Ballpark Love

I could say dreams are curious, but are they really? I cannot recall a time that a dream has flirted any inquiry of me, it is only me that inquires into my dreams, or so it seems. What if we never spoke of dreams and regarded them as an off-shoot of memories? "What was it I was thinking?" Dreams are portals; step into the fissure and feel yourself carbonate. Bubbles rushing through your toes up and out of your nose. You're in deep, dark, thick, sleep. 

So, last night in my dream she was sitting next to me. We were at a ball game of some sort. It felt like baseball, but smelled like football. I sat with her and her girlfriend. The two were laughing and joking at topics easily ignored by a man. She sat next to me, plainly gorgeous, light, and womanly. She is a woman. And here in this stadium, immensely packed with blurred apparitions of people, she was my girl. I wasn't mad at her, but a little annoyed - much like my actual attitude towards her in my waking life. However, annoyed as I was, I was playful and caring, though hardened and quiet. She sat on my left, her hair in a bun, a black tank-top clung to her chest, and jeans that I did not see. A comfortable halt in her girly conversation and she turned to me, finally. Cracking a smile she sarcastically complimented me, "Ohhhh, look at those veiny arms of yours..."she joked, but meant it seriously. My arm outstretched, veins and all, responded immediately to the call. Annoyed, I was, but still in love. Her words still push, prod, and shove like they always have. She tried to turn, but I caught her in my gaze and stared at her as if in a daze. My face was cut as sharp as stone, and in that moment, we sat alone. Isolated in a crowded space, focused on my lover. 

And as I awoke the stadium went black, a heavy vignette shrouded my dream-girl and she was gone. I tossed in my bed from one side to the other, grasping frantically at a pillow, shoving it between my legs. It was early, too early to get up. I laid my head down and thought about that mystery until the waves of sleep carried me again into the sea. 

I'm fighting the evening ritual at the beginning of the day. Spent all night upright without muttering a word. Watched the gears turn the horizons wheels. Jolted my head back and forth in between realities. Saw a man sketching, speaking so little, about nothing with a woman, they had few areas in common. The hair next to me grew thicker by the minute, and much more quiet at every passing hour, I dared not bother her. Saw not my reflection, but reflected on the weekend. Sure, my mind is strong, but is my body weakend? Spoke too many words faster than I could think and, tripped through sentances, stopping to repeat them. Rode into the dawn with my wrist tied in palms. Listened to Joni Mitchell sing like preached psalms. Saturday and Sunday called for more lip balm. Or chap stick for chapped lips, like chop sticks for Asian kids. Thought about conversations the way water seeps into bread. I got soaked up and saturated in my own head. Somehow made due upright in my wicked bed. A loud horn woke me and scared me half to death. And half dead I wandered the chambers of my personal void. I chased down a melody and when I found it struck a chord. The notes shuttered as they rang and stole the clothes off my back. When my body dropped its guard my soul picked up the slack. I was a groovey piece of melon, dripping sweetly across cement. A blue birds worst nightmare, a white crows lament.

Debt. In debt to a greater sign. In debt to a greater evil. In debt to my eyes. In debt to my body. In debt to my brother. In debt to my Mother. In debt to all Mothers - we are. It's a shame. It's a damn shame. How can you let this happen? How? This is your life, isn't it? You have control, don't you? It's your phrase, catch it. Play the hand you're delt, kiddo. This is your hand, this is the game. PLAY. Play and you might win. Play and you'll surely lose. Either way - play.


I'm envious of those who can clearly interpret those abstract thoughts that come to one as a butterfly to a spring bloom. Winged, they flutter about in multitudinous array, mocking our legs. Thoughts, as these, gather and become dense. Thoughts as these are clouds becoming storms. They are tornadoes. They are hurricanes. They are a great tsunami. And what am I? What am I to my mind? Am I the prisoner or the liberator of my thoughts? Both. Though, uncertain, I am, certainly, unsure. Never the less and never more, will a great wave of instinct and impulse rush to the shore, freeing death to the heavens, leaving bodies behind and beneath the flood. Or perhaps blow them away. Send them off flying to an aftermath. Where the rattled collect the scrap metal of what was swept away. What was swept away? It was your house. It was your flat screen television. It was some dusty computer that you had since junior high - the one your Mom brought home, but never quite knew how to use. It was your favorite blanket, the one that smelled like some oak-wood crevice in your house. It was a medallion, your great uncles' from the War. All blown away. All dust and morons gather. Picking through the pile up. Tears falling heavy - the storm below our foreheads. We gather here 'round the mass of a broken past. But it was not broken at first. That flat screen was in your home, but it was not in your home first. It was in a box. And before that in a car or truck. And before that a warehouse (you probably saw it on the internet or in the electronic section of Wal-Mart). You payed your stupid money, the stupid clerk behind the blue and gray cash podium accepted your stupid credit, your stupid television was delivered or maybe you drove it home your stupid self. And for some stupid reason you're bent over, arms folded into your stomach, shedding tears, wailing, hollering to God over what is now a pile of broken glass, microchips, plastic, and steel. My son was taken away by robed men in the middle of the night, but no one gave a goddamn hoot about that. Not even me! I was too busy watching the Nicks play the Heat on MY FLAT SCREEN. Oh, but I did see what that storm did to your family. Terrible, just terrible. I'll send my condolences as I flick the ash of my finest into a tray that one could say might have been forged out of diamonds. It's remarkable how expensive my ash tray is. I marvel at it as if it were my own son. My daughter is going out tonight, with some guy named Steve. Or maybe it's Ramon.. Actually, now that I think about it, my daughter is a lesbian. Yea, that's it... She brought her girlfriend her just the other month, week, or day.. I really can't remember. But my daughters girlfriend had long legs, she had blonde and pink hair, a black net hung off her shoulders and bright pink linen stuck to her sticky skin, she had blue jean short shorts, the kind that would make Daisy Duke seem like a real respectable Northern Gal. Oh man what a wallop my daughters girlfriend is. Her name is Stacy, or Gina, or something strange. But, that was weeks ago... I think. So who is she going out with tonight? My damn son, taken from me. Out the window he was dragged in the middle of the night. His pants were barely fasten around his waist. I was saw his face as his eyes rolled back and his mouth twisted. I saw the men, both tall shadowed hounds of the night, white gloves, white shoe laces, white, eyes, white teeth, all else, black. He was Gods son. He wasn't Jesus, but he was special, you know? Like a fresh hot apple pie. That kid was straight out of the oven. What a kid. He went to school, did his homework, ran from the police... or did he run for the police?? I can never remember - this TV is just too big!! I'm a fat fuck and a fat pig. I lay in the yard sometimes wishing somebody would mow me down. I hide in the daisies plucking pedals pondering purposely, perfectly placid, perky and poised. I am the slow gin - I fill the noise. I am the females and the boys - daisies.
Good men, all were we. Fellow men in the army. Righteous foes, we'd cut them down. Meat for our stew, bones for our hounds. Pious men, the flock of we. Battle Ax, our infantry. Tough as nails Max claimed to be. Shot him dead in the first battle of New Guinea. Immortal Al took heed at the front. His head was struck and he was killed from the blunt. Good men, all were me. Fellow men in His army. We'd cut them down...
I remember the first one. But, it alludes me now..