Zzzzzzzzzz...

Yes, that is the idea.

I dare you!

WWPSD? (What Would Peter Switchback Do?), Part 2.

Peter Switchback would never follow his heart.  He knows that the heart can get a man into trouble.

Peter would only follow the conviction of the Holy Spirit.  That's a lot harder to do, but it works out a whole lot better in the end, he's always reckoned.

Peter would always choose to do his duty over his desires.  A free man works for a reason, he's always figured, and a man should be thankful for that.

Go get your Peter Switchback on.

This is not Fiction.

...I suppose that much is obvious.   I was about to post a fresh piece of flash, taken from a mega-stupendous ultra-compendium that I am working on, when my breakfast arrived.  Let me share this with you...

A greasy, blue-lipped lady brought my pancakes to my table with a cough and a tremor. Don't you hate that?  The cough deposits all kinds of germs onto your pancakes, and the tremor spills your coffee.  "Hey, Jack, here's yer bloody hotcakes,"  she coughed at me.

"Thank you," I replied, covering my mouth and nose with an errant piece of camphor-soaked ermine.

"What'cha writin'?"  she asked, slapping my breakfast down in front of me.

"Nothing of any importance," I said.

"I wrote something once," she said, wiping her hands on her apron. " You wanna' hear it?"

"Sure," I said, "why not?"

"Once upon a time," she began, "there was a boy named little Mikey Nitrous, who would eventually be known to the world as Mr. Michael Nitrous of West 43rd Street..."

"Wait a second," I said, "Michael Nitrous is MY character...you couldn't have written that."

"Yeah, " she said, "you're right.  I got it off a website."

"MY website," I said.

"Whatever."

"Well, tell me," I said, "why on earth would you steal my character?"

"Well," the blue-lipped waitress croaked,  "I didn't want to get caught."

"Huh?"

"Someone once told me that if you're gonna' cop, cop from the best..."

I felt my fuzzy little melon begin to swell with pride.  "Oh really?" I asked.

"Yeah," she said, "but if you don't wanna' get caught, cop from the worst."

I looked down at my pancake.

"You want I should get you some syrup for that?"

I ate my pancake dry and washed it down with a  cup of cool phlegm.

Back to the woodshed.

With a Half-Moon Shake

Half-baked mumbling nutters running down the street and shoving pointy, pointy spears into fragile and innocent flesh is no way to start a tale, and it is sure no way to make a body smile on an otherwise fine day. But there you have it, and there was that pointy, pointy spear sticking straight out of a patch of fragile and innocent flesh.

You have to call them like you see them, I guess.

“You mumbling nutter,” cried a security guard in a dusty blue jacket, “you mumbling, mumbling nutter!” The security guard saw the pointy, pointy spear go right through the flesh, and he couldn't believe his eyes. Would you be able to believe your eyes if you saw something like that? No, I don't suppose you would.

Well, that mumbling nutter didn't pay any attention to the security guard, and just walked right on (after he pulled the pointy, pointy spear back out again). He knew that pointy, pointy spears had been made illegal under the 1974 “Pointy, Pointy Spear Act”, but when pointy, pointy spears are outlawed, you just know that only outlaws will have pointy, pointy spears.

Anyhow.

That mumbling nutter retrieved his pointy, pointy spear, and shambled down the avenue, with the dusty-jacketed security guard following at a safe distance. They passed a man with a small pushcart selling peach fritters, and the nutter thought about stopping. He thought better of it – the last peach fritter he ate gave him heartburn, and so his doctor had advised him to avoid fried pastries. The security guard stopped for one, though, and had nearly caught up to the nutter again when the saturated fats from the lovely, sexy, peachy fritter coursed their wicked, wicked way to the tricky-dicky neurons in his fuzz-covered melon and he toppled over in a heap.

The mumbling nutter walked back and stood over the security guard.

“Fragile,” he mumbled to himself, “but not quite so innocent.”

Tantum Ergo. Well, I Declare.

Peter Switchback done seen the best kinda' horse you ever gonna' need.  A horse like that is hard to find, and worth lots, besides.  Just imagine what it musta' looked like.  We all seen horses like that, but we ain't usually ever able to lay claim to 'em.

Know what I mean?

Sure you do.

So he seen it at the auction, and there was that music playin' - not the music you think. It warn't that "Brown Eyed Girl" song like you might s'pose.  It was even better, and it reminded him of things almost as good, almost as carefree and good.  Hell, it might've even been better.

It was sung in Latin, and he wept.

We all gotta' done have wept now and again.  Some just does it sooner than others.

Stabat Mater, You Might Say

“Nev'th'less, she stood there. All hangedy-outy like she was. You know how she was.” Folly Martin sucked a bit of barbecue out of his teeth and spat after he said this. “Damby, but'n if she wasn't a fool sometimes. Know what I mean, Tiller?”

Tiller just kept quiet and kicked at the dust. Lots of dust in Crawford County, there is. That's what my uncle John always used to say.

“Lots of dust here in the county,” he'd say.

Can't blame a man for just saying what's true. You know what I mean.

Anyhow, Folly spit some barbecue out of his teeth again and Tiller kicked the dust. “I think she knew it was the end,” he said, “and she didn't care too much. And I don't rightly mean she was hangedy-outy in that she was anything other than likin' to hang out with folks. Know what I mean?”

The question was again met with silence and a kick of the dust. Tiller pushed his baseball cap back off his forehead and cleared his throat.

“She never said anything, until I said something that I didn't think I was gonna' say.” said Folly. “Somethin' pretty bad. Not 'bout her or anything, just 'bout me. She knew it and I knew it, and she just made a noise so's there was no way I could miss what she meant by it. It was like a cry. A cry, I tell you. A cry. Anyone ever do anything like that for you? Do something without sayin' a word so's that you know exactly what they mean?”

Tiller scratched the center of his chest and coughed. He spit again into the dirt, and then pulled his cap down again over his eyes.

“So we all knew. She knew anyway. I think ever' damned person knew,” said Folly. “I just had to get over it and not say it again. You hear?”

Tiller looked off at the dry pea fields. “Who wouldn't cry?” he asked in a voice. A voice like bitter anguish.

We've all got a voice like that somewhere, I'd guess.

And in that harsh southern sun another patch of Crawford County dust got hard baked like a stone of stumbling.

Stone of Anointing

There was an old man sitting on top of that hill. Sitting, smoking, scratching. The usual. You sit and you scratch and you smoke and the next thing you know you get around to thinking. Thinking isn't all that bad as long as you keep it in check and don't think about the things you're not supposed to think about. You know how it goes – you start thinking about things like being free or following your own will or someone's will or how we are all so different and that it isn't such a bad thing and then the next thing you know you might start to think differently than other folk want you to think.

That's OK for you and me, but it sure isn't OK for them.

You have to think the way they think.

But I probably digress. Anyhow, back to what I was saying. The old man was sitting there, up on top of that hill, and he was smoking and scratching and then he did indeed get to thinking his own thoughts, and some of those thoughts were a little inflammatory, but they weren't all that odd – lots of folks had actually had thoughts like his in the past, but most had abandoned thinking that way.

Crazy how it goes like that, I say.

So he gets to thinking, and wouldn't you just know it, but some folk didn't appreciate it all that much. They tried to distract the old man with offerings of smoked meats and a few bits of cheese, but it wasn't any use. “This is a discussion we probably shouldn't have,” said one of the folk when the old man spoke up about what he believed. Everybody opened their flapping yaps and made the mumbledy-mumbledy sound until they drowned out the old man.

Well, that old man thought better of it, so he shut up his ancient mouth and went back to just thinking and smoking and scratching. Everybody walked away, confident that they had convinced him to shut his mouth and change his mind. They were relieved that his ways of thinking had obviously been changed, and they believed that now he was convinced that his ideas were part of “a discussion we probably shouldn't have.” Everyone was quite happy.

The old man sat on the hill and looked to the place where that other fellow had been silenced. Someone else who said things that no one wanted to hear just then.

Hell. Just then or ever, you might say.

So they shut that other fellow up as well, but the old man sat on the hill (not far from where they silenced the other fellow) and he smoked and scratched and thought. And light poured forth from the little bitty hole on the side of that hill, and as the old man touched the living rock he heard the stones cry out, and he heard a voice that echoed a familiar song.

Smoking and scratching, and thinking eternal thoughts. And soon all that remained were the old man and the rock.

The living rock.

And the rock isn't something you change. The rock changes you.

W.W.P.S.D?

What would Peter Switchback do?  Hopefully I'll have some idea after I return from the Holy Land.

Can y'all bear with me?

Thank you kindly.

Polluted Offerings

As I was trying to look upon the one whom they had pierced, a short man in a dark beard walked up and grabbed my arm.

“Come along,” he said, trying to jostle me away from the crowd, “there's nothing to see here.”

“No, I think there actually is something to see here,” I protested.

“Come on,” he said, “let's go and get a nice drink and a basket of onion rings. My treat.”

Who, I ask you, could reasonably turn down a free drink and onion rings? Not me, certainly. We walked over to Limpy's place and went inside. I shot a knowing glance at Limpy and lifted two fingers and made a retching motion with my face and throat (not easy to do inconspicuously, mind you). This was our special, secret sign for ordering a martini and a basket of onion rings. Limpy smiled, nodded knowingly, and limped off to the kitchen to drop my rings in the fryer. The short bearded man and I perched ourselves on a couple of barstools.

“So what do you have planned for the day, friend?” he asked.

“Friend?” I asked.

“What do you have planned for the day?”

“Well,” I said, “I have this sack of sheep dung out back, and I was looking for some faces upon which to smear it.”

“Is that supposed to be some kind of symbolism?” he asked.

“No,” I said. “That's just it. There is no symbolism whatever. It's just sheep dung that I hope to smear on someone's face. No symbolism. No hidden meaning.”

The short man with the dark beard was getting sweaty and his face would flush red and then get pale white and then flush red again. He began to look like a neon sign in Vegas. “Wayne Newton. One Night Only.”

“Look, friend,” he said, pulling a small coin purse out of his jacket pocket, “why don't you just stay here and eat onion rings. All day. On me.” He held out the coin purse, offering it to me.

“I think you tried this once before,” I said. “No thanks. But thank you for the onion rings and martini.” I got up and called out to Limpy, “give those o-rings to Scabby Duane over in the corner, Limpy. I'll come back for the martini later on tonight.”

I leapt like a calf out of the stall as I left the bar. Sheep dung can work wonders on a guy, you know.

Dominus vobiscum.

Oremus.

Just Look at it, Will You?

Nothing is funny anymore.  There is no symbolism.  There is no veiled meaning.  Everything is laid bare.

Little Mikey Nitrous held up four fingers.  He stared at them in the cold winter air.  He reached out with his other hand and grasped one of his fingers. With a deft twist he snapped it at the joint.  It sounded like when his mother prepared chicken for frying. Intense pain raced up his arm to his brain, but he didn't say a thing.

He just looked at it, and smiled.  He knew what it meant.

Do you ever do that?

Maybe there is a little symbolism left, after all.

That Man Over There...

Yeah...that man over there...do you see him?  The one with the long overcoat and the fedora pulled down over his eyes.  It looks like he is holding a violin or a dozen roses or a wrapped fish.  I'm not sure what it is.

I think he must have some kind of problem.  He's dressed in such old-style clothing, and he looks like he's thinking about something.  He obviously is not using his cell phone, and it is not entirely clear whether or not he even has one.  He has not been sending texts or anything.  He just stands there.  He was reading a newspaper just a minute ago, so he must have some kind of problem.

The next thing you know, he will break out a book.

What is wrong with some people?

Go, Learn What This Means

Again, several reasons why David should not return to Madison. You know this – I told you a long time ago. He had as many reasons to not go back as he had tears that had been shed, but that is one of those sad stories you don't really want to hear.

Who wants to hear a sad story these days? No, I didn't think you did.

So David stood on a street corner in a small town, and smoked a tiny little cigarette. It was once larger, of course, but David had been smoking it for some time. It is amazing how cigarettes get smaller as you smoke them, he thought. Unlike people. As time goes on, most people grow deeper, richer, and in a sense larger. They go the opposite direction of the cigarette.

The wind was quiet and warm. Soft, you might say. David said that, in fact. “Soft,” he said, as he turned to face the gentle breeze. The winds of life that blow on a person are not always as gentle, but they can be rather quiet. Again David said “soft,” and crushed out his cigarette on the heel of his shoe.

Again, several reasons for lots of things. We all have lots of reasons, don't we?

Go ahead. Think back. Stop, right now. Think back on all the reasons you have had or so many things that you have done. You had lots of reasons, didn't you? Of course you did. Were they all 'good' reasons? Of course not. But it was like a water-color, wasn't it? Imagine it, if you can. Think back. Go ahead. It was like a water-color painting wherein your reasons and your desires blended together and all of the environment of the moment began to blur as though you had been crying a little bit and then squinted just ever so slightly so that sharp edges went away. It blurs.

It blurs like a watercolor.

And David walked down the street, as he would walk down every street. As you walk down every street. And he thought he would never blur again, as he always thought he would never blur again. As you think you will never blur again. And the more you think it doesn't, the more it always will.

It blurs like a watercolor. And the winds of life are not always gentle.

But mercy and forgiveness reveal the face of God.

Happy, Poetic-y, Kohlrab-i Anniversary!

“If you would just put that damn thing away, we could talk.” The clown rubbed his groin with a gloved hand. Not his own hand, strangely enough. Little Mikey Nitrous (to be known to the world one day as Mr. Michael Nitrous of West 43^rd Street) kept his miniature crossbow trained on the clown. This was not the first time he had used his little miniature crossbow to enforce justice, but it was the first time he had used it on a clown.

“Just you quit your jaw-flapping,” said little Mikey, “I'll have no more of your parley. You were snoopin' around my mother's zucchini patch, weren't you?”

The clown stared silently at the ground. The ground pretty much just stared right back. He glanced nervously at the little, miniature crossbow in Mikey's hand.

“I need a kohlrabi,” said the clown.

“A likely story, whiteface. If you needed a kohlrabi, then what the heck were you doin' in the zucchini patch?”

“I got confused,” said the clown. “I don't see that many zucchinis. Not that many kohlrabis, either, to tell the truth.”

“I likely story,” said Mikey again. “Do you think I just fell off the melon truck?”

The clown fell silent again.

“Okay, floppy-shoe,” said Mikey, “I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll make you a deal. If you can make up a poem for me, I'll let you go without plugging you full of bolts. Kapiche?”

“A poem?” asked the clown.

“A poem,” said Mikey Nitrous.

“A poem,” said the clown.

“In heroic couplet.”

“Heroic couplet?”

“In four-line stanzas.”

“Four-line stanzas?”

“With good, solid rhyme scheme. And it's gotta' be about kohlrabi.”

“Kohlrabi?” asked the clown.

“Yeah,” said Mikey, threatening him with his little, miniature crossbow, “you got a problem with that?”

“No, no,” said the clown. “Can I go, then?”

“Heck no!” cried Mikey Nitrous, pulling a pad of paper and a pencil out of his back pocket and handing it to the clown, “you sit down right there in the kohlrabi patch and get to work. I'm gonna' sit down next to the gazing ball and keep an eye on you.”

TO BE CONTINUED...

Celebrating One Year of Poetic-y Goodness!

Zoiks!  My cousin, Denise Janikowski-Krewal, and I have been collaborating on our poetry blog "the lost beat" for a year as of today!  Holy cow!  You should go over there right now, grab a glass of room-temperature champagne, and begin reading!  Keep coming back all week long for “thelost beat first anniversary celebration week.” No calories! No trans-fats! No cholesterol!

Click above or on this sentence to be magically transported to the lost beat! Cool!