I Am

I am a faded cardboard sign – illegible in the rain.
I am a sailor lost at sea.
I am blue raspberry marketing – unreal.
I am a forgone conclusion,
    a smile in the dark, an unfinished melody.
I am the memory of a dying dog.
I am a hesitation mark.
I am standing in the rain again,
    the looming threat of war, mushrooms on a fallen log.
I am an unfamiliar dog in the neighbor’s yard.
I am an owl in the sanctuary.
I am unlike myself, as far as I can remember,
    but I am becoming true.
I am an abandoned car at the side of the road.
I am rabbit trail digressions into nonsense,
    an absurdist defeatism.
I am stomach pains and vertigo in an airport terminal.
I am a halfhearted Baphomet.
I am slowing down, full stop.
I am not especially well written,
    clumsy but earnest.
I am helpless and I don’t know what to do
    except to say that there’s nothing I can do.

Never Far Enough Away from This Word

     “Look into the courtyard. Down there. Just the other side of the magnolia tree. See him?"

    “Someone just left the room.”

    “I know. I’m pointing at him. That’s him, down there.”

    Drop this noise and the brighter lights and the darker shadows in the corner of the courtyard will stand out stronger. The setting sun casts strange and moving shadows across the concrete. Like a passage of blood through the arteries and veins of the body. Like a slow-moving train and a visible target. The shadows move and we observe. We write it all down in our official reports, filed upon our return to headquarters. Someone else will summarize and index our reports for the captain and the chief.    

“Stand by…”­

    This sort of thing goes on everyday­ in your mid to large size cities. New York and Chicago? Obviously. Des Moines? Occasionally. But in smaller towns and villages? Perhaps it happens, but no one notices. Or if they do, they will not report it. Midwestern nice is a thing. And civility is rarely pressed.

    “Anything?”

    “Stand by…”

    My partner, G., and I were on a standard surveillance detail­. Observe and Report were our instructions. Just that and nothing more. Observe. Report. Crime doesn’t pay. We’ve seen it’s deficiencies and failures. And we were tasked to watch for it and to write it all down.

    “Do you see anything?”

    “I said stand by...”

    Lawsuits and shootings. A record of violence. Criminal, military records. But here we are, watching and waiting for something to happen. And when (or if) it happens, what will be required of us? We been instructed – unambiguously – to observe and to report. Nothing more. Nothing less. Lawyers come. Covert operatives go. Our man sits on a park bench in the courtyard eating a sandwich. Looks like pastrami and sauerkraut on rye, but I can’t be sure from this distance. I wrote it down in the ledger anyway. 

    While we were waiting, while we watched, G. put down the binoculars and turned to me. “What are you going to do when you’re thirty?”

    “Thirty?” I chuckled. “Thirty?”

    “All right, then. Fifty?” G. asked.

    “This,” I said pointing to the filthy apartment where we squatted “I’m fifty.”

    “Really?­ What’s it like?” he asked.

    “I don’t really know. I’ve never been fifty before. My knees are still okay. I’m healthy. Mostly.”

    “You know they just pushed the retirement age back again?”

    “Yeah. I saw that,” I said. “I’ve often said that I’ll get to retire when they drop me in the box.” G. laughed. “Yeah. Yeah.” I laughed too, but mirthlessly. “I’m tired.”

    Quoting scripture from memory isn’t enough. I’ve sat in the all night coffee shop on the corner with the street corner preachers strung out and ranting. One hundred thousand hours since 1925 and it’s still not enough. In Texas. In Oklahoma. In Minnesota, Iowa, and Illinois. Always in Zion, but never far enough away from this world.

    “Has he moved yet?” I asked.

    “Just a minute,” G. said as he replaced the binoculars. “Stand by…”

    I woke up the other morning – before my alarm, before dawn – and my first thought, even before I opened my eyes, was ‘It never ends.’ It never ends. Day after day, one more day and then another. It never ends. And now this. A phone call from my brother. A message from my mother and it feels like all my old failures returned and revisited. Like Nero Redivivus. The past isn’t dead. It isn’t even past. Just concealed and waiting and watching, biding its own time until it can return. My nightmares come back to haunt me. Death and divorce. Poor communication and spreading cancer in this ruined temple. Who am I? That’s still the central question, isn’t it? After all these years, it still comes back to this: Who am I?

    “He’s moving.” G. says abruptly. “He’s moving. He’s moving.”

    “Let’s roll,” I say as I grab my jacket and my camera.

There Should Be No Poor Among You

     If this is to be a Christian nation – founded on Judeo-Christian values – let this be the baseline standard: “There should be no poor among you.” Deuteronomy 15:4 We can argue over words and names and the interpretation of the law, all of our internal religious disputes. But let this be the minimal standard: “There should be no poor among you.”

    But there are billions in amusements and billions in military spending. Always billions more uncounted. And those budget cuts are never an option. There is always money for guns and butter. Let the poor starve. The free-market has spoken.

    “Do you have any better ideas, whiz kid? Smart alec. Jackass.”

    “Defund the military. Demilitarize the police. Feed the poor.”

    The cold air operators and cold war operatives recoil in horror. Taped phone conversations are tagged, flagged, and reviewed. Who is this criminal? Who is this asshole?

    “A sociopath, obviously.” This is their detailed analysis. “A commie libtard with a poor memory. We have all the evidence that we need: the phone calls are real. The photos are authentic.”    

    “Blessed are the poor and the hungry…”

    “...the poor in spirit! It says the poor in spirit, you illegal piece of shit. You’re not entitled to a damned thing except hostility and bodily harm.”

    Blood and hair. Bone and blood. Drag marks in the dirt. Hanging and beating in the public park with all the other liberal scum. Strung up and left bleeding. “This is the way. This is way things are. Who are you to object? Who are you to complain? We stomp commies like you.”

The Best We Can Say of The Man of Lawlessness

     He has the potential for life. He is potentially self-aware. That is the best we can say of him, this man of lawlessness. This son of perdition. Imposing laws. Changing times and laws to fit his own chaotic whims. There is no law in this. There is only chaos. Deceiving many – serial liar. The truth is not in him. His promises of peace are red flag warnings. The liar lies. It’s what he does. It’s what he is. Have nothing to do with his lies.

In Christ There Can Be No America First

 

    The National Guard and the Marines are called out to California. Making a problem where there wasn’t a problem. Inciting the very riots they claim to control. The President speaks: “Repulse the civilian attack with smoke and tear gas. Fall on them with flames and they will crumble beneath you in the flames of hell. When I damn, I damn them whole. Witches, heretics, libtards, and communist dupes. Perfidious, treacherous, treasonous, disloyal betrayal. The proud Pope presumes to speak of me, of open borders and the forgiveness of debts? Cut and stamped out! Burnt and trampled down! All Arab camel-drivers, terrorists, and drug cartels. True Americans – Real Americans – God Fearing Americans will not march with these.”

    “But all Americans are born heretics,” says a voice.

    “Kill that voice. Shut it down.”

    “The bitter east and the ironic west,” the voice says again and laughs a little.

    “I said kill it! Dead! And who will stand between their throats and our swords? Who will stand between their heads and our batons? Between their hearts and our bullets? Bring back the gallows and the gibbet and the bright burning stake. Flogging, drawing, quartering too. The wheel, the rack for the victim in his misery, in her degradation.”

    “Defund the military. Demilitarize the police,” comes that damned voice again. “Do not deploy the National Guard against freeborn American citizens. Four dead in Oho – how many this time? How many more? Cruelty is the point.”

    “I cannot bear to see my country defeated by cheap-ass foreigners, by traitor Americans, by liberal Nazi scum. The blood and the soil are ours.”

    “This much is true: There is a will to power in the world, and it belongs to you. It is the entrenchment of power. And the enrichment of the powerful.”

    “It is law and order.”

    “It is a calculated escalation. Stop talking of law and justice when you will enforce none but your own.”

    “It is the protection of our Judeo-Christian heritage.”

    “Invariably it is the Christian nationalist that wants something for nothing. Stop talking of God and of prayer when you know neither.”

    There is a blazing rage and a halting, dropping wind that blows across the land. Even the fat-headed fools feel it. The enemy at the gates is our own, is us. We destroy ourselves if we are given the chance. In love with war (of which we can never have enough) as we are... In love with religion (of which we have very little – true religion, pure and undefiled, is this: to care for widows and orphans in their distress) as we are… There is a great noise and big smoke as the national guardsmen storm the streets. More artillery and little art. No heart.

    “Nevermind the tears!” the President says in scorn. “Make for the flash and the gash. Make with the flash and the grenade.” He is as mannerless as dog of war and no joke. Neither angel nor soldier, the yet uncrowned king of America claiming the blood royal.

    “If you cannot rule yourself,” the tired voice speaks from the dark, “how will you rule the nation? Take the crown and the holy oil. Consider nothing and take everything else – but the Church Universal knows only one realm – the realm of Christ the king – and only one law – the law of love. In Christ there is no east, no west. In Christ there can be no America first.”

    “Fewer canons! More cannons! Fire the prelate! Fire the powder! Kill that voice”

    But the voice will not be silenced. “We have lived faith and died. Now we steal away to pray.”

Before We Get to the Upper Room

 

    What is it today? What is my heart doing and why? Heart and lung and unidentified pains. Heart and lung and sudden onset migraines. Dislocated hips. Hospital tests and procedures. I am frail and vulnerable, seeking care.

Unspoken silence.

    Years of pain, howling wind and a house a’ fire. The familiar rhythm of struggle. Something missing – a loss of spark. But the inevitable doubt is tinder for the fire.

Is this the restoration time?

    Yes, but not just yet. It is not for you to know. Between the was and the will be. Between dry bones and breathing wind. I’m on fire or soon will be. Head and heart. Flesh and bone. Spirit and soul all at once.

Unspoken silence.

    
    Come wind. Come fire. Burn, breathe, blow. Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayer.

Angry and Reckless – A Song for Trump

 

It's another backyard recording of a song I wrote - this one for President Trump. 

As angry and as reckless
as a toddler with a gun,
shooting off his vulgar mouth
and staring at the sun.

He’s a liar and a cheat
human nature misaligned
the harbinger of chaos
with death and hell close behind.

Claiming to be righteous
claiming to be wise
a heart full of impiety
and a mouth full of lies.

An abyss of willful ignorance
a vacancy of love
defaulting and defrauding
living push and shove.

The Emperor Nero fiddled
as Rome went up in flames
Trump goes to the golf course
leaving us the blame.

Ed Wood Stole Four Hundred Dollars from Me

     “Ed Wood stole four hundred dollars from me and I want it back.”

    This is how he comes to me, standing at my door at just after ten in the morning, his gray, felt suit faded, its collars and cuffs worn ragged. I haven’t seen or heard from good Doctor Tarrec for several years now. What is it? Count it back, it was just before my divorce … my first divorce, so what is that? A little more than four years ago? Has it been that long? He comes and goes. He does his thing. He does whatever it is that scientist, alchemist, philosopher, magician, mystics like him do.

    And here he was again, after four years, on my doorstep ranting about my favorite low budget filmmaker from the nineteen fifties. I had the day off – a relatively rare thing for me. I’d been up early – early-ish. It was my day off – to mow the yard – a necessary thing as it was starting to get out of control. I actually enjoy mowing my yard – it’s relaxing. Therapeutic, maybe. So I mowed the yard that was all I had to do for the day. I grabbed a beer from the fridge (can’t drink all day if you don’t start before noon…) and sat on the couch with a battered copy of George Bernard Shaw’s play, Saint Joan.

ROBERT: Do you know why they are called goddams?
JOAN: No. Everyone calls them goddams.
ROBERT: It is because they are always calling on their God to condemn their souls to perdition. That is what goddam means in their language…

    That’s when the good Doctor banged on my door and announced. “Ed Wood stole four hundred dollars from me and I want it back.”

    “Doctor… Doctor Tarrec? What are you doing here? Where have you been?” I opened the door and motioned for him to come inside. “Can I get you a beer?”

    “Do you have any Pliny the Elder?” I didn’t of course. It’s a great beer, but it’s only released twice a year and in limited quantities. I’ve only had it one time and that was years ago.

    “I knew him, you know?” Doctor Tarrec said.

    “Who? Ed Wood?”

    “Pliny. The elder one. His son too, but I never cared for him.”

    “What?” The conversation was already getting away from me. I showed him the couch and got him one of the discount IPAs I was drinking. “Where have you been, Doctor? I haven’t seen you for years.”

    “Nevermind that,” he waved off my question and sipped his beer. “Have you seen the movie Orgy of the Dead? It’s one of Ed Wood’s movies. And not one of his better ones.”

    This wasn’t saying much of course, but…

    “He stole it, and four hundred dollars from me,” Doctor Tarrec continued. And I’d never seen him so agitated. His face was red and his hair frizzled. He sipped his beer and wiped his lip. “I told him of the secret graveyard rituals, I told him of the moonlight emperor and the black ghoul. It was me who told him of the parade of dead souls. But he twisted it all up into that … into that burlesque travesty.”

    Chimes and discordant music rang out in the moonlight, strange music, and a crash of piano chords. A sudden gust of wind and the scent of night things. Dead things. Other, unpleasant things. Something in that cemetery was not yet dead. Call the psychic Lord of misrule and the dollar store Lady of goth. The prince of sots and princess of chaos. The scum of serpent and the poison of the basilisk. Spread the names of false messiah and the world suffers whole. The lover of flames. The Streetwalker, the Mummy, the Werewolf, and the whip-lashed Cat before dawn arrives. A sound from nowhere, the sound of nothing. Ever increasing. The sound of failure and solar disintegration.

    “You may have to let it go,” I said carefully. “Ed Wood died a long time ago. Back in the seventies, I think.” I looked it up later. He died in nineteen seventy-eight, when I was barely three years old.

    “It’s no matter,” Doctor Tarrec said as he stood and set down his beer. “I know where to find him.” Then he waved farewell and walked back out my front door. Perhaps I will see him again soon. Perhaps I won’t. I never know. 

I’ve Fallen Asleep in My Dreams

 

    I am a paradox version of myself – mournful and brokenhearted, anticipating and owning the heaven of perfect love. Slumbering and overcome by sleep and dreaming of something real. There is a danger, a great danger here – a subtle infiltration and, and, and a complete distortion of the facts. But nowhere regenerated. Nowhere. So I move. And move away.

    Move away to nowhere. Somewhere I can be heard. But beware. Beware. I do not trust the willfully blind to lead me, to keep me to secure. I am falling back – no more forces. I am falling back - no more focus. The future is uncertain, but some men and angels predestined. Like the pythonic spirit of prophecy, a slave able to predict the future and to make great prophet for my masters. The rest shall keep as they are. Helpless to believe. Helpless but to be. Like the rest of us. I open my mouth, but there’s nothing there. I’ve fallen asleep.

    The whole thing makes me ill. It hurts. I know it hurts. Severely beaten and imprisoned, yet singing psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs. It hurts to have a spirit, a soul in this world of physical pain. A disillusioned failure in the middle of a psalm. To have feelings in a world of frailty.

    I may not know what it is that you are facing, but I've had plenty of low days of my own. One thing (maybe the only thing) I know is that tomorrow will be another day. For good or for ill, tomorrow is another chance. 

    The future uncertain within the storm, singing in the dark deeper than fear. Defenses fall, fail future attack. But believe even more. Strength in mystery and the mystery of the faith. I am a future version of myself or soon will be. If not now, then.