The Sculptor:

And where was I while Legerdemain
and Nipwilliger the troll
rested by a dying campfire
in woods by a river in North Georgia?

Drinking Dortmunder beer and smashing
the empty bottles against the wall for kicks
roughly 500 miles to the north
in a converted elementary school,

making flexible molds for the end of the world
while Jacob Beizart drank whiskey, smoked grass,
slept on an old, dusty couch by the stairwell
and yearned after my girlfriend

when he wasn't playing his guitar; channeling
the terrible power of his blues, the terrible
wondrous power, the only thing left that
scared me

that truly mystified and scared me
in those last dying days
of our country.
Oh say, can you see?

the drinking breed
I guess I am
It gets less cool/fun to reference,
right?

mott aint bukowski; neither
are you. but the keyboard
still plays. did for him. will
for you. does

for me. I am Special Lager;
I am 2 horses. Don't
fuck with me, is what I say to the world
(in my head) but what am I

really saying? [pause--
take piss--grab beer--]

"What's your name?" asked Nipwilliger.

"John. John L.," said the cyborg.

"What's the 'L' stand for?"

"Legerdemain," said the cyborg. "I.e., the word tattooed on the skin of my back."

"What's it mean?"

"Sleight of hand. Someone's idea of competitive branding."

"Whose idea?"

"It don't matter. I fucked him up and wrecked all the blueprints."

*

That's right, I broke the mold when they made me, mused Legerdemain, later, sitting Indian style before the dwindling campfire, streamlining his calluses with a Dremel tool while the troll dozed. Maybe they'll get me, maybe they won't. But not tonight, and it won't be here. That was in a song written and sung hundreds of years ago by a man known as Bob Dylan, widely recognized by the emotionally intelligent as the American Shakespeare. Whenever Legerdemain had cause to wonder (as he frequently did) Why are the humans? he would queue up some Dylan. Or better, a dude named Neil Young, who also ranked, in the mind of Legerdemain, as the American Shakespeare.

*

Legerdemain wondered who or what might qualify as the American Jesus. Could a half-human qualify? A half-machine? One thing seemed certain: left to its own devices, pure humanity had for roughly the past three thousand years revealed only a disturbing propensity for birthing anti-Christs. And not of just the, "I'll get mad drunk and mean and trash the mobile home before I kill you and the kids" variety either, thought the cyborg. No, humanity had borne -- and continued to squeeze out, centenially -- an alarming processional representative of what the cyborg thought of as the Lucifixion: shit-eating, fire-breathing, civilization-destroying lunatics. Chemically imbalanced

*

Rock and roll will set you free

One way or the other, the poor among the humans were perceptibly disappearing, whether through violent self-immolation, or because of the many diseases coupled with a lack of medical resources, or via various methods of abduction - some hidden, some well-known. Or through a combination of all of the above. And the ones who weren't dying were leaving. Or hiding. Or histrionically losing their minds in public and being killed by the authorities.

Anyway, as a result, certain species in the hybrid community were finding themselves increasingly among the employable classes - for certain posts, even most desirably so.

Nipwilliger was able to land a job as overnight cashier/stockboy/custodian/gas attendant at the Blue Egg Kwiki-Mart out beyond old Rt. 70, north of the city, not far from the main freeway. A twelve-hour nightly gig, from 7 pm to 7 am, Monday through Saturday.

Even with his fundamentally (though refined) trollish heart and ways, or perhaps in spite of such hard-headed, inflammatory proclivities - in spite of all, Nipwilliger thought that he really couldn't believe some of the shit he began to witness during these overnight shifts. No wonder they're dyin'

Kevlar lungs. Heart laced with titanium alloy. Graphite bones for lubricity. It all sounded good. Who knew how much of it was true; how much, hyperbole.

There were ways of knowing.

What he knew was, he felt pretty good. Lucid. Light. Good to go. Ready to roll.

*

The high, slashing noises of electric guitars, the wail of electronic audio feedback, the rumble of electric bass notes pulsing within a low, steady drumbeat...what appealed to his cyborg sensibilities most about all of it was its forward imperative, its architectural integrity, but first and foremost its quality of occurring in the moment

Bombing along in the rental car. Slashing down across the latitudes. Through Indiana, Kentucky, Tennessee. Sampled riffs from every electric guitar passage he'd ever heard blooming audibly in his ears, warping along through the miles, random tapestries of collagistic sound.

Now and again long dim shapes, faintly red, seemingly swaddled, marched aslant through his visuals, crossing the opposite lane, winding in and among the streaming lights of northbound traffic. Like marching columns of men. Soldiers. Prisoners. Penitents. Sorcery

Me? All of the above

How I despise these android dreams

 

I was gonna write Ragezilla [book title]
but it's out there

Drinkzilla

Red Stripe, fuckers.
Friday night,
flares on the road cuz
trees are down. Heavy wind;

about this I know much.
I once mouthed to some chick
at the Video Saloon,
You don't know who you're dealing with

but the joke was all mine: she
knew exactly who. Strange. The only
time I ever got to truly empty
my nuts on such chicks was

amidst deep unselfknowledge.
For both parties. Parties. I was scared
of them before I drank. Had a year or 4
of blood, come on tits, and whiskey,

capped off with a stay in the County
and a ride up Risperdal Hill. What
I got to show for it? Here.
I am truly glad. It's only worth it

if it's disturbing to me

angular insectoid fervent hidden
accidental
dire
eastern sex reversal:

the dream I had last night

twice

ok so I guess what this blog is best for is not wasting the better bullets
as that must shade into dearth of continuity which is not
requisite. I guess what it's best for

is old fast fingers and head be damned. unexpected travel
plans can put a man on edge. And if a man aint
on the edge, then where is he?

complacency is a slick and shallow bowl,
one to be avoided. hey,
word. I'll tell you once more

get thee behind me
ok now

that's more like it. no bullets wasted. just a few

let's go

I'm an accident; I was driving way too fast
Couldn't stop though, so I let the moment last
I'm for rolling, I'm for tossing in my sleep
It's not guilt though. It's not the company I keep

People my age, they don't do the things I do
They go somewhere while I run away with you
I got my friends and I got my children too
I got her love. She's got my love too

I can't hear you but I feel the things you say
I can't see you but I see what's in my way
Now I'm floatin', 'cause I'm not tied to the ground
Words I've spoken seem to leave a hollow sound

On the long plain, see the rider in the night
See the chieftain, see the braves in cool moonlight
Who will love them when they take another life?
Who will hold them when they tremble for the knife?

Voicemail numbers on an old computer screen
Rows of lovers parked forever in a dream
Screaming sirens echoing across the bay
To the old boats from the city far away

Homeless heroes walk the streets of their hometown
Rows of zeros on a field that's turning brown
They play baseball, they play football under lights
They play card games, and we watch them every night

Need distraction, need romance and candlelight
Need random violence, need entertainment tonight
Need the evidence - want the testimony of
Expert witnesses on the brutal crimes of love

I was too tired to see the news when I got home
Pulled the curtain, fell into bed alone
Started dreaming, saw the rider once again
In the doorway, where she stood and watched for him

I'm not present. I'm a drug that makes you dream
I'm an Aerostar. I'm a Cutlass Supreme
In the wrong lane, trying to turn against the flow
I'm the ocean - I'm the giant undertow

-- "I'm The Ocean," Neil Young, Mirrorball

Dealing with the New Yorkers generally made him feel like an idiot, a chump, a hick, a momo. This effect was, of course, not unintentional. The key, naturally, was that you couldn't let them intimidate you. Once they saw that you weren't afraid of them, you were generally OK.

Anyway, the United States of America at that time was absolutely brimming with raging maniacal assholes of one brand or another; there was no point in bringing any kind of regional or ethnic bias into the game. That, of course, was one of the great forgotten lessons of the place. Along with quite a few other of the more moral, decent, and generally fair and upstanding tenets of humanity.

What do I care, he thought. I'm a fuckin cyborg. See you in a thousand years, bitches

ingrown narrative
ingrown image sense

grow them inside
take them out later

The production floor held an eerie, quasi-convalescent atmosphere of gloom. Outside, the cold sky pissed greyly in the feeble dawn. It was February in Indiana in an injection molding plant where apparently everyone was poor, poorly educated, and addicted to some variety of "Basic" brand cigarettes. My head and eyes those early mornings felt like 9 day old prison baked goods tossed out into the yard by some sad-eyed lady of the American lowlands. The plant was full of them.

low shifted into failurematic and mashed the pedal to the floor

Nipwilliger - Troll; half-human hybrid. Composes his oversized, knobby, damp green hands on the booth tabletop before him in the diner. Usually orders black coffee, cinnamon buns, onion rings. Lives in a shanty in the deep woods far up along the banks of the Chatahoocee.

Patiently recounts his victimization in a recent hammer attack. Lucky for him his skull's like petrified oak and he's got LSD mingled in his DNA

I was a walker in elementary school due to my proximity. I was a walker in Junior High; Jonah and I drank hot chocolate from DQ walking up George Street toward Highland. I was a walker in high school, trudging up the Derry Road from Alvirne, aching for a blackhaired girl who I'd never have, no chance nor choice.

I was a walker in college, every damned day, toward no degree in Creative Writing--I could never buckle down. I was a walker in Georgia, right up to the county jail. I nearly lost my mind. I was a walker in New York, past Babylon, with all the other disasters waiting to happen, coming up from the train.

And I'm a walker now, on a cinder path, round an ice-skimmed pond, amidst chiaroscuro pines during a mild winter.

You feel me, motherfuckers?

positive neuron activity

the feeling of satisfaction that comes with inaugurating what you know will prove to be a sustainable routine

Peppermint Chinchilla (band name)

*

this blog as the tip of my iceberg. feel it. live it. be it. mott motherfucking cromby

that terrible white minivan

*

his janitorship

*

the many wars

*

she came into his life like crushed roses

the hangover was of the creeping time-release variety, pretty tolerable if one gave oneself over to the notion of frittering on retardedly throughout the cursed immobile day a saucer-faced sentient husk in brain-damaged auto-pilot mode no sweat I mean literally must drink more water emitted a neuron

there's one key to writing, and know what it is. you do it every day, like training. like training a dog or training in the martial arts, etc. Or practicing guitar. you do it this way, and it pays you back. I know this and yet I don't do this the way I should. if you hate something, don't you do it too...this is not for you

sadly this blog got lame because I ceased feeling jiggy about making private writing public. bummer

stillness not necessarily equating to immobility

recumbent mass auto-lobotomy, from sea to shining sea