own feces.”
Chauncey bends to tie his shoes, silently wishing he could cry “Uncle” too.
Chauncey lays in bed enduring yet another unwanted free-fall through the muddle of faded memories and vanquished hope. Sparse remnants of his radically brilliant father evaporate into the dark shadows of his dreams. He blinks at his dingy, yellowed ceiling, hoping to spot the first traces of random intervention arriving to rescue him from the day’s impending obligation.
He staggers from bed and glimpses a younger image of his father as he passes the vanity mirror, then continues unsteadily to the toilet and the day’s first piss. He aims into the water and senses his hunger for the simple diversions of life’s innate functions. As the last few drops fall he feels his despair and loathing return.
A forty-something version of his father stares back as he brushes his teeth. Chauncey automatically counts thirty strokes for each surface as he carefully maintains the proper angle of attack, just like dad had taught him in that other lifetime.
It’s funny, he thinks, how things become gospel, as if there’s only one correct way to brush teeth.
He spits into the sink, still weary from the night’s unrest.
Chauncey pulls on his pants, then sits numbly on the edge of his bed to slip on his socks and shoes. He contemplates the collective weight of each seventy-five minute drive to his father’s new residence, the ‘Gentle Estates Senior Care Center.' And for the umpteenth time he replays the lies he and his sister had shared, that “it’ll be best for dad,” that “one visit per week is doable,” that somehow “things will be okay.”
And he also remembers this…That last Sunday morning the head nurse had called to say, “Your father was found naked except for one white sock, fetal and sobbing beneath the word “Uncle” smudged on the wall with his own feces.”
Chauncey bends to tie his shoes, silently wishing he could cry “Uncle” too.
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