Born in the Year of the Butterfly Knife: 1 Read online

  “Seems like you’re hiding something, Jules. Or running from something.”

  “Some women aren’t running from anything. Some wait for things to run to them and they live in an advent calendar, counting the days until the things they need or love walk away or get their guts ran over by a bus. Women like me settle in their sadness like a cat pawing a pillow. It’s OK.”

  She has had a lot of stuff go astray for such a young girl.

  She wouldn’t want me to tell you because it’s private. All this noticing, it was the first time I felt like I wasn’t losing. I hope you’re still learning from this.

  “Look out behind you, dead meat!” was the name of my first poem. It went like this.

  Look out behind you, dead meat!

  That’s what you say when you stab a rack of tires in Basic.

  I see love in many ways.

  Mostly as a rack of radials

  you just keep jabbing and stabbing

  until it dies in the midst of this obstacle course.

  I don’t know if it was ever alive before,

  but it sure feels good getting a chance to bash the crap out of it.

  I’m not sure what I’m saying here.

  The teacher the next day made me read my newest poem in front of the whole class. I was shaking like a box of maracas. I had trouble breathing.

  Julie rubbed my shoulders and slapped me on the ass like she was Vince Lombardi.

  She worked withme a lot on it and I thanked her for being hot and not letting me sleep with her and for all the advice. I made my way to the front.

  “This new is… is called ‘I Fall For You in Autumn.’

  Margaret, your skin is shinier than a platoon of new jump boots.

  Your laugh is a grenade in the chest

  of a child that thought he was indestructible.

  Your hair is hiding all the camouflaged wonder of your mind.

  I want to curl the brown of it around these gunpowder fingers.

  If found by the Ranger who needs you,

  He will dream tonight of the weapons in your hips.

  I’m the love tank, Margaret. My treads have been blown.

  Pay attention, young soldiers. Whether I got Margaret back or not doesn’t matter. This feeling, or feeling, is the act of not losing. This I give back to you, the same way Margaret gave herself back to me. This is one blind idiot telling the world “I see you sucker.” You can stand up and say “I am not a victim or a passenger. I am the one fuckin’ the duck around here.

  You just stand back and watch the feathers fly.” Carry on.

  HOW TO LEAVE THE OZARKS

  March 3.

  If you have found this journal, I hope you are reading it slowly.

  I am in Arkansas still. I am still in Arkansas.

  The wind is hurling itself against the meadows;

  It comes to the hotel windows

  as a low song from a record played too fast.

  To me, the wind is a Victrola.

  It is born to howl these ballads.

  I am here in this hotel to figure out how to be.

  I wonder if this feeling has ever crossed you.

  When the big ‘life’ question is asked—

  it’s always Why, but I want to know How,

  How to keep goin’,

  when you just don’t feel like goin’ anymore.

  When are you done?

  The engine is underwater.

  This storm grinds its wet stuff against the exterior walls of this room

  and the raindrops cruise tiny applause across my balcony window.

  I think of all the lovemaking I’ve never done.

  I’ve been staying here on the eleventh floor of the Radisson

  in Fayetteville, Arkansas

  for the last 2 weeks.

  There is the thick black Gideon book on the nightstand that I can’t start.

  There is a story here that needs a finish.

  I’d like to choose my ending.

  You could call it ‘A rebellion on God’s surprises.’

  I just have to pick the ending.

  Where do we find a good ending?

  In the lost index of a love novel?

  In the catalogued files of our misery?

  In the confidential losses of the living?

  In the Radisson?

  I can’t stay here. I am almost out of money.

  I need a beer and 50,000 dollars.

  Every night before I sleep

  I remember the question slumber party kids would ask

  ‘Is it better to drown slow or burn alive fast?’

  The question for me has always been

  ‘Do I want people to remember the smoke

  or the fire?’

  I heard of a Navy veteran who outmaneuvered Kamikaze pilots in WW2

  and then died at age 78 from a West Nile virus mosquito bite.

  I feel like if I want to die in a rebellion or by skydiving into the roof of the

  Oval Office without a chute.

  What I’ll really get is a slip on a soapy loofah,

  concussion in the bathtub.

  If you want die to die valiantly,

  rescuing someone from a building or saving a baby from a car crash,

  you’ll probably just get testicular cancer.

  Some stories end well. Some just slam on the brakes.

  I paid cash to the friendlies at the front desk.

  I wanted no visitors.

  I am room 1101.

  The window is locked.

  I haven’t opened it. Weird having a window burglar lock eleven stories up.

  I thought all the giants died in the ‘60s.

  Someone had been smoking in my room.

  It smells like my Father and I remember bronchitis.

  The art isn’t nailed down which means this is classy for me.

  The stale starch in the bedspread. The unoffensive everything.

  This feels like a good place to have surgery or an affair.

  I use the whole shotgun-shell-sized hotel conditioner bottle every night.

  All

  over my body.

  I feel rich and my arm hairs get soft as…I dunno.

  Not a baby’s ass. That’s a fallacy.

  Babies don’t actually have softer asses.

  People just don’t touch naked babies as hard.

  What am I talking about? I’ve been alone for too long.

  I’d really like to go home but I know they’re waiting for me.

  Sneaky little beavers.

  There’s no way I am gonna spend another year, for them,

  with the retards at that idiot clinic.

  Unless they catch me.

  I can’t let them catch me.

  I remember, six months in, some in the group at the clinic who were also sent

  by loved ones actually started believing they were sick with an affliction cause

  they had at least …seven drinks a work week. I’m not kidding.

  Europeans would wet their pants if they heard that. Every day, as the counselor

  talked us through his coma monologue, I would yell out something in the middle.

  Not because I really hate the guy, I just hate what this whole thing is really

  about…and I was feelin’ horny.

  I think his name was Michel. A soft, faraway name. He spoke like he was from

  a commune in Arizona.

  “…No, I don’t think it takes vision to see who we really, really really are, but

  that amazing moment is hiding where we release and say I am worth…”

  “TITS!” I’d bolt out.

  “…er, uh I’m sorry, question? No? O.K. um…and the real thing is to watch

  honest-to-goodness joy flow abundantly, truly abundantly…”

  “PEEEEENIIIIIS.”

  “Who? Who? No question? O.K. Today is a new day and it’s really about

  just really letting the self encourage you. If we could jus
t really look inside

  ourselves, not at what you see, but to look inside ourselves and see what you

  are…”

  Then something inside me really started to hate this poor guy. I lost it.

  “Look inside ourselves? I suggest a personal X-ray for yourself, you heartless,

  illegitimate, crystal-vortex-riding hippie.”

  Blood rushed to my tongue.

  I had just seen One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest before all this went down.

  “I’m tired of you telling me to look inside myself

  ‘cause you can’t come up with any real advice. Is everything a disease? When

  are we allowed to die? Even if it’s slow. Gimme the damn choice at least. That’s

  freedom, assholes.

  I’ve seen alcoholics and this ain’t it. Thanks for the fancy commitment coins

  and the mantras. I’ll make my own. You should be out there on the street

  helping the homeless get on the wagon. They’re out there waiting for you,

  freezin’ and drinking just so they can fall asleep.

  Why don’t you wrap up your little pity party so we don’t have to keep sitting

  here feeling guilty while you chase the air.

  You’re a Sasquatch hunter.

  You’re a Loch Ness handjob.

  You conjure fear harder than the 11’o clock news, begging us to confess our

  normalities so you can make an easy paycheck while your nipples turn to

  rockets every time we cry, symptoms you invented, you filthy walking pile of

  organic, touchy-feely overanalyzed ass. I wipe you. I wipe you away.”

  Wham. I got another six months in the treatment center under high security.

  That diatribe wanted out more than I did.

  Let’s call it, Senioritis. There’s a disease. I’ll call Pfizer.

  I was treated like a psycho after that and I probably deserved it.

  I put a Bible verse on my wall to show I was making progress.

  Proverbs 31:6. “Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine

  unto those that be of heavy hearts. Let him drink and forget his poverty and

  remember his misery no more.”

  Thought it was funny.

  All the guys really wanted me after that which is nice, except for the fact that

  all the guys in there were already broken.

  They weren’t alive.

  I wasn’t attracted.

  My parents had begun to sell my personal things to pay for treatment.

  I don’t know what to tell you…it’s just the worst feeling.

  You ever been lost in a department store as a kid?

  Hiding in the clothes racks,

  longing for your mother to slide her hands in

  and take you from the polyester slacks?

  That’d be nice. I dreamt of that last night. As if the world was a whole

  bunch of pants

  and I was just waiting for someone to find me and take me home.

  March 4.

  The wind is picking up wonderfully outside.

  Sounds like an African elephant shot in the face

  gaining anger and release.

  The Ozarks are getting darker than a tar pit of widows.

  Someone slid a note under my door.

  I thought it was an eviction notice. I didn’t pay for last night.

  It said “Tornado warning in full effect.

  If you hear the smoke detector siren, take refuge in the stairwell. Thanks.

  The management.”

  I stepped to the beige disc on the ceiling and pulled it apart.

  Someone had removed the battery so they could smoke.

  Good for them.

  What I really want is a beer.

  I don’t need it, I just want it…wish I could afford a case.

  My parents think I need it.

  They don’t know what I need.

  March 5.

  I watched T.V. all day,

  roaming the morning halls

  for leftovers on plates and in the bottles of champagne.

  All of this, ‘cause of them.

  They were so obsessed with showing me how to live right

  they put my spirit in a chalk outline.

  I stare out the soft focus of smeared balcony glass

  through the storm.

  I think of all those people,

  all those problems.

  God is not trying to fix the unfixable.

  so what the hell are we doin’?

  He set this mother in motion and let it go.

  He is not trying to heal those that don’t want to be healed.

  Stuff breaks down for a reason.

  Sometimes you should just let it be.

  I just want to feel good.

  I just want to feel incredible.

  I just want a great ending.

  March 6.

  It sounded just the way I spell it now,

  KEEERRRRASSSSHHH!

  Holy shit! Glass everywhere.

  The wind is pinning the blankets into wallpaper.

  A cursing kind of wind peaking at the center of the room.

  Hair straps across my face.

  Something has just burst through the glass of my balcony window.

  It is rolled like a huge cigarette, covered in a curtain.

  I ran into the bathroom and just slammed the door.

  Fear is born inside me. I can’t do anything but write this down.

  Quiet. Calm down. Exhale. Lord.

  I’m going to go out there and see what it is……………………..

  I thought the twister must have launched a log

  through my window.

  I opened the bathroom door,

  peeked out.

  I saw the lamp became toast.

  The carpet’s got wet.

  The wind is high but dying down.

  The phone is off the hook and beeping. It’s cold.

  Something was rolled in the fabric of the curtain.

  I moved towards the stuff on the wall. It looked like paint. It looked like blood.

  It was blood.

  A moan came out of the curtain on the floor. It was a man. I couldn’t tell his age.

  There was blood painting his neck and face.

  His leg are mangled.

  I unwrapped him from the cloth and sat him up on my bed.

  I could envision his body lifting from some tractor and feeling the moment

  when gravity vanishes.

  Trailer pieces, trees and cars whirling about him. Narrowly missing his skull.

  A balcony window zooming towards his face.

  He is hurting, out there, wheezing.

  I wiped the red and the mud from his eyes.

  His retinas were wide with adrenaline.

  He is dressed in farming overalls, maybe in his 20s. He’s still out there.

  I wanted to ask him what happened, but I couldn’t stop staring at his eyes.

  My heartbeat is climbing right now as I write this.

  I’ve never seen his countenance on a person before.

  I felt as if I was staring the universe, all the ages, right in the face.

  I couldn’t stop for a bit. I couldn’t believe he was still alive.

  His eyes were blasting electricity into my spine.

  His spirit formed a power plant around me.

  He held my hand.

  There was. He squeezed my hand and said, “help me.”

  I began bleeding a little from the shards, into his blood and felt no pain.

  He gripped my hand tightly and his lips were trembling like California.

  He spoke with a great pain in his voice, “I can’t…uh, move.

  We…are in…the eye of…storm…for now,

  it will come back.

  I don’t want it to grab me again. My back.

  Am I gonna die? I don’t want to die. I don’t want to.”


  His teeth showed through the rust on his face.

  He was without blinking.

  I helped him to the safety of the bathtub and gave him towels for bandages.

  He is next to me.

  I told him he was going to be fine. That he was going to live and will feel

  better tomorrow. I told him to relax.

  I am going to prop the hall door open so they can find him.

  I am going to move to the window in a moment.

  I am not depressed. I am not drunk. I am tired of the gravity.

  I am choosing my ending, hard on the brakes.

  I stand on the edge of the balcony.

  The wind begins to swell around me.

  I listen to its song. I’ve sung that song.

  I am done.

  YOU, MY DEAR,

  ARE A VERY SPECIAL STARFISH

  Text of the first graduation speech delivered by famed dramatist Lydia Handlestock on the moon, June 18, 2028

  It is immaculately quiet in here. Do you know why? Because you’re here…and you’re here because you’re rich…and because you’re rich you’re well mannered and because you’re well-mannered…you don’t test the rules.

  And because you don’t test the rules, your performances last night were the equivalent of a puppet show done by dead monkey cadavers…and yes, it was redundant on purpose. It was prison sex with Neil Simon and a looped yawn for an orgasm. You were cartoons drawn by cartoons. You’re a cheerleader with a boner and no quarterbacks to pile at the party. You are CONFUSED BY PASSION. You can’t control or summon the force of ridiculous triggers inside you like my students on Earth do.

  But so help me, as God keeps holding this blue gun to my head. By the end of this address, you will stop being a bunch of interstellar doorknobs. You will know passion. You must know passion. LYDIA HANDLESTOCK PASSION.

  And now I will sing. Why? Because I do whatever I want. Aaaaaaa.

  Listen, I don’t know what they’re teaching you pinko, snot-nosed goobers up here on Mars but I sure as hell hope you know who George S. Patton is.

  General George S. Patton was King Shit. He had the curse of mandatory victory inside him. Comparatively, he was the greatest warrior of the twentieth century. He said something…to the effect of…

  “Men, I know some of you are concerned about whether you’ll chicken out under fire when you’re in those trenches. Well, I guarantee you, when you put your hand into a pile of goo that moments before was your best friend’s face, well…you’ll know what to do.”

  It is gory, heartfelt, weirdo brilliance. You didn’t let us, the audience place our hands into your goo last night. Don’t hide it under a bushel, give us the goo!