Friday, January 31, 2014

SUNSET STREP

In out in in out out dazed out in sit stand sit sitting ulcerous leakage straightening bending again dazed out in sit sitting wince from it comes dazed wince hand on stomach lower stomach between stomach and the sewer or upper stomach between stomach and the top of the dust storm somewhere up there obscenely tall dust storm towering its dirt over a slumping back a collapsing posture attempting not to take in such and such garbage such that is thrust forward failed attempts not to take in such and such garbage such garbage such garbage not to take in in out in in out out dazed out in sit stand sit sitting ulcerous leakage straightening bending again dazed out in sit sitting wince from it comes dazed wince hand on stomach lower stomach between stomach and the sewer or upper stomach between stomach and the top of the dust storm somewhere up there obscenely tall dust storm towering its dirt over a slumping back a collapsing posture attempting not to take in such and such garbage such that is thrust forward failed attempts not to take in such and such garbage such garbage such garbage.

About to already making the same sound with the same lips about to already uttering the same words with the same ideas sprouting up from the corner in the same darkness about to already making the same noise with the same broken fragments about to already producing the same spills with the same mess sprouting up from the corner in the same darkness.

About to about to about hiding under a dream that has been dropped from a window onto your hesitation and now to about to about to about hiding under a dream that has been dropped from a window onto your hesitation sweating under the blanket the edges are coming apart on fire perhaps smoldering can't shake them they will know your hesitation ended your escape ended your you you ended up there under there.

About to about to about to about about hiding hiding can't shake the smoldering can't shake the smoldering can't shake shake shaking veins thrusting their way through the attic of these hands shaking fingers refuting each other knock it out would like to knock something off nothing left knock this block off this one this one of these things is just like the others even though they stared every time you opened your rotting mouth every time you kept it shut must have smelled the decay fuming from the corners those turned down corners never watched the corners either was never done with them and they stuck to the skin the attic of these hands shaking fingers refuting each other knock it out would like to knock something off nothing left knock this block off this one this one.

"I've told you."
"Wasn't very useful."
"If you're not going to do what you're told then it won't be very useful."
"Told you."
"Are you agreeing with me or just being an ass?"
"Must be an ass then if I agree with you."
"You might want to try something else and don't take so long like you did last time."
"You have no sense of time.  There was a considerable gap before I began to respond and I don't think I ever completed one."
"Neither of us has any sense of time."
"You finish ..."
"Your thoughts for you."
"And when you do that I'm horribly aware of time and how much gets wasted and it is still never in short supply dragging me from one side to the other of the smallest rooms stuffed away in the furthest corners of the most insensibly drawn labyrinths."
"You know how I can't start what I finish."
"You keep that up and I'll start pacing again."
"It's like watching taint never quite dry."
"And that's saying something."
"Nothing impresses me anymore."
"Why should anything do that for you anyway?"
"Are you going to pace or not?"
"I haven't made up my mind yet."
"Don't you pace in order to do that?"
"I know you're going to say something about me making sure to pace myself."
"It's one of those chicken or the egg things."
"Or what's to be turned off while other things are to be left on while you're on an errand or off somewhere."
"Or off nowhere."
"Or just off."
"Aren't we a pair?"
"A pair of what?"
"A pair of nuts."
"You mean like testicles?"
"No, like screwballs.  Plus if we had it your way we'd be a pair of pairs."
"What is that?  A pair of pairs?"
"2 pairs like 2 pairs of pants."
"Or a quartet as in 4 testicles."
"Will you stop with the testicles?  I have been somewhat able to ignore them until now.  Still no sign of anything to step into to offer relief.  Only shit to step into.  My childhood years have apparently found a way to crawl out from under the wreckage of structures toppling into each other and come up behind me so I find myself saying to myself in a quivering whisper and in a stark raving mad screech are we there yet? are we there yet?"
"I used to appreciate the opportunity to listen to a well put together quartet."
"Shut the fuck up with your quartets and the balls of any kind they played for!  And ram your appreciation up your ass!  Am I to appreciate endless days of sunless skies so I can ignore the malicious burning in my crotch?"
"Can I get back to you on that?"
"You are a barely alive mimesis that movement is not much better than inertia."
"What does that mean?"
"I don't know.  It was my turn to speak."
"Why don't we mess up the turns?"
"Deliberately?  By not speaking?  I'll take your nodding as you having both of us be quiet."

Journal entry without paper in a head stuffed and mounted on the top of a body frozen to a point lost along a timeline buried beneath the dirt and trash in the heat of desolateness with a blank canvas in front of it and a growing pile of traitorous passions behind it:

From between what lies ahead and breathing down or out this throat only that one could pull the pin of this mind that was stabbed into on the first flat surface it was spread across to be changed into a routine consisting of such a round world that could be so prone this close up when there was water and always a brutal hand to hold it under gasping to reach up to where this foul head thirsts for a woman's hand and a drop of moisture.  From between what lies ahead and breathing down or out this throat only that one could pull the pin of this mind pull the pin pull it and tug at the stuffing and if it might come loose it might become from between a line reading that's all it was line readings.

"It could be said that we're just taking a turn at silence for all our refusing to speak."
"It could be said that you shouldn't have said anything."
"Your pointless pacing only reinforces the fact we'll never get anywhere."
"Get anywhere what?"
"Anywhere resembling home.  I shouldn't have said anything. They were so quick to pounce upon what I said and when I said nothing I was going back on what I had said.  Makes me question my questioning our continuing to look around and trying to find anything because I'd be going back on my wanting to get away and trying to get back to something would probably end up being finding nothing and if I just quit then I'd be going back on finding something and choosing nothing."
"Somewhere inside me ..."
"Is a parasite."
"Besides the parasite and it is being rather a slow poke about the whole killing me off bit, somewhere inside me my brain that is there is this notion I heard something outside the window or was it inside did it have windows there was this couple who let me ride in the back of their moving truck this was when my legal situation was less than ideal and I heard something that sounded like music that was how should I say it was almost as if it was suggesting a picking at this tremendous scab and it led to this revelation of color bright deeper bloodier layer that was slimy and wasn't about to heal and it covered so much of the expanse of tone that no matter how much you decided to let it start to scab up you could tell this crust would have to accumulate mountain after mountain of deadness that there would always be picking about it and a relentless heavy draining."
"They put you in the back?"
"Of course.  I was too specific a detail with my above mentioned legal situation.  Do I need to review that section for you?"
"No you do not.  Was there any light in the back?"
"Didn't work.  There was a little red light coming from where the music was playing until the batteries started running down and that seemed to suit the situation even more so with my legal situation at that juncture being what it was how did I put it?"
"Less than ideal."
"That certainly fits the bill and I had too many of those which led to my legal situation at the time and now there is no situation at all."
"All you had was the little red light and whatever the music was."
"Until the batteries ..."
"Ran out."
"No.  They didn't run out.  They just kept running down but never out.  Just running down and the music would keep dropping down into lower and lower dropping but the little red light went off and there was no light at all."
"Not at all?"
"Until the back door was drawn up and at first I thought it looked like a new dawn except it was cloudy and how I got there or here is smudged like by some gigantic thumb through a pencil drawing made to a piece of jejune music."
"Like was playing in the back in the dark."
"Quartet I think."
"Did it have to be a quartet?"
"It had to be a quartet when so much that came before it had to be all this way or that way so much forcing the issue concentrated in this minuscule cell of the universe.  It had to be a quartet only thing that could fit in the smallest of ruined spaces."
"Unless the batteries ..."
"Run down.  They never run out."
"I'm supposed to finish your thoughts.  You're going out of turn."
"Apologies."
"It's quite all right.  Just don't let it happen again."
"Empty threats."
"That's all we've ever had."
"I'll start a thought when it's my turn next and you can finish it."
"Nothing like taking turns."
"Nothing."
"Almost makes the inoperable seem almost ..."
"I'm trying to think of something to start off the next part with. I'll have it for you eventually."
"You're pacing."
"Am I?  I didn't even notice.  Took care of that part already."
"Didn't I tell you that it works when you do it without thinking?"
"I thought my pacing involved thinking?  And didn't I hear you say it was pointless?"
"You claim you hear a lot of things somewhere inside you or was it outside a windowless conveyance?"
"You're distracting me from coming up with something to say to start off the next part?"
"What next part?"

About to about to about hiding under a dream that has been dropped from a window onto your hesitation and now to about to about to about hiding under a dream that has been dropped from a window onto your hesitation sweating under the blanket the edges are coming apart on fire perhaps smoldering can't shake them they will know your hesitation ended your escape ended your you you ended up there under there.


- Max Stoltenberg








Tuesday, January 28, 2014

AND IT'S BITTER

Getting away walking away sidewalk for walking away is not here right now just leave a voice one of the voices that plagues what plagues what ails is they they send voices in dozens opened by other hands other's hands and their consuming gestures pressing fragile shells they they send voices in dozens opened by other hands other's hands and their consuming gestures pressing fragile shells one or two cracked in every batch of voices overlapping intermingling amniotic universes swirling with lumps of brown the floaters are in the fluid of your eyes.

Getting away walking away sidewalk for walking away is not here right now just leave a voice one of the voices that plagues what plagues what ails is they they send voices over dark skies days dying the same day divided into laps around flares in a windshield lying tilted against the side of a ditch cutting through the given the given too much and now now and then it's about her being made out opened by other hands other's hands and their consuming gestures pressing fragile shells one or two cracked in every batch three or four in every batch five or six dozen in every batch of voices overlapping intermingling amniotic universes swirling with lumps of brown the floaters are in the fluid of your eyes.

Your eyes told me to tell you to tell her that her eyes your eyes told me already and that's why it's been so long since getting away walking away sidewalk for walking away is not here right now just leave a voice she did he did and they never seemed to they may have seemed for a lot of seeming and so it went and she went and he went she held her hands and held her whatever you want to call them because you are not listening anyway as the desk where the smoke floated up toward the ceiling some bounced off and most of it disappeared most of it she would sing what she thought until he rearranged it into the dimensions of his aloofness her tongue recoiled from her glass not to linger again while her music covered by his sweating body squeezing her lids to destroy it in the only way to be preserved away from his reordering a knack for getting things out of order getting away walking away away away your eyes told me to tell you to tell her that her eyes your eyes told me already and that's why it's been so long since getting away walking away sidewalk for walking away is not here right now just leave a voice she did he did and they never seemed to they may have seemed for a lot of seeming and so it went and she went and he went she held her hands and held her whatever you want to call them because you are not listening anyway as the desk where the smoke floated up toward the ceiling some bounced off and most of it disappeared most of it.


- Max Stoltenberg

Monday, January 6, 2014

END OF STORY

Picking picking at cardboard sides missing sides see through box might have had fish little fish in little bodies of fish turned on their sides turned on its side leaning towards death leaning in death not even a box picking picking at cardboard sides missing sides flaps flimsy flaps setting one's mind on a bit of flimsy before pickings became even flimsier and they have not had a shortage of flimsy flaps thinned and dried up down to the passages underneath tubes cardboard tubes cardboard wrapped around nothing just designed into itself and stuck sticking together for flaps now flimsy flaps before pickings became even flimsier picking picking at cardboard sides missing sides see through box might have had fish little fish in little bodies of fish turned on their sides turned on its side leaning towards death leaning in death.

Rabid
Is it that the swing
Hands on 
the choking feeling
just a clearing of efforts
born with holes in them
went through them 
anyway
the holes
went through with the holes
asses they were
went through them
run right through you
who are
it starts again
it starts with a burst tumor

Was still is a landing platform road stretch of Earth it doesn't stretch it sits there on its rump and its blemishes of highs and lows was still is high was low was high still is high sort of a not as if running at the stickers are not doing a very good job of staying on were at one point was still is a landing platform road stretch of Earth it doesn't stretch it sits there on its frets and rummages about in cans twisted by now cut hands cut off long while ago and that has been that cold bricks heated by the inferno over our heads where have the roofs gone off to taking some kind of time off of so many hands hands draped over shelves split in half by fallen grunts spitting pits of not going to make it say a tangled climb onto a ledge drummed into preparations for crushing into shrugs gestures powdery enough to be asked to leave with the next backhanded gust.

"Where did you see him?  And what did you say he looked like?"
"One at a time for shit's sake."
"You spotted several and they were taking a crap?"
"No, you buffoon you post-luminescent moron.  I meant one at a time with the questions with the steps the sequence."
"All right if you want me to pinch the conversation between my thumb and forefinger I can do that.  Where did you see him?"
"By a fence I think."
"What kind of fence?"
"A chain link fence."
"And where was this chain link fence?"
"Somewhere not near here."
"Can you be more specific?"
"I think I could have possibly seen some metal fragments resembling car parts around there."
"Car parts? Are you sure? Why didn't you tell me?"
"It just resurfaced. If you like I can flush again."
"And what's with this one at a time thing anyway when you don't seem to have any problem with composing two insults in a single breath."
"Almost yields a hint of tearful residue in these bloodless eyes when I think that I used to be able to square off and fire 3 and sometimes even 4 at a time."
"Car parts are certainly better than running into a person."
"The only downside was that if I could get 4 insults out I'd more than likely get the hiccups."

Fading slow
There are more missing pieces
Less to see
Less light
And that is almost even
with pulling your
underwear out of your crack
not yours mine
not mine yours
can't keep anything
straight anymore
you always said
I never touched you

"When I grind my teeth long enough I can erase entire cabinets of thoughts in my head."
"Did you say that?"
"What I was just saying about my teeth?"
"No, less light."
"It is getting dark."
"I've always preferred less light until I see it can get darker."
"I can only summon the stars when my head reverberates with pain afterwards. That pain doing away with before."
"14."
"On a scale of 1 to 10 I would rank it a 14."
"No the person I saw.  They had a number 14."
"Where did they have the number 14?"
"By the fence."
"Where on their person was the number?"
"It was on the front of a wool cap they were wearing."
"Did it look like there was something more that might have worn away or fallen off?"
"Just a big number 14."
"Just that and nothing else?  Weird."
"Big and right on the front of their wool cap."
"His wool cap."
"I'm not sure."
"I thought you said you saw a man."
"No, I didn't."
"Then why didn't you correct me when I asked where you saw him?"
"I'm trying."
"You're trying what?"
"I'm trying to figure out what sort of problem I'm having."
"You never mentioned if you said anything to her."
"Because I didn't."
"Why didn't you say anything to her?"
"How could I when she couldn't put it any plainer?"
"What did she say to you?"
"She didn't have to say anything.  It was the look she had as she passed by that fence and then passed on by me.  She seemed to be saying to me you see this fence this thing that barely counts as one side of anything that can't even begin to close in any bounded space I'm looking back only long enough for you to see this face this mouth that was so soft for hard things now tied into a knot I'm looking back only long enough for you to see that and so I can turn away and not see what you'll spill on the Earth behind me."
"All that from her not even saying a word."
"I don't know what threw me off. I was instead going to mention the marks on her arm and try to deduce what type of animal might have inflicted it."
"And you said nothing to her.  You remained silent in her presence."
"What presence?  She passed through that dismal space with a certain something that didn't even qualify as something. It could only be called ephemeral."
"You made it sound as if it was much more than that."
"Then I remembered when we used to tell each other about all the deaths due to animals and in what manner."
"When there were animals."
"We've gotten out of practice.  I used to make a sound and you would have a guess at what could have made it."
"And you said nothing to her.  Didn't even get a name.  Just a fucking number 14."
"Right on the front of their wool cap."
"His wool cap."
"Just a big number 14."
"Just that and nothing else. Weird."

Was still is a landing platform road stretch of Earth it doesn't stretch it sits there on its rump and its blemishes of highs and lows was still is high was low was high still is high sort of a not as if running at the stickers are not doing a very good job of staying on were at one point was still is a landing platform road stretch of Earth it doesn't stretch it sits there on its frets and rummages about in cans twisted by now cut hands cut off long while ago and that has been that cold bricks heated by the inferno over our heads where have the roofs gone off to taking some kind of time off of so many hands hands draped over shelves split in half by fallen grunts spitting pits of not going to make it say a tangled climb onto a ledge drummed into preparations for crushing into shrugs gestures powdery enough to be asked to leave with the next backhanded gust.


- Max Stoltenberg