07/08/03, Tue; Home, Nashville

 

            160 lbs.  Occasional smoker.  Bad skin.  Messy hair.  Never clean-shaven.  Poor eating habits.  Depressive.  Unskilled.  $10.75/hr, Secretary.  Too much beer.

            I’m not a writer.  I’m not a singer.  I’m not an actor.  I’m none of the things I think people should treat me as.  I laid down to write and my wife turned on the TV.  This is my last month in Nashville.  I release my claim on my identity and take responsibility for the change.  This is not good enough yet.

 

 

I Must Have More To Give

 

This body doesn’t break.  This body doesn’t heal.

I’m never really sure which of my lives are really real.

These sutures are superfluous, like eyes that never seal.

I keep pulling at the mending, just to see if I will ever really feel.

 

Take my life in your arms; raise the chalice to your lips.

You drink me up in equal cups of overflow and proportioned sips.

But I’m not sure just what I offer; you lift your fingers and sift.

If it’s you I’ll spend my life with, I must have more to give.

 

To me you are a mystery, the whole of scripture come alive.

I wonder how you ever got to be so close to me… so buried inside.

You freeform endless poetry, sublime and canonized.

I take my cues from disappointing you—turn them into bubbling pride.

 

I glimpse a hint of introspection; you legitimize the myth.

If it’s you I’ll spend my life with, I must have more to give.

Add a dabble of distraction, wrap my fracture with a splint;

if it’s you I’ll spend my life with, I must have more to give.

I’ll keep looking ‘til I find it—I must have more to give.

 

 

09/12/03, Fri; Home, Glendale

 

As of Friday, September 12, 2003 I am 27, unemployed, unpublished, without a degree, slightly overweight and quite unhealthy.  I smoke, I drink, I curse unnecessarily, I drink too much coffee.  I fear becoming delusional as my family pattern is.  I do embarrassing things in my pursuit of fame and fortune.  I have a collection of rejection letters from publishers and agents.  I am very negative, and have always thought it my gift to be so.

            I have a crazy neighbor.  Her name is Melissa and she’s an artist.  She eyes my cats as if plotting to kidnap—er, catnap them.  We keep her business card on the fridge that just says “Melissa B., Artist and Writer”.  She tried to suggest a book to us on the link between creativity and mental disorders.  I dismiss that as an irresponsible excuse for facilitating dysfunctions.  I prefer to believe a disciplined person can become whatever they want—in Melissa’s case, she has disciplined herself to become crazy because she believes artists must be.

            The only thing I have going for me is complete honesty.  I tried the other day to print up business cards of my own and I couldn’t come up with anything to say that I am.  “R.C. Hedegard.... person who writes down thoughts.”  It just doesn’t work.  All I do is pass judgment on things in whatever form I happen to be inspired in at the moment.  I am not exactly a poet.  I am not exactly a writer.  I am not exactly an artist.  I’m just... me... not quite sure what I’m marketing, my honesty for your entertainment, perhaps.  But I want to be better.

            I have ambition.  I have drive.  I more than likely also have a good number of dysfunctions of my own.  But I will not give in to them.  I will not point to them for vindication of the way I am when I know that I can be better.  I would rather make the effort to discipline myself and take responsibility for my own path.  Yes, there is a lot to be discouraged about, but fuck me if I can’t use every bit of it for good.  So what do I do?  Start a new journal.

            This is my starting over.  This begins with transplanting myself to California from the east.  Everything is stacked against me.  I have no prospects and nothing to set me apart from anyone else in Los Angeles.  I want to reach the same people.  I want to work for the same companies.  I have the same starry-eyed visions and will most likely make the same stupid mistakes as millions of people before me.  I have no idea what the true outcome will be.

            Like I said, all I have going for me is honesty.  With a little discipline and faithful evaluation, I have an idea something might click at some point.  If I am honest with myself every step along the way, I might be able to catch the details that cause other talents to derail.  That is the point of this book.  It will be chronological because otherwise I’ll get distracted and become something detrimental.  This is the strict monitoring process I have set for myself to avoid pitfalls.

            First thing first—I have goals.  Yeah, well, so do you.  No one gives a damn unless you’re prepared to back them up with hard work.  The first step, then, is to clearly define them—write them out, set up an active, measurable plan.  I want very specific things.  What are they?  Can I rattle them off if someone asks me point blank?  Am I constantly aware of them?  The point is this; every moment of every day I am moving either toward or away from my goals.  If they are well defined, I will be able to identify in an instant whether what I am doing is productive or counter-productive.  This journal is that string around my finger, that well-worn, laminated card or trinket in my wallet reminding me at every step that there is something I can be doing to get me closer to the finish line.

            This is more than a journal, then.  It is also the log and minutes of my beginning in Los Angeles.  I am recording them for myself in order to track my progress.  I am sharing them with you—whoever is in the same situation—because I believe everyone must find their own path to success.  I tried for 26 years to follow protocol... I’m not that kind of guy.  If you are reading this, then you are probably not that kind either.  So let me encourage you—because no one else will—it’s up to you and me to show these motherfuckers what we’re capable of.

 

I.  Physical Goals (appearance, endurance, assurance)

I want to look good.  I want to feel good.

 

            All right then, I want to be on a magazine cover in the next ten years with the caption “Sexiest Man Alive”.  In the next five, I want to be one of the “50 Most Beautiful People”.  I want women to talk longingly and defensibly about me, and teenaged girls to have posters of me on their walls.  I want a ridiculous fan created web ring with photos I didn’t know existed.  I want gay guys to hold me up as an ideal.  I want to be a natural inclusion in those stupid entertainment industry shows about shallow celebrity stuff like “Hairstyles of the Rich and Famous” or “The Stomachs of Hollywood”.  I want Melissa Rivers to say she can’t believe I wore that.  I want to see myself twenty feet tall on a screen and know that I measure up.

 

II.  Psychological Goals (motivation, evaluation, affirmation)

I want to think clearly.  I want to perceive correctly.

 

            I want my thinking to be clear.  I want to be honest with myself and with the world—to know who I am and what I have to offer.  I want to make my own decisions and not be manipulated.  I want people to talk to their spouses about how solid I am, how I am rational and well adjusted, and am able to be so without drugs of any sort.  I want to be trusted, to know my emotions are healthy, an asset, not reactionary and destructive.

 

III.  Spiritual Goals (discernment, temperament, empowerment)

I want a relationship with God.  I want to be a positive influence.

 

            I want to still write worship songs.  I want to quote scripture in daily context.  I want to make it through reading the “boring” books of the Bible.  I want Christians and non-Christians alike to be confounded by the strength of my convictions, and to respect that I am what I am, solid in foundation but gracious in practice.  I want the Church body to look outward and the world to look inward; toward the doorframe I stand in and lean against, actively understanding, as I do, and participating in both spheres.

 

IV.  Social Goals (family, friendship, fellowship)

I want to experience love.  I want to exude love.

 

            I want to not work on holidays.  I want weekends and vacations, and to retire early and devote myself to family and friends.  I want date nights and community volunteer days, to be the person people are comfortable visiting or calling up at any random hour of night.  I want my tithing to go directly to the people who need it most.  I want to make memories for people, the way people made poetry for me.  I mean to be a force of good in individuals’ lives, an empathetic inspiration to anyone needing comfort or guidance.

 

V.  Intellectual Goals (learning, earning, discerning)

I want to keep learning.  I want to keep teaching.

 

            I want to finish my BA.  I want to learn everyone else’s job.  I want to connect with the unappreciated and speak eloquently for those with no audible voice.  I want to earn respect through discipline and hard work, to show myself worthy for any position I’m given, and to guide by example.  I want to “speak softly and carry a big stick”, to not demand anything I do not merit.  I want to be respectful and appropriate, to live in humility and submission as a man of question, not overbearing opinions, nor tradition.  I want to live in true wisdom, tempered with structure, accountable to both God and humanity.

 

VI.  Professional Goals (reputation, situation, concentration)

I want to be wealthy.  I want to be renowned.

 

            I want to be a multi-billionaire.  I want to be a brand name.  I want my money to make money, and the profit from that to make more money.  I want to buy Disney and Vivendi—or to have the option—or to have the power to change their direction.  I want my purity of vision to restructure the world.  I want people to forget that I was ever human, that I was once a poor aspiring artist collecting rejection letters and not getting callbacks on jobs.  I don’t want luxury for luxury’s sake, but to esteem highly the ethic and endurance that ultimately pays off if a heart remains pure.  I want the people around me to be protected and secure, to be facilitated in honest endeavors and to reach out with charity and spread the gospel with liberal generosity.  I don’t want in order to have, but in order to increasingly give.

 

            And so it is.  My goals are set out and defined.  I think they are a good model, but I can only lay out my own plan.  The important thing is that each person adapt him/herself to his/her own course, and find a unique path faithful before God.  The plans must be as distinct, as different as each individual.  What follows in this journal will be mine, but it will only be a part.  The full picture will not be seen until long after I’ve passed, long after everything has been presented and the aftereffects felt.  It should be interesting….

 

 

At-A-Loss Angeles: New Resident Already Unhappy

 

I don’t ask too terribly much.  A little common sense.  Tempered with a little grace.  I’m new here, but for the love of God, could somebody explain California’s welcoming committee?  I understand the difficulty in finding the right place to rent—we had droves of starry-eyed, delusional “talent” arriving in Nashville, too.  My wife and I spent our first few days ruling out areas with more graffiti than movie ads, or places where we couldn’t read the billboards; sort of opting for places we could actually feel safe coming home to after ten.  So we ended up in Glendale.

That’s right, Glendale.  The town that time forgot.  Walking down Honolulu and the Montrose area, I couldn’t see how any of the shops stay open.  Don’t get me wrong, they’re cute—it just felt like a movie set that we weren’t supposed to be walking around.  Only Matt at the bank made it slightly more comfortable.  Which brings me to my next rant, on financial issues.

First off, you need to anticipate the cost of moving in to a physical house.  In this case, the physical house only has one up-to-date electrical outlet (the remainder being those old two-prong type—I mention this only because my new energy efficient AC just quit working, which is why I’m writing this at three in the morning instead of sleeping); a gas water heater without a drip pan, at an angle much like the Leaning Tower of Pisa, which makes a spectacular banging noise whenever plumbing is used; and walls that look like they were once crackle-painted.  So yes, we dropped the initial $1800 to be able to unload our rental truck, just one day late, the landlady all the while calling to make sure we switched all the utilities immediately to our name (who ever would have thought of that?), and making sure we knew to dial “1” before an “800” number.  She also said we had missed a school payment, which is impossible since they are still in deferment.  Nonetheless, she was very nervous to rent to us, and absolutely WOULD NOT take Travelers Cheques, which is why we opened the account at Washington Mutual.  After that goodly chunk of money, my wife’s parents and brother helped us buy an energy efficient refrigerator.

Our new bank account would have been very helpful starting out, except that it generally takes 7-10 business days to receive an ATM card and real checks.  So writing a check or running a debit for groceries was out.  Which brings up another way California has already seceded from the rest of the country.  Let’s say a person’s brand new check card can’t be activated by the 24 hour, 7-day activation line because “It’s the weekend” (how that makes sense, I’m not sure), but the person does have their new checks.  California grocery stores can only accept checks if you have a California drivers license—regardless of where the money is.  Keep that in mind, we’re coming back to it.

Upon entering the state, you have roughly twenty days to register your car and obtain a California drivers license.  The DMV recommend you make an appointment.  Therein lies the problem—the next available appointment was after the allotted time period.  So, we went in at 10:40... and left around 3:30.  But we were prepared.  Okay, my wife was—I still need to wait 7-10 days for a certified copy of my Birth Certificate, because apparently in the year 2003 we still cannot verify Vital Records online among government agencies.  Also, no one in California is able to provide you with an estimate of what registration might cost.  All we know for sure is that it is about to triple (thanks to Gray Davis).  But, like I say, we were prepared—or so we thought until the somewhat abrupt and humorless man at the window asked for our Marriage Certificate.  But it’s okay, as soon as we said we weren’t told we needed it, he sent us to a closed window to speak to a supervisor who wasn’t there.  Soon enough that was resolved, the rude man was reprimanded, it turned out I was right and did not need it, and my wife finally got her license.  No wait... I’m sorry, she got a piece of paper that said “Not A Valid License” and was told she should receive it in about four weeks.  This is the part where you recall that we can’t write checks, and the part where you do the math and figure that four weeks is well after the allotted time period.  All I’m saying is, those little laminating machines aren’t that expensive—I know high school students who could make me a license faster.

All of those inconveniences and mounting charges—even down to the smog check—would be fine with me, if it weren’t for one tiny little detail.  I still need a job.  It’s as hard to get a call back from the local Starbucks as it is an agent.  Even Staples makes you take an hour-long test before considering your application  (I mention this only because my printer stopped working yesterday and I could have used their discount).  Put me to work and I’ll shut up.  Otherwise, lookout L.A., there’s a new writer in town... and he don’t look happy.

 

 

No One Here Can See Past Yesterday

 

Used to be the most succinct thing I could say was “I want you.”

Recently beams of uncertainty have shifted aside.

Animal instinct sniffs the slums of Los Angeles in the afternoon,

the dirty streets, graffiti and en Español Hollywood signs.

 

All my dreams of never dreaming I would

live here in the hollow heart of archery,

forsake an industry where once a week

street cleaners sweep the filters of the currency.

Another line, another quatrain or a tag-line

from a nonsense of urgency—

emerge another scripted writer with a tendency

to choose money over pay.

 

It is perfectly clear,

no one here can see past yesterday.

Where nothing is as it appears,

no one here can see past yesterday.

 

Everyone still talking about how wonderful everything was,

and presently contently residing off residuals from then.

Every buzz and each commotion stoking

embers from memberships forgotten,

former child stars and has-beens groaning

no one knows just what to do with them.

 

Still the star-painted faces of admiration, pasted off Sunset,

offset the glare from the warehoused soundstages’ painstaking detail.

With job opportunities dwindling like tinder from both ends;

pick up a check, they pick your pockets, pick professions

carefully for the sale.

 

It is perfectly clear,

no one here can see past yesterday.

Through the thick cloud of hopes and fears,

no one can see past yesterday.

 

 

Undated

 

Now comes the barrage, streaming through vertical blinds with retiring sun.  Another two hours wreck themselves against twisted vertebrae in plastic chair.  Breathing comes heavier upon each throbbing temple, inanely following, with a perpetual “11” in the forehead, faceless drones incapable of expression, reminding me of my own accumulating stack of rejection letters.  I switch my cell phone on, then quickly off again as another succession begins with waves of dread in accents and ancient languages resurfacing.  I think of my few comforts back at the house and wonder how long it will be—eternity perhaps, so overused—before I can enjoy anything at all.  An unplanned, misplaced conglomeration of suits and sneakers picks through service trays uncomfortably, and I shift position to upright and outside.

 

 

09/15/03, Mon, 4:00 PM; Starbucks, La Canãda

 

            Sitting for a second interview at Starbucks in La Canãda—the sixth Starbucks I’ve applied to.  It’s busy.  A worker is late, so I’ll be pushed aside.  I’m up to five cigs for the day, as I spent the first half online searching for HR info at local studios.  I was physically nauseous driving here, my only prospect other than Häagen-Dazs.  I dread stepping foot, again, behind a counter.  If I were in school I would almost be guaranteed an internship.  I wait for Roe and think about how absurd it is that I’ll be making half what I left in Nashville.  Ridiculous people make hundreds a day, and I’ve been unemployed for over a month, with rent and car payments coming up.  I’m terrified.  I don’t want to serve people again.  I don’t want to take phone calls.  I want to silently work around a set, behind the cameras and crew, unnoticed.  I want to tend to details on my own, see things trained eyes overlook and correct problems independently of supervision.  I want the consumer world far, far behind.  I want to retain my empathy for the server… but God I’m tired of that world.  I want to create.  I want to be paid for my mind and hands….

 

 

09/16/03, Tue; Starbucks, La Canãda

 

            Back again. Repeat of yesterday.  Only difference is, today I’m wearing jeans.  And the smog has rendered the mountains invisible.  Sent online applications to the top five agencies.

 

 

09/21/03, Sun, 11:00 AM; Lake Ave. Church, Pasadena

 

 

            Seems a California version of Belmont… times three.  I haven’t spoken much this morning… could break down at any moment.  I am hard and dark without trying to be.  The projector gives prominent writing credits—Peter Furler wrote this one.  I still don’t get church.  Don’t take that wrong; it’s no different than how I don’t get anything else.  I can understand why masses flock to it; I’ve just never been one of the masses.  I’m so frustrated.  I keep being pointed to what I don’t want to do.  I have no interest in starting a company.  I don’t sit around thinking what will sell.  I just react to things and create from it.  Nobody knows what I am.

            “What could separate us from the love of God?”  The bald man talks about job searching, and God’s love being constant—that the newness is fresh every day.

 

 

09/24/03, Wed; Home, Glendale

 

            I stopped eating yesterday afternoon.  We set out midday, jobless still, and the car stuttered through city traffic like the transmission was slipping.  We have $56 to our name.  Less… Marci bought cigarettes.  We can’t make rent next week, so have to borrow from parents again.

            I printed an iron-on and made a “Hire Me” t-shirt with my qualifications on it that the humorless HR girl at Warner Bros. didn’t think was funny.  Nevertheless, I go back today for an interview for a Sales Associate position at Central Perk.  I applied to six more jobs yesterday.  Marci and I spent the day taking turns in tears.

            I wish these cats would go away, staring up at me as if I have something to offer.  I obviously don’t.  This, right now, is the poorest, most trying time of my life.  I don’t know what else to do.

 

            Weight: 150, Cigarettes: 0

 

 

09/24/03, Wed, 11:00 AM; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

            Actually, this is more thrilling than I expected.  The sales position is inside the functioning studio.  I thought it would be a tourist thing—which it still partly is, but just to be on the location is tremendous.  So much security and activity.  I’m humbled just to get a Visitor Pass.  There’s a Starbucks here, a Ben & Jerry’s and a Jamba Juice.  Lots of movie posters I didn’t know they were associated with.  I get the sense I’m up against hundreds of applicants.

            Marci is sitting in the car waiting for me.  I almost cry again just that she’s so supportive… dressed up and waiting when she didn’t have to come.  But I would have gotten lost had she not.

            I’m still broken, but better.  The place is in biking distance—well, about ten miles.  I’m dressed in my uncomfortable dress clothes.  I kind of want this now.  Badly.

 

 

09/24/03, Wed; Home, Glendale

 

            Now I’m thinking about studios all day.  A moment ago it occurred to me that friends and family are going to start visiting soon.  For many on the East Coast we’re the settlers.  We have to succeed.  Imagine my cousin from New York, and all I can show him is the mall.  That just won’t work.  He’s relying on me.  And my brother, the photographer, needs connections to expand his business.  The elite out here would eat his work up.  Okay, so right now we can’t afford groceries or cat litter, but a lot of people are counting on us to make it.

            I had my Warner Bros. interview today and Robert was a wonderful inspiration.  I’m tremendously indebted for his advice and encouragement.  He said one of the most important things out here is to be specific when someone asks what you want.  He said that people who can help you want to help you; they just need to know the details.  It was nearly a 45 minute interview, with Kelli there part of the time, and I felt good about it.  Not about my fumbling ramblings, but in the interest Robert showed.  He seemed sincere.  I wondered if my squirming account of my Christian background made him uncomfortable.  I don’t know what’s happened to me; I can’t speak or write eloquently anymore.  I think this ridiculous job search—this lack of callbacks and these fruitless interviews—must have crushed me.

Most of my confidence is gone.  A little was restored today when Marci got hired temporarily to cover an upcoming Union strike at Vons (that’s right, a grocery store) and even though they don’t usually hire relatives, I was asked to come in as well.  In that case Marci was right, and I was wrong, about calling places being ineffective.  We have a three-hour training session first thing in the morning, but aren’t guaranteed any work because the strike doesn’t start until October 5^th, if at all.  So we committed to keeping open for the possibility of work.  But the paid hours tomorrow are enough to believe my 24-hour protest fast worked, so I’m eating again, for now.

            I spent a good while online looking into Hot Topic, to see if there’s any potential of tying them to GrimMISC, but it was inconclusive.  I’m thinking I’ll proceed with the designs and begin offering to produce everything (the alleged merchandise) myself.  If it takes, it takes.  If not, I keep working, keep adapting and adjusting.

            I swore I was through writing once I reached L.A., but it’s always been the product of discontentment and frustration, my way of sorting things out and reevaluating, so I guess I’m locked in for another.  I really ought to put my efforts into something more productive.  I’m thinking “Special Skills” section of my resume.  There is so much I can’t do, no one cares if I write it down.  Diaries were never meant to sell.  I don’t know why anyone keeps them.

            I should note, however, that I’m settled, that everyone is not so horrible as I supposed.  The longer you’re here, the more people you meet, the more humanity and goodness you find.

 

            (Who the hell just wrote that?)

 

 

09/29/03, Mon, 7:54 AM; Saturn, Alhambra

 

            Spent yesterday, while Marci was at work, cleaning for Allie’s visit, and to clear my head.  On her way home the car started sputtering.  Cigarettes: 2.  The house was immaculate.  I made calls to update people.  I meant to make the bike ride to Warner to time it, but the front tire was low, so I fixed the front brakes instead.  Called Jay to wish him a Happy Birthday, and he forwarded me $200, which I am most likely about to spend for a diagnostic.

Our service person is from Nashville.  He asked why we moved out here and Marci said “work”.  Boy, isn’t that a laugh.  I’m terrified that I won’t get this job.  Meanwhile, more people are praying for me than I’ve even met.  I have to think that I don’t interview all that well, since I’ve gotten only hesitance and no fruition.  Marci is waiting with me this time.  I guess I asked yesterday, “Why does God hate me?  I’ve done nothing.”  Guess I should have gone to church.

 

 

10/10/03, Fri; Saturn, Alhambra

 

            Another six AM morning after being up past one.  The past few days have seemed busy, even being unemployed.  Allie left last Saturday and I spent the weekend painting cabinets in the garage of Aunt Betty’s new house.  Her professional estimate for the rest of the house was $34,000.  I’m sure I could do it for less.

 

            [Good Day L.A. happens to be on right now and it’s amazing how unprofessional they’re allowed to be.  I’m often embarrassed for them.]

 

            I’m at Saturn again for the catalytic converter and an oil change.

 

            [Aside from my wife, blondes are irritating.  They’re tacky and cheap, and I think the darker the hair, the deeper the soul.]

 

            For a frame of reference, Arnold Schwarzenneger was just elected Governor by way of recalling Gray Davis, Dakota’s “Run Ronnie Run!” that Bruce worked on is out on DVD, and the supermarket labor strike begins tomorrow.  We don’t have TV yet, so I don’t know how intensely we’ll be hated, but Marci and I begin our Strike Relief at nine in the morning.  I’m thinking about renting “Hoffa” tonight.

            As for the rest of our time of late, we’ve been at the bank frequently making deposits from God knows where, shopping for new interview and work clothes, revising resumes and making phone calls.  I’ve been obsessed with sex with my wife, so I’ve been hanging pictures of her in the room and positioning mirrors everywhere, and hooked up two TVs to the camcorder to see from every angle.  I’m sure it would be dirty and improper if it were not my wife, but it’s my Christian duty to enjoy her.  And I do.

           

            Changing directions, the more I look into Warner Bros., the more I want it.  I sent homemade thank you cards to my four interviewers and followed up with emails and phone calls.  Now I wait, and continue checking the website.  Meanwhile, I interviewed with See’s Candies yesterday with hopes for a callback by the end of the month.

 

            I got another call for W2s from the background check people, because Catholic Charities kept up a two-week pattern of losing paperwork and not responding, so I prepared an “Email-By-Request Background Verification” packet while revising my resume again.  In addition, I’m deleting all the personal information and self-promotion from the website.  I realized last Friday, while at a taping of “King of Queens” that only taking my art seriously will set me apart from everyone else.  I asked one of the ushers how to get a job at Sony Pictures and he said, “Honestly, you have to know someone… or try the website for half a year or more.”  So I thought, forget it… I’ll stand apart by being the best at what I do.

 

            Ah, this just in… the replacement part for my car was welded wrong, so they have to reorder.  So I’ll be back next week.  Ah well, another cup of coffee at Saturn.  I like this dealership.  The one guy at the service desk reminds me of Buddy from “Charles In Charge”—the guy who became “Bibleman” on the Christian market.  The girl at the payment desk is pregnant.

 

            Marci came home from The Gap in tears the other night, just for hating it so much—the pressure to sell.  Corporations no longer seem to believe that a superior product will sell itself.  Rather, they push to be sure every person to enter the store buys an average of $80 in merchandise, because that’s just what we need.  The only good thing about the job is that she made a friend—who will be moving soon.

 

            We haven’t seen Didi in a week because we’ve both been sick.  Bam thought it would be funny to crash Bruce’s rental car through a wall in the room where he was sleeping.  Cops said if he’d hit a foot or two over the roof would’ve collapsed and killed him.  Ha, ha.  Good one, Bam.  Thanks, MTV, for encouraging responsible behavior.

 

 

10/12/03, Sun, 12:02 AM; Home, Glendale

 

            So the Union chose Vons for the strike, which started at 10:30.  Which means I’ll get called in tomorrow, first thing.  Marci will be at Gap, so I’m going in alone.  Not a great way to make friends in our community, but I’m fundamentally opposed to the modern union.  Marci bought me a 3-pack of Nat Sherman Mints… I expect I’ll go through them quickly.  I kept praying and bargaining with God for the strike not to happen, so I’m a bit disappointed.  These people can’t afford to strike.  The Union mandates their actions.  They vote without hearing an outsider’s perspective:  A) No one should tell a company how it has to operate.  B) There are millions of people who would be happy to get a fraction of the pay and benefits they think they’re entitled to.  C) Who do you think pays for their benefits?  Me and you, every time we buy groceries.  If they would accept less, the prices could lower and everyone’s bills—theirs’ included—would be more reasonable.

I don’t want to scan groceries.  Ever.  Much less during a strike, with hundreds of people hating me.  It can only feed itself, and worsen every day while the workers get more desperate.  They shouldn’t strike.  It’s a bad idea.  Yes, it’s unfortunate that the companies have to offer less.  But that’s life.  It never promised to be easy or carefree.  We just endure.  We do whatever we can and hope it’s enough.  I hope to God what I’m doing is enough.  I signed papers yesterday to work for See’s Candies.  I’m officially hired; only it doesn’t start until late October or early November.  I tried to relax today, but kept pacing.  I felt nauseous at the thought of Vons.

Fuck you ingrates for striking.  Now I have to do your work under deplorable conditions, with almost no preparation.  And you’re going to yell at me for helping keep a job for you to come back to at will.  I’m resolved to ignore you all.  I’m angry that you put everyone in this position.  I want a studio job, not a grocery store.  But I’m more desperate than you can imagine.  Suck it up and accept your lot.  Take your fucking job back.

 

I go to bed with the phone on my head, waiting for the call.

 

 

10/18/03, Sat; Vons, Glendale

 

            I think it’s Saturday.  I’m not really sure.  I’ve been working at Vons since Sunday.  On day three they made me the manager of their Starbucks.  There have been a few stories on the daily news about the strike, and a few talk radio shows have been devoted to it.  Other than that, things have been quiet.  We’ll make rent this month.  We can afford cable finally.  The strikers are trying numerous tactics, not all of them quite ethical.  I rode my bike to work at 5:30 this morning.

Darlene and Suzie came up from Betty’s, where they’re staying for a women’s conference, so we went to Michelina’s for pizza.  I’m starting to feel more comfortable on Sunset.  It reminds me of New York.  Darlene spent the last few days in prayer (her usual mode) and had a vision that my feet were bound, but God was about to cut the rope.  She sensed that it was more about a position than a job.  I cried, and nearly am now just relaying it.

            Lunch is over.  Back to work.

 

 

10/21/03, Tue; Vons, Glendale

 

            Mandatory lunch… had to strand a new person I’m “training”.  To do what, exactly?  Lord knows…  I’m making things up as I go.  We’re almost out of milk.  The days pass too slowly.  Dinner at Didi’s last night.  The computer stopped working.  I’m exhausted.  This whole thing is ridiculous.  Scheduled training for See’s on the 4^th and 5^th.  I need sleep.

 

 

10/23/03, Thu; Vons, Glendale

 

            Six AM on my day off, sitting in the café after dropping Marci at work, because I have to take the car in again.  My workers aren’t there yet.  The strikers are losing their jobs.  We’re hoping several cross this week.  I just got a voicemail from WB’s HR asking me to call at my earliest convenience.  Tomorrow we’ll get our first legitimate paychecks.

 

 

10/23/03, Thu, 11:03 AM; Saturn, Alhambra

 

            Now I have a decision to make.  The offer is Temporary Seasonal Staff at Central Perk for $7.25/hr through November and December.

 

 

10/23/03, Thu, 2:52 PM; Vons, Glendale

 

            I left a message that I would do it, and happily will.  Now I sit at the café waiting for Marci, listening to a talker complain about the strike and the poor economy, but happy to be served so quickly.  Each customer scrutinizes their receipt for five minutes before leaving.  It’s rewarding to be the best at what we do, but I truly hate being here.

 

 

Scab

 

Picking at the scab with no bleeding,

crossing in unfortunate times;

bite the slender fingers of feeding,

slitting throats with unionized lines.

 

 

Drop Him

(for John Ritter’s family, and others like them)

 

I won’t talk about this right now,

but when I get to your door, we’re gonna fight it out.

You got some nerve to tie me to this one day in history—

one shatter in the calendar year.

Oh dear.  Oh dear.

 

Drop him.  Please, let him come back.

I don’t want to think this can’t be undone.

This isn’t fair!  This isn’t right!  This is sick…

no good can possibly come.

I don’t want to let this let me lose my faith in you,

but I’m just not prepared to accept that it’s true.

Explain yourself!  Show the worth,

or drop him back to earth.

 

I still cry.  I got another verse before I reach the punch line,

but by then my red eyes will be rubbed raw,

and these people here will know that I am sick of them all,

and I just wish that they would cease their casual words.

It’s all just so messed up, with no resolution.

 

Drop him.  What do I have to do to make you hear me?

Drop him!  No one not in Heaven can ever understand.

How can you give such love, only to snatch it back again?

I am angry and there’s no one here to punch….

If you really want to get back my trust,

then drop him back to us.

 

 

10/30/03, Thu, 10:53 AM; Vons, Glendale

 

            Technically, my day off.  Sitting alone at a table for two in the store café again, having woken up to drive Marci to work, then being called back to open until Lynne showed up.  Chris’s tires were slashed and windshield broken.  The man-haters were by the door being rude.  Now Amelia and Dee-dee are outside.  They’re the regular Starbucks workers, who I finally talked to yesterday.  The truth is that they’re afraid to cross Union lines because they fear never being able to get another Union job.  Amelia is the good one—yesterday she wore fairy wings and blessed or cursed people as they passed.  Dee-dee admitted that she was unhappy before all this started, just hoping to work with children soon.  They expressed fear for me that Warner Bros. is unionized, that if they find out I crossed a picket line I’ll never make it into a studio.  Now let me ask you, then, if all the Union workers base their actions on intimidation and fear, are not the Unions doing more harm in this instance than the employers?

            I want Lynne to take over the café.  She’s capable and willing, and I don’t yet know my schedule.  Nor do I like being here, but I’ll do whatever it takes.  I am thankful for the opportunity.  But I’m 27.  I’m tired.

 

            Bruce’s show did well for ratings.  I decided to start praying for them, and for his success.  California has been on fire for a week, so Murphys called yesterday to check up on us.  It looks like Bethany will be the family’s redemption.  I’m proud of her.

 

            I am a blend of unending compassion and perpetual discontentment.  I can pine for another’s situation while aching for my own.  I find myself fortunate and vexed at the same time.  I can’t believe I wake every day.  I can’t believe I’ve endured 27 years of life, and found that this is all there is.  There is no resolution.  There is no single moment after which everything is okay.  I can’t stand seeing people every day living life.  So monotonous.  So unfulfilling.  Vons depresses me.  Customer service is hollow.  There is no art, no creation, no vivacity; only self-centeredness and misunderstanding.  It’s amazing that these people can function with so little sense or concern.  The world is staggering.  It is dead, with no hope of revitalization.

            The she-male at the deli talks over-loud and over-sweet, with a trained vocabulary.  She has been brainwashed with videos and classes, conference calls and memos.  She acts out of frustration and underlying misery, wretched and cringing inwardly with hopes to stamp out the demon terrorizing her life.  She has no sincerity or passion—least of all passion—and is only a shell reflecting humanity.  I, on the other hand, am hard and harsh, but can be cut by a wind, impressed irrevocably by an involuntary shiver or an ill-timed glance.  I shouldn’t be left to think.

            There is beginning to be a line at Starbucks.  Nicole has neglected to return from dropping Chris home, so Marci can’t take lunch.  These people do not deserve our time.  I hate consumerism and what it’s done to people.  Only discipline can temper me.

 

 

Passion Comes But Once, My Love

 

You are the embodiment of the detriment of my days.

You sift through the sediment of the regiment of my praise.

Time dishonored traditions stir inhibitions within

a disjointed ambition to break this condition of sin.

Enduring renditions reset my submission to the grave.

Passion comes but once, my love; absence never fades.

 

Eyes half closed on an upraised nose with a predisposition of gloom,

frozen fingers lingering over bone scraped straight from the womb.

All around there’s an eerily resounding, profoundly disturbing resume,

exhumed from the plume of the wreckage,

divested from the crest of the tomb.

Disgrace and dejection—poised intercessional malaise.

Passion comes but once, my love; dissension never caves.

 

Oh, woe is me!  I feel it constantly weighing on me;

its shadows fall as sure as night.

I navigate this ship of misery solely

on the only thing on which I can rely.

 

You impress my weakness and hold me accountable for my pen,

the implicit details expressed by my reckless aversion to friends.

You sharpen the focus evoked by the hopeless scope of my lens,

embolden the cleansing commotion provoked when my frenzy descends.

You bandage and mend when my tendencies bend under what they intend;

passion comes but once, my love, but sorrow never ends.

 

 

11/03/03, Mon, 7:11 AM; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

 

            Took exactly one hour to make it here by bike.  I’m an hour early.  I’m nervous.  There wasn’t much communication, so I don’t know what to expect.  What if I can’t do it?  It’s about 52 degrees this morning.  My new hat left black fuzz in my hair and on my forehead.

The picketers at Vons are getting rowdy, spurred on by the Ralph’s workers who taunt the young and weak.  There are a handful of butch man-haters I’d like to tie to the dumpsters.  I won’t work with Marci most of this week.  It bothers me, but they’ve made her a manager, and she likes aspects of working there.

            More than nervous—I’m terrified.  I want supervisors to love me, to have not a moment of hesitance or apprehension.  I want people to be comfortable with me.

            7:41 AM.  I’m calling Marci.

 

 

Colloquialism

 

On the search for poetry, I came across discipline,

on the path of which I stumbled upon grace.

Now each day I see interconnected, overlapping worlds,

differing, while not disagreeing, in unique offerings of perspective.

I think at times about things like Christmas, and warmth,

contrasting sharply with the empty parking lot

next to the VIP Tour garage,

lined with young trees of light crayon,

where vines climb unplanned in ugly solitude awaiting familiarity.

 

I am here, waiting,

and all I can think of is my wife,

how nice it will be to sleep in one day,

without having to kick the cat at four in the morning.

I wait, forgetting where I am,

or what it is my intent to do,

not knowing what today will bring,

or what next week will be

colloquial speech.

 

 

11/03/03, Mon, 10:29 AM; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

            Staggeringly unprofessional.  Central Perk had me scheduled to train at 10:30, after HR had me in at 8:00 and passed me to five different people.  Everyone here is too familiar, too comfortable, too young.  I walked around the lot to kill time.  I already want to go home.  There are some good points—a rental library, a screening theater, employee prices on media—but nobody seems to know what they’re doing.  Of course, I haven’t started with them yet, so I may be harsh; it just seems more chaotic than necessary.

I’m actually hungry.  I miss Marci.  I want to whip this place into shape.  It should be flawless, immaculate and classy.  So far only one guy seems to carry himself that way.  The rest should be in bands.  The highlight of the day was the bike ride.

 

 

11/06/03, Thu; Vons, Glendale

 

            Our first day off together since we started working, and Marci got called in.  I smoke just to have a reason to be outside with the picketers.  Some Teamsters were laid off last night.  The employees will lose their benefits in a few days, but I don’t think they know that.  My hands are trembling from too much coffee with no food.  Their spirits are down.  It suddenly turned Autumn this week.  No one is sure about me, how I fit in to anything.  I dread having to be here tomorrow.  The Union head stood in their corner near me to do some paperwork, but left as soon as she noticed me.  It’s been a week since I’ve even worked here.

 

            I hate unions more and more.  They make it impossible for those of us with work ethic to thrive.  I could very easily get fired from Warner Bros. for working too hard—too readily trying to help.  I got to the lot at six yester-morning and prayed for a half hour that the day would be better.  Raza trained me to open Jamba while I waited for their delivery, then I assigned myself the windows and retail counter until help came.  Eventually I was assigned to Randy, to help with new merch and displays.  He was laid back (or slow) and gave me a personal tour of the lot—two actually.

 

[I just gave up my dry bench, as a gesture, unnoticed.]

 

I spent most of the day back and forth between Bldg. 3 and Marylin’s office—she’s the one who started the store some thirty years ago—the one everyone seems to fear.  I get the impression she likes me.  There’s a noticeable difference in the way I relate to customers.  The other workers remind me of Nashville, in that they’re hoping to be discovered.  I, frankly, know I’m undiscoverable.  I’m there to learn everything as quickly as possible.

Randy was helpful to that end.  I was taught to never assist a Union worker, and I saw very quickly that they are ridiculously overpaid.  I’ve seen too many workers struggle and take their time to do things I could do myself.  For instance, the Furniture Dept. had to walkie the Carpentry Dept. to take a look at a loose wheel on a display, while I stared, bewildered, thinking, “Just give me a fucking screwdriver.”  Every tiny thing is at least a two-person job.  Then I nearly got in trouble for working past eight hours, so I stopped in the middle of a job—very difficult for someone with OCD.  I have gotten a lot of positive reinforcement; I just wish the customers got the same treatment.  There is a marked contrast between who they know are WB employees and who have only one-day passes.  I detest the distinction.

 

11-ish.  Sitting on the bench at the other side, still shaky.  The meaner—or, rather, less understanding ones—are on this side today, the ones who don’t talk to scabs.  We’ll see.  I’m sticking around because I’d planned to spend the day with my wife.  Some of these people are getting exactly what they deserve.  Or more.  They think they’re standing up for something.  Just stupidity.  All anyone deserves is death.  Anything more—life, work, entertainment—is a gift from God.  My immediate thought is that death would be a gift for me.  I stay alive and active for Marci.

I wonder what it must feel like to be loyal only to a collective that dictates how you act.  I wonder how it could be rewarding to intentionally isolate everyone else in the world.  In the beginning their propaganda was geared toward community and fairness.  By now everyone knows the dispute basics; the shoppers are those with a different life-view.  I can’t see any of these people having a life plan, taking responsibility for their own circumstances.  Everything is “give me what I deserve, what I’ve earned.”  That assumes you deserve anything at all.  You deserve to be fired.  Immediately.  You deserve to work at your archrival Wal-Mart, since a third of you will end up there in five years anyway.  I fail to see how your failed marriages and poor life choices are the responsibility of the community or the company that pays your bills.  To me that seems not only unfair, but unreasonable.

Most of these people are too harsh, too angry.  Their looks are hateful to the people who give them work.  It’s appalling.  It’s tiring.  It’s old.  I want my wife to leave here soon.

 

 

Take It As It Comes

 

The glass has always been half broken.

I’ve cut my mouth on its jagged teeth.

Sweet relief never dreams of cleansing the wounds

infecting these expressions underneath.

 

I take it as it comes.  I take it in stride.

It will never get the better of or wear me down inside.

Though my hands and feet are bleeding with the toil of the world,

I suckle life from my precious little girl.

 

My reality is bleak and uncaring,

but I’m sharing it with someone just as dark.

Disproportionate misfortune and despairing

bare the imprint of disparaging remarks.

 

I take it as it comes.  I accept what it is,

this meaningless diversion from encouraging my sins.

From the perfect isolation of this complicated mess,

I linger with a fingering and center at her chest.

 

I take it as it comes.  She loves me as I am.

I flip the world a gesture and return to her again.

Her mouth retains the focus of my deprecating sneer.

I let the world pursue me, and she makes it disappear.

 

 

To The More Fair-Minded Of The Picketers, From A Scab

 

            Okay, it’s been over a month now.  Picketers deserve an explanation for why I persist in crossing the lines for temporary work.  First off, we need to be sure we know actual terminology; Oxford’s second definition of “scab” is “person who refuses to strike or join a trade union, or who tries to break a strike by working.”  Now then, I don’t refuse to join a trade union, I simply haven’t been offered.  Nor do I have any personal ambition to break the strike.  By definition, then, I am merely a temporary worker, not a scab.  In order to accurately call anyone such, you would need to determine their personal motivation.

            I feel it necessary to apologize on behalf of those less eloquent for any disrespect you have been shown while fighting for what you believe is right.  I have been watching very closely both your actions and the reactions of those who cross your lines, and the polarization on either side has led to some unfortunate exchanges.  I personally regret that things are not 100% civil.  While it is apparent that some who cross do so simply out of self-centeredness, that is not true for a great many of us.  The truth is, a fair number of us are quite compassionate.  Allow me, then, to offer another perspective, even if only one individual’s.

            I am fair-minded and rational.  I would not accept a job simply for personal gain if I believed it at the ultimate expense of another.  So I am going to attempt to explain where our ideologies conflict, and I expect not all of you will accept it, because it is a complex matter based upon years of preconditioning.  But I have remained silent and respectful, and followed every detail of the dispute since the day I first applied out of desperation to a grocery store, not knowing an ugly matter was looming.

            There is one fundamental difference of opinion from which this entire conflict stems, and it has yet to be settled, but I must work up to it.  I must first address a few of the flyers and handouts I’ve collected, so that you understand the way many people feel about your approach.  It is important to remember that any intelligent person can use selective information and manipulate facts and statistics to present a believable case for anything—that’s one of the first things Universities teach.  For me, though they are emotionally compelling, the handouts are intellectually unconvincing.

            The “Attention Shoppers” handout predating the strike claimed that out-of-pocket expenses for health care would cause workers to opt out and become a taxpayer responsibility, that retirement rollbacks would necessitate government assistance, and that new employees would enter below the poverty line, thus lowering the standard of living.  According to which numbers in your contract you utilize, that could be somewhat true.  However, if you think about it another way, the cost of your wages and benefits makes it necessary for the companies to keep grocery prices slightly higher, in which case we (your neighbors) and you are still paying the same amount, only in a different form.

            A subsequent handout introducing the decidedly propagandistic www.SaveOurHealthCare.org claimed that the employers wanted to cut health benefits by 50%.  While I was not able to find that outright anywhere in the Offer Of Settlement from October 5, I am willing to concede that since there are so many numbers to toy around with, it is possible to come up with that figure in some imagined worst-case scenarios, but nowhere near convincingly enough to present it as a platform worth crusading for, since in the majority of situations it will never amount to that.

            The “Corporate Greed Vs. Human Need” handout is hardly worth discussing because there was not one supportive reference, only unsubstantiated figures with pleading commentary.  It could only possibly work on people who accept what they’re told without questioning the source (like Michael Moore fans).

            The “Facts about the Supermarket Strike” handout brought up the cutting in half thing again—which at this point is more of a sympathy play that actuality.  It reminded the public that many supermarket employees earn less than $10 an hour, but neglected to show the entire pay scale.  It mentions the “second class” of new employees that I will return to later, and refers to increased profits of 91% (once again failing to cite the source), without taking into account what programs that profitability is reinvested into, such as new stores and refurbishing, and fails to mention the proposed bonuses.

            Most significantly, this one claims that Wal-Mart is an overblown threat, that it would only capture 1% of the grocery market in California.  Being from the east, where Wal-Mart dominates, let me reassure you, the threat is real, and in all likelihood it will do more damage to your familiar lifestyle than you know.  It is important to remember that the big three companies you are clashing with have trend analysts whose sole job is to predict market trends and help in suggesting proactive measures to ensure company profitability.  The 1.3 million square foot distribution center in Apple Valley is not just looking to support 40 Supercenters—it is able to supply over 200!

            The next handout was a list of alternative stores to shop at.  The interesting thing here is the inclusion of non-union stores the UFCW website normally asks us not to patronize, which could lead a person to wonder if the Union tactics change simply to target whoever is the most imminent threat, which could raise questions about the sincerity and conviction of certain stated causes.

            The “Setting the Record Straight” letter to customers made more of the same claims, somewhat more eloquently and condensed, mentioning again the 50% cut in medical, the 75% of employees being part-time and making only an average $312 a week, the “second class”, and the pension plans for retirees, reiterating that Wal-Mart is not a threat.  (Meanwhile, your employee areas of the store are plastered with “Wal-Mart Sucks” bumper stickers and market trend posters showing its incredible gains.)  This was the most effective paper yet, but still failed to address the larger issue, which I am still working up to.

            The “Attention: You May Have Been Overcharged!” handout was just wrong.  First off, I’d like to remind you that as a regular customer I recall being incorrectly charged once or twice myself before the strike.  This handout was a misuse of insider knowledge, calling customers’ attention to things that have always gone wrong in the past and blaming the temporary workers.  As for the statement, “Employees working in this store have no experience in the Retail Food Industry”… out of the couple hundred applicants I’ve seen in the past month, I think management has done a fine job positioning suitable people where they are most effective.  I’ve seen managers, degree holders, and many workers with several years experience.  I myself have an eight-year history—just not in California.

            The “We’re your friends and your neighbors” handout is my favorite because it begins with “Here’s the facts….”  That’s right, “Here is the facts….”  Grammatical errors show carelessness.  Also, I would hope that my friends and neighbors would not curse at me and deface my friends’ vehicles, nor would I expect them to resort to intimidation.

            Then came the “Fiction Vs. Fact” handout.  Having read the Offer Of Settlement myself, I cannot accept the actuaries provided by a biased source because, as I have said, it is possible for any intelligent person to manipulate any data to make it say whatever he/she wants.  This Line News Issue brings up that the typical grocery store worker is a single mom with three kids, averaging 30 hours a week at $12.30, and that the average hourly wage needed for a two bedroom in Southern California is $18.59.  These portraits are too simple, intended to evoke sympathy for the hardworking, barely-making-ends-meet individuals we are familiar with in our daily struggle to survive.  The L.A. Times figure has been stored for justification since September 2002, lending credibility to the possibility that someone is intent on presenting only selective information to strengthen a case, which should set off an alarm to a rational individual that perhaps they are not being told the whole story.

            There is an October 23 L.A. Times article by Michael Hiltzik circulating, along with another “Dear Valued Customer” handout, supporting the Union’s position that Steve Burd is the #1 target—the enemy, if you will.  I don’t know the man personally, so I will not defend him personally, but I suspect there is a lot more going on behind closed doors than anyone guesses.  I think it is important to remember that he didn’t just fall into CEO; he had to work hard for it and prove himself to a good many people.  If he were as incompetent as the portrait being painted of him, he would not have lasted.  That seems obvious to me.

            The approaching holiday season has now prompted the Thanksgiving handout, once again claiming CEO “greed”, and the “Shame On Vons” handout claiming that the Vons Club exploits its employees.  If consistently respecting Union rules and continually paying your paychecks and healthcare is exploitation, I must misunderstand the term.  Even your own UFCW website acknowledges that your (now expired) health care and pension benefits were “exceptional”, which means unusual and out of the ordinary—most people don’t have anything close.  Meanwhile, your WIC and Food Stamp customers complain to me about being made to feel guilty for shopping at their usual store.

            Finally we have Line News Issue 13, which attempts to downplay how many are considering crossing for the sake of their families and other personal reasons, and suggests that support is growing and the strike might be nationalized.  First of all, it is absolutely inhuman to suggest that a collective is more important than each individual involved, so much so that loyalty to coworkers should take precedent over devotion to family.  Each must do what is right for his/her own situation, and it is no more than brutish intimidation to instill fear that goodwill cannot exist toward those making personal choices that might counter the Union ideal.  Secondly, nationalization will be difficult because a good portion of the nation has never heard of your local California stores.  I come from a land of Supercenters and self-checkouts.  Unions only have measurable power in the bubbled-in island that is California.  The claims of community support are exaggerated—most people not crossing your lines are either too afraid of retribution or simply uninformed about the true numbers.  Those who do cross—including many union members—have very definite opinions about the validity of the UFCW’s claims.

            Now then, how can there be ambiguity, confusion, or disagreement about the issues we have been obsessed with for the past several weeks?  I mentioned that there is only one fundamental difference that has caused this situation, and we have finally gotten to it.  The issue is this; how is the new contract “unfair”?  “Unfair” is the word plastered all over your signs, accented with “corporate greed”.  So the real problem is that you have failed to support your main claim.  An accurate sign would have to read “Unfortunate Labor Practices”, unless you are able to prove that it is actually unfair by today’s standard and that the CEOs are truly greedy—a difficult claim.  Amassing personal wealth by heading your own company can hardly be considered greedy—it is in fact the American dream.  How one goes about prospering is an individual, personal matter; Steve Burd chooses to head a corporation, while many grocery store clerks choose to rely on his leadership and management—even while second-guessing it.  Some pursuits of wealth work while others fail.  That’s just life.

            The problem, then, is ideological.  You can either believe that personal success is a matter of demanding it, or you can believe that it is a matter of earning it.  At the moment, I daresay you are not exactly making yourselves assets to the company.  You may maintain that you have worked long and hard for your employer, and therefore “deserve” what many deem an excessive package.  While I fully respect your hard work and dedication to doing whatever it takes to care for your families, I remain convinced that there must be a limit to how involved in your personal lives an employer must be.  No one has been able to tell me why it is the employer’s responsibility to take care of the typical “single mom with three kids”—unless of course that employer happens to be the deadbeat dad who abandoned them.  I reiterate that some people’s lives and financial situations are unfortunate—I am familiar with neglect and abuse and illness and death—but there is just no way that it is an employer’s responsibility.  They pay your paycheck, and if you are truly fortunate they use their power to assist in other ways as well.  But to completely coddle every single worker is by no means fair.  Indeed, to expect more than that seems unreasonable.

            The second class of workers argument is a non-issue.  First off, most companies adopt a policy of confidentiality, not discussing wages.  Secondly, there is already a pay scale that groups workers by skill level and tenure.  New employees will automatically accept that those hired before them will earn higher wages.  The notion that this could cause “unfair firings” is absurd while the companies are still subject to government regulations in an atmosphere of legal paranoia; a worker can only safely be fired it there is just cause.

            I am reminded of a parable where a landowner hired some men early one morning to work in his vineyard for a denarius.  He hired more men at intervals throughout the day, and when the time came to pay them, he started with those hired late in the day and gave them each a denarius, then paid each of the men the same thing regardless of when they were hired.  When those who were hired first received no more than those hired last, they grumbled against the landowner.  But he answered, “Friend, I am not being unfair to you.  Didn’t you agree to work for a denarius?  Take your pay and go.  I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you.  Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money?  Or are you envious because I am generous?”  The new hires will be the ones who agree to the new pay rate, and it will be fair because they are entering into an agreement with the employer, regardless of what agreements anyone else made.  Whatever workers make themselves an asset to the company will not be let go; only those with questionable work ethic need be concerned.

            I am not one who accepts anything without delving into it.  I have to wonder what is at stake in this strike for the Union leaders, what happens to them if Union power diminishes.  I would want to know how much the Union leaders make, and what they do, and how their jobs and lives and financial situations compare to those they represent, since their jobs depend on Union dues, membership, and support.  I would want to know why I did not see them marching around the parking lot with the workers after their pep talk at the rally.  I would wonder, if the Union was really so fraternal, why the newsletters warn people thinking about returning to work that they will never again have that solid relationship with their coworkers—I fail to see the understanding, compassion and individual concern in that.  In fact, I hardly see that the individual matters at all, even though that is who the Union leaders say they are trying to protect.  I would question authority that discourages finding out as much information as possible from every available source to determine truth.  It was that kind of arrogance in the Catholic Church that led to Martin Luther’s Reformation and St. Francis of Assisi’s ministry of poverty.

            You must consider how rapidly technology is changing the grocery industry.  You must realize that you are not irreplaceable.  Case Ready Meats, EFT efficiency, automatic espresso and coffee vending machines, electric carts, surveillance cameras, online shopping, and U-Scans (which I am terribly fond of, and which are already everywhere back east) are an unavoidable reality that will drastically reduce the manpower and training needed to run a grocery store—that task will fall to computer experts and technicians.  Wal-Mart is only the first step, the immediate future; there is much more coming to destabilize your workplace.  You (and the employers) must now adapt and evolve or you will find yourselves quite on the losing side.  I did not wish this strike for you, but I am convinced that the employers are taking the necessary steps to ensure that many of you will have jobs a decade from now.  They are preemptive measures I am convinced should be unopposed.

            Perhaps I am old fashioned, but I still believe that loyalty and hard work will pay off.  It is up to each individual to decide their course, never allowing themselves to be at the mercy of uncontrollable elements.  You must make yourselves indispensable, invaluable and irreplaceable.  These are my convictions.  I am not cold-hearted, selfish or misinformed.  I truly believe there is a power greater than the Union, and that he is still in control; and that we must be faithful with what we are given, and thankful for what we have, and count it all extra every day God allows us to wake up and continue our service to humanity.  That is why I cross your line every day.

 

 

Undated; Vons, Glendale

 

            About nineteen picketers out, several in D.C. for the negotiations the Union keeps walking out on.  We’re getting more and more crossing, to where only the die-hards and imbeciles are left.  I pity the dimmer ones, the ones who got themselves trapped on the losing end.  I still take my breaks outside, but I care less and less what happens to these people.  They are responsible for themselves and their own misfortune.

            WB is giving me more and more hours, as if they’re trying to integrate me into the necessary staff.  Even the Vons customers all seem to be connected somehow.  Most of the picketers right now are workers’ kids with signs they don’t understand.  Chris has been venting all day in his awkward, timid, whispering voice.  I’m completely out of supplies, trying to run a Starbucks with no mocha, chai, or venti cups—even alarmingly low on coffee, no decaf.  The picketers still don’t talk to me, don’t threaten or attempt to taunt me like they do everyone else.  I attribute it to my perpetual smirk.  One obnoxious closeted teenager yells louder than everyone else.  I think he has a desperate need to be accepted.  Chris too.  He kept following Marc and me around, wanting to hang out and drink after work.  I just want to go to bed. And eat meatloaf and mac & cheese.

The newspaper beside me picks up in the wind.  The employees walk back and forth in conversation, never say anything to the customers.

 

 

Raw Material Breach

 

Artists have brushes now,

and instruments

with which they need only master technique

in order to call themselves such.

I wonder how well they might function

with raw materials,

having been themselves manipulated,

and chosen their careers for various reasons.

 

I have nothing

—absolutely—

but the remnants and scars

of past artists, great names

with personalities forgotten,

and with it I make

nothing else entirely.

Today will be slow,

and I will make, if I am lucky,

another $50

sitting outside

a great expensive studio,

relating to fewer and fewer people,

on this midday before Thanksgiving.

 

 

Following the Sun

 

A poem without similes is like a day without sun;

I haven’t seen one in a long time.

It is the fifteenth today, nearly Christmas,

and I am scheduled 53 hours between two menial jobs,

yesterday the day Sadam was captured

and my President once again a hero,

today everyone walking around, coated, doing jobs like

holding up microphones above the sightline.

I was homesick yesterday while my wife shopped,

little things setting me off—because there are only little things—

everyone scrounging for some meaningful accumulation,

me dreaming it all away while outsiders pass off into the sunset,

painted on scrim, so many people I don’t know

doing things I can’t imagine while I annotate,

and punctuate my commute with time to spare,

and nothing to fill it with.

 

 

We’ve Forgotten Why We’re Here

 

After the third cup and the third nodding off,

after finding once again the inherent flaws with the system,

the injustices, impoverished and abused,

shredded bits of identity wrapping up for presentation

our best hand-painted paces; exhaustion sets in,

phone tag increases in frequency, back to notes and cards

and scrawled on hands, and eyes prematurely closing.

I do not remember what it’s like to sleep.

My wife does not remember being appreciated.

No one remembers God or life not on a schedule.

I can’t recall what it feels like to sit in an easy chair

or having feet not aching.  There seems for a moment

to be nothing but this, and no reason to continue it.

I’ve worn these same clothes, this ragged outfit

for three days now.

 

 

Rhetoric

 

How many times?

I have no more room to question

this refuse of strenuous repentance

nowhere near redemption.

Too many crimes unreported

to the legislative hierarchy,

anarchy replacing the amended

constitution of exemption.

In this atmosphere, I must point out:

there were only ten original commandments.

Apparently there was some ambiguity.

 

 

Cali-Gomorrah

 

San Bernardino is on fire.

Lines encircle with increasing

venom, distemper.

A fountain full of secrets

slices silent mockery,

as the day

struggles to begin,

labors to end.

 

 

The Body Feels It

 

There is no healing

the trademark undeliverable punch

broken up by lines

airbrushed to my abs.

I am thin, and thinning, slowly dying,

sick to an unthinkable degree,

watching, still observing

the surrounding (enveloping) world

with signature disdain,

wrought with compassion,

anticipating the next cut,

the final chip and chisel

that will release me from

the burdensome shackle of

framed, awkward eccentricities.

 

 

Serve, Write, Serve, Write, Repeat

 

I.

I would rather

smoke myself to death

than continue this shift.

 

II.

Occasionally

a customer makes me smile; my wife

always does.

I’m not sure the tradeoff is worth it.

There was a reason I went to school,

and right now

it is this woman’s hair.

 

III.

Laurel, in Sylvia,

was about the most

hilarious thing.

My coworker,

making those same

gestures in life,

makes me smile.

 

 

Stories From The Slow Hour

 

I am torn today,

between talking and crying,

and ever remaining silent and sad,

not ever reaching for another word.

I am slow in unreal circumstance,

gazing through the monitors’ methodic mayhem

as a fixture or unpersuasive compassionate smile.

It occurs to me that I nearly wrote,

“The express lane opens;

the light flickers on,”

and a wave of futility nearly escapes.

I consider how little sense or thought

it takes to do what I do,

and slump into despair at how much

less than that surrounds me.

 

 

The Little Known Girl

 

The little known girl

cowers on stage,

screams with a flickering tongue.

She will be something,

but I sure don’t know what;

I certainly don’t.

Pleading with the audience,

converse with convergence—

urgent, urgent, urgent!

Divergent ex-virgin,

the girl, the girl,

the littlest known

girl in the world,

surrounded by her

tea party toys.

The little known girl

collecting boys.

 

 

12/20/03, Sat; Home, Glendale

 

The transition is over.  We are established.  I am unhappy again, having spent my only day off Christmas shopping, and now back to my three hour sleep schedule, to the routine of cleaning before bed and again no sex, though again the finger points to me.  I want perfection and cannot create it.  I have no control over the details despite my discipline.

            I know that I have a remarkable woman, an amazing wife, but I do not support her like I should.  In desperation I blame my customers.  I hate them, with their clipped coupons and impatience.

            Let me give you some advice, friends, if I should serve you.  Be certain to gauge my mood, that you don’t fall on the receiving end of my imagination.

 

 

12/22/03, Mon; Vons, Glendale

 

            You just handed me a photocopy of a coupon.  Please tell me you’re joking.

            If I begin to write, customers will undoubtedly arrive, though it is hard to predict the flow three days before Christmas.  Hopefully everyone is at the mall.  There is no… something.  There is no mood for serving customers.  Only the opposite, of course.

            I write the way people think, associative and disjointed.  I was born tainted.

 

 

12/29/03, Mon; Vons, Glendale

 

            Watching my wife effortlessly, pretending to write with no ink.

 

 

Tuesday At Year’s End

 

The lot

smells like steak.

Not that cheap steak

—the good kind.

I am fresh and inspired,

living in two very,

very different worlds,

having left so many others

to stand now by a poinsettia

with a steaming black-eye,

watching the clock

to swipe my badge

to the minute

on the hour.

 

 

Undated

 

There is nowhere I can live I do not see utter depravity or grace shining through it.  Autobiographical, I watch the marinated state, with thoughts of judgment and perception skewered with ideals.  I am vague, while others smother selves with transparent cover, wondering how they can breathe, or how I?  Living in the crime ring of peaceful Glendale I am another minority, even still more altogether alone with my wife, considering that within race there are no places, no finishing at all except death, and I am angered and calm considering that Caucasians are rude and cheap and self conscious about it, while Armenians are rude and cheap and proud of it (or in denial).  We take things personally; they give it no thought whatsoever.

 

 

Hell Is In Six Hour Shifts

 

The Christians are in church today.

The Catholics are in church today.

The others are in church today,

except the callus atheists or

careless waifs, or the poor.

A regular… a pause,

familiar conversation.

Backup arrives in a tiff.

 

 

Watching, As I Do

 

What I do

is watch,

habitually, closely,

the interaction among species,

cringing as necessary when

something subtle or overt

involuntarily knocks my head

to the side.

Words like intolerable spring to the forefront.

I am already working past scheduled

and see things vividly for what they are.

Life is not hard

if you try,

but most people are not willing

—not incapable, but lacking the foresight

to head off what to me seems inevitable—yea!

to all to whom I give a hearty half gesture,

the way they go through life.

I am separate, given cause and authority

to esteem merit and judge the condition of

those who are clearly not me,

those insufferable, unfortunate things.

Everything breaks down under my gaze.

My stare is an instrument of demolition,

the precursor to fresh budding of

new hopeful cynicism.

I have been this way too long to expect

any surprising reintroduction.

 

 

Peppermintara

 

I saw Tara Dé’s eyes

emblazoned on another head,

sadly reminiscent of those winters.

 

All I want in this

single snapshot moment

is a tremor of fueled sighing,

a couple minutes to cry silently,

a brief recognition of longing,

of misplaced fond passion,

disappearing in peppermint.

 

I wonder, is Tara Dé still Tara Dé?

I hope no, and happier for it.

 

 

Five & Counting

 

One man, somewhere, stabs himself with

this model of pen, with hatred and disgust,

his life having been reduced to clicking,

temporal utensils, diagrams, brochures and meetings,

and I would gladly trade him for a week or more,

then just as happily kill myself with paper cuts or scalding coffee,

get myself fired for the shock value of just once telling a customer

the unbelievable truth, holding up a knife blade to terrify with reflection

and speak what every human really knows to be the state of things.

A simple 24 hours and everything falls back into perspective,

the writing it down is still not worth the five months required to get there.

The only rewarding thing will be death, will be knowing that

there is no more tomorrow, no more alarm or having to confront

the absolute horrendous fucks deserving slow, torturous, creative ends.

I entertain the thought—yes, daily—smiling as I do with

each and every step you take in my direction.

I have you summed up, already dead and buried thirty years,

before it will finally occur to you how wasted and small and unliked

you really were for that half a year I had to endure you.

The only great loss is my time, so I remind myself that

without my attention… you still exist, still equally

as intolerable and wretched.

 

 

PAs Needed

 

PAs are funny,

with their random notes

about ice cream and coffee,

wired in to very busy people,

very busy, impressive people,

who cannot so much as

set a stack of papers down.

 

 

That Verse Never Comes

 

I keep hoping to write the poem that ends it,

the one that finally hits and draws to a close this nonsense.

I am responsive and faithful to the whore—my mistress and muse—

the idea that something will come, when nothing ever does.

I write not because, but because I cannot not.

I reiterate the deeper things that age with misuse, with neglect,

or are refined like sand.

I am too tired to think, too tired to stay awake and create.

Long after I have died, a useless and tired, wasted barista,

you will read this and miss entirely the pointlessness of my life.

The whole of my work is to impress to you the futility of hope.

Do not fall victim to the idea that it ever will pay off.

I have not yet found that verse.

 

 

Standing Area

 

Stand here, in this

designated standing area,

or sit in this round of chairs.

 

I wonder if

riding my bike so far

opens up my lungs

further to cigarette smoke.

Always, there is time to kill,

and never enough to let live;

patches woven together

into a shroud.

 

 

Useless Round

 

“Young man, I spilled coffee right here.”

“And what, your legs are broken?”

 

I can’t imagine anyone I would rather be,

with such quick wit.

 

 

Undated; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

After hours: ice cream unavailable, coffee pots dry.  Men who speak no English, uniformed and silent, scrape at the floors under Security’s eye.  I am on another mandatory lunch, squeezing in the half hour before rushing home for a few bites of cheese and rice—a beer if I’m lucky—then rushing off to the grocery store for an overnight of price changes; then back here again for six hours of Starbucks.  I go wasted, my mind, my body, my voice, my tender core buried under years of scowling and hardness.  I am hidden and neglected and stronger for it, though sometimes more independent than a married man should be.  I kill time like an angry man.

 

 

She Makes It Look Easy

 

With that extra bounce in her step,

that extra bright gleam in her eye,

a smile that flirts like the sun on the ocean,

the shelter that keeps me dry;

 

she makes it look effortless,

like she don’t even try,

she makes it look easy,

and it’s easy to see why I’m her guy.

 

Sometimes I’m unguarded when her voice comes

from the other room, and undoes me fine.

I get swept up and wrapped up and caught up and

tangled up in her, like barbed wire electrified.

 

She makes it look natural,

like it springs from inside;

she makes it look easy,

and it’s easy to see why I’m her guy.

 

She makes it look simple,

like it can’t be denied;

she makes it look easy,

and it’s easy to see why I’m her guy.

 

 

Nutmeg In The City

 

The cat

disappeared

into death sentiment,

guilt and grief;

and I was amazed

that people who take

everything so seriously

could so lightly dismiss

a woman’s comfort and joy.

 

For those of you with

pets you love;

he came back late into the day,

and now lays at my feet.

 

 

Listening To The Neighbors

 

It took dying

for Duke’s family to visit,

all with memories

too good humored to turn the engine

or work into schedules,

all still smokers, they,

which in fact is less destructive

than the emotional and intellectual ways

people cripple themselves.

He was a good and hardworking man

—probably—

but toward the end

could not open

his own door.

 

 

Please Be Joking

 

I must confess I am perplexed

and more than just a little stressed.

I’ve seen the pleasantries vividly digress,

leaving a mess of dreadful sets to coalesce.

 

Please be joking.  Tell me you don’t mean this.

I can’t believe you’re serious.  This is ridiculous.

 

You’ve just got to be kidding me, but it is not funny.

I can’t even articulate the absolute absurdity.

My sunny disposition is conditional at best;

you put me on the offense, my definition to the test.

 

Please be joking.  Say this is just a little jest.

You stun me like a swarm of killer bees.  This is madness.

 

I mean no malice.  I intend you no harm.

But it’s just that all this stupidity has me alarmed.

I can hardly contain my shock, barely hold back my rage.

I am noticeably incensed by overwhelming malaise.

 

Please be joking.  Don’t make me lose faith.

Just point me at the camera so I can laugh and wave.

 

 

02/20/04, Fri, 12:30 PM; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

            Virtually every employee scheduled on a strange calm day, a half-hour to kill staring at black painted windows.  I don’t know my place.  Or rather, no one else does.  Easily I could sleep to add to the cumulative 5½ hour total for the week.  I was called in early, then earlier still, but not told why, so I struggle to stay awake.  A quick nap, perhaps, head down on the table, a few more cigarettes, and then thrown to the devourers.

 

            12:45 awakened.  Man of the hour am I.

 

 

For Shame

 

Am I faithful with what you’ve given me,

or do I expect to be given so much more?

Who am I living for?  Have I gotten comfortable?

Do I keep starting over each time

you change what lies in store?

 

For shame!  I hang my head low

for forgetting you letting me

tell you which way I would go.

And say, I should have known

you could only return

what I offered to give you alone.

 

I should be weeping.  It’s uncontrollable.

The sun must rise and set on another day.

It’s embarrassing; I’m so dismayed that this

travesty of me needs to see more than you gave.

 

For shame!  I fall to the ground,

denouncing my own set of values

for crowding you out.

And hey, I can’t make a sound

without doubting my mouth

or the grounds I’ve been howling about.

 

There is no bridge I can safely cross

without deep streams beneath,

or through forests where I could get lost.

I regret I neglect sometimes to remember your hand,

that you’ve been there before and are sure

you know just where to stand.

Help me to see where the light,

streaming between the leaves,

meets the path that you promised

would always be beneath my feet.

 

For shame!  I beat at my chest

for forbearing to foster the fortune

adorning my neck.

I pray I get out of this mess,

to best know how to use

the blessings you’ve given me next.

 

 

Another Ten

 

My time is measured out

in ten minute increments,

hours frothing to waste

quickly, discarded.

I have a wife and no

luxury to enjoy her.

I do not find fulfillment

in cup after cup, fold after fold,

sale after sale.

I am surrounded by unenchanting

            disenchantment,

a franchise of callous drivel

causing me to not care

if I live or die;

indeed, to lean preferentially

toward the latter.

I wonder, how many walking this

same stone walkway are truly happy,

and how many are simply

too distracted to care?

 

 

Attuned To A February Day

 

When days like this hit,

I meld with weather.

Music disappears; sounds dissipate.

I stand in different judgment,

hard communion with nature,

small-ing, coining abstractions,

feeling the breadth and insignificance

of wobbly, sprayed Styrofoam,

people-less.

 

 

Waiting For My Death

 

This is not a good life.

There’s too much awfulness,

too much awkwardness, too much strife.

My lover is away and I cannot sleep.

I can’t keep believing this wild

beating heart will ever be tamed.

I keep waiting for my death,

in the reds of its eyes.

I keep meaning to stop waking up

day after day to that look of surprise.

 

Change does not exist.

No solution ever comes.

I am far too much an optimist to think

the sickness ever lets on where it’s from.

With broken back and soiled hands

I petitioned the sky to fall,

with the full force of urgency

reserved for these times.

 

I keep waiting for my death,

for my fated last goodbye.

I keep expecting to be gasping

my last breath by the conclusion

of these useless rhymes.

 

I keep waiting for my death.

I keep counting the chimes.

I sit back in a solitude, alluding

to an ending yet to be defined.

 

I keep waiting for my death.

I’ve been waiting all my life.

I keep living through the influence

of innocence, infected by a network of crime.

I keep waiting for my death.

 

 

03/08/04, Mon, 10:25 PM; Home, Glendale

 

            Quickly now, I must rest.  The next phase has begun—I pray it is short.  The strike is over.  Murphy is back in New York.  I am now the Starbucks manager, officially, and still at WB—waited on Jack Osborne the other day.  Working roughly 65-70 hours a week, unable to do anything else.

 

 

The Low List

 

We are the low list.  We are the meaningless.

This is the catalyst.  On to the conquest.

 

 

Too Much Trouble For Too Little Reward

 

It’s just too much trouble for too little reward.

I got too much invested where I cannot afford.

I can’t remember where my treasures are stored.

It’s all too much trouble for too little reward.

 

I didn’t know when I set out this path would be so tough.

I didn’t know the definition of sacrifice.

I learned quick that when this world hits, it hits all at once,

and it’s never quite the listed sticker price.

 

It’s just too much trouble for too little reward.

My bones are breaking and my back is sore.

I’ve been overlooked by God and all his angels before,

but it’s too much trouble now, for too little reward.

 

I am struggling just to find a place to put my faith.

My blasphemy has tainted me for worse.

Mama, what’s your little boy become of late?

The pain and hate have stuck like some ancient curse.

 

And it’s too much trouble for too little reward.

I’m taking my complaints before the Lord.

If I don’t come back I haven’t been ignored,

it was too much trouble for too little reward.

 

 

Another….

 

We found out by email that Hannah is dead.

 

When David died from an infected dog bite,

it didn’t matter enough to mention.

But I liked Hannah.

Hannah matters just like Pete mattered.

(The things we revisit in a lifetime….)

 

Don’t worry, loves, I’m still here.

 

 

03/31/04, Wed; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

            Standing behind a counter opposite Safi, dodging tour groups and Perk lines in tight, ridiculous clothes.  I finally realize I’m worth as much as anyone on the lot, and that impresses the absurdity of the whole thing.  I can’t afford the Bukowski disc or a bottled water, and the whole place is laced with people stuck in routines—their most pressing decision what to buy today, their biggest concern getting the correct boost in their Jamba Juice.

 

            I slept in this morning… 8:30, with the cats locked in the bathroom.

 

People wear suits as if this were a cruise, or cargo pants as if there were no one to impress.  Everyone survives on polite conversation, hung on names and badges, and flocking together like—I can’t even think of what—something worse than cattle, something altogether worse than animals.  The cell vibrates at my hip and I can only glance at the name and ignore.

 

 

Undated; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

I am now the ice cream man, standing before fat people, looking the model of judgment.  I do not practice restraint, but discipline, discipline in the form of disapproval.  My head calls for a redeye and the service guy jokes like an SNL skit.  Oh, to have such a simple life, to be content knowing how incompetent electricians can be.

 

            Between every verse:

            stop and scoop,

            stop and scoop.

            Question?  I don’t honestly know.  I don’t eat the stuff.  Stuff your makeup-caked face.

            Stop and scoop.

            And now I am also the juice man.  (I got something for ya’… tell ya’ where to stuff your wheat grass.)

 

            Wasted.  Yes, that’s the only word; leaning back scrawling, hat pulled down, ducking beneath the brim, unprofessional—as if standing behind a fucking counter with a saran-wrapped smile is a profession.  I profess a lot with different food smells drifting over, complicating satellite waves over cell phone pauses.  I will not smile today; smiles do not disdain, and I will certainly not today condone anything quite so Hollywood—not for all the meager money in the world.

 

 

Fade In

 

My shift begins

one hour before the sun

begins its slow fade in,

while only God

and God-knows-who are vibrant.

Five months of dread,

petitioning God for

the next phase;

it begins, and it is

exactly the same

as the last.

 

Feel every pause.

 

 

Silently Mouthed To Each And Every Customer

 

It doesn’t fall apart, the grocery,

or even the retail outlet

where I spend menial hours

earning my $10 or my $7.25/hr.

They do not come to a crashing halt,

or if they did, what difference would it make?

There is an agenda to lock me in, not conscious,

not concerted, but the unfortunate result

of century after century of decline,

of brilliant men reducing life and impact to systems,

overanalyzing with disregard and poisonous recklessness.

Once there were brilliant minds, shaping what needed

improvement with cynicism and sparks of imagination.

The dead result is a world where entertainment

replaces expression, and disingenuous mantras

wear into dead souls with professional courtesy.

I glare deadly through each of you, day after day,

stepping as you do to the same counter for the same

reinforcing empty words, for the same unfulfilling drink.

A man with a handheld scale weighs the empty cup for deviance;

I weigh his empty head and treacherous hand for alms

and produce none.

Words wildly bend at this moment apart—

this brief restoring look and refreshing distance—

blend to curves over the tip of the pen.

 

 

Cryptic At Best

 

Poetry speaks to me as I often wish none of you would.

With your clumsy, fumbling ordering,

I suspect you are up to no good.

My customers coddle themselves with the bloated notion they should.

I throw them like kindling and coal to the smoldering heaping of wood.

 

Life is cryptic at best.

I can’t find the message beneath the mess,

and in the daylight of all the distress

I profess my dismay.

Life is ecliptic; and yes,

the seasons return in a sickly cruel jest,

and as it happens that they coalesce,

I can’t get away.

 

The puzzling perplexity of literature liberally bends,

ensuring elasticity of dichotomously literal trends.

My handwriting falters as I slaughter your thought with my pen,

then fashion remembrance with trembling, resembling the author of then.

 

Life is cryptic at best.

I am just meant to grin and endure it, I guess,

but as I keep moving closer to death,

I am much less afraid.

Life is elliptic, and when pressed,

I confess it is increasingly obvious

that if it ever comes to a rest

I will beg it to stay.

 

 

Neurotic

 

I keep getting hit.  I keep getting hate.

I keep getting ripped.  I can’t get it straight.

How dark is too dark?  How much can I take?

What penance must I pay?  Who must I forsake?

 

I’m on the edge, about to snap;

on a ledge, about to crack.

 

Look out! Look out! Look out!

Look out! Fuck it… I can’t cope!

 

It keeps getting bleaker.  It keeps me awake.

It keeps getting deeper.  It wants me to break.

I’m at the end of my rope.  You’re at the end of my arm.

This is the end of the scope; are you alarmed?

 

I won’t mince words; I’ll make mincemeat.

I’m baring my fangs, ready to eat.

 

Look out! Look out! Look out!

Look out! Fuck it… I’m done!

 

I am driven by constant fear.

Don’t you think that’s just a bit neurotic?

I am tired of living this way.

 

 

Waiting For My Death (Part II)

 

I’m still torn up.

My stomach still bleeds.

I’m still unhealthy and unhappy

and disgusted by the same old things.

I still get those pangs

of incredible pain.

I’m still as utterly sickened

for no apparent reason

just to be awake.

 

And I am still on course

in the direction of the sun;

I’m still about to burn upon reentry,

and I still think I’m the only one.

I’m still about to burst,

and I still can’t breathe.

I still do all the screaming

and the seething, and the teeth

are all still buried in me.

 

I’ve been waiting for my death,

with its outstretched hands;

it calls me like a siren

to the undertow of violence

in a vibrant land.

 

I’ve been waiting for my death;

it’s been waiting there in kind.

It gets nearer like a pendulum swinging

with a double sided axe on the line.

 

I’ve been waiting for my death.

I’ve been praying it comes soon.

I’ve been playing with fire

and electrical wires,

and inhaling the fumes.

 

 

The Mug

 

The mug

is not designed to fit

my hand;

my hand

is designed to fit

the mug.

I would like, today,

to stand

straight three hours,

unaccosted.

 

My voice is failing.

Already the monitor shows

daylight, revealing hoards.

I want AND

I do not want

so many things without control,

and poorly today will be graded.

I know the secret shopper by face,

and think

“how about grading me on

something that matters,”

while I critique humanity at large,

and you in particular,

again with aching bowels and

an upset stomach,

longing for baking soda and hot water.

 

 

Johnny Depp

 

Johnny Depp

is a good looking man,

but I’m not sure

we would have

anything to talk about.

 

 

04/05/04, Mon; Home, Glendale

 

            I thought this morning, “I smoke so that you know I’m unhappy.”  It is the only outward symbol of the destructive pattern of life.  It is the very least of my worries.  I reek now of cigarettes, with a half hour left until the half hour trip to work.  Jess is visiting all this week, making it impossible to relax in what rare moments I’m home and unaccounted for.  I have profound plans to be productive and am instead reduced to catnaps with an aching neck and forehead.  The computer is once again corrupted at the moment I was poised to use it.  I don’t know what God wants from me.  Everyone else wants too much.

I hate my customers.  I cringe as they trickle in.  I hate the companies I work for, and am ashamed of who they hire and how they operate.  I am insignificant and wasted.  I have to move on.  Soon.  But why should God give me better?  My wife reads my journals and worries.  My mother used to do the same.

 

 

04/06/04, Tue; Vons, Glendale

 

            I was prepared to quit yesterday, but all my supplies came in today.  We are all—the four of us; me, Carlos, Amelia and Andrew—cruelly overworked.  Poor Amelia had a line of about eleven people as I stored loads, everyone looking at me as if I should be behind the counter helping, not realizing I was already two hours off the clock just to accomplish half of what needed to be done.  I hate customers.  I hate my job.  I hate Starbucks and Safeway and Frappuccinos and everything about corporate America.  I hate minorities.  I hate not being surrounded by whites, even more than I hated Green Hills.  I hate coupons and waking up at five every morning, groping through the dark to not wake up Marci.  I hate clocks and breaks and applications, and I especially hate unions.  They make it fucking impossible to work, or to help my own staff.  I’m still quite ready to quit today, poised to quit tomorrow, but I won’t even have time to think about it as I anticipate the busy hours alone, running the bar and register at once.  The challenge will be—or rather, the masochistic game—to see how quickly I can get everyone out.  I don’t care how fucking long the line is when they choose to stand in it.  There are four other Starbucks within two miles, if they weren’t so fucking lazy and stupid.  Don’t blame me for not knowing your order or having your money and Club card ready.  And the coupons!  Why the hell would I keep a stack behind the counter, or allow you to reuse the same one over and over?  You’re lucky I don’t just gouge your eyes with the pastry tongs.  I’ll get roughly four hours of sleep tonight, after being gone all day; then I’ll work another fourteen-hour day tomorrow.  This is some big fun, this phase.  Marci’s been praying for me for seventeen days.  Meanwhile I remain dark, miserable and tired.  (It’s a more emotional word than exhausted.)

 

 

04/08/04, Thu; Vons, Glendale

 

            Slow weak, sort of.  No coupons, but lots to do.

 

 

04/09/04, Fri; Vons, Glendale

 

            24 hours later.  Not sure what to expect.  Already killing everyone in my head, flipping them off behind the counter, the nagging life question, who the hell is up at this hour, oblivious that the store is still recovering from Night Crew?  I have no line.  Now I’m terrified.  It’s going to be a mad day.  People are unoriginal; get the same ideas at the same time.

 

 

If This Were Real Life

 

This must be some kind of fairy tale,

but I have yet to live up to the notion.

This must be some twist of fate to be

painted in undue shades of devotion.

 

If this were real life,

if this were true,

I would be able to treat you

like I keep pretending I do.

If this were simple,

or if it were fair,

I could stop dreaming

and we would finally be actually there.

All of my songs sound the same;

I just keep complaining and crying in vain,

but if this were real life,

I wouldn’t be so scared.

 

This must be some kind of mystery,

but it feels more like an inquisition.

I must be some kind of hero,

but I feel more like a huge imposition.

 

If this were real life,

if I could have faith,

I’d be able to read you

by just taking cues from your face.

If this were redeemable,

if I could believe,

if this whole fucking thing could be

over with one last reprieve,

I would clasp my hands over my heart

and offer you ever last piece of my art,

but if this were real life,

I’d be keeping an ace up my sleeve.

 

 

I’ve Got To Get Out Of Here

 

I kick and I kick and I kick,

but the door won’t open.

I’m sick and my skin is thick,

but my back is broken.

 

I’ve got to get out of here.

I’ve got to get out of here.

I’ve got to disappear.

 

I scrape and I scratch and I pick,

and my teeth are grating.

I thrash and I gnash, and my

passionate rebukes are scathing.

 

I’ve got to get out of here.

I’ve got to get out of here.

I’ve got to disappear.

 

 

04/09/04, Fri; Vons, Glendale

 

I write because

I’m not distracted by the same things

that distract other people.

No, I am distracted by other things,

by seeing improvements that need to be made.

I am distracted by anger and longing

and falling asleep sitting up,

head propped up over a journal.

 

 

Service With A Smile

 

I am nothing if not adaptable;

I’m unflappable to the sting.

I am nothing if not invincible;

it’s the principal of the thing.

 

Well, hey howdy, I hail from the South,

I’ve got it dripping from my mouth,

and I’m ripping in with my talons,

to your talentless soul.

And just like an old country cliché,

as syrupy sweet as molasses, they say,

I smile in the daylight, but at twilight

take my torchlight and resume digging holes.

 

I am nothing if not hospitable;

I’m remittable and mundane.

I am nothing if not retractable;

I am tactical, practical and sane.

 

Well I’ll be some wasted analogy,

rife with comparative lessons garnered from life,

an old wives’ tale that perhaps began

as a quote, from either Shakespeare or Jesus.

What difference, as long as I thank you politely,

and then reap the profits of raping you nightly?

It’s frightening how easy it is to please us.

 

I am nothing if not rational,

internationally acclaimed.

I am nothing if not formidable,

inimitable and strange.

 

You are nothing if not completely gullible,

lullable to a false sense of safe.

You are nothing at all but an animal

with a pleasant aroma and taste.

 

 

Undated; Vons, Glendale

 

            Can’t clock in or start working because the Union is watching, so I’ll stand around useless another five minutes, allowing myself to get behind; which will affect all my customers as they back up in line at once.

“If I see you in the store working off the clock, I’ll write you up.”  What are we, in grade school?  You’re going to fire me for having an ethic, you self-centered fucking baby?  What I choose to do with my free time has nothing to do with you.  Write me up… I’ll write you into a poem so everyone can read about the pinnacle of your achievement.

 

 

The Lotto Routine

 

The man I instantly hate,

simply for being a customer,

reminds me innocently

that he is getting coffee,

that he also doesn’t want to be up

on his way to work,

that he doesn’t win a dollar on the lotto.

I promise him a poem

to immortalize endurance,

a testament to posterity;

he smiles gruffly

and drags away in a leather jacket.

Next, Bob the stuntman

for his venti Irish Cream,

then the IHOP waitress

for her tall Americano.

I stare at the clock

as every one of us suffers.

It is a slow morning,

boding poorly for Carlos’s afternoon,

when I strand him for four hours.

 

 

Before God Himself

 

The paperboys are up,

the nurses in scrubs up,

the gas station attendants

and truck drivers, mostly up,

and the people who make coffee

—motherfuckers all—up, up, up

for no damn reason,

while the farmer sleeps peacefully,

content.

 

 

Pretentious Bastards…

 

$100 opening till.

First four customers—

$20 cash back.

I smile.  Next.

Decaf, venti, soy, 1= latte.

Instead, how about a big cup of

FUCK YOU (to go).

I guess it could be worse

—I could still be checking;

the only humor in my day,

what I write about

each person I well-wish.

Another soy latte;

thanks a lot, Train…

that was a good joke.

 

 

Long Time To Be Miserable

 

Just how much is too much when I’m just

not sure just how much more I can take?

Just when I touch on the source of my troubles,

I’m crushed by a new rush of fate.

I can’t wait for the day to be laid out to greet me

when minutes do not turn to jabs,

when the state of my urgent defamatory gestures

refrain from their scraping at scabs.

 

It’s a long time to be miserable,

when there’s just so much more to endure.

How much more ‘til it’s purely unbearable,

when it keeps caving in even more?

 

How much longer can I harbor faith

in a heart that seems destined to never be full,

will I foster the frosted imposter who’s lost

in a monstrously wretched downpour?

Surely the end must come quickly,

when there’s surely nowhere else lower to go.

Just when I think I’ve no rope left to hang on,

I find a knot tauter below.

 

It’s a long time to be miserable;

it’s too hard to pretend I’m this strong.

This persistence is cruelly unthinkable,

and I shouldn’t have lived it this long.

 

 

Coffin-Sized Kiosk

 

My tiny world, hectic in its smallness,

its unimpressive monotony, set off by magnetic strips,

lined with Plexiglas and particle board;

pushing pastries and soy to fat, obnoxious people,

or unfulfilled single women on the [go, go, go],

in designer sunglasses and faux coats.

My small world encompassed on a security camera monitor,

writing myself into another corner,

condemning myself to a single tragic line,

waiting for the arm-in-arm in spirit to cascade in,

embittered but ignoring it; suppression the long-term condition.

 

 

04/16/04, Fri; Vons, Glendale

 

            Had to call out of Warner to cover the close at Vons.  My new employee wasn’t trained for register, so we can’t leave her alone.  Amelia has had enough, and I frankly need her to leave.  I have a meeting on the 27^th to discuss further management training, so I have until then to find another job.  It’s impossible to schedule around Union shifts, so I end up working 10-20 hours a week off the clock—still getting in trouble if I don’t clock out at six hours.  All I need is $400 a week to quit both nowhere jobs, but I won’t have time to think about it today.

Marci is off as an extra in an indie film.  It’s been almost 98 years since the San Francisco earthquake.  I need more cigarettes.

 

 

Blue-Collar Adjustment

 

Every day

I go to bed early—

shoes and outfit set out,

coffee maker set,

binding myself with eye masks

to make work by five—

is a day further from

the day I no longer have to.

 

 

Six Audible Ticks

 

Six minutes to kill

is enough

to kill

or to sum up unhappiness,

falling asleep

on studio steps.

 

Simplicity is beautiful,

all else commonplace,

inadmissible,

as quick minutes tick.

 

 

04/24/04, Sat, 5:20 AM; Vons, Glendale

 

            Ten minutes to kill sitting in a parking lot, smoking, watching lunch hour breakers stroll the front with newspapers I’ll have to put away.  I’ll work the busiest 3½ hours alone, then leave Carlos for 3½ hours of the same; then go home to attempt paperwork—unpaid—just to be back at 5:30 for inventory.  Marci is in Pennsylvania with Didi, because Bruce collapsed a lung falling off an ATV.  Christopher Reeve is staying at her hotel.

 

 

They Must Know

 

How do you do?

How do you do that,

stand there looking so pleasant,

while all my emotions at present

are tied to some far off future time,

that likely may or may not ever arrive?

I stand with my pen in my hand,

scribbling vainly some vague escape plan,

but I am just a man who can’t understand

how anything gets done.

Thank you for reminding me

that people can be so vile;

I haven’t dwelt on it for a while, but now

I feel that creeping feeling settling back in.

The day has a slow start,

so I think they must know

that I’ve been graciously obliging,

while wishing they would all

just go away.  They must know that

I despise and rue the day.

 

 

He’s Come Back To Me

 

Jesus has come back to me lately,

like a memory triggered

by some mundane thing.

He’s come back to me;

he’s right back here where he said he’d be

when I finally resolved to acknowledge him

in my suffering.

 

There’s a time for wailing

and a time for worship,

a time for healing my peeling skin.

There is peace and restoration

in the plan of salvation,

and all I need to do is let him in.

 

Jesus is presently, patiently waiting,

while I push with my face

through the earth of this dirty world.

While my tears make a mudpack

and my ears hear the bloodbath,

he clears the way as the years unfurl.

 

 

The Assault

 

Accosted immediately

on the day I might kill everyone.

I will not be able to fake it today.

It is too much.

Too, too very much.

 

 

It Doesn’t Pay To Be Good

 

I have tried and tried with all of my might,

and all of the goodness I had wrapped up inside.

But I’m tired, so tired of holding to these ideals

when it keeps being reinforced that they lied.

 

It doesn’t pay to be good.

I am still just as far from my goals.

I really thought that it would,

but I am poorer now and left in the cold.

And if I ever said in past I’d never compromise or quit,

or if I hinted at a target I believed I that I could hit,

well it just shows how little I really know.

 

I redefined in my lifetime words like solid and endurance,

and I did it all with never any help or reassurance.

I just kept on getting spit on and stepped on and kicked around.

Well, I have finally had enough and reached the end of my ambition.

There are limits to how tall a man can stand in this condition.

My position is changing as I’m crumbling to the ground.

 

It doesn’t pay to be good.

I am still going through this alone.

I really thought that I could get a fair shake;

but, oh my god, no.

And if I ever quite let on that I expected resolution,

all the suspect evidence, instead, is fraught with convolution.

I am lost in debtor’s prison, and the system just let me go.

 

It doesn’t pay to be good, and even less to be better.

I had peaked at perfection while I waited for that letter,

that one bit of good news that would make it all worthwhile.

But like I said, not one solitary thing ever goes smoothly;

I guess God somehow forgot that he was ever going to use me,

so I am wasted here beneath this feigned and breaking smile.

 

 

I Know What The Heavy Hearted Know

 

This temporary job

has gone on now seven months,

longer than I’ve lived some places.

I stand over a counter, ticketing pampers,

another coffee kiosk to my right.

My face drops,

my countenance falls,

my soul sinks as I continue to find

still deeper levels of despair.

I say yes to everything and remain

agreeable to nothing.

 

 

Outside Stage 18

 

I am being shed on

by trees,

quietly covered and

serene as stone,

still with a flurry of activity

in a whirlwind of walkies,

as the convention sets

and men sweat in business suits.

It is as if it is winter, and

I am not here.

A stream continues in;

I do not know what they do,

and they certainly

do not know what I do.

I spend every hour

frustrated,

seeing the same words

recurring in my books,

over

and over

and over,

reapplying the same coats,

just barely covering

the dry rot underneath.

 

 

Randy, Hit Four Times By Cars In Recent Years

 

The unnecessary man

with his tool pouch

limps over slowly,

flustered and melodramatic

as if the whole world

that doesn’t matter

hinges on his

twenty minute tangents

that don’t matter.

I wonder what he must have

been like

as a weird, weird kid,

playing down by the creek

with smooth stones

as best friends.

We wear down the cart battery,

and the time clock,

silent and unnecessary.

 

 

Worn Down

 

I am worn down to nothing,

flailing around like a scarecrow.

I was expecting something,

but my outstretched hands

are worn down to the bone.

 

Like a charcoal that makes a great

smudge as you press harder down,

or the ivory that once was

an elephants tusk, smuggled out

of a third world town,

I age like an imported bottle

of fermented grapes,

and am forced to endure in immediacy

all my potency going to waste.

 

I am worn down like a crayon

making signs saying,

“Will work for food.”

As my resume sits on your desk,

unimpressed, you dismiss me as

just another one of those fools.

 

 

I’m Not Sad Anymore

 

I have finally moved beyond

the confines of finding things so awful

that I just had to write them down.

This new ground I pound my stake in

cannot break or falter or fail.

And words like finally betray me,

once I think I’ve reached with certainty

a plane that can’t get worse

or any verse that gives a summary.

I keep finding new ways to say

that I keep getting nailed.

 

“I’m not sad anymore,” I said.

You said, “I’m glad.”

But I was thinking there is something

so much deeper than sadness.

There are some things so terrible

that all you can do is bounce back.

 

I try to keep my comments brief

because relief will never come to me,

and what’s the use in speaking

if it won’t amount to anything?

I may as well retire my pen,

and just lay down and die.

Wouldn’t that be just the ending

for my constant stream of poetry?

But Jesus seems to keep me here;

I just can’t imagine why.

 

I can finally smile;

it’s just that it means something

different when I do it.

 

I’m not sad anymore.

You say, “That’s great.”

But I’m afraid I mean I’ve sunken

past that point you can relate to

and discovered an entirely new plateau

so much lower than that.

 

I’m not sad anymore;

I am so much more than sad.

 

 

I Shouldn’t Talk About People I May Meet

 

L.A. is the only place that thinks only L.A. is relevant

to everywhere else in the world.

The actors and producers and writers here think the earth is square.

Well, I have been to the edges of the map, only to find

that it folds back and meets the other side, line for line,

and California is quite to the left of the borders it shares.

 

I shouldn’t talk about people I may meet, but I’m afraid

I have very strong opinions based in ethics and morality,

and anyone who doesn’t agree will likely burn in hell,

even if they choose not to believe hell could really exist,

because how could a loving God allow anyone to go there

for thinking their way is right, as long as everyone treats everyone well?

 

I’m so bored with people who think truth can be subjective,

who will key my car if I don’t share their perspective; yet they

don’t share mine,  and therefore keep confusing tolerance and hate.

And every other thing I find I have a platform to complain about

will wind up being something I could never have campaigned without.

You doubt me, but I guarantee you never did, or ever will relate.

 

It doesn’t mean I don’t respect you; it just means I really don’t care.

 

 

05/07/04, Fri; Vons, Glendale

 

Customers are vile.  I hate all of them.  Hours off the clock since Monday: 6½.

 

 

Ruining The Ending

 

Rosebud was a sled, and that was the very last thing he said.

Mr. Cane and I share a striking disdain for life.

Bruce Willis’s character dead, every Jane Austin gentleman wed,

and Mattie Silver was ultimately paralyzed.

 

I’m ruining the endings, cause they’ve all been ruined for me.

Just hand me the Cliff’s Notes to my enduring legacy.

And when we find that in time our assignments on earth are recalled,

it appears I’m the only Guardian Angel left after the fall;

and though I am strictly forbidden to influence how it unfolds,

I just love the look of surprise when you’re finally told.

 

No good can come of this simply ridiculous, burdensome foolishness.

It’s as if my punishment sprung from the strung up lights in the sky.

I sift through the tealeaves to tell you of treachery, coups and mutiny,

and still you seek council and comfort that I can no longer provide.

 

I’m ruining the ending not worth seeing through to the surprise.

I’m defiling your memory by not allowing it to be disguised.

And when at last it comes down to just dwindling embers of truth,

I’ll walk over barefoot to drip and extinguish that fountain of youth.

I’m proving my stature as a prude who alludes to the means;

I’m ruining the ending, cause the ending is not what it seems.

 

 

My Other Lives

 

I am rethinking now my aversion to all that has come before,

realizing that there are moments of late I will be able to look back on.

My lives—the many wonderful stages and colors—are so far removed,

so distant and behind that they have begun to truly matter;

or I have only begun to realize that they did.

No one knows that there ever was a clubhouse.

No one suspects stars or campfires, or would certainly imagine

I could ever have been young and unmarried, that I ever was

uncertain of myself and searching for love.  But I was.

I was.

Having found so much does not dissolve anything,

does not mean I have never cared for another human being.

The fact is, I was a kisser once.  I experienced each thing for a first time.

I am built of people I am unable to find—nor do I have the inclination.

But those times, those firsts and that learning

are how I got here, and in this moment just before sleep,

I would reclaim each of them with fierce devotion.

 

 

Why Should I Expect To Be Like You?

 

Dear hero, I kind of know you.

Yes, you are the quandary, indeed, I have adjusted to.

I know you live just across town, I know your schedule,

I know you’d love my stuff, but I respect you enough

to never go down to where I know is your favorite bar.

When I accost you, I half expect you to

extend your crossed arms.

 

But why should I expect to be like you?

I know you’ve had success,

but please, this is me you’re talking to.

Who will believe me now, after thirty years?

Who am I to think that there will ever be relief?

You think it’s laughable, I know,

and I quite agree.  Just look at me;

I am laughing through my tears.

 

I have my wife, I have my own life,

and I have two jobs that I don’t like,

and I keep struggling just to keep

my head up above the ice.

This is it for me; I have everything

these tiring eyes can ever believe in.

I honestly don’t know why I even try.

 

Now why should I expect to be like you?

You know I get depressed whenever

anything comes true,

and I am not too blind to notice

the devotion in the vultures’ eyes.

Who am I to say it shouldn’t be this way?

Deep abrasions, in the shape of a heart in pain,

scar the surface where the hope allegedly resides.

But I am too young to know if it survives.

 

 

05/24/04, Mon; Home, Glendale

 

            Up at five for inventory.  Six hours at Vons, then another six at Warner.  Marci got a job at Cosgrove Meuerer, which she once did an episode of Unsolved Mysteries for.  Morrissey songs in my head for the past month.  Bruce is back in PA for Bam, and Didi will join soon.  Haven’t had time to job search, but am confident something will come.  I can’t stay this mean for much longer.  Customers bother me.  The people I work with bother me.  Everyone is self-seeking but me.  I just want to get away from it.  Haven’t vacationed in over a year.  Haven’t seen family in nearly that long.  They don’t like me in CA; I don’t really have a choice.  God put us here.  Mostly I need time with my wife.  Alone time.  No work.  All I can do at home is clean a path to my side of the bed.  My coworkers are asked, “What do you want to do?”  As if a company store or coffee shop is some path to get there.  And what do I want to do?  Nothing more than I do already.  I just want to get paid for it.

 

 

It’s All Just So Stupid

 

I have suddenly stopped caring.

No, it wasn’t sudden.  It

stretched out over a thousand years,

dragging me over coals, scraping my face

over twisted grates and concrete.

I have been crushed and rebuilt

so many times.  (I am so cliché,

and so much more for saying so.)

 

 

06/04/04, Fri; Cheesecake Factory, Old Pasadena

 

Another Friday night with company in town—Amy this time, who we can no longer call Ross, two months before her wedding.  The dark wood lattice holds us in while full wall windows push out to false streets lined with neon and streetlights.  I live again in another major city, as always unimpressed as envious suburban teens imagine the glamour of moving streets.  I am stagnant and propelled forward by the moving walkway of purpose.  I was not called here.  I did not choose here.  I did not even make the conscious decision to move here.  I simply obeyed.  I heard and was responsive.  I don’t know how it happened.  But now….

This is L.A., the place you read about.  The place happy hollow people sing about.  City of Pasadena.  A fire truck drives by.  People walk by.  A draft moves the awning.  Somewhere near, Morrissey lives and breathes.  It is not out of the question to run into such people.  Another Friday night, craving suffocation.

 

 

Sitting On A Bench, The Obvious Socialite

 

When the third person stopped to talk,

I thought, “I have to stop sitting on benches.”

First, sitting Indian style, the man stopped pushing his cart,

ignored my cigarettes, and said,

“You know, sitting like that is bad for your heart.”

I guess I figured the white man would slaughter me anyway.

Second, do I want a resort in Palm Springs?

“Already got one,” I puffed.

The third tap on the foot as I nodded off;

“Aren’t you going to make our Starbucks?”

“He’s on break.”

Finally, “I’d like to pay you for a cigarette,”

she said, following with a comprehensive list

of heart and glaucoma medications,

and that her husband died two years ago.

Mmmm-hmmm.  My lunch is over.

 

 

Testament To Joe

 

Monday evening, just before seven; Trader Vics, Beverly Hills.

Sitting uncomfortably with the group that clearly doesn’t belong

—the type that don’t order drinks (just water), say they’ll pay,

then coyly slip in “You can split if you want to,” or,

“The appetizers look good… I wonder how big they are?”

When the meal comes, they ask by reflex for salt and pepper,

real butter and soy sauce… and more lemon.

I think to myself, “Why don’t we just slap the waiter in the face?”

The valets and excellent servers have more class in their dish sinks

than we in our homes.

I dread the bill and am asked to put my journal away.

I oblige.  I would hate to offend anyone or not fit in.

 

Joe Phu, I admire you.

 

 

We All Do This

 

I tell stories twice,

even though

they are not interesting enough

for a first, and despite

that I lose interest

somewhere in the middle,

and end with,

“I guess you had to be there.”

And you think to yourself,

“I was there, actually.

And it wasn’t funny then.”

But I guess that’s love.

Listening like that, I mean.

 

 

More Than This

 

Years ago, I thought

I was killing myself.

Apparently, it takes

more than I smoke in a day,

more shots than I do in a day,

and apparently far less sleep,

far more loneliness

and many more tears and words

than I can fill a page with.

Much more has to go wrong

before I am taken.

The suffering must never end.

The sentiment must never end

ever.

 

 

Measures Of Happiness

 

Time is no friend of mine,

as friends are no friend of mine.

Family, the same, and obligation.

I am unchanged, even though more fully

realized from what I was outside Seminole,

sitting as I did against my pillar,

betrayed by places and memory,

discounting the minutes to the approaching tone.

Here pass high-ranking men with awards,

and the excitement—the dreaming and acting out

of scenes in my mind—is gone.

I cover with heavy eyes the colors of flowers,

alive and still in their brief commitment to life,

avoiding the sentiments my predecessors

would have afforded, every day

another part of my death realized.

I am put off by the parade, disgusted by

the procession, and once again betrayed by

measures of happiness set forth by man.

 

 

The Road To Success

 

The road to success, paved with…

I do not know.

My road is not paved,

and does not lead to success.

It leads, in fact, nowhere,

circles around sometimes,

loses earth and wear,

blends in to the thicket,

becomes something more of

an obstacle course.

It may not get better,

but it can’t get any worse.

 

 

Voice Of Souls

 

I am ready to be fired, braced for the swift,

just fulfillment of my changing role.

I have served my drinks, served my purpose,

and am no longer fit to stand smiling behind the counter.

I no longer fit the mission statement,

no longer meet the qualifications,

because now I drag my customers down,

invite them to sample my misery

and grin sadistically, adding members to my cult.

They now feel guilty for ordering,

disgusted with themselves for arriving each day,

feeling the ice of my silence and eternity in my look.

This is arrogant, but true;

I am no longer the best at what I do,

but now only the best at what I am.

There is no longer a place for

Ryan the barista or Ryan the clerk.

It is now Ryan, hope to the hopeless,

voice of souls.

 

 

Rarities

 

And now the customers tell us how much things are.

I think, perhaps, the one three back in the suit,

with tapping hard feet, must be amused at the rare sites of:

Me here after noon,

Me on break.

She’s late, and her drink will not be as good.

 

I am almost relaxed now.  Almost.

I get up for a split second

to explain the wording of a coupon,

what “Valid June 20^th Only” means.

(It is June 19^th).

For the first time since we got here,

my wife and I will have a weekend.

Together.  Alone.

I breathe out that breath before crying.

 

 

What I Wrote Instead Of Smoking

 

Here

on the fountain step,

a pained breath

before a longer sigh,

the day after

I stopped caring.

 

This is no life,

behind a counter,

stretched back arched,

waiting, waiting, waiting,

with never a stagnant moment

but the stench of death surrounding.

18… no, 19 people waiting for orders,

leaning on my glass case,

me leaning on the hard point of inner counter.

This is, they say, the slow month,

these the dead weeks before production resumes,

and yet, I can’t get to my orange juice and ice,

and I think that’s Briggs (maybe).

I ring one by one,

glance down to people’s hands

and try to hide somewhat my written on wrists.

Horrible people (—What do they do?)

like ants, or whatever swarms,

press in.

 

 

I Didn’t Like You At First

 

I didn’t write your haikus, S.F.,

the recitations from

this morning’s ride to work.

And I didn’t go to graduate school.

I wrote that in one sitting,

because I am that literary.

 

 

Past The Grocery Store Workers

 

Wearing what they shouldn’t be—

probably aren’t allowed—

lacking anything

I ever found appealing.

I think of my wife, glance at my cell,

faintly tremor in the lip,

scour the store quickly with

stone, deadpan eyes.

And now also, walking,

I would be filling with smoke

my decayed lungs, my collapsed chest,

quite happy, and quite not.

 

 

Setting The Tone, Early

 

Things get weird, or weird is questionable,

when for no reason Elaine shows up,

and a version of playful Dianna, halfway to Sarah,

with elements of someone else, as yet unidentified;

taunting and mocking with envy my rejected note tablet.

The park bench splinters as I spring from bed, another sensation lost,

head straight, naked, to the coffee pot;

and the cat pads at the inside of the door.

Poetry will ruin the day, and the day will ruin poetry.

 

 

The Monday Routine

 

Monday mandatory meeting,

managers in ties and leads in white and aprons;

I lean against the doorframe with a nervous foot tap,

stranding my single worker, to watch satellite television

to a pileup of customers.

A stack of paperwork overdue,

my shipment backing to the dock, breaks left uncovered

and the hour approaching—encroaching—

when I start getting told not to hit overtime,

and not to work off the clock.

 

 

Undated, 5:22 AM; Vons, Glendale

 

Out front of Vons, on the bench near the bike rack.  Eleven miles yesterday.  One six-hour shift to go before a two-mile uphill ride home, then a nap.  A potato bug crosses slowly in front of my grounded foot.  Three things off the clock yesterday.  Screening for Brothers Grimm was full.  The day will not be good.  I just want to sleep.  Traffic is already heavy on the 134.  I tap on the glass with keys to be let in.

 

 

My Peculiar Status

 

Even here I draw stares.

I draw deeper breaths than everyone else,

don’t fulfill any particular part,

and remain outside as a source of intrigue.

 

I am too comfortable,

slipping in and out of skips.

I am admired; meanwhile

I admire far off places

and circumstances not mine.

 

 

06/27/04, Sun; Betty’s Cabin, Lake Arrowhead

 

             My wife who loves me—still sensitive where I died in the last year—sleeps downstairs with a struggle against weight.  She is beautiful, but doesn’t know it.  She is playful most of the time, but on those days between looks down and hates her body, which is only an expression of herself.

            I write today only because it is early and she still sleeps downstairs.  The sputtering coffee maker calls my first cup, and I breathe to hear my own strained sinuses.  My muscles are tense and sore and my eyesight is poor.  I am still crooked in neck and spine, and now there is flab on my stomach.  I am at that in-between age, where I am not quite old, but certainly not young.  I don’t know what comes next.  I don’t know if it gets better.  I am surrounded in life by struggling, unhappy people (although, every one more sociable than I) able to say they’ve been with the company for nineteen years.  I am not allowed to quit my job because of school debt and living expenses, but I can’t look elsewhere working 62 hours a week, especially now that our computer crashed.  Did I not know God, this would all seem impossible.

            I have given my whole self away to everyone, and expected nothing in return.  We are in Arrowhead for the weekend, in a cabin in elements similar to that cottage five years ago in Canada.  It is the first weekend with nothing to do since the strike started.  I have been miserable.  On the way here I put in the CD mix Todd made for my birthday two years ago, and I cried to realize I haven’t purely enjoyed anything since moving here.  Los Angeles has a unique death to it that I wonder if I can be revived from.

            Marci is up.

 

 

07/05/04, Mon, 5:00 AM; Vons, Glendale

 

            Already, the neighbors TV on.  The observed holiday means most likely an absurdly busy day.  Marci is off.  For three days straight I’ve gone immediately to bed upon arriving home.  Customers love me.  I hate customers.  It is unfair for me to continue.  I’ve never been shy about what I want.  God has been shy granting it.

 

            Weight: 140, Cigarettes: Switched to Eclipse; they don’t count.

 

 

Recalling The Café

 

At least there, I had at least

some moments of anticipation,

or at the very least

something short of contempt,

even behind the strong wooden counter,

and the beer cooler

that one bitter collaborative writer

started in by nine in the morning.

There I had an occasional smirk

or worthwhile conversation,

a sudden reprieve every so often,

in the feminine form of a tip jar.

Here my eyes close for

altogether different reasons.

 

 

Undated

 

I know it’s over.  Weight: 137, cigarettes: ½ a pack, bike miles: 18.  Rushing through coffee tasks and customers to try and finish a schedule when #257 called twice to borrow workers.  I said I would call before noon—when I finished.  They got angry, called Paula; she waddled over to see where I was.  (Keep in mind that I can’t work off the clock, meaning no schedules at home the night before due.)  I showed her the requests I was working around, and she responded with, “They’re only requests; Vons doesn’t work around family.”  Hmmm… you know what?  Fuck Vons, because I do.  It’s a fucking grocery store.  People are more important than your fucking bottom line.

All that is to say I know I’ll be fired.  Soon.  They know I’m looking.  They know I hate where I am.  And frankly, I haven’t abided by the Union rules or Safeway to-do lists, because they haven’t supplied the resources to back me up.  I’ve been doing a reverse fast for an answer about work.  Rather than deprive myself of yet one more thing, I thought to read the Bible every day for forty days—to add to my life.  The fortieth day will be Friday, August 6^th.

 

 

Now I See It

 

Two to clock in;

one more minor emergency.

It’s only coffee.

I miss my wife.

Safeway stands above me

with a sickle.

 

 

Awaiting Word

 

Please make up my mind,

so I can know—

just KNOW

what I’m supposed to do.

 

 

07/04, Sun; Christian Assembly, Los Angeles

 

Standard issue straw hats for the parking attendants, logo T-shirts, red, white or blue (get it?).  11:30, Sunday morning, the camera awkwardly shakes and zooms too close on the shiny headed, puffy man stumbling to relay the power behind continuously running keyboard music.  Then the greet—and I thought I could get through a day without cursing.

Now affirmed it is that this is again—standard model—every other church, at the very least across America, and my head drifts and I lean back and drone out as the ushers come forward.  My passive gaze penetrates the tall, booted, indistinguishable type, projecting too loudly from sincere obligation; out the bay windows, past two crossing men in cell phone conversations, past the street with passing cars, past the church lot across the street, and out to the trees, and in the trees I find the actual living embodiment of the creator.  We the created hole up and bless walls, dedicating to Christ the measured confines, while outside a wind rustles a series of hanging blossoms.  The sermon plays to the Hollywood dreams the duration of the service.

12:10, Sunday afternoon.  I am in church in L.A., longing to be out in the hills with Christ.

 

 

Dept. Of Public Works

 

Outside California

you don’t see leaf blowers

hitting the pavement around cars.

Here, they put coasters

beneath your glass.

Here you don’t know

how much work and cost

goes into the illusion of happiness.

 

 

07/26/04, Mon, 8:08 AM; Pavilions, Monrovia

 

            Eight Starbucks managers, me the only guy, none of us manager by choice.  A new kiosk opening in the same complex as a company owned store.  A little nervous; feels like day camp.  Chariots of Fire plays overhead.  I bet Vangelis wasn’t thinking about grocery stores.

 

 

07/27/04, Tue, 10:09 AM; Starbucks, Monrovia

 

            Seven huddled around a Starbucks table, exchanging anecdotes about spilling milk and leaving tops off blenders.  I think about Christmas, and listen to Costello and Radiohead on the in-store.  I stopped writing about relationships.  I stopped writing about hopes and dreams.  I don’t mention my ideas for a holiday room.  I don’t mention anything.

            My eyes are hard.  My face is hard.  My stance and shoulders—hardened.  I relate to no one.  I don’t care about audits or health codes, or guests standing around waiting for drinks.  They’ve killed me, and I breathe back death.  I want the system to crash the way I have crashed.  I want everyone to break down with what I feel.  I don’t want to manage a counter-full of coffee.

 

 

Disproportionate People

 

It’s not the fat,

but the disproportion that bothers be,

and that they don’t hide or correct it.

Disproportionate people

unevenly distributing children

is the worst abuse of all,

not respecting,

not loving,

not training,

people who don’t deserve children.

 

 

Undated

 

            Another day wasted, money wasted on stale coffee and weak people, an island of boxes and binders, excessive array of monotony and money; worker ants scurrying around the island counter, sinking, sinking, forgetting what in life truly matters and replacing it with systems and ready answers.  People with apparently nothing to do—“whatsoever people” as I call them—converge and descend like bored parasites and dim the substantial.  I am flooded with obscurity, and breathing becomes gasping through calamity.

 

 

What Happened To Life?

 

How can I miss so intensely from only one room away?

Who are these pointless motherfuckers

who waste my conservative days?

All the dreams we had rest like wreckage beneath a vast sea,

and I’m suddenly sorrowful for the lost suckling between you and me.

I am draped with dissension and dripping derision and scorn.

You are the catalyst coping, not knowing how to keep me warm.

 

Oh, what happened to life?

What happened to happiness, bliss or intrigue?

What happened to closing our eyes and imagining

that there was anything left to believe?

What happened to life?

 

What happened to that thin silhouette in the moonlight,

breathing with fear that our heaving and thrusting

would awaken the household when I pulled you near?

Sliding one hand between your legs, one up under your shirt,

getting harder the longer we played in that heightened alert.

 

What happened to life?

What happened to passionate longing in sweat?

What happened to staying awake all night long

‘til every inch of our bodies was wet?

What happened to that?

 

What happened to life?

What happened to dying to see you undress?

What happened to nakedness, beauty and intimacy

being everything I could have guessed?

What’s left?

 

 

One Day Ahead

 

My enemies are closing in from every side.

If I slip up and fall now, I swear I will not survive.

My thin bones are weary and my muscles are sore.

A torrential downpour is imposing,

the likes of which I’ve not seen before.

I have given my all and it just keeps getting worse.

The scenes I am given are not quite the scenes I’d rehearsed.

 

I’m just one day ahead.

Any minute I could fall.

The whole delicate balance of power

could shift and I could lose it all.

I am just at the cusp and the structure could burst.

I could be at the point where historians voice

it began to get worse.

 

I have seen the prize, but I practice what I preach,

and if I have learned anything for certain, it’s always outside my reach.

I’m not quite forsaken, but my luck may have peaked.

I may wake up tomorrow back on track with my losing streak.

It feels like a shiver with a quivering lip;

I mouth my mantra and brace for the impact that may sink the ship.

 

I’m just one day ahead.

I could so easily lag behind.

I am prepared for the wake to overtake me

and to drown in the tide.

I’m just barely in front of this impending storm.

I can see my reflection in the eye of its ominous form.

 

I’m just one day ahead,

at the foot of a hill,

prepared to be kicked by the crowd,

determined and avowed that they will.

I’m just one day ahead,

near the end of my ride.

Instead of repentance, accept

they will never take me alive.

 

 

07/31/04, Sat, 6:45 PM; Bruce’s, Valencia

 

            At Bruce’s, the Saturday before Didi comes back, for a West Coast Viva La Bam production crew reunion.  Eva from Dakota is here—Harry Anderson’s daughter.  Tim Glomb seems unable to make eye contact.  I’m sitting downwind from the smoker, amid Eclipse and Foster’s, as usual, with nothing to say.

            7:30.  A few more show up while I nap against the patio wall.  Marci makes coffee and I hear introductions without participating.  The girls and I find our way to the kitchen.  Eminem plays as I write; I wonder how many people can relate if I’m the only one I’ve seen writing through an entire party.  The Cure comes on.

            8:15.  Moz now.  The newcomers discuss Kerry’s DNC speech, not knowing I’m a Republican.  I drink black coffee, the only non-alcoholic beverage here.  I thought I cursed a lot, until now; now I’m convinced I curse poetically.  Glomb talks about controlling his own life.  He brought his own table and chairs.  I listen to everyone and say nothing.

 

 

The Gifting

 

The gifting

is a gem

I have turned

to dagger,

scraping off skin,

pulverizing

precious faces,

awaiting the swelling.

 

I am an oyster today.

You will have

nothing to show

from me

for a thousand years.

Someday I will be

held accountable,

and claim masochism

as my defense.

I have, to show for

my time,

a sales figure

that would have

been the same.

Put someone else

here, then,

and let me at

rest,

the merciless tyrant

I am, with my

frothing pitcher staff.

 

 

Someone Must’ve Been Drunk

 

Something very wrong about

the cut and pull of that woman’s tight white slacks,

even worse the self-important stance

and outmoded hairdo on heals,

those matchless shades of pink;

something horrible about any intolerable detail of

so pointless a life—85 years all told,

just to wind up a standard vehement curse

in a world unhinged from perspective’s frame.

 

 

It’s All I Can Do

 

I’m doing all that I can do.

I’m doing everything I can.

I’m doing all that I know how,

and everything that I was taught

would make me a better man.

 

It’s all that I can do.

It’s taking everything inside me

not to crumble before your eyes.

It’s all that I can do not to cry.

 

It’s getting darker by the day,

It’s getting harder by the hour.

It’s getting tedious and troublesome

to keep up this facade

that it has not all gone sour.

 

It’s all that I can do to keep from crying aloud

while I’m just trying to get through the day.

It’s all that I can do to keep on living this way.

 

Please don’t ask me how I am.

I’m too emotional to speak.

It’s simply better if I hide myself

until I am not so weak.

 

 

08/07/04, Sat; Vons, Glendale

 

            Sitting up asleep, partially sheltered in a mildly shaded wind; a droning outside day passes unnoticed by the inside workers, scurrying to checklists and Union hours.  I hate my own words, struggling for some glimpse of faith or grace beneath a hazy blue sky of sunshine, trying desperately to breathe serenity over the glossy film of careless daylight.  Another forty years of wilderness flake away like chipping paint.  Winter is coming.  Thoughtless people push on with hollow drudgery through heedless streets and sweeps of… busy… busy… busy… dead.

            Incapable are the shoppers of calculating the equations enveloping them with a frenzy of calm detachment.  I see it, but am bound to its futility and unable to feel that once familiar water-logged sensation of floating up and up and up.  Language turns to languish, and I long to hand in vocabulary for wings.

 

 

30

 

Thirty years of suffering

for one inestimable phrase;

when the thirty years pass,

wisdom of the age remains.

 

 

08/07/04, Sat; Bob’s, Glendale

 

Later on a day not named in the week, a boy from Greenland watches his fingering and laments over the loss of home and simple ways.  (A helicopter passes overhead.)  A little girl crawls beneath feet, lined in chairs up to the playhouse, trimmed in shrubs and clinging vines.  On track, a scheduled PR, pristine event with lifestyle artists and awkwardly suited aging couples, unaware of aspiration, believing what they’re told and see.

A light Merlot’s aroma marks the key change, and fruit trees bounce back monitored sound to the hardened face of a man hours from now in a bar, mocking the surroundings.  For now I wonder what makes people think ideas are okay, what says things are not endlessly hilarious.

 

 

The Bits

 

Poetry is knowing

what to steal from whom,

without them knowing.

 

I got that from Ellis,

who got it from Lori,

who got it from

God knows where.

 

 

We Are All In This Alone

 

Huddled round under the same ever-changing sky,

arm in arm, but definitely not eye to eye.

All of my songs and pleas, it turns out, were lies,

and anything you ever said to me was certainly a surprise.

 

We are all in this alone.

There is no such thing as together.

There is no way to get into each others’ souls.

We are all caught without raincoats under the weather.

 

Thinking hard, trying to remember what names I’ve forgotten,

all of those lovers whose faces used to mean everything.

Living as though those foundations were completely rotten,

I think I’ve uncovered the roots of my suffering.

 

We are all in this alone.

I have since gotten over your influence.

I have learned how to stand on my own,

and I honestly can’t see the difference.

 

Here’s the part that cuts you to the heart, unintentionally;

it’s just that “I love you” must’ve meant something else in your head.

I never intended to keep more than one girl forever,

and I sure never meant for you to hold me to what I said.

 

Now we are all in this alone.

There is no ground for you to intrude on.

Now that I’m happy, healthy, and grown,

there is nothing else you could improve on.

 

We are all in this alone.

I don’t mean to sound so indifferent,

but I’m well, and I want you to know

that all I ever needed was that imprint.

 

 

Soul Stirring

 

Soul stirring, wide eyes;

I can’t believe I made you cry.

So fluid in your natural grace,

I need your eyes to find my

future in your face.

 

Seems too cliché to say

I love the way you bring me to life,

breathe motion on my tattered banner

and return as my wife.

There’s something subtle and spectacular

that sweeps when you speak,

ignites the private life,

the pilot light residing in me.

 

Soul stirring, bright eyes,

so innocent, sweet and wise,

so flawless in your natural state;

I need you by me just to

spy my rightful place.

 

Seems obvious to offer

praises when I can’t hardly talk,

get choked up with emotion,

and can’t wait to walk up the walk.

A million moments, in my

vivid, wild imagination,

live like a true romance;

a deep, enhanced sensation.

 

Soul stirring inside;

how did you agree to be mine?

So tempting and divine,

so sensual and fine.

Soul stirring; tongue-tied,

I take one look at you and die.

 

 

08/14/04, Sat, 10:00 PM; Ryan’s, Redondo Beach

 

            Flaming Lips and drinking games a level down.  Kirstin’s Ryan’s housewarming, nearly everyone meeting for the first time.  Already I pity the neighbors.  Marci settles on the couch, talking theater and marriage to a 23 year-old in a Dodgers hat.  I’m in the corner as usual, at the moment thinking about Mollygraphs, almost looking forward to revisiting Nashville next week.  My $500 Starbucks manuals sit in my backpack across the room, and I’m already half asleep thinking of all I have to do before Wednesday.

            Photographs are interesting; I wonder as I get older what age I’ll want to be remembered as.  I think of this because I’m wearing a Longfellow shirt—a very bizarre concept if you think about it.

            It is impossible for me to look interested.  Kirstin leaves the game and joins our corner, half a sweetheart, half a person.  There are no virgins at the parties anymore.

 

 

I Crave It Every Weekend

 

For a thick slice of

deep dish, sausage

pizza with extra cheese,

dripping with oil

down the crust,

I think I would do

almost anything.

 

 

08/19/04, Thu; Richland Baptist, Nashville

 

An uncomfortable rehearsal dinner, with two distinct cultures awkwardly sitting with crossed arms and legs.  A weight hangs over the room in the form of chatter and gossip.

 

 

08/19/04, Thu, 8:45 PM; BP, Fairview

 

A closed BP outside Fairview after Amy’s Rehearsal Dinner.  Marci and the bridesmaids are down in Hillsboro Village for dessert.  I’m stuck with Rog’s overheated car and a gallon or so of water, hoping it’ll cool down enough to make it over the hilly, excessively narrow road back to Beck’s.  This is why I ride a bike.  Fairview is not the sort of place one sits in a parking lot writing.

 

 

Scratched At the Wedding

 

On the day Amy’s life begins,

lit by lowering sun and candles,

one way or the other through soft frosted glass,

the piper and the players congregate,

the family in tailored or fitted clothing,

recede into shadow,

the simultaneously cool and inviting concrete

arches in, framing the scene,

and solemn introspective thoughts detach,

lift like feathered birds, graciously and slow,

while the sad and excitable silent orchestra

twitters delicately in form from wall to pew,

from walkway to pulpit, gilded with candelabras.

 

 

The World Is Not Enough

 

If I had everything the world has to give,

I would still not have found my reason to live.

‘Til you showed up here with arms open wide,

I never knew how much I needed inside.

 

The world is not enough;

I need your warmth, your faith, your love.

With every breath I ever breathe,

I need you right here beside me.

 

If I were king over some vast enchanted land,

I would fend dragons off to win your precious hand.

And in our fairy tale, the riches wouldn’t count.

Only our love is what the tale would be about.

 

People say that I’m a dreamer,

but I have only dreamed of you.

I’m not ashamed to say it’s possible

that all my dreams are coming true.

 

The world is not enough;

I can’t survive without your touch.

If every other wish came true,

it would mean nothing without you.

 

The world is not enough;

I never asked for all that much.

I only want one simple thing…

for you to wear my ring.

 

 

The Moment That Started It All

 

Let me not miss how the light hits

so delicately the blush of your cheek.

Let me not casually take for granted

bewildering beauty.

But take your cue from me looking at you

like I can’t find my way through this life

without taking each step like we’ve only just met,

and yet knowing you’ll end up my wife.

Keep the stars shining just where they are,

and don’t let their luck ever fall.

Leave in place, my lord, every last trace

of the moment that started it all.

 

Help me always to see how perfectly

only I and she fill up the frame.

Let me never lessen intensity,

never forget the sparks caused by her name.

But guard our hearts as the most central part

of the narrative of our charmed lives;

write our names with indelible ink in our thinking,

to always remember this night.

Hold in place every detail encased;

wrap us tight like a permanent shawl.

Keep on our faces the tender embrace

of the moment that started it all.

 

 

The Almost

 

The almost came and went.  The almost wile away.

Casting shadows of red, they play and they play.

 

I was your biggest fan and closest friend.

You were the cockeyed grin beneath my shades.

Whatever happened to when your words could blow me away?

A year has passed, perhaps, maybe a winter or more.

I sit now just where I did, to reclaim it I think,

but it just isn’t the same—even this memory is cliché.

 

The almost paint new pictures, but hang them in old frames,

keep changing the verses to the same old refrains.

The almost keep playing in vain.

 

 

Why?  How Come?

 

I know my wife loves me

because little things like

grilling chicken strips,

melting cheese across

and wrapping in bread,

the whole thing folded securely

in by wax paper,

then dropping by work to

tuck it with grapes and granola

into my bag,

are otherwise too much effort.

These are the acts most people

fail to see motivation behind,

and the infinite accumulation of these

is why I love her back.

I hope I can remember

the next time she asks.

 

 

My Favorite Story

 

“Tell me a story,” she says, when I’m already halfway asleep.

“I’m not that creative,” I answer, then turn to her pouting cheek.

“Alright, let me think,” I give in, because there’s no resisting those eyes.

“Well, my favorite story is the story of you and I.”

 

When I was a young and aspiring artist, I met a girl

who made me forget there was anything wrong with the world.

We both looked for life and love elsewhere,

but still remained friends,

and kept meeting up in unlikely places again.

I was terrified because I was just a kid;

still I knew that I loved her, yet never let on that I did.

 

“I like this story,” she says, “But I feel like I’ve heard it before.”

“It may sound familiar,” I say, “But I probably should tell it more,

because the world would do better hearing a story like mine,

how there’s only one other on earth for each person to find.”

 

As I grew slightly older and a little bit more mature,

I was through with the games I’d been playing,

and found myself needing her more.

Our innocent friendship turned into an intimate romance,

‘til the day came I could no longer leave it to chance.

So that’s when I asked her if she would marry me.

She said yes, and I never regretted a single thing.

 

“Well, that’s a good story,” she says,

“But that doesn’t sound like an end.”

I can no longer speak as she kisses my cheek again.

She once again turns me to tears as she turns away;

my favorite story is the one she adds to every day.

 

 

08/30/04, Mon, 2:40 PM; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

            People keep asking about the band-aids (5) on my arm.  And the red mark.  I burned my arm on a light bulb, and fell off my bike while making business calls.  Not the same day.

            Central Perk is short staffed, so I’ve been running between departments.

 

 

08/31/04, Tue, 1:15 PM; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

            Cross-legged by the fountain, having been pulled to coffee for the week.  I really love not being in charge.  My last day at Vons will be Friday, the 10^th.  I look forward to… sleep, and my wife, and watching my President change the country in tangible ways.  I look forward to not waking up at 4:45, to editing my books, and going out sometimes.  I look forward to the death of retail and the end of customer service, to a Bradbury future where my sphere can be reduced to a chosen few.

            I can’t remember my last time in a pool, or soaking in a bath, being immersed in water, feeling thin and clean and loved by light.  I have hope again.  I am alive again, active in parts that had been dead for a year.  That, friends, is the benefit of creativity.

 

 

09/02/04, Thu, 12:17 PM; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

            Same fountain, knees crunched up and shoeless; very between shifts, eyes dragging.  People treat this like a real job, but it’s a joke.  School is back in.  The week is too busy.  All I want to do is sleep.  A crazy woman gets in everybody’s way.

 

            This is the life I know.

                        Not

the one I imagine.

 

            Once again mistaken for a homeless person, I’m woken up to be checked on.  My response probably confirms it… hard to be instantly coherent mid-dream.  There are too many people in the world.  I should find somewhere else to sleep.

 

 

I Feel It Again (Pandora’s Box)

 

These tears don’t make any sense.

They can’t say what they mean,

and certainly can’t plead their defense.

They just fall at the mention of you,

seemingly unprovoked, in these

unspoken moments of truth.

 

I feel it again, this feeling that will not end.

Whenever I think that I’m through,

well, you surface like someone who drowned.

I feel half dead, but I think that I killed you instead,

by becoming that one sort of person

impossible to be around.

 

These fears must make it intense

when they can’t be deflated,

my grotesque shadows growing immense,

while, so small, you look up from the corner

with eyes that can smash me to pieces

and melt back the core that’s inside.

 

I feel it again, that victimized cry you send,

that unintentional message that slips

when I’m sensitive to being exposed.

I feel your heart, while breaking its pedestal apart.

Once it started, I found I could not

keep Pandora’s Box closed.

 

 

09/07/04, Tue; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

            Three days.  Three miserable, wretched days left.  I proved myself and paid my penance.  That’s all I can stand.  And next?  This place, kneeling at my fountain, dreading even my next step forward.

 

 

The Conclusion Of The Matter

 

I conclude that I no longer need

to stamp my disapproval

across the face of everything.

If, after all, God remembers his covenant

to not wipe out mankind again with waters

or rain down sulfur from Heaven,

I can certainly divert my eyes

and not rejoin the image of my scorn.

After all, now that I have plateau-ed

back on my blistered feet,

I can at last look eternally back,

and under any circumstance, say

with great conviction, triumph and relief,

“At least I no longer work in a grocery store.”

 

 

09/13/04, Mon; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

Day one of my new life, a flat on one bike and jammed gears on the other; three miles pushing with my foot and coasting, a half hour late.  That’s day one.

Everything is calm right now.  I know it can’t last.  I had my first weekend.  Semi-agnostic Jared was here.  I live by anxiety, ready to pounce on what’s next.

 

Weight: 141, Cigarettes: 0, Black-Eye: 1^st

 

 

As You Search For Signs

 

I am

increasingly:

            stiff,

            stoic,

            stern,

finding amusement

            in deadpan face,

more and more at ease

            perfectly still,

            matter of fact,

            curt and concise,

very happy to not

            respond at all;

the less reaction,

the funnier,

the more absurd.

 

 

09/16/04, Thu; Warner Bros., Burbank

 

            Lunchtime.  Everybody wanders, bags under arm and cup in hand, wrapped in loose fitting second layers hiding nothing, headed somewhere as if they were needed there.  Every day the nuances of nuisance increase, and I conclude that I cannot police the world.  All I can do is remove my glasses, allow everything to blur, and hope the world is not the same when I look back up.  It always is, and I always respond reiterating thirty-year trends, pent up tendencies rising like magma from deeply hidden core.

 

            Sanctuary.  Retreat.  Respite.  My eyes well the moment I wake.

 

 

My Fountain Out Front

 

Someone can afford

a fountain.  That’s it.

A top of 42 flush

stones in a square,

and a filtered reservoir of

probably 200 gallons of

crisp water in constant shade

by paper trees.

I don’t have 50¢ for a soda;

and water surges perpetually

up from a bubbling spring,

merely to walk by,

or to be thrown pennies

by children.

 

 

What I Was, I Am No More

 

Should I feel bad?  I’m failing.

The angels assigned to me are wailing,

for they have seen what I’ve done

and keep on doin’.

They have witnessed this

proud prophet turn to ruin.

 

Once I was the focus of her dreaming.

Now I’m just the reason she sleeps.

Once I was the light inside her, beaming.

Now I’m just a souvenir she keeps.

 

Should I be saying something?

This is awkward….  I know my voice

has turned to nails against a chalkboard.

Everything I promised I would be

is all she ever asks

but never sees.

 

Once I was the hero of her fantasy.

Now I hold her captive to the lie.

Once I knew the secret to her fancy.

Now I am the man who makes her cry.

 

Once I was a certain sort of person,

the likes of whom she never knew before.

Now I’m just a faint and tainted version.

What I was, I am no more.

 

 

I Mean To End Retail Forever

 

If I’m happy now, then why

am I still irritable?

Despite my placement,

people are the same,

always standing, waiting,

crossed arms and

poor word choice with a smile,

unnecessary spending and

circular time.

 

I am interrupted by a thought:

If I write while on the clock,

are they paying me to write?

Does that make me professional yet?

No, what a stupid thought.

And then I wonder, what happens

if I don’t pocket yet my journal and pen?

What might happen

as my eyes wander