fuck you, ghost basket

Woah man, where am I?
I run my moist palm down my face. Why do I even do that? What good does it possibly do? Anyway, it's a ritual, an integral part of waking up on the floor and feeling like shit. Maybe it's action imitating emotion. Maybe it doesn't matter at all.

My stomach wakes up too. Making all sorts of gurgly noises. It's sloshing around some stale beer from last nite, hoping for some breakfast. Who knows what it really wants, though. Cuz my gut definitely just wants a cup of coffee.

Wait a couple of minutes, coffee or not, and my brain starts kicking into gear. Bad news bears for me though, because all it wants to do is sulk, long, or bring up a bunch of really nice things that are not longer possible.

It's all ghost pains, though. Makes no sense at all. I've got a pain in my gut and hole in my brain because I did what I knew was right.
Makes no sense.
I cut the threads that were keeping the picnic basket from falling off the edge of the cliff. It's a waste of red wine, but I was told not to cry over spilt liquids. Too late for that good advice, I guess.

Ghost pains. I couldn't get to the basket, but I knew there was some good shit in there, missing pieces of myself, good books, discovery, full course meals, and a lot of mind-blowing sex. Amazing that it could fit all in there. Suppressed giggles aside, and continuing with a really shitty metaphor, I knew full well that this basket wasn't well constructed, obviously made by a white person who thought they could do anything with the help of the internet. The basket was also full of poison, not down to the marrow of the thing, but sprinkled around on various amenities so you could never be too sure of what you were sinking your teeth into.

So yeah, SPLAT. Then came that feeling of vertigo, looking over the cliff, really considering the pros and cons of jumping after it. To the passerby it's obvious that the man on the edge of the cliff is fucking nuts, and he is, but the jump sure is attractive.

Makes no sense. It shouldn't hurt to let go of what I didn't have, but I guess you really don't have to touch someone to punch them in the gut and make them puke blood. I wonder what else you can do an ocean apart.

How's it going, man? Like hell, but still kickin'. Singin' lullabyes and spitting out my own teeth. Thinkin' about pain so much it makes me sound like the goth girl in middle school. I'm pretty sure I'm plagiarizing her work.

I'm going to keep on walking, not a clue where I'm going, 'can't feel my legs, totally half-smiling. Trying to be angry so I don't have to be sad, but anger isn't my nature, and sadness is usually what I have to work with. Nothing new there, I'll have my own damn picnic in fucking stormy, hot, late August. I'll be laughing while it's pouring, I'm not even worried about eating. I'm a child in a tantrum, but grown enough you can't stop me.

Oh yeah, and I'm glad you didn't hesitate to go back to your whore.
You've always been a gentleman, you piece of shit basket.

catch more flies with honey-mustard

*****

eddy takes another pull. "why does anybody care what rich people do??" he bellows. "I have four warrants and I build hot-air balloons in my yard..."
The boys will never know exactly what happened back at the complex, tho there was plenty of postulating. She-thought-we-were-after-her-credit-cards led to she-thought-we-was-disposin-somebody and finally to she-thought-we-found-the-body-she-disposed-of. No one guesses that the crack in the air, the little lightning that met just above their heads, it snapping down from Sal's window and welling up from the squishy roach-ridden dumpster. It bringing them to wince a split-second before actually hearing anything unusual. It being the force that inspired their panic and the force that inspired her cry. The sound itself serving only as alibi for their loss of balance and form, and of course they can't understand that they were met with a memory that was not theirs; of course they don't know they were just lightning rods. Of course they can't figure why the lady would scream like that.
They decided to hightail it home. None of 'em are rich enough to get bothered by cops (even tho eddy doesn't really have 4 warrants out) and the beer store's still open. Now they're trying to undo their encounter with Sal's memory (of some twit named Bernard) the only way they know how.
"...and soon enough I'll be dreamin' of a life I just finished every sundown"
Eddy gets incoherent sometimes. It's unpredictable, but so's lightning. Sometimes Mark writes down what he says for a laff the next day. They're at Eddy's house. It's clean in a messy way, devoid of hot-air balloons or balloon parts. The colors all seem to be dropping-off somehow, not changing or growing dim, rather falling into view from behind themselves, tipping into focus.
"brain-bleach, brother - where's Mooze at?"
Mark insists that you know you're good friends with someone when their drunken rambling works like a lullaby. He's dozing off, lit cigarette stuffed between the middle and ring fingers of his left hand. Pitz found a roll of duct tape and is busy setting fly traps around the room. Now Eddy's settled pretty well into watching him work, having come to accept Mark's habit like his parents told him to accept the Italian custom of belching loudly after a good meal. (He still hasn't witnessed an Italian doing that, and he suspects the "custom" might be a fable thought up and smuggled into popular knowledge by some old-fashioned racists. Eddy is sensitive to these things.).
Mark inhales and sits up sharply when the fire burns close to his fingers. He tries to take a drag but burns his throat, calling up a bit of wetness round his eyes. He puts out the butt, but not without dropping a pile of ashes into the carpet. He blinks slowly, watching Pitz watch. Kneeling on the floor like that, it almost looks like Pitz is praying with his eyes open or working a spell. Mark yawns and sez you catch more flies with honey-mustard before falling back to sleep.

There's no accounting for taste.

Somewhere in some DNA strand, or actually in every DNA strand I suppose, is some mistake inside of me. Not a mistake to the point that I'm necessarily handicapped... some people would say it's a blessing. That I'm not missing much, or that I'm lucky for the lack. And these DNA strands keep getting replicated into RNA, and float around to the right spot and make a new strand of DNA, but they keep fucking up over and over again. The same garbled code for type 2 taste receptors making my tongue wrong over and over again. As a test, I put phenylthiocarbamide and 6-n-propylthiouracil on my tongue, and nothing happens.

Some biology class in some distant memory is all crashing metal and flickering lights falling from the ceiling onto lab benches, while I sit there with some synthetic chemicals in my mouth. Everyone's running to bathrooms, water fountains, and sinks... panic ensues... and I sit numb, or not even numb, but just completely unaware of the gravity of the situation.

Banana and orange peels, coffee, beer, olives, tonic water... It's not like there's something missing to the flavor. There's not even a particular aspect of the taste to which I can point and figure, "That is where what I'm supposed to be tasting this." Taste isn't a place, or a quantity. No discrete measurements can convey complex chemical reactions. Literally, completely ignorant. Bitter truth, sorrow, enemies, words, criticism, tears, cold. Infinitely complex imaginary word associations, feelings, nuances, colors, and shades of colors. I'm ignorant. It's honestly not a big deal, really. It's just what it implies. Sour. Check. Savory. Check. Salty. Check. Sweet. Check. All very significant tastes... or at least significant to me. I can savor things. I've tasted sour grapes. I know what someone means when they say they're salty. I've tasted sweet. They all seem so important. But.. Bitter. Negative. Am I missing a lot? Can I say that outside is bitter cold without feeling like a charlatan or a symbol impostor? Can I even feel bitter if I've never tasted it?

scene bam bam.

PIGEON SCENE>

direction: 

in frame. back of young man. purple shirt. in chair. a bit sweaty.

just shoulders... cant see head. still frame.

sound- typing. lots of typing from everyone in the office.

color of carpet in frame a grey with overtones of green/ maybe greenish lense.

owen is typing and we switch to an overhead camera... we see owen's hair and its a bit messy. his glasses are smudged cause the air conditioning is going a bit haywire... too cold then too hot.

then the angled overhead camera switches to his computer screen...

ACTOR #1.7

_pigeon

i guess theres something wrong with killing. right? 

the idea of stabbing or shooting or choking or bludgeoning. its messy. its visually stark.

 haunting.... 

the plain face of a dead man. something agape. something gone in them...

something gone in you....one less symbol.

do you have images like that? when youre about to fall asleep...

comforter..soft pillow...

dark empty apartment...

leaves scratching around outside..       .then....

      

  violence...injuries...destruction. cities ablaze. cites under the waves?

or is it something more subtle?....like your famiy moving away one by one...?

or even..

.uneven development...one here...one there. 

one here. 

one job. two jobs. 

three jobs...

small town in the middle of the city... security camera talk show hosts....touring those streets you loath.

something is out of your control.... and in the worst of these dark little thoughts youre not doing anything. connected to everything...but .just watching...

cartoons

...

pffhh....its just been a long week. think too much about certain things and then-

 pop goes the weezle between my ears!

(this blog is so free and huge and open to me... i love it.. i wonder how many people are on livejournal anyway)

and i guess on another point...

i dont want this job anymore. i dont like the people anymore. i dont like myself here.

 its a certified green architecture company and  i draw the pictures of what everything is supposed to look like.

we're responsible... we're cutting edge... and a big part of me is proud that im doing what im doing....

but its a bit over the top...

 there are even green file folders. green ties. hybrid cars and organic cereal bars...

shit.. i mean i turn on nbc late at night and they have a green peacock

and these fucking stupid shoes. and this stupid fucking shirt that i bought a while back thinking it would be an impressive look for someone young like me...

but ive lost a bit of weight since then and now it looks like a bulgy sheet on me...

i feel silly...

i have a crush on a different girl this time...someone i work with...

i look at her shyly and smile whenever we pass each other... usually after our 'team' meetings in the conference room...

i think tomorrow im gonna offer her a cereal bar from the kitchen nook as shes walking by...

i better figure out something interesting to talk about... she looks like shes into movies... 

i wonder if she likes young frankenstein...

im a bit worried though that these will just end up being drawings of things other people build...

know what i mean...

hmm...

when i get home... ill have a tumbler of wine. turn on the news. and maybe ill start painting again.

or maybe ill train a messenger pigeon to write these notes to everyone... it will be a super-pigeon that will know exactly where to go..and itll be able to fly forever..

and itll know what time of day is best for certain areas of town due to wind and temperature and updrafts and all that...

and itll know all the right people to send these messages to... and we'll start an army of poets liberating each other from these cubicle blues...

ya right!

or better yet!!!

maybe everyone will read this!!

i mean its free right? all you have to do is have access...

well back to work...

ciao

direction:

once this inner monologue/blog entry is done we see owen's boss rachel walk out of her glass walled office into the cubicle room...she walks past owen's cubicle space and the camera zooms to her hands texting a message to her girlfriend. shes wearing a eggplant colored blouse and a blood donor pin.. 

Cheating death day

Fidgety not knowing to sit or stand
to smoke or drink
to laugh or grimace.
Sweat on my nose like salty dewdrops
nervous about the future
about the present
waiting for the sun to come up
maybe to lend some legitimacy as to why I'm awake.

I cheated you.
You, the tumor that tried to take me before I breathed in the dusty air.
You, the tow truck that blindsided my mom's car.
You, the car that almost hit me while I was riding a bike too big for me.
You, the chemical that surged through my veins while I was getting teeth removed.
You, the boys who spat on me and roughed me up.
You, the men who ripped my heart out and made me want to die.
You, the bacteria that resisted medication.
You, the virus that will never stop killing me.
You, all you cigarettes.
You, yes you, who taught me what pain really was.
I cheated you all, because I'm still standing.
With bells on.
And I know you've got more to throw at me
but I don't give a shit.
Cuz when the dust settles I'll have a toothy grin to show for what I've been through.

Happy birthday
Cheating death day
Drink and forget day
Smoke and remember day
I've got more to come.
From saccharine sweet to lemon sour.
From banana peel bitter to grit and blood.
Wholesome wine and grain
Crumbs of great and terrible in a mediocre porridge.
I'm ready for more than a taste.

Thinned Air

Ooh-ma something is picking up.
Never in all of my everydays has my step bounced as it does right now and I ain’t gonna let it stop. Last year this time something white-noisy had my dial jammed up, all stuck, cellular phantoms ping-ponging my brain waves, internet jukeboxing my eardrums from outer space to pocket-piece machines custom fit to every hole in my head.
Ooh-ma today I am hanging up on the TV towers and phone wires’ tranquilizing lullabies, disconnecting the line, stepping my bounce to the la-la-la-laing drugging my mind…
…give me some more…
Ooh-ma something picked me up, something whistled through the smiling teeth of the shoe-shiners, hummed from the back of the bus to the vagrants at the stops, la-la-la-laing hooch-drunk toothless gums to a new kind of placated numbness…
Zoom zoom zoom zoom!
Starving Former-Retiree Sweating Outside of Plasma-Donation Center: “Hey what’s that tune you’re singing?”
“No matter the name just boom boom boom boom it yourself. Give it a try!”
Zing zing zing zing worries are fading away, spirits lifting like trapped helium, shout it out now everybody with a body ooh-ma that thing and sing along…

Drooling Man with Infected Fillings Collecting Aluminum Cans in a Shopping Cart: “Last year this time, I had a Cadillac…”

Three Hundred Pound Diabetic Single Mother of Four: “Last year this time, I had some money…”

Forgettable Foreign Man of Unknown Nationality Working Eighty Hours This Week at Two Fast Food Restaurants for Minimum Wage: “Last year this time, I was in the door…”

Aging Hipster Chain Smoking in Salvation Army Suit and $100 Ironic Throwback Fedora: “Give me some more!”

One Armed Man in Rags Bumming Change for a Coffee: “Last year this time, I had a Cadillac...”

Emaciated Methamphetamine Addict of Indistinguishable Sex: “Last year this time, I had some money…”

Unbelievably Exhausted Former Prostitute Pulling Ancient Fag Ends from an Ashtray: “Last year this time, I was in the door…”

Now Everybody: “Zoom boom zing la-la la-la la la-la-la!”

No need to question the origins of the tune it’s like you wrote it yourself la-la la-la la la-la-la Don’t worry you about their Cadillacs and money and the home of your honey they’re all just singing like la-la la-la la la-la-la We’ll handle those suspicious satellites and ethereal electric screaming just keep your ears peeled for la-la la-la la la-la-la All the dejected masses of the Earth zooming booming zinging into fucking stupid oblivion la-la la-la la la-la-la.

Flies

Mooze sits hunkered over his sister's Dell, typing furiously about the most fascinating topic he can think of. He likes dipping popcorn into honey, and he happened to find both in the pantry this afternoon. The fallout is shameful, and two prospecting flies have already perched on the rim of an empty coffee mug nearby. It won't be long before they find the almost-empty honey tray and radio the network for reinforcements.
Adios and Hoffman, the flies, have finished comparing field notes and moved on to small talk. They're not on what houseflys refer to as an 'unofficial official' -- or an unplanned spot of R&R in the field. Adios rubs his front legs, Hoffman rubs his back, and they're watching each other, the sky, and the enormous cloud of CO2 in the distance with most of their eyes.
"I think you have a drinking problem" sez Hoffman.
Adios has been making a name for himself.
"This body's gettin old, hoss. This place is making me heavy and loud. And the dreams flying through that cloud are hitting me harder every time it come around."
"I thought that's why you came here in the first place. You said there was something you wanted from that cloud."
"Not just the cloud, but the boy. That kid's putting more stress on the air than any I've seen in years, and when I lose this body I may spawn too far to reach him again."
Adios has traveled over six miles from his spawn behind a guitar amplifier in a practice space downtown. His brothers and sisters were forced to take to the streets when their roommates the musicians finally found a new bassist. He was sucking up dumpster juice behind a concert hall when he first felt Mooze. Felt him from across 6 miles of static and an interstate highway, for which Adios spent long days collecting lore and tips concerned with crossing.
Mooze came through first as a vibration that gradually transformed into visible waves, repellent to most flies, but to which Adios was tireless drawn.
House-flies don't use all of their eyes for seeing the same light, at the same resolution, as humans. From my understanding, people appear to house-flies first as shifting surfaces of CO2 production, then as shapes moving within clouds of CO2. Upon closer examination, humans become nodes or traps for vector light. People, especially in groups, take on strange amoebic shapes to fly minds, not reducible to a lack of focus. The fly's sight is fuzzy cuz it takes in more, not less.
They're watching Mooze now, panting carbon cloud, planting his sticky index fingers all over his sister's keyboard. Something like fascination is flying out of his face, whirling in the air above him and even forming a translucent film over the spreading layer of honey.
"Well look at that. It was a trap" sez Hoffman. "See the bind on that light? We'd have been toast to set one foot on that mess."
Adios nods slowly. "You mind calling this in? The Network should know the conditions in here, and I need some time to think this through."
Hoffman's not so sure what this means, but figures his friend will be better off if he has some alone time, rather than rolling with some of the undesirables outside.
"No problem. I'll see you tomorrow."
Hoffman flies off in search of a bedtime snack and Adios, big as a zeppelin, floats as quietly as he can to the underside of the mantle behind Mooze's head. He needs the time to think through what he's seeing. These details are fuzzy, of course, but it's important not to label Adios a pilgrim, though he traveled so many miles to find Mooze. Mooze made of fly repellent these days, but not a chemical kind. This makes Adios more of a salmon swimming up-stream, and Mooze is more than a factory. It's worth wondering if the two might be kindred spirits, who've only to recognize each other's cognizance. It's a wonder that a three-month-old fly might work as an ancient boy's sage. I suppose stranger things have happened.
Adios makes himself comfortable and stares, eyes wide as ever, wondering if he won't return tomorrow as a prophet.

*****

"I guess they can't see the blade cuz it's so thin. Maybe they can't see it cuz it's shiny or reflective. I didn't think it would work, either. I figured he'd fly away as soon as my hand came within a few feet, but it didn't. I just brought the knife down, real slow and steady, and sort of pressed it into his back."
"And it just went through? It didn't try to fly away or freak out?"
"Not at all. And it keeps working. If i see a fly in my house I never try to swat it now. I just pick up a knife and slowly cut it in half. I've missed a few times, but once you get the technique down it's hard to fuck up."
Mark is having a hard time believing that Eddy kills flies with a knife, Pitz is in the back seat practicing on Mark's upholstery. Maybe it would work if the fly in question wasn't so eager to find a way out of Mark's car.
Pitz notices the empty seat next to him and calls up "hey where's Mooze at?"
"Dunno" sez Eddy, "prolly dead."
The boys are out foraging tonight. They just finished hitting the big-box stores with nothin to show for it but dirty clothes and a frozen chicken for Pitz's dog. Dumpsters these days have a bad habit of being picked clean by 9:30, and the boys rarely get started on time. Consensus has been achieved to raid the bins of urban and near-urban apartment blocks. They won't find much food, but young-professionals have a habit of leaving some pretty exciting trash every week. Plus we, I mean they, can always roll around behind a pizza joint later and find enough pie to last until tomorrow night.
"Have you ever been to these places, Mark?" sez Pitz.
"Not yet, I got the tip from Bennie. He says these downtown development types are spoiled rotten and throw out all kinds of stuff."
"Aren't there guards or something?"
"No, but if they see you rifling through a pack of papers they might think that you're trying to steal their identity."
In that case, who knows what someone might do. The boys are familiar enough with defending their identity and individuality within their circle of friends. The act of "copping a style" can illicit unpredictable and ostensibly nonsequitorious reactions. "It's all about identity" says Sirus, who wears an Ottoman seal around his neck, hoping to sound versed in what he is not. "I'm Turkish origin, but I identify as Ottoman." Eddy had to tease him - "But no one is Ottoman anymore. Doesn't that just make you Arab now?" Sirus had flushed "no, I'm Turkish." "Ya," sez Eddie, "and I'm a Nordic warrior, but it isn't so hip to call yourself Arab these days, is it." Eddy doesn't think we should invoke ancestors in a shithole like this. Especially not for cool-points.
The boys finally find the dumpster for the first block.
"Alright, everybody in."
"What's another word for pirate's treasure?" Pitz singing into the bags, coaxing treasures from hefty and gladlock. In order: a spinning-dolphin paperweight, deflated balloons, coffee grinds and banana peels, a Russian doll set, a pressure cooker, a half-broken china tea set, one and a half lamps, fancy candles, a computer monitor, two blankets, a brown and red bull-whip, a bag of assorted vests, a dead squirrel, a dirty diaper...
Lena is back to reading when Sal hears the singing from outside. It's not everyday you see 3 men singing in a dumpster.
...a hanging basket, a pair of fake-moccasin slippers, a conch shell, a two-foot tall painted wooden parrot, an aquarium, three croquet mallets, fuzzy hand-cuffs, a DVD-player...
Pitz is reaching for something. A bottle that had been on the surface was swallowed from view when Mark jumped in. It had looked like ranch dressing. He's found it now, he can see the cap trying to nestle itself deeper into shifting trash bags.
He's under a spell now; no one goes shoulder-deep in trash for a bottle of salad dressing, especially one that's probably empty.
Finally, successful Pitz pulls himself from the quicksand.
"Ah, crap. It's just honey mustard..."

ooowwwweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

...the boys dash for the car as Sal's cry punches through each of them. Tendons fray, knees buckle. Pitz keeps singing but his song has risen an octave and is made of gibberish and slur.

*****