—IS THERE ROOM ON YOUR SHOULDERS?

 

The Upside

At least I didn’t find you. 

At least I loaned you that chunk of money the first time (though not the second). 

At least we were best friends going on 16 years. 

At least you got to call me a Dick and we both got a jolly laugh out of that. 

At least no one got hurt (until they did).

At least we bought each other’s books (and drinks). 

At least we knew who the frauds and wolves were among us.

At least you knew how much I loved you. 

At least one of us is still alive to write this.   

 

—FLY ROBIN, FLY

Hollow

We were going to live forever, your blind cats too, that was the plan, but every bottle had a hole in it, every glass a crack that leaked, and the riverbeds were dry and the sun thirsted like an iguana in the desert, and you kept saying, Give me one more week, Give me one more week, until forever fell apart, leaving us both bone dry and broken, two empties made of hollow glass.

 

     Karen Stefano passed away last weekend. Some of you who come here knew her. She was one of my very best friends and favorite people. I loved making her laugh. 

     She was a writer and ran one of the first podcasts highlighting authors from the indie world. 

      A former San Diego prosecutor who earned a judgeship, she was a badass, so smart and bright, sarcastic and funny as hell, but she was also incredibly kind, fiercely loyal and one of the best listeners I’ve ever met. 

     There’s obviously much more I could say about Karen and even writing this was a challenge. I’m still crushed beyond measure but just wanted to let those know who need to. I’m unsure what her relatives have planned, but I can give you details once I learn them.     

 

--- YEAH, I GET OVEHWELMED, I GET STRESSED OUT, I’M ALWAYS THINKINIG ABOUT MY HEALTH

 

                                                                   Black Diamonds

       As they walk, the wet pavement sparkles black and diamondy.  Overhead streetlights shine down on them their blessings, his new wife clamped inside his right arm, his daughter hooked against the left, this merry, makeshift family.  They laugh.  It was a stupid movie.  Why do they even make them?  As a car leaps the stoplight, he reacts blink-fast.  He has time but to save one.

At the funeral, dirt clods pound the mahogany lid like infant fists.  On knees, he shudders.  His wife bends down.  “Shhh,” she says.  “It wasn’t your fault.”

At night he never sleeps.  Instead he counts stars and slivers of light.  He remembers the stories his mother read him, the tales of fairies and angel dust, the ones of angels safeguarding on windowsills.

       He watches the drapes dance, their sheer cloth gauzy, ghostly.  The window is closed but then he hears it, mercy, the heater kicking off, and he lets his breathing resume.   

     

  1637 -- A Place Called Mistick  

 

            My brother rips off a strip of deer meat and chews while saying, “We should kill them all.  Woman and children, too.”

            His long brown hair is tied in a ponytail and he’s shirtless.  Wisps of wood smoke curl behind his back where a breeze twirls and the effect of this sight, mixed with Running Boar’s smoldering anger, makes me grin.

            My brother kicks me, his toe as sharp as an arrowhead through the moccasin.  Running Boar’s eyes are black holes, each with a center flame of red.  His face twists and contorts.  He has finger-painted two blue slashes on either side of his high cheek bones.  War paint.  He is too eager.  Even Father tells him to settle down.  “We are so many.  They are but few.  This is our land.”  Still, my brother is a fuse, an angry coil.  Once upon a time, though, we played with pet squirrels and swam streams.  We used to chase mountain goats when we were younger, trying to out run them, but now we are men and my brother is all about decimating the white man, greedy to make their blood soak through the sun-baked soil of these rolling hills.

            “If you are Pequot, you will not stand by and watch these invaders steal our land,” Running Boar says.  “You are a fool with your happy ways.”

            I have not told my brother that I am in love with First To Dance, she with eyes as blue as turquoise.  Running Boar once loved her himself, but now the white man crushes his heart.

First To Dance is pale for a Pequot but her smile is ripe.  I see her raising our strong sons.  I see myself loving her as an old man, loving her all the days of my life.

Running Boar says, “You are too comfortable.  You stare into the sky and spin silly thoughts.”

“Yes, it’s true,” I say.

“Someday the snake will draw your blood.”

I make a phony motion as if my hand’s been bitten.  I jerk it to resemble spasms of spurting blood.  Running Boar has no choice but to laugh.  “My brother is crazy,” he says, shaking his head.

I believe we are no different than the white man.  We have dissimilar skins, yes, and different customs, but our bodies and minds are composed of the same chemicals.  We should be able to coexist.  I am thinking this in my hammock on a morning when a few tiny birds chatter atop a bushy tree.  

Today I will tell First To Dance of my feelings for her.  She knows them already, but it’s better if I say these things with words to her so-pretty face.

Afterward I will ride into the settlement which sits in a valley fifteen miles from Mystic.  I will ask to meet with Mr. John Gardner who is chief of the white men there.  I will broker an agreement to ensure peace.  I am certain Mr. John Gardner wants this as much as most of our people.  If he resists, I will go to our brothers from the Mohegan and Narragansett tribes and gain their heavy muscle.  But we will not make war.  Fighting is what animals do.  

I’m about to lift my body and start my day when I feel the air tremble, the ground shuddering.  Birds squawk and scatter.  I can hear hundreds of hooves pounding like thunder.    In the distance, a dust cloud hovers over the peak of a hill.

Running Boar screams.  He is the first, but the rest of us follow.  Bullets and arrows.  Metal and flame.  One by one, we are erased from history.

 

—CLAP YOUR HANDS, SAY “YEAH” 

…Before we jump into the gibberish, let’s take a look at some of this week’s headlines, which would normally be impossible to believe if a person lived anywhere else but in America:

 

--Rich people are leaving California 

(because of proposed one-time 5% tax on whose assets are worth more than $1 Billion.) –The Washington Post

(You have a BILLION dollars and you can’t give up a ONE-TIME 5 percent charge?)  

 

--Trump Says Civil Rights Led to White People Being “Very Badly Treated” – The Guardian

--DOJ probing protesters group that disrupted services at church with ICE pastor –CBSNews (Huh, you’re a Christian AND a pastor and you work for ICE? WWJD?)

--ICE agents ate at a Mexican restaurant in a small town. After their meal, they detained employees –ABC News

 

--Trump Says Since Norway Never Gave Him the Noble Peace Prize, He Should Be Able to Take Greenland  --The Atlantic (First of all Norway doesn’t own Greenland, Denmark does. Second of all, if you read any part of the letter he sent to the prime minister of Norway, it’s all cringe-worthy: the writings of a lunatic and a child. 

 

--Trump says, “Canada lives because of the United States.” --Axios

 

--They ransacked the U.S. Capitol and want the government to pay them back

The president’s pardon freed Jan. 6 rioters from prison and emboldened them to demand money from the government. –The Washington Post.

 

…I’m not making this up, but thanks for indulging me.

 

…And people ask what triggers my anxiety.

 

…It is no small thing to realize that you are the one who is being waited for.” Katie Kitamura, The Audition

 

…Change, exercise, and great friendships are how keep from growing old.

 

…When you have a choice, choose love.

 

…I’ve gotten pretty good at reading between the lines.

 

…There’s always a “what else.”

 

…Being content can become its own form of addiction.

 

…I guess it just depends.

 

--    now finally maybe

I’m winning even 

       if it just looks like 

my fingers are shaking

          --Ocean Vuong

 

…I’m back inside my head, safe, where nobody gets hurt.

 

…This is not going to go over well, that’s for sure.

 

--“You and I must work too much because we’re both all crippled up.”

 

…Some of the stuff I write is so shitty it’s embarrassing.

…I’m confused about what’s going on here, but I think I like it.

 

…Well, we’ll see how that plays tomorrow.

 

…Stop picking. There’ll be time for that later.

 

…It’s amazing how, even on the news, people have to waltz around the fact that we have a fucking lunatic running our country.

 

...Last week I had a day that was one of my bigger struggles. I’m not sure who you share that stuff with, because they’ll worry and try to fix you, and so that’s why I just shut up, suck it up and never share.

 

,,,And then, in the end, no matter what happens it all feels really s stupid. 

 

…The only thing worse than being severely handsome is being severely handsome and smug. (I’m talking about my GP here, McDreamy.)

 

…When you tell your doctor the pills he’s prescribed make you vomit two or three times a day, and he says, “That shouldn’t happen—they’re just beta-blockers,” is when you should ask to see his credentials.

 

,,,But do you understand what that means?

 

…And there you go.

 

…I don’t have an answer for that, but I’m pretty good at making them up. Just look at my resume.

 

…The Theme From Shaft is an amazing piece of music until about 2 minutes in when he starts singing. Just saying.

 

...I’ve never been in a fist fight in my life, if you discount all those times my brothers beat me up. I wouldn’t even know what to do in a fight.

 

…It’s not quite close, but it’s close enough.

 

…Maybe I’m a tool, but I just want something to believe in.

 

…This is going to take some time, this time.

 

…It seems like a trick, but it’s a pretty good one.

 

…Wow, where did those bruises come from? And how did I even get them?

 

…I never did Tolstoy, did you?

 

…It’s troublesome at this hour. Oh, Boy.

 

...Maybe I’ll re-think these sentences tomorrow, though that’s doubtful.

 

...I’m probably always going to love The Carpenters, The BGs and The Partridge Family and be sad that you don’t.

 

…Time to start a new book.

 

…Just tell me if you really mean it.

 

…It’s pretty easy to be a martyr anymore, but do you really mean it?

 

…Okay, I get it—this guy’s angry. But screw him.

 

…I wish I could just kick her in the ass, but there’s a fat chance of that happening.

 

…Sadly, I think I know the end to this story.

 

…It meant something to me when I wrote it but now I’m like, “What the chair?”

 

…How did I ever arrive at 170 pounds? This from a guy who was once 146. 

 

…I like a chain around my neck. It’s not a BSD thing. I just like the notion that something’s holding onto me.

 

….If it’s good and sounds authentic, I will listen to your Worship for hours, and I have.

 

…Are you sure you’re okay?

 

…Who’s to say that lost credit card didn’t save my life?

 

…I’m trying to figure out how to make this okay and so far it’s not working.

 

…I guess it’s time to say, What the fuck?

 

…All right—Fuck it. Let’s go all the way.

 

--I WANNA GO DIVING, GET STRUCK BY LIGHTNING 

 

Harvest

It was a pretty good year for harvesting children, torsos having grown plump and sturdy as watermelons, their hair unruly leaves of kale, their mouths full of rich soil seeded with cukes and spuds and pea pods about to poke through.

Each wagon was loaded to overflowing, tires nearly going flat as they caromed over the rutted road, the babies bouncing with each divot struck, some of them bewildered, some of them gurgling as the factory loomed up ahead and the masked men unshouldered their machetes.