Friend

She's a friend, but not someone you feel passionate about, just someone you pass the time of day or kill time with, whatever, then one day without you realizing it, something changes and you can't wait to see her, and you buy her stupid little gifts like key chains from gum ball machines or bottles of hazel nut iced coffee because she likes it, or pins with funny sayings, you know, just to let her know you think of her sometimes, but nothing too dangerous or telling, but she notices, and suddenly she doesn't answer her phone when you call, and she doesn't ask if you want to get a beer after work, or go shopping with her on Saturday, and she begins to hang out with this guy she works with, no one special or anything, kind of a jerk you think, and it seems like every time you talk to her now she's telling you how the jerk told her this really funny joke, and it turns out to be something you used to tell people when you were in junior high, and it was funny back then, but you were in junior high and you think to yourself, what a jerk, and little by little you stop calling her because all she ever talks about now is this jerk, and you begin to realize how annoying she is and how predictable she's become and you realize how lucky you are that you decided never to tell her how you were beginning to feel.

Eulogy

Conceived by a father who was a dream, and a mother who was form, Story was alas, not to be; stillborn because Story’s mother was too cold to get out of bed where other lovers beckoned from beneath the sheets and behind the curtain, Story would never realize her dreams of Tibetan mountaintops or shy engineer suitors, nor would she parade herself garishly and proudly across snow white pages for all to admire. 

Story will be missed.  

Hair

You stand behind her as she sits at her desk, and in the overhead light, you see as if for the first time, her head, once all brown, now a halo of white, and you don’t feel revulsion that she’s gotten old, nor do you feel sadness at sensing yourself suddenly at the tipped end of the see-saw; you feel gratitude, that someone like she has shared this time, bestowed upon you this history, and those strands of white hair, (more than any ring) will tie you to her forever.

Grace

It’s the sweetest part of the night:

you squint through crusted eyes

at the red LED on the cable box

as you return from the bathroom;

it's 3:11.

Quietly, you slip back into bed, so you don't wake her,

but as you settle

with your back to her,

she turns and presses her warm naked body into you

and you smile,

thankful for four more hours.

Carrie

I’ve tatooed you,

I’ve tatooed you on my soul

in a palette bright and garish,

(blue, red, aqua, purple and gold)

and when I close my eyes

it’s always you I see

and I know for a fact, that 

from us, I'd never flee.

I’ve tatooed you, you see,

I’ve tatooed you on my soul

and when with age, I fade

and my days grow short and cold

in me you’ll yet remain

warm and constant, glowing and bold.

Pickpocket

admittedly,

I’m a verbal pickpocket

pilfering words from the mouths of babes

amongst whom apparently,

it is the currency

that anything for cool is the trade

so much spent

on this precarious commodity

that in those tender years,

even one's own mortality 

is nothing at all, but modest absurdity.

Waiting For You At 80th and 1st

rain dust on the windshield glows

green glows

gold retires

red but like the Moon without the Sun's light 

it’s really nothing on its own

shapeshifting people pass by with their dogs,  traffic 

sweeps up first 

diamond yellow silver spikes stab

the night, an illuminated ballet

anticipation grows

DCPS

“Kid,” they said, “you’ve got the gift of words”, but when no one could figure out who'd given it to me, they reached their hands down my throat to grab it away.

NEW MANIFESTO FOR CREATIVE EXPRESSIONISTS

We the creators, pledge to adopt and adapt the following:

-To imagine new outlets of expression

-To break former boundaries created both by ourselves and others; in other
words, to treat our past works as "straw dogs".

-To reset parameters so that other less brave or less creative individuals can express themselves within them, while they’re learning themselves and growing their own brave senses of self-expression

-Not to be ruled by preconceived notions of ourselves, our world, or our art-forms

-Not to be confined to only one venue of expression when we might find another medium or style to be more fitting at any given time

-Never to be confined by any external genre, culture, subculture, religion or platform

To add to this list as necessary or desired, and to copy and distribute it as widely as possible.

Together, we will create a non-centrist progressive movement in creative expression. We will recognize that only by being true to ourselves, can we be truly artistically free.

The Writer

On the page he pours his blood, his soul, and his cum, while in bed, his lover waits, patience ebbing.

Cord

I’m vacuuming over by the kitchen, and suddenly surprised by the length of the cord,  (I’d thought it was only 9 feet,) I look behind myself to see my wife holding the plug in her hand, and she shouts to me over the whir of the motor, “something strange happened to me today”.  

Gitty and Esther

“Mommy what does self-righjus mean?” 

Gitty took one last drag off her cigarette before stabbing it out in the styrofoam cup that held the sludge from Esther’s hot chocolate.  “It’s like your father, not letting us see each other more than twice a month, and not letting you live with me because I refuse to wear a wig and skirt, and keep Shabbes”, she wanted to say, but instead: “it’s self-righteous, and it means, you think your way is the only right way to do something.”

She watched as her daughter tried to select a color for Yogi’s picnic basket from the crayon fragments scattered around her on the floor, before settling on purple.  “So what do you think you’ll want for dinner mameleh?  I bet we can have pizza delivered to our room, you want pizza?”

As she passed the bay window on the way to the phone, she surreptitiously parted the vinyl curtains and scanned the motel's parking lot for the familiar white vans. 

While the two waited for their dinner to arrive, Gitty lit another cigarette, and studied the gas-station map,  while Esther continued to color Yogi.  

Advice

“What the hell do I need with advice from a goddamned tea bag” I thought.  I got that fortune cookie on Tuesday night, and it says to me  “Good clothes open many doors. Go shopping.” I figured I needed some new interview clothes, so I did.  I bought a new tie, a new shirt to go with it, and just for the hell of it, a new suit so I could make the best impression.

Now, my rents due, and I’ve got three dollars and seventy eight cents in my bank account until next month, so I go to the bank to see if I can get an overdraft, and while the bank managers in the back office, I see there’s this bowl of candy on his desk for anyone to take from, so I take one, and I take the little red square Dove chocolate, even though it’s the last one, and there on the inside of the red foil wrapper, it says “Success comes to those who have no fear; simply leap and the net will appear”, so before the manager even comes back, I get up and leave.  Just like that.  I go next door with my last three bucks, and I buy a cup of tea, the evening paper, and a lotto ticket.  I open the tea bag, and there, printed on the back of the little tag, it says “Don’t believe everything you read”.  

$5.00

Each story begins with a choice, one made either by or for its main character. Consider Yaya. Yaya is a 40 something year old man who works in a garage; though he isn't supposed to accept tips personally, (there's a lucite communal tip box for the benefit of the entire staff,) from one customer to whom he's been exceptionally helpful, he accepts the neatly folded five that's pressed into his hand. Later that night, he'll use it to buy himself one extra drink, which will effectively keep him at the bar an extra 17 minutes; during that extra time, he will meet his next girlfriend, or get in a fight. On the other hand, he may use the extra cash in his pocket to buy himself two lotto tickets, a cup of coffee, and a bag of Doritos.

If he chooses to save the bill, and use it that night at the bar, and he meets his next girlfriend, perhaps she'll become his wife and give him two children, one of whom will attend Princeton one day and earn a doctorate in physics, specializing in magnetics, the other of whom will die of leukemia two days before her 11th birthday, or maybe the woman will give him herpes.

If he gets into a fight, maybe he will accidentally kill the man who started with him, or before the first punch, perhaps the two will reconcile and become fast friends, and discover they are from the same obscure part of Kenya.

Maybe one of the lotto tickets will win 2.00, or 34,000,000.00.

If it wins 2.00, maybe he will count himself lucky, bless God, and buy himself a muffin to eat later for desert, or maybe he will buy himself two scratch-offs, win nothing more, and curse himself for having wasted 2.00 when he could have had a muffin. Or maybe he will win a million dollars a year for life.

Maybe guilt, or honor will get the better of Yaya, and before moving onto his next customer, he'll quietly slip the bill into the lucite box himself.

Each story begins with a choice, and with each choice there are a million stories.

Click

You're drunk, and the cold feels like something else, as you stagger out of her basement apartment, barefooted and bloodied. "Damn it", you think, "she should have listened when I told her to keep her mouth shut."

The book in your hand is already falling apart, but you do your best to keep the pages from scattering in the wind. "Just once more", you tell yourself for the seventh time now, when behind you, just a bit to your left you hear the click.

HELP WANTED

Applicants must be at ease accepting criticism, take being misinterpreted and misunderstood with aplomb, have a high threshold for stress, and be comfortable making life or death decisions.  Extensive knowledge of world history, politics, philosophy and religions required.  Executive experience preferred. Must be multi-lingual, able to multi-task, and have advanced problem solving capabilities. Work schedule is for 6 days a week.

Interested applicants may leave their curriculum vitae at any synagogue, mosque, church, temple, ashram or ancient grove. 

Shorty

I had a dog named Shorty once. I got him from the pound, because they said they were five minutes away from killing him. Shorty
had one eye, a coat of about 7 different colors, and his back legs were
just a little longer than his front ones, making him look like he was
always in the mood to play. My friend Meiron said he looked like Frankenstein’s dog. When
I went to pet Shorty for the first time, he took a bite out of my left
hand, but he must not have liked the way I tasted, because he never bit
me again. When
we took him to the park on Saturday afternoons to play Frisbee, he
would always chase other people’s soccer balls instead and pop them,
and when a lady soldier was bending down to get something out of her
backpack, Shorty bit her on the ass. He
must have liked the way she tasted, because he didn’t let go for a
really long time, even though she was screaming, and it took her
boyfriend, Meiron and me together to pull him off. Meiron said we were probably the first people in the history of Independence Park, to be kicked out and told never to come back.

When I met Neta at “The Moon” one Friday night, it was love at first sight. Three days later she moved in, with a footlocker full of her CDs, Books and clothes. When
I picked her up from work on Tuesday night, we came home to find her
locker pried open, her CDs scattered and scratched, her books torn to
shreds and her clothes piled in the four corners of the apartment: one
pile had been shit on, one pissed on, one vomitted on, and on the last
pile was a very tired dog, sound asleep on his back.

“It’s him or me,” said Neta.

When we took him back to the pound, the lady smiled at me, took the leash without a word and led Shorty into the back. As we walked out into the bright afternoon sun, we heard her say “Poor thing, we were starting to wonder how long you'd be away this time”.

Impossible

Never one to give up easily, you slowly ease your left, then right foot into your own mouth and swallow.  Now, if you can just manage to get your legs down, you think, the rest will be a breeze, you’ll show them all, and you slurp at your knees, but you can’t seem to make any headway. Your back is on fire, and your jaw, throat and stomach feel like they’re going to burst.  Tommorrow, you tell yourself,  tomorrow you’ll show them what happens when they tell you  "impossible”.

Second Hand Reminiscence

The song “Ein Li Eretz Acheret” comes on the radio, and it reminds you of her, and on the movie screen of your mind, you see her sitting alone on the corner of her mother’s bed, listening, like you are, to Gali Atari, and moved, like you are, because it reminds her of her childhood in Israel.

Fade to flashback she’s lanky and nine, sun tanned, pigtailed, sandaled and shorted, and her brother, Tzion, is there; carelessly they’re devouring enormous yellow and red summer peaches that drip down their chins and stain their shirts. Though you're not there, she looks at you and smiles a drippy smile, the peach’s stone apparent beneath her cheek.

As the song ends, she’s there once again, sitting at the foot of her mother’s bed: neck bent, head down, face obscured by that mess of curls, waiting for something to begin.

Boom

Let’s just say, the bus you’re on goes boom, and you survive, not only survive, but you’re totally fine, like, not a scratch on you… now, let’s just say, all around you, everyone is dead, there’s no way they’re still breathing, and let’s just say, you’re walking through the corpses, and instead of blood and guts all over the place, there’s half a woman lying by your feet, and hanging out of her torso, where her guts should be, there’s a bunch of CDs and a Walkman, and there, to your left, is the chest of some kid popped open like a pan of jiffypop, and where his heart and lungs should be, there are two slightly deflated soccer balls, and a Sony PSP, and over by what used to be the front of the bus, you see what used to be the driver, and he’s got a book sticking out of his chest… so you pick up the book and open it, and amidst all the sirens, and the smoke, and flashing lights, you sit down on the street and you read, and it says “Let’s just say, the bus you’re driving goes boom…"