A THOUSAND SPARROWS HIT THE GROUND THE MOMENT I WAS BORN.
I negotiated my birth into this life,
saved like Mordecai by Esther's soft eyes.
And as a boy my toys would not fit their function.
When no mysteries matured I made my own, hiding the golden embroidered thick velvet bag
where no one would find it except for me, and a few hours later I'd uncover the treasure,
acting surprised, confused or sedate.
>
Hypocrisy rang like bells from Avalon's water bed.
I drank the poison but still survived.
Pigeons woke me, sounding like doves.
But now I've grown up.
The occupation of Estonia has replaced Patagonia.
My made up secrets are nullified to accommodate your highway.
>
Petrochemical plants and chain link fences have erupted where I thought my culture would grow
and nearby the last known Camacho can be found writing his unsung history in a three-ring-binder.
The Shramana cannot find his Prajna or his shoes as the crows descent on the last French fry.
Meanwhile, the neopagan picks up her wolf skin cloak from the dry cleaners on 39th Street.
>
On television it is only the most sexually vindictive of us that are praised and emulated;
Fawned over like some burning statue of Jupiter impaling a seahorse with a chopstick,
and given enough lire to manufacture a million of their own Grammys or Emmys.
Still they get a ceremony. Best Supporting Actress. Best Acting Supporter.
Best Romantic Comedy of the Century.
These are the extent of our odysseys.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Letters from a Cambodian Slave Camp
Dear Susan,
I have been imprisoned now for 37 days. I wish you could read my letters, but unfortunately I am only able to carve them into my feet with a rusty nail I pulled from the wall. Yes, it is lonely here.
Here, in the darkness, there can only be dark. I am only given one aspirin and one cracker a day. For water, I am forced to drink my own sweat and tears. For comfort, I think of you my dear Susan, and it is only then that I can have hope.
Every hour I am systematically beaten about the arms and face. Shortly afterward, a man with several skull tattoos on his shaved head reads me a page from The Cat in the Hat before whipping me with a dead but still poisonous snake. Still, I think of you Susan and of my daughter, Dove Sky, and once again I am able to endure.
Mostly I am forced to eat the mortar from between the bricks for sustenance. Although both my arms are fractured in well over a dozen places, I would still hold you Susan so tightly. And although my legs are covered in second degree burns, I know I would run to you and frolic with you among the Bermuda grass and haystacks.
Today they brought me a bag of poison ivy for lunch. Of course I ate it, gratefully, and went back to writing to you. My feet are now badly infected, possibly because of the rusty nail I've been using, but still I write to you Susan, hoping that I will see you soon. Please do not give up on me. The guards have been saying you met a much younger, much more attractive and much more successful man, but I know they are just trying to break my resolve. Even when they supplied photos of you two having sexual intercourse in our bedroom, I knew it had to be a fake.
I've run out of space on my left foot, and I also cannot feel any sensation from it any longer, so I'll have to move on to my right now. The itching from the poison ivy has been a bother, I will admit, but aside from the excessive vomiting and hair loss, I know I can make it. I think about those nights when we would lay in bed listening to Moby and you would just be so adorable, going on about how you wanted to divorce me to see other people. You were always such a flirt.
It looks like for dinner I'll be having biscuits and battery acid, just like you used to make Susan! Remember those delightful Sunday mornings when you'd lace my omelets with arsenic and stare at me with those gorgeous, expecting eyes. Such a kidder you are. I loved how you joked about hiring someone to frame me for embezzlement. How you'd have me thrown into the worst jail you could ever find because your new boyfriend was a criminal prosecutor and how he was much better in bed. I must have laughed for days! But still I do wonder how I ended up in this Cambodian slave camp. The nights pass as my bowels do now: Slow and with excruciating precision. I can't wait to come home.
Well I am all out of space, but if the tetanus doesn't kill me in the next few days, or the poison ivy, or the battery acid, I know I'll write you again. My body may be turning yellow from jaundice and severe internal bleeding, but I like to think I am turning yellow out of love—out of my love for you dear Susan, and the love for Dove Sky.
Susan, since we never had what one would call 'sex', I know now that Dove Sky really was the result of immaculate conception, and I'm sorry I didn't believe you before. Take care of our little angel.
Also, I'm so glad you pushed for that prenuptial agreement just before I was thrown in prison. Just like you said: "If you are imprisoned and/or sentenced to death in somewhere like Cambodia, it will be best that I maintain indiscriminate and total authority over all your money and possessions."
You always did had a way with words.
I love you dearly and please stay strong. For the both of us.
Sincerely,
Billy Dreyfuss
I have been imprisoned now for 37 days. I wish you could read my letters, but unfortunately I am only able to carve them into my feet with a rusty nail I pulled from the wall. Yes, it is lonely here.
Here, in the darkness, there can only be dark. I am only given one aspirin and one cracker a day. For water, I am forced to drink my own sweat and tears. For comfort, I think of you my dear Susan, and it is only then that I can have hope.
Every hour I am systematically beaten about the arms and face. Shortly afterward, a man with several skull tattoos on his shaved head reads me a page from The Cat in the Hat before whipping me with a dead but still poisonous snake. Still, I think of you Susan and of my daughter, Dove Sky, and once again I am able to endure.
Mostly I am forced to eat the mortar from between the bricks for sustenance. Although both my arms are fractured in well over a dozen places, I would still hold you Susan so tightly. And although my legs are covered in second degree burns, I know I would run to you and frolic with you among the Bermuda grass and haystacks.
Today they brought me a bag of poison ivy for lunch. Of course I ate it, gratefully, and went back to writing to you. My feet are now badly infected, possibly because of the rusty nail I've been using, but still I write to you Susan, hoping that I will see you soon. Please do not give up on me. The guards have been saying you met a much younger, much more attractive and much more successful man, but I know they are just trying to break my resolve. Even when they supplied photos of you two having sexual intercourse in our bedroom, I knew it had to be a fake.
I've run out of space on my left foot, and I also cannot feel any sensation from it any longer, so I'll have to move on to my right now. The itching from the poison ivy has been a bother, I will admit, but aside from the excessive vomiting and hair loss, I know I can make it. I think about those nights when we would lay in bed listening to Moby and you would just be so adorable, going on about how you wanted to divorce me to see other people. You were always such a flirt.
It looks like for dinner I'll be having biscuits and battery acid, just like you used to make Susan! Remember those delightful Sunday mornings when you'd lace my omelets with arsenic and stare at me with those gorgeous, expecting eyes. Such a kidder you are. I loved how you joked about hiring someone to frame me for embezzlement. How you'd have me thrown into the worst jail you could ever find because your new boyfriend was a criminal prosecutor and how he was much better in bed. I must have laughed for days! But still I do wonder how I ended up in this Cambodian slave camp. The nights pass as my bowels do now: Slow and with excruciating precision. I can't wait to come home.
Well I am all out of space, but if the tetanus doesn't kill me in the next few days, or the poison ivy, or the battery acid, I know I'll write you again. My body may be turning yellow from jaundice and severe internal bleeding, but I like to think I am turning yellow out of love—out of my love for you dear Susan, and the love for Dove Sky.
Susan, since we never had what one would call 'sex', I know now that Dove Sky really was the result of immaculate conception, and I'm sorry I didn't believe you before. Take care of our little angel.
Also, I'm so glad you pushed for that prenuptial agreement just before I was thrown in prison. Just like you said: "If you are imprisoned and/or sentenced to death in somewhere like Cambodia, it will be best that I maintain indiscriminate and total authority over all your money and possessions."
You always did had a way with words.
I love you dearly and please stay strong. For the both of us.
Sincerely,
Billy Dreyfuss
Monday, September 7, 2009
Regarding Coffee
The coffee practically pours itself into the perfectly tempered wineglass. It sits in it's vessel still and complacent. The coffee feels a sense of pomp and fanciness which translates well to my palate. The coffee says I am not engineered for this kind of container, but I enjoy it none the less.
The coffee shares stories of the old days when it was poured into coconut shells. How it was heated over a fire inside a terracotta or copper bowl. How, once, many men died to obtain it's bounty. How fires spread through the fields to prevent it's fruition. How coffee, like gold or tobacco or religion, was fought for, tooth and nail, like any other commodity.
The coffee goes on to explain how some men drank it in excess to obtain mental heights that today would only achieve insanity in order to defend it's place in the village. And how, one day, the spears and sledges no longer worked. How the white man came peering through the foliage, armed with guns and ammunition. How the bean was swept from the plants, carted away, and sold for profits equal to a thousand canoes and goats.
The coffee boasts that it is older than ale or even tea. The coffee suggests it is older than man itself, having been enjoyed by the hapless and humble animals long before man came to manipulate and brew it's potential. I sneer down at it and gulp it's volatile history. My stomach responds with outrage, but quickly comes to terms with it.
The coffee shares stories of the old days when it was poured into coconut shells. How it was heated over a fire inside a terracotta or copper bowl. How, once, many men died to obtain it's bounty. How fires spread through the fields to prevent it's fruition. How coffee, like gold or tobacco or religion, was fought for, tooth and nail, like any other commodity.
The coffee goes on to explain how some men drank it in excess to obtain mental heights that today would only achieve insanity in order to defend it's place in the village. And how, one day, the spears and sledges no longer worked. How the white man came peering through the foliage, armed with guns and ammunition. How the bean was swept from the plants, carted away, and sold for profits equal to a thousand canoes and goats.
The coffee boasts that it is older than ale or even tea. The coffee suggests it is older than man itself, having been enjoyed by the hapless and humble animals long before man came to manipulate and brew it's potential. I sneer down at it and gulp it's volatile history. My stomach responds with outrage, but quickly comes to terms with it.
Regarding the Esbat
There is no moon goddess menstruating her way into our spiritual lives,
no chants or cauldrons, no stew to conjure and pour in the streets,
no knife to make ready, no wand to wave through the enchanted air.
Things have changed. The animals retreat, the trees, they shrink away
and there are no broomsticks, no spell books, no Secrets of the Cloak.
But something remains in the ceremony, the provoking and the knowing.
There are no goats to hear laughing. No pilgrims stalking the fields.
No wolves to protect the silence. No needles needed, no candles lit,
no altar on which the old ways stand. No parchment and also no pen.
No Salisbury or Avesbury. No snakes in the mounds. No stones are made round.
No collective breathing together. But the fever remains, the cold white heat.
Still something remains in the water, stirring unchanged by historical science.
Ritual spirit melt pool of hot gel that burns
by the water bathed in the blue coin's light.
Is the candle enough, the whispering idol,
or the closing of eyes, the looking behind,
to appease the unseen, unfelt and unreal
or is something missing, some lost
holy herb, some sage of old knowing,
some talisman, a feather with stone,
a feather in water, the burning of paper,
the words on the paper lost, burning with waxing?
The old way could not have ever survived.
The others are no where, no longer nearby.
I Am Normal
I am normal in a transcendental, misanthropic, voluntarily imprisoned kind of way.
I can't shake the night terrors. Images of a rich man breaking into my apartment
to take away my insurgent, poor person belongings, to monetarily cleanse the land
and pave the way for a more lucrative, more free America. I am terrified
with the world of impersonal greetings and appreciations. The non-committal
“How're you today?” and the bubbly, predisposed response “I'm good, and you?”
It drives me quietly crazy, most days, when my porch is the brink of my intellectual expansion.
Where the books of dead, often irrelevant men and women, compose the extent of my social
commitments, each Saturday night. I miss some of those unsubstantial situations. I regret
passing up the chance to party mindless with my partners in fashion.
It's not that I think this generation can't make a difference,
it's that I know we can't make a difference. However,
we sure can make music and independent films.
We have mastered all arbitrary things.
How one of us wrote a screenplay about a guy
who wrote a screenplay about a guy
who stood up for what he believed in.
It won an award at Cannes.
Another guy wrote a poem in his living room
about a guy who got mad
and wrote a poem about it in his living room.
No one read it.
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