KETCHUP

On Sunday morning, post Easter, Jesus had been resurrected from the dead. I was non- plussed. Not being a catholic and drinking myself into a coma on a weekly basis, I didn’t think anything of it. Instead, I bathed in the darkness of my bathroom, slowly washing away the cave of pain that surrounded my life. After partially drying myself off with a dirty towel, I dressed in random articles of clothing I found between the bath and the bed. I stumbled down the stairs to hear the vibrancy that was Bed Stuy. Bill Withers blared. Actually, that’s wrong. He can never blare, cause he can never be too loud. He reverberated. He shook the halls and the mailboxes so that bills fell from their respective places and people forgot their debts and over-arching problems. I traipsed on.

Squinting my eyes I avoided the locals and wished I would have bought a pair of shades. They are seasonal in my lifestyle. Like fans, space heaters and ramen noodles, they all come at a typical time of the month or year.

I walked into the restaurant I go to now that I don’t go to the other one and yelled out my order in Spanish and stared at the table. Still wishing I had the glasses. On it were three things. Salt, pepper, and fucking ketchup. I moved in a way that made the table shift and the ketchup bottle fell sideways. It was resting on its top. It was Heinz. The first thing I read was “only the best tomatoes for the best ketchup” and realized that this was how I was going to get her back.

I had lost my confidence years ago through a series of poor choices and accidental mistakes and had an idea. I often did. Unfortunately most were forgotten due to the loss of memory that excessive drinking often causes. I would make sure that the best tomatoes for my best ketchup would be her tomatoes. And, like Heinz, if there is any quality control, my ketchup, and therefore, her tomatoes, would be mine.

In order to do so, it would be a slow process. I’m sure mister Heinz didn’t come up with his commercially viable recipe overnight. It would take time. So in order not to rush things I decided I would think of her as muse and do one simple thing a day. Write one word.

And so i set forth to reconnect with the woman i hoped to be my muse. The sweat that came from the trying follows.

Click thru for the bullshit...

The first would be the word “hope”

Hope sounded like dope. What did that mean. I guess it didn’t mean anything. It didn’t sound like anything either.

It felt like everything, though. It felt like a birthday party. It felt like being washed ashore. It felt like coming clean from lies that kept you washed in filth.

The second word would be “despair”

It sounded like the last grains of the hourglass falling onto the ones before it.
Like the people singing the last words of happy birthday as you entered the room from coming from the bathroom.

The third word was “faith”

It was the place to you would find to spread your ashes so no one had to clean up after you anymore.

The fourth word was “jealousy”

This is the party that I wasn’t invited to where you were invited to and I hoped I could talk to you.

The fifth word is “solitude”

These are the evenings that I spend talking to myself so that I will know what to say to keep you from leaving me next time the morning comes.

The sixth word is “desire”

The emptiness I feel on a daily basis because my hunger strike is not for a noble cause, but one of selfishness. Unlike Tibet, I don’t want freedom, I only want to be chained to you.

The seventh word is “regret”

Because instead of saying I love you, I only said I’m sorry.

The eighth word is “promise”

Because I don’t have to say it if we are together forever.

The ninth word is “love”

Don’t forget that the heart not only pumps blood out, it sucks it in. Without the two actions, death is inevitable.

The tenth word is “alone”

A man that cannot enjoy his own company can’t truly enjoy the company of others. But without the company of others, his enjoyment of his company cannot be shared.

The eleventh word is “broke”

This has to be not having a quarter to call and say I love you.

The twelfth word is “walking”

Because I would do so like hazel motes with glass in my shoes to get to you.

The thirteenth word is “absolution”

All of my hopes and dreams will be washed away when you will be here in my dying days. Choking and coughing, love and my blood, never tasted so sweet.

The fourteenth word is “ran”

Past tense because it happened. Going forward because it was what I need to get to our future.

The fifteenth is “law”

As morally obligating as ‘til death do us part’ might seem, it is still not binding. However, being apart til death kills me every day.

The sixteenth is “fidelity”

Our life has had a series of rainchecks. How many days will it have to rain before I can cash them all?

The seventeenth is “child”

If I am lucky it will be a girl and it will be as beautiful as you. If I am not, it will be a boy and not be as smart as me.

The eighteenth word is "explosion"

It gets larger as the day that gets longer still only gets longer.

The nineteenth word is "TEXAS"

Cause the meaning of YES in Texas is worth more than the meaning of NO anywhere else.

The twentieth word is "replace"

Because 6 figures will never replace the 7 letters that I will miss every day.

the twentieth word is naked

because when i am seemly i am covered in ashes and hope to be surrounded by the molten lava that is you.

More to come.

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Garden-Hose

I was in a Volvo leaving something that I should have stayed for. I had a guitar and a set of knives that served as forks with sharp edges. They were called knorks. You could cut ravioli and tomatoes but they were advertised as something that could cut meat.

Qvc could not help this. This was my product. I tried to sell it and failed.

I pulled the car into a slow town in Louisiana in hopes of finding an easy take on the knorks. I found nothing but rain and a church. I found solitude with a water spout that was surrounded by a garden hose. I missed my family very much. It had been days since I had bathed in cleanliness and hope. I stopped there and stepped out and washed myself naked in the rain in hopes of being whole again. I was. The parking lot was empty in the back of the church, however, the gutters were full with free water. I was clean and resting in the backseat of the car that was full of beer cans, beef jerky packages and stolen hotel shampoo bottles. These, I used under the gutter to wash myself to sleep. It was like my own shower. I went back in the car after the nature bath. I fell asleep like coma patients waking up. Click through for more, it's worth it.



The sun came and started shining in my mirror. My radio had died and light was in my eyes. I stumbled across the street to a diner I had never been to with a handful of door to door items I hoped to trade for breakfast to no avail. I had them in my pocket. I ordered pancakes and solitude and left the waitress alone. This didn’t work because when the food came I was lost. I had seen this person before next to a swimming pool at a motel in Arizona. I was sure of it. She told me quick and clean that I was getting a ticket and towed. This was strange cause I had never been here before in my goddamn fucking life. It didn’t stop then.

My wallet and my clothes and my gun was in that in that car. I needed everything. She gave me access to nothing. I knew that what was happening was not an accident. The thing that I had been escaping from had finally caught up to me here in New Orleans. There were no more Mardi Gras or churches or green garden hoses or weather reports that could save me. I was good.

I traipsed back to that church and Volvo and thanked the rain. If I tipped my head back I would drown like poultry. I didn’t. I went into the back of the car and looked for an umbrella in order to maintain my dignity.

I broke a hole in the church window and went inside. I went into the bathroom and found the toilet paper and wrapped it around the handle. 3 or 5 times. Strung it to the door. Pissed all over it and closed the door and brought it to the top of the broken window.

Then ran like hell.

I ran down the street through an alley over an overpass through a bathroom to another window that I climbed in hoping I would get away. But again, I found myself back to that car in the church parking lot,later. It had my gun, my clothes and it was the place where it rained when I arrived. It was where all the answers were reconciled during a later date.

The roof of the church was nice. The garden hose could be a rope (or a noose). The church served as a venue. I fell into the past but stepped into the future. Delusion wasn't a nightmare but a dream of the same sort:

I went to the back and climbed up the set of steps with Eve's green shackles wrapped around my neck. And as I did, I stepped gingerly up the iron necklaces that kept me bound to the excuses that were you.

I knew that I wasn’t going to make it in that town. I knew I was going to fail. I had too many things in my pockets to sell to so many people that did not want to buy them. I gave up and…

I fell down those steps before I charged up them. I ran before I lost it. When I did, I swam up those steps and life to make sure that I went forward. Face forward. Into a pool without water. Into a pool without hope. Into a parking lot with a garden hose, drowned by the greenness of the rain that came from Jesus himself. I hung myself faster than I started to tie the knot.
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