The Government School

Deliver me from the workers of iniquity, and save me from bloody men.

Psalm 59:2

We were working in the cook tent, my friend Maria and I, 

when the bloody men appeared.

At first I took them to be

new roustabouts,

or maybe reporters from

the local rag.

I've noticed in the past few years

that journalists are getting more and more

frowzy and fly-blown.

Things, I guess, are tough all over.

Anyway.

They asked for beans and tortillas.

With scowls and threatening motions

with their forks and spoons.

Mental midgets,

I thought to myself as I served them.

'Bloody idiots' Maria whispered to me

as they took their tin plates to a picnic

table and silently wolfed down their food.

When they left I felt like a sentence of death

had been lifted from me.

I didn't like anything about them.

'Who were those guys?' 

I asked Trey when he came in for 

an early lunch.

Since he owns and operates the show

he gets to eat whenever he wants.

"What guys?" he asked.

"Those rotten looking guys that just left"

said Maria. She is sweet on Trey,

and gives him extra gravy on his

mashed potatoes.

"They're from the government school down the road."

He took his tin tray back to his trailer.

I could tell Maria wanted to follow him back to

his trailer for some hanky panky,

but there were thirty-odd people expecting lunch

in an hour, so I couldn't let her go.

The entire student body from the government school

came to the matinee. Their clothes were shabby

and sullen.

They didn't applaud anything

except when the elephants defecated.

They didn't buy anything

except sour pickles on a stick.

Their eyes were angry blue marbles.

When they left, trooping out like a chain gang,

they left behind pamphlets about their school

under the bleachers.

I told the crew to throw them all away 

with the rest of the trash.

But Maria kept one to read while

we got dinner ready before the

evening performance.

That's why she didn't get the potatoes

peeled in time.

"Hey" she said to me while we ladled out

the stew that evening,

"That place up the road is a government school

for journalists  -- they're being trained to sit

quietly and take notes of what the President

and his Cabinet says all the time."

"Any money in it?" I grunted back, my back

beginning to ache.

"Sure. They make good money when they can

start a war or make minorities feel insecure. It's all

in the pamphlet." Just then Maria dropped

the ladle into the stew -- again.

"Oh, get out of here!" I yelled at her in 

deep frustration.

She flounced out.

And left the show.

Didn't even say goodbye to Trey.

I didn't hear anything about her 

for several years.

During that time I quit the show

and went back to school.

Now I'm a corporate lawyer in

New York.

That's when I met Maria again.

She enrolled in that government school

after she left the big top.

Got her own radio show and started making

powerful enemies. 

She hired me to dig up the dirt on them;

which I did.

So they all became her friends.

She starts a new war about once a year;

usually in South America. 

Then goes down to conduct peace negotiations

and give away powdered milk and blankets.

She tells me she misses doing the Spanish Web.

 

Conqueror.

 

Pray always, that you may come off conqueror -

D&C 10:5

True champions the arm of flesh ne'er seek to endure trials;

but pray in constant humbleness while running weary miles. 

Quit you like men

 

Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong.

1 Corinthians 16:13

I know the Lord my strength prepares/when to him I give all my prayers.

I'll watch and wait as He unveils/how I'll be quit of my travails. 

The Greatest Man I Ever Knew.

 

The greatest man I ever knew lived under a bridge.

The bridge ran over the Mississippi River.

The cars driving over it made a continuous

and monotonous buzz.

In the summer the river smelled to high heaven.

And the carp grew to the size of leviathan.

The greatest man I ever knew spoke very little.

He had bad teeth. They were very crooked and brown.

But he liked to shake hands a lot.

He kept his hands spotlessly clean. Even had an

emery board to keep his nails smooth.

He smiled at everyone he met.

The greatest man I ever knew met me one day

by accident. At an old hotel being demolished

downtown. 

I was working a temp job there, ripping out carpets

and throwing moldy furniture out the window

 into a dumptser.

I found an old barometer, encased in brass and weighing

a ton.

I was taking it home when I saw him smiling at 

me.

"May I have that please?" he asked me.

I don't know why, but I gave it to him.

Then I followed him down under the bridge,

where he hung the barometer onto a rusty iron

rod sticking out of the bridge foundation.

The greatest man I ever knew opened a can

of pork and beans and offered me some.

But I couldn't stand to eat them cold,

so I went away.

But not before he smiled and shook my hand very

warmly. 

And I never saw him again.

The greatest man I ever knew was gone when I went

back under the bridge years later.

But the old barometer was still there.

A bird's nest sat on top of it, with three blue speckled

eggs inside. 

There was a rusty can of pork and beans on the ground

right underneath it. 

A small turtle crawled out of it, looked up at me, then smiled.

I wanted it to speak to me; I almost wrote down here that it

did speak to me -- words of warmth and wisdom, of comfort and great joy.

But of course turtles don't talk. 

They're not supposed to and they don't need to;

they have all sorts of other pleasant and important

things to do in this world.

The greatest man I ever knew taught me that.

a rip in the fabric of interstellar dreams (NYT)

Interstellar gossip suffers from an accident/The Arecibo network has been twisted and then bent/No more can we eavesdrop on an asteroid's affairs/or find out what Venusians have been whispering downstairs/We'll have to be content with dishing dirt from our own sphere/which is about as striking as a bottle of stale beer.

 

Crazy Henry Fights Wildfires.

 

Crazy Henry enjoys reading the newspapers. He never has gotten used to an online newspaper subscription.

So when I went over to his place the other day I was not surprised to see newspapers strewn all over his living room. I didn't mind in the least; it meant I didn't have to take off my shoes -- I could just walk all over the newsprint with my dirty shoes.

"What's new?" I asked Crazy Henry. 

"Have you heard about those terrible wildfires out in California?" he asked.

"Yeah" I said. "It's a tough break for all those people that have to leave their homes and then come back to find nothing left but ashes."

"I have cousins out in California" he said.

"Yeah?" I asked. "Where?"

"Oh" he waved his hand vaguely, "they're out there somewhere -- my dad's sisters moved out there back in the 60's to sell swimming pool filters -- they all had a million kids and they're scattered around places like Sacramento and San Francisco."

"Any of 'em in the wildfire danger zone?" I asked.

Instead of answering me, Crazy Henry dived into his bedroom and came back out with a large and floppy black notebook.

"I'm gonna call my aunts right now and find out!" he said fiercely, as if someone was trying to stop him from doing it.

"You go, girl!" I told him encouragingly. In an emergency, we're all feminists.

Naturally he couldn't find his cell phone so he borrowed mine. 

In a few minutes he'd found out that he had a dozen cousins right in the path of the wildfires. 

"I'm gonna volunteer to go out there and fight them wildfires" he told me when he had hung up.

I didn't doubt him for a minute -- Crazy Henry does everything he thinks about doing out loud. If he said to me "There must be some truth to that saying about pigs can fly" I would expect him to immediately procure a shote and toss it out his window to see how far it would glide.

This was one time, however, when I refused to be carried away by his enthusiasm and altruism.

"Good luck with that" I told him. "I'm staying right here where nothing burns but barbecues."

Crazy Henry didn't mind my craven attitude. He's big-hearted that way. Or doesn't recognize anyone else in the world that can be a hero but himself. I've never been quite sure which it is.

"First thing" he said to me as he scattered newspapers around looking for his shoes, "is to get a hold of some good firefighting equipment."

His shoes were actually on his dining room table. When he got them on he asked if I wanted to go with him to get his firefighting stuff.

I told him no thanks; I'd stay at his place and look for the comics and then do the crossword if I could locate it.

He was gone for several hours. He came back with a large box full of boxes of baking soda and bottles of  apple cider vinegar.

"What's all that?" I asked him.

"Remember in school when we made those volcanoes with the baking soda and vinegar? Well, you combine the two to put out fires as well!" 

"Who told you that?" I asked him.

"It's just common sense. C'mon in the kitchen and we'll test it out."

So we went into Crazy Henry's kitchen, where he started a small fire out of newspapers in a coffee can. Then he poured a whole box of baking soda into an empty plastic gallon milk carton and on top of that poured in a bottle of apple cider vinegar.

Boy, did it fizz!

It not only put out the coffee can fire, but knocked over the salt and pepper shakers and blew an empty Mason jar right off of the counter onto the floor -- where it shattered into smithereens. Crazy Henry was exultant. I cleaned up the shattered Mason jar.

"See how good that works!" he yelled at me in glee. "Now I'm ready to go fight wildfires!"

Something got into me just then, and I had to say it.

"You know what works even better than vinegar and baking soda?" I asked him.

"No, what?"

"Mayonnaise" I told him earnestly. "You know how it gets bubble gum out of hair? It also puts out any kind of fire."

"No kiddin?" 

"No kiddin."

Crazy Henry rushed back out to corner the mayonnaise market. But I decided not to stick around for when he got back. He has a nice big fireplace in the living room, laid with wood from the corner convenience store, and I'm betting he's going to light a fire in there and then try to put it out with mayonnaise. I didn't wanna be around for that. 

Besides, the smell of the apple cider vinegar he used with the baking soda made me think of the apple cider donuts they sell over at Aamodt's Apple Orchard this time of year -- so I decided to go get a dozen or so. 

I'd bring some over to Crazy Henry's tomorrow -- if he hasn't left for California yet.

Deliver me from darkness

 

Deliver me from all my transgressions: make me not the reproach of the foolish

Psalm 39:8

Deliver me from darkness, Lord: I wander aimlessly.

Help me repent so fools reproach not my plain frailty. 

Unbuttoned.

 

“Scratch my back” I asked my wife.

But when I turned to her she wasn’t there.

I got up and went into the kids’ bedroom.

“Hey, have you seen your mother?” I asked them.

But there were no kids. And it wasn’t a bedroom.

It was the garage, with a green plastic barrel

Full of greasy washers.

It smelled harsh and cold.

I buttoned the cuffs on my long sleeve shirt.

Propriety is important during a crisis.

But it made no sense,

Since I had to immediately unbutton them

To roll up my sleeves to move the greasy

Barrel of washers into a corner.

So I could open the trapdoor.

At the bottom of the trapdoor stairs

I found a magic abalone shell.

My one wish was to have a clean oven

Again.

The shell spun around, then puffed

Out yellow smoke.

When I went back upstairs to check the oven

I discovered I had no kitchen. Just a hotplate

On a gate leg table on the sun porch.

But the sun refused to shine.

This wasn’t very strange because

A permanent eclipse was taking place --

Congress refused to release funds 

To end it.

I guess my mail-in ballot never 

Got through.

My back still itched something fierce,

So I found a long shoehorn to use.

It worked fine.

But now I’m worried about that barrel

Of greasy washers.

They don’t belong to me. I have to turn

Them in.

But to whom? I don’t have a receipt.

I could be accused of theft. Or worse.

Of a hate crime. 

I’m leaving immediately for Uruguay. They 

Have no extradition treaty with the United 

States. 

I guess it’s a good thing after all 

I don’t seem to have any family.

They’d slow me down shopping

For souvenirs.

The Age of Velcro

 

I never saw a door slammed with such vehemence or cold malice.

It was the end of the Age of Velcro.

For me, anyway.

And my library disappeared with it.

My books were many and dog eared.

Paperbacks signed by the author.

A child’s version of the Necronomicon.

Circus programmes.

The History of Lollipops, by M. Zapruder.

Back issues of the Feldspar Times and Seasons.

 The Emmett Till Cookbook.

I became addicted to mumbo sauce.

My teeth fell out and my tongue turned 

Glossy red.

Group therapy was a bust;

I just switched to Patum Peperium.

But I went on to win the Chirruper Cup in Hosiery;

The Charles Baumann Award for Superior Grit;

A set of ceramic thimbles from the S.S. Kresge Company;

The 1997 Pinewood Derby Medallion;

A lifetime supply of 3-in-1 oil from the

George W. Cole Foundation;

And was runner up at the 2011 Squab Games

In Basra.

Still, I never got over my childhood trauma.

She was eleven and I was eight.

We never met formally or corresponded.

In fact I didn’t know her at all back then;

But I saw her walking down Hennepin Avenue

The other day -- a perfectly complete stranger.

So beautiful and distant that I knew right away.

We should have been frustrated lovers as children.

I get that way sometimes when I have

Too much peppermint.

In the matter of punctuation I

Always taught my students in Thailand

To leave it alone and let the context

Take care of the meaning//

Unless they wanted to be published

In the Huffington Post//

Then they should hire a plumber?

(in the entire history of etiquette in Thailand no one has ever slammed a door)

For many years I was in great health and poor pain.

Those were the years I grew bushy eyebrows.

Those were the times when I mastered the 

Art of Velcro

To such an extent

That I could afford to take a trip

To Milwaukee.

I peddled so much absurdity 

That I finally got silliness poisoning.

Forced to retire, I bought a pineapple

In Hawaii.

It’s still there, in a museum.

I’ve found that the only cure

For sleepiness is loneliness.

Or a mop handle between the teeth.

When you write as much as I do

And with so little effort

You start writing in your sleep.

Since you can’t buy a mop handle

For love nor money anymore

I stay lonely instead

By brushing my teeth with tuna fish.

I haven’t been visited by another 

Human being in a dozen years.

Excepting the Census Enumerator.

I find this interview is becoming tedious.

Pray, what newspaper did you say you’re 

With?

And why am I being singled out for an interview?

My literary work -- my postcards -- or my heretical

Recipe for mumbo sauce?

I don’t believe there’s any such newspaper

As the Marmalade Times.

Please to show me some credentials . . . 

Well, as I was saying,

The reason I cover my walls with

Maps is because they keep the flies out.

Have you ever seen a fly land on a map?

No you haven’t.

That’s one of the great secrets I share 

Only with my writing students --

And only at the graduate level.

Flies are emissaries of Beelzebub,

And as such want to destroy every

Generous creative impulse in mankind.

All great poets were continuously bothered by flies.

They landed in Byron’s soup, flew into William Blake’s

Inkpot, and crawled into Shakespeare’s second best

Bed. 

As you may have heard,

The life of a blurb artiste is a hard one.

I settled into that vocation almost by accident.

Walking past a Walgreen’s Drugstore one day

I swerved to avoid a shih tzu, only to bump

Into its owner -- a comely maiden who immediately

Invited me into Walgreen’s so we could compare 

Our blood pressures. 

So smitten was I with her loveliness that

I composed a romantic blurb for her on the spot:

“Eyes to bedazzle the sun; a face to steal the heart; and 

A suppleness of spirit that suggests much but reveals little

At first acquaintance.”

The druggist on duty overheard my blurb, 

Phoned it into the head office,

And the next thing I knew I was ensconced

In a cushy office writing blurbs about Epsom Salts

And nail clippers. 

As for the comely maiden,

We parted amicably enough

 as vice presidential 

Candidates.

You keep harping on my political views.

Why?

I never form an opinion on things

Until after I write something about them.

As I was saying,

Once my library was gone

And I had come to terms with

My addictions and inner Elmos,

I settled down to the writing of blurbs

Until the embargo on chindles began.

It was then impossible to continue,

So I got a grant from the Ronald McDonald House

To stay at home quietly minding my own business.

A little known fact is that these grants, amounting to

Millions of dollars each year,

Are available to just about anyone who is 

Literate and a native born American citizen. 

Life has been good since then.

I’ve switched from blurbs to platitudes,

Which are easier on my throat and impressive

To teach.

And now you want my mother’s maiden name?

You’re absurd, you are!

This interview is over. Get out.

Oh, I see . . . 

Not a newspaper at all.

You’re National Security.

And I’m a threat. A small threat.

Who can be dealt with kindly.

But firmly.

Yessir. My mother’s maiden name

Was Bedell.

Can I just say I really don’t have any addictions.

Not as such.

Mostly I have obsessions.

With Velcro. Anchovies. Yiddish. Peonies.

And houses with orange tile roofs.

There’s something compelling yet suspicious

About a house with bright orange colored

Roof tiles -- don’t you think?

They ought to be investigated as some kind of threat.

I mean, really, won’t airplanes get distracted by

Their unusual color and go off course, 

Crashing into mountain sides?

Has anyone done a study of that?

I’d be glad to do it for you,

Free of charge of course.

And who needs a lot of books lying around,

Cluttering up the place?

They smell of stale wood pulp.

They’re an invitation for silverfish 

To take up residence.

Some of them contain strong ideas

That children cannot digest.

I’m actually glad I lost all my books.

Now will you take those baggies off my

Hands and feet?

The Abandoned Glass Factory

Near my boyhood home in Southeast Minneapolis there was a railyard that harbored half a dozen dilapidated grain elevators, several cadaverous warehouses that no longer did any business except as condos for pigeons, and an abandoned glass factory.

At some point before I was born the glass factory had partially burned down, and was not reopened. The derelict building stood on a rise of ground, giving it a sort of collapsed cathedral radiance in the sunlight.

My mother told me that under no circumstances was I ever to cross the railyard to the abandoned glass factory. She painted a grisly picture of railyard hobos lurking in the shadows, waiting to pounce on disobedient little boys and eating them up like Twinkies. All the glass in the abandoned factory was tainted, poisoned by toxins so powerful that should I slice my pudgy fingers on a discarded piece of glassware my hand would blow up like a dirigible and explode in my face with fetid black pus.

So naturally I had to go exploring there with my pals as often as possible. 

It was only two blocks away, and my pals, incipient hooligans like myself, relished the thought of trespassing; and what was even more tantalizing, after our first clandestine visit, was the demonic joy of hurling clots of melted glassware at the factory windows. Watching the glittering shower of powdered glass from a desecrated skylight was all the bliss a nine year old boy like me could handle.

In front of the abandoned glass factory was a small pond of black water. Like a black hole, it absorbed light but gave none out. A slick of oil on the surface gave it a surly rainbow color when the light was right. Using splintering pallets, we managed to sail out into the middle of the festering pool, which smelled of an evil and sour disapproval of all lifeforms. Inevitably, I fell into this cesspool one fine day. Thrashing around in terror, I discovered the whole pond was only about three feet deep. When I dragged myself to shore I reeked so bad that my pals -- fair weather friends to a man, curse them -- hightailed it out of there, leaving me to slog home by myself. 

Hell may have no fury like a woman scorned, but a mother confronted with a child whose summer wardrobe is ruined, and who smells like a mothball factory, runs a close second.

My memory may be a bit fuzzy after all these years, but it seems to me I was grounded through the entire administration of LBJ.

Since then the only abandoned buildings I have ever felt like exploring are made of Legos, and constructed by my grand kids.