—THIS IS HOW SOME OF IT REALLY HAPPENED

 

 

…Here I am, overthinking everything again.

 

…Maybe I should sleep it off.

 

…So, what do you want from me? What do you need?

 

…It’s not easy. It’s never easy.

 

…When it comes to feedback about my writing, I’d rather have blunt honesty than people blowing smoke.

 

…Everyone says tomorrow and tomorrow, but tomorrow never comes.

 

…Maybe I’m the drama.

 

…Everyone has their stuff.

 

…But who were you telling?

 

…It can sometimes be a shock when people remember what you remember.

 

…Thank God for Spotify.

 

…I’ve been thinking twice. Thought you should know.

 

…It was never going to be good timing.

 

…What are you sorry for?

 

…A lot of times, reality really sucks.

 

…When you find yourself circling the drain is when it’s a good time to call a friend.

 

…There’s always a “but,” an “unless,” and “except.” 

 

…--“Why are all of your songs sad? Every single one of them?

     --“They’ve always been that way. Even when I was a kid, I wrote them like that. I don’t know why exactly, but that’s the way they come out.”

          ---Willy Vlautin, The Horse

 

…There are five times as many men who say they have no close friends as there were in 1990. 

 

…I hate when people say something is a “gamechanger.” But I dislike “Y’all” a lot more.

 

…Today, it’s me. Tomorrow it could be you.

 

--I had hardly begun to read 

I asked how can you ever be sure 

that what you write is really 

any good at all and he said you can’t 

 

you can’t you can never be sure 

you die without knowing 

whether anything you wrote was any good 

if you have to be sure don’t write.

    --W.S. Merwin, Berryman

 

…This is probably the right time to re-direct your focus.

…Yeah, I know.

 

…What’s the smart move here, because I never really know?

 

…Maybe you should come to the funeral after all. 

 

…I think there are more steps.

 

…I wish I could feel like that, like they do on Sunday. I wish I could believe in something like that.

 

…Being happy is a really important part of living for a long time.

 

… “I can't believe what you say, because I see what you do.” James Baldwin

 

...This is like totally stupid. I don’t even know what I’m doing.

 

…You have to give it up for anybody (especially a guy) who tries to cover The Cranberries, “Linger.”

 

…Sing me song for a while. We can talk about it later.

 

…Just drop me off and pick me up later if you feel like it.

 

…“He was done with stewing over songs until he was half mad. And no matter what he did or how hard he tried, his songs were good but never great. How many notebooks had he filled? How many hours and months and years had he toiled and tinkered?” Willy Vlautin, The Horse  

 

--Everything okay?

--I don’t want to bother you, man.

--You’re not bothering me. I’m asking.

 

“…Asking one good question is like pushing the Play button.” The Boys 

 

…Yeah, I’m just not so sure about that.

 

…I’m not there yet.

 

…Is this going to be a good thing?

 

…When I say, “I love you,” I’m not joking.

 

…We’re about as good as we’re ever going to be.

 

…What is it you remember about that time?

 

…It was strange, in the corporate world, always being on display. And now I’m the opposite. I’ll take today over that every time.

 

…YOU APPEARED IN 43 SEARCHES THIS WEEK

 

…I guess I just don’t want to keep on carrying it. Do you know what I mean?

…“The fake liberal media says I’m charging $5,000 for front-row tickets,” Kid Rock wrote in his social media message — before going on to confirm that $5K is indeed what he is charging for the top face-value tickets to his upcoming shows. “I WILL pray for them, but I know that sooner or later God will cut ‘em down,” Rock said, referring to members of the media who reported on his ticket prices.”

 …Clowns to the left of me, Jokers to the right…

 

…People only know what they see.

 

…But you didn’t even listen.

 

…I wish I was the favorite.

 

…I guess you can train yourself to do anything.

 

…“Prayer is the hygiene of the soul.” Baudelaire 

 

…Infirmed much?

 

…I need to avoid nowhere.

 

…Nothing hurts as much as hope not being met with reality.

 

…Just 54 percent of U.S. adults say they consume alcohol, the smallest percentage in 90 years.

 

…Since the U.S. president claimed he wanted to make Canada the “51^ststate,” traffic across the Washington state border from Canada has fallen by 1.2 million cars.

 

…Headline last week from The Washington Post:

Trump aides struggle with how to spend $500 billion more on military

  

...Last year, the government eliminated all US funding at $22 Billion annually for USAID (U.S. Agency for International Development) whose key initiatives included “ Feed the Future (agriculture), Power Africa, global health (vaccines, disease control)”

A 2025 study estimates that USAID-supported programs saved approximately 91-92 million lives in low- and middle-income countries between 2001 and 2021.

 

“O.K., I’ll put that on my calendar and we’ll just keep an eye on the weather and the fall of democracy.”

…What are you thinking about?

 

…Almost every day, it’s impossible to read the news and not be completely repulsed by something.

 

…I think I mostly agree with this guy—

"I’ve been watching an absolutely heroic amount of pearl-clutching lately from people who insist that J.D. Vance would somehow be “worse” than Trump once Trump’s inevitable political and biological expiration arrives.

Let’s get something straight: it has never been about Trump, not for one second.

Trump is just the mascot. The real story is the people who finally saw themselves in him and felt validated by what they saw.

I actually believe most of them will drift away when the cult collapses, like embarrassed fans of a one-hit wonder. Many of them will swear they were never really into him at all. The MAGA amnesia is going to be epic.

I used to wonder how it was possible that Trump could have won in 2016 and then again in 2024, given how emotionally toxic, morally vacant, and psychologically mangled he is.

I don’t wonder anymore.

I think he won for that exact reason.

He wasn’t a candidate. He was a mirror.

If you were a racist, you found your guy.

If you were a misogynist, you found your guy.

If money was your only religion, you found your guy.

If your heart was armored shut, you found your guy.

If you mocked disabled people, you found your guy.

If you hated intelligent people, you found your guy.

If you were a rapist, you found your guy.

If you enjoyed golden showers with Russian sex workers, you found your guy.

If you’d done absolutely nothing to confront your emotional wreckage, you found your guy.

If you were a serial cheater, you found your guy.

If you were a perpetual bankrupt, you found your guy.

If you stiffed honest workers, you found your guy.

If you were a conman, you found your guy.

If you mocked people’s appearances, you found your guy.

If you longed for a toxic Daddy, you found your guy.

If you were dissociated and disembodied, you found your guy.

If you were unconscionable in every economic dealing, you found your guy.

If you lied as naturally as breathing, you found your guy.

If you’d never eaten a green vegetable, you found your guy.

If you were a white supremacist, you found your guy.

If your ego contained a hole so large not even the presidency could fill it, you found your guy.

If you were a sociopath who cared not one molecule about other humans, you found your guy.

If he had only two of these traits, he never would have won. He won because he had hundreds of them, and millions of people recognized themselves in at least one.

This has never been about Trump. It has always been about the people who finally had their worst instincts validated.

Trump didn’t create the cruelty, he licensed it. He handed out permission slips for hate.

He is merely a symptom of a far deeper disease: collective toxicity.

If there is one sentence that explains Trump’s power, it is this: “He says the things I’m thinking.”

That’s the part that should chill the spine.

Who knew that tens of millions of Americans were thinking such unconscionable things about their fellow citizens? Who knew how many white men felt so threatened by women and challenged by minorities that they were ready to torch democracy to feel big again? Who knew that after decades of apparent progress on race and gender, so many people were living in seething resentment, waiting for a demagogue to legitimize their worst selves and convert their bitterness into political power?

Perhaps we were living in a fool’s paradise.

We aren’t anymore."

– Michael Jochum, Not Just a Drummer: Reflections on Art, Politics, Dogs, and the Human Condition

 \

…“In a time of rising cruelty, love feels like something we’re not supposed to have time for.” Ingrid Keir

 

—NO NEED TO STAND SO FAR AWAY

 

                                            Witches                            

        People call her a witch, but they don’t know.

       I watch her slump.  She’s always slumped over—when walking, seated, sleeping.  Her hair is a matted fern, covering her face while Merv Griffin grins on the television set.  The blinds are closed and a stripe of light, thin as a stalk of uncooked pasta, cuts the window in two.

       My brother and dad have gone hunting.  Last week they killed a buck and had me take pictures of them standing beside the bloody carcass.  The two of them are close, like friends, how I will never be.

       My mother’s breath is a rasp-and-hum, rasp-and-hum, a lawn mower stuck in mud.

       I get a hairbrush from the bathroom and sit down on the sofa beside her, gently working through the tangled mess.  I tell her about school and girls I only know peripherally.  I don’t say how they call me The Witch’s Daughter, Satan’s Spawn, names like that.  I make up a story about a boy who loves and protects me.  I say his name is Gary.  I tell her he would make a wonderful son in-law someday.

       I make chicken noodle soup and spoon some into her mouth.  She has a hard time chewing the noodles and bits of them cling to her lower lip looking like crumbled molars.

       I tell her that whatever’s happened to her is an accident of the body or mind, some type of physical failure.  I say, “Someday you’ll be better, tip top.  You’ll see.”

       Her small head sways like a buoy.  Warm tears—hers and mine--spill over my palms.

       I stand her up and help her shuffle across the room, out the door, down the steps and into the car.  I’ve packed everything we’ll need and, even though it hardly fills up the trunk or backseat, I’m certain it’s enough.

       As we drive away, for fun, I cast a spell—nothing evil or spiteful.  Just a simple incantation so people will forget who we ever were.

 

—A SIDE OF ME SHOWED UP WITH WET HAIR

                                       

How We Got Here

       We wear hand-me downs and each other’s shoes, even if they’re too tight and pinch.  To save money, father buzzes our hair down to bristles with shears that rattle and sometimes catch patches of skin.  We eat in silence, the only sound metal chinking on plastic plates, food being chewed and swallowed.

       After supper, we lay on the shag carpet watching black-and-white TV, listening to a family that’s nothing like our own, hearing how happy they are, noticing what a fine car they drive, how big their dining room is.   

       At night we three sleep on the same mattress.  We never dream, or if we do, we never say.  In the mornings we rise before the sun and make it to the fields, row after row of the same bushes, flocked with blood-red berries glinting against green.

       We work on our knees, filling the flats as fast as we can because it’s cash money they pay here.  Afternoons, we stand in line with the other migrants, wilted and sweaty, each person taking his turn, handing over a punch card and receiving berry-stained bills in return.

       Years later, one brother steals a car, another brother robs a convenience store, and I break into a house.  That’s how it starts and begins to end.

       Now we wear orange uniforms, sit in similar cells, stroll in sunlight for a single hour each day.  At night we lay in cots.  We imagine freedom, beaches with chalk-colored sand, a skiff bobbing on waves. 

 

—ECHO VALLEY 2-6809

  

…I know you know.

 

…I guess, I don’t know.

 

…Deep is relative.

 

…The only way out is to write.

 

--You must really like that song

--Yeah, I really do.

 

…Thank you for closing that door. Perfect timing.

 

--“Isn’t love a form of hope?

--“No. Love is crushing. Love is something you let yourself feel at your own peril.”

            --Lily King, Heart the Lover

 

…Constantly lying to yourself requires a special kind of stamina.

 

…Most people are a contradiction of themselves.

 

…Hope can be just as devastating as despair.

 

…Wishing you could change the script of your life when the scene is over is pointless.

 

…At some point, you have to learn to protect yourself.

 

…I’m the first to admit that men can be very stupid.

 

…Was today really so bad?

 

…I know what it’s like to keep all your hurt bottled up inside.

 

…There comes a point with everything in life where there is no turning back.

 

…It’s been a good run, and I’m grateful. Truly.

 

…I was mostly a joke then, still wandering.

 

…Puff up those cheeks while you sit there and watch her die. Good, Boy.

 

…I must confess, I have regrets.

 

…Might be time to shape up.

 

…I’m not sure anymore.

 

…How many times can you say, “There’s nothing worse,” and really mean it.

 

…I hate being a cynic, but just take a peek, Patterson,

 

…It’s amazing how much I can still be a dick.

 

…As of today, I can still smell a little bit of eucalyptus. What a gift, what a wonder.

 

…I’m usually good at knowing when it’s me.

 

--What’re you doing?

--I’m drowning.

--Need a towel?

--No, a snorkel would be better.

 

…Well, there we go.

 

…Ahhh, let’s play that one.

  

…I put my faith in some wrong people, though they seemed right at the time.

 

…“Being a good, or best friend, requires about 200 meaningful hours over six weeks.” Ezekiel Emanuel, MD

 

…Stop fucking Afibbing. Just go ahead and kill me if you’re going to. I don’t need all this foreplay.

 

…“So I do what I always do when I don’t know what to do. I pour a drink.”

 

…You can’t walk around like that forever, can you?

 

…When those lights go on, the show’s over.

 

…Wake up. It’s been dawn for hours.

 

…You lose the “h” and we have a whole other story. 

 

…No, that’s the important part.

 

…That’s the problem with texting when you shouldn’t, even if you’re well-intentioned.

 

…So, there you go again.

 

…How many times can you kill yourself in a day?

 

..."What if I can never meet someone who makes me feel that happy?"

 

….“You aren’t seriously considering this, are you?”

 

…It’s a beautiful sensation, to hear the rain but not see it fall because it’s still too early and dark out.

 

…Who would ever have thought?

 

…To be honest, I’m not sure what that is.

 

…It’s a very fine line.

 

…The Grim Reaper is always one step behind us. Fuck him.

 

…If you want, I’ll take the fall for that and you can pay me back a nickel the next day.

 

…I’m not sure why anyone reads this.

 

…I think a sunrise means there’s hope, even if you don’t feel it at the time.

 

…Yeah, yeah, yeah again.

 

…I’m really scared right now.

 

…Can I have a few of those leftover covers?

 

…You start noticing things better right before something momentous is about to happen.

 

…“Start by accepting that willpower deteriorates over time.” Ezekeil Emanuel, MD

 

…If it was a good morning, I’d still be in bed.

 

…“Would you like to be alone some more?”

 

…Changes need to be simple, or they just don’t work.

 

…I know what I’m doing most of the time.

 

…It doesn’t mean anything to me if doesn’t mean anything to you.

 

…I suppose I’m supposed to be a grownup, whatever that means or entails, but it feels futile.

 

…Who cries in their cuffs? Like no one, right?

 

…Who can I tell that to other than you?

 

…“Seasonal Depression” is really a thing?

 

…“If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. Is there any other way?” Emily Dickinson

 

…There should be a way to block yourself.

 

…I’m not a mind reader, but I know what happens next.

 

…Wait, remind me; What day is it today?

 

…I just want to sway a bit, if that’s okay.

 

…Apparently, the time is right now.

 

…It must be what you mean it.

 

…And who’s to say where we’ll be tomorrow?

 

…Who puts up with this shit, and why would they? 

 

 

—I CAN’T AFFORD TO KNOW WHAT I’M MISSING

  

                                          Blood Orange

        She wants to go back to before, back to the beginning, prior to this secret death, long before the twins were snuggled inside her womb, a pair of bocce balls, grapefruits sprouting limbs, becoming gangly, alien-looking in medical film, later floating inside her embryonic soup like plucked chickens, as if pretending to be astronauts tethered to nothing, gravity inconsequential, and her feeling their slide and glide all the way up to her ribs, Jim, her husband saying, “Hey, they just moved, didn’t they?”, her thinking they should never have married let alone gotten pregnant, let alone with twins, her a twin herself, always copying Claire’s style, dying her hair blood orange in high school because Claire did, piercing her navel, lip, clit, now married-Claire, perfect-Claire, already bringing over baby gifts before the twins are even hatched, scads of matching baby outfits, Seuss-striped pajamas and miniature spoons, Claire thinking of twins—the concept of twins--as rare, precious, a kind of unbreakable bond between them, no different than the covenant of marriage, Claire happy in hers, Jim now lifting a butt cheek and farting into the sofa, him pale, bloated, dull as alabaster, an unremarkable future staring back through a reflective square in the television’s right hand corner, it becoming a kaleidoscope, then a camera, clicking away at their beige walls and carpets, their beige ambitions, nothing ever ventured, nothing, really, ever gained except an ordinary existence, a death sentence she feels sluicing down her thighs as her water breaks.