Prose Poem: Preface. (Dedicated to Sheryl Gay Stolberg.)

 When you're looking for signs, for guideposts to point you in the right direction, there is nothing more reliable than a freeway billboard.  I'm sure my life has been extended because I heeded the call of a billboard cow to 'eat more chikin.'  Chicken is very good for you.  But perhaps the greatest thing billboards have done for this country is keep the spirit of poetry alive in the hearts of motorists as they sped upon their appointed rounds.  I mean, from what I've read in the history books, you could be driving along a country road when suddenly you came upon a series of signs reading:  

If your whiskers

turn to thicket

your love life

is a sticky wicket.

Because of billboards like that America eventually overcame the Axis powers to win World War Two.  This is not hyperbole.  A nation filled with rhyming jingles is a nation filled with the 'can-do' spirit.  Just ask any red-blooded American boy to complete the classic limerick that begins:  'There was a young man from Nantucket' and you'll see for yourself.   We thrive on balladry, especially when it comes from billboards.  Billboards tell us who to vote for.  Where to eat.  How to overcome erectile dysfunction.  And succinctly explain mortgage rates.   That is why this book by Sheryl Gay Stolberg, Billboard Empire, is so important and fascinating.  She details the intricate machinations of modern billboarding with a fine Italian hand.  I recommend this book to anyone who tires quickly of trees and mountains while driving, who yearns instead for the commonplace poesy of the masses as epitomized by that endangered species, the American billboard.

Prose Poem: Cooking with Snow. (Dedicated to Maura Judkis.)

 

Passive-aggressive cooking was first reported on by Washington Post reporter Maura Judkis in 2020 during the opening stages of the Covid pandemic.  She wrote about chefs who no longer catered to their own whims or their customer's tastes, but instead made up dishes like snow with sauerkraut and ant egg remoulade.  Feeling threatened and angry at the sudden demise of their livelihoods and security, many chefs reacted by creating dishes that mirrored their sense of an elegant way of life suddenly turned ugly and insubstantial.  Feeling useless, they created meals that were not meant to be eaten but to be gawked at, or even installed as works of art at MOMA.  Pierre Bonsat's "Cooking with Snow" became the bestselling work of non-fiction for sixteen straight weeks.  And McDonald's came out with their infamous McMush -- fried mush topped with stir fried dry ice on a bun.  Now that things are getting somewhat back to normal, post-pandemic culinary schools of thought are turning away from passive-aggressive dishes.  They are returning to consumer-friendly items like mac & cheese and bacon jam on toast.  This is good news for everyone, except, perhaps, food journalists like Judkis, who now have to dig up ways to make pork and beans sound interesting and trendy.  Me, I've always stuck with Ball Park Franks dipped in mambo sauce. 

Prose Poem: Body and Soul. (Dedicated to Andy Newman.)

 

I first met Andy Newman at the National Archives in Washington D.C.  Where we were both looking up the use of lentils in political assassinations.  It was interesting work, and very revealing.  Did you know that Mahatma Gandhi . . .   But no, the world is not yet ready for that particular revelation.  Maybe someday, when pelicans can rhumba.  One day he and I brushed off the documentary dust and went out for a cup of oolong tea together.  He really opened up to me:  Did you know, he said as we sipped from earthenware jugs, that I was born and raised by an Aleutian family?  I knew better than to say a word, because it was obvious he had a yarn to tell; my inscrutable silence would keep him going.  They were kind people, he went on, always giving me the choicest bits of walrus blubber and rubbing my chest with ambergris whenever I came down with a cold.  But I sensed there was more to life than harpooning skuas on the storm-tossed sea, so I left home when I was only thirty-two.  To make my way in the world.  I drifted down the coast, working as a longshoreman, pedicurist, grease monkey, and soda jerk.  Anything to keep body and soul together.  Then I met a woman.  At this point he prodded me with the halberd he was carrying, for I had fallen asleep at his stirring tale.  He continued:  She was as mysterious as the East.  As defiant as a cranky six-year-old.  And as beautiful as a baseball card.  She taught me everything I know about journalism.  And soon I was working for the Shanghai Clipper in San Francisco's China Town, running numbers for Larry Ferlinghetti on the side.  Just to keep body and soul together.  We had finished our tea, but I wanted to hear the rest of his story, so I ordered bear claws with caramelized onions.  We both dug in with unalloyed gusto, as he continued his tale:  But one day I caught her using a Bic pen instead of the turkey feather quill I had given her -- and it was all over.  I moved out of our split level ranch house in Sausalito and thumbed a ride to the Big Apple.   Where I had to start at the bottom again, polishing spittoons at the New York Times.  Then I got my big break.  A roller rink in the Bronx had hit an iceberg and was sinking.  I interviewed the survivors and won my first Pulitzer.  Now look at me, he finished, standing up to brush off the crumbs.  I have no trouble keeping body and soul together!  In fact, I have donated my body to science and sold my soul to the highest bidder at Sotheby's.  I had to agree with him that life is what you make it -- as long as you split the check fifty-fifty.

Rent-a-Poet.

 

Times are tough all over.  

The Torkildsons have been impacted by the runaway inflation just like everyone else.  Our lifestyle has contracted accordingly.   Willy-nilly, Amy and I must embrace the gig economy to continue to live in modest and decent comfort.

So today, while Amy was toiling temporarily at H&R Block, I came up with this paragraph:

Wife to be laid off in April. Am offering my services as rent-a-poet to help us pay rent/buy food. Five dollars for six lines of verse. This is not a joke -- and neither is inflation! Serious replies only. Please help a soon-to-be-starving artist!
 

 And posted it to 64 journalists who have 'liked' my poems on Twitter.

I don't really know what kind of response I expected.  But here are the responses I got back so far:

 

Peter Coy

@petercoy

·

55m

Replying to

@torkythai911

I'll vouch for the quality of this man's verse!

 

 

John Schwartz liked your Tweet

 

 

Erik Buchanan

@erik_buchanan

·

3h

Replying to

@torkythai911

I'm unemployed and broke, my friend. Best of luck, and may things improve.

 

 

 

Rusty Ray

@RustyRay1980

·

4h

Replying to

@torkythai911

I'm sorry to hear.

 

 

 

Jeff Tully

Retweeted your Tweet

 

 

 

Andrew Ackerman liked your Tweet

 

 

 

 

Andrew J. Campa Retweeted your Tweet

 

 

 

Andrew J. Campa liked your Tweet

 

 

 

Jennifer Brooks

@stribrooks

·

4h

Replying to

@torkythai911

Oh no! I’m so sorry.

 

 

 

Ethan Bauer

liked your Tweet

 

   

 

 

Paul Vigna

@paulvigna

·

4h

Replying to

@torkythai911

Sorry to hear this, Tim. Give your wife my best. Keep your heads up you crazy kids! Better things are on their way.

indsay rittenhouse

@kitten_mouse

·

3h

I’m sorry to hear. look through my tweets for his clever and entertaining work. It brightens up my day

Sonya Goins (산야)

@sonyagoins1

·

27m

Replying to

@torkythai911

I'm so sorry to hear about your wife's job. I hope she finds something she really enjoys doing.

 

 

Prose Poem: The Horse Pond. (Dedicated to Jennifer Levitz.)

 

Normal is the new quirky.  I found this out the other day when I bought a new dark blue suit for work and to go to church.  The salesperson showed me dozens of ties, each one quirkier than the last, to go with my new suit.  I choose a dark blue tie with small white diamonds on it. The salesperson disappeared into the back of the store for a few minutes before returning with my items wrapped in a bizarre oversize leaf of some kind.  "We're all doing our part to save the environment" she told me.  The leaf smelled like stale bubblegum.  "I hope you don't mind" she continued, "but I called the Wall Street Journal to report how normal you are -- it's a thing with them now, trying to find normal people. They pay a finder's fee if they use my tip."  "Perfectly alright" I replied, somewhat nettled all the same but not caring to showing it.  As I stepped out the door I was waylaid by a young woman who identified herself as Jennifer Levitz, a reporter from the Wall Street Journal.  "What is your agenda in buying a dark blue normal suit for work and for church?" she asked me.  "I have no agenda" I replied quietly.  "This is how I live. Dress modestly and don't call attention to myself."   She looked at me shrewdly.  "I bet you work in a bank and take a brown bag lunch in every day!" she told me.  "Correct" I replied.  "Now if you'll excuse me I must stop at the Post Office to buy some stamps."

"Oh my gosh!" she sputtered.  "That is SO normal!"  It occurred to me that I should answer all her further questions with 'no comment,' but my mother taught me better manners than that.  So I answered all her questions politely. Thanked her for her interest in my admittedly quotidian existence.  Made sure my lucky rabbit's foot was in my right front trouser pocket.  And walked into the horse pond.   

Prose Poem: Thailand nurtures writers. (Dedicated to Hanna Ingber.)

 

Thailand nurtures misfits and writers.  Especially writers.  In a cheap un-airconditioned room with cross ventilation you can create sprawling novels, short stories, poetry, or even work at journalism as a stringer.  Work as a news stringer to earn your room and board so you have time to parse words together for, say, an epic poem about the Great Molasses Flood of 1919.  That was my current project; it happened in Boston when a huge vat of molasses meant for fermenting and distilling burst apart -- actually killing people.  I labored over my epic poem at night while running down light travelogue stories during the day.  The Songkran Water Festival in April, when everyone throws water at each other from small silver buckets.  Loy Krathong in November, with millions of tiny candles floating in the water and drifting through the air.  Like Victorian fairies.  How to make green papaya salad with a mortar and pestle.  The riot of orchids growing on everything from telephone poles to bamboo birdcages.  Since I speak fluent Thai the stories were easy to get.  The Thais love anyone who speaks their language.  They are very open and gregarious.  They'll talk about anything, tell you anything, after a few bottles of Chang beer.  For a long while I had the field all to myself.  I only worked a few hours in the morning, filed my stories, and then worked on the crew manifest of the USS Nantucket the rest of the day and into the night.  The Nantucket was in Boston Harbor when the molasses tsunami occurred.  Then Hanna Ingber showed up.  Ambitious. Beautiful. Literate. Witty. And she spoke the Thai language with a melodious tonal quality that enchanted everyone from the Prime Minister to the ladies of the night in Soi Cowboy.  Suddenly my normal Thai contacts had no time for me.  They preferred to talk to 'Khun Hanna.'   I scrabbled hard to pick up the few news crumbs that Ingber deigned to leave me.  My poem suffered for it.  In fact, I have put it away and work as a full-time English teacher just to make ends meet.  I catch fish out of the klong behind my apartment building for dinner.  And even when Ms. Ingber finally left Bangkok to go write stories in New York City I couldn't get my writing rhythm back again.  After all, there's not much that rhymes with molasses.   But I don't mourn my demise as an epic poet.   When you fail in Thailand you just light some incense, then get an hour long foot massage.  After that, the Buddha comes to you in your sleep with wise and comforting sayings.

Prose Poem: Four Years in Iowa. (Dedicated to Catherine Lucey.)

 

I went to Iowa by mistake.   The bus was supposed to travel to Sarasota.  So either I got on the wrong bus or there was a massive conspiracy to detour transients such as myself to Iowa.   When the bus stopped in Sheldon there was black crystalized snow piled up on the sides of the streets and none of the stop lights worked.  A man with a long beard told me where to find shelter for the night.   There was no work for hired hands at that time of year.   So I sold used newspapers at the corner of Fifth and Henderson.  You'd be surprised at the market for used newspapers.   They're used to wrap fish and chips, which Iowans dote on.  Abandoned store fronts (of which there are lots in Iowa) by law have to paper over their windows with newspapers.   They build houses out of paper mache in Northwest Iowa.  Patch automobile tires with vulcanized newspapers.   Even stew up old newspapers with hamburger to make Iowa Goulash -- it tastes pretty good with ketchup.   And of course professional journalists, those few working writers who roam the countryside looking under Cadillacs to see who's in cahoots with who, often grow nostalgic for old newspapers.   They collect them, like coins or stamps.   So I wasn't surprised when a lady came up to my stand in early April and bought my entire supply of old newspapers.  I pegged her as a journalist, and when I helped her pile the papers in her station wagon there was a sign on the dashboard that read:  "Property of the Wall Street Journal."   "You a reporter?" I asked her.  "Sure am!" she replied proudly.  She gave me her business card.  CATHERINE LUCEY. INTREPID JOURNALIST. WJS.  Is what it said.   I tucked it into my sweater vest for future reference.  You never know when a journalist might come in handy.   I heard they can fix parking tickets and cure warts.  But a few weeks later I was summarily herded onto another bus and sent to Hugo, Oklahoma.  Where I got a job as a candy butcher with the Carson & Barnes Circus.  We were told never to contact the media or we'd be redlighted.  So I'm writing all this down on the back of a popcorn box.  To hand off to Ms. Lucey when the show plays the White House on the Fourth of July.

Prose Poem: The Express Desk. (Dedicated to Johnny Diaz.)

 

The express desk loomed before me like a sudden plateau.  I jumped into the chair behind it. Spun around several times.  Put my feet up on top of the desk and wiggled my feet vigorously back and forth.  "Nobody's gonna be asleep on their feet around here!" I roared at everyone in the room.  Then I grabbed a sheaf of papers, furiously holding them up to my face to discard one by one with enraged expletives:  "This one is crap!"   "Hogwash!"  "Stuff and nonsense!"

The phone rang; it was the President of the United States.  He wanted reassurances.  "Damn the reassurances -- full speed ahead!" I growled at him, then hung up.  

A cringing editor, his knees knocking, came up to me with a mock up of the albino edition, due on the streets in half an hour.  "There's no lead story, sir" he quavered.  "Take this down" I barked at him: "'Putin to send Ukrainian P.O.W's to secret camp on the Moon.'"  The editor backed away, kowtowing.  "And get Johnny Diaz to fill in the rest -- he knows what I like!" I yelled at the retreating editor.

A delegation of baggage smashers barged in to demand I let up on their mascara cartel.  I sent them scampering with a flea in their ear.  When half the staff collapsed from ptomaine poisoning my willpower alone cured them instantly -- they rose from the floor to dance a jig and then go out to raise Cain.  By the end of the day the express desk looked like a pockmarked war zone.  I handed out the next day's conniption fits and jogged home for fig spring rolls and a quart of emerald water.  I threw my bed out the window and slept on the floor.  Tomorrow I would conquer Mars.

Prose Poem: Follow that Balloon! (Dedicated to Ben Cohen of the Wall Street Journal.)

 

We were all simply mad about balloons that particular February.  There was little else of interest in the news.  Or rather, there was too much that was tense and stressful.  Our nerves went to seed.  So we decided, as a group of young successful gravel pit investors, to form a band to monitor the rise and fall (pardon the pun!) of balloons in the news.  We got started on this mad pursuit by the stories of reporter Ben Cohen in the Wall Street Journal.  All about balloon technology.  We became balloon trackers.  Whenever there was a report of a large round object floating in the skies over Montana or Iowa, we jumped in our customized Humvee and barreled off to study and film it.  Sometimes it turned out to be a flop -- just some old UFO spying on Earth. But other times we discovered a meandering weather balloon.  These we carefully documented in scrapbooks, which we later donated to the Wichita Public Library.  That is where Mr. Cohen gave his landmark lecture on "The difference between blimps and dirigibles."  Our crowd attended en masse.   Afterwards we held a celebratory dinner for him at the Doo-Dah Diner.  Which he was unable to attend.  He did send us a note, though.  It read, in part:  "Do not pursue balloons as a mob.  They are sensitive anthropomorphic creatures.  They lead very solitary lives jostling with clouds and go in terror of the random bird beak.  Give them a roll of duct tape and they will follow you to the ends of the earth."   That was some February, that was.  The bottom fell out of our gravel pits and our parents made us get real jobs at the Post Office.  We disbanded and never saw each other again.  But we'll always have Wichita.  And Ben Cohen.

Prose Poem: Hiroko Tabuchi is passionate about composting.

 

As I walked down the street, keeping myself to myself, I nonchalantly spit out a sunflower hull into the gutter.  Snacking on salted sunflower seeds was my passion.  I figure the discarded shells do no harm where they land, since they are completely biodegradable.  Then imagine my astoundment when a woman rose up from behind a Japanese andromeda, shaking her forefinger at me like a baton.  I decided she must be 'tetched,' as we say back in Iowa, and continued my stroll unheedingly.  But she jumped over the shrub to follow me.  I turned to give her a stern look, hoping to discourage whatever shenanigan she had in mind. Then I saw her t-shirt.  It read: "Captain Hiroko Tabuchi. Composting Constable."  Uh-oh, I said to myself.  This day is now officially off the Mercator projection.  I gave her a weak smile.  Gave her a limp wave.  And began to sweat like a kinkajou.  She strode up to me but before she could speak I took the initiative.  "Why are you wearing a mustache?" I asked her.  She looked startled as she felt her upper lip.  "I have no mustache" she replied, bewildered. "Ah" I riposted, "but you were thinking of getting one -- right?"  "Well, no, not really" she said.  "Could it be the New York Times does not allow its female writers to have mustaches?" I sneered at her, feeling rather cocky.  Now things were going my way.  Her look of bewilderment turned to sadness.  This alarmed me.  "My father had a fine mustache" she told me quietly.  "And so did my cousin."  "Uh, tell me about composting" I begged her.  Her feelings were shattered because of my aggressive behavior.  I had bullied a member of the Fourth Estate.  And I felt like a cad.  But she just slowly shook her head while walking off into the gloaming.  As she shuffled away, head bowed in sorrow, I vowed then and there to never abuse a writer again -- no matter how many shrubs they jumped up from.  And I would give up sunflower seeds.  My breath already smelled like ammonium nitrate anyways.