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Essays, Verse and Stories
Mar. 6th, 2006
11:53 am - Seeking...
Having grown weary of stagnant days and withered nights, I've decided to actually do something difficult for a change and attempt, with full dedication, my first novel. I am hoping to have a first draft completed in three months, and a second two months after that. My only problem: my computer currently lies on my floor in several inoperative chunks. As such, I issue this humble request: if anyone has a spare computer (needing only to be capable of word processing; nothing fancy, just a CPU that can support Microsoft Word) and would let me borrow it for a few weeks until I have the money to fix mine, I would be very grateful. Very grateful indeed.
Samuel
Feb. 14th, 2006
01:42 pm - Gather Round and Listen: Tommorow Ain't Coming as Planned
He twisted in his linen sheets, that tired, old little man, and the rustle of dry skin on fresh twisted flax sounded dull and metallic in the austere room. Harsh light from the twin neon bulbs hovering above the bed reflected easily on his bald, tired, old little head, the few last wisps of marble white hair sticking out in all direction, like they were trying to get as far away as they could. His movement brought him to his side, and he propped a thin, tired, old little arm on the pillow, and laid his head in his crinkled hand. When he spoke to me, thick spittle gathered in the corner of his lips, and specks struck my legs.
“I’m afraid of dying all right. Terrified. Every time I close my eyes and think about it all I see is this never ending blackness, so deep it swallows you whole, except there’s nothing of you to really swallow. I never held to that notion of heaven; all my life I’ve know this time on this floating green orb is all the time I get. But every time I try to wrap my head around death, trying to think of what it will be like to not exist, I tremble.” He coughed suddenly, a long, racking and dry hack that shook his withered, tired, old little lungs in his weak, tired, old little chest. His whole body quivered, the loose skin hanging aimlessly from his bones shaking in neat waves. He managed to quell the rumbling, and wiped the phlegm away from his mouth. “I mean you can’t even picture it, really, not existing. I try to tell myself that I won’t care, because I won’t know I don’t exists, seeing as I won’t know anything. And that makes it better for a minute. But then I think about how not knowing anything is just as bad, maybe worse, then knowing everything. And all of a sudden I’m back in that thick, swampy black.”
I sat unmoving, watching his face contour with each word. Outside, the chatter of birds in the distant trees filtered in through the grinding hum of traffic. The sun beat down like crystal, but a cool wind was blowing steadily in from the west. The day was delicate, and seemed ready to break at the slightest shake.
The man reached over for a glass of water atop his nightstand. With a delicate sweep he plucked it up and brought it to his lips, drawing the tepid fluid down into his worn, tired, old little throat. He swallowed deeply, and then sighed as he returned the glass to the stand.
“I’m afraid for my daughter, too. Did you know I have a daughter?” I shook my head. “I do. She's a student at the University. Melody Jacobs. Maybe she’s in one of your classes?” I shook my head again. It was a big school; the chances that she was in one of my classes were slim. Then again, I didn’t know the names of any the students in the classes I was taking, so she could have been sitting next to me half the time. “Well, she’s pre med. Gonna be a doctor. Not like the asses that prowl around here every day with their clipboards and their fake little smiles. She’s going to care. She has a boyfriend too. David, or something. And I’m scared because I know I’m never going to see her marry that boy, or any boy at all. Never going to see her in that white, pretty dress walking and smiling and crying. Never going to see her have a baby of her own, and care for it and love it as much as I did for her. My wife, her mother, passed away a few years back, and I’m scared because I’m all the family she has left. I’m scared because I know she knows it. She’s going to try desperately to make these last months we have count for something. But you can’t force memories like that, and I’m scared what she’ll come away with is just this sadness that never really gets plugged up.”
He sighed deeply, his weak, tired, old little shoulders sinking into the mattress, pulling down at his neck and exposing the thin collar bones hidden beneath his smock. Breathing in deeply through his collapsed, tired, old little nostrils, he rolled back over onto his back, and traced the crevices of the cold white ceiling with his forgetting eyes.
“Most of all,” he said in a surrendering whisper, as though he were afraid he himself would hear it, “most of all I’m afraid of not being afraid. I’m terrified that these months of chemo and drugs and pain and sadness will beat me down so far I welcome death, like some kid running to his momma when he scrapes his knee. I ain’t done a lot in my life, but I’ve always been a man who stands on his own two feet and provides for his family with money he can take from his own pocket. And now. Now,” he paused, his throat catching as a muddy, tired, old little tear slid out from his dusty sockets, “now I’m gonna sit down and take what they feed me and do what they tell me, and I’ll end up this husk that can only grin, ask for more, and wait to not be afraid anymore.” He stopped, smacking his lips with his tongue like a mourning salute.
We stayed like that for a while, time passing loosely between us as he cried gently and I watched and listened. Silence passed between us in stutters. Behind me, a door slid open, casting a long shadow as it swung across the linoleum floor. I turned, and watched the nurse stride confidently in, a tray of food clenched between her fat fingers. Her eyes caught mine and she jumped.
“Who are you?” she demanded, scuttling over and setting the tray on the nightstand, sliding the water glass to the side with her hand. “Visiting hours are over, you’re not supposed to be here.”
I looked up at her. She looked back, expectantly. Silence.
“Well?” she demanded, throwing up her arms. “Answer me.
“I’m no one, and you’re right, I shouldn’t be here. I’ll leave.” I stood up and slipped my jacket from my chair. I took a few short steps forward and angled passed the nurse. Leaning down, I extended a hand towards the man. He grasped it, and weakly tried to pull it down. I obliged, and leaned further in, my ears hovering just above his cracked lips. He whispered to me, filling my head with his defeated, tired, old little words-
“Don’t come back here, stranger. I don’t want to be seen anymore. But don’t forget: we’re all scared of something.”
I straightened up and he winked at me. The nurse was tutting and tapping her foot impatiently on the floor, so I turned quickly and strode out of the door and into the bustling hallway. Nurses in pretty little uniforms rushed passed me as I made my way to the stairs, the occasional doctor with a stethoscope glancing aloofly from wall to wall blocking a door or entrance. It was enough visiting for one day. I beat down the echoing steps of the dank stairway, and kicked open the door at the base, stepping outside into the cool spring air. High above, the sun fought through the cold air and bathed my face in yellow sheets, and, high above in a lonely room, cast shadows across the eyes of a tired, old little man.
Feb. 1st, 2005
12:34 pm - Preface
People like all kinds of things. Some like apples, some like oranges, some don’t like fruit at all, preferring vegetables or chocolate or meat. Some people like being high up in the sky, some people like lying down in soft grass. Some people like conversation, some people like music. Some people like parallelism, some people are attracted to alliteration that alludes abstractly to astonishing adventures. Some people like all of these things. Some people don’t.
I like three things more than any of the others. Smoking a nice cigarette, lying in a soft bed after good sex, and writing. If I could do all three at once, I’d probably die. I’d be glad too. Two of these things happen on a more regular basis than the other. I leave it to you to figure out which. Suffice it say, I find happiness where I can.
A lot of people like smoking, and a lot of people like good sex. But we can talk about that another time. Here’s what matters: A lot of people like writing. Some even use words. Its been going on for thousands of years, and, hopefully, will go on for thousands more. A Neanderthal in Vallon-Pont d'Arc, which is a little place stuck between Marseille and Paris in France, liked writing. He drew little pictures of horses and buffaloes on the wall of a cave. People visit it all the time. A Spaceman living on Mars in 4520, who isn’t really a Spaceman at all, seeing as he, and his father, and his father’s father’s father were all born on Mars (“spaceman” is just how we think of it) likes writing stories too; stories about ziplogs (little orange aliens from the planet Voogus, who have feet for heads and heads for feet) and trocans (the name native Martians gave to themselves). I like writing stories too. We’re kind of a family, the three of us, and the countless others who write too.
Unlike the Neanderthal and the Spaceman, you won’t have to travel very far to read what I write, if you want to read it at all. And I can understand if you don’t. Still, if you do, its right here, painted on the virtual wall of my virtual cave. Feel free to stay a while.
The dates don’t matter much; I just like to organize things that are easy to organize. I’ll leave a little list of what’s on this wall, in nice, little categories.
We are all part of some family, you know.
Samuel Butcher – 2005
Table of Contents:
Short Stories:
Foxtrot Juliet - March 1st
The Acceptance Speech - March 2nd
Exhibit A - March 3rd
Essays:
I.E. Names - February 1st
That Which We Call - February 2nd
Poems:
Me, and He – January 1st
Clubs on Tennessee – January 2nd
Jubilee – January 3rd
Chicken Scratch – January 4th
Fuck and Die – January 5th
White Bites – January 6th
Hallway – January 7th
Faith - January 8th
Fond of Saying - January 9th
You to Me, As I to You - January 10th
An Epic Poem in Four Lines - January 11th
I Would be Amenable to It - January 12th
Marker - January 13th
Predicated - January 14th
Young - January 15th
Dictation - January 16th
Writer, Poet, Lover - January 17th
This Morning - January 18th
Suppose - January 19th
The View - January 20th
Sketch - January 21st
Idiom - - January 22nd
Upon the Threshold - January 23rd
A Rock - January 24th
Muse - January 25th
Mar. 3rd, 2004
12:34 pm - Short Story
Exhibit A
By Samuel Butcher
“Note the lines of color here and here,” she said, pointing at various little blotches and smears of paint whacked across the crinkled canvas, “it really is beautiful.”
I nodded with a little frown, I think, I don’t really remember, inasmuch as I wasn’t paying attention. At least not to her talking about this painting, which looked like someone had just dipped their hands in a couple of paint jugs and hurled the globby mess onto some white clothe with a series of wet splots, and written “Jurisprudence in Juxtaposed Forms, B” on a little black tag to hang underneath their work. I read the little black tag that did hang serenely under the canvas. That, apparently, was what happened. But his name was James, and he called his piece “James in Repose”.
She started to move away, further down the austere white wall, her heels bouncing noisily on the wooden floor. “It’s just seems as though he’s able to lay his soul out onto canvas, like sex or physics.”
Sex and physics. Do physicists have sex? I suppose that’s how little physicists get made; I don’t know how else they come about. I’ll bet sex with a psychic would be good; you’d never have to tell her when you were cumming, that’s for sure. What the hell am I thinking about? This is art damn it. Art. You appreciate it damn it. Damn it. I took two steps behind her, followed her to the next frame, my hands clasped behind my back. I looked like a flamboyant monk. Hell if I knew.
“Now this is interesting,” her voice tipping up a little, a nod to someone who wasn’t there. “I wonder what his motivation was.”
“Or her,” I replied, trying to sound at once indignant at the vestiges of patriarchy, mysterious as to my own understanding of culture, content with my lot in life, eloquent in my discussion of important things, and a good lay.
“No, him. This is James again. You can’t tell?”
“Oh, yes, well. Now that I see it in the light…” I trailed off into a mumble, as fools and liars tend to do when caught out in their own buffoonery, and slunk my shoulders a little to look at this painting. For a good few seconds, I couldn’t tell if it was different than the last. Then I saw a few different shades here and there, mixed in with the greens, blue and oranges, muddy and almost dripping. I don’t know how the color blind appreciate modern art.
I’d figured out a useful trick about a half hour ago, at the beginning of this little tour, after we’d left the impressionist display, and I lost the ability to even pretend to know what was happening, let alone seem interested. I got the idea from a man with a goatee. Maybe the first idea a man with a goatee has ever had. Not having one (a goatee, of course, not an idea) I wouldn’t know. But that’s not the point. The point is this: he would take three even steps back in a slow, backwards meander, and then raise one hand to his hairy chin, rhythmically stroke the waxy black hairs, and, as he tilted his head evenly to the side, give out a small, contended sigh. My first thought was just to walk over and yank his pony tail- hard. Did I mention he had a pony tail? He did, and I wanted to yank it. Then it hit me. At the next painting, what I think may have been a baby holding a Madonna, or Madonna holding a bowl of fruit, it’s not important which, I took three, somber steps back, raised my hand to my chin, gave the smooth, dusty skin a little stroke, and stared unabashed at Lauren’s gorgeous round ass.
“Beautiful,” I had sighed, delighted at the both the brilliance of my subterfuge, and the tightness of Lauren’s skirt.
“Awe inspiring” I now said, my head cocked, again staring dumbly at Lauren’s ass.
She turned around, and I had to lift my chin quickly to at least appear civilized. I went for a look of far off conference, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it looked more like the little boy sitting in math class who hears his name crackle suddenly over the loudspeaker.
She paused noticeably, her lips trembling with the weight of the words she apparently needed a moment to prepare.
“If roses could talk, I bet they’d quote Maupassant.” Her eyes lingered on mine for a moment. She moved out into the slender corridor, following the black arrow above the words “The Photography of Amicus Brother.”
This was how she talked when she wasn’t talking about art or music, which was, fortunately, not that often at all. Each time she’d name some random political figure, or allude to a poet or a writer or a whore, and it was a little like a pop quiz. I started to enjoy them after a while. It was like a little game. I’d try to remember what the person in question did, the cliff notes kind of biography, then say something sort of clever and profound, to let her know I A: knew who she was talking about B: knew them well enough to demonstrate some level of intellect C: could relate two or more things in a short amount of time and D: wanted to fuck her.
“Well, erotica for the mind is a better fate than pornography for the body.” I said, following her out of the room. The corridor was short and cramped, and Lauren’s legs bounced, kind of an adult skip, past a cold, steel water fountain and into a space the size of my bedroom, but without the comforting smell, and with more photographs of pregnant Africans. Through a little opening in the far wall, I could see people in heavy coats brushing the snow off their heads in the lobby, and, in the dim translucence of the swinging glass doors, the city outside.
I glanced at my watch. 7:45. Good. That meant we would be back at Lauren’s by 8:30, 8:45 at the latest, fucking by 9, done by 9:30 and I could be home in time for Antiques Roadshow on PBS. It not necessarily my favorite program, but I like to plan ahead. There’s nothing worse than coming home at 13 or 23 past the hour, and having to sit on your hands waiting for the next show to start. Sneaking another quick look, I figured I’d better hurry things along, just to be safe.
“You’d think with all the war and starvation, all these African’s wouldn’t be having so many kids. Who wants to bare a child into that carnage?”
Lauren tutted noisily, but kept staring at the picture in front of her. It hadn’t worked. I went for the jugular.
“I’m not saying they shouldn’t get to have sex. I’m not an evil man. But, come on, how hard is it to pull out. Or go for the blowjob. They are starving, right?”
My back was to her, so I was posing a rhetorical question, which is, obviously, something intelligent, vivacious people do. But are answers to rhetorical questions ever as wise as the questions themselves? Is that the point?
She turned around quickly, and crossed her arms over her chest, which, annoyingly, covered the fitted top with the slit down the middle that showed her cleavage nicely. It was worth it, in the long run, but, even if it wins the war, it always hurts to lose the battle.
“I cannot believe you of all people, of all angels, would say that. Think of what Sartre said…”
Success. This really is a magic trick. The skill is knowing how far to push: too far, and over the edge she topples, and, best case scenario, no sex, worse case scenario, a full handed slap, the kind that stings for hours. Push too little, and she’s just annoyed, and, best case scenario, you get some lackluster sex cause she’s still a little mad at you, worse case scenario, she ignores you, and then it feel like no one is listening, and you’re shouting into a void of tar and happenstance. This was perfect. Angry, pissed off sex, and she’d leave soon in a huff. Granted, I’d have to chase her down the street and grab her slender shoulders, but you get used to those kind of things with a girl like Lauren. If it’s not happening big, it’s not happening at all.
“…and that’s the nature of the beast isn’t it? Bird of prey, praying for mercy and all we hear is the tweet-tweet of pigeons. Sure, they’re pretty, but can you eat the eggs? Can you stomach the eggs of oppression?”
“That’s not what I meant and you know it,” I said once she paused for more than two seconds: that was my cue that she wasn’t formulating a new sentence, but was giving me my time to piss her off more. I obliged. “I’m talking sex, not politics.”
“Sex is politics, chum. Sex is fucking politics. Fucking is political sex, for that matter. And to say that…”
I made a bet of three more minutes with myself, and set myself in for it, Zen like, tranced and tranquil. From the left side of me, my good side in my vanity, someone screamed. I turned away from Lauren, following the sound with my eyes to the lobby. A woman was lying on the ground, an old man in a little gray cap leaning down painfully to help her. Another man stood over them both. His long, matted hair shot out in every direction. He had what looked like sausages tied to him. A little pen was in his right hand. More people started screaming, and the man looked up at the ceiling, or maybe looked out at the stars. From the side of the room, a little, round man in a black jacket with a golden little badge started to run at the sausage fellow, and you could almost see the fat and skin rolling around loosely over the atrophied muscle. The sausage fellow raised his right hand up, like some kind of Jeopardy contestant, opened his mouth in a wide, lion gape, then shut it down, hard. His thumb hit the pen in his hand.
A deafening, low, rolling boom, and a wave of liquid yellow fire is rushing right at me. What’s special about day? Today’s the day I die. What’s special about me? Today’s the day I died. My synapses tingle, and, all at once, I wrack my brain for one final thing to say, one word to echo in the river of time, to mark my place, an eternal epitatah unto the darkness itself. I really should have prepared for this. Which word do I choose? Which one word marks me? Love. Desire. Family. Life. Peace. Sic. Semper. Tyrannous. Faith. Nobility. Goodness. Antidisestablishmentarianism. Martyr. Kindness. Heart. Passion. Beauty.
It came out an awed whimper; the last uttering of a stoned church mouse.
“Fuck.”
Oh well, I guess that’s art for you.
Mar. 2nd, 2004
12:34 pm - Short Story
The Acceptance Speech
By Samuel Butcher
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Really, you’re to kind. Thank you.
Ladies and Gentleman, Honored guests, dignitaries, foreign leaders, domestic leaders, actors and actresses, thank you.
(Wait for applause to finish. Use hand in a flattening motion if necessary. Think Moses. You can do it. Woe ‘em, baby)
I’d like to start by thanking God for all he’s done for me. I know that may not be a very popular idea with you cerebral types, but there it is. (Look up, extend finger). Thank you, Big Buddy.
I’d also like to thank my parents; Billy and Susie-Joe Jenkins of Adamsburg, Alabama. They did more to bring me here than anyone, except God. (Gesture again). I’d also like to thank my friends and neighbors in Adamsburg. You’re the best kind of people, and I love you all.
My first and third wife, Jenny also deserves a big thank you. She washed the dishes and the socks that I used to earn this award. My second wife, God Rest Her Soul, got exactly what she deserved: bupkiss. Har. Har. My current wife (Front Row Center, Wave), Alice, the light of my life will get her thank you later tonight. I tell you, I won’t be able to get out of this tux fast enough!
(Hold for applause)
Now I know a lot of people object to my being honored with the Nobel Prize. I know it’s caused a bit of a stink with the east coast types on every continent. They say I don’t deserve it. They think I should be strung up, and have all manner of vegetables thrown at me. I don’t know why they’re still mad; I guess some people hold a grudge. They even say it’s my fault, MY FAULT, that we are having this ceremony in Berlin, and not Oslo. I’ll say it again: it’s not my fault. I think the question of my guilt has been debated enough. I’ve been found innocent. Even if it is because there is no incontrovertible evidence. But there you have it. That’s the burden of proof, my friends. I guess I’d even like to thank those people who still call me names in the press, and burn effigies of me in public. Thank you for making me more famous, baby! I mean, come on, it’s water under the bridge. Har. Har.
(Wait for laughter to end)
I guess I won’t have to take much flack anymore. People don’t like arguing with Nobel Laureates!
(Hold for applause, beware of standing variety)
The idea for my invention came to me, I think, from God. I guess my Mom knew something was up when she name me Noah. There I was, in my front yard in Adamsburg, fixing the carburetor of my truck. I was real thirsty, but didn’t feel like going all the way back to the well for some warm water. Then it hit me, like a ton of bricks. We need something, some machine, that makes water. (Allow awed silence to hang for a few moments). That’s right folks. It came right out of the sky, and thru me. H-Two-O. Perfect.
Now I can’t go into the details of how the Noahanator works. Most of you already know anyway, and I don’t want to bore you. But I do want to make one thing clear. My machine makes water out of the air, not anything else. See, it can’t be my fault.
Think about. What have we been hearing about for decades? Global Warming. Global Warming melted the ice caps, that’s what caused the floods. Now some of you are going to say to yourselves “But wait, we have photographs that show the ice caps in pretty much the same state they were two years ago, before the Noahanator, before the floods”. Well my friends, the ice caps are basically icebergs, and we all know those stick out under that water much more than they do above. That’s what happened folks: the bottoms melted. That’s why they look the same from the top. I would never have invented a product that would do anything to hurt people.
Don’t get me wrong, though. Even though I’m not at fault, I still miss the old things. New York was a beautiful city. So was Los Angeles. I can’t say I ever went, but I only heard good things about Scandinavia. I miss these places, and I mourn those people.
There have, of course, been some good things. There’s a lot more beachfront property these days! (Hold for applause) But seriously, folks, how many more Africans now have access to water? It may not drinkable, sure, but H-Two-O is H-Two-O.
Now, if you’ll join me, I think we need a moment of silence for the three hundred and twenty million who have died. They will be missed.
(Cross self, lean head towards heaven, cry, if possible)
I can only hope the families of the dead, and those who survived, can find some sort of closure with this ceremony. I say this to them. (Look at camera) I mourn your loss, but I am not at fault. I’m sorry for what happened, I really am. But blaming me is like blaming a baby for spitting up on you. I mean, come on, its not the babies fault.
This is the proudest day of my life, and I’m happy to share it with you all. (Gesture to crowd) The Noble Prize in Physics is the greatest thing that has ever happened to me. And not just because of the million bucks! (Wait for laughter to end). Thank you again. I hope the world will be as happy for me as I am. God bless you all.
(Take one last, lingering look at crowd, pump trophy/medal above head, leave podium)
Mar. 1st, 2004
12:34 pm - Short Story
Foxtrot Juliet
By Samuel Butcher
It was a fairly ordinary day in Olympia, Washington. Warmer than usual for early February, true, but not warm enough to be a blurb in the local paper about “the warmest February 3rd in 74 years”. Still warm, though. People wandered about in sandals and t-shirts. A few who no doubt enjoyed the look and feel of a good jacket wore their favorites. People milled about in a comfortably normal way. The jewelers smiled at customers. The bartenders filled their drinks. Mothers walked with their babies clutched loosely to their breasts. People sat in front of coffee shops discussing art and politics. It was a fairly normal 1:37 in the afternoon. Fairly normal indeed.
Scientists later used velocity, direction and intensity, those being the kinds of variables any self respecting scientist is most likely to use, to place the epicenter of the event four and a half feet outside the front door of the Olympia Federal Reserve, a boxy, gray building across the street from Bonsorf and Bailey coffee shop. Using the same variables, they calculated that it all began just after 1:38 in the p.m., a good a time as any for anything to start.
Justin Divorak was standing in line inside the Olympia Federal Reserve at 1:35 in the p.m., his weekly paycheck signed and ready, held tightly between his thumb and forefinger. The line ahead of him moved quickly, and in less than a minute, an open teller beckoned him forwards. He chatted idly with the teller, and, satisfied that his payment had been correctly deposited, turned and walked out the front door. It was 1:38 and 21 seconds in the p.m.
Having no place particular to go, Justin stood outside the Olympia Federal Reserve, and allowed himself a longing look at the blue sky above him. When later asked by the local paper, The Olympia Review, he said of the moment: “It was funny, really. I don’t much know why. But, as I stood there, looking up at nothing in particular, I listened, maybe for the first time, to the sound of the city. Cars moving along, wheels spinning, lights changing, shoes tapping. Things like that. Vroom vroom, skid, skid, tick, tick, top, top. Vroom vroom, skid, skid, tick, tick, top, top. I started tapping my finger on my chest, moving along with the beat.”
His finger tapping against his chest, and still looking at the sky, Justin, quite by chance, starting lightly stomping his foot. Vroom vroom, skid, skid, tick, tick, top, top, tap, tap, stomp, stomp. He smiled to himself.
Wendy Munchausen, herself also leaving through the front doors of the Olympia Federal reserve, a mere twenty five seconds after Justin Divorak, nearly bumped into the man standing outside, looking up at the sky. She managed to stop just behind him. She was thirty one, and on her way home, to clean. Whether by providence, chance or luck, she didn’t grumble and move briskly past the man standing in front of her. She stopped, and listened. Vroom vroom, skid, skid, tick, tick, top, top, tap, tap, stomp, stomp. She closed her eyes, and drew her left hand up, then, as she it fell back down, she lifted the right. She repeated the process, and began twisting her feet from side to side.
Across the street from the Olympia Federal, David Olsen was drinking a cup of strong coffee and smoking an additive free cigarette. He was with a group of his friends, students at the local college mostly, but wasn’t particularly involved in their conversation about free trade. He was watching a woman across the street flailing her arms. She looked rather happy. He stood up, unnoticed by his friends, and started snapping his fingers loosely. Vroom vroom, skid, skid, tick, tick, top, top, tap, tap, stomp, stomp, snap, snap. Still snapping his fingers, he moved onto the balls of his heels, and started spinning evenly from side to side. His friends looked up at him. The sky was still blue, and it was still warm. His friends stood up, one by one at first, and then the whole group of them, and, without design, formed a little circle, which moved back and forth, undulating lazily on the cement.
People at the surrounding tables looked at the strange group. Maybe it was something in the air. Maybe in the water. It doesn’t really matter. What matters is this: these onlookers felt tired in their bones of looking. Felt tired all at once. They stood up too, some of them joining the circle, some forming their own little bent shapes. The sound of shuffling feet grated peacefully in the air. Vroom vroom, skid, skid, tick, tick, top, top, tap, tap, stomp, stomp, snap, snap, grate, grate.
The Phenomenon, later dubbed “The Promenade Affect” by a newspaper editor, spread quickly from there, like a rising tide washing through the streets, coating and covering all the people in a warm, senseless blanket. Jewelers left their gold and diamonds and ran out onto the street, joined the bartenders and the mothers with babies clutched to their breasts, and all threw up the arms and lifted their feet, plodding up and down. Phillip Hodges grabbed his wife Elise, who dropped the bag with a scarf inside she was carrying, and swept her along just as he had at their wedding, forty seven years prior. Elise Hodges smiled.
Dorothy Zinn, who had been sweeping outside the small movie theatre where she worked, ran inside when the invisible wave hit her. She ran past the concession stand and into the single theatre. The lights were down, a movie playing on the screen. “Everyone, come outside, you have to see this!” She waved her arms excitedly above her. A few people got up from their seats. “Fire!” Dorothy yelled, and everyone got up, pushing past each other in a rush for the exits.
The loud, murmuring crowd, maybe a hundred in all, pushed out of the doors and onto the street. They felt the wave, too. A sort of line formed, each person holding onto the hips of the one in front of them, and the fleshy snake sache’d along Bleaker Street and onto Fourth Avenue, where it absorbed, in turn, the people inside the Whodunit Bookstore, The Again tattoo Parlor and the Hash Art Gallery.
A crowd formed, pushing lightly against each other, rocking back and forth. The clusters at the Olympia Reserve, and the coffee shop joined in with those from the movie theatre. People from all around felt the pull, something tingly and warm right at the midriff. They came in ones, twos, threes and tens. They came smiling and happy. The crowd grew.
People tangoed in the streets, waltzed in the alleys and bogeyed in the gutters. From Adams to Jefferson, and Third to Seventh, nearly 18 blocks of concrete, building and asphalt, five and some odd thousand people danced, accompanied only by the beat of the city, and the interment shouts of exaltation.
Vroom vroom, skid, skid, tick, tick, top, top, tap, tap, stomp, stomp, snap, snap, grate, grate, step, step, skid, skid, twirl, twirl, twist, twist, Yip, Hosanna, Woo and Yehaw.
It was a sight to see.
Feb. 2nd, 2004
12:34 pm - Essay
That Which We Call
By Samuel Butcher
Piddlestock is not a word. Merriam-Webster says it’s not, American Heritage says it’s not, Cambridge International says it’s not. These are big players too, in the dictionary world. No “Dictionary.com”s here. Even my computer is telling me it’s not a word, the scraggly red little line under it the only color on this black and white screen.
Piddlestock is not a word. It is a group of letters. Phonetically, it would be “pid” (rhyming with bid), “ul” (like bull, minus the b) and “stock” (chicken, or beef if you prefer). Try saying it. You just said something that isn’t a word. The language police may bare down on you at any moment, beating you with their clubs and spitting licensed obscenities at you.
Fortunately, a lot of things started out as a group of letters, and not words. There are only 26 you can use, and some of them, your X’s, Y’s, Z’s and Q’s, aren’t really that useful. Pinch hitters with choppy swings, really. But if some group of letters gets said enough, written enough, it can graduate to word status.
Before that can happen, though, Piddlestock needs to mean something. That’s the fun part. It’s new. It can be anything. If Piddlestock were a high school student, when the guidance counselor said “You can be anything you want!”, the guidance counselor wouldn’t be lying.
Piddlestock is an ambitious little group of letters though. Eyes on the prize, reaching for the stars kind of thing. One meaning isn’t good enough for Piddlestock; this group of letters has drive. Luckily, Piddlestock also has a role model. A great little example to follow. The inspiration: a plucky little word, “fuck”.
Fuck started out just like any other word, a group of letters. But it worked hard, and now is just as good as any other word you can think of. Maybe better; it’s ubiquitous, works in all forms of this little language, and makes old ladies blush.
Piddlestock doesn’t want to make old ladies blush, but it does like the idea of being versatile. But what does it want to mean?
Years ago, a little airplane named the Enola Gay flew over the city of Hiroshima, in Japan. There was a war on, it had a number. 2. The Enola Gay dropped a little present on Hiroshima, a bomb. This bomb was designed under a football field. Touchdown. Massive burst of light, like the sun was melting, and one hundred thousand people vaporized, just like that. Dust to dust had never been so literal. So, of the two hundred and fifty thousand people in Hiroshima, you’re down to hundred and fifty. But that plucky little fuck of bomb wasn’t done yet. Another seventy five thousand, most of them with big pestering burns over their bodies, got sick. Radiation poising, they call it. Most of them died too. Some of them are still dying, cancer now, but still caused by the radiation. Anyway, you must be thinking to yourself that’s tight spot to be in, a real humdinger. Burned, your house flattened, your city in ruins. But its gets better. Two months after the bomb blew, and blew big, people had returned to the city. A lot of them were still sick. What happens? A flood drowns ten thousand more. That’s now known as Piddlestock luck.
Let’s say you see an old man walking down the street. A real codger. He trips, and lands face first on the mucky ground. What are you if you don’t go to help him? A Piddlestocker, of course.
To dance with tenacity of motion will be Piddlestocking, a group of still born kittens Piddlestocks, to speak in a fake accent is to verbate Piddlestockely. Call a rose a Piddlestock and sniff that, you Piddlestockeralous fuck.
Piddlestock is even going to break in on the name bracket. Sometimes, a name is so good people make a word out of it. Thomas Crapper invented the toilet. That’s no lie. Don Quixote fought windmills, so if you are caught up in the romance of noble deeds and the pursuit of unreachable goals, damned if your not quixotic. That’s a good one too; it’s got two of those lazy wild card letters. That gives quixotic a good reputation. The next time you have sex without a condom, it will be a very Piddlestoxoquitic thing to do.
This word has no limits. It can be all these things and more. The world is your oyster, Piddlestock!
Piddlestock is doing well. Piddlestock is moving up. Still just a group of letters, but now a group of letters with meaning. Piddlestock can really liven up the “P” section of the dictionary, which already has a tough time, stuck in there next between the sturdy O's and the exotic Q’s. Besides picturesque, pedantic, profound and polite, “P” doesn’t have much going for it. Piddlestock will fit in well, too, right in there between picot (loop in an ornamental edging; raised knot in embroidery) and piebald (of an animal, consisting of two or more colors).
Sadly, Piddlestock has an uncertain future. It needs your help. It only has one dream: to be a word. Help Piddlestock be a word.
And if you don’t, well that makes you a Piddlestocking Piddlestocker of Piddlestocked Piddlestock, now doesn’t it?
Feb. 1st, 2004
12:34 pm - Essay
I.E. Names
By Samuel Butcher
I’m an ornery person. Most people can be, at times, when something rubs them the wrong way, or tickles them sort of funny. I don’t like being told what can and can’t be done, what I can and can’t do.
This habit only extends so far, of course. If someone tell me I can’t fly, I’m not going to scampering up the nearest radio tower and fling myself off the top, trying to stave of gravity. Little things, though, manageable things, I’ll challenge.
“You can’t dance!”
I dance.
“You can’t talk like that!”
I talk how I fucking please.
“You can’t write an essay!”
That’s what I’m doing.
“You can’t!”
I can.
Sometimes, of course, maybe more times than I’d like to admit, I can’t. Simple as that: just can’t. But I still like to try. Let me tell you about one of the things I can’t do.
E.B. White is a fairly famous person. He’s famous for being a great writer, not just of short stories, but of essays about writing as well. Wrap your head around that. This fellow was so good, he wrote some of the best essays about writing, ever. E.B. White. He’s also, its worth mentioning, part of a trend of good writers who only go by their first two initials, dropping the name. E.B. White. A.A. Milne. e.e. cummings. T.S. Eliot. Good writers, these people. It’s also worth mentioning I don’t have a middle name. Maybe that means I’ll never be a good writer.
Maybe it doesn’t. I could change my name. It’s been done before, also by great writers. Ever heard of Samuel Clemens? Sure you have, he went by Mark Twain. Tennessee Williams is one of the best playwrights who ever lived, and he was John Williams until he was 30. He never even went to Tennessee.
Back to E.B., and his writing about writing. In one of his essays, he said any short story worth reading, or worth writing, for that matter, has to have two things: interesting characters, and interesting happenings.
Smart guy.
I read this little nugget he wrote. I read it again. I wrote it down to on a scrap of paper, to remind myself. That’s when the ornery bit reared its head. I can’t write a good short story with no interesting characters were nothing of note happens? Sure I can.
And that’s what I did. Mistake the first. I called it “White”, and it was about a box. Not a special box, just cardboard, a little soggy from the rain. The box sat in a street, as boxes are prone to do, and wasn’t conscious of its existence, again, not an uncommon disposition for a box. On the first day of the story, it rained. Not an interesting happening. On the second, it didn’t rain. Again, not an interesting happening. The story ended after the third day, when it rained in the morning and was sunny in the afternoon. If you find that interesting, you need a new line of work.
So that was the story. “Paint Drying” may have been a better title. I was satisfied. Then I figured if I really wanted to prove ole E.B. wrong, I had to have other people say it was interesting. I slapped a name on it (B.E. Black) and published it on a little forum I used to belong to. Mistake the second.
No one liked the story. Not a single person. It was called dull, foolish, pointless, crass and stupid. Not unfair comments. I decided to rewrite it. Mistake the third.
If at first you don’t succeed, don’t try sky diving. Or besting good writers.
Draft after draft I worked on this story. This little box became my friend. I loved him. But, again and again, people panned it. They were brutal. Christians in the Coliseum had it better, and they had lions to deal with.
Eventually, I gave up. Deleted the story, withdrew my name, quit the forum. I’ve never written about boxes again. But it doesn’t really trouble me. I was beaten by a superior adversary. I’m still glad I tried. Sometimes losing a battle is better than winning a war.
“You can’t make it; you’ve got nothing going for you!”
I can.
Jan. 25th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Muse
By Samuel Butcher
It’s come to this; the pressure clawing
up from the pit of my chest, and drawing
my hand raggedly across the crisp page,
scattering words and rhythms on this paper stage.
Because I can’t control my heart’s sweet agony,
can’t live another day of listless parsimony,
when all I feel is the beating of infinite feeling
that batters my veins and leaves my mind reeling.
Hating and hurting the fact I can’t hold you,
can’t be, can’t know and shouldn’t even pursue.
You: so the ardor grows; rises and swells,
lances my fear and curses my tells.
Till all I can do is sit, and try to write
of love and of beauty, but in spite
of myself, my words miss, fail and fall,
torn asunder by the sheer power of the squall
that rages somewhere in between
my soul, head, fingers and screen.
So what’s produced is a pale, quivering mass.
A poor reflection through obsidian glass
of the soft, holy utterings of my desire,
that surpasses every feeling I’ve ever know prior.
These poems; a caricature of the truth,
etched by the hands of this lonesome youth.
Who cannot malign the poor result-
words fail when feelings exult:
but true passion can never be mirrored,
just as real burning never with words delivered
After all, poems are just a poor paying of dues,
the real beauty, of course, is in the work’s muse.
Jan. 24th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
A Rock
By Samuel Butcher
What for when the rest is done,
Pox! But there as such its war is won-
Maligned and malleable to be sure
Tacky and salty, of dew and earth
Missing the muddied foolishness
Of song
But still sitting, restlessly
In shoddy night eye swirls
Back, forth, again, behind
Juxtaposition for this coward’s diatribe
Jan. 23rd, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Upon the Threshold
By Samuel Butcher
When standing on the threshold of
this great uncertainity; my tongue
quivering beneath the sheathed weight
of its own pomposity, I can see
past choices I haven't made and
places I've yet to love and leave, I
can see- in the distance- such
sweet rolling crests of hilltops new
that, breaking, my lips can
barely fall to shake.
While I am not a man who holds
himself to portents, or reads with weepy
temperment the omen of the falling moon
I can say to you (whether you are
beside me or not- voices carry, voices carry)
I can say "Look, beyond our wisdom
lies another stranger. Melancholy
cannot hold for long."
If I had the will to dream of
this, I can almost hear you
say back to me, the distance
of our folly between us:
"Behind this stranger sits
a greater man than you; but
I love loved and felt
and do not need to be."
Jan. 22nd, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Idiom
By Samuel Butcher
It all flows back, you know
Like twisting streams or yoked
Cattle plodding dreamily through the sun
The gentle rustle of their hooves
Kicking the salty dirt into the air
That hovers, low, just above the ground
Where the angels dance on pinheads
Jan. 21st, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Sketch
By Samuel Butcher
Sketch a person on a page
And give him her hish a nose
And a mouth and watery eyes,
And hair that stretches loosely
And breathes lightly in dusted
Granite chalk, but when you
Hit the eyes, and the ovals
Set stern, and you even added
Lines as veins they are still dead eyes-
Dead as the tree that made the page
That held the sketch that I
Told you to draw-
That you didn’t draw
Because I don’t care if you didn’t draw
Or didn’t think or forgot to feel
Or just sat there, staring, because
You thought of someone who
You knew who could draw
And all at once,
Like seamless gesturing it’s back,
And you know the feel of their thighs
And the look hovering in their eyes
And that smell,
Those teeth, the grinding, dusting
Of pen and sheet
And that’s a sketch and dammit,
I say that’s art
Jan. 20th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
The View
By Samuel Butcher
Slip slide, mountain passes, water
Dripping from the cracks of slate
Black rocks that tend to tumble
(The yellow sign informs)
Stagger on, such distant peaks
Also black rocks, probably, hard
To see from this far: but if the white
Is snow
Which it must be, then the black
Are rocks, peaks maybe, dots climbers
Or trees.
Jan. 19th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Suppose
By Samuel Butcher
Suppose you spent your weary days
Plotting and scheming for a grander thing
Than waiting for your body to decay
Into a mass of worms and dust-
And, coming to the fateful peak,
Stuck out chest and all,
You found you had failed to think
You ever might just lose, or fall.
And do
What would you think of that?
Or suppose you only ever bore a child;
Watched him grow, made him smile,
And, coming to that rueful age,
Of marriages and dying rage,
He did his deed, forgot to think
Laid some words on pulp and ink,
And in his haste, his sheer elation
You were the fourth name in the dedication
What would you think of that?
Or suppose you never worked out
This grand secret, this human scar
And spent your time in a foolish haze
Like prophets and lazy zealots
Beating your head in vain
What would you think of that?
Would you be happy with yourself?
Happy in your own mind-
Which is, to me, a crueler judge
Than history.
Jan. 18th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
This Morning
By Samuel Butcher
Somewhere on the other coast
The first mass is ringing,
And my baby is sleeping peacefully.
I read folded pages in the yellow light,
And the faltering rain keeps me awake;
This morning reeks of usury.
Jan. 17th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Writer, Poet, Lover
By Samuel Butcher
God said to this kid, who wasn’t
Even born yet (a mass of ethereal clay,
If that’s how you want to think of it)
He said “Kid, here’s the scoop-
I’ve got three fingers here”
And he raised them up, but they
Weren’t like the fingers the kid would
Have when he was born, or when he grew,
They were like astral hurricanes and
Imploding fireworks
“And they’re what you will be,
and are (time doesn’t matter
to God) so choose wisely
or foolishly, but choose”
And written on those fingers
Those outer cosmic sandstorms were
“Writer”
“Poet”
“Lover”
And the kid, who didn’t even know
He could do it, just that he should
Spoke back, and said
“So, good writer, bad poet, bad lover
or, bad writer, good poet, bad lover
or bad writer, bad poet, good lover?”
God nodded, galaxies exploding all around
And the kid just sat for a moment,
Then asked to be a drunk,
God smiled, and it was so.
Jan. 16th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Dictation
By Samuel Butcher
Consider this:
As darkness pales in lights embrace
truths become self-serving;
axioms of ceaseless pandering
in drifting slotted seams
Ponder this:
Many a man has strived and faltered
toiling mindlessly in hopes
that one-day more than his neighbors
lot will make a king of him
Know this:
In love, having is needing, not
wanting- and paupers of feeling
in heights of passion see clearer
than buoyant mystics
Embrace this:
The lightest touch of your fingers
is more to me than salvation,
in your most fleeting gaze I
am more than I have ever known
Jan. 15th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Young
By Samuel Butcher
I’ve heard older men speak of younger things
Intoning in warbling baritones that only
The good die young, and, these days
The young don’t die too good
But the melodies of their casual barbs
Always ring against the melting sheet
Of solace I keep as I wander harshly in the
Cool of these winter Florida nights
And, I must confess, as much of a confession as I have to bring
That it’s their voice I’d use to speak
To chant, to sing, oblivious parsimony
Idiom a better fate than warrant
Nuance a more callous judge than truth
A harsh, throat tearing scream unto the
Depth of the night: that impertinence is not a crime
And passion surely no disease
Jan. 14th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Predicated
By Samuel Butcher
It is a wholly human (beautiful) act to
predicate upon a glance (a sigh, a smile,
a word, a kiss) an action so forthright
as this- yet to discount it simply
because it is not made new, or can
never truly be simple (understood),
or may begrudge some forgotten
(ignored) disposition or illicit the
stares and rants (made holy) of
self styled prophets makes a martyr
of a fool- it once was said
"love is the method by which
all madness is made", but is there
in chaos (disorder) no truth (love)?
Jan. 13th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Marker
By Samuel Butcher
We are as a testament to the night
of silver tongues and needless fights
in seedy, shifty, smoke filled rooms;
avoiding the past as the future looms
and muddens our minds, the inky black
cannot always hide the simple fact:
The more we lose, the more we take;
and these things do not a good man make
Though we sing in hearty voice
of courage, love, and the single choice
that marks us higher than the rest
we know, in somber moments, that lest
we change our hearts, and change our lives
no more strangers, nor beds nor dives
The sting of content will pale in wrath
to the fury of a one word epitaph:
Failed
Jan. 12th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
I Would be Amenable to It
By Samuel Butcher
In seeing as dancers whirl eclectic,
and actors know parts better than
they know themselves (which, in either
case is barely tolerable at best),
I feel it is only fair to mention,
as long as you are here, beside me,
the cool breeze of my
fingers swirling portraits
on your inner thigh,
that should you ever
feel the need to break
from me a piece of
soul, and, cracking it open
(like crème bruele) dip
your tongue into the center
simply to see me cringe,
I would be amenable to it;
little sacrifice for your embrace.
Jan. 11th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
An Epic Poem in Four Lines
By Samuel Butcher
X meets Y, a slave to Z, loves
and fucks her fiercley, Z finds
out, kills them both, but
is haunted by their memory
Jan. 10th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
You to Me, and I to You
By Samuel Butcher
Winters folly does in spring create
in essences a dire, wily fool
who, speaking truth- a noble trait-
can make the blooms anew seem cruel
In temperate waters, the ocean blue
bind you to me as I to you
Youthful solstices in equal parsimony
bring hushed utterings, the listless creed
of breaking hopes, the terrible fragility
that lifts desire, want, dream and need
Before this schism, our great undo
bind you to me as I to you
Stars never see the light of day,
or feel the warm stroke of the sun,
but each is at peace, in its own way
before and after it’s burning is done
With sunfire and ice, kiss me imbued
bind you to me as I to you
The hollowness of my voice that fails
and falters belies the nature of my love
and defines more than the tale
of young souls in the greater above
Let our hearts, that simple truth
bind you to me as I to you
Jan. 9th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Fond of Saying
By Samuel Butcher
If, as they are fond of saying, being
is nothingness, and nothing
really matters, then being
doesn't matter,
and matter isn't being
If, as they are fond of saying, money
is the root of all evil, and evil-
the soul of the masses, then
the masses are rich,
and should stop complaining
If, as they are fond of saying, God
is full of mercy, and mercy
is for the weak, then
God is weak,
and so is what he made
If, as they are fond of saying, truth
is relative, and relatives
are annoying, then truth
is annoying, and relatives
speak double lies
If, as I am fond of saying, I
love you, and you
love me, then knowledge
has no higher goal
and, for something so complex,
never so simple an answer
Jan. 8th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Faith
By Samuel Butcher
Oh, you of greater faith, and
high nose claims that echo and
drift in silence, the yaw of wisdom
clamping down over your heads
which, in darkness can seem bright
You bastions of truth, you martyrs
of goodness, you shadow dancing
saints and pristine whores, who like
all skin cats prance about and
swish your hideous tales, licking
your icy lips, stinking of fish
and trespasses
For what needless truth do you
profane your lips to utter
such vile things; god made saints
and sinners too, which am I
and which are you
Is consequence only to him
her, and nothing
Blackness judges fools as harshly
as any; so sayeth
the Lord.
Jan. 7th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Hallway
By Samuel Butcher
I wander down padded blue halls and hear cries
Behind closed doors guarding our summer lies
The boy outside with the gold hooped ear
calls it a ghost town
Then takes another drag and tears
Slip past his locked up frown.
I never knew his name
Jan. 6th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
White Bites
By Samuel Butcher
I could never say it to your face,
But to mine, in the dim reflection of this sheathed glass,
I cannot tell a lie.
I can see you in white.
This girl, who you’ll never meet, sweets
She was on top of me
with her legs curled behind my back
And I knew I wanted to feel
The sheen of sweat across her skin
And run my fingers across the soft
Temple arches of her form
I kissed her, sweets
I did
And she leaned in, and slid her tongue across me ear
And whispered
“Do you mind if I bite?”
And I made a joke,
You know I do sweets,
And slid my hand up her black stocking,
As I nuzzled against her neck
So her breathing quickened
That sharp intake of breath
You know the trick
And she slips her hips against mine,
And I kiss her sloping clavicle,
And she leans in, and trails her tongue
Across my shoulder
Which is tanned, and beautiful
And sinks these teeth into my skin
And it hurts sweets,
It hurts
And I know some people like
And I know it’s not that strange
But, to me,
It’s alien, and foreign,
And I just want her lips on mine
But the bite, the bite-
I’ll break it off here
It broke off anyway
But this shadow
This damn reflection
Draws my eyes to these swollen red scratches
And scars across my skin
And, to me,
All I can think is,
Not the my Atlas crimson, but that
I can see you in white.
Jan. 5th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Fuck and Die
By Samuel Butcher
So,
What now
We drank our
Last drink, ate our
Final meal, finished what we
Started, and forget what we didn’t
Wrinkled skin and yellow teeth, dead hair and
Idle dreams. Years before the green and gray yards
Before the flowers cover our names and the years that
Marked us we’ll bid our last goodbye, turn our
Backs and walk away. Cast out the demons,
Shout to the sky, write a poem,
Fuck and die.
Live life like animals.
Jan. 4th, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Chicken Scratch
By Samuel Butcher
Well, all I’ve got is these pieces of paper,
three of them,
and their folded and soppy and reeking
of cigarettes,
with black scrawl across the margins.
And I can sort of remembering writing them,
as much as I remember reading them,
and thinking it was shit.
Which this probably is too
but liking it all the same,
because nothing beats poetry when you’re off
or down, with a girl missing from your side.
So I do remember an elephant,
and something about some hips.
Like a memory that becomes a dream
and then a memory again.
The words sometimes come, but mostly
they’re scrawl and code.
And all that’s clear is that view
of her as she walked away
and me, an idiots grin on my face,
thinking she was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
Jan. 3rd, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Jubilee
By Samuel Butcher
As I sat on that wilting wood fence,
my fingers scratching at my eyes,
my only company the haggard men
sitting outside, nursing bruised cans,
chattered, their words catching the breeze.
I heard them say-
“There’s a storm a coming”,
like something from an old western
with a band of dirt poor pirates
rustling cattle on the edge of town.
And I half expected one of them
to grip his ankle, and moan
that he felt coming in his bones.
But they just sat there.
The two of them.
Looking out at the gray smattered sky,
rocking loosely in their chairs,
waiting for the rains to come.
Jan. 2nd, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Clubs on Tennesee
By Samuel Butcher
Roaming the streets like wolfs,
swaying gently, almost peaceful, like
babes listing their first steps
down beaches, sun glistening on the water.
But the voices raise and roar.
On a row of neon lights and less.
The cars shriek by my ears, the wind moves my hair-
My hands claw at my eyes,
the stars have stopped shining out here.
A man stumbles up to me.
A splash spills on my shirt.
He points a finger at my face, his own
clenched and red.
He half yells, half cries:
“We could have been the best”.
And I am forced to shake my head.
Words from a generation that didn’t shed a tear
when we wrote our own requiem out here.
On the streets that bore our fathers names.
Jan. 1st, 2004
12:34 pm - Poem
Me, and He
By Samuel Butcher
I once had this friend, see
and I was as much him, as he me.
And we’d laugh, and cry and dodge the stars,
weaving in and out of love,
fight and fuck, and long to starve,
hoping one more would be enough.
I only really remember him, me,
because he did things I’d never seen.
Things you can’t tell people:
they just look at you like an animal;
something wild, and foolish, and raw.
And you say,
“Mainly, he used to sit, funny,
like something that mattered was coming,
all on edge, leaning forward,
perched between paramours and providence.
And his eyes,
My Eyes,
Would scan ahead, and roll
dully in the sockets.
Like well worn rocks of shale.
And it seemed
(or so I was told, after and before and all at once),
that he, I, was about to pounce,
And tear at the flesh-
And rip at the bone-
And scream at the sinew,
carnal and callous fates.
But every time, beyond the guile,
Little more than a lamb; docile.
And nobody moved.
And He,
and I,
would just sit there,
watching out for a lullaby”.
The audience will laugh,
And think you mad.