I’m waiting outside McDonald’s. We’ve just gotten off of the subway at Union Square. My friends needed to use a bathroom after pregaming on the train to Penn so we stopped here. It seems the cashier is giving them a hard time, not one of the ten have come outside in a while. A friend of mine named Neal is waiting with me. He is smoking a menthol cigarette. The wind picks up suddenly. I cross my arms to block it and trap the warmth inside my hoodie.
“Want one?” Neal asks, holding out his pack.
“No thanks, they make me sick.” I hurriedly ask him, “I’m feeling kind of nauseous man, is this normal?”
He nods and takes another drag. His left hand digs in his coat pocket and resurfaces with something white and oblong, the size of a cigarette, with a hole revealing a hollowed interior that reaches halfway down its length. He puts one end of the something to his mouth and turns up to face me. Staring at the hole now, I look into it, closer, trying to figure out what it is. A breeze of cool air filters through the hole and slowly spreads across my face, starting with my eyes. I take a deep breath of the cool air and relax. My nausea fades.
“It’s a menthol inhaler,” he says as he slips it back into his pocket, “I never come without one. Better?”
“Much. Thanks,” I say smiling. Neal is a good guy, I’m glad he’s here. I look to my right and see our group leaving McDonald’s, but missing two people.
“Chloe’s at Starbucks with Jake,” says Johnny, as he walks up to Neal and me. “We’ll leave as soon as she gets out.” Then, turning to me he asks in a low voice, “How are you feeling?”
“Good now man, I was getting a bit antsy but Neal calmed me down. I wish we were just inside already, it’s going to start soon.”
“It’s only a few blocks away, we’ll get there soon. Once you start walking everything will be fine.” He pats me gently on the shoulder and walks away. About ten feet to my right the majority of our group is huddling together.
I nod and lean against a metal gate designating the Union Square Café’s outdoors eating area from the sidewalk and look up the road, towards the venue. Two years ago I spent many nights here in Union Square. I would wander around the city before melding with the crowd on the stairs and watching whatever entertainment was there. In this huge city, a place like Union is comforting; the stairs are an inviting break from the relentless flow of the city.
I start to feel a sensation that the buildings here are smaller than I remember. Most of the stores are closed now and the sidewalks are almost empty. That must be it. After reasoning with myself, I look up the sidewalk and stare into the face of a passing woman. She is black and about 30 with short curled hair hid under a brown beanie. The wires of her headphones peek out from a multi-hued brown knit scarf around her neck. She is listening to something on her iPod, and her eyes focus on the ground in front of her feet. I stare at her eyes and a strange empathy rises in me. I see something familiar there , something–
“Let’s go! It’s almost ten, doors opened a half hour ago,” Johnny says as he walks past me and down the sidewalk. He has trouble lighting a cigarette and turns his back to the wind, flicking his lighter and staring determinedly at his hands.
“We’ve got plenty of time, they won’t start letting people in until past 10 anyway,” says Neal, tossing his cigarette and throwing his hood onto his head. He walks up to Johnny, holding up his light behind a cupped hand. The end catches and they both walk towards Broadway.
The group I came with has reformed fully now and is walking down the road and I am watching it all with my hands stuffed in my pockets leaning on this gate in this shrinking city until an arm locks with mine and brings me with the group. My eyes follow the arm to its body and I smile back. It’s Chloe, with her coffee now, and Jake on her other arm. I laugh and imagine us as a human weave walking down Broadway, and the wind is gone, the fear is gone, the hunger is gone, everything gone or going –
“I’m feeling gooooooood right now,” she says, and takes a drink of her coffee before holding the cup out to me.
I shake my head and wink at her, “I’m good, thanks. Almost there.”
The line is moving by the time we get there, but it is long and wraps around the corner to a neighboring movie theater. The lights underneath the movie theater’s awning are bright white. Now I’m uncomfortable; the fluorescence makes the night seem colder, harsher. I look down, away from the lights and up the line. A homeless old man in ragged beige clothing and a free beard is moving up the side of the line. He is holding a cardboard sign with ‘HAVE A HEART, I’M HUNGRY (for booze)’ scrawled in black Sharpie. When we pass him I look away, turning my ear towards him. He doesn’t talk to me but I hear him gathering change behind me. Someone says, “At least he’s honest…” and chuckles to a friend.
At the entrance we empty our pockets and pass security without a problem. I step gratefully into the warmth of Webster Hall on a sold-out night. I look back to see that everyone got in okay. I separate and wander into a crowded room on the first floor. Smoke, strobe lights and whirling bodies, a two-step remix of Everything In Its Right Place by Radiohead are the room. I understand that I am the room too and writhe towards the source of the sound. The flowing, loving, super-divine rhythm and bass are everywhere and I lean wearily on a pedestal topped with a protective glass separator. The DJs behind are pushing buttons on a controller I’ve never seen and I’m in love with them and those buttons and this wood that feels so firm and safe against my forearms…
I look back at the floor and see gyrations and want to be there, to be in it, to be it. I squirm towards the mass of bodies swaying in unison and become an undulation. I look down at the finger lights I stole earlier and switch them on. My arms begin to spiral around each other and I close my eyes. The beat enters me; Dum-ts Dum-ts Dum-ts Dum-ts in my heart’s beating, in my soul. A girl I don’t know begins to rub my head and as my eyes open I see her grin mirroring mine. I know her now. Her hands glow and dance for my eyes. We are synchronizing with the air, with the lights, with the kick, the shuffle of it all, of the beat, of the bodies, of tonight, of life. In my self, my own significance and self-love rising with my beautiful newfound love of everything.
—-——-
“The comedown wasn’t so bad. This shit was definitely pure.”
Johnny and I are in his room, sitting on his futon. I’m slouched, gazing at the TV while he cracks open a vanilla Dutch Master and guts it into a Ziploc next to the ottoman. Footage of the protests in Libya is on Fox News. Kids my age and younger are holding signs at rallies that say “Free Libya” and “No More Oil for the West”. My attention fades when Imus shares his opinion on the obligation of US’ intervention in the Libyan conflict. I sit up and reach for the remote. I change the input to HDMI2 and leave the screen blank.
“Yeah. I don’t feel any different than usual. We should definitely do it again for Rusko.” I say, slouching back into my seat. A bar from the futon’s frame prods my tailbone and I reposition. “The futon’s fucked up here.”
No response. He’s engrossed in licking the inner leaf of the cigar closed. Careful not to let any weed fall to the carpet, he sets the blunt down on an Economics textbook and starts to roll the outer leaf back on. He inspects the blunt for any incongruities and licks them into place.
“Here, roast this. I gotta shit,” he says, before exiting the room and walking down the hall.
I hear a door close, followed by the hum of a fan. I hold the lighter up to the blunt and run the flame up and down the length of it until it feels crisp. When I finish I put the lighter and the blunt down on the ottoman and wait. Spray-painted stencils and bumper stickers from Sub Pop and other music labels are sloppily hung on the wall behind the TV. There are holes too, from former hanging spots. It’s so thrown together, so rushed and asymmetric. Unfinished water bottles and beer bottles from the previous weeks litter the floor beneath the futon. I reach down and grab for a fresh water. I gulp what’s left of the bottle before realizing it’s stale and, swallowing with a grimace, I throw it away. It lands next to the bag of guts on the floor and tips over on its side.
I remember that I have work tomorrow on top of all of the reading I have to do for school, most of which was due three weeks ago.
My shift is 2:30-11, so that will give me enough time to head to Matt’s after and chill before heading home to read half of For Whom the Bell Tolls. Then I’ll start in on Like Lesser Gods, hopefully getting halfway through before passing out. Tomasi kills me. Her writing is bland and slow and I just don’t care about Mr. Tiff or any of those other names on a page. I just wish I had someone to talk to at school, someone to study with.
I need someone to inspire me, to make me see what value this has. Then I’d get the work done and it wouldn’t be work because I’d believe in it. I wouldn’t put it off and I wouldn’t have to pull all-nighters to finish on time. I can’t wait until it’s over and I’m out of college and I can read what I want to again. But what then? Where is this leading? What will happen when I have my official, framed diploma – my piece of paper. Will I be passionate about work, like my Mom and Dad? Will I be happy then, will life make any sense? Will I –
The lights go out and Johnny reenters the room with a sigh of relief.
“Ready?” he asks, grabbing both the blunt and the lighter off the ottoman.
“Yeah,” I say, rising, “we doing this outside?”
uncooked meat
for flies
1” of lemonade for
yellow jackets -
at least fifteen struggled.
a wing
or 4 legs
caught -
the others not
gripping
before they’re really in
they try
hard
but the free limbs fail
they succumb to goo in a jar
hanging from a branch filled by a janitor
at 6:35 am
to prevent
the use of an epi pen
or leftover pizza crust and fries
in the dumpster
behind
the cafeteria
to prevent a buzz
a sting
to prevent an insect from
flying
into the face of a student who paid
$199.50
in
technology fees.
high and
chewing spearmint gum
at 4:24 AM
in the next six
eight to ten
hours i’ll be
stretching out on
new grass somewhere
in a corner
of my mind
while an 8-bit
siren sits set to remind me
that the sun has
come up
again
and it’s the 18th now
somehow the blankets
didn’t collect warmth
throughout the night basking
in the sun
in a dream that ended
too soon.
when I walk out to my
Civic
I won’t
notice the grass on
my lawn
as anything but
peripheral
I should lay in it
sometime.
antonio
twenty-four
ever
in a half open
casket
wax mannequin hands
show preservation
is still
unnatural
imperfect
a mouth sewn
Shut
eyes closed
the rosary beads seem
tacky
some dated superstition
that can’t help him
now,
never could,
but the stuffed
elephant in scrubs
is a nice touch
and
the temporary
tattoo of a purple duck
with a halo
on his right forearm
i focused on
long enough to notice
its fading / imperfections
cracking on the
edges
the halo no longer
whole
but still
noticeable
a late night
at a diner with two people
i’m close to
theorizing about
future events
non-events
relations and a new way to
perceive
and exist as a
conglomerate
‘i hate our country
but love it’
as a stage for nights spent with close
ones
over chicken fingers
fries a milkshake for
3
and french toast
reminders of
importance and the
definers of existence
as
things i
can’t recognize
notice:
a memory of a leaf on
a shroomy night
reminds me of a pact i made
to
go on more walks
some-one stitched a monkey on
a bathtowel that hangs
from the railing on my shower
door some -
where i have never seen a
place i don’t know
what life is like
there existence is foreign
alien
separate
not unlike what
life is like here
i take my grandmother
shopping once a week usually
Saturdays we pile things into
my car (food without value
and my cousin in Manhattan
won’t make it past
the weekend his bed in a hospital
might be empty sooner
- nothing -
is going to happen to him
harsh nothing
its everywhere
inside me in what i project
outside me)
alien in/to
twenty years
of ex -
perience -
is-tense
one tiny piece of shit
floats glancing back at
the monkey the railing the shower the
place i don’t know
kool enough to die but not
kill I take my doctor’s green
pill
drink tea
as the sharks swim through vases of
flowers
ten times around they go
twenty
searching for my sissy
heart
in a freak May night in
Los Angeles
Sunday
somebody playing
Beethoven
I sit behind pulled shades
in ambush
as ambitious men with new automobiles and
new blondes
command the streets
I sit in a rented room
carving a wooden rifle
drawing pictures of naked ladies
bulls
love affairs
old men
on the walls with children’s
crayons
it is up to each of us to live in
whatever way we can
as the generals, doctors, policemen
warn and torture
us
I bathe once a day
am frightened by cats and
shadows
sleep hardly at all
when my heart stops the whole world will get quicker
better
warmer
summer will follow summer
the air will be lake clear
and the meaning
too
but meanwhile
the green pill
these greasy floors off the
avenue and
down there a plot of worms of worms of
worms
and up here
no nymph blonde
to love me to sleep while I am
waiting.
- Charles Bukowski
laying in the shower
water spraying from the head
onto my knees
and thighs
i am still the same as i have always been
motivation hasn’t gotten easier to latch
onto. i am still a late sleeper
this is the first time i’ve washed my self in a week
i still jack off
i have a beard now,
my slack can be measured
in stray hairs. when i do
shave i always miss
something wearisome
days are occurring too often
too quickly
and the orgasms
aren’t as fun
as they used to be
i see the age -
the lines are
clear and there
is disgust in a
face.
how human i feel.
low to exhaustion
a lack
draining the life
potential. two eyes
look appalled looking
down
at me)
from the foot of my
bed. (looking only
