And always it is this Gift-giver, this woman from the other side of midnight, this darkness that is not taken from. And she comes in pieces, trajectories, soft angles and planes, curves from a world galore I look for in this, her classroom of touch, taste, and sleek terrors wherein she says, Hello, Two-Dream Tommy, here are dimensions of a barrier, the two roads you must take one at a time if you’re meeting me and getting crushed that side of midnight. Oh, is she north of me or south, breathing yet or not, an image impossible to see, yet I would bet on her on either road I find. Lo, I speak out to her and dream of her, spraddled, urgent, these two parts of unspeakable darkness. Do they have to mean or what become?
It is more than geography hugging me, but what deliciousness in the wind in January, trees stripped to the rawest dimensions, oh bare bark that’s borne. On edges of this electric road, crows by dozens the only intruders in full dress shadows, a three-day-old snow crusting to gray, three marvelous, mysterious wires hanging as if they knot ships together at low tide, weighted with more than a sense of ice, sing a song through the keen teeth of a day going down to its knees in her own perfection. Absolve me, love.
Tag: literally stories
About 465 nm: A Chronology by Martin Agee
Age 7
You can’t imagine how much I loved holidays. Especially Christmas. Getting out the Christmas records and playing them over and over on the stereo. There was a Bing Crosby one where he talked in soothing tones about Young Jethro unwrapping presents all done up with paper that looked like stained glass. Decorating the tree. I was a Christmas ornament. Miss Twitchell told us to bring our school photo and we cut it into a triangle and put popsicle sticks around the edge. She came around and put glue on them and we sprinkled dusty sparkles that looked like icicles all along the frame and it made us feel proud. We knew we’d be right there on the tree, front and center, and everyone would say “oooh” as the tinsel reflected off the sparkles that made our faces with smiles shine and our lips look like flower petals that would bloom in different colors in April. I’m still there, somewhere down inside a cardboard box under the stairs wrapped in newspaper that’s got 1950 and some other words on it. Once a year I come out and hang there smiling at everyone with sparkly popsicle frame.
Continue reading “About 465 nm: A Chronology by Martin Agee”The Sowbelly Trio by James Hanna
My wife, Mary, and I sit on the front porch of our Florida home. Mary is feeling nostalgic, so she asks me a syrupy question. I never feel very comfortable when Mary asks me such questions. I am not good at providing the sort of answers women like to hear.
Continue reading “The Sowbelly Trio by James Hanna”Crack by Yash Seyedbagheri
The train horn rises through my window. It starts as a hum, but rises to a wail, insistent and bursting, fragments of noise burying themselves in my ears, in my body.
I cover my ears again, sitting on my bed. Mother tells me to think of anything else, moving closer and closer. She plops beside me, a defeated little plop.
“Close your eyes, Nicky,” she says, her lips quivering. “Take your mind elsewhere.”
Continue reading “Crack by Yash Seyedbagheri “Literally Reruns – Blessed are the little things by Leila Allison
A splendid choice this week – the penultimate of Joy’s first list of Rerun submissions. These have been great. We’ll take more any time you like.
Continue reading “Literally Reruns – Blessed are the little things by Leila Allison”Week 336: The Words of Prophets and My Unsteady Jukebox
The Words of the Prophets
I had lost the ability to hear The Sound of Silence until Disturbed brought it back brilliantly in 2015. My mind gets that way with songs; I can hear them too many times–at that saturation point they assume the guise of an echo that my mind ignores upon further soundings. But Distubed’s over the top yet somehow restrained remake of the Simon and Garfunkel classic brought back to me one of the truly great lines in the history of music: The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls and tenement halls…
I wonder what Paul Simon felt when he wrote that line in 1965. Did it excite him or was he so lost in composition that it was just more words to choose from. I also wonder what Da Vinci experienced when he finished Mona Lisa. Did he bask in the glow of his own genius or eat cheese? Now, obviously you can ask Simon the question, but I doubt he could give you the actual answer because time has a way of reshaping memories, and inevitably a legend of some sort will creep in and take the actual event’s shape. I’m not saying he’d lie, but there stands a chance he’d buy the mirage.
Continue reading “Week 336: The Words of Prophets and My Unsteady Jukebox”This Ol’ House by Mark Gormley
Sometimes genius isn’t recognised the first time around. It took until the year 2035 for the world to appreciate the song-writing force that was Shakin’ Stevens. Since his reign in the rock and pop charts, music had become formulaic and contrived.
Continue reading “This Ol’ House by Mark Gormley”Swinging At The Daisy Chain by William Kitcher
It wasn’t until about three in the afternoon that I got back to the bar. After the show the night before, we partied in the bar with the band until about four, then went to someone’s apartment, I think she was with the band, who knew or who cared at that point, it was a place where we could keep going. I left about nine and most of the band was still there, drinking whatever was left, blowing coke, pretending the night was still happening, ignoring the fact they didn’t have another gig lined up.
Continue reading “Swinging At The Daisy Chain by William Kitcher”Cold by Yash Seyedbagheri
My older sister Nan and I climb up our makeshift tree house armed with our latest swiped goodies. Vienna sausages. Saltines. Sardines. Plastic Merlot bottles. The Sutter Home brand, not anything fancy, but durable. Plus, it’s enough to give you a good buzz, but not enough to get truly, raging drunk. Not like Mom.
Continue reading “Cold by Yash Seyedbagheri”Week 335 – Antagonism Counts, Coubertin’s Rings And Horse Shit Is Never Plastic.
I follow on from Leila’s excellent Week 334 with the not surprising Week 335!
Continue reading “Week 335 – Antagonism Counts, Coubertin’s Rings And Horse Shit Is Never Plastic.”
