Papa Was a Fisherman, But Mama is a Saint (A Possible Novel Sneak Peak?)

The tears that stain a room's carpet remain until the shampoo hits the spot.

This is being considered as a possible basis for my novel.  Maybe, maybe not, considering I have four or five other themes going on elsewhere.  Some have 40-50 pages completed, others are short stories like this that could be adapted. I’m torn.  But I felt I should share some recent output.  Enjoy.

She wrote the names of all of her boyfriends in the back of a Holy Bible her father had given her as a child.  It was a leather-bound King James edition that he snatched out of a seedy motel room in Kingston, Louisiana. He, by all accounts, was a seedy man himself. He told her it was a family heirloom, passed down from generation to generation, her mother’s side of course, but she knew better.  The first few pages were littered with phone numbers, and lots of references to “The Rowboat Inn,” the likely result of a missing notepad in the room. Her father had spoken of staying at the Rowboat down in Kingston, more often than not when a drink was placed in his hand. But she treasured it all the same, and carried it with her at all times. 
    

Shannon wrote another name inside, “Alan,” and put a star next to it.  A star next to the name meant that she had kissed him. Only kissed him, one can be assured, because the star denotes this specifically. She had eleven stars in her book. She had created a detailed system for all of her activity. Triangles were for the next progressive step, circles for the next.  Squares were designated for what Shannon called “the cake,” a term she had gotten from her sister when she was younger, so mom would never catch on. She found it a very silly euphemism, but still saw some good in its intentional code. Finally, hearts were placed, believe it or not, next to the boys she had truly loved. Puppy love was an entirely different thing, although not specified in her system. The page was scattered with all kinds of names and shapes, and even one square.  But of hearts, there were none. 
   

  She ran her finger down the page of names, stopping every once in while to drag it horizontally across the shapes.  She had an adequate amount of names, she thought, and closed the book with a thud.  The cover had grown worn over the years, and Shannon often thought of finding a new place for documentation.  But something about the bent and weathered bible made her feel as though what she wrote inside meant much more than teenage mischief. It deserved to be inside she told herself, just as much as the book of Exodus or Matthew. Maybe even more so.
    

Sometimes she wondered how long that old book had laid in the bottom drawer of the hotel in Kingston.  Flipping through it one night, she had found a note at the top of a page in Corinthians that said, “Randy and the whore – 1988.”  The copyright page had been torn out, but assuming the book were placed in that room any day in 1988, Shannon figured the book had been there at least ten years.  Ten years of one-night stands, Shannon thought, and the idea made her cheeks swell with joy.  Maybe even a murder.  How exciting! She liked to lay on the bed with her bible, talking her way through possible scenarios.
    

“So, he drags her in through the door,” she’d say, looking up at the ceiling. “She’s got long blonde hair, but she looks kind of like a slut, so he thought he could get away with it.  Oh, maybe he did!  Anyway, she’s kicking and screaming and trying to get away, but he’s too strong.  He’s got slicked back hair and mustache.  And cowboy boots.  And a cowboy hat.  He’s a cowboy.”  The thought of a rapist cowboy made her laugh, and she adjusted her glasses before continuing. 
    

“He gets her in the room and orders her to take off all her clothes.  She tells him she won’t, and promises she won’t call the police if he lets her go.  ‘They all say that,’ he says.  He’s got a real deep voice, and if he weren’t a rapist, I suppose he’d be kind of sexy.  But not movie star sexy, just kind of dangerously sexy.  Like cowboys.  Anyway, he points a gun at her head and she eventually gets naked.  He smiles, lighting a cigarette with his free hand.  He smokes Marlboros, of course.
    

“And then he rapes her.  Pretty simple.  And this little book caught the whole thing,” she said, tapping her fingernails on the cover.  “Every woman that came in with high heels and too much makeup. A few guys with scars, I’ll bet. Probably a lot of guys with scars.”
    

And in fact that Holy Bible had seen it’s fair share of painted ladies and battered men.  Sixteen years it sat in the bottom drawer of Room 119 at the Rowboat Inn.  It had seen her father with a number of women over the years inside that poorly lit room, and especially atop the ancient tufted mattress. It had witnessed not one, but two murders, but never a rape.  Shannon failed to realize that a hotel room was a terrible place to rape someone, with the paper-thin walls and amount of possible witnesses. A rape is a loud event, even louder than a murder.  But it depends on the subjects at hand, one must gather.
    

But above all else, the book had seen love, in it’s most temporary of forms, and deceit in it’s most primal capacity.  And lots and lots of cake. 

-Alex Denison

Me? Not Classy Enough? ME?!

I should be studying for the big journalism test I have in a little less than an hour.  I should be reading material that I have been putting off for weeks.  I should be in my Sociology class.

But most notably, I should be sitting in the front row of Busch Auditorium at Cornell, listening to a lackluster presentation by America’s first female Supreme Court Justice,  Sandra Day O’Conner. 

But I’m not.  I’m not at Cornell at all.  I’m sitting at the journalism library, scribbling on some notes I took but don’t have the stamina to look through any longer.  The reason?  I was not allowed to enter the auditorium to see O’Conner.  I wasn’t wearing a suit. 

I have several posts on this blog about suits.  I think they are important.  They can make or break a man in many social situations, as well as business interactions.  They are an essential element to the elite section of the American Dream, being the chosen attire of men and women alike for any and all noteworthy occasions.  Only the tuxedo out-classes the suit, but only in social functions, whereas the suit is the only option for international affairs, business, or law.  Except for Justice O’Conner, who got to wear a robe most of the time.  I often wonder how many robes they are issued. 

But I am wearing neither a robe nor a suit.  I’m wearing the same pair of jeans I’ve had on all week, a blue-plaid collared shirt, a rusty brown button-up jacket with breast pockets, and hollow soul Doc Martens.  I look like a dime-store cowboy, or a Colorado farmer, neither of which is particularly classy, but not without class, all the same.  I’m not in the ratted attire that I see so many of my fellow students wear, whether it be torn jeans and a filthy t-shirt, or a tit hugger top and spandex pants that are just one step up from naked, (and worn because of it.)  No, I look like a commoner with restraints from the obscene.  That’s generally my wardrobe philosophy: Casual with a conscience. 

But when I went to pass through security at the entrance, I was told I was not dressed for the event.  I thought I looked like a journalism student, which I still maintain is the case, but I didn’t quite look like a LAW student, who all got dressed up in their pinstriped suits, (many of which did not compliment their chosen shirts OR ties,) or their nice skirts and high-heels, (both of which were early considerations for my clothing decision this morning.)  I walked away in shame.

So, now I bastardize O’Conner for not doing something about it.  And furthermore, I bastardize her for the little comment I heard one of her staffers mumble as she walked by me in the lobby:

“Dammit, she wants the prompter high, then low, then high., then low again  She wants to see the audience and the speech at the same time.  I’m thinking about blocking both.”

Suck on that, O’Conner, and just wait until the blogging community gets ahold of that one!…About how you…want to be able to read…and maintain eye contact…at the same time…Yeah.  You’re done for.

I would have liked to see her though.  Especially in a cute little tit hugger top and some spandex. 

-Alex Denison

Somnambulist in an Ambulance

            She’s reminiscent of a girl I know, just vaguely, but still in mind.  The comparison is a sister of a friend of mine, although I must admit she is not much older than twelve or thirteen, and I should be ashamed to even consider them in the same thought.  A girl who has barely discovered that hair grows on more than heads in the same idea as this young female who fully comprehends her fine appeal: a travesty of the human mind.
          
  She tends to sit in the same spot every day, pressed firmly against the brick wall of the auditorium, with her head dangled from the back of her chair.  She likes to spindle her long, dark hair, perhaps out of nerves, and to be quite honest I feel like doing the same.  Her eyes are light, the lashes dark, and the contrast makes me squirm for more than just a concerned glance.  Concerned with what, you may ask, which is a considerable question, that I would be more than jovial to answer.  Perhaps I drop my satchel down the long flight of stairs, or I hit my head on the seat in front of me, one would call these clumsy moments.  In reality, they are desperate ones, merely hoping for the attention of her deep green eyes.  I’d be glad to throw my entire body down the stacked ledges of the room if she would display some kind alarm.
           
As opposed to debating the ethics of my field, I instead debate whether or not to try.  To try and insert myself into her probably packed life, as seen by her filled backpack and her portfolio of work.  She has friends, a lot I’m sure, and probably some well-meaning boyfriend too, with a nice short healthy haircut and some slick Nike shoes.  Maybe K-Swiss, maybe not, I don’t know what kids wear these days, but it certainly isn’t the worn stompers that I keep on my feet.  My favorite part is how she concentrates, how she actually listens.  She isn’t lost inside her laptop, she isn’t meddling with her cell, but instead she’ll lean forward and rest her head inside her hand, and actually, in an adorable gesture, absorb an entire lecture. 
           
The idea crosses through my thick skull to send a note to her end of the aisle.  But that seems difficult, and is always means for interception.  I, however, am craftier than I look, and a better idea sprung.  A paper airplane full of compliments, a name, and maybe more.  I could float it over the heads of five or six unsuspecting gadflies with their noses buried inside cell phones that cost more than my car. 
           
But then the doubt spills over.  What if it misses her completely and lands in some hooker’s lap.  What if , God forbid, it strikes her in the eye!  A serious orbital injury for the sake of blind admiration, what am I crazy, have I lost it, should I be locked up for the rest of time?  I think that question was answered long ago when I was given the gift of speech, and used it quite successfully to make myself the ass.
           
Perhaps worst of all is the prospect of the note being received.  I’d drown in my own sweat, and likely flop a little, too.  Should she take it, squint, and crumple it into a ball to toss away, it will be as though it were my heart inside her angelic little hands.  May God give me instant cancer, with only six seconds to live, or better yet may all the world witness a documented case of spontaneous combustion.
           
And that’s why it never happens.  That’s why I sit and twitch.  Some day I might make my paper airplane and fly it cross the room.  The more likely scenario sadly remains that I will never even know her name.  This realization accompanies my gift of easy infatuation.  It also makes me sick when I walk down crowded streets.
           
But if I ever sail my airplane to her strip against the wall, for once I could be victorious in the game of cat and mouse.  And we could climb aboard a real one, and see the golden shores of Spain.

A Homeless Aristocrat Fools a Harmless Tourist In An Alley

            So you walked down my humble alley.  Why?  Why do you ask so many questions? I’m sure it’s out of good intention, but I’d prefer if you stayed still.  Before I was interrupted, I spoke of how you journeyed down a sidewalk, Sunday, in the middle of the night.  Let’s say you come across my lifeless corpse inside an awful dumpster.  What’s it doing there? I do not know, and I thought I told you to shut your mouth.
           
This sterile beauty is here for a reason, brothers.  It has been dropped into this dumpster by an otherworldly force that I can not identify.  Can you?  No you can’t.  Let’s go ahead and say that you feed this baby seal.  Peanuts, from your pocket, they are stale and you don’t want them, so you bandy them upon this flopping beast of sea-like proportions.  That’s me we’re talking about, you know.  I’d ask you to stop playing with my britches, and you’d act confused, but you know what I’m saying.  I don’t trust that face of yours.  It’s full of confusion and ignorance, and I’d fill it with caramel corn if I had the supply.  Don’t look at me, you heathen.  But come inside, just a moment, for a harmless drink.
          
  It’s tequila, you child.  And no, you can’t have something else.  And you certainly can’t have anything but this dirty cocktail glass and the bottle.  Do you hear that?  It’s the sound of my heart breaking with every moment that you let slip, when you could be drowning in my bottomless ocean of liquor.  You’re a fool, I’d say, and I’d snatch the bottle from your hand.  It tastes like manhood, junior, but you wouldn’t know.  What if I told you it was candy?  Would you gobble at the beak of my dear friend, Jose?  Probably not, but not because you don’t like candy, but because you think you’re too good to get down on your hands and knees for the sorry man that you love.  How dare you, gentleman.  How dare you.  I’ve been on my knees for every man that I love, not for any other reason than pity, for myself, and no one else.  Can we drink to that, my friend?  I’d hoped you’d say, “Why not?”
          
  Your hands are soft, dear comrade, do you model them in town?  I mean to say, not arrogantly, do you use them for your trade?  Don’t look at them!  You’ll curse them!  Like the battered face of Medusa I can see your evil stare has the same effect of staunch destruction, and I will not have it here.  If necessary I will call in my band of gypsies to escort you from my view.  They are well trained in their musical follies, but also in the arts of war.  Your face will become but a crater in comparison to your world, and I will strike my nimble fingers into the cores of your orbs of sight.  That is eyes, my friend, just eyes, but I like the high-brow verse.  Don’t you?  It makes me feel like a man of God.  His hands have yet to touch me, but I wait, oh yes, I wait.  Quite the same for yours, I’m sure.
           
I have no band of gypsies.  I think they all died in the ‘60s. Do you have a lady, soldier?  Is her name Catherine, or Jane?  I took two blind-eyed guesses, as I’m sure you know, I’m sure.  But what is it that you’re sure about?  The foolishness I give, or the seriousness in which I give it? I hope that it is both, that would make you a knowledgeable sort.  Though your haircut may not be the best hint, I could see you as the type.  The type of man who knows his place, but yet will strive to be much more.  I like the way your eyebrows dance when I propose such lovely theories.  I would ride them, your eyebrows, I mean.  I would ride them like bucking broncos that needed to be tamed.  This is not the place for taming, brother.  This is not the place at all!
         
   My hands are full of money.  Can you see it?  It is dirty, but it serves the same damn purpose as the rest of the dollar bills.  I don’t imagine you can prepared for dancing, I wouldn’t ask you to be prepared.  Can you smell the hint of butterscotch upon my midnight breath?  Of course you can’t, you mindless freak, it’s been doused in pure tequila!  Can you drink to that, my friend?  Or do you fear said drink?  Or do you fear the host you found inside this square of tin?  I was sleeping, dammit, sleeping, and it happens, don’t you know?  So I don’t own a home, so what, as if you’re some humbled saint?  Take the goddamned drink, goddamn it, or I’ll finish it myself.
         
   I pray you’re liquored up, or else my words will seem like Satan’s.  You have a pretty little frame that suggests you work with weights, and although I have dabbled in the past, you can see I lost my touch.  I was a strongman once, the strongest of the world, and I could lift entire buildings above my head at times.  Look at my calloused hands, just look, they testify to my wounded past, but yet they are artifacts of beauty.  And I envy you and your segmented stomach that is full of my generous drink.  A gang of six, I see, I see, and a gorgeous one of that.  Mine has been demoted to a gang of one, a lonely hanging sack.  But this is not about me, oh no, it’s about you and your smooth skin.
        
    You’re poor, I know, don’t lie to me.  I’ve seen your kind before.  But I have yet to see a man so beautiful in his lowest of the low.  So I’ll reach into my pocket, stranger, and give you all I have.  It might be ten, it might be twenty, do you trust me, or will you flee?  I know you’re hungry little soldier, I know you’re hungry for real meat.  And I don’t refer to mine, aha! I mean a steak, a chop, of something, anything, that your belly aches for, son.  And I can help you, yes I’ll help you, if you want it bad enough.  Do you remember those stale peanuts?  The ones that were tossed in a hypothetical time?  I’ll take them if you have them.  And I’ll pay you for them, sure.
           
Your desperation is not the first I’ve milked into my hands.  I’ve had sailors and tailors, and a pair of twins from Salvador, they said.  We’ve all hit rock bottom, but we find a way back up.  And if the way you need back up is through my anxious, anxious sword, then can you turn it down?  Or will you fight it, with your tongue?  The pocket yields a twenty, soldier, I have nothing else to give.  But I promise I will not touch your head, nor will I fail to warn of heaven.  I’ll tell you that you’re in control, if that’s what you want to hear.  This dumpster may not be the Ritz, but it’s better than some I’ve seen.  So I won’t ask you to unhinge your jaw, you wild-eyed hollow snake, for I am not absorbed with my own thickened custard.  But I hope you will be, brother.  I hope you’ll be amused.  For this twenty dollar bill, I say, you should lie to me, just lie.  Keep your eyes on mine, you ass, or I’ll surprise you, this I know…

Fruit

There’s a banana at a bus stop, and his hair’s a fucking mess,
His job is safe, I say God bless, but I’m sorry, I digress. 
He works with numbers, does his homework, never has to second-guess.
He’s the best in the business honey.  You know it.

There’s a watermelon in the cheap seats at a hometown baseball game,
The action was near tame, and the players all the same.
Until a child fell from the upper deck, and the melon was to blame.
Life needs some ups and downs.  You know it.

There’s an apple throwing dice down around the back of the old store,
His wife’s a beauty, but she’s a whore.  She’ll suck your dick, but nothing more,
Sometimes he watches, sometimes he doesn’t, her service: somewhat of a bore.
‘Cause you run out of things to do.  You know it.

There’s an orange shooting smack, sniffing glue and huffing gas,
He’s got no money, but he’s got brass, and several bulletholes in his ass,
He held up a liquor store, but dropped his gun, his mouth as wide as a deep-sea bass,
Sometimes you just get caught.  You know it.

There’s a pineapple in limbo, and he’s looking for a date,
The patrons here are full of hate.  Their applications all came late.
If an angel doesn’t come down soon he’ll just have to masturbate.
You do what you got to do.  You know it. 

There’s a pear down on the boardwalk tapping the oak planks with his cane,
The ocean seemed so damn mundane, the seagulls form and then complain,
He looked out at the sea before the bullet pierced his brain.
The world ain’t that surprising.  You know it.

A Sunny Saturday, That In Reality, I Almost Lost

It’s interesting.  I’m sitting on a park bench in the middle of campus watching a little jazz quartet perform.  And although I am not giving them my undivided attention, everyone else walks past without even noticing them.  Sure, it isn’t Charlie Mingus and his marvelous backing band, but it’s delightful all the same, and complimentary to the weather.

And to think, I almost didn’t make it out today.  I woke up with a knife in my temple,  and considered suicide by sloth.  With each throb I felt less and less prepared to embark on anything.  And who usually caters to my worthless days?  TV Land.  And yet again, they did not fail to please. 

“Broadcast News” had just started. I felt as though God were encouraging me to stay inside.  My friend Dylan has been awed by his own place in the world of journalism for some time, and I am just starting to get that sense of urgency.   Anyway, the movie focuses on the ethics of journalism and it’s reporters, while still providing an interesting romantic angle.  It’s only been within the last few years that I can stomach an on-screen romance.  I’ve grown soft.

Following this, it seemed to be an all day marathon of “Third Rock From the Sun.”  It’s far more brilliant to me now than it ever was when I was young, but in consideration, I was 7 when it started.  John Lithgow, if you’re out there, you are the finest actor of your generation.  Your skill with arrogance is rivaled only by your looks. 

Nuzzled in between the nuggets of joy provided by Commander Dick and his family were ads for a television series TV Land is plugging.  It’s called “High School Reunion,” and I feel like I’ve already watched the entire season.  The entire show is based on putting a group of former classmates in a house together, and observing whether they are the same personalities they were in high school.  Each has some role, like “the class clown,” or the “player,” and each looks equally ridiculous trying to impress their former peers.

I began to think about my own high school experience, but not too hard, due to the headache.  Who would be our “jock” or “snob”?  Then I realized, why do I care?  Had I not just watched a forty year old woman get breast implants so she could try and seduce a guy she had a crush on in 10^th grade?  Had I completely abandoned my powers of analysis?  Shame on you, Jericho Grimm.  You don’t deserve to hide under such a fine pen name if your musings are so childish!

It was after disappointing myself that I decided to come out.  The sun is shining and people are laughing everywhere, and if I weren’t so impressed by the weather myself, I would find it all disgusting.  It was 20 degrees two days ago, and now it’s 68.  This quartet is wearing suits, and they look too hot to me.  For some reason, this little area is full of bantering Japanese tourists, with their cameras in hand, and they are all wearing coats.  Japan must be hell.

The day was worth discovering.  I figured out my playlist for tonight’s show, and even shaved the stubble of a worried little week.  Yes, I’m glad that I came out today, and might even do the same tomorrow.  The girls’ thighs are all so tan, and their sunglasses so big.  They are begging to be poked, I say, but I have no urge to try.  I can barely get up in the morning, let alone satisfy anyone but myself. 

They walk right past the band and out of my life forever.  That’s ok, I think.  Their sunglasses make me nervous.  I’d prefer to see their eyes.  

The Hair-Brained Scheme

“Listen here, lady,” the Lord bellowed out,
“I’ve got things to do, but I’ll help you to sprout
A spry little bastard with the strength of a bear,
But the provisions for which depend on his hair.”

“His hair?” said the mother, with her infertile womb,
“And what are the provisions, oh bringer of doom?”
The Lord replied with a chuckle, “My only provision:
His hair shall never receive circumcision.”

And so it goes; and the boy grew up strong,
His hair and genitalia, both presumably long.
His name became Samson, and he fled to the hills,
A keeper of truth, under the guise of God’s will.

What Samson and his kin failed to understand,
Is that God had created the boy for a plan.
Smite the damn Philistines, and smite he would,
Through the strength of Samson, for the “greater good.”

Sprinkle some killings, and a one-sided romance,
Enter Deliliah, into Samson’s pants.
“Hey sugar baby,” she asked with a grin,
“Just by chance, what is it that makes you weak again?”

Well, Samson is brawny, and by that trade, a dunce,
But he avoids the question more than just once.
Soon he admits that his hair is the key,
To sexual performance and brutality.

Well, the whore sells the secret, then cuts his locks,
The Philistines grab him, and like high-school jocks,
Proceed to burn out his eyes with the brand of an ass.
Was I the only one with a hellish gym class?

The moral is a mix of profanities,
Directed at the hole of humanity,
The sex we call “women,” the one of compassion,
(Whose concerns are actually more fixed on high fashion.)

But where was the big guy when this all went down?
Picking his next list of victims to drown?
For when the screams of poor Samson echoed to the sky,
God turned his headphone volume up to high.