Suicide Note 1985

It was a dirty Chicago bound
Greyhound bus.

Winter diesel exhaust
Heavily painted the outside
Sooty black
Making the elegant image
Of a running thin dog
Barely visible.

After boarding
I made my way to the rear
Shuffling down
The midway
Bumping into the sides of the aisle seats
Past the curious gazes
And defiant glares
Brown snow falling from my feet.

The back of the bus.

That is where I felt most comfortable.

Isolated.

Instinct,
Like a magnet
Drew me there.

I did not contemplate the empty seats
Nearer the front.

I grew up at the rear of a bus.

In high school
I would join the ‘cool’ kids
There, in the seats
Just behind the rounded humps
Of the wheel wells
And smoke cigarettes and pot
Windows open,
Even during the cold winter.

Juvenile delinquency
Knows of no seasons.
Winter chill taunts
Common sense and caution
Just as easily as the burn
Of the licentious Summer sun.

I’d kiss pretty young girls
Bubblegum mouths
Until their bus stop came up.
My eyes would follow their soft bodies
As they bounced to the front
And down the three steps
Onto the pavement outside.

They would gather together in a clique
Whispering
Only looking up and smiling
As the bus pulled away
And I’d have dogboy magic
Working away on my insides
All tingly
As the smell of bubblegum
And the picture of a group of long legged girls
Laughing
Faded through the large rear windows.

Our juvenile gang would make plans for the weekend
At the back of the bus
And after the weekend
We would be gathered there again
On Monday morning
To talk all about it
Usually
Ripping into somebody
Deservedly
For their stellar performance
In the theater of the idiotic.

Back on the Greyhound
I chose a seat to the left
On the passenger side
Putting my bag in the overhead.

I dropped down in the seat
Looking out of the filthy window
As the bus pulled out of 210 West Fayette Street
Into the grey slush of Baltimore.

A few blocks rolled by before
I brought my eyes back inside.
I was all too familiar with these streets
And I lost interest.

It was then that I noticed the
Blue Bic pen scribbled
Manically
Across the cranberry vinyl flesh
Of the seat
Directly in front of me.

“IT’S DONE, IT’S OVER, I CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE!!!...”

Was the title.

At least those were the first words
Nearest the top of the headrest.

The largest, darkest words
Drawn over repeatedly
Almost tearing through
The thick, fake leather.

I could smell the sanitary blue chemicals
From the
Onboard bathroom
Several steps
Behind me
As I read her letter
Scrawled down the entire length.

The details were chronological
Starting with her earliest memory
Of her mother ‘falling asleep’ in bed
Carelessly letting her infant daughter
Slip out of her arms.

The vodka bottle fell first
Clinking to the bare wooden floor
Followed by her small bundle
Hitting with a dull thud
Followed by crying for what seemed like hours
Until her mother shook her violently
Screaming at the top of her lungs.

She had written
“I could feel myself moving and I couldn’t do anything about it.”
“I knew something terrible was happening, I could feel it in my stomach.”

I read about her jagged childhood
Where her mother’s abusive boyfriends
Existed
Where her father did not.

Her home was filled with the flicker and noise
Of a TV
For days at a time
While she, just a young girl
Foraged for food
Drinking cloudy tap water
Out of dirty glasses
While her mom lay passed out
In torn clothes
On a torn sofa
Bruised
Self inflicted and otherwise.

She confessed her own addictions to the vinyl.

They trickled in while other kids played sports
Or went to the library.
They turned on full blast like a faucet
With the onset of puberty.
She hung out with a rough crowd
Self medicating the ugliness away.

But it got worse.

There were details of rapes
Forced sex
Hooking up with
Assholes that weren’t capable of love.

‘Lies’ and ‘stealing’
Were blocked out in heavy dark ink
While
‘I had several abortions by my sweet sixteen’
Was written in script with flowers and hearts
Drawn around it.

There were words written
About being homeless
And cold
Dirty
And tired
About using her body to make money
To buy drugs and survive
Surrounded by dollar signs.

“That’s it. I’m going nowhere. I can’t take it anymore.”

“I’m going to jump off of a bridge and this bus is taking me there.”
She wrote confidently.

“That feeling that I had when I left my fucked up mother’s arms.”
“I knew something terrible was happening.”
“That sums up my twenty years here on this earth. I’m gonna fall for the last time.”

XXoo.

The ride took the better part of a day.

I was a twenty one year old punk
On a road trip to Chicago
Riding at the back
Of a Greyhound bus.

It made stops in Pittsburgh, Akron, Cleveland
Toledo, South Bend
And Gary
Before dropping in Chi-Town.

I could’ve gotten off at any one of those stops.

But I decided
To continue on.

To get know someone
That was my peer
That wasn’t physically there
That very well might be dead.

To see it through to the very end.

The Hawk Wind sunk it’s talons
Deep into me
As I stepped out of the stale warmth
Of the bus
Making me reconsider
My decision
After all.

The Human Condition As Portrayed By The God Particle At The Center Of The Venn Diagram (Would Make For Some Great Reality Television)

It appears to me
For all intents and purposes
That they are content

Day after day

Huddled around the water cooler
And coffee maker
Talking about their shared interest of things
Like

‘Brangelina’
‘Snookie’
‘HG TV’
‘Dancing With The Stars’
‘Entertainment Weekly’ magazine...

‘NJ Housewives’
‘DC Housewives’
‘Central Pacific Out In The Middle Of Nowhere Housewives’
‘Transgendered Housewives’

And if nothing new
Were to be discovered
From these morning summits

So be it.

They are comfortable with the same routine
Of living their lives
Through others
In a box
From a sofa
And existing to the next day
To tell about it.

Each one
Already knowing the answers
Dissing the others
For they passed by their GED’s
And got their doctorate
In such fleeting things
As important as this.

I’m sure many
Fall asleep
Alone
On the sofa.

The particle
Gets smaller
And

Smaller.

Destination Mars

It was day three
Of a four day junk bender
Which would’ve been longer
Except the money was running out.

The party was gonna come to an end soon
And that wasn’t gonna be pretty.

It was Dave’s turn to make a run
To the store
For a score
And he looked like shit.

Hell...
We all looked like shit.

When he came back
That was gonna be it.

We were gonna hafta find money
One way or another
Whether it was stealing
Selling
Or begging
Or else the party really was over.

But all of that didn’t matter at that moment.

I was playing DJ
Spinning records on the turntable.

There were plenty of pillows on the floor
And while Dave was gone
There were just three of us left.

Me and two girls.

We lay there limp and sprawled
White of a three day high
Chapped lips
Metallic breath
Listening to Einsturzende Nuebauten
Usted Ghulam Hussein Khan
Hement Kumar’s
“Songs From Hindi Films”
Gregorian Chants
23 Skidoo
Velvet Underground
And Iggy Pop.

When Dave finally crawled back
We could tell that he was already high.

We could see that the bag was short
Which was against our housebound junkie principles.

Technically
We were supposed to wait
Until we got back to the party
To get high.

We were really pissed off
And really jealous.

The girls turned
Their ‘Bitch’ mode up full volume
To the point of
Hysterical screaming
In stereo.

It was too much.
I couldn’t take it any more.

“Look” I said.

“Anyone of us might’ve done the same thing”

“Let’s just get high and forget about it”

We did.

The girls were pros and hit themselves.

I put on
Annette Peacock’s “I’m The One”
Bauhaus “The Sky’s Gone Out”
Minnie Ripperton’s “Adventures In Paradise”.

Things became distant and forgotten
Within the black channels of
Lydia Lunch
And Throbbing Gristle.

We drifted off
All of us
To the repetitive click
Of the lock groove
At the end of
A Cachao record.


I awoke parched
Lips cracked
The early afternooon sun
Illuminating dust.

I looked around
Lifted the needle off of the record.

We were all strange friends
Not to be trusted
Curled around each other
Mouths open
Like corpses.

I shuffled to the fridge for some juice.
I had a sweet tooth coming on.

The fridge was empty.

It was going to be a very rough day ahead.

Horology

There is a rip... there
In the sky
Where the moon
Is pulling from its socket
Like a soft egg eye

Dangling
Vericose
Swinging
Gently
From a thin blue vein

Slow pendulum movement
Like a dusty German clock
Geartrain spinning inside
Frictionlessly
Ratchet clicking
Antique motion work
In need of slight adjustment
And cleaning

Time slowing
As the bob falls lower
Behind cumulus clouds

The tall black trees
Stand there
Spines cracking
Vertabrae separating
As bones of hands reach high
To pass the hour mark

Waiting
With
Decelerating
Breath
For the fragile yolk
To break lose and fall

Nightbirds go blind
As the sky goes dark
Clouds disappearing
And somewhere
A clock keeper
Trips
And bruises himself badly
As he climbs
The heavy wooden stairs
Of the cold stone tower

He settles
Alone
Chilled
Weeping
As his bells
Remain silent

Blues For A Dying Marriage

It was a molotav cocktail

Too much booze
Shaken
Not enough love and tenderness

Lots of bitters

The garden
Once her pride and joy
Rested
Defeated
Surrendering all of it’s splendor
To ugly weeds and vines
Wrapping around the trunks and branches
Of the small flowering trees
Wresting breath and animation

A botanical of the grave

The fairies were missing

Devils had moved in

Within glass bottles
That would be hidden
In the back of closets
And under the bed

Forgotten about

Like the pot on the stove

Love and intimacy
Burned away inside
With the brittle chicken bones
Turning ash grey black with carbon

The flowers of romance
Long withered and fallen

Petals crisp without color
Spread around the base of a vase of clear glass
Of which the dark departed stems were visible
In the futid green foamy septic water

Let Me Tell You About Some Of My Social Shortcomings

Just as soon as I finish
Flipping off the asshole driver
In front of me and tell
Him to go fuck himself
Because he is driving
Too godamn slow
Causing me to be later
Than I already am
For something that is way more
Fucking important
Than his pilgrimage to the pharmacy
On his retirement schedule
Upon this congested two lane highway

This road to hell...

Coffee In Bed

Well...

I think I had
The WORST sex
I’ve ever had
Last night.

I mean...

Look...

Why even bother?

If you’re that boring
Why not just turn on the TV
Or listen to Justin Bieber.

This morning
She brought coffee
Into bed
And proceeded to ask
Dull questions
Like

“Where’s the strangest place you’ve had sex?”

Really?

I rattled off a long list of places
Others might find strange.

But
What I REALLY wanted to reply
Was

“The strangest place I’ve ever had sex was here in YOUR bed!”

Now that I look back
And think about it

The coffee wasn’t that hot either.