Sunday, November 25, 2012

CHIMNEY SIDEBAR

Blew it.  A boneless blast fluttered between her pursed lips speckled with the crumbs of crackers packaged in his and hers matching bowels feeling a tad inside out muscles exposed messages mixed tamped down like tobacco into the bowl of a pipe sprinkled with the flame that won't catch and has only the remains of strings attached strings of smoke pulling pulling for no one.  Blew it.  A boneless blast fluttered between her pursed lips speckled with the crumbs of crackers packaged in his and hers matching bowels feeling a tad inside out muscles exposed messages mixed tamped down like tobacco into the bowl of a pipe sprinkled with the flame that won't catch and has only the remains of strings attached strings of smoke pulling pulling for no one.  Blew it.  Feeling a tad inside out throwing out cold shoulders into a little collar a little hot under the collar someone else had read it, too, and you did have it incorrect the first time and you're not sure if you get it now.  

Have another slice and see if you can pull it off didn't think we could make it up here didn't think we could get this stuck this far stuck asking how it is he was asking how things are the carpet mostly in our habitat full of the smell of routine we lobbed it out there onto the rug our grenade and act so surprised when it left its blackened attempts at whipping ourselves into a theater of expectations hot lights on the hot dirt our sandals thinning this roof over our heads and underneath our asses thinning out.  Thinning out for a thin slice have another slice and see if you can pull it off didn't think we could make it up here didn't think we could get this stuck this far stuck asking how it is he was asking how things are the carpet mostly in our habitat full of the smell of routine we lobbed it out there onto the rug our grenade and act.  

"Are you going to hang out your shingle?"

"I'll hang you out."
"You've been one to deal with me at arm's length."
"One of many who came before me."
"Rich in habit and poor in everything else."
"I do crave a drink."
"What kind?"
"What's the point?  You know I'm getting tired of this exercise of of what cluster of muscles did you call them?"
"You can discard that one."
"Whatever happened to our deck?"
"Another abandoned project of yours."
"I don't mean the fiasco in the backyard, I mean the deck of cards.  What happened to them?"
"I have no idea."
"What's happened to you?"
"I meant you could discard the idea of muscles as in hitting the discard button on a computer."
"What happened to our hardware?"
"Are you deliberately asking that way so I have to choose between wondering if you're referring to what happened to our computers or our own brains?"
"Only if you insist on imposing a mechanical model on human nature."
"Isn't that what remained unspoken when I said I do?"
"You're acting very cold my dear metal monster."
"I'm sweaty."
"Careful you might rust right in the middle of a bitch slap."
"Then I'll have to make it quick."
"Take your time.  I haven't been able to nod off for the longest stretch."
"If you were able to manage a nod off you could actually lean into it and tumble over the edge."
"When it comes to my way of asking that would be asking too much."
"Even if you're able to miss those tall weeds there and hit the concrete we're not high enough and you'd at your best would end up paralyzed."
"That's an unpromising prospect.  I'm already paralyzed at my best."
"Then again I'd dislodge what imagination you had left."
"I have to keep what imagination I have left in otherwise if it makes contact with the outside air it begins to mold and rot."
"I was thinking of putting something together."
"With our shit for leftovers?"
"A fragment of a story."
"How can you put together a fragment?"

Have another slice and see if you can pull it off didn't think we could make it up here didn't think we could get this stuck this far stuck asking how it is he was asking how things are the carpet mostly in our habitat full of the smell of routine we lobbed it out there onto the rug our grenade and act so surprised when it left its blackened attempts at whipping ourselves into a theater of expectations hot lights on the hot dirt our sandals thinning this roof over our heads and underneath our asses thinning out.

"I was thinking of putting something together."
"With our shit for leftovers?"

They didn't know how to pronounce her name with all their abbreviations and acronyms and nicknames that new arrivals assumed because they were too tired to discuss it any further with the more seasoned the pillars that salted the Earth with their ejaculations at the visitors and their being made to look silly at the visitors and their brokenness they had to swallow to coat their insides to stomach and say the right words to give the impression they were open to healing at the hands of those who justified the need for repair in the first place at the visitors and their being made to stay with nowhere else to go.  

"Was that it?"
"I don't think so."
"What's happened to you?"
"I think it may have been a poem instead."

Towards nothing
Not even the horizon
Not even that
Uneven even now

Windows darkening
Eyes unable to close
Mind lit up with exploding hopes
Words that go boom
Expressions that are nothing
But duds

Hair tied back
Hair pulled out
Floats limply
In the filthy water
Thought it was water
Having nothing left
Having fallen 
Having fallen back
Into this trough
Another trough
Reserved for what wanders by
Left for what gets stranded
The only meaning
Is what's meant for those
having fallen 
fallen back
Into this trough

"Is there any more?"
"Remember what you asked about fragments?"
"I try not to.  It only spoils whatever leftovers I can eke out."
"So you just settle for repeating yourself?"
"Pretty much.  Speaking of, must you keep your hair pulled back so tight and all the time?  It makes you look like a skid-mark hurtling at me."
"We've been over this too many times.  You know perfectly well why I can't let it down."
"My remarks about reusing toilet paper?"
"I know you said it was pointless earlier."
"You make it sound like pointlessness is subject to time."
"I'd still like to know what kind of drink you're craving."


Windows darkening
Eyes unable to close

"I'm not craving anything anymore."
"You always say that after you've mentioned what you've been craving."
"Forget I mentioned it."
"I won't."
"You what?"
"I said I won't forget you mentioned it."
"Then then . . ."
"Go ahead."
"Go ahead what?"
"Go ahead and say it."

Feeling a tad inside out throwing out cold shoulders into a little collar a little hot under the collar someone else had read it, too, and you did have it incorrect the first time and you're not sure if you get it now.  

"I said I won't forget you mentioned it."
"Then then . . ."
"Spit it out.  You didn't have to back up that far."
"What?  I backed up that far because you backed up that far."

That was what what was was that was what was what was that what was that episode where there was the office and the girl the office girl the woman who ran the office she did everything for everyone practically ran the office or was she in charge?  How old was she how old she was.  She was actually the administrator how old she was still there told everyone that it was her career when her time there expanded her duties shoved the rest of her off the balcony not enough room for her ideas on the upper floor only what was lifted from below.  What was what was that what was that episode?


"We've been over this too many times.  You know perfectly well why I can't let it down."
"My remarks about reusing toilet paper?"
"I know you said it was pointless earlier."
"You make it sound like pointlessness is subject to time."
"I'd still like to know what kind of drink you're craving."
"I'm not craving anything anymore."
"You always say that after you've mentioned what you've been craving."
"Forget I mentioned it."
"I won't."
"You what?"
"I said I won't forget you mentioned it."
"Then then . . ."
"Go ahead."
"Go ahead what?"
"Go ahead and say it."
"Fuck you?"
"No not that."
"Fuck you."
"No."
"That's not it?"
"No, I said."
"What am I supposed to say then?"
"Say please."
"Please fuck me?  I mean please fuck you?"
"No you dung-beetle.  You're supposed to say please forget I mentioned it."
"OK.  Please forget I mentioned it."
"I like when you talk dirty like that."
"What's dirty about that?"
"It's the only time you have that look like you've said something you shouldn't and I don't mean that you're being ridiculous although you are it's the only time you look like you're being something that hints of something hinting of something else and I try to give myself the idea you're being forward because with all my having no idea about anything and so that's what I think OK?"
"So you want me to say it again?"
"Damn it all.  Forget I mentioned it."
"And that has more grit for you when I add please?"
"What's the point?  What remained of that cocktail lounge is long gone anyway.  What was it called?  Hammered, I think."
"Plowed or was it The Three Sheets?"
"Someone plowed it away whatever it was named."
"Whatever."
"It's only a matter of time before we hear the machines coming closer in the next dust storm."
"It's just the wind my dear clanking artificial humanoid."
"You've cornered the market in artificial intelligence you elbow-headed ass."
"The wind and the noise of humanity: a match made in the restroom of existence.  My over-ripe peach, just tell yourself it's hot air then."
"Every time you open your mouth or any of the other openings on you that haven't been completely clogged up with your shit."
"It's getting there."
"They've closed the gates for good."
"Shall we assemble a commentary tomorrow on the quality of the devastation we can see?"
"If there isn't a dust storm tomorrow."
"And if there is another dust storm?  What then?"
"We'll assemble a commentary on the dust storm then."
"Assembling commentary is all we can put together from the wreckage."
"They've closed the gates for good."
"Tall fucking things aren't they?"
"They are fucking tall."
"What do you think they're made out of?"
"I think they're made out of what they won't admit."
"I'm glad success passed us by."
"Why?"
"So we wouldn't have to play pretend and keep acting for a larger and larger audience."
"Instead we cover our faces during the next dust storm trying not to pretend for a smaller and smaller audience an audience more less than one every other line."
"More or less."

A boneless blast fluttered between her pursed lips speckled with the crumbs of crackers packaged in his and hers matching bowels feeling a tad inside out muscles exposed messages mixed tamped down like tobacco into the bowl of a pipe sprinkled with the flame that won't catch and has only the remains of strings attached strings of smoke pulling pulling for no one.  Blew it.  

- Max Stoltenberg

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

SANITATION AND NAPKINS

Corner of a sandwich missing a bite mark passing through layers of cheese and ham and lettuce and being and its being tired that seems to fill the room with slow ticking and itching drew some blood on the canvas of an arm did the skin have to apparently apparently it did holding out a hand with fingers with fingernails did the skin have to apparently apparently it did holding out a hand with fingers with fingernails there was no space to fill the room no space at hand so much for holding out in a room filled with stupidity patterns in interior design nothing it's nothing really really it's nothing drew some blood.

In a classroom eyes roll in response to comments that spill out from between yellow teeth like a puddle of spit darkening the grout didn't feel that building up under such a surface a rougher surface perhaps keep your eyes down looking at the small print so small looking down at it looks like a tiny crushed bug the one that crawled through a quickly appearing and disappearing spot of light coming from the Sun through the window high up the grey wall near the ceiling just before a fingertip broke its body into small print keep your eyes down looking at the small print looking down at it looks like a tiny crushed bug in a classroom eyes roll in response to comments that spill out from between yellow teeth like a puddle of spit darkening the grout didn't feel that building up under such a surface a rougher surface perhaps.

Leave It
(a poem stolen off a steno pad forgotten in a shopping cart brought along for the ride in a septic truck and contemptuously balled up and tossed out the window)

Leave it
Leave it now
Don't bother with that spider
Put down the rolled up newspaper
Magazine
Put down the magazine
Looked like a newspaper 
Black and white

Leave it
Leave it now
Stop with the buttons
Pushing this pushing that
Don't touch the DVD player
Magazine
Turn off the movie
Things
Staying put to escape
Getting out into the drying land
Held in place
End the film

Leave it
Leave it now
Mouth wanting
Wanting mouth
Chewing into this face
Gasping every morsel
Tongue sends out
each and every twisted
expression
Leave it 
leave it now

leave it
leave it
now
Towards the side
opening onto a chasm
Pulling the window glass across
shutting it in 
the laughter
from the other side 
the wall's sounds
is it someone hurt?
sounds so young or old
now it's in here
shut in against the glass
against the chasm
leave it
leave it now

They're going out were here only a few minutes enough time not to hear a word before they go out again and they're off this rocker rocking lulling into water for drinking our own lubrication lulling into watery eyes rolling eyes oiling the machines moving in and out of the houses when arriving they're going out were here only a few minutes enough time not to hear a word about it about the time about the one about not being about it about the time about the one about not being about the time when arriving they're going out were here only a few minutes enough time not to hear a word before they go out again and they're off this rocker rocking lulling into water for drinking our own lubrication lulling into watery eyes rolling eyes oiling the machines moving in and out of the houses.


Dear Sir, 

It comes once in a month's lifetime on a daily basis with way too much obnoxious warning that the weeks have run out through a hole in your memory (not yours, mine or yours and mine or not yours and not mine) when you swore you could have seen this coming when you swore you could have sworn something fell into your coffee trying to figure out what in the fuck it was could have been a chunk from that shitty patch of ceiling you call a repair.  Need to find a spoon to see what some stirring will bring to the top.

On behalf of the elk you ran into, the children you confused and the tree you cut down into our last house, a word of elaboration on the topic I do not want to discuss for it would occupy too much space here in light of the dark facts in addition to your having lost some of your weight but not your ignorance in my estimation as well as that part of my mind that was consumed sufficiently with you to fire off this little missive.

For I do not presume to trust that this projectile will find you incapacitated with stomach upset or an illness of the malignant and deteriorating kind.  You may not have even read this far being of short attention span and fuse to go back to resting on your laurels of an epistemology founded on having a scrotum increasing your chances above that of flies.  Alas, mine have been and will continue to be somewhere in between despite your proving what order you belong to as evidenced by your preferring to grow in cold and moist areas.  Keeping my knees together while flushing you away the walls look thinner when I had expected them to thicken.  What is continuing to make those gouges?  And in every fucking room, you know?  I have worked so hard to make myself as lonely as possible and something still continues to nibble away at it.

From L

p.s. and why must they be so slow?


It's nothing really really it's nothing drew some blood.  Corner of a sandwich missing a bite mark passing through layers of cheese and ham and lettuce and being and its being tired that seems to fill the room with slow ticking and itching drew some blood on the canvas of an arm did the skin have to apparently apparently it did holding out a hand with fingers with fingernails did the skin have to apparently apparently it did holding out a hand with fingers with fingernails there was no space to fill the room no space at hand so much for holding out in a room filled with stupidity patterns in interior design.

"Did you get that?"
"I think so."
"So I'm not completely crazy."
"Then again I'm getting along in years and the old bowling ball of neural jell-o is not like it used to be."
"So I am completely crazy."
"Uh, yes.  In a nutshell and that's what is currently producing my gibberish."
"I want to know what is producing that noise."
"Sounds like people talking."
"Is this going to be another one of your lead-ins to bitching about the stark chambers discourse has been exiled to?"
"Maybe they're wearing bearded beanies and that would account for the muffling?"
"Are you suggesting it might be a hostage situation?"
"I just posited a novelty item.  How does it go from something novel to the taking of hostages?"
"Maybe you're right.  You should listen to yourself."
"Listen to myself?  How can I when I have all this debris of conversations affecting the performance of my sense organs?  Can't get past the parties and the games.  They were decorated with laughter the laughter I only noticed when I looked up and saw their faces and then I understood the laughter and how I had the rules all wrong.  It was what they said about me and what I couldn't do that was the way it was going to happen and it did.  Now the encouraging words and what was possible and supposed to be freed up inside me and used to help others and change things that ended up never being how things were played.  The aim of their abuse was always so accurate.  It was the hope that turned out so off target and misleading."
"You should take action and coordinate a rescue operation and play down the performance and sense organs portion."
"I'm not coordinating anything.  You coordinate something.  The only operation I'll be attending is to take care of a fistula I've been plagued with."
"Brap!"
"Goodness, what was that?"
"I know it wasn't very ladylike, but I did have a soda with my spicy wings."
"That was loud.  Chipped my skull."
"Good.  I needed a diversion from the details of your operation."
"I need a diversion from the details of my operation."
"Are you going to get the hostages out of there or what?"
"Of course not.  Even if there were hostages in there, I would rather that they each individually learn to practice waiting for natural organic stabilization."
"What?"
"I can go right there.  I can see and feel myself in the bathroom with the window open leaning against the towel rack and hear the breeze watch the fence gently sway until that flipping dog starts yapping."
"Comes across as a long-winded way of saying get over it.  I can go right there, too.  You and your sense organs.  And your performance.  His performance.  Nodding off with my chin against a pillow against a shoulder asked to move because I was cutting into his skin.  About to nod off again and my cell chimes my brother's chimes had to answer it.  Sister is dead car accident a red light runner so much for the afterglow of my orgasm.  It's gone.  Just like that.  All there was was the stretched and warped design on the blanket and I collapse on the bed and roll over and pass through this shaft of light that keeps appearing and disappearing.  And then that's when it started when it ended.  Somewhere else outside that room something took place something went down and the room wasn't empty like I used to think it was.  It was full of so much shit that there was no longer any room for anything to change.  It started then when it ended.  It was gone.  Just like that."


- Max Stoltenberg