Othello Tree (Story 2)

    “The Othello Tree”

            The serene red and orange sky in the background set an illuminating and silhouetting effect on the tree that stood on top of the hill. Almost nobody knew it existed, and yet almost everybody had decided to name it “The Tree”. When approaching the tree from the hill’s already elevated side (from the city towards the valley), all you would see past the tree was the valley, almost eternal, and somewhere in the background you could see (if you looked hard enough) that the valley was surrounded by mountains. The hill went down only on one side, the one that went into the valley. It went down that side, past the tree, bending symmetrically at different but even parts, so that if you were coming from the city toward the valley, you felt like you were looking into God’s mouth and onto God’s tongue. The valley was shaped like a curled tongue, even on both sides, right and left. It seemed to not have an end when looking down from the city. “The Tree” stood there, on the tip of tongue, like a thumbtack. When walking towards the city and up the hill from the valley the tree simply disappeared, all you saw was the hill and behind it the giant skyscrapers. Nobody knew the tree existed, because everyone was always going up towards the city.

            I first saw the tree, when I bothered to stop looking. After I had spent my entire life looking for something like the tree in the city, I found it outside of the city. I didn’t see it until started walking toward it. With the city at my back, I looked towards the valley and the tree in awe. The symmetry of the valley was mesmerizing, and I used its symmetry to approach the tree, like someone would use a parabola to find the x-axis that intercepts it evenly. Walking directly towards the tree, along the axis, kept the tree from disappearing. I walked in a line, keeping the valley in the background even on both sides. I finally approached the tree and found no footsteps. I could tell no one had seen this tree in ages.

            The tree was incredibly thick and gigantic, but wire thin at the same time. It was as tall as the heavens and yet I could reach the top. It was metallic and natural. The tree held no leaves, but many branches, that held on them white and black fruit. For every white fruit on the tree the was a black fruit. There was an even number of each. The white and black fruit where connected to each other and formed sets. One set held one white and one black fruit. These two fruits were connected to each other and to the tree like a weight system. Each set had three endings. One ending connected to and lead towards the tree and the other two held the two fruits of that set. Each set spun around the branch connected to the tree. The white and the black fruit on each set were even and thus propelled the set to spin together with there equivocation. If a white fruit fell of the tree, the set it fell off would stop spinning, until a new white fruit grew on that set, of equal size to the black fruit which remained on it. Sometimes a set was connected directly to the trunk of the tree or its main branches. Sometimes more then one set was connected via a system. If this was the case, then two sets acted like a bigger set. Each set then acted like a fruit, without losing the fruit already on the set. Sometimes one set would toss part of itself to another set. This made the tree kind of like a giant machine run by perpetual and even motions.

            On every fruit was a word, or an image, or an idea. Each set contained two opposing such inscriptions, one on each of its fruits. One set for instance had “pain” written down on one fruit and “pleasure” on the other. However, because the tree worked like a machine, it was not a simple correlation. At one moment pain was written on the black fruit, and pleasure on the white fruit. Then the machine spun its cycles, tossed its fruit, and did its job. If you stopped the tree again, at a random time, you could find that pain was now written on the white fruit and pleasure on the black. At any given time there was an even chance on stumbling across either phenomenon.

            There was no definite answer it seemed while looking at the sets, as nothing was ever constant. However when you looked at the tree you could see the was one ultimate icon-centric constant, called “The Tree”. 

            There was one more thing in the valley nobody saw. To see this thing you had to first gaze at the tree. When you had gazed at it for long enough your eyes were free to see this other thing which was a tall shadowy figure with a spotlight projector and projections, somewhere in the valley. He was the tree’s opposite, just like the white fruit was the opposite of the black fruit, just like pain was the opposite of pleasure, just like the left and right sides of the valley were opposites, and just like tree’s size and visibility were opposites. The tree represented truth and freedom; the figure represented lies and bondage. He stood with his back to valley looking towards the city, and lit the projector toward into the city.

            It was only then, I realized the city never existed; it was just mere projection, of the shadowy figure’s deceit. Every little thing that I thought had happened to me before was just a mere slide change in the lie that the figure had made. The people inside of the city were both real and completely fake; just like the fruit on the tree was both white and black. The figure was trying to block out the sight of the tree using his projections. This made sure that only those who ignored his projections, and walked down the symmetrical axis of truth saw the tree. Likewise it seemed that the tree was putting out the figure. He seemed as afraid of it, like it should have been of him.

            I had to stop this man, this manipulator of the universe. I had to destroy him, with the only thing he was afraid of. I started to shake the tree.

            Like a spring the tree shook, back and forth, catapulting all its fruits back into the valley. The figure realizing his doom turned of his projector, and ran away towards the valley. The city disappeared. As he ran the fruit fell like rain into the valley, until the valley became a giant “Othello” board and the fruit the pieces. The people emerged from the forgotten city in awe and cheered. I stood on one side of the board, with the people behind me, he stood on the other. We each grabbed a fruit off the ground and began to play. I was black, he was white; then I was white, he was black. We played for ages, nobody winning. I kept honest, but the figure stood up and retrieved his projector. He turned the projector on the board and all the pieces turned to his likening. He grinned and in a instance the board like a wave was turning his color. The wave of loss kept coming toward me. I held in my hand my final fruit. I closed my eyes, I saw the tree. I meditated, and with my eyes closed I saw the one spot on the tree and in the valley where I could throw my piece. I threw it, it landed with a thud. The wave stoped. A moment passed as the valley considered my move. Then slowly the whole board turned my color, I had won.

            The shadowy figure disappeared as if he was never there, like the night disappears with the coming of sunlight. The fruit pieces stood up from their valley board bowed to me and returned back onto the tree. The people and I now stood in a giant eternal valley on all sides symmetrical. Where skyscrapers once stood now stood the other side of the valley. In the smack middle of valley was one hill with one tree. The people started asking questions and I started replying, but my answers puzzled them, for they had not come to the tree on their own. My answers, since I had looked at the tree were far more advanced the anything they were ready to hear. The people, naturally curious wanted me to explain it to them in a way they could understand.

One of them took the shadow figure’s projector and asked me to use it to show them the answer in a 

language they were accustomed to see. I took the projector and started to explain, while the people were 

giving me their full attention. The more I explained, the harder the people looked until they looked past me 

onto the projections. The harder they looked toward me the taller I got. The taller I got, the shorter the tree 

got next to me. I started to become dark and shadowy, and the tree though diminishing started to bring me 

discomfort with its illuminating lightness. I aimed my projector at the tree, drunk with the power I was given, 

until it disappeared from my view, and behind it re-appeared the illusion of the city. The people bowed 

down  to me and went back into their city. They continued to work, to reproduce and to feed, and they 

always continued to look for “The Tree” all of them knew existed, but nobody knew about. One day 

another man walked the straight line and challenged the shadowy projectionist (me) who was dis-illuminating 

the tree. He succeeded, but eventually became himself the shadow. And so, the tree, the valley and all of 

humanity, kept spinning in a perfectly dualistic and symmetrical pattern, past even the end of time.  

Old omeegel conversation

You: do you think if the Vikings came to our time they would be more amazed at the amount of glow in the dark shit....or how we take it all for granted?
Stranger: Jews
Stranger: daleks
you: explain...
Stranger: Jews
Stranger: daleks
Stranger: we are the daleks
Stranger: EXTERMINATE
Stranger: EXTERMINATE
you: exterminate who?
Stranger: THE DOCTOR
You: Vikings didn’t have doctors
Stranger: DALEKS HATE VIKINGS
you: and they certainly didn’t have Jews
Stranger: EXTERMINATE
you: where do u daleks come from?
Stranger: SKARO
you: ah I c
Stranger: EXTERMINATE THE TARDIS
you: and you hate Jews?
You: how do you feel about Mexicans?
Stranger: WE HATE TIME LORDS
Stranger: EXTERMINATE
you: even marty mcfly?
You: you hate Marty mcfly?
Stranger: EXTERMINATE MCFLY
You: LOL
you: he has a time machine...how are you going to exterminate someone with a time machine
Stranger: DALEKS DONT HAVE EMOTION ONLY ANGER AND HATRED
Stranger: WE TRAVEL IN TIME
Stranger: EXTERMINATE TIME
you: so you made out of light?
Stranger: WE ARE SUPERIOR
Stranger: WE ARE SUPERIOR
you: if god told you Mexicans can’t dance...what would you say?
Stranger: PRAISE DAVROS
Stranger: WE ARE SUPERIOR
you: you are suprior to Mexicans or to dancing?
You: superior*
Stranger: WE ARE THE DALEKS WE ARE SUPERIOR TO EVERYTHING
Stranger: EXTERMINATE EVERYTHING
You: so you are superior to time...hate Mexicans, dancing and Jews...care not for Vikings...and wish to exterminate everything?
Stranger: YES WEARE THE DALEKS
you: well...praise Davros then
Stranger: PRAISE DAVROS
you: praise Davros
Stranger: WEARE THE DALEKS
you: we are the daleks
Stranger: PRAISE DAVROS
you: indeed
Stranger: EXTERMINATE THE DOCTOR
you: may he smite the filthy Mexicans...and neon lights...and...The dancing Jews
Stranger: EXTERMINATE TOM BAKER
you: why do we daleks hate doctors?
Stranger: EXTERMINATE DAVID TENNANT
Stranger: EXTERMINATE CHRISTOPHER ECCLESTONE
Stranger: WE HATE THE DOCTOR
Stranger: EXTERMINATE THE DOCOTR
You: I understand
you: this one doctor once stuck his ass up my hand
you: exterminate the doctor
Stranger: EXTERMINATE THE DOCTOR
Stranger: EXTERMINATE DAVID TENNANT
you: what shows do we dalaks watch?
Stranger: TORCHWOOD
Stranger: EXTERMINATE TORCHWOOD
you: obviously not one with David tennant.....
You: do dalaks like spike lee?
Stranger: EXTERMINATE SPIKE LEE
you: exterminate extermination?
Stranger: EXTERMINATE LANGUAGE
you: thank you derrida
you: language exterminate itself...
Stranger: EXTERMINATE OMEGLE
You: why?
Stranger: EXTERMINATE OMEGLE
Stranger: and yermum
you: Davros hates omegle?
Stranger: DAVROS HATES REALITY
Stranger: and your mum
you: yeah well we all hate my mom
you: bitch thinks....that just because I don’t go to church she can’t take away my x box
You: well fuck church and fuck god
Stranger: EXTERMINATE XBOX
You: Davros > Jesus
You: would Davros give me a x box I became a dahak?
Stranger: HUMENS CANT BECOME DALEKS
Stranger: THEY ARE INFERIOR
you: but surely Davros could help me
you: I mean he is Davros
Stranger: YOU ARE INFERIOR
you: well compared to Davros so are you
Stranger: DAVROS IS SUPERIOR
you: agreed
Stranger: HOW OLD ARE YOU
You: EXTERMINATE AGE
Stranger: EXTERMINATE!!!!!
Stranger: you bitch ass nigga

So Jumped the Luck Stealer ( Short Story 1)

This is back from 2008

                                    So Jumped the Luck-Stealer

            He stood there.

            One could see the bridge out of the hospital window, in the room where his mother was. In the bed covered in “It’s a Boy” cards, gift certificates, and germs from the hands of the many people who came to visit, lay a sick woman with a beautiful view of the world. Outside, a building company was building a bridge across the New York Bay. Its arches bent into fabulous shapes of geometry, connecting mainline New York City to the huge Pyramid City that now stood on its waterfront. It was a technological marvel, a city inside the most secure shape in the world, standing on water. At first, it was a Japanese invention, meant for Tokyo, but Ethan Crosby brought the rights to it a long time ago.

Angelina Tyler, just gave birth to a beautiful baby boy in this very room. She pushed him out, the end of her bed pointing towards the window, into the beautiful new world, expanding in its own glory. She had been a victim of war, revolution, and the bombing of her country. She had lived through bomb shelters, reformations, and mass poverty. She saw the men who fixed the world, lucky people, their actions written down into the history books. It came of course at a price, her brother died in Iran, her assets were destroyed in Korea, but they were all right now. She had dealt with it all, the war, the poverty, the death toll, the reformation, but the cancer, that was going to kill her.

She found out 18 months ago, they gave her 19 months to live. 9 months later she was pregnant. Dr Ann Toberson brought back Vincent, Angelina looked at him, her son, and she felt a warm feeling in her breast, maybe love, quickly subsiding. She knew she didn’t have long to live.

Many people showed up at the funeral of Dr. Ann Toberson. She had died of cancer. It was a long fight that lasted five years. Angelina Tyler and her son Vincent, recently six, wore black. Angelina, looking blushed and beautiful, held Vincent’s hand, as the casket was put away into the earth. She kissed him; and turning to her husband they decided to get into the car to beat the traffic over the Crosby Bridge.

When he was in seventh grade, with the help of his mother Vincent Tyler build a miniature solar system, it was his idea to insert the isometers. The thing spun around on its own, the isometers, carefully monitoring that the ratio between all the planets was accurate. The teacher had no hardship deciding that this project was better then the one Pierson Allen of ninth grade had presented. Vincent brought home his science project with its official Crosby Junior Achievers Award, a blue sticker with a golden 1 on it, and placed it on the mantelpiece in the living room, next to a picture his father took of Pyramid City, from the hospital window; in the room he was born.

With his second place red ribbon tied firmly on his Wind Funnel, Pierson Allen, went to the house of Joey Patone. The Patones were friends with the Allens, however were always at work. It was here, that Pierson began to drink. Drinking a whole beer, in a minute, he slammed the bottle down on his wind tunnel, and threw both in the trash. Pierson’s life was never the same; he was sent to Crosby School for Troubled Children, his window looking down upon a graveyard. The only visible tomb from his room was a tomb with a medic cross shaped headstone upon it.

Standing in his Advanced Sociology course, Vincent gave a graduation presentation, which in no way reveled he was merely 18. Surrounded by his classmates, teachers, guests, parents, members of the Crosby Collegiate Association, and other people who wanted to see what the ruckus was about, he made a speech to an ever growing crowd, about the benefits of social monopolization. He quoted Ethan Crosby five times in speech, each time without the use of note cards. He looked at the whole audience and never down on the floor, the only person he looked longer at was his mother.

He spoke confidently, and explained everything well. Kids understood him, teachers admired him, and he was even able to convince old people that the current definition of a monopoly, did not have the same negative connotation it carried in pre-Crosby years. He was awarded a free scholarship to the college of his choice to study any social science he wanted to. He accepted it, on one condition. For the first time the Crosby Scholarship was split among two people, Vincent Tyler and Steve Kruz, the boy who won second place. They went to college together and were best friends for life. Steve never forgot what Vincent did for him, and was loyal to him forever.

In college he met his wife, a petite little girl of 20, with dark hair. He beat up her boyfriend who abused her, onto a status that later caused the man to commit suicide. He threw the best keggers on campus, participated in tons of activities, and got frat pledges laid. He participated in starting a movement that legalized marijuana, and throughout all this he managed to graduate with straight A’s, helping his fiancée and Steve achieve similar grades.

He went to graduate school for three years, but was soon called out by the Crosby Company to fill in on their management staff. He filled the role of a man named Shelton Bates, who was close to Mr. Crosby. The man’s son recently died after smoking too much tainted weed, from Florida which caused him to OD on traces of heroin. Vincent soon found jobs at the company, for both his wife, and Steve. Himself he got close to Mr. Crosby.

Crosby, lost for words by the death of his oldest colleague’s son, gave Vincent the job as the new head of the Crosby Science Department. 9/10 of the world brightest people worked for this department. After a few years, some luck, and some hard work by Vincent all the world smartest people worked there. Under Vincent they produced theories on black holes, cured cancer, and closed ozone layers. Vincent himself was there when Brian Dawning’s proved that Genesis and the Big Bang were most likely the same event.

Peter Halbcorb, of the newly bankrupted Halbcorb Science Institute stood on the roof of his repossessed building, looking at the Crosby Pyramid City. His last hope, a scientist he nurtured, funded, taught, and raised, a man by the name of Brian Dawning, had a new boss now. He clutched the newspaper which held on it a picture of Vincent Tyler and his wife, Ethan Crosby, Steve Kruz, and Brian Dawning all standing as a group. He threw the newspaper of the roof, and the wind carried it like a feather, next to it he fell like a stone.

Steve Kruz, hand on the bullet-wound, said goodbye to the world. He saw the shooter a women being placed in a cop car yelling “Jesus saves”. He saw his best friend, a man who he had stood by his entire life, crying

“You should have let her get me, Steve”

“I owed you one buddy” was all that Steve could reply.

Steve was buried, the only thing in the casket but his body, was his second place sociology award.

Crosby retired, handed down his company, everything, to the only person he trusted. Vincent, the son Crosby never had, now 35, stood in front of the Pyramid City Bridge, looking out into the bay addressing, his employees, his staff, and the citizens of New York and Pyramid City. He talked about the company in the new century, and the new name it would fly under. Pyramid City would be renamed after its creator Crosby, as The Crosby Pyramid City. The company building was renamed too, after the man who died for its ideals; it would be named Kruz-Corp. Both stood under the titles of Vincent Tyler companies. Perhaps only one man looked upon this unhappily, he was an elderly man who was visiting his son’s grave. Shelton Bates knew the company was supposed to be his.

He had kids, four sons and two daughters. He named one, Angelina, after his mother, who was always his inspiration. He named the other kids after his father, his friend, his wife, Ethan Crosby, and Brian Dawning, a man he strongly admired. He made sure they all had successful childhoods, and would have successful lives. His kids were privileged, but not spoiled, but none turned out like him. In his family room, were six racks of second place ribbons, all placed under a bigger rack of his first place awards. His kids hated him a little for it, because they were always known as Vincent Tyler’s kids. They all moved away when they got older, none of them wanted to do what he did.

His work was fine. He stood there, 55, thinking he would give it 10 more years and retire. He was blind to the metamorphosis his company had made.  Crosby Pyramid City was now overrun with crime and corruption. Members of his own company, making the poor poorer, and the rich, themselves, richer. In the days of Crosby, the company stood for raising the level of the economy by “teaching the poorest members how to fish, so they could provide for themselves”. Now the company taught nothing, and cared little for the poor. In the slums of Pyramid City, people took down the statue of Steve Kruz, at a protest, kicking its head around on the streets.

He retired and left the company at 58, he reconnected to his family. He brought a house in LA, his whole family moved there. He saw his grandchildren and smiled seeing them. The only traces of his former success were the luxuries all around him, and the company being talked about on TV.

He was 62 when he realized what he had done in his life. He walked throughout each step he took and noticed all the people his actions affected negatively. It took him ¾ of a year to see the damage his luck caused others. It took him the rest of the year to figure out what to do about it.

******************************************************************

He stood there, on the bridge, which he closed down for the night, due to his good connections. He looked down at the world thinking about all the lives his life ruined. The doctor, who absorbed his mother’s cancer, the kid who died because he legalized marijuana, the father of the kid who lost his position, to the man responsible for his son’s death, and many maybe-countless others, all of whom had terrible luck when interacting in the life of Vincent Tyler. He heard the sounds of police cars, and saw the lights approaching the edges of the bridge. On one side of the bridge was his legacy, Pyramid City, on the other side, his birthplace. However, all around him was the truth, with it as his guide he jumped into the waters below, everything went black.

He was ascending on a cloudy elevator towards some gates in the sky. He looked down, into the city, then up into heaven and smiled. Down below, squinting carefully he could see millions of people standing around and on the bridge. It was his world and his legacy, his people he was leaving behind. However it now appeared different.

Down upon the main coastal street, adjacent to the bridge, a homeless man wanted to see what the ruckus was all about. He was almost hit by a car, crossing the street, and would have been if he didn’t luckily see its reflection in the glass building of Kruz-Corp across the street. It was Vincent’s decision to use reflective glass, when the building was erected. He said when the world looked upon his building they would see reflected the thing that inspired him to build it.

A poor man, jobless, walked along over the bridge to his house where his kids are waiting hungry. After losing the last of his money gambling, he doesn’t have enough for a loaf of bread. He walks over to the heart of the crowd and spots a paper in the sewer drain, next to area Vincent jumped off. He finds the first check Vincent ever wrote which is easily sellable for thirty million dollars as memorabilia. It fell out of Vincent’s pocket when he jumped.

**************************************************************

Vincent Tyler’s life ends as luckily as it began, he spends the rest of his days in heaven, if there is such a place, looking down finally seeing all the good things his life did for people. It is too late to go back, he made his mind up now, he chose to only see the bad consequences he had put upon the earth. That is the curse of man; who spends his whole life looking at a tree, instead of stepping back and seeing the forest. One rotting tree or one strong tree for that matter is no indication for the status of the forest as a whole.

 But it is too late; you can’t go back and change the things you have done. So: jumped the luck stealer, so he then taught me, and so I tell you now.      

Tex-Mex

We had bad luck at the first strip bar we went too
Where the girls looked like they swallowed machinery
Cellulite and debauched dreams, all in their 40's
They looked like that crook from The Dark Knight
Who had swallowed the cellphone bomb
But the only Joker in their life was fate.
We moved onto another,
Where my fare was covered by someone.
Lap-dances, were given for free
But the girls were to heavy for me
Although considerably better looking
We both kept being drawn to the floor.
Sliding off the chairs.
While one of these trumpets was on top of me
Pulling me down into the abyss on the linoleum floor
Anton managed to get his girl on stage
In order to voyeur out her pre wedding jitters.
But someone got too comfortable
And Anton wound up throwing them
They got kicked out,
But I was too drunk to figure out what happened
My view had been abstracted.
We left an hour later.
4 people in the front seat of a pick up truck
Driving down the wooded lanes of Texas
With only one headlight, at 80 mph
Family, and after all
Home is where the heart is
And this place has more hearts
Then a bagful of Lucky Charms
The back of our heads rested
Against a loaded shotgun
In case we saw any deer on the way
Free to take, easy to spot.
And plenty of mouths hungry for Venicine
When we arrived at the property,
40 acres of it
We took a golf cart to its middle
A minute ride which led to a pond
Where we lit tiki torches and spent the night
Avoiding misquotes in the middle of nowhere
Sitting on lawn-chairs
Surrounded by nothing
But the silent and constant chirping of crickets
And by heap-fulls of useless junk
That had been dumped in the woods 
Refrigerators, and cabinets, and an old bicycle
All over and random like they fell out of the sky.
And above, when the moon didn't shine
The starts peaked through.
We talked about traveling the world
While Anton's friends chewed Skoal.
And even though I had been on 8 hours of sleep
In the last 3 days, i felt immortally awake and aware.
Dozing off, on the car ride home I kept awake by
Sticking my hands out the window
And following the air current
We got home and fell asleep
Getting up the next day
Setting everything up for the wedding.
Which was nice, with an interesting crowd.
The couple and reception lovely
I talked about conspiracy theories
With a local advertising executive.
And leaving, now with both Mr and Mrs Alvey
We drove home again, where i slept like a horse,
I imagine Anton, though equally tired, did not sleep that night

Have you ever shot fireworks before?

I was drunk off of moonshine
Given to me from a glass flower vase
With whole peaches in the middle of it
I thought it was vodka at first.
As I bit into a peach reluctently
But not as reluctantly as I should have.
When he told me what it was
Pouring me a very hardy class
Typically an amount allotted for rum
I gulped it down, as greedily as sense allowed,
So that I did not appear pathetic, and to get it over with.
It hit me like a meat frezzer
It was what those mint gum commercials
Claim there bullsiht makes you feel.
I was shot out of a cannon. 
Everything on moonshine
Returns to normal pretty quickly
In that everything makes sense
Compared to everything else
But everything is completely and holistically shifted
In a way, which you can only appreciate
When you are sober again.
We talked drunkenly about shit
Tarot cards and classmates
And catagorizations
And then left in his pickup truck
To visit his family
After a few hours there,
Which I will describe later
We set off to Danny's house
And aforementionedly, spoke of crabs
We then entered a shed
The size of a small warehouse
About 50 feet from his house.
Where I was asked a pun
So rotten, that Twain and Shakesphere
Would curse its existence
Have you ever shot fireworks before?
I had shot of bottle rockets
So embellished and said I did
But Kant was right about lying
I realized, as I was quickly given
A shotgun, about as big as me.
They smiled at me, knowingly
Wordsmith hicks, reveling in my
Illiterate northern counscious
I felt like I was on drugs
Feeling the ill effects
Of some juxtaposed misunderstanding
As they smiled down on me
Lovingly but teasingly
Saying subconsciously,
"You're in our world now"
We made our way back into the feild
They walked, fireworks in hand
While I wobbled, under the weight
Of the shotgun and the moonshine
Which had come back in this moment
Of weakness, senseing my low immunity
I also carried a jar of homemade honey
Stuck into my arms, in a selfless manner
That I dont think I can replicate.
I looked at it like it was a baby
Stuck into my arms
By a women screaming
"He is your son"
I realized I couldn't say no
But that the airlines would not allow
Me to carry this on board.
But that I would poop
Liquid diarrhea, if I tried to eat this much
Honey, while in Texas.
So, I said nothing
And made my way into the field.
Still not quite sure
If I was wrapping my head properly
About what was going to happen
I needed to reaffirm what I was dong
Multiple times, while we were in the feild.
I even needed to reaffirm what I had just done
After I drunkenly hit a firework, falling on my ass
From the kickback of the shotgun.
Throwing fireworks into the air.
The really big, illegal kind
With a tractor nearby, if a fire started.
We laughed, mainly at my initiation
As Anton's brother and Danny's son
Lit and threw many fireworks into the air
As we all alternated shooting them
Aiming, as instructed .7 seconds
Ahead of where the fireworks was gonna be.
Some seven feet diagonally up.
And hitting them, they exploded like
You would expect fireworks to,
Only on our command, and much closer
Then they would normally.
Multiple jokes were made
Mainly jokes about the pun
And my hymen being broken
We were all drunk, laughing.
As the fireworks we hit,
And the ones we missed
Exploded overhead,
Or veered of into some
Undetermined direction
Some hit trees, some fell normally
One flew into his pond with a splash
One hit his house with a thud
And we decided, all running towards
The house, making sure it was not asunder
That we would continue this
Or something like it, tomorrow.
We drove off waving goodbye
As I pocketed an empty cartilage shell
From the hit I made,
Which was handed to me by Danny's son,
As we shook hands.
So now I fell like I am always in a privileged position
When someone in the future asks
Have you ever shot fireworks before?

Deep in the heart of Texas

He was showing us photographs of crabs he caught
On his recent extrusion to Alaska.
Red and giant, with him next to them
A huge smile on his face.
He was smiling now, just as wide,
As he causally returned to the counter
From the stove, where he was making jambalaya.
He kept adding ingredients, that smelled
Like they took up the whole room.
He explained each photograph
And each crustation, as if it was
Some Shakespearean play,
Each photo an act, each crab Othello himself.
This was complex work, and complex pleasure.
The joy of the primitive man,

An existentialist, remembering
The fine taste added by just salt water and lemon.
He didn't have to say it, but Alaska
Had clearly run close to his Texan heart.
He orgasmed emotionally on the beauty
Of the mountains and the lake, and the creatures inside.
So simple and so peaceful, but the best seafood
He had ever had.
He had buckets full of them, sharing them
They had struck gold.
It looked like something out of
A television show, seductively appetizing.
Like something you see on Anthony Bourdain
While saying to yourself, "I'll never have that"
But here sat Danny, Anton's family friend;
Who not only had this adventure and this meal
But came back to tell the tale with photographs.
The photo itself was a sonnet
Like Helen, it could inspire with it's beauty
It's symbolic meaning, many a muse.
The catch of the day, transcended time
Even in this small glimpse of that moment
And just from Danny's description,
We started to think of him as a time traveler
In a ritual of man and sea, that exceeded aeon's themselves.
The room smelled so rich now, that my ears
Felt the pundit odor of the meal in store.
He talked about his pond,
Where he grew his own fish
And catching my understanding northern eye
He pointed at something as shocking as the photographs.
Out in the carpet, 10 feet away.
An alligator rug, leather incarnate.
Hard and soft simultaneously.
Real, brutal, but with touch of niceness
Which screamed, "I killed him.
I didn't buy this at some store".
Like a living purse, authentic and unstiched it lay
Next to the Norditackt, a token totem.
A representation of my trip, and destination
Primitive man was not barbaric,
But for a moment poetically excellent.
I touched the skin every which way,
Ogelling it, meditating on its meaning.
Before moving on to the head
With its glass eyes.
Like some dinosaur
It had many teeth
Still sharp in its decapitated home.
I wished, the gang could see this.
I got close to its dead face
The way  I would to my pet dog.
And examined every inch of its
Stuffed physique, mystified.
I came back to the counter
As his wife came down, panting
Screaming she heard strange voices
And how she almost shot the kids
Or thought that Danny, was feeding
The homeless again.
Seeing Anton, her thought of strangeness returned.
She shook my hand, telling me she thought
Seeing just my head, some black guy
Had been prowling around her kitchen.
She kept saying, that she almost went for the gun
Until she heard laughter.
I realized this was not some axiomatic saying.
She knew where all 12 guns were in the house
She joked repeating "I almost shot them"
Panting, like exhaustion
"I almost shot the kids"
We all ate jambalaya, which was exceptional
But his wife complained that Danny
Liked to ghost cook, and didn't know how to regulate
His spice usage; it was indeed spicy.
She refused to have bite
And just talked with us while we ate;
Joking and comparing stories
Reminiscing, reaffirming their culture
Inadvertently, letting me in on their worldview.
As we got ready to go outside
She scraped a bowlful out of the pot
But spat it out, claiming it was all clove down there.
She yelled at Danny, as we walked
Towards the shed, about moderation.
She found clove and cumin
Generally disgusting.
Danny made a smirking face and kissed her
Before heading out in to his yard
As she turned on the back-light silently
So we could walk over to his warehouse size
Shed, where fireworks were waiting to be shot.


. 

Faberge - Part 1 (Part of musical)

When the lightning struck the tower

Like the tarot readings say

And the news it fell upon us

On our shoulders to dismay

The death of our beloved

Like the crumbling of the ruins

What we know and what we covet

We are all just merely fools.

Underneath we stand united

With the gravel at out feet

Though the tower may be broken

We will live with the deceit

And the light that shines upon it

Lights the tower, night and day

Bringing all the ships to harbor

Which want to go astray

Here we are, we are just conman

Here we are, we have no home

Thankful that we found each other

So we do not stand alone.

So you ask

How do we feel now?

That our elder man has gone

With the thundering disaster

How will we all go on?

Are we now so cynical that

 We won’t believe

 Is there an idealism

We can no longer conceive

      

But the truth is really- truly

We are the honored ones who earned

For the man who died before us

Had his reality confirmed

We were the only ones naïve enough

And brave enough to see

That we don’t care what illusions

BECAUSE IT ALL

IMAGINARY

Well historians will tell you

That history is a lie

All that is told to you, is just a by and by

History written by the winners

The black weren’t really slaves

They were willing well rewarded servants.

And one day they will get paid.

The philosophers will tell you

That they spent so many years

Learning that the only thing man wants

Is to confront his fears.

But we go out in the big world

Where the business leaders meet

And we scramble for some bread

And we look down at our feet.

For the doors we cannot open

And the things we can not say

Comes out of our mouths like tokens,

On a dreamy dead subway.

Faberge is in the harbor

Faberge is in the bay

Buried somewhere in a bank vault

Buried where he would not say.

But if we read his conscious

Buried deep within his soul

He let out all of his secrets

We took them into our tome

So we stand with him departed

The peak now looks to steep

We feel a little bit retarded

We believed a bit too deep

So in isolation

Together we grow to brew

A respect for a man we got to know

But who we never knew

Truthfully, we all have secrets

That we really truly hold.

Things we cannot let out easily

Into an already foggy world

What is this revolution?

That has come upon today

Revelations left ungranted

Leaving us all felt betrayed

So we all stand together

For we cannot stand alone

Faberge might be the answer

Faberge becomes our home

It might all be a delusion

Just a peasant’s fantasy

But I am glad I know it

Cause, illusions are very real to me.

When you're in Texas, look behind you.

His house contained odd sex toys
Which he collected from a curiosity shop
Called "Open Minds", in the dark part of town.
He quickly hid these, not sure if he should be embarrassed.
He was getting married soon and it didn't seem
Odd in the least bit, that he would be pursuing
Extracurricular stimuli.

I had yet to meet his fiancee.
In fact, when I last saw the groom
He had not yet known the bride.
In Philadelphia, he appeared prophetically.
He took philosophy classes, and talked about
His ideals while writing archetypal notes backwards
In a little black notebook.

He always seemed alien to me and
I wondered what he would appear like in
His own natural habitat.
I would talk to him from time to time.
He was reaching success by using his mutant latent abilities
At pragmatism; he attributed his success to paradox-
The Prince and The Art of War.

A stranger from a strange land.
He would describe the customs, he was used too,
He was good at this - Deconstruction, Comparison, Reconstruction
All in his little black notebook, inseparable.
He belonged in Philosophy class, like cheese belongs on pizza,
An improvement to the tomato pie.
Telling stories of Texan life, documented empirical data from his past.

He lost his brother and crushed his hand.
He meditated knee deep in swampland
While on homegrown psychedelic mushrooms.
He built catapults which led to miracles.
He was a good fighter, and Texan problems were often solved with fists.
He trusted the wild boar and crocodile more then man.
For he knew they wanted to kill him.

I wanted to see this, and being invited to his wedding
I came down to Texas, the night of his bachelor party.
He promised to show me the reality of the dream he had weaved
When we were back home.
I drove from Dallas, for two hours, on a empty highway
The silence was deafening.
I arrived at his warehouse, and waited an hour

I followed his car, and my GPS simultaneously
But he lived in the sticks, in a place not considered
A road by my technology.
Only the mailman knew where he lived.
The door was open, always, to car and house alike.
You didn't steal down here, because you never know
Who you were stealing from.

It was everything I imagined, and I was only
A couple hours deep, The beginning of my journey.
Laying my things in the living room of his redneck manor.
With a buckhead hanging on the wall, and moonshine in refrigerator.
While he hid the rabbitears from the night before.
He blushed, while catching up, glad to see me
My Texas journey was just beginning.

Tarot Part 3

The seventh seal is an Astral Chakra.
The Chariot, the proactive, the immovable force-object.
Touring the world, looking for sun and starlight, he hails from Texas
The liquidator, he recently wed.


The storyteller, he is experince incarnate.
Transmuting knowledge theoretically,
But it seems he builds with theories.
The world to him is a game,

And he invest himself in the rules and blueprint.
Making sure to maintain communication between all players.
He explains complex ideas to simpler people,
And simple ideas, to the people who ignorantly dismiss them.

He breathes paradox,
"The Prince" "The Art of War".
Order comes from chaos, understanding from ignorance.
The pragmatist, he rules the physical.

Sophisticated redneck; shooting fireworks with shotguns
And downing spoonfuls of cinnamon.
The problem solver, like an alien, writing out our lives
Backwards, so that no one notices, in his little black notebook.

Eve or Kata; they are too easily confused.
For many men they are the muse
The eighth wonder of the world
"Lust"

Sexual, getting in everywhere for free
Because of her DD's.
She explores randomly.
From musicians in basements of alleyways, to India. 

Where will she go?
What will she do?
Will she come back?
Has she even been here before?

The fool on the hill
Breasts in the clouds
Her seduction whispers perfectly loud
But nobody understand her, cause they think...

You talk to her and she orgasms
You play for her and she convulses.
She is a sister of mercy.
A poet, a nun, and a virgin whore.

"As someone long prepared for the occasion
In full command of every plan you wrecked
Do not choose a coward's explanation
that hides behind the cause of the effect." - LC


You can write her a love song.
But Helen has many suitors.
However poor Ulysses, site at home.
While she sails home- towards the Sirens.

I know three "Hermits", 3 nines' 
One is JFR, he is a hermit of the mind.
Nah, he is a hermit to his mind.
Casting empathy, he is fragile,

He needs someone to explain to him.
The notion of action.
Full of fear and reason- mixed
The only cocktail he drinks.

He can come up with a universe
That supports his answer,
But it will be to a question no one asked
And he will probably be wrong.

A dangerous man to take a car-ride with
He will equate all your failings to his;
He doesn't have that many,
But he lives in the moment of his failings.


A real fucked up Buddha,
If you ask me.
But his friends always explain it away
To his rampent and isolated worshiping of Devils.

Then there is JFB, a neighbor of the High Preistess.
JFR, if his parents paid attention to him.
He is a man-child,a white and pasty Micheal Jackson
A coin however with two sides.

James Bond seems to be more fitting
A wolf of the courtroom, in sheep's clothing.
Who after anouther flawless litigation,
Will jump in the puddle of his way home.

He never lost a case,
He scuba-dives and flies airplanes
He knows rocket science
And the chemical makeup of the universe.

His Dinner manners are a thing to be desired.
He asks for separate checks, and half filled coke glasses
With the lemen wedge granted on Eastward
And no ice, and then pays for everyone's meal.

A man who is in his fifties
He insists he is six
A good man to know
A tough man to understand.

Finally there is my brother
Who is not a hermit at all.
But being 15 years my minor.
It would be hard to bring him into the deck

He is as his sign implies, a man of beasts.
He loves animals, and cares for them.
Isolating himself to treating them like people
We are only animals too, in his eyes.

A dog, a cat, four rabbits,
Three turtles, ten chickens.
Two outdoor fish, A 13 fish seawater aquarium
And a frog named Bubba, all belong to a 12 year old.

His day consists of school, sleep, and cuddeling
Feeding this one, watching TV with this one.
He is an introverted artist.
He picks up skills like music and art and dance.

He is unexpectedly bright.
I sometimes wish my parents had him sooner.
As we get older our difference shrinks.
One day he will no longer be the Hermit.

JFR and JFB however,
Will always stay inside
They are the  three Hermits
One Unwillingly, one willingly, and one temporally.