waiting a very long time for a bus
happy xmas
I Wouldn't Mind If Allah Shut It All Down.
Send in the flies to eat it all.
That we might, with our final gasps
Breathe in the flies
That feast on our flesh.
Gnash open this skin of the world
And bathe the wild everything
With lava and fire.
What ghosts will remain?
To walk amid the bones?
To cry and be small?
Let us prepare,
Just in case the time is near.
Let us now begin the last rites, Insha'Allah.
You be my priest and I'll be yours.
We shall burn the sage
And smudge our foreheads with ash.
We shall say the prayers together.
-jobe
Excerpt from On the Road – Jack Kerouac
That night in Harrisburg I had to sleep in the railroad station on a bench; at dawn the station masters threw me out. Isn’t it true that you start your life a sweet child believing in everything under your father’s roof? Then comes the day of the Laodiceans, when you know you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, and with the visage of a gruesome grieving ghost you go shuddering through nightmare life. I stumbled haggardly out of the station; I had no more control.
All I could see of the morning was a whiteness like the whiteness of the tomb. I was starving to death.
All I had left in the form of calories were the last of the cough drops I’d bought in Shelton, Nebraska, months ago; these I sucked for their sugar. I didn’t know how to panhandle. I stumbled out of town with barely enough strength to reach the city limits. I knew I’d be arrested if I spent another night in Harrisburg. Cursed city! The ride I proceeded to get was with a skinny, haggard man who believed in controlled starvation for the sake of health. When I told him I was starving to death as we rolled east he said, “Fine, fine, there’s nothing better for you. I myself haven’t eaten for three days. I’m going to live to be a hundred and fifty years old.” He was a bag of bones, a floppy doll, a broken stick, a maniac. I might have gotten a ride with an affluent fat man who’d say, “Let’s stop at this restaurant and have some pork chops and beans.”
No, I had to get a ride that morning with a maniac who believed in controlled starvation for the sake of health.
After a hundred miles he grew lenient and took out bread-and-butter sandwiches from the back of the car. They were hidden among his salesman samples. He was selling plumbing fixtures around Pennsylvania. I devoured the bread and butter. Suddenly I began to laugh. I was all alone in the car, waiting for him as he made business calls in Allentown, and I laughed and laughed. Gad, I was sick and tired of life. But the madman drove me home to New York.
-Jack Kerouac, 1922-1969
The Bones Are Held Together By Cheap Glue And One Can Hope For The Best.
Summer has ended, but it is still hot, and now the bones
Are calling each other names and making vague threats.
The bones seek someone to blame for the state of things.
The soul has had enough and looks toward Heaven
Like someone who has been waiting a very long time for a bus.
Rapture. Judgement. Maybe some kind of peace.
The soul keeps hope that some good will come from this life.
The bones have fallen apart in the street.
Waves of heat rise from the asphalt of the street like angels
Returning to God.
Glue those bones into place and wipe the sweat away, my friend.
The bus will indeed arrive, sooner or later.
Everyone else is waiting, too.
-jobe
Always be a poet, even in prose.
-Charles Baudelaire
Writing In Longhand While Ghosts Watch Over Your Shoulder.
Kneel here in the wet sand and pray for something that isn't possible, like growing wings and flying, and then for something that is quite possible, like a lot more human kindness.
Follow stray dogs and give them meat and names.
Write your story out in longhand, and if the ghosts want to watch over your shoulder, just let them.
Buy a drum, or build one, and bang away all night if you want.
Time is a mirror with a golden-painted back; the reflection is true, but then it also isn't true.
They say you have only one life but they're wrong. You will be back again and again; friend, this isn't your first rodeo.
Take a chance on the good things that happen along. You have a heart, so listen to it.
Run with the bulls, swim with the sharks, make the leap. Or don't. Just spend the days drawing in your notebook. Writing poems.
All of these lives are yours, every last one of them. The ghosts are here to love you, they come with the world.
Try to relax a little and love them back.
-jobe
Merry Christmas! Thanks for your support.
-jobe
And a merry Christmas to you sir! Loved this Christmas morning selection. Particularly the last one. Have a great day.
Merry Christmas, Mike!