Scrap Paper Review #58

Friday, July 02, 2010

 

 

City

 

Isn’t it noble?

We, who redeem our towering spears from sunrise,

clutch closed our desperate cloaks

As we rush through these bleak streets each day,

Our pathetic missions robed
in prayer and good intentions

As we ignore the pleas

Of people we meet,

Black hands, white hands,

Clinging to us like dirt.

The universal evangelists

Drink us in

Telling us as we pass

How much Jesus loves us

But how we still must be saved

Our wrists locked in handcuffs and addiction,

Our faces marred in pain.

 

We look up and wonder

Is it the skyscraper that holds up the sky?

Newspapers belittle our intelligence

Full of celebrity faces

More family than our own,

Behind which the real news hides,

We believing even the most obvious lies,

Blaming the easiest victims

The way Nazis blamed Jews,

Always getting it wrong

And not knowing it is wrong,

And feeling big about ourselves

Anyway.

 

This city has me splayed out naked

On the ground,

My hands and feet staked and bound

Waiting to be raped

I sit by the river side on the west side

Staring out at Jersey,

Thinking of the Red Sea and Moses,

And how some seas should never part,

I ache for Eden and lust for the apple

Wondering where I went right

And how I can change that.

I keep waiting for a serpent

To seduce me

And none ever does

 

Do we look like maggots

From far above

This cramped, gnawing

Rushing mass over this

Cracked body of concrete --

Wiggling in the rippling mud

After any heavy rain,

We moving in mass

Across this face,

This chest,

This groin,

Aching for recognition

Maggots never get

Waiting to evolve into some

Higher form

The Jesus Freaks say

We will become

So we won’t have to suck off

Dead flesh

For our living

 

I’m sick of tired

Of feeling so small

Stumbling through

The valleys of mountains

We made for ourselves

Glorifying some pathetic concept

Of manhood,

None of us can possibly

Live up to

I live in their shadow

And the shadow of

Other people’s greatness

One of the quivering, shivering

Masses of humanity

Making my way each day

 

Even here I hear

The shrill cry of gulls

Trailing the Staten Island Ferry

For their daily fill of fish,

My bones aching

From the rumble of

Trains and trucks,

My head pounding

From the endless assault

Of jackhammers, jackasses,

And jacking off.

I walked ten miles today

And never got above

Midtown,

A new frustrating kind of

Masturbation that doesn’t even

Leave stains.

 

I don’t look at other people much

Only pieces of them,

A troubled, suspicious eye

A luxuriously set of

Lips or tits or thighs

This world is

A collection of body parts

Some of which touch me

On the subway

When I can figure out

How to work the ticket machines

My body reacting to their bodies

So we are all born again,

All of us caught up in the same

Endless and pointless

Cycles of life

Walking the same sidewalks

Stalking the same careers

While we all

Lust for more

 

I keep seeing my reflection

In the windows that I pass

And wonder who I am

And what do I really want

And where on earth

Do I think I am going

If nothing

But nowhere,

Remembering vague

Words of love

Uttered from under me somewhere

During some overheated moment

When I was lucky enough

To find some other nobody

Going to the same

Nowhere as I am

And willing to share

The ride.

Who am I?

What do I want?

What am I doing here?

 

I keep thinking

There might be meaning

Underneath all of this

Somewhere in the roots

Of these jagged teeth

That rise into the sky above us,

And if they have meaning

I might have meaning, too,

and that I am more

than just another pigeon

dodging taxi cabs

until I’m too slow

or weary

so that  one

of them pins me,

leaving me one more

flattened pancake of feathers

I step over

each day.

 

I know it is morning

Because the sky brightens

And the lights go out

And I rush to a box where

I live with lights

Not sky

And bang out numbers

Into a smaller box

Which somehow

Generates something

That someone somewhere

Considers valuable
enough to pay me

For doing it,

And I know it is

Night because

When I go out again

The sky is dark

And the lights go on

And people push and shove

To get me out of their way

So we can all go

Home to other boxes

With other smaller boxes

We can stare in

Until it is time to sleep.

 

How noble is this?

How this city stares at us

With its mouth a gap,

Spilling us out from

Between its teeth

Like sperm or tooth decay,

Its eye glued to some

Vision we are too

Insignificant to see,

Let a lone comprehend,

And we traveling

Down its edifices

Dripping down its cutters,

Finding ourselves flowing

Into the sewer of our lives

Waiting for something

To happen,

Some faith to save us

Some opportunity to

Lift us up and make us

Better, bigger, brighter

Than all the other sperm

Ejaculated into the hemisphere

For some great being’s

Amusement.

How noble is this?

 

 

California here I come

 

Nov. 14, 1969

 

I stare out the bus window like a peeping tom, the cross country Greyhound passing through narrow county highways on its route from town to town, leaving me to peer into yards, ball parks, schools as we pass.

Los Angeles seems a long way away like this, as if we devouring the miles in small chunks so we can full digest it all.

In all my dreams of going west, I never realized just how big this country really is, seeing it bus stop by bus stop, peeping into people’s lives as we pass.

We roll over bridges that take us across rivers whose names are printed on signs, but I rarely remember once they are gone.

I entertain myself by counting the fence posts, or hawks, or cars with mud flaps and then peer more closely at people trimming hedges or cutting lawns, or the groups of kids gathered in parks and sports fields. Sometimes I even see kids who sit on the fence and stare into space, just as I used to do, excluded or rebelling from the activity going on near them.

I even see some who look the way I used to look, staring at the others with that strange mixture of loneliness and defiance, caught between wanting to be accepted and triumph at being alone.

I feel that way now, riding away from everyone and everything I know into a place I’ve only dreamed about, following lyrics of songs that said I should wear flowers in my hair, and find inspiration.

The sun sinks ahead of us, casting long shadows across fields and road, leaving me to squint against the sunlight in order to glimpse anything at all. I dread night because we are in a place where there are so few lights that we move along as if in one vast tunnel, and I am forced to look around inside the bus, inside myself, and question why I am here and what I have done to my life.

This is not anything I want to explore, but can’t ignore.

I am traveling in space, but carrying all my problems on my back, and know that when I arrive, they will leap out of my suitcase to confront me. So I close my eyes and try to sleep as the wheels hum under me. We are due for a rest stop soon, where we might see people and other things to distract me, where we will meet another driver to take us along for another four hours ride west.

California, here I come, the question is what will I do when I get there.

 

 

 

Getting the city out of me

 

The morning tastes empty

And I sit sipping in the rise of the sun

On the beach alone,

Each wave washing up with bubbling brine,

Leaving bit of detritus on the smooth wet sand

I see the city reflected in each

Busy streets bustling with the hurried life

I managed for the moment to escape.

A wooden dock juts out into the sea

Near where the state built a stone jetty

Each wave stealing splinters

So that it sags more and more

A haven for gull, who squawk

Like street urchins

About every infraction,

Arguing with other gulls

The way motorists do with cops

No tickets, no street cleaning

Just the complaints,

I can’t get the city out of my head

And refuse to leave this frosted haven

Until I do,

Watching the gulls fight

And the distant puff of some foolish

Fishing boat

Setting sail in high winds

I want the waves to wash over me,

I want to feel warmth between my thighs,

I want the morning to ooze into evening

So I can cure my thirst and hunger

In one of the sea side pick up bars

Where nobody knows anybody else’s name

And nobody cares.

I want to pump the memory of the city

Out of me,

So that when I go back

I don’t have to feel

Like I never left

 

 

 

 First Day in LA: Nov. 17, 1969

 

            I wake to the smell of cleaning flue and I think I must be in jail.

            But what I see from my back on the bed looks like no cell I’ve ever seen in movies, so I think I must be dreaming.

            I live in fear of jail, and think of little else – three days on the run – and it weighs on my chest like an iron apron.

            I’m bleary-eyed and my head hurts from cringing over eternal visions of my uncle nearly catching me mid-theft back east three days ago, the pockets of my winkled tweed suit bulging with his mafia’s cash.

            I’ve never seen so much money in one place, which is why I only took a portion.

            No point in getting greedy even when I’m stealing someone else’s money and have no intention of returning – ever.

            The smell persists so I know this is not a dream or a jail, and I have the vague memory of checking into a hotel.

            This explains the stillness.

            After three days riding a bus, I think the world must vibrate to be real and the only clanking I hear comes not from suspension, but from the maid’s cart jangling in the hall.

            I sit up, making my head throb even more.

            I feel hung over as if I have imbibed alcohol for three days a few hours in bed unable to make up for the weary sleepless nights on the bus.

            Excess air-conditioning makes me shiver as if I am back east where it actually gets cold in winter.

            I panic, glance around the room until I see the open brief case on the dresser (which I bought in Philadelphia) and the bundles of cash inside, partially reflected in the mirror. The brief case top blocks out my scruffy reflection. I have not shaved or bathed in three – no four – days, since before my crime. I stink of the road and fast food from greasy bus stops. I know I should have bathed as soon as I checked in last night. But I was too tired.

            I ought to wash now, but the only clothing I have to dress in is the same brown tweed suit I word for those three days and I refuse to wash until I get some clean clothing. I’m more than a little embarrassed to recall how sophisticated I thought I looked when I first put the suit on back east, realizing at some point over the last three days that I look like a nerd.

            Yet is a safe look. What cop would look at me and see grand larceny?

            I find the switch for the air-conditioning and flick it off.

            I ache for sunlight, but the room has no windows and I have to stick my head into the hall to verify the account on the clock. The gaudy crimson and gold of the carpet and walls (which impressed me last night) look cheap and phony in the streaks of sunlight.

            The sun’s brightness – even this late in the year – takes a little of the chill off, and I hurry to dress in my wrinkled suit so I can feel the sun for real outside.

            I glance one more around the room before leaving, then notice the brief case still open like an oyster boasting of its green pearls.

            If I am to buy new clothing, I’ll need money, so I grab a bundle of the cash, and shut the lid, locking away the rest until I get back., then hurry out, making certain the door locks behind me.

            My suit pockets bulge. Cash in one pocket, my pistol in the other. I feel obvious and misshapen as I climb into the elevator with a pair of newly weds and some overdressed elderly rich woman drenched in expensive perfume. So I am immensely relieved when the elevator door opens and we get spit out into the lobby.

            Sunlight pours through the glass of the front doors, stealing the sense of class here just as it did upstairs in the hall, making the pale trees seem like cheesy props from some badly made 1930s B movie. The plush sets in-between have orbiting clouds of dust caught in each streak of light.

            This is an alien landscape I only vaguely remember passing through last night, the large wooden clerks deck the only element that sticks out clearly in my mind, one more aspect of dream. I head for the revolving door and for a moment feel trapped in a coffin made of brass and glass, reborn a moment later into the stinking, dirty street of downtown Los Angeles, where even in this early hour crowds rush by New York City-like, but not New York, some men dressed in suits and ties, other in sandals and shorts.

            The sun warms the air, sidewalk and buildings so the chill of my cold room soon eases out of me, an odd contrast to the calendar which claimed this was mid-November, not June. While the area directly in front of the hotel is neatly swept, the sidewalk and gutters to either side is not, filled with empty bottles, old newspapers and an occasional bum. I half expect to see a sign posted somewhere saying: “Welcome to Skid Row.”

            After the mock luxury of the hotel lobby, I’m stunned.

            I don’t know what I expected from LA, but certainly not a mock up of New York, but a twisted version of my favorite city.

            “Can I get you a cab?” asks the doorman, dressed to match the gaudy lobby I just left.

            I shake my head.

            Images from the previous night flood into me, as I recall the precarious walk up the street from the bus depot, and the string of clothing stores I passed on the way.

            “I’ll walk,” I say and draw a sharp look from the door man

            “Here?” he asks, his tone repainting the nighttime hell I passed through last night, full of groping hands of panhandlers and annoying attack of Jesus Freaks, one group trying to take my money, the other, my soul.

            The more villainous characters hung back in the deeper shadows last night, some whispering offers of drugs or sex. But I recognized the violence in their voices, having heard their mantra on the street of New York since I was 13, steering myself towards the bright lights the bus station clerk told me was the hotel.

            “It’s safe enough by day,” I tell the doorman, drawing a shrug – he obviously concluding I am too new to LA to know one of the most basic rules: nobody walks here unless they absolutely have to.

            Not that the landscape is devoid of danger. Some of the same faces stare at me as I make my way down the street. But the bums seem sad, not threatening, and without the intensity of the deep dark, the dealers and the pimps must curl up into the few pools of shadow the buildings provide for them, as scared of direct sunlight as vampires.

            The Jesus Freaks alone brave night and day, driven by some insane need to take over the world, more communistic than the USSR ever was with their secret cults and clandestine activities the CIA would envy.

            I brush them aside as if mosquitoes, trying to ignore their buzzing about how much Jesus loves me when I know they are not motivated by love, but hate, and hate anyone who doesn’t think exactly like them: I have dealt with them before in New York and know they are at the core pathetic if not evil, but spreading evil as thoroughly as the pimps and drug dealers, selling me salvation instead of dope or sex, and their offerings are much more dangerous, and I stare away at the dusty glass of the store front aching for escape.

            Yet I still see them and they still see me as we all float in those dim reflections, part of some mystical world where our real lives are exposed, all of us thieves of one sort or another, sinners and saviors locked into some odd dance neither of us can avoid.

            Wire mesh covers many of the windows to the stores I want, headless mannequins showing off shirts and ties, bodiless feet, shoes and socks, torso-less heads, hats and wings. Small signs give store hours whose opening is still hours away.

            The Army & Navy store is open, door area sprawled with the supplies for a full scale war, boxes piled high with boxes of assorted sizes, a large white sign bearing red and blue letters saying: “sale inside.”

            I step in and feel a little like Alice through a rabbit hole, such is the confusing the array of goods causes me.

            Helmets and gloves hang off hooks like chunks of meat, jackets and boots fill shelves like loaves of bread, mess kits and folded trousers fill glass covered display cases like iced fish.

            And everywhere, sitting on tops of crates or tiny tables, knives, pots, cans of sterno, in or out of boxes looking like baskets of spilled fruit.

            And I have to weave through these cluttered aisles to a counter at the rear of the store which is also overflowing with smaller items: compasses, penlights, pen knives and such. A small black and white TV drones on with the images and sounds of some early morning news show, bearing the faces of unenlightened and uninspiring TV anchors staring at the camera and thus at me.

            I call for the clerk.

            A gray-haired, disheveled man in a dirty white t-shirt appears out of the dimness beyond the counter, his yawn revealing large gaps in his set of teeth. So does his grin when he says he thought I was someone on the TV and asks when I want as he limps up to the counter.

            “An old war wound,” he explains when I glance down at his twisted leg. “I got myself shot up in WWII.”

            He mistakes me for some rich kid from “the hills” and tells me he has all the camping gear I’ll never need or want, if that’s what I’ve come for. Then, after peering at me for a bit, he makes an abrupt about face.

            “What service you from?” he asks.

            “Army,” I say.

            “Where were you stationed?”

            “Fort Dix.”

            Then he goes into a bit about some guy he served with from Dix who he saw die but can’t forget the face.

            “You don’t look anything like him,” he says, as if I should, then nods when I say I need clothing not issued by the U.S. government.

            He piles shirts and pants, underwear and socks on the counter for me, but says he can’t help me with the shoes, glancing down at the Army-issued pair I’m wearing, saying “They’ll last you a life time,” and for some, like his old

Friend for Fort Dix, they did.

            I leave the store with boxes and bags and make my way back to the hotel, passed the frowning doorman, through the still gaudy lobby, up the elevator, through the hall, to my room where the maid’s cart sits outside my open door, with the maid inside dusting my dresser and the still-closed brief case which contains the rest of my ill gotten gains.

            I go into a panic and insist that she leave, she giving me a dark and suspicious look that only increases my panic. I have become too obvious, standing out too much in this new city, and will need to find a new place quickly where I won’t seem so public.

            I don’t even take a shower, I just pack my newly purchased clothing into the nearly empty suitcase, and rush out with my bags, back down the hall to the elevator, out into the lobby and then into the street, where the door man eyes me with a little more satisfaction when I ask him to hail me a cap.

            Ah, LA!

 

 

Boulevard Dan

 

Dan stands as stiff as a wire brush,

Each bristle of his beard straight,

Unlike the hair poking out

From all sides of his hat,

Hippie-bum the beat cops call him

Tall as an Oregon pine

Replanted in a skid row hotel

Roving the boulevard

On his nightly vice patrol,

Curling the end of his moustache

Like the arch villain he is,

Always pausing longest to chat

With the Midwest girls

Clustered outside the modeling agency

To lure one home

Before they get too wise

Or too used up by the porno people

The older girls already hip to his tricks

Refusing to pay for his cigarettes

Clothing and meals,

Figuring he can find plenty of other

Suckers to fulfill their needs,

Yet staring longingly after him

When he leaves,

As if wishing their were still naïve enough

To fall for his pathetic lines.

 

 

 

Porno flick

 

The two skanks eye me like I landed here from Mars.

Louise and I aren’t the stars of this movie, we don’t even get to do anything on or off camera, except serve as support for these gals and the well-hung man they have brought on to do most of the work.

            But we’re naked just like the skanks are, and they seem to think that’s funny.

            I have to pose with both of them, doing some shots as if I am going to be in the love-making scene.

            This is pure fiction. But one skank wants me to touch her, and to French kiss her, when the script doesn’t call for it, and I won’t.

            She wants to know why?

            I tell her Louise is my girlfriend, and both skanks stare at me, their mouths hanging open.

            Nobody is loyal to anybody in this business, and they glance at Louise and tell her, she’s lucky to have a man like me.

            I want to set them straight, to confess about all the secret lusts, I’ve felt here and elsewhere, but see no point in telling them since they really don’t care.

            They are simply envious of any woman that has any man that won’t jump into any other woman’s snatch when offered.

            This is why they ask the director to include me in the shot with the star, suggesting that one man is not enough and that they need me to put it into them, too.

            I look at Louise and see nothing in her eyes, no jealousy, no pain, just that emptiness that seems to come to all the women in this industry, and like any empty vessel she is waiting for someone to come along and fill her up so that I’m the one that’s jealous, and make no argument when the skanks make their case, angrily thinking my making love to them will teach Louise to love me more.

            Much later, I realize just how stupid an idea this is, but by then, it is already too late to take it back.