Out of Control

I was in my bed when I heard our alarm system go off. I jumped up and ran downstairs. I found the control box to the security system. I pressed it on. The security system question my mom designated a few years ago popped up.

“WHAT DO THEY CALL THE BOUNTY HUNTER CLONES IN STAR WARS?”

I typed in “Storm Troopers.”

It blinked red then the statement, “MUST BE FEMALE TO OPERATE” popped up.

I proceeded to try and tell the machine I was female so I could disable the alarm. The fuse suddenly blew. The lights in the house turned off and it was complete black. At least the alarm was off.

Then, wait, I could hear the T.V. on in the other room. I saw the dull light glowing against the walls. I slowly walked over to it.

The man on the T.V. reported, “Alien invasion plagues Western United States. National Guard and all military forces have been mobilized…” I was so confused.

It was suddenly daylight outside. Lights shone in the window and I squinted at the bright rays. I sprinted up the stairs to get to my attic. The attic had the highest window in my house where I could overlook the neighborhood and see what was going on. My hands were sweating and my heart was pounding. When I crested at the top of my stairs I saw a small toddler at the single window in my dusty, wooden attic. He held a television remote out toward the window. Tears were running down his face.

“Who is this kid?” I thought.

“Why won’t the channel change?” he cried.

I took him in my arms and looked out the window.

Out on my suburban street stood what looked like a man, but eight feet tall. It was pale. Ghostly pale. It had short white hair, a little whiter than its skin. And its eyes. Its eyes…

The alien stood still; so still that the earth seemed to sway underneath it. Neighbors stood on the edge of their lawns, staring at it.

The toddler suddenly jumped out of my arms. It ran across the attic and down the stairs. I followed after him. The toddler burst out my front door.

“WAIT!” I cried.

He was running straight for the alien! The “thing” turned toward the toddler. Before the toddler reached the alien, two of my neighbors ran and tackled the eight foot beast. Both my neighbors and the creature lay on the ground, motionless. The toddler stood over them, crying. I was shocked. My feet felt like led. I tried to scream but my throat was stuck. Finally, I was able to slowly walk toward the bodies. I rolled over the bodies to see which of my neighbors had saved this young boy. It was my mom and my dad.

“NOOOO!” I yelled. I fell on my knees crying bitterly. Then I took up a stick and struck the beast. Then I hit it again. I beat it until all my strength was gone. Nothing on the creature changed no matter how hard I hit it. It facial expression was the same as it was alive, but its eyes were closed. It suddenly looked beautiful, even intoxicating. I was still afraid, but a type of wonder rose in me. I bent in close to its face. The eyes opened.

I awoke with a gasp in my fox hole, and drew my knife. I sorted through my brain what was dream and what was reality. I leaned back again and closed my eyes. I knew I wouldn’t sleep again that night. I heard the sounds of the jungle around me. The rain poured on me and there was no escape. The thunder rumbled in the distance; or was that mortar rounds? I couldn’t help but feel the chaos and fear of my dream felt a lot like reality.

Idols

Ashtoreths
That were raised by my friend
Innocent at age thirteen
Her hand felt good in his
Love was foreign
Since a child he has known none
Hysteria led him to the slaughter
I'm with you in the city
Roaming the streets on lonely nights
The only company the man on the moon
One lonelier than him
Moloch
Lain beautifully by the hands of the innocent
The blood ran pure till the days of dark
Your eyes still sparkle
Through the security of the mask
But dark places you control
The blade brings comfort
I'm with you in the corner
Where words can't pierce the night
To cry would be joy
Because I feel once again
Baal
He was planted and grew
Socially, with a friend you grew up with
Confidence returned with a sip of the bottle
Your warm chest numbed the pain
It was easier to sleep with your past forgotten
Guilt was only real if felt
I'm with you on your deathbed, alone
Your children gone
Etching lives out of the pieces you created
gods,gods,gods
Built tirelessly
Our calloused hands build, build, build
We're trying to reach the floor of heaven
Only to find we're digging instead

As the Rocks Gave Way

I existed. I woke up. I guess there was a funeral. I’m assuming they buried him. The last two weeks must have been there, but I didn’t remember it. My dad is dead, and all I feel is his absence. Everyone talked, the pastor preached, I wore a suit, then I ate a bagel, but I didn’t move. I sat while everything changed around me. Now that everything is said and done, the traditions finished, I just am.

           My mom and I are sitting in a car. We’re donating some clothes at the local clothes drop. My sister is getting rid of some old stuff and cleaning out her room.

            “I’m going to have to go back to work again,” my mom says. “But don’t you worry about any of that. We will be just fine. God always provides. You’ll see. When Grandma was a kid her dad died….”

           - She keeps talking, but I let it reside as a humming in my ear, while my mind wanders elsewhere.

            “You know he’s really not worried,” my dad says to my mom.       

I almost jump right out of my seat.

            “You okay?” my mom asks.

            “Yeah I’m fine.” I say. “Just thought I heard something.”

            My mom continues talking while all I hear is the humming in my ear.

             My dad chuckles. “We all have different ways of coping with things. Your mother just likes to talk.”

            I realize I’m the only one that can hear him, but he’s there. My dad is in the backseat, commenting on my mom’s ramblings like he always does; or did. But, in another second, he disappears. Am I crazy? Have I reached my breaking point? I don’t really care. I get to see my dad.

            I wake up early the next morning. I’m always the first one up now. It used to be my dad. I’m groggy, half asleep in the bathroom brushing my teeth. I spit, rinse, and shut the sink off. I hear a soft “clink, clink, clink” in the kitchen. It’s the sound of a spoon in a coffee cup. I make my way into the kitchen, still rubbing the sleep from my eyes. My dad is sitting at the table, arms folded and head slouched, mixing his coffee slowly while watching the dark, thick, liquid twirl in the cup. He’s a real morning person, which is something we share. It’s still dark out. I pour myself a cup and sit across the table from him.

            “Want some eggs?” He asks.

            “Sure,” I reply.

            I wake up slow, while he seems to be fully alive right when his feet hit the floor. He enjoys making us breakfast and lifting us out of the fog of morning. He goes to the fridge and grabs the eggs, butter, and cheese. He brings the frying pan out of the cupboard and turns the burner on. He scoops some butter out of the tub and I listen to it sizzle on the pan. Two eggs are cracked and placed in the pan. He cracks the yolks and lets it sizzle, then gets some bread. He’s making me an egg sandwich instead, no dialogue is needed, he knows they are my favorite.

            “Morning,” my sister says, opening the fridge and getting out some juice.

            I look to her and look back, and he is gone; the stove with nothing cooking and all the ingredients back in their place.

            “Morning,” I say after a long pause.

            Days pass into weeks and weeks into months. The earth still revolves and the world changes around me. I’m back in school, playing volleyball, and bussing at a diner on the weekends. He’s always there. I see him. I feel him. I hear him.

****

            It’s been a year and a half, I realize as I sit on my couch at home alone. I don’t know what triggered it, but I am sobbing. I can’t control it. I’m rocking back and forth with tears streaming down my cheeks. After a while, the tears stop coming, but I’m still sobbing. Something in my soul twists and chokes me.

             My mom comes home. She opens the door and starts to say something— then she sees me. She drops her groceries, runs over and embraces me.

            “What’s wrong, honey, what’s wrong?”

            “He’s gone! Don’t you see?! He’s gone and he’s not coming back! He works his whole damn life and it means nothing! Nothing!” I yell. “He can’t see his kids get married, he can’t take that trip to Yellowstone, he’ll never see his grandchildren, nothing!”

            “I know, I know, honey,” she whispers reassuringly as I sob some more on her shoulder.

            After a while, though, I calm down. She leaves to make a call. I lie there still, curled up in a ball with a blanket she put over me.

            That’s when I see him for the last time.         

            He walks around the couch, grabs a pillow, and leans against the lazy boy, lying on the floor, watching TV with me. He always lies on the floor instead of in a chair. I never understood it. It’s a commercial break, and he grabs me by the wrist playfully, like he would when we were kids. He used to wrestle around with us during commercial breaks.

 Usually dads come home at night from a long day of work, sit in the lazy boy, and watch TV. Not my dad. As I got older, though, I stopped horsing around with him. I was the guy coming home from a long day of work, not wanting to do anything. But, he never stopped trying. A commercial break would come up and he would grab me by the foot or wrist.

            “Dad, stop it.” I would say.

            He would continue to drag me off the couch.

            “No seriously stop it. I had a really long day. Can’t I just sit here and not be bothered?”

            He would then retreat, never saying a word.

            But this time, I let him drag me off the couch. We wrestle for a little while. I sit on his, stomach as he lay down. He looks into my eyes. He sees the sorrow.

            “What’s wrong, son?” He says, looking concerned.

            “I’m afraid I won’t see you anymore.”

            He smiles the kind of smile you see when a parent is so proud of you, they smile, but their eyes well up in tears. You can tell you’ve reached their soul.

            My mom walks in, and, just as quickly as he appeared, he’s gone forever.

****

As the time passes, I still think of him, but I don’t see him. I think he would have liked it this way, I realize; he will live on forever, through us. That’s enough for me.

Thoughts in the Night

            I looked out in the night sky and down the long lonely street; trees bending toward the road, the night suffocating. My hands fumbled into my pockets grabbing for my match book. Some comfort came in the lighting of my pipe, but I couldn't help the sinking feeling of being alone. You see, I snuck out of my window earlier. It was about eleven-fifteen, my parents conk out at about 9:30 so I knew they would be dead asleep by the time I went out. The problem was that no one knew where I was or where I was going. If I vanished my friends would just think I didn't show up. My parents wouldn't realize till morning. The warm yet suffocating blanket of my parent’s protection was off of me. At least for a couple hours.

            The adrenaline surged through my veins even though it wasn't too big of a deal. I mean I've done it many times before. Every time it feels the same.

            I got to the corner of the suburban street, sitting and waiting for my friend to come out. The lights were off in the houses, and I let my mind wander to the people inhabiting the cookie-cutter dwellings. Most of them were likely to be warm in their bed, anticipating the next day of work, even before they got up in the morning. They were probably even thinking of paying off their college loans. Thinking of job security, living in homes they don’t own, driving cars they don’t own, and eating out of a fridge that is on layaway.

            I chuckled thinking of how suffocated they are. Then I frowned thinking of how suffocated they are. Like I normally do, I sat back and dreamed of my future. How I was going to be different.

             Life can sometimes just be pain, and anyone who tells you differently is selling you something. I am seventeen and broke poor, and am fine with being that way for the rest of my life. I knew something that person in the house with the big T.V. and the dog didn't. Joy is freedom and friends. That’s it. 

Look Up

Look up, young man, look up

Dragging, dragging on your belly all day long

Sisyphus, oh Sisyphus! Throw off your stone

Foot-dragger, bottom-feeder, axe-grinder

Look up, young man, look up

Reaching, reaching, further than ever before

Return, oh return! Pure white as days past

Mud-slosher, alley-way-walker, evil-tempter

Look up, young man, look up

Burning, burning with restless, maddening desire

Chaos, oh chaos! Animals with no soul

Fence-jumper, track-traveler, woman-luster

Eden, oh Eden! My days reincarnate within your gates

Madness-healer, utopian-keeper, soul-fulfiller  

Woods and Wonder

            UFO’s fly through the air while a T-Rex roars on earth below. The T-Rex grabs the spaceship in his mouth and starts to tear it to pieces. Just in time a knight arrives to fight the T-Rex for the spaceship. The knight wins but the ship is destroyed beyond repair. He hops in his getaway car and drives to the coast, where the pirates are waiting for him.

            Ever play with toys as a kid? You play and play with them and it seems to never get old. Your imagination soars and you’re in your own little world and no one can destroy it. Wonder fills your heart as you play out the bad guy or the good guy.

             One day it gets old. It’s that birthday or that friend that makes you say “I’m grown up now” making the toys start to lose their wonder. Imagination decays, until the toys in the closet are just a replicas collecting dust.

              Being in the woods fills me with wonder how toys fill kids with wonder, but the feeling never went away.

We're All Different

“How’d the SAT’s go?” my dad asked.

            I was getting out of my car and walking towards him as he leaned against his car, waiting for me. It was my sister’s graduation from college, and I just drove three hours to get there separate from my family because I had to take the stupid SAT’s.

            I started to shrug off my shirt while my dad grabbed the nicer shirt Mom had for me in the car. It was pressed and still on a hanger.

            “The system was made for monkeys,” I replied.

            “Huh?”

            “It’s like telling the animal kingdom to take a test to see how smart they are, but the test is to climb a tree. The monkeys have the advantage. I’m a fish.”

            “Now, look, everyone has to work hard and do their best.”

            “Yeah, yeah” I replied as I buttoned the last button on my shirt.

My dad closed the door to the car and locked it, and we started walking toward the gymnasium. The graduation started in a couple minutes.

“I’m sure there’s water somewhere,” I said.

“What?” asked Dad.

“For a fish to swim in.”

He chuckled as we opened the doors and walked inside.