Overread at Booth 2: Crystalline

Crystalline

                You are like the waters of the North Sea,

                                always cold and ever changing.
                Some will say that the ocean turns
                                different colours
                                                depending on the angle of
                                                the sun.

                But you, my dear, are constant,

                                bright, shining, reflecting
                                sparks of light from
                                each undulating wave.

                Your curves are cold yet mysterious.

       

                You are like the North Sea,

                               ever present –

                                                eternally changing.

MR

2018-0420

Overread at Table 1: At This Time, On This Day, America

At This Time, On This Day, America

 

These are the angels of our bitter nature:

time, they unfold their wings, and assault the sky,

caring nothing for what they leave against the ground,

not the sound of their dying afterlives, or

their good fortunes, no,

these angels are not made a little less than men,

they are made of acrid moisture

that seeps out between the foetid toes,

they are the bile that churn from the spleen

and drips out the rotten nose,

these angels are the angry noises

that we make at night to the children

that we spit on, those little faces,

that stand just outside our windows, looking in,

their tiny fingers curled around the diamond shapes

of the links in the chain,

fences that keep them forever out

and which allow us to pretend that we are all

free.

 

MR

2018-0713

Overheard at Table Two: Proust and the Only True Paradise

Marcel Proust once wrote, “… the only true paradise is always the paradise we have lost.”

 

                But what if that’s not true?

                At least not entirely?

 

                What if the one true paradise is the one that we have never seen?

                The one that we wish for, the one we yearn for? the one that we see in our dreams?

 

                What if the one true paradise is the spouse that we have created in our minds?

                The house that we have pieced together out of photos of houses in magazines, or the insides of

                houses that we have seen?

                The rolling ocean when we live in a land-locked state?

                The open fields when we are living in the urban jungle?

 

The paradise that we have lost is the one that we can never reclaim, but the one that we have not yet obtained, that paradise is always perfect, always true.

Overread at Booth 3: "Perhaps It May Seem Impertinent"

Perhaps it may seem impertinent

                                to imagine you as you might

                                have been, at a different time,

                                                in a different age – say,

                                                in 1986, with your bare foot

                                propped upon the passenger door –

                                window open, August night air

                                creeping into the car like

                my fingers wend through your hair,

                                trace your neckline, peeling back

                                the collar of your shirt from the

                                sweat of your skin, and

                                the curve of your shoulders, so

                                                ivory in moonlight.

MR

2018-0418

Overheard at Table 3: Always the Nicest People

Lucky Moron: You know something that has been pissing me off for a long time?

Otis Redwing: I know lots of things that have been pissing you off for a long time.  Is this something new?

Lucky: Look, I know this isn't popular to say, but I'm tired of all this, 'They were the nicest people you'd ever meet' memorials when people get killed in mass shootings.

Otis: Lucky!  You really gonna go there? 

Lucky:  It's ALL THE TIME!  The victims are ALWAYS called "the nicest people."

Otis: It's about respect, my friend.

Lucky: I know! I know! But it's also about the news trying to bring out the sympathy tears.  They're digging these poor families to plaster the stories of their dead relatives.  Just ONCE I'd like to hear a story about the victim being a total asshole, but who didn't deserve to die like that anyway.

Otis: Fine.  Make you a deal.  You ever get killed in a mass shooting, that's what I'll tell the news.  "Lucky Moran was a total dick but he didn't deserve to go out like that."

Lucky: Thanks, man.  You are a true friend.

Overread at Table 1: from "Bike Trails of Canada"

The Bike Trails of Canada end a grocery store in Labrador,

Where now you may purchase cannabis along with your eggs and milk.

The Bike Trails of Canada reminds you not to forget to add cookies to your grocery list.

Lots of cookies.

Double chunky chocolate chip cookies.

 

The Bike Trails of Canada tends to get the munchies.

MR

2018-1101

Overheard at Table 4: What is Work Time?

Keiko Rajo: If you dream about work, it’s considered work time.

Cassidy Jones: I say if you think about work while you’re cleaning the house, it’s considered work.

Keiko: Right!  Because you’re analyzing the problem.

Cassidy: I ran that by my boss.  She agreed to let me charge that time to the job.  She is SO understanding!

               

Overread at Table 3: from "Bike Trails of Canada"

Marcel Proust once wrote, “… the only true paradise is always the paradise we have lost.”

 

                But what if that’s not true?

                At least not entirely?


                What if the one true paradise is the one that we have never seen?
                The one that we wish for, the one we yearn for? the one that we see in our dreams?

                What if the one true paradise is the spouse that we have created in our minds?

                The house that we have pieced together out of photos of houses in magazines, or the insides of houses that we have seen?
                The rolling ocean when we live in a land-locked state?
                The open fields when we are living in the urban jungle?


The paradise that we have lost is the one that we can never reclaim, but the one that we have not yet obtained, that paradise is always perfect, always true.

 

 

Overread at Booth 5: Mass Shootings

Mass shootings are merely the face of the truly endemic, ingrained problem of gun violence.   Mass shootings are flashy, high-profile, graphic, shocking, and horrifying by their high body counts in short time frames.  But they are glimpses into the more subtle culture of gun violence.

The only time that the culture of gun violence is faced in the media is when the propaganda machine, in an effort to detract from a Caucasian shooter, is to bring up statistics showing the amount of African American victims of gun violence (“Black on Black”).  While crucial to understanding the overall culture of gun violence, this is only treated as a strawman fallacy: basically it says, “Hey don’t look at the white guy slaughtering your children!  The dirty blacks kill each other every day!”

However, such stories paint a misleading picture, and even the most basic investigations would soon lead one to understand that the problem with such crime is institutionalized poverty and lack of economic mobility.   This is part of our gun culture, and frankly, only by destroying poverty can this aspect of our gun culture be improved.

Yet, the gun culture in America reaches all levels.   It has been reinforced in our cultural narrative for more than several generations.  Stories of cowboys and heroic soldiers full our novels and our pulp magazines.   After World War Two, nearly every crime novel or thriller was a tough guy who had fought the Nazis or the Nips.   The 1950s were filled with cowboy tv shows with sharpshooters who could shoot the guns right out of the grip of the bad guys.  No blood on that, just straight shootin’ and the town was saved, yay!

2018-0225

Overread at Booth 2: Poem of the Day: Onyx Fingertips

                Fingertips, you touch

                my skin, and thus, you

                assign my identity.

                I am merely the

                race you require of

                me, according

                to the situation.

                At a restaurant, I             

                am white, at our

                family fiestas,

                soy puro Latino,              

                and for this

                war,

                I am black

                and hard

                as onyx.

MR
2017-0719

Overheard at Table 3: Kris and Mack

Mack: Had a dream about you last night.

Kris: Am I going to have to take you to HR for this?

Mack: No, it's not THAT kind of dream.  We were all at your house, early morning, it was still dark, and you have this detached garage.

Kris: I don't have a detached garage, but go on.

Mack: Anyway, there was someone rummaging around your garage and you were saying, "Be quiet.  I think it's my neighbor.  She's in a car in there.  You can hear the stereo."  And I said, "She's hiding in your garage?" and you said, "Yes," and I said, "Like a possum?"

Kris: Like a possum?

Mack:  That's EXACTLY how you replied in the dream and I said, "Yeah" and then your husband was there with a flashlight, trying to shine it in the window of the garage and you said, "Don't scare her" and then your mom came and opened the garage door and your neighbor said that she had been moving your Buick out of your garage every day for the past few weeks and parking her Buick there so she could get some peace and quiet before having to go to work.

Kris: In your dream we own a Buick?  What the hell do you think of me and my family?

Mack:  I dunno.  It was a Buick.  Anyway, your mom is then leading your neighbor away, saying something about taking her to get booked at the county jail, and then your son...

Kris: Kevin or Kenny?

Mack: Kenny.   He said, "Well, why doesn't she just come over every morning and walk our dog?  That way, she'll get peace and quiet and we'll get our dog walked!" and you said, "That's a good idea, buddy!" and that was the dream.

Kris: I don't know if I want to talk to you about my family issues any more.

Overheard at Booth 4: Mack and Kris Discuss Madame Secretary

Kris: I love Madam Secretary.  Halfway through Season three.  Just LOVE that woman.  Tough as hell.


Mack:  Yeah, she reminds me a lot of you.   Only without the sailor's mouth.


Kris:  Fuck you.


Mack: My case in point.