Untitled

He would do the same thing each day. He would wake, throw the sheets, descend the bed and enter the bathroom. He would piss a toxic yellow sludge, a result of the vitamin pill he took each night. He had learned that the remaining nutrients not readily absorbed by his body would be passed with the remaining wastes left overnight. He stopped taking the pills once, but the color remained the same.

He would look in the mirror and take hold of the blue hand mirror to his left. The hand mirror was his mother’s. Although never given proper denomination, there were objects amassed in his home that he never felt were his own, as though he were constantly borrowing for want of use. These, were his mother’s things.

He would spin round to check the thinning patch of hair on the crown of his head. He started doing this two years ago. His father has a similarly thinned patched, aged appropriately through time. He knew what would become of him, and he felt nothing through such an understanding. This was uncontrollable, an event that has happened long before any evidence of being. He thought perhaps this predetermined existence was fate. As he would stare into the blue hand mirror, however, he thought that he was no longer sixteen.

He would spit into the white tarnished bowl, run water, lift his head and look into his own eyes. There would be nothing left. He knew this would be so, just as he knew the sink would run cold at first and the hair of his crown would increasingly being to fall. Each twitch, blast of color or imperfect pigment of his eye would be superficial. He would wonder how much longer he could hide this.

He would kill the light but the rising sun would refuse to cast shadows on him.

Buzzard’s Bay, 2009

Buzzard’s Bay, 2009

by M. R. Brown

The old man sits at his bench, displaced in time and age

He is thirty-nine, adrift in Nantucket Sound

It is his first time at sea

Braced and white-haired, hunched over his meal

His wife has left him and alone he sits

It is 1855, and his eyes raise from the worn oak wheel

An empty parking lot of gravel lays before him

The wind passes through his now thinned hair

Swaying to and fro

His hand shakes at the fury that bellows through the sheets

and the waves that press against his hull

He pauses his search through his food

Docking in Newport, seven years passed

His wife waits ashore in a white-lace dress

Her body is the crest of a wave

He breathes a heavy sigh, wasted and destroyed

He weeps, quietly

-2009

Pull My Daisy

“Pull My Daisy”

by M. R. Brown

The poet

waking off the hardwooded floors,

scatter-thought, as the old folks

gather outside church in the morning.

In his breast pocket he keeps the

four pronged memory notepad, pages

filled with the unbridled desires and passions.

The secrets to the poet’s heart.

These words, characters

placed in perfect unison, one

beside the next, are vacant from the bookstore

shelves. I’ve read what he offered all men, $24.95.

It’s Sunday morning in the universe and all

is right. The flat’s a mess, what with

all the little plastic bottles and books half read,

set against a white painted wall. The evening

stink of dried wine and spilt beer. Did no one drink

the darker liquor last night?

There are horns playing from outside

as the caps and suits file down the sidewalks

in their neat and ordered rows. The television

is on in the four cornered room, news channels

left running from last evening, all previously recorded.

They break the silence of the room for the moment.

Faint echoes of the past arguing what is present

and what is past.

The poet comes out of the white

steeled door, twitching his head as

he cours the room for a last cigarette.

He sits forcefully on the grey couch, blending

in. With the final drag of his cigarette he says,

‘What’s in my chest, boy, is for no man’s eyes.

What’s in my chest can never be sold.’

Anita Ellis sings with such beauty. Such a beauty can

never be harmed.

Unfinished Short Story 5

Noir on a Saturday

“Do you know what time it is?” he said, pulling the last drag from his Marlboro cigarette. He was sitting in is green and yellow patterned chair in front of the door, waiting for this moment.

“Bill, you startled me. I’m sorry, I was just running late.” The sound in her voice was inextricably that of excuse.

“If I look behind my left shoulder I have a feeling that Timex clock will read 3:35 a.m.”

“I didn’t think it was that late”

“The funny thing about clocks, Daisy, is their inept ability to be void of human emotions. They are simple machines. This one runs on a small lithium battery that lasts months on end with zero problems and zero interruptions. That Timex will never lie about what time it is.”

“I’m sorry Bill.” She forcibly yawns, trying to downplay the situation.

“Oh you’re tired? That’s funny. Usually someone gets tired when they have been doing something exhausting. What have you been doing, dear?” The end of his statement was grinding gears in her ear.

“I was out with a friend.”

“It was that new guy from work wasn’t it?” he pressed.

“Yes. His name is Oli, and it was only a drink.”

“I know a drink is never just a drink with you. You suck those down with a fury, dear, as though they were your salvation.”

“Bill, you have to believe me. It was only a drink.” She approaches him as though to console him but she is halted before she can reach him.

“You loose that button in a fit of rage at a computer at work?” She hadn’t notice that her breast button had bust from its seam.

“Oh, I must have. Silly me” she giggled. Her eyes couldn’t find the appropriate place to land, leaving her browsing the room’s floor.

“Don’t worry dear. Relax. This will only take a minute. Look at me.” He paused. “Look at me.” He paused again. “Look at me!”

“I’m sorry, Bill. I’m sorry. It was just a drink.” She fell to her knees.

“Get up. Get up! I want you to look me in the eyes as I take care of this situation. Now, smile for me, baby. Show me those pearly whites.” He raised his hand as his eyes gleamed off her porcelain veneers.

Unfinished Short Story 4

Written In Name And Blood

Daniel’s bowler hat lay atop the oak table beside his glass of whiskey, no ice. A man who drinks whiskey never drinks with ice, this, Daniel would often comment, was because ice is used only to destroy the flavor. He propped his legs up on the table, threw his head back and finished the last of the whiskey in his glass.

The homestead was built by hand in 1878 by Daniel’s father and little more than broken boards was all Daniel could claim to be his own in the house. A black soot had settled into the thin cracks that ran along the veins of the wood until deposited in the knots. Through the stained black windows, poorly painted and with chips of wood continually breaking along the seams, Daniel noticed someone approaching with haste. He snatched his hat and made for the door.

“Can I help you boy-o” said Daniel, reaching the front steps of the porch before the young man. Daniel held in his hands a .22 caliper rifle that was stored next to the door.

“Is this Daniel Evergreen’s house?” the boy wearily inquired. He couldn’t have been more than twelve years old but the gun in Daniel’s hand shot the fear of God in the boy long before a bullet could ever be fired.

Now, I suspect a lot of things out here in these woods. I suspect that any man dressed nicer than myself ain’t from around these parts. I suspect that the scarcity of rodents around here to be a direct result of this .22 in my hands. I suspect a man who reached first to be disrespecting anything I might offer him. What I don’t suspect, boy-o, is a boy your size to give me any trouble. That right, boy-o?”

“Right, of course, sir.”

“Good, cause I am the man you’re looking for and this better be worth me leaving my chair.”

“I only bring news from the Dudley household.”

“Yes, that may be family albeit from my wife’s side. Continue.”

“Right, of course, well, they are concerned as to why they have not received any letters from their daughter in the past nine months and have filed a missing persons report with the sheriff. He has sent me here to call you down to town when you have a moment.”

“Did I hear you wrong when you said you only bring news from the Dudley household?”

“Right, sorry, I meant word from the sheriff that he got from the Dudley family.”

Daniel raised the barrel of the .22 to the boy’s eyes. “You’d be best to run boy-o. Ain’t no room for a liar in this homestead.” The boy double-clutched and nearly fell from his exertion towards where he came. Daniel hollered, “And tell your sheriff if he has something to ask me he’d be wise to get off his ass, grab that copper badge of his and come ask me himself.”

He passed through the kitchen, resting the .22 back against the side of the door. He entered into the dim-lit bedroom. Nancy Evergreen’s back rested against the center beam, mouth agape and eyes clouded over. He removed his bowler hat and hung it on the nail he drove through his wife’s forehead. “Looks like they’re playing our song, love. Do you remember the outro or are you still stuck at the crescendo?”

Unfinished Short Story 3

The Surprise Ending

It had been 43 days and countless miles. Amy left Boston in what seemed ages ago. And now, after confronting Bobby and his new girlfriend Jenna she has muddled it all up. Secretly though, the sound of Jenna’s hand as it laid into the cheek of Bobby, a sharp bit of thunder from out the Savannah Desert, rang angelic in her ear. The sight was even more inspiring.

“What the hell are you doing here?” screamed Bobby. It was as though the blood from a thousand angered disciples crying mutiny to Moses ran to his face. He was a candy apple red that Ana never witnessed before.

She was immediately disgusted by this outrage in Bobby. She saw her father, her uncle, and every man who had wronged her in life. She realized Bobby was no different than they were. In her disgust she stormed out of the room.

Outside, Jenna was hunched over sitting along the hallway wall. She was crying, deep tears of true affection. Amy approached her and pleaded that she was sorry for all the trouble she caused. Jenna ceased her tears and with here wide blue eyes stared into the very soul of Amy. In their gaze, Amy saw what it was she was missing. Her mother was the only loving figure in her life and in a strange apparition Jenna had taken her mother’s form. It hit Amy like an 18 wheeler truck barreling out of hell. The two embraced, pulled away, and kissed. This was Amy’s America, this was her true journey.

Unfinished Short Story 2

The Epiphany

It had been 43 days and countless miles. Amy left Boston in what seemed ages ago. And now, after confronting Bobby and his new girlfriend Jenna she has muddled it all up. Secretly though, the sound of Jenna’s hand as it laid into the cheek of Bobby, a sharp bit of thunder from out the Savannah Desert, rang angelic in her ear. The sight was even more inspiring.

“What the hell are you doing here?” screamed Bobby. It was as though the blood from a thousand angered disciples crying mutiny to Moses ran to his face. He was a candy apple red that Ana never witnessed before.

“Do you have any idea why I’m here?” she pleaded. “Bobby, it took me two days after you left to realize I couldn’t let you go. I think of you every night. You were the closest person I’ve had in my life. If you only could know how much I went through to get here, to be here beside you now, you would truly know how I feel.” She resisted all the temptations to unleash her tears but she wasn’t strong enough.

“Amy, when I left I had no idea how you felt. I used to stay awake at night and think about you. Secretly, when we would take those walks when we were younger, I was so nervous that my palms would sweat. I was too embarrassed to even hold your hand. I’ve always felt like I missed my chance.”

The two embraced and kissed, a long kiss that was worthy of years of waiting. Amy pulled back and realized something she never thought would happen. She felt nothing. There was no emotion, no longing.

“Bobby, I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“I love you and that’s why” she paused, and realizes the words before she can even say them, “I have to leave you.”

“Wait. What do you mean?” replied Bobby, utterly dumbfounded.

“I can’t do this. I feel nothing, Bobby. I’ve traveled through heaven and hell and all I’ve found is Purgatory. Maybe I’ve found a part of me that doesn’t need this endless chasing.”

Amy leaves the room and finally feels what she dreamt of as she stared down the veins of America. There was no need for this man to give her approval, all she needed was to find herself. It was backseats and the open road, that fueling of the soul that Jack Kerouac once found, and as she walked out of the building it was day 1.

Unfinished Short Story 1

The Elegy

It had been 43 days and countless miles. Amy left Boston in what seemed ages ago. And now, after confronting Bobby and his new girlfriend Jenna she has muddled it all up. Secretly though, the sound of Jenna’s hand as it laid into the cheek of Bobby, a sharp bit of thunder from out the Savannah Desert, rang angelic in her ear. The sight was even more inspiring.

“What the hell are you doing here?” screamed Bobby. It was as though the blood from a thousand angered disciples crying mutiny to Moses ran to his face. He was a candy apple red that Ana never witnessed before.

“Do you have any idea why I’m here?” she pleaded. “Bobby, it took me two days after you left to realize I couldn’t let you go. I think of you every night. You were the closest person I’ve had in my life. If you only could know how much I went through to get here, to be here beside you now, you would truly know how I feel.” She resisted all the temptations to unleash her tears but she wasn’t strong enough.

“Amy, when I left I had no idea how you felt. When I got here, Jenna was the first person I met. She was smart, beautiful, kind and sincere. She made me feel like my family never moved. I immediately felt for her what I couldn’t feel for you in all these years I’ve known you. I’m sorry Amy, I love her.”

And that was it, the dagger through her heart. Her journey down the veins of America in the pursuit of finding the boy who left too soon had only resulted in a final chapter. It was over, and she knew that. She had lost to a woman half her size and twice her beauty in Jenna.

She slowly bent forward to grab her bags and as she left the room, the radio played “She said, hey babe, take a walk on the wild side. I said, hey honey, take a walk on the wild side. And the coloured girls say, Doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo, doo.” Her tears left crevices down her porcelain face.

How To Be A Good Writer

“How to be a Good Writer” by Charles Bukowski

you’ve got to fuck a great many women
beautiful women
and write a few decent love poems.

and don’t worry about age
and/or freshly-arrived talents.

just drink more beer
more and more beer

and attend the racetrack at least once a

week

and win
if possible

learning to win is hard —
any slob can be a good loser.

and don’t forget your Brahms
and your Bach and your
beer.

don’t overexercise.

sleep until noon.

avoid paying credit cards
or paying for anything on
time.

remember that there isn’t a piece of ass
in this world over $50
(in 1977).

and if you have the ability to love
love yourself first
but always be aware of the possibility of
total defeat
whether the reason for that defeat
seems right or wrong —

an early taste of death is not necessarily
a bad thing.

stay out of churches and bars and museums,
and like the spider be
patient —
time is everybody’s cross,
plus
exile
defeat
treachery

all that dross.

stay with the beer.

beer is continuous blood.

a continuous lover.

get a large typewriter
and as the footsteps go up and down
outside your window

hit that thing
hit it hard

make it a heavyweight fight

make it the bull when he first charges in

and remember the old dogs
who fought so well:
Hemingway, Celine, Dostoevsky, Hamsun.

If you think they didn’t go crazy
in tiny rooms
just like you’re doing now

without women
without food
without hope

then you’re not ready.

drink more beer.
there’s time.
and if there’s not
that’s all right
too.

1960

Revolutionaries. The New Campaign.

The Holy God spouting

obscenities in spoken Word.

Black are the sores upon our broken backs and

grey the eyes of our Maker.

Pry up the floorboards till the end of

every means are unearthed.

Turn them over in your hands

admire their form.

How they flitter in the fading

moonlight.

Like creatures of a trip dropped from

a light green moss, salty and true

Trace the paisley patterns that fall down the side of her face. Mark the dark rings around her eyes