Damn your cage, a pit filled with human quick sand. Quiet, invisible muck, sticking me just below a jutting clavicle; I’ve been fighting gravity too much these days. Invisible, this sand, allowing ribs to expand this ___ much, enough to keep the hamster wheel turning; the blue body creative suffers to breathe. Keep pushing; got to groove that vinyl, a personal weather vain projecting wind that eventually blows this pile of cookie-cutter shit to smithereens. Suburban detritus, pink plastic pails filled with Wal-Mart emotions; cheap tricks that break hearts faster than a slap. No commotion down these paved bowels paralleling sterile trees; no seeds shall embed perfect greens perchance to propagate disease. How we fear change even if God or President promises it. We, They, Them, I, revert back; (yes, I) revert back to a lazy boy old way; overstuffed and kicked back; believing osmosis shall invoke change.
Is that what happened to Jeff? I keep finding his name in used books. “Find your voice in Chicago”, one inscription read, before a red Chi-town book of tales; fictional blends of POVs written over a decade past. Another book, an inscription on each chapter, “Good Luck, Jeff” (chapter 2) “Jeff, find your dreams” (chapter 12). Copyright reads: 1999. Damn, did Jeff give up? Did he move, then sellout with the rest of us? Where did he plant his seed, finally. I fear the truth as I touch each page, knowing how easily time feeds on young flesh; feeding until we check the mirror and the disguise wakes up.
How can I explain this isn’t my life that I write. The seed got lost. I’m pouring water on this uprooted vine hoping to transplant what is left. Throw me a string; hell, throw me a lifeline, if you know how to change. This application contains my vitals, my name, but not me. One more chance, I pray to any god, before they dig below ground and bury me; hungry worms will eat my remaining seed, unless, the body rises first in a swirl of promised dust.
Another coffee shop file. A new one, downtown, great ambiance. It reminded me how much I miss living in the city. I’m trying to move. Landlocked, I keep pushing, hoping that something happens to set even a minute wheel to turn in a new direction. Words inspired by these thoughts, written as you see, on napkins and mail fliers. Jeff is true. I’m intrigued. Three books at the used book store used to be his. I pray he made it. It would break my heart to believe these are there because he died, or ever worse, he gave up. ~
Mark Kerstetter
/ 2012/03/02For me it was a guy named Harvey – signed a bunch of modern poetry books in the local used bookstore. I wondered what happened to him too, so much so I googled the name and found an obituary for a guy with his name who was a truck driver and owned a leather goods store. I imagined Harvey driving along wearing a hand-tooled belt, a copy of Pound’s Cantos jangling on the seat beside him. I bought his book and felt like in some way I had become him.
a. m. forret
/ 2012/03/04How sad. I do dig the vision of Harvey, thou, with the Cantos. Perhaps he tooled special covers for his faves.
I’ve not noticed a last name, but I’ve a notion that Jeff was perhaps part of the Iowa Writers Workshop, since that is the press of one of the books (grad gifts?). I’m going to try and hit the store tomorrow after work for another look. I’m a bit intrigued to have found another.
kateshrewsday
/ 2012/03/04Whatever happened to him, I hope he found his voice
Breathtaking writing, Angela.