Mental Health

Love Machine

December 22, 2011

love machine in hallway gives more candy cookies than pay for twice change deserve pump machine every day getting fatter sad when stops bonuses then halts everything no matter how many coins justified to slap kick curse damn machine and ignore staring fools

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Tijuana Taxi Ride

December 16, 2011

american drunk in tijuana night lumbers into taxi and in spanish asks for senoritas and marijuana fine says cabbie few minutes later american admits really wants cocaine cabbie reminds not what said then silently drives way out and says here’s best place for you american enters and thinks goddamn that guy dropping me where there’s…

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Alarm Radio

December 13, 2011

another tardy you’re fired boss told fred sir i’ve been creative as well as diligent in this matter alarm radio was problem but stopped listening to wakeup news which interested me too much to get right up until fell back asleep rock and classical music soothed into slumber then tried country which had hated but…

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Deadbolt Rules

December 11, 2011

(This vertical prose was rewritten horizontally and posted September 22, 2012.) hell of hot day fishing in thin mountain air sun scorched harold and he drank too many beers didn’t matter he caught no fish he had to return to rat hole room at rear of house in bad area rusty deadbolt jammed and impatient…

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Perchance

December 3, 2011

are you perchance a difficult person

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Wired in Bed

November 18, 2011

cold night drunk in ‘eighties bar met chunky woman who showed some white powder we snorted in car at apartment she called woman who came sold more asked for hit and took three firing thousand words before leaving we burned noses and strained hearts couple hours before moving upstairs about two and were nonstop at…

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Sunday School

November 5, 2011

lady in sunday school passes out color books and crayons saying draw some pretty pictures all kids comply but one who scratches black lines over faces and bodies forcing concerned lady to gently remove and wad

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Road Warrior

October 31, 2011

suv dusted right door frantic to tailgate sped to catch and gore wanting a missile

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Mr. Johnson

October 24, 2011

mr johnson never seemed stable especially when he argued with mr jones and chained him to a streetlight

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Shoot Me

October 16, 2011

i’m going to shoot myself but you first

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Rocks Afire

October 8, 2011

smoldering rocks burning white smoke me till you can’t

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No Room

October 8, 2011

the bedroom is the kitchen is the living room is the only room is the pit

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Shooting Baskets in Dreams

December 10, 2010

Generation after Hal moved from two small dingy rooms connected to old house in battery-stealing part of town, he thought dreams had disappeared so was saddened to see himself there shooting baskets. Old friend sat behind and watched errant shots. Damn ceiling’s too low to shoot right. Friend should’ve agreed but only stared as Hal…

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Psychiatrist Assesses Nidal Hasan

November 9, 2009

Prominent psychiatrist Dr. Joseph McClellan comments below about Dr. Nidal Hasan, the army psychiatrist who, during a rampage early Thursday afternoon November fifth, reloaded two automatic pistols to sustain fire on unarmed soldiers in a medical facility at Fort Hood, Texas, killing at least thirteen and wounding more than thirty. As I addressed the media…

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Michael Jackson This Is It

November 6, 2009

A movie of rehearsals in a big empty room can’t excite like concerts alive with screaming fans, but I still hope you enjoy This Is It because that’s what it is.  My dancers show why when we first gather in March.  Hundreds have come from all over the world to compete in rigorous auditions from…

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Michael Jackson: 1958-2009

June 26, 2009

In the beginning the boy was wholesome and cute and sang like an angel and dazzled as a dancer.  His early musical success transcended that of most adult stars, and as a young man he generated the light of a supernova.  None of that, we must periodically remind ourselves, is helpful in shaping a tranquil…

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Poe at the Gentleman’s Magazine – Part 11

August 20, 2008

Edgar Allan Poe, despite working for Burton’s Gentleman’s Magazine, seemed not to understand the implication of my being William E. Burton: I paid ten dollars a week, more than sufficient compensation starting in June 1839, and expected him to be a dutiful and deferential editorial assistant.  I realized many readers considered Poe brilliant, particularly after…

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Roderick Usher Assails Edgar Allen Poe – Part 10

July 28, 2008

My family and I are profoundly distressed by Edgar Allen Poe’s recent short story “The Fall of the House of Usher”.  We, who so often said yes when this forlorn orphan begged to visit, now learn he considers our home “melancholy” and one which pervades his spirit “with a sense of insufferable gloom.”  Had Poe…

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Virginia Clemm and Edgar Allan Poe – Part 9

July 17, 2008

I hated gossip about Eddy living with his “child cousin.”  I wasn’t a child but a young lady only three months short of fourteen.  Eddy still made sure our marriage bond said I was twenty-one.  That afternoon in May 1836 a smiling minister married us in our boarding house.  My mother and our landlord and…

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Poe the Editor and Family Man – Part 8

July 7, 2008

When Aunt Maria’s mother died her pension was also buried and that night Edgar Allan Poe raged to dig it up.  Aunty and Virginia guided him into bed from which he two days later arose dazed but determined to be responsible.  Aunty had become his real mother and Virginia, though only age thirteen, was already…

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