Mums.

There were little things that had been changed. He noticed. All of her home-coming memorabilia had been taken down, probably stored away in some dark box in the attic. He walked in hesitantly as if even a slight change in the air pressure of the room would wipe away the memories that were sitting in his mind at that very moment.

The sheets on her bed were still strewn about the mattress and her pillow still had an indention in it.

The room seemed empty and cold. He drew the blinds and opened the window and sunlight came streaming in and filled the room with a bright 9am shine. On her old trunk were pictures from middle school and high school and from when they were dating senior year. On the bookshelf sat the albums that she had made him for every year of college that they had gone through together. He had never really appreciated them but he went and got them down, one by one, and began to flip through them in chronological order.

He started laughing and having vivid flashbacks but soon it was too much and he just rested, sitting against the wall, crying.

He was not sure if he was crying because he was sad or because of the fact that he couldn't help her in the end. But he knew that he loved her with everything that he was. His whole self. The fullness of what someone had made him to be.

He stole a picture of the two of them from one of the albums and put it in his pocket. It was from that time when they were on that hillside with the sun setting in the background. He liked it because the sun made her hair look like it was on fire.

He placed the albums back on the shelf and looked around one last time. He thought about closing the blinds but decided against it knowing that a room like that should never be dark.

The Town Loveless.

The Town Loveless was a place filled with melancholy lives & bowls of depression & every shade of gray imaginable. It was the saddest place you've never known. Even the street lamps had frowns. I suppose that is why she thought herself out of place.

Wouldn't you if your name was Happyson McJoyjoy?

From the bookshop window

What you don’t know about Bernadette is that she was never born.

She just was one day.

On a rainy morning on a corner of some street in some small town she just became. Sadly no one was around to see her become what it was that she was destined to be. I wish that I had been there. Present, there on that rainy street, to see the origins of the woman for whom I love so deeply.

Her hair reminds me of mud if the mud were sprinkled with gold flecks. Her shoulders are deeply freckled and each one overlaps another, telling stories from summers long ago or from some paintbrush held by God.

Across the street from her bakery stands an old bookshop. Sometimes I sit in the bookshop at the window on the bench that has been there since Jesus was a boy. I sit and I watch her hands as they press firmly into the dough of an unbaked loaf of bread or the sticky concoction that will, undoubtedly, become the greatest cookies ever created.

I watch her not in lust or desire. I watch her not for personal enjoyment or because I gain anything from this action. But I watch her because, to me, she is something that I have never seen before and will never see again.

Today it is raining.

I walked to the bakery to see and talk to her. But as I got closer and closer to the bakery I could see that all the windows were covered in brown packing paper and the door handles were gone and replaced with heavy chain and a pad-lock. I tried peering in through slits in the paper-covered windows but could only see flour and yeast covered floors. No tables, no oven, no bowls…no Bernadette.

I turned and looked into the street in utter ponderment, my eyes focusing and re-focusing on the slick-shiny cobblestones. I thought about where she could have gone and why she would ever leave. As my eyes wandered they stopped on a space, a gap, where a stone should have sat. In its place laid a puddle of water. As I looked closer I could see at its bottom a bed of mud sprinkled with gold flecks.

Move.

Who wants to fall in love?

'Cause I'm dyin' over here and this old heart ain't got much left in it so I'm just gun' give it all away from now on until that last of days when my Lord Jesus comes a'runnin' down those stairs of gold.

I ain't got time to waste.

Get to runnin' with me or get out ma' way.

Bean Pole.

The little boy had not meant anything by it but it birthed within him an anger that he could not control. He lashed out yelling, "AUTHOR!? AUTHOR!?" The boy ran for his mother hiding behind her legs and clutching her thighs for safety.

"I am NO AUTHOR!" He screamed at the top of his lungs stomping his feet and pounding clinched fists angrily on a fictional table.

"I'M A FUCKING WRITER!"

The veins of his neck bulged and coiled and undulated like worms reeling for life under his flesh. The beast had been reborn in him. It was no laughing matter. People eyes began to widen, mothers swept up children, husbands shielded wives, a scarecrow of a security guard spoke a few words of haste into a shirt-clipped radio.

"You all think just because you bought the book that your opinions matter to me? well THEY DON'T!"

He sprinted to a table covered in teenaged vampire novels and flipped it with the ease of an angry ogre.

"Is this the kind of crap that YOU WANT?!? Well take it!"

He started grenade tossing books into the crowed of book store customers. As men would approach to stop him he would fast ball the books at them hitting one man square in the eye-ball, the man fell dead with blood oozing from his head. People began running for the door and hiding in between stacks of Fiction-Fantasy and Sci-Fi books. His rage was out, it was present and it had taken him over fully.

Four security guards appeared in front of him varying in age and height and width and tone. A tall, bean pole, black man with a bald head, maybe 40. A thin old woman who was too bored at home after her husband had lost his battle with cancer. A fat pudge roller of a man who had to cut new notches in his security uniform belt which held only keys and a flashlight. And finally, the captain. A shaved head, pierced ear, tattooed punk ass who he hated instantly.

"Really?" mocking the rag tag security crew.

"They're mocking my life's work here!"

The shaved head twenty-something raised his hand in a STOP gesture and said, "Sir, please calm down."

"CALM DOWN! This is who I am you punk ass NOTHING!"

Just then the black, bean pole security guard gestured to one of the store employees to call 911. The book chunker saw this and was enraged. He grit his teeth for all to see and began to vibrate with pure and unadulterated rage.

"I'm not goin' anywhere!"

Just then he felt the weight of something strapped to his shoulder and when he reached for it his hands clutched an AK-47 automatic assault rifle. He raised the gun towards the guards with one hand and waved with the other yelling, "See you in hell you illiterate rumple-shaggers!"

He pulled the trigger and...

Signing the last of the books he looked at the little boy and, through gritted teeth said, "It's writer, not author, I'm a writer."

The girl who spoke in waves.

Eveline walked into her bedroom, laid on her bed, rested her head on the pillow and was asleep instantly. This is her dream.

You see, Eveline is a girl who sees beyond what is there. She is one in whom others find what they are looking for. Eveline is a dreamer in waves.

Eveline walks quietly and with great caution into the blue lit ballroom and her skin shudders and calms all at once. Her eyes roam from side to side and all the tables and chairs and center pieces and lighting arrangements watch her as she moves. Her dress sways like a ripple in gold water and her skin if pinkish with hues of tan and khaki and yellow and orange. Her skin is perfect. There is water outside the windows and in it float IV bags filled with clear liquid and amongst them swim small balls of light that speak to her but she can't understand them. They are too beyond what she needs to know.

Then all at once she hears the voice in the distance that is coming from beyond the velvet curtains of the ballroom and they speak softly and comfort her and then they are gone and she knows. They tell her, "It's OK my baby. You can do it."

Her alarm rings from the other side of the room and she gets up to smash the snooze button. She stumbles drunkenly back to the edge of the bed and rests her face in her hands and begins to weep and say softly, "I know, i know, i know..."

She gets dressed. She drives to the hospital. She checks in. She walks to her mother's room. She speaks quietly and softly and gently and lovingly to her. She calls in the Doctor. She cries her goodbyes.

"Them" or "Shiva" or "People that keep me from falling into pits"

They write on the insides of books and the walls of hearts.

Their intentions are scribbled in bathroom stalls and the heart of God.

Their cars are chariots for the spirit,

their feet carry them to and fro on the winds of God's will.

Those around them do not know,

but among them walk the living dead.

Their voices sound like voices

but if you are an angel they sounds like symphonies.

Their eyes are green and blue and brown

and all of the regular colors,

but when they close them they see bright white

light and colors that man has not yet named.

They listen to things that no one can hear

and do things when called to action by individuals

who are not seen that reside in places never visited.

These are the people who keep me from falling into pits.

The Whale, The Fox and Mr. Bagell (Full Edit I)

The Whale, The Fox and Mr. Bagell (Revised/whole)

Part I

I am sitting next to the lake. I have been holding this orb of light in my hands for over two hours and I can’t look away. Not even for a second. Not even for the sake of being aware of anything that might be of harm to me.

I found it.

I found it in the dark.

I found it in the place where no one ever looks.

I found it when I didn’t even want it.

I sit on this cold rock and my feet sink into the silt muck of the lakeshore. The muck oozes through my toes like it did in my youth when I would run along the shoreline and my dad would watch form under the tree with the rope swing and he would yell out, “Faster Jonny, Faster”.

The house is far away to the east and the rest of my family sleeps soundly in their beds with their covers tucked in around their necks like scarves and their toes poke out from under the sheets because it helps to keep them cool in the warm night.

I am not worried about anything.

It’s almost as if I have never worried about anything in my whole life.

The water is still and calm and rested and it looks like glass; glass that someone might be abele to walk across. Then he is there at my side. His fur is a dark orangey red and his tail is white white white. The eyes in his foxy head are yellow like the fire you find between the orange fire and the blue fire when your burning smores in your backyard. His name is Pure and he talks quietly to me about staying calm and remembering what love means and how this will all end for some but that for me it’s only the blink of the beginning. He tells me about staying on the narrow road and about remembering rules that are coated in gold and blood and about fighting the good fight.

Pure has a very thick coat and his tail seems to exude light from its end. His voice is like a warm cloak that sets itself upon my mind and my heart and my soul and it makes me feel like the broken pieces of me are being knitted back together. He speaks very slowly and very quietly and as I stare at the orb I strain to catch every last letter that drips from his mouth. And then as if he were never there I am alone again there on the rock with my toes sinking in the mucky siding of the lake.

No paw prints.

No fur on the mud.

No smell of canine or fox or whatever it is that they are.

Time has past but how much I am not sure.

It’s then that the orb I am holding, Whale I will call it, begins to change color. I wish with the fullness of my whole being that I could in some form or fashion describe to you these colors. But, I do not know their names or their hues or their origins and my mind is not large enough or wide enough to capture them fully and because of this I apologize with the deepest of feeling because if I were to accurately describe them I am sure that your whole life would be better and more complete.

Whale shows me things.

Whale turns memories into lessons.

Whale loves me so he scolds me.

Whale makes a char filled brain clean and clear.

Whale showed me all of his colors and shapes and then inside of him I began to see them. They danced around and were all connected and were all made of the colors that Whale had been showing me. There was no sound but I could still hear them singing and stomping their feet and slapping their thighs. Whale never spoke but I could feel his words on my heart like stickers from the field sticking into the soles of me feet. They were there to stay; they were never going to be taken away.

They clung but not in a needy way.

They wanted to be there.

I wanted them there more than they wanted to be there.

I am not sure if this is true.

Whale dimmed and those that were in him went away and the colors reverted back to white and everything in my head got still and quiet again. My inability to divert my gaze was cut and my head jerked back and my eyes rolled like ping-pong balls in their sockets and my face rushed with blood and I fell back-first to the cool earth and passed out.

I think it has been ten minutes.

The air still feels the same and the stars seem to be in the same places they were before. The moon still low in the east.

The orb sat cradled in the deep mud of the lakes shore and inside it was what seemed to be a low burning candle. The flame was low and it flickered and it did not give off much light but for some reason I do not feel like Whale will ever go out. Ever. Never. Ever.

I sat up and the wet shirt on my back clung to my skin and my body is cool and I feel relaxed and very tired. I look out on the lake and I see a figure on the other side. It is large and roundish in the center and it saunters in big lumbering steps from side to side and it takes me a few moments to realize but the figure is walking the edge of the shore and is coming towards me. He’s hugeness scares me very much. The blood in my heart pumps much more quickly and I can hear it in my ears like a sledgehammer against conrete.

He?

Is it a male?

Yes, He.

He.

He stands before me and I stare up at him, ninety-degrees up. The kind of up that people talk about when they are referring to skyscrapers or hot air balloons directly overhead. He is a bear. He’s not a bear that I have ever seen nor is he one that I can affiliate with species that I have seen on the television or in books. His fur is flowing but thick and rough like straw and his paws remind me of large mitts of leather and knives. Hit snout and teeth deserve respect and so I do and I step back a few feet remembering not to trip over Whale who lies dim behind me.

He stares out over the lake and over the land and up at the stars and at the moon and he sniffs loudly and he blinks frequently. At this point I am unsure as to whether or not he knows I am even there. But then he speaks.

“Quite the evening I must say.”

His voice is so deep that I can feel my ear drums vibrate and rattle. My heart murmurs and stops for a split second and my breath is knocked out of me and I go blind. I blink and my sight is regained and tears stream down my face while catching a breath floating by on the cool evening breeze. The lungs in my chest fill and I feel life come into my body. My eyes focus and everything is silhouetted and the hair on the back of my neck rises and falls.

“Do you not think so?”

I am still catching my breath and try to push out a yes towards his face that towers above me. The bear speaks very slowly and lingers on words and meditates on every thought that is spoken.

He seems brilliant.

He seems to know a lot about things that I don’t.

He seems to eat well.

His voice reverses the invention of fear.

“Bagell’s the name.”

I am unsure as to what my next move should be. I keep exchanging glances between Mr. Bagell and the stars that sit atop his head. Brilliance sat atop his shoulders.

“Do you know Whale?

I ask it like a child. I ask it as though his answer might complete my life. I ask in it such a way so that I am prepared for my whole life to change. His face twists and his eyes wonder and he scratches under his chin and picks me up and places me on his shoulder.

“Walking is a good way to spend a conversation.”

I didn’t agree or disagree. The drop from his shoulders was easily twenty feet so I was along for the ride weather I wanted to be or not. The fur on his shoulders is thick and very comfortable and so we began our walk along the edge of the lake.

“I know Whale.” He said with bass in his throat. “Have you met Fox? I love Fox”.

I say, “Yes, I met Fox while my feet were in the mud.”

“Fox is very quiet. Fox speaks for me most of the time.” Mr. Begell says.

All of this seems very vague and simple. I want to know if this bear knows Whale and if he does, what is Whale? Who is Fox? Why am I not in bed?

Part II

I am cold and my butt is numb and the door creaked as I walked into the cabin where the rest of my family was asleep. My watch got water in it when I was swimming four days earlier and so now I can’t tell what time it is but the sun is peeking up over the tree line so I know that I have to get in bed now or my parents will know that I was gone all night.

Mr. Bagell talked so slowly that in the time we spent together he only made out about seven or eight whole sentences. That’s fine though, everything he said was gold, pure gold that glimmered in a night so dark that without his words we would not have known where we were going.

I am so tired.

How are my eyes open?

Where are my shoes?

I don’t care.

Brother is sleeping in a ball on his bed with no covers and the only thing he has on are his whitey tighties. He’s twelve but when people my parents know get invited over to the house my brother talks to them as if he were an old Englishman with a vocabulary that resembles that of the child of a dictionary and an etiquette manual for young adults.

I’m undressed with my shorts on and as I lie here my calves are burning and my head is spinning and my butt is still numb because, even though Mr. Bagell is a nice and kind individual, his shoulder is not. His fur is thick and when I sat in it I sank but after a short time the hair began to itch the back of my legs and without being able to maneuver much I was stuck with a numb butt for some time.

I can’t remember anything.

I can’t remember what he said.

I can’t recall one single word.

Did he even speak?

I fall asleep with my hair sticking with sweat to my forehead and a light steam rising from the damp warmth of my chest.

I am asleep.

Part III

I am awake.

My watch is completely lifeless now. The incessant ticking that I had once found so unbelievably annoying was now gone and it made me sad. That was my dad’s watch and his dad’s before him.

Mom is in the garden, Dad on the porch, brother most likely in the woods and sister is asleep in her crib in the back room that was once a sewing room but is now her room and not a sewing room. My mother, when I was younger would make all of my clothes back in that room but now I am too old and I prefer to get my clothes from the stores in the city.

I am walking outside when I see Whale. He’s just sitting there in the middle of mom’s garden in a patch of kale. Mom doesn’t even notice him. Dad doesn’t notice him.

Is he there?

Can they see him?

He is still dim.

In the garden?

I am not going to go out to him yet because I never go into the garden and my mom will be wondering why I am all of the sudden taking interest in the garden and if she hasn’t seen Whale yet then she definitely will and due to this a lot of questioning will happen and I have no answers about anything. So I stay inside. I walk back to my room and I sit down on the bed. I have to go to the Lake.

Put shirt on.

Open window.

Go out window.

Run to lake.

“FOX?!”

“FOX?!”

“FOOOOX?!”

I am not very interested in Mr. Bagell right now because he talks much too slowly and I need answers and I need them in a quick fashion. I think Fox can help me in this way.

“FOX?!”

The dirt of the lakeside is drying and cracking and my toes have nothing to sink into so I just sit on the rock again and look out onto the water and wonder if I really just dreamt everything last night. But that couldn’t be because my calves were still sore this morning and my shirt still had mud on it from the lake.

“Fox!” I yelp.

“Hello boy, why are you yelling so?”

“Do you know Whale?” I ask.

“Yes, I know Whale. He is Me and I am He and We are We.”

I am confused and I fear that if I ask Fox why Whale is in my mother’s garden that he will give me an answer to which I will need an equation to understand. So I stay quiet. Fox has never looked at me. He just looks out at nothing I suppose. He is very still and I try to pet him but my arm can’t ever seem to reach him no matter how close he seems but he is always near.

Fox’s tale I have told you about. His paws are perfect white even when he walks through the mud and the field and the water and the muck. His nose is black like death and his eyes are deep and dark and they taunt me with the wondering thought that they just might hold the answers to the universe. His fur is a shade of orange that Whale showed me.

“Fox, who are you?”

“I am your helper, boy.”

“OK.”

I decide to not ask him about Whale but rather I go straight to the point.

“Fox, I need you to get Whale out of my mom’s garden.”

“Boy, I can’t do that. Whale is everywhere. You will be seeing much of him now.”

I turn to ask him what he means but as I turn he is gone and a wind blows and my hair flips up over my ear and I see some clouds rolling in. It’s going to rain. I head home.

Part IV

“Boy.”

“Boy, come to me, boy.”

I am sitting in a kitchen chair balancing on the back two legs trying to keep myself from touching the wall behind me. I am facing west with the sun streaming in through the bronze screen door onto my face and my bare chest. I am skinnier than normal this summer and my mother continues to fill my plate at dinner with more food than I could eat even if I were starving. She thinks me to be sickly. I’m just not hungry.

“Boy.”

I had been ignoring it for about fifteen minutes when I knew that I had to get up and see where the voice was coming from.

Whale.

The orb sits in a nook of the huge oak tree that rests at the corner of the front yards eastward fence line. Dad and mom are sitting on the porch in the warmth of the summer sun drinking hard tea and holding hands. Brother is down at the lake fishing with Timothy Gurman; a local boy who lives on the next ranch to the west. Sister is lying fast asleep on a blanket in-between my mom and dad on the porch.

“Boy.”

It’s a loud but gentle whisper that carries with it a wind, a breeze.

“Here I am boy.”

I look at mom and dad. They hear nothing.

“Boy, I am here in the branches. Come to me.”

I look back one more time to see my parents with eyes closed and heads reclined back onto the chairs where they sit. I move slowly towards and tree keeping one eye on Whale and one eye on my parents.

Still no movement.

Everything quiet.

Am I deaf?

The grass is cool under my feet.

“Boy, are you listening?”

This is the first time Whale had ever asked me a direct question and I was confused because he had no mouth or ears or anything to justify a response from a sane person of sound judgment. Why should I, a sane young man, be talking to a glowing orb?

“I’m listening.” I was.

Thought on candy.

Just as a child is tempted and lured to candies and sweets at youth all the more I was tempted by sin when my faith was nothing. But now, just as we know that candy holds no benefit to health, I know that sin is an agent of rottenness that hides in crevices and holes and eats away slowly at the enamel of holiness.

You can't hang a man for killin' a woman who tried to steal his horse.

It doesn't matter if she's God's own gift to the term Beautiful.