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The difference between large and larger is how much pain I inflict on myself the difference between small and smaller is how much I avoid keep my hands still and watch them both come down again and again they like to show it with an a cappella chorus of "Oh, shit!" The workbooks were used with all the answers in them 9 out of 10 problems 8 out of 10 problems 7 out of 10 why did I get these? phony ketchup nowadays chocolate syrup missed the milk went bad anyway missed the chunks that hit the nostrils swish for a nausea riding a dead cow manure on the panel trying to get the last word in before the commercial dropping something in the kitchen smearing the black syrup car leaking into the house on the neighborhood plenty of complaints making paper pushing it simple enough to have a complex my very own slice of the run over animal ran over walked as slow as I could to drag it out my showing up in this life is contingent on my making it for the last 5 minutes.
"505 to 506."
"Go ahead."
"505 to 506."
"Go ahead."
"Disregard."
The nanny idea was aborted not in time anyway sweat vaporized into the already hot air didn't want to say say to this look anything about her face reflected in her face this look anything about this say to this to say say to this didn't want to say didn't want hot air already your water is boiling the bottom the underside of the cabinets steamed up about things things having to do or not having to do with the nanny idea was aborted not in time tried to what negotiate? was that what it was legs folded under her face reflected in her face folded into the couch what do they call that what do they call this in her face this?
Eyes close into each other pressed into the top of a fist leaning on a fist for broken friendship is that what this was what they call it? Was it did we call it friendship is that what it was? Whatever it was we called it broken used that a lot broken this broken that broken people they complained about them but liked them that way easier to open and have other holes to poke and fill with themselves intersubjectivity my ass he dumped some of the pills but took enough enough to rid himself of the disease of life eyes close into each other pressed into the top of a fist leaning on a fist for broken friendship left out a letter omitted a response the one where it becomes apparent that it doesn't matter which is left out took enough to rid herself of just a fraction enough for a theme that tears everything apart enough enough to penetrate and separate her a little more a lot more eyes close into each other.
"505 to 506."
"Go ahead."
"505 to 506."
"Go ahead."
"Disregard."
He called to him to come out of hiding what to talk about who knew he called to him and there were the usual excuses bailing out this loved one and that not so loved one looking up backgrounds and the interruptions of viruses. Can't put her back together anymore she'll just have to do it herself no points no weapons lose everything with each death died so frequently moving around has lost its blur for a sharpness a definition high with manic clarity walked briefly across a bridge between tabs until one closed and fell through my head as the voice inside split across the brain into tomorrow and yesterday these hands have become useless can't even rip junk mail not even a beginning cut following the causality to the lower levels of others only between is where they lead to the spaces of their avoiding me walk away and follow closely behind them or pretend to sniff behind their ankles heels just heels lifting them out of what they stepped in leaving what they're leaving more gaps for me to pause and forget and hesitate to answer hesitate to act gaps and the interruptions of viruses.
"Are you ignoring me?"
"You're jumping to conclusions."
"I like jumping to conclusions. It's the only exercise I get these days."
"When I was a child and my parents would take me to visit my cousins they had one of those upright pianos against the wall and under a picture that was very grey and looked like a boardwalk that appeared to go to the edge of the ocean except that there was nothing beyond the boardwalk no sea no sky just grey it almost matched the boardwalk except there was enough contrast in the boardwalk just enough to let you know there was nothing after the last step nothing and I would lift the lid on the piano and I would make up notes and press them softly and wait to listen to them fade into nothing until one of the adults would come up behind me and say, I think we've had enough. I would sit there with my ears burning with the dissonance of silence and their words echoing in it and banging against it and pivot on that bench and swing my legs around to walk back along the boardwalk into the never enough that held my hesitation in place between the planks of every return trip."
The difference between large and larger is how much pain I inflict on myself the difference between small and smaller is how much I avoid keep my hands still and watch them both come down again and again they like to show it with an a cappella chorus of "Oh, shit!" The workbooks were used with all the answers in them 9 out of 10 problems 8 out of 10 problems 7 out of 10 why did I get these? phony ketchup nowadays chocolate syrup missed the milk went bad anyway missed the chunks that hit the nostrils swish for a nausea riding a dead cow manure on the panel trying to get the last word in before the commercial dropping something in the kitchen smearing the black syrup car leaking into the house on the neighborhood plenty of complaints making paper pushing it simple enough to have a complex my very own slice of the run over animal ran over walked as slow as I could to drag it out my showing up in this life is contingent on my making it for the last 5 minutes.
- Max Stoltenberg
The hammer was on the ground next to a grave that had been dug with the back end of it. The digger sat down next to an empty cardboard box looking around it to see if the hammer was still there and waited for the stomach pain to subside. And the stomach pain continued on in keeping with its resolve. The things remained where they were unless rubbed by the weather until more choices among them the choices of words stirred them up into an internal dance of motionlessness.
arrows do not actually move
tell the hearts they pierce
that
with all the moving around
of which parts matter
at the time of entry
we leave them alone
and bother each other
instead
nothing moves
not really
after all the collisions
spaces for the margins
of existence
poetry retreats
from the margins of books
Get up get up get out of there it's not that deep I regret having said hello again and again during those earlier times I saw you I see you now I see your predicament and now I am blind I've lost my sense of the dimensions I should talk right maybe I shouldn't as the dimensions come pooling back shitting out like diarrhea in the dark corner of my mind goodbye says shut the fuck up while the marks of getting up and getting out wander away into it out of it get up get up get out of there it's not that deep I regret having said having said having anything at all said ripped from the room whipped like a plaque stuck the wall of forgotten expiration dating matched paired up like tangled cord behind and under the desk where asses bang heads into fake wood screwed together adhering to nonsense having nonsense come out with the afterbirth after it was too late out in the open where tree branches drop leaves coming a long way for bark cold bark of smelling the cut of hurt thumbs part to push up the wound bulging with ignored questions they're they're going on to something else too late out in the open where tree branches drop leaves coming a long way for bark cold bark.
"I can't remember what we were we talking about?"
"You're doing this again because you don't want to discuss it."
"How can I? All I get is did it have to do with I'm not even getting that."
"Are you seriously going to swipe everything off the counter of our conversation and into the hole of your coma?"
"No no I'm not. This is the coma."
"Do something else with your arm like getting it stuck in a lathe?"
"I don't know what I've been drinking."
"The house is surrounded."
"House?"
"The building the building is surrounded."
"Someone is going out to talk to them."
"You don't have to do this."
"What? Make shit up?"
"No I mean go out to talk to them."
"I wasn't going to go out to talk to them."
"I'm asking you to reconsider in short this could be this is an opportunity to be the roundabout in the circular argument that can finally be employed to bolster the weaker passages through the woods through the nothing but arid spaces you know you've always known what needs to be said to them now go I'm asking you to reconsider."
"Being employed isn't what it used to be."
"Now you're just making excuses. It's understandable you have your doubts and what day like today that arrives at last today on this today without it being put off until today without doubts?"
"What I'm getting at is that that someone is already wrapping up out there."
"You've missed it I tell you a bonehead for chiseling at the hands of the mob. You had your chance the chance and allowed the thin conduit available to you to them to fill with dirt desert dirt."
"Wasn't I the one who said existence is the narrow course between the runs and constipation?"
"That was said by the woman in the camouflage shorts in that awful joke you told the night you couldn't stop vomiting."
"So I did say it."
"You claimed it was inspired by some friend of yours who shared a similar joke that was actually quite different and even more tasteless with its gory details of old lady bridge players interrupting their bidding and play from the dummy with the presentation of sex organs found stuffed in brass instruments."
"I don't find your line of reasoning persuasive in the least. A slathering of the macabre is no different than the surgical mask covering a physician's alternating smirks and expressions of disgust."
"You had your shot."
"We keep changing the angle and missing a vein."
We've been out of the woods for too long and look for a canopy in the waste the quench has lost its way in the back of our throats to trip over itself and cough we choke ourselves into tears without the emptying of a sorrow that never comes only escapes with our euphemisms and chairs stacked in the back of our minds standing with our faces turned away from the table under the cracked glass spilling unpleasing water trickling towards a smashed bug its surface tension cannot lift its crushed its crushed while all the while we've been out of the woods for too long and look for a canopy in the waste.
- Max Stoltenberg
The danger of it hovered the head the back of the head one of the shoulders sounded familiar like a script like a repeated meeting of things that didn't belong together and yet kept bumping into each other heard that one with the ear in the tall plastic cup with the design scratched out most of it scratched with some utensil some writing utensil had those removed at least that's what the dress the wrinkled dress told me and laughed now that wasn't good was it? was it? used the last tissue from the box the last box from the last time she disappeared when she looked looked like she was looking and I as I looked right at her looked as if I was looking right at her she disappeared without moving nothing moving about that that feeling that sensation of danger the danger of it hovered and perhaps another visit to the closet would settle this at least just this one time in the closet balled up in a corner and listening to the sounds orbiting around the corner I was in this corner of done for things this corner of had my chance and I never made swing at it many times too many times for this feeble memory of whose was it again the danger of it
hovered
"You're exaggerating."
"Of course I am exaggerating."
"I can tell ask me how I can tell, Stamen."
"Stamen? Isn't that part of a plant?"
"It's a good name. Now ask me how I can tell."
"That is the genitals is it not?"
"You're not going to ask me are you?"
"Why would you name me after plant genitals?"
"Not you. This guy I used to work with in another building. They actually let us use tools there? Remember those? You probably don't."
"Why would you name me after him? Did he walk funny?"
"I'm just pretending you're him for the rest of the day. You probably won't remember what we're saying after you take your next shit."
"Is it because he dropped things or only read the first couple of sentences in every email he got?"
"This will all be falling out of your ass momentarily."
"Is it because he would foul up what he thought were profound quotes or the air at large?"
"Just for the rest of the day. Until he died."
"How did he die?"
"In the desert."
"Exposure?"
"Dead end job."
"I use less contractions when I exaggerate."
"There was this plastic snake that had two heads and the one plastic snake head said to the other: Help me to launch an all out attack on the rear. I think there is another head back there that could make trouble for the two of us. And the other plastic snake head replied: Ask me how I can tell that is a dumb ass idea. And what do you think the other plastic snake head said?"
"I use less contractions when I exaggerate."
"I am not being that overt you glued shut ass crack. The other plastic snake head didn't say anything because the little girl whose toy it was came along pulled it apart into its segments and put it away in a drawer."
"And what does that have to do with anything?"
"There was this stapler on a diving board in the desert."
scratched out most of it scratched with some utensil some writing utensil had those removed at least that's what the dress the wrinkled dress told me and laughed now that wasn't good was it? was it? used the last tissue from the box the last box from the last time she disappeared when she looked looked like she was looking and I as I looked right at her looked as if I was looking right at her she disappeared without moving nothing moving about that.
"I see a face."
"Where?"
"In the cloud next to that creepy tree."
"Which creepy tree? They all look creepy."
"In the middle of this cloud here next to this creepy tree here."
"This cloud here?"
"Yes that one. Doesn't that look like a face to you?"
"Where you see faces I see clouds that withhold their rain."
What she had tumbling about in her head she did not want to put through another cycle wetting the towel is as far as she rubbing the sleep out of her glasses the town did not sit well on her stomach or any other part for that matter could not be destroyed but a voice was plucked out and hung over the fence looking over its shoulder this this doing of this out of context what should we call it she many times called him out of context speaking from the middle of his sentences trying out what trying on another as she walked away to come back with a beginning and end maybe that's what she went to get or find we'll just sit here until look for a place to sit until.
- Max Stoltenberg
It was the dawn of another disappointment pains in the body blood in the mouth spat into the sink and swished around thoughts to be discarded and brought back up with the plunger of memory alas what a shitty instrument to have about convincing the torn paper with nonsense on it anyway that it cleaned something that filled and emptied and refilled with shit like this mind point with this finger to this head here. Pull back to a coffin merging with a corner filled with grounds for dismissal dad doesn't like the entry again what we're saying being said the sides of the hurting head pump into the other side of the glass where blurry faces mumble colors to number stapled to questionnaires don't mention the part of the having trouble breathing when you talk no position whatever they offer won't slow won't thin out the heavy breathing don't tap for too long and then the broken record this should have been engraved a broken record that's what it always sounded like still sounds like when it's played back pulled back to a coffin merging with a corner filled with grounds for dismissal dad doesn't like the entry again what we're saying being said the sides of the hurting head pump into the other side of the glass where blurry faces what is that smell building up in my mouth it must be my words making me sick point with this finger to this head here.
The office was abandoned the air almost rid of the stench of people their chairs venting what their asses left behind food left in the refrigerator for weeks fuck the air upside down sunglasses that had been thrown on the desk pushing a paper clip through a hole for plugs cables someone pushed their chair back to look under the desk to see where the paper clip had fallen.
"What's wrong with you?"
"I'm sad."
"No, what's wrong with you?"
No don't get up where are you going? I hate it when someone walks away from a conversation and doesn't want to face it what I'm saying what I'm asking turning it off won't work this going on without you if you have to be dragged all the way through your walking away little person little knot twisted in on itself little rubber plastic end of the balloon of this little twisted end trying to tie this off this is on and will stay on until I say it is over and done with until I say later for you little twisted balloon end nobody come back here from down the hall you can hear me on the inside of the other end of the building.
"What's wrong with you?"
"I'm sad."
"No, what's wrong with you?"
"I'm sad, I tell you."
"There is something very wrong with you."
"Sad is the fucking shittiest way to describe it."
"You do have a shitty way of describing things. Stop describing and admit you're weak. I just figured it out. That's what's wrong with you. You're weak."
"I'm sad and weak."
"And not as good as you think."
"I've rarely thought that I was good enough."
"And you like to slap that victim card noisily on the table."
"Right after I eat my own waste."
"You're proving my point."
"That's why I was brought into this world to prove someone else's point. I have been stuck on a spike and you jerk it around and make me say whatever it is you want me to say."
"Shut the fuck up."
"First you have to shut the fuck up. Do you hear that? Coming from the break room. Someone's probably taking what doesn't belong to them again. They look at your food and see your name on it and take it anyway."
"There's nobody in the break room."
"They found a way out. I haven't yet. More than likely I'll be going out as ashes inside a coffee can."
Paralyzed arguments squirm around
Flail their gassy defensiveness
Don't have a leg to stand on
That hasn't stopped the beating
of a chest of drawers
deposed stack of experiences
remember the way she warmed
the shitter for you
both of you
plugging up holes
stopping
so much desert
room for the vapid
in all directions
spin yourself and fall
that way
The fly swatter itches with dirty blank stares pouring into them what's left over and recycled there was a manner in which it could be but not now maybe not tomorrow nothing will do it not a movie not a book not a carving not a slicing not a hearing not a voice not a smashing not a sound the fly swatter itches with dirty blank stares pouring into them what's left over and recycled used and reused mop water there was a manner in which it could be but not now maybe not tomorrow nothing will do it not a movie not a book not a carving not a slicing not a hearing not a voice not a smashing not a sound not a sound.
- Max Stoltenberg
Shoulders sore blades itch decisions seep into the sheets pillows soaked with thoughts tangled into re-charger cables still interested? still interested throat clearings is about the most of it developing into nothing more than getting up to go to the can passing by the handle pull on it and see if it is still even there even there still interested? most use gotten out of it amounted to underwear that had seen its last dump dropped into the waste basket in the bathroom those plastic clips don't do what they're supposed to do that sounds like a voice singing a tune thought it had a voice in it and now it is more like a droning of the neighborhood a droning is more than a voice now less than a catastrophe and that brings it back to this issue of suicide hanging in there again would think hanging really hanging could make what actually cares about living you know rise to the occasion and then give it up and be dead but but there is has been this not doing that and hanging in there with a neck sticking itself out you know rise to the occasion someone else's thing waving it about excuse you put that back that brings it back to this issue of a droning of the neighborhood what do they have under there a dried out bag on the sidewalk they put that dropped it into the trash thought they did and it felt somewhere back there and I still can't bring myself to end it hanging in there for eyes mouths ears that listen to something else and haven't missed a thing just don't feel like it and refuse to answer just like I never did only once and that was the end of it the only end I could bring myself to got myself into under the roof with them out from under it just enough under the gutter dug them out and threw them down to me what the skies mixed with where we lived a mess of ingredients for getting into my eyes mouth that listen to someone else until my responses my attempts at reflections end up more like a drone of the neighborhood and that was the end I could bring myself to got myself into under the roof with them.
"I don't want to talk about it."
"You don't have to if you don't want to."
"What do you mean if?"
"Since I meant since."
"But you said if."
"It was an accident and don't say there aren't any."
"I wasn't going to. At least I'm not one to say if when I meant since."
"I'm sure you've mixed words up many times."
"Of course I've mixed words up. It's commonly referred to as communication."
"You know what I mean."
"Apparently not."
The bottle was empty their bottle was empty the one they had been sharing and the startling thing or not so startling thing as they somehow managed to remain a thing or became more of a thing each of them more an item scribbling that smudged on the back of a plastic card none left as they thinned them out their words to each other like planers shaving away the sides of their frames of reference both of them knew that they had both forgotten who had drank the last amount and yet both insisted that the other knew that the other was in denial and took turns blaming themselves that's how it went when the man who taught the self-defense class for women went home and put his hands around his wife's neck and saw in her eyes how his laptop crashed right in the middle of his latest first person shooter. Temptations to open close open another tab ran up his tab in the bar downstairs down the street if it had been down the street he might have turned down that alley that to the used bookstore down the steps where the old woman in the trenchcoat would piss. One would walk carefully down the steps or not remember and stare at the drain in the concrete in the corner the dark corner across from the steps and not put it together not put anything together.
"Are you still planning your suicide?"
"Planning? Planning. I'm beginning to make my approach over the idea that it might be better not to plan it and do it on a whim so that it serves two purposes."
"The only reason I'm asking is to pretend that I give a crap."
"So I take it that you don't want to know about the two purposes that it might serve?"
"It does make me wonder why something to be done to confirm the purposelessness of life would serve not only a purpose but twice as many."
"One: it is not planned so there is less chance of objection or backing out and two: it reflects the lack of planning involved that characterizes my life."
"More planning goes into avoiding having to make a plan."
"And then you take this as your cue to go on about how skepticism enters in only because it emerges in the context of what we do know about the world."
"You're talking about incredulity."
"Only when I encounter the fuckhead in the house next door. Can't even rely on my backyard. I sit there with my ass in the dirt looking through a chain-link fence. A see through wall vulnerable to other encounters and social interaction that makes my brain fall into my mouth and choke on my thoughts that's how responses get stuck you know."
"You need to let your neighbor be someone to challenge your ideas about things."
"They already do that. My neighbor blocks my view of the waste of the world."
Saw something the other day shoes that's what was seen the other day the other day what was seen was shoes they are still shining shoes that's what was seen the other day.
The bottle was empty their bottle was empty the one they had been sharing and the startling thing or not so startling thing as they somehow managed to remain a thing or became more of a thing each of them more an item scribbling that smudged on the back of a plastic card none left as they thinned them out their words to each other like planers shaving away the sides of their frames of reference both of them knew that they had both forgotten who had drank the last amount and yet both insisted that the other knew that the other was in denial and took turns blaming themselves that's how it went.
"It was an accident and don't say there aren't any."
"I wasn't going to. At least I'm not one to say if when I meant since."
"I'm sure you've mixed words up many times."
"Of course I've mixed words up. It's commonly referred to as communication."
"You know what I mean."
"Apparently not."
Temptations to open close open another tab ran up his tab in the bar downstairs down the street if it had been down the street he might have turned down that alley that to the used bookstore down the steps where the old woman in the trenchcoat would piss. One would walk carefully down the steps or not remember and stare at the drain in the concrete in the corner the dark corner across from the steps and not put it together not put anything together.
- Max Stoltenberg
Late in the night early in the morning darkness blankets it all for the coffin of ideas snoozing and coughing back awake not quite but late for breakfast and more hot grease in your veins ear lobes raised to the ceiling where they smash into blocked eavesdropping all the floor you plummet to in desperate anguished flossing that snaps the strings attached to every word you stir in the bowl that won't flush you won't flush to keep the ground from getting shit on oh wait like that hasn't happened before overflowing toilets happen brimming with excitement that kind that makes you declare, "Oh, shit!" to an audience packed into your musings your lips are moving ever so still but if you listen carefully or in case you missed just in case you missed it the echoing in the bathroom is you coming out of one hole or another in your body sprung a leak your father did into your mother who sprung a leak and here you are draining away into a bowl that's overflowing and leaking into the bedroom where you have to wait for it to maintain some sense of not being so wet and not smelling too bad before going to sleep and then you sprain your neck looking up at the clock that reminds you how late in the night early in the morning darkness blankets it all for the coffin of ideas.
- Max Stoltenberg
In the back was where they still sat as the time clock conveyed them from town and from out of town in the back was where they still sat as the time clock conveyed them as they sat on their objections thumbs plugging up their bitterness their murkier chambers for inconsolable arrhythmia thumbs up jammed in the direction of the betrayed secrets of the disheartened. The autosave is fucked up and another crash strains tongues through cuffs of shattered glass. Normally wouldn't mind when waking from forgotten dreams dissolved in the acid of thoughtlessness another headache slept on the left slept on the right didn't matter again the ibuprofen isn't where it's supposed to be it suppositions of nauseous setting of the Sun. Brought this on ourselves did we trapdoor clerks spilling out the bottom of the building's ass.
"What is that beeping?"
"The fries are burning?"
"We are the fries. Is someone's hard drive broken?"
"Did the administrator forget she left a call on hold?"
Graphic calendars you think you're going to tell me what you think we went out we went back in and we're stuck hearing about the day and what it could be somewhere else and it doesn't matter because we're stuck inside hearing the same things over and over again and there was standing on tables and crawling under pews sliding along the floor pulling ourselves up to that spot that very spot where we stand and get stuck where graphic calendars fall from the balcony poured down by the overweight dissatisfaction of doing what you resent and there is absolutely no way out of it and the gory positive attitude's blade is turning in our backs holding us in place graphic calendars you think you're going to tell me tell us all what you think what we think out we went back in and we're stuck hearing about the day and what it could be somewhere else and it doesn't matter because we're stuck inside hearing the same things over and over again and there was standing on tables and crawling under pews sliding along the floor pulling ourselves up to that spot that very spot where we stand and get stuck where graphic calendars fall from the balcony poured down by the overweight dissatisfaction of doing what you resent and there is absolutely no way out of it.
"What was I doing in here?"
"Are you the one who broke the picture frame?"
"Came in here for something."
"Stumbled into or out of the obvious have you?"
"The obvious? I've been bringing down the Earth's value since I was born."
"I gather you're going to claim it was the slamming of a door that led to the broken picture frame."
"'Twas the infinite regress that led to the slamming of a door."
"Says you," they quipped as they dug at an actual substance on the keyboard and ended up typing the letter J 28 or 29 times.
"The infinite regress keeps me flapping my gums."
"The three-bumped block."
"The what?"
"The lego the one with three connectors on top a sixer cut in half. You think a kid running with scissors is bad."
"I do think they're quite bad."
"A kid wielding scissors cutting one in half. Have you seen what it does to the underside warped under there that's me."
"Are you trying to get out of doing even less work by not having to operate scissors?"
"No I'm warped."
"Always suspected you were. Your underside is warped?"
"Now is the perfect time to mock me."
"And I haven't worn a watch in a spell a little past half of forever."
"You should then move on to puncturing me with receipt holder spikes."
"Have you ever looked at your personnel file?"
"Then dump my bleeding body into the incinerator."
"It doesn't matter if you're too disinterested to ask as you would put it there's nothing in there."
"My inflamed horrorshow mortal remains end up getting jammed in the shaft and you would be obliged to harpoon me down with a broom handle."
"That's because they know they know all the time I've wasted and that's why they hired me."
"You can't divide forever in half. It wouldn't be forever if you could."
"Or this is all about their critique of my theory of knowledge."
"I didn't think you had a theory."
"Neither did I until I sat here one day and noticed I was getting ink from my signature stamp all over my papers and desk and my clothes put too much into it I guess didn't want my stamping to fade as quickly as it had before and I knew it had to be from now on keeping this world in the window a small flat circle there from such a distance but there so I was aware of what I had checked out of into my spectator theory of knowledge never could get used to the sound of my own voice could have been a bark or a chirp the shrieking death of a rabbit for vanity the dark implicating stains of ink on my pants called out to me in the ink of my signature in the alien groan of another unfamiliar recording bad aim of the knife slitting the throat of theory draining the blood out into a hollow purity choking on the emptiness of nothing but theory."
The prospect of staying late they peeked past each other around the corners of stacks of documents the heat of desert darkness encroached on the walls of the office one of them told the other a short story a former employee had told them of Whistler's Orchestra a short piece in 8 paragraphs of which 5 had been lost and only half of one paragraph poorly reconstructed or so it felt that way at least to the one telling the other would have insisted this to be the case even though the other's disagreement with this opinion would soon follow. The teller of the former employee's shorter short story visited the bathroom prior to starting in order to avoid any more ruined pants in a likewise interrupted and already butchered abridgment. He told of how a former employee in the cafeteria told him about the motley crew of eldest born teens who had walked off into the waste and came upon a building once a library that had been turned into a mausoleum abandoned to become a makeshift concert hall and then a fast food establishment that had burned to the ground. One of the adolescents spoke after a long silence standing around blackened walls the shortest said that her parents had taken her and her brother to see an orchestra perform and instead was tormented by a large puddle of folding chairs filled with people who put their lips together and fifed large logs of annoyance none of them seemed the least bit invested in putting a point on to let fall and splat on the stage from between their legs to end the wheezing and skirling. She recounted how she and her brother walked out and drifted through a nearby park that had been ripped by a succession of messy storms and her brother sat down by a hole where one of the biggest trees used to grow and asked her to tell him one of the bedtime stories she made up for him when he was younger maybe she would remember the one about the duck who was an aging knight fighting his last battle where his bill was cracked off from his head and as Sir Quack lay dying on the field he saw his bloody and dented helmet and then moved his eyes ever so slightly to look upon his bill open with the melting voice of his killer.
Graphic calendars you think you're going to tell me what you think we went out we went back in and we're stuck hearing about the day and what it could be somewhere else and it doesn't matter because we're stuck inside hearing the same things over and over again and there was standing on tables and crawling under pews sliding along the floor pulling ourselves up to that spot that very spot where we stand and get stuck where graphic calendars fall from the balcony poured down by the overweight dissatisfaction of doing what you resent and there is absolutely no way out of it and the gory positive attitude's blade is turning in our backs holding us in place graphic calendars you think you're going to tell me tell us all what you think what we think out we went back in and we're stuck hearing about the day and what it could be somewhere else and it doesn't matter because we're stuck inside hearing the same things over and over again and there was standing on tables and crawling under pews sliding along the floor pulling ourselves up to that spot that very spot where we stand and get stuck where graphic calendars fall from the balcony poured down by the overweight dissatisfaction of doing what you resent and there is absolutely no way out of it.
- Max Stoltenberg
