How to Succeed in Continental Drift Without Really Trying (or Get Outta Here, Greenspan!): Chapter One

It was cold and I took a hat for it.

Outside, frost wraiths lined the avenue like invisible waffles, perforated and terrible. A silence draped over the town like a carpet of shit. Somewhere, a car barked, softly, as if to say, Dear God.

The funeral was later on. Nobody wanted to go. It was that kind of funeral. I breathed a heavy sigh, and adjusted myself. Wind blew.

I stopped at the usual spot. It was dark inside and moist, real moist, with the promise of failure lingering in the air like poisoned milk. I ordered a Silent Wonder, which is scotch, tonic water and Legos. The Legos went down like puzzle tumors. I shuddered. Small talk. A smoke. I made eyes at the leggy yarn-mane down the counter, real small ones. The drink was slugged, the butt out. Cough. Money. The apparent future and the realization.

I staggered out into the dewy urban wild, shielded my brow and made a noise like a 78 on 33. I pushed away a wraith and hailed a dude mover. "Abe and 441st," I spat out. "Step." He did. The scenery passed. I lit up and blew out a cloud of triumph.

Templesmith was all wrong. It was the green wire with yellow stripe, not the blue wire with the red stripe. We'd argued cyanotic, shaking our parched fists like little fleshy bundles of parchment paper in the shape of human hands. I chuckled to myself, if only to stave off the acid-rain tears. There was plenty of time to get bloodshot and lumpy. The smell of fire and blood wafted in from the War District. I took another drag and ran a calloused finger through thinning, sad hairs. God damn him. God damn him.

My knuckles cracked, muscadine. Bing bang. Ring a ding. Fiddle faddle. Other things. The future yawned its desperate, wailing mouth wide like a blow-up doll, eager to disappoint. I stayed quiet in the back there and stifled a prescient wave of nausea. The dude mover pulled up to the church and stopped. I handed the man an eight-spot with room. We exchanged brief, but substantive eyebrow raises. I disembarked.

The church loomed high, high in the chuckling sky like a man possessed and also made of concrete. Lichen blossomed from my fingertips. A homeless person farted, with no teeth.

The church's insides were warped and convoluted like stolid brain maps. I folded my programme in half, then again in half, and a third time also in half. Taking a seat in the way back, I breathed out slowly, fingering my pocketwatch as the masses spoke their putrid reminiscences and cried cheaply, the weep of the unknowing, the pointless weep of the conscious attempting to pull apart the sublevels as if expecting to find treasure maps and heaving bosoms, car fresheners and mint juleps, all of it just a writhing mass of awful vapid vacuums and reality television, horses snorting in the dying fields, makeup running down the countenance like jet black diarrheal outbursts, hands placed about each other artlessly, the children, God damn him, God damn you, God damn ourselves and what then. What then, Templesmith. What Godless, artless, pointless futures you have wrought upon the living. A sea of white noise made of sobs and ghastly averted stares wet the place like a sodden diaper. I sucked in my gut and let out a soundless scream, a gaping chasm of a crevasse of a silent outpour of cinematic grief, a tear making its empty way across my cheek, and pounded my knee, then once more. I made my way up to the coffin and dropped in the folded programme, then derailed the narrative of a filmic yawn as I made my way out of the church.

It was still cold and I was glad I had taken a hat. The wraiths shifted in place, eyes cast down, erections tucked under the belt. We shared a thorough and gentle cleansing in the frozen sun. Things would never be the same again.

A cat moved, but only part way.

a different whale

false ghost
timid whale
shredded skin
bent knees
juniper wash
stumble down
lost meal
curb nap
donor's eyes
fountain medals
false songs
land whales
immolated
right angles
hey ladies
get quinine
hands up
tonic sheets
frozen whales
bloody cleats

astronaut cop

like a hot zephyr
from the puking sky
astronaut cop
contain that shit

like a masked wind
with breathing shoulders
warm-lensed
medium shot
hold it
that's perfect

like breaded gold
like a child's whiskers
astronaut cop
superman that ho

Sea's Lament

Sailing on the high seas
In search of fabled treasure
Huffing ether from a grocery bag
Absent-mindedly

Love has left us blind
Scrambling through the branches
Of the mauve-hued afterbirth
Of a pierced demon

When all is lost
I'll simply clap the light off
Simply pour a glass of fucking
Geriatric wrecking ball

Siren call of the
Generation XXY
Attorneys at sea: pray with us
As we might pray for thee

On the high fucking
Sea

sand

coughing up sand
in the middle of nowhere

retire i said
waste of oxygen
even nitrogen
get thee gone

soles comin off
tie rotten
face frayed
future past
o captain
take leave
for god's sake

coughing
sand
nowhere

hmph

viral fount

Spray hard
It's a long way to
The CDC

Protein coat
Hides the horror
Rowin boats
Got no oars
Eyes to the floors
Kind sirs

Fold thy legs
Deliver thy prize
Eyes on the skies
Gentlemen

Thrust hard
It's a long way to
The beginning of time

humans

Hold your fire
I'm a human

Sorry about that
I thought you were
One of them

What's going on
In this town

I ain't got a clue

By the time
I noticed
Something was wrong

Hold your fire
I'm a

little stress bird

O little stress bird
What do you know
How's it go
Where are you from
Where are you go
Little stress bird
Myopic aviary

O gnarled vein
Who is the stress bird
Hand me the microfiche
Where are the microfiche
How does it work
Little vein bird
Stressed me right out

Do
Keep pouring coffee or
Forget getting sober
Mr. Roper
Little stress vein
Birds are free
Who are you

Community Christian Boys Basketball Becomes A Face

Community Christian
Boys Basketball
At Gilcrest
Wednesday 8pm

Communiface Christian
Boys Faceketball
At Gilface
Wednesface 8pm

Faceuniface Chrisface
Boys Faceketface
Face Gilface
Facenesface 8 face

Facefaceface
Face Face
Face
Face

With Batman At Your Side

With Batman
At your side
In the field
In the snow
Fighting

With Batman
At your side
Making drinks
Taking tricks
Learning to love
Again

With Batman
At your side
Here's a boomerang
Here's a razor wire
Awesome

With Batman
At your side
Focus on the family
Save the day
For freedom
Yes