NEEDLING

My car’s on its last leg
the exhaust pipe barely two inches from the road ...

Was driving home
from my folks
after lunch today
when I get a call from my sister.

She says, “is there anything
dragging on the road when you drive?”

Her girlfriend is two cars behind me
and she was wondering?

I say thanks, I’ll stop
on the shoulder
and check it over.

When I pull over
K. drives by me and ways hello.
I wave back.

I get out of my car.
It’s all good and not good.
It’s as it’s been now for a few weeks.
Which is not good,
because it could all go to hell
any time.
Which is good
because it hasn’t really gotten any worst
in at least two or three weeks.

My exhaust pipe has been dropping
little by little
the last few weeks
or months, I don’t know
and I’ve been ignoring it
for financial reasons
among other reasons
like laziness
lack of time
drunkenness
lack of time
denial of the world as it stands around me ...

Working double shifts
every other day.
Got to be at the store in the morning
to open up shop
first thing mañana!

Wednesday I close on my first house!

I’m so broke it’s not even funny.

I owe money left and right,
but what the fuck!
that’s the way
and I’m happy about it all.

(Before buying a house
I bought a brand new laptop
and went to Paris
on holiday for one week ...

can't complain.)

Earlier this evening I couldn’t find my nail clippers. I was so frustrated, so pissed ... Normally, I keep them either on the shelf underneath my coffee table, or in the top drawer of my desk, or inside the Cuban cigar box next a deck of cards sitting inside the cinder block holding my bookshelves up ... They were nowhere to be found, the little fuckers! And my toe nails really needed cutting! Two weeks ago, I banged the shit out of my left foot little toe against my futon. It hurt like hell. I’d been drunk, and now my toe-nail is black, dead, and half-way coming off. I wanted desperately to cut off all the slack … and … I couldn’t!

The essential is never seen
it seems
or maybe I’m just a prick.

No amount of liquor
can get me sloshed enough to forget
it seems
until it’s too late and I didn’t want to
after all.

Hennessy VSOP. That’s what I’m talking about. There’s been smoke coming out of my car. Like I’m stopping at a red light and it’s over eighty degrees out there, my windows are down because my a.c. sucks, I see smoke coming out from under the hood of my car, and at first I don’t know if it’s my problem or the other guy’s exhaust spewing all over me … it’s been a few weeks now, and since I’ve started driving my car, that I’ve started asking myself some serious questions. It smells like burnt rubber! But I figured it was all part of the ride. My dad gave me this car a few months ago. Lucky me! I was driving a Mazda back then, which went to shit, and every other day it was breaking down, and I was spending hundreds of dollars I didn’t have. It got real bad, and it started to look as if I was going to quit my job—30 minute commute both ways—when my dad offered to “lend” me his car, a 1990 Peugeot station wagon. That was a few months ago. Thanks to my dad, I didn’t have to quit my job. And from the get go, there’s been a “burnt” smell to the car, which I’ve always figured to be part of the experience.

I take a screenwriter’s class at ACC and I take I35 to Braker lane every Wednesday, then I more often than not get stuck at the red light at North Lamar. For several weeks now, I’ve been seeing smoke coming from underneath my hood, but I haven’t been sure. Last week, it was obvious. It was like a fucking BBQ. It reminded me of that time I was stuck in traffic in Hoboken waiting to enter the tunnel to Manhatan in my little Chevette! People next to me kept looking at me with lots of fear in their eyes. There was some major smoke coming out of my hood, and there was no shoulder for me to go onto, nowhere for me to go! If I exploded, so did they! At the Lamar intersection, it wasn’t so drastic. The smoke wasn’t so bad. I kept going, went to class, came back home, went to sleep, woke up, et cetera … and popped up the hood finally to see what the fuck was going on.



Two blocks of wood were stuck up next to my battery, holding it there, half carbonized from heat and such. I couldn’t believe it! Why would anybody put wood in the engine? At any time, they could have flamed up and taken me to hell! I called my dad to ask him who had changed to battery last? He hadn’t ever gotten it changed, so this dated to before he’d bought the car.

Brutus is sick, or at least not in top top shape. Woke me up around 4h30 this morning throwing up. Took him outside, and he ran to the back behind the tree where I knew he was doing something that I’m glad he didn’t do inside the house. Bless him. Locked the front yard and went back inside to clean up the mess he had made, not nearly as bad as it could have been. Haven’t fed him this morning. Figured … let it go through his system whatever it was. Went for a walk a bit ago, and he was sick again, then it was plenty of dry butt heaves. Poor boy. It’s nothing too bad since he’s not depressed, he’s wagging his tale, running, being a normal dog. So I’m sure it’ll pass.

This morning, I tried to go back to bed, but couldn’t sleep, so I sat up and read till I finished the book I was reading, “Le Roman de Molière” by Mikhaïl Boulgakov, translated from the Russian to the French by Michel Pétris. Liked it, makes me want to read all of Molière’s plays.

Now, after a bath, a walk with the dog, and still some time in front of me before I need to be at work, I’ve re-opened a book I read and enjoyed many years ago: “Jacques le Fataliste,” by Diderot.

Here’s a quick and badly translated interpretation by yours truly of the first page or so:

How did they meet? By chance, like anybody. What were their names? Why does it matter? Where did they come from? From not too far away. Where were they going? Do we ever really know where we’re going? What were they talking about? The Boss said nothing; and Jacques said that his captain had told him that everything which happens to us down here, whether good or bad, had been written up in the skies.

The Boss – There’s some big philosophy that one.
Jacques – My captain would also add that every bullet leaving its gun had its ticket.
The Boss – And he was right …

After a small pause, Jacques burst out and yelled, “May the devil take the barman and his bar!”

The Boss – Why tell your neighbor to hell? That’s not very Christian of you.
Jacques – Well, it’s that, while I was getting drunk off his bad wine, I forget to take our horses to the drinking through. My father notices. He gets mad. I shake my head. He takes a stick and rubs my shoulders rather harshly. A battalion was passing there on their way to Fontenoy, so vexed, I joined up. We arrive at destination and the battle starts up!
The Boss – And you receive a bullet with your address on it.
Jacques – You figured it out, right in the knee. And God only knows what unfortunate adventures I’ve gotten into because of that shot. They hold together no better or worse than the links of a cheap chain bracelet. Without that shot I believe I would never have fallen in love, for example, or get a limp.
The Boss – So you’ve been in love?
Jacques – Yes, sure I have!
The Boss – And all because you were shot?
Jacques – Because I was shot!
The Boss – You’ve never told me a word about it.
Jacques – That’s right.
The Boss – And why’s that?
Jacques – Well, it’s because it couldn’t have been told neither too late nor too soon.
The Boss – And has the time come to learn of these love affairs?
Jacques – Who knows?
The Boss – Just in case, give it a shot …


Well ... I think I'll stick to reading it, rather than trying to translate it! My my, now I know why I've never wanted to be a translator. It's hard work! And I suck at it! And did I say it was difficult? Cheers.

At the Hilton last night ...

okay ... okay ... I know it's annoying, but I've never owned an Apple before, and I've never played with photographs before ... so here I go, here's my impromptu way of correcting bad pictures ...

enjoying some tunes on Ken’s show this morning while doing my wondrous bastardization of all ready bad images taken last night …

Got to meet the guy who runs the Del Maguey, single village mezcal company! I've been a big fan of said mezcal for some time now, so that was exciting to me.

What to do? Listening to the repetitive instrument. Solo Piano, by Philip Glass.

Ric said many things. Among other words, he said:

"Leave it alone after this
It is fine”



III       Unheard song
from Vacuum Dance

            1

We rolled along
ascended the coastline
to this place on the map
top right of my mind.

We found black pebbles
on the beach
our bodies bending
at our waist
at our knees
picking pebbles like small petunias.

The waves are dogs crazed
friendly but don't touch
don't carelessly jump
and don't caress the wind
a mad woman blowing nubiferous songs in your face.

Over the waves the rocks are silent
comfortably cold
overlooking the water at a hundred feet.

Steeped strephonades I sing.

The clouds, the way
they move through the sky
like big floppy bellies
going in separate directions
listening
to the sea beating the bottom of the cliff.

I was the earth moving
a great big ship going nowhere.

            2

Pale blues barely
blue
just almost gray with sand.

Rivulets crawling
laughing tickles of water
through the beach towards the sea
like an arousal
a cry
endlessly coming back
through the sand
into the bay
where the waves are cold
I know
I was wadding my feet.

I was looking at a dead
black-backed sea gull
its carcass halfway gone already
eaten by fish and other gulls.

I ventured further into the waves
rolling up my pants
the carcass floated out of my reach
I had a long stick
to help me prod.

                         Let it go, what'you gonna do with a dead bird?
                         I don't know. I want to see.
                         Let it go, what'you gonna do with a dead bird?
                         I don't know. I want to see.
                         Let it go, what'you gonna do with a dead bird?
                         I don't know. I went to sea ...

            3

An unpaved road
into the woods
into the hinterlands
the backwoods
with an old wooden shack
at the end
burnt down to the muddy ground
and a rotten mattress
eaten by mites and the cold
with springs sticking out
rusted.

She stopped the car.
She had to piss.

Steam came up
from the frozen leaves.
I watched.
She had a hot ass
or she was full of hot piss
or both.

Back in her car
in the backseat
I had her knees
cupped in my hands
pushing them apart.

...

She had to piss again.
Me too.

Nothing like pissing
after sex in the backseat of her car
on a freezing afternoon
and her just one tree over
also pissing.

Tickling a subtle melody
of happy thoughts and frozen squirrels
we laughed as we pissed
we laughed
we pissed as we laughed.

There was laughter all around us.

She was the earth moving
a great big nubiferous ship
going somewhere
or possibly nowhere in the lactic skies.

I have to write the critic of a film for my screenwriting class. Tomorrow morning, I’m getting up early again, and driving to Taylor to go take pictures of the house I’m attempting to buy. My insurance man needs these pictures so that I can get a good deal on home insurance. Every single hour of time off I’ve had in the last couple of weeks, I’ve spent it there, it seems. It’s like I’m trying so hard not to be too excited because what if the loan doesn’t go through? What if my car breaks down? What if anything happens and that at the last second, I won’t be able to close on the house? So I cannot get excited about it, I just cannot, I have to keep thinking that it can still all fall down the pipes so that if it does, I’ll be upset but I’ll be able to get over it faster. I have to read ten to twenty pages of four student screenplays by next week, and comment upon them. My fellow students from the class I’m taking. Somehow I’ve got to find the time for that as well. (pause) Listening to Philip Glass. Solo Piano. Watched a movie tonight, a movie I started watching with no expectations. I pretty much knew it was going to be a good movie, technically speaking, and acting-wise, but other than that, really … nothing, I figured it would be yet another big Hollywood over-the-top drama. I was blown away by the lead performance. And I won’t let on to which movie it was, because I need to sit on it a bit, lay my head down on my pillow, and let the night take its toll. For the moment, I’ll content myself with Philip Glass. Maybe I’ll go buy the book and re-read it … just for laughs, then watch the movie again … then write the darn two-pager … or maybe I’ll go pick a totally different movie.