by Tomorrow's Man
August 2001
Wednesday, 1 August 2001
Recovered and transcribed Texticity from drowned notebook, dated 04/01/01:
Okay, I have no confidence that I will hold onto this pen. Salt water. It is 6 AM. I have heard my thoughts make red the dreams of [unreadable] sleepers.
I dance with the bats, [unreadable] on the fears of soberers.
[unreadable] with the lice of lovers. A family, we.
These lyrics...they say a storm is coming. And the sky is the grey of rabbits that certainly don't seem to be in a rush to hold off carroting down into their comfy holes. I don't blame them. It is cold out here, the cold of a thumbs-up to being born with fur.
The salt water is bashing at my knees, scything waves leaping in gouts that eschew the stiff state of ice; and this pen, the felt tip that it is, impressively writes on, crackling.
Thursday, 2 August 2001
Some things are worth waiting for, she said.
Like a sandwich in your pocket. A bolt of sunlight through the rain, warming your kitten's fur with a rainbow. A check in the mailbox. The snowman melting outside, beyond your window and hot chocolate. A dream of flying, of love, of joy. More and more music. Waking to the susurrus of the sea each morning. This coming Saturday, and the next, and the next. The kiss of your lover united at your heart, a kiss from the stranger united at the mind; a kiss, a kiss, a kiss.
Friday, 3 August 2001
The bass-Clef on my screen sings to me in tones that shake my bones, a 3/4 time that trip-hammers my heart with spirals and the desire to reach out and in, I grasp at the white and feel chalk grease my hands, I hear it slipping behind my oblique mind that used not to see what I mean, but now understand; that the bass is a voice, the words a prayer, and even if you dream without this tonight, tomorrow the world, to you, will sing.
Saturday, 4 August 2001
I have cried enough tears to fill your skin.
Sunday, 5 August 2001
In August, the red dragonflies begin to hatch in the cool crevices of the huge boulders along the beach. The boulders look bowled as if by giants. The boulders line the concrete beach wall to bolster coastal storm resistance. The boulders retain much rainwater and morning dew in their deep, dark hollows; you could lose babies down there.
If you stand by the boulders long enough, let the days bleed away into the hot red sky, the hatchlings will emerge for you. With their six-packs of sharp insect-feet they climbs from the stone belly and into the late afternoon light, their red bodies and fire-veined wings glistening. Dragonflies.
Their wings need to dry before they can fly.
But in the late afternoon 'round here, the seabreeze tends to kick up its velocity, becomes a Harley Wind, and speeds toward the red setting sun.
If you stand by the boulders long enough, you will feel the pricks of mini red crucifixes with an extra cross beam (Was there an insect Christ? Were the dragonflies as Romans?) as they bounce off your cheeks and get confused in your hair. The Harley Breeze is too tempting, and the red riders must lift their quintet of damp wings, perhaps never wondering if they will dry in time to land vs. gravity.
In a strong enough breeze, even we don't need wings.
Turn your back, open your eyes, let them find their own way out of the tangle of your hair. It does not hurt much. And the experience is one worth telling. You, the red setting sun; You, and the Harley Gusts; You, alone, in a Hail of Dragonflies.
Monday, 6 August 2001
It's got a warm plate of voodoo
and I'm melted in the curd's skin
I'm tasty as a salt lick with razor blades, ooh,
watch out watch out watch your thirst there, doe,
watch where you put your tongue, little doe,
'cos you just might get bled
by this salty me in a man's curdy skin
you just might get served
up
a plate of warm voodoo.
Tuesday, 7 August 2001
Everything: What you believe, when you believe it, and why, why, WHY right now, right now, you need it.
Wednesday, 8 August 2001
Maybe I just imagine writing this. Maybe the spit on my hands isn't mine, maybe it's viscous, not lubricating, maybe it has another motive, Maybe it got on me somewhere else: in the taxi from Cambridge, on the plane from Madison, on the train from Providence.
Maybe I didn't tell you that mixing concentrated frozen orange juice with gasoline and funneling the mixture into your enemy's computer monitor during the night causes a deadly, brutal murder by way of explosive [there are other keys to this; don't try to unlock a door with your shoulder my friend, you'll just get the rest of your torso eaten by fire, charred like marshmallow, remorseless] should that be your vein.
Maybe I just imagine writing this. Maybe this is my imitation, selling my twisted truths.
Wait. MY twisted truths?
I guess I can't fault them.
Or yours, heh.
Sucker, fucker, murderer, deceiver; these and those you may be. I guess, to prevent a further layer of hypocrisy from settling on my soul like bacon fat, I should listen to the voices I call myself.
I am listening.
And I am speaking.
Oh boy.
I am speaking.
I imagine...nothing.
Thursday, 9 August 2001
Hot. Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot 100 Degrees Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Effing Hot So Stupidly Armageddonly Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot Hot and yes I typed every one of these Hots by hand just to bloody-mind the point across about how Hot Hot Hot it is.
Friday, 10 August 2001
See this? It's society falling apart. A five year old and an eight year old beating the living hell out of each other on the train, 7:45 A.M., two unsupervised boys engaged in ultra-violence. Twenty-five of us adults sit around them, poorly ignoring the younger child's screams. I turn up my walkman, but even Marilyn Manson can't drown out the wail of the younger as the older twists the small arm behind the small boy's back. Just before I leap to my feet teeth bared, fissts clenched and unsure of why they are, a woman standing next to them whirls and turns beet red screaming that she's going to murder them if they don't cut the everloving shit.
I'm shaking. Music loud and hurting. Society, falling apart. Must be this heat.
Storms're coming today.
Saturday, 11 August 2001
I don't have anything in my head. Empty, echoes, cavern. There's a shadow on the back of my skull; it's me, walking around in the cranial twilight. There's nothing in here. Empty, but for me, and my echoes, my heartbeat lub-dubbing off of the walls of my skull. My hand is small on this inner surface. It is rough, like the inside of an avacado skin. You could slough your face clean with the inside of my skull. Odd thought, but true. These are the kinds of things that float around in here when there is nothing else but the big empty, the echoes, and you.
Sunday, 12 August 2001
Apples bananas and cherries, apples bananas cherries and limes, limes and thyme we make a pie, with bananas and cherries and limes, bananas and mangoes and limes, mangoes and limes we make a pie, with mangoes and pineapple and time, with mangoes pineapples and thyme, ginger and nutmeg, cardamon and thyme, and apples and cherries, bananas and limes, with time we make our pies, with time we make our pies, with time.
Monday, 13 August 2001
Spam. Not the email; the meat.
Tuesday, 14 August 2001
I am about to be married. 17 days, less or less. I think I am handling the "stress 'n reality" quite well.
Some men will run screaming into the night when the ol' "s 'n r" hit, jibbering like they're on muscle relaxants and blowing a digeridoo. Usualy, they're naked or baked (notice only a one letter difference in those words).
Some men stare blankly at a comic strip. Some men get REALLY INTO sports, any sports, even CURLING is to die for. Some men just pull their teeth out with pliers and blather like Jim Carrey.
Some men blame the gods. Some men blames their moms, or their dads, or, most often, their exes.
Some men wonder just what in toasty Hell they are doing; then run screaming into the night, or screaming into the hills, or screaming into the ocean; naked. Or baked. Of course.
Some men consult their best friends - all married - about the stereotypes of marriage, the best friends who say oh ha, and ho ho hee, oh hee hee ha ha, we hope you like porn. Want some? and smirk over their high-proof libation.
Some men just drool. Some men cry.
Me?
I did none of the above. Well, I borrowed some porn. Just in case.
Wednesday, 15 August 2001
Had some accidental fun on the train this morning. Was standing up against the emergency door at the end of the car when something caught the corner of my left eye; that something was a 1/4-inch diameter spider, webbing his way down from the ceiling of the train about six inches from my face. The dozen or so passengers of the train didn't see him; yet.
What would you have done? Right.
I raised my arm slowly and pinched his web about a foot above my head; he quickly began ascending toward my hand, giving me a creeping case of the jeebies. I gently arc'd my arm to my right, bent at the waist, and swacked the web to the edge of the nearest seat. The spider quickly disappeared beneath the torn black vinyl cusion.
I stood and re-adjusted...and noticed every person on the train staring at me in varying levels of disgust and horror. They glared at me, then gazed wide-eyed at every seat on the train. Three women abruptly stood, still shooting me smoldering looks in between trying to focus on their romance novels. I guessed their mornings were skewed....
Thursday, 16 August 2001
There are things living all over you.
Friday, 17 August 2001
I am having a disjointed day. Might be the three hours sleep, or the four cups of coffee, or the spider bites running along the inside of my left thigh, or maybe it's just the weather, but I feel like I'm walking on nine toes. One of *those* days.
Saturday, 18 August 2001
My hair as snaking hurricane, my smile as razor blade, my shoulders diamonds screaming, my nipples as knife-blades, my intestines scrawled graffiti, my crotch god's serpent seeping, my knees a twitch from shaky, my feet bleeding in the sun, I'm happy.
Sunday, 19 August 2001
When the world's electricity inexplicably goes out in a few weeks for an entire month while the governments try to figure out if they should be uniting or bombing, I'll be out back learning to saltwater fish with a long pointy stick. Y'all come by 'n say howdy now, y'hear?
Monday, 20 August 2001
The film of tiny, sweet pink bubbles on your upper lip. That's me. The tingle, almost an itch, on the lower ridge of your belly button. That's me. The salty sweat at the base of your spine. That's me. Your toe, touching the mirror at that exquisite inverted angle. That's me. Those taste buds in the back that are exposed when you laugh. They are me. The nape of your neck. The back of your knee. Your Ischium. The color of your eye. The color of your I.
Tuesday, 21 August 2001
BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BELLY BUTTON!
You have no idea how fun that was.
Wednesday, 22 August 2001
Found a bug inna my brane found him to be da one insane found he was a nice guy too so took him out an put im inna my shoe.
Thursday, 23 August 2001
Okay, right there, while she's asleep, then lower, yes, ah, that sigh, then lower and the sigh is mine, the arch, the smile, the salt, and the morning starts brighter than the sunrise...
Friday, 24 August 2001
I've noticed my hair is growing back.
On my legs.
Must be a Summer thing. No 22-eye jackboots rubbing it off below my knee, and I barely wear pants so my thighs have re-bushed.
It's silky smooth. Purr.
Just rubbing my thighs.
Don't mind me.
Oooh. Yeah, that's it buddy. Right there.
Oooooh, nice Friday.
Saturday, 25 August 2001
I crow-hopped into sleeps, dreamt between the zeroes. Stabbing ones poked me awake, promising the hangover of a hammer.
They didn't lie, and my head filled with the buzz of a chainsaw in a nursery, and all the aspirin in the world could not deter the chewing blade.
Sunday, 26 August 2001
Is it a compliment when you're coming out of the showers at the gym and a guy whose left wrist is bigger than your entire body batter-dipped says, "Hey, slugger, how do you get through doors with that thing! Don't break the floor, tie it around your waist or somethin', haw haw!!"
Is that a compliment? I mean, really; is it?
Monday, 27 August 2001
As my mp3 collection tops 100 Gigs this week, I've realized a sublime, wonderful point about myself: Every day since October 17, 1993, I have listened to a single piece of music: "1/1" by Brian Eno. Sometimes I only hear a piece of it; and sometimes the entire 17 minutes, over and over again.
Couple with that the fact that every day for three months I have made myself listen to at least one piece of music I have never heard before, for better or for worse; sometimes it is a majectic 7-hour ambient/atmospheric epic ("Somnium" by Robert Rich; utterly unique); sometimes it is a grindcore anthem like "My Nordic Butt Can Rule Nations" (though this band - 7000 Dying Rats - has a lovely, touching epic entitled "Ozzy Looked Like Bea Arthur On The Ultimate Sin Tour" which I highly recommend for Windam Hill enthusiasts.
Let the sounds roll on in to my thirsty ear.
Tuesday, 28 August 2001
I am the room with many clocks, none of whom hold correct time; I am the cigarette snuffed in the toilet bowl, but oh damn still a few puffs left; I am the Q-Tip that applied make-up to the ugly, desiring application to the unhealthy; I am a cloud wishing to resemble a lamb, as I drown you with my grey; I am silver and worthless, I am gold and I burn, I am what you breathe and I contain no oxygen.
Wednesday, 29 August 2001
I watched the lights change, and I stepped from the curb as I have about 2200 times since I began working across the river; I headed through the intersection toward Anderson Bridge.
In three seconds, four lanes of traffic were bearing down on me. As the car horns began their monotone arias, I realized that the lights I had watched change were the East-West lanes, not the ones that make the crossing clear. I ran for it, coffee sloshing and snadals slapping as I muttered shitshitshit. Something unbraking came very close to my leg as I reached the opposite curb (a VW Beetle or an SUV, I'm pretty sure).
Insomnia can't be supplanted by caffeine. I need a break. Before I get broken.
Thursday, 30 August 2001
I dreamt last night that I won the lottery. Not the State Lottery; it was more like a lucky pull at a 'lottery machine,' like the right something-or-other would have made it spit millions of dollars out at me. Well, I did something right. Sorta. I won one pound of change. Not quarters, like in Vegas, just change, i.e., dimes, nickels, pennies, and a few quarters. Oh, and it was Canadian. I won One Pound of Canadian Change.
Is this prophetic?
I also dreamt that I had named my left testicle "Laurel" and my right "Costello," but as it turns out that one came true.
Friday, 31 August 2001
I finally found out what OxyContin is, just this week. [For those of you who still don't know, it is a pain releiver given to the elderly who can't handle harsher drugs like Percodan, Darvocet, etc. A few months ago some junky figured out that if you crush it up and snort it, it gives you a high similar to heroin, without the big comedown].
I had ignored the stories about it over the past months as more lurid Fox News media pap, until an old folks home down the street from my front door was pillaged at knife-point around one in the morning a few nights ago for a total of about 30 tablets of the stuff.
Is it me, or is it time to kill the junkies?
Let's face it, legalization is the way to go - let the worthless fucks o.d. right away, and the more responsible fiends can trip along while paying most of our taxes. But, of course, that's a pipe dream.
Now the junkers have decided that their highs are important enough to beat the shit out of old people to obtain (why couldn't they have figured this out AFTER the Yuppies hit their sixties??).
So, I reiterate: Isn't it now time to hunt them down like the chicken-shit worthless curs they are, string them up by their OxyContin-junk-riddled testicles (and/or labia), cart them off to the rendering plant, and turn them into meal-feed for McDonald's cattle? Hey, it's a solution that gets rid of that pesky Mad Cow Disease problem; and we'd get a nice little buzz from a burger.
McDonald's: We Love to See Your Vacant Smile.
[Sidebar: When I first heard the word 'OxyContin' and heard people were concentrating it and getting blissed out, I thought they meant oxytocin - which, of course, is the hormone secreted by females as they orgasm that gives them the spine-cracking shivers and causes them to make all those lovely little noises. Now that's a drug I'd like to see on the shelves.
Note to Pfizer: I'd like to submit my application for the position of "Harvester," please. Thank you.]