Sunday, September 30, 2018

11,203. RUDIMENTS, pt. 457

RUDIMENTS, pt. 457
(the whiskey rebellion)
The guy was telling about
Irish warfare  -  hitting the
other guy with a beer bottle
but making sure it was empty
first. Oh, yeah, I get it, that
was pretty funny. I moved
away from his seat as soon
as I could. There was a pile
of Irish newspapers on the
window shelf too. I tried
reading one of them but
couldn't make much sense
even though I do think it was
English, but to them that's
a foreign language (he also
had said that). You know, in
'Portrait of the Artist,' when
Stephen's father takes him to
visit Cork (a town near to 
Dublin), and Stephen gets
all embarrassed because the
next morning he's got to cover
up for his father's tea cup
clattering (with his father's
shakes) on the saucer, and
he's hoping others won't
notice. It's not much of a
scene but is the kind of
thing I retain. Well, I felt
like that and the best thing
for me to do was just move
away from the guy. This
was in Jonathan Swift's
Hibernian Lodge, which
is more or less a quite
glorified bar on e4th
street, claiming its
temperament as Irish
and its resident saint
as Jonathan Swift, the
writer. I spent many hours
there, to the point that
if I was 4 blocks away
they already knew I was
entering the premises and
Bernadette (my barkeep)
would have the Guinness
all settled and ready for
me. (It takes a good Guinness
a minute or too after pouring
to foam up properly and
settle in for the drinking).
We knew all that, and so
did everyone else. Tredwell
House was across the street.
It was one of those 200 year
old brownstone jobs, kept
near to restoration all the
time, so they could hit
you up for a 10 buck entry
fee and have you look,
supposedly, at how they
used to live in there 200
years back, except it was
all mostly bogus, probably
even the silverware and
serving stuff they had laid
out. In New York City that
stuff would have been scapped
up 2 days after whoever it
was had died. They don't
tell you that though. You're
supposed to fall for all their
rot. The street was like a
mouth with a lot of missing
teeth, on that side of the street
anyway. For a while the Tredwell
House had a decrepit, falling-in
version of itself a lot or two
over, but that got so bad they
did take it down. It's something
other now, newly built. In
all manner of times, through
it all, somehow, this one
Tredwell Hose remained  -
money and support and
some historical-group
connection  I guess  -
and it still stands, now
listed as Merchant's House
Museum, Seabury-Tredwell
or something like that. Totally
wigged out with furnishings
and even a  rear-garden and
a walk-through and guides
and all that. Any one of those
Irish guys in Swift's I know,
fifteen years back would
have swept through that
place like a magnet,
drawing up anything
they could get. But now
it's all revered and special
and no one touches a
thing. That's the sacredness
of  myth and story, you
know  -  how the people
enticingly build their stories
up into some form of group
think, and that's how society
congeals. Things and people
get all together, and it takes
on a life of its own and
everyone starts believing it.
It's the campfire mythos of
old tribal stuff; it's how
civilization got started. The
rest of the block, as I said,
through the 90's looked like a
gap-toothed mouth-remnant,
what with all the torn down
buildings and open spaces.
-
I took Avenel people there a
number of times. Not Bikers,
for it wasn't that sort of a
place. It did actually have a
finesse  -  a 'literary' finesse  -
attached to itself and the Biker
thing would have clashed.
My own motorcycle, on that
I went a few times. Bernadette
herself, on time, came out and
asked for a nice, long ride
around parts of lower Manhattan.
She went on break, took off
her serving apron, and we
went off. She totally enjoyed
herself. I think she needed 
the break. The Tredwell 
House, if you use your
thought-cap, could have
been perfectly made for
those kinds of Springtime
class trips that teachers use
to waste the time through
May so as to get through the
school year. Like the Betsy
Ross House, in Philadelphia,
except that there's no place
for buses to park and little
access except for the brash
nitty-grittyness of 4th street.
Traffic's a killer; so none of
that works. Few people anyway,
especially today's NY snotty
parents, would want their kids
standing out in a line across
from a bar, even a bar like
Swift's. Poor little Johnny 
and Janie (no, I'm not to be
making those distinctions these
days) wouldn't fare too well,
and no one gets to experience
real-life anymore.
-
I didn't know anything about 
this stuff, growing up in 
Woodbridge and Avenel as
I did; it was a foreign idea
that one would go somewhere
else to be imbibing history 
and not beer. And anyway,
the Whiskey Rebellion was
never taught in Woodbridge
High School  -  simply just
glossed over. It is, however,
one of the most important
early and founding principles
of the nascent American state,
by which we are now forcibly
ruled and of which we are 
(forcibly) kept in the dark;
the 'Tredwell House Merchant's
Museum' being a perfect example
of the sort of drivel by which we
are now coerced and lorded 
over. 'Bernadette, draw me up
another Guinness, I'm again
nearing your front door.'

11,202. ERUDITE AND FEATURELESS

ERUDITE AND FEATURELESS
He's erudite and featureless, skimming
from audacity's perch as he does. If I
didn't know any better I think he was
Wilbur or Orville Wright. There was
one who flew, while the other stayed
on the ground, I think  -  I'd need to
get the right before selecting
-
It's a featureless plain, this heading
out across the western land, and why
should anyone bother? Another selfsame
shoe-fit buckle of rest-stop food and
coffee. All those same people, touring
and passing along, just like yourself :
with song and batteries and baglets
of chemical foods.
-
I want a land that stands for something;
one with hillocks for truth and justice, and
With a mountain range named for Liberty.
Not these jaunty parking lots filled with
college-sweatered girls and their hordes
of dough-faced followers and the pre-Med
boys from Exeter and Midfield Tech.
-
I grow tired of the living, and I'm
already groaning from Death.

11,201. HERE'S THE TROUBLE WITH PRETTY VOICES

HERE'S THE TROUBLE 
WITH PRETTY VOICES
I'd not see you had you not
showed up. First things first
when you get to the moon?
Here's some cartilage to eat;
see if you like it, it's all I have
to offer you. What? You'd rather
chew on my heart, in pieces?
I don't think that's very nice
of you to say. You'd better go.
-
Your mammie's pickaninny
was some wastrel I bought at
the arsenal. Funny, but it really
was the Picatinny Arsenal. It's
in New Jersey, along 287, up
north. Pretty funny, I thought.
I know, I know  -  you're going
to ask if we'd listened to Paganini.

11,200. RUDIMENTS, pt. 456

RUDIMENTS, pt. 456
(the lately lamented everything)
'They have redness of eye,
who tarry long with the
wine.' Boy did that ring
true. It used to be that the
city drunks were all called
'winos.' I saw hundreds
of them over time; never
knowing what they drank
nor what it was called.
Thunderbird. Night Train
Express. Red Scorchy.
All those little bottles,
left about everywhere,
and the prone bodies of
the dead or passed out
from those bottles before
being emptied. Sometimes
they  could talk, these guys,
or still try to, with or without
teeth. Gumming their words
like a suction-cup thought,
their deep-seated feelings
did sometimes turn to tears
 - there's nothing worse than
having to witness a man
crying over his past, yet
in his useless present. It
was a speechless section
of time, to see that, and
one without a script.
-
Igor Stravinsky said, 'One
lives by memory, not by
truth.' I always agreed
with that, from the first
I came across it as a quote.
As life lengthens, it's like
more goes behind and less
stays in front, so I guess in
its own way it's only natural.
-
I had never been attracted
to alcohol; never even
thought about it, but when
I hit the streets of NYC,
from the Bowery on up
through that student corridor,
alcohol was prevalent : NYC
was a 'bar town' to be sure.
I'd known of the old artist
quarters, the taverns and the
bars of the old writers and
painters  -  all that Cedar Tavern
stuff, the famous photos, the
tales of brawling and loving,
all along the Village streets.
But I'd never seen it in person,
nor 'up close and personal' as
they say. My friend Jim Tomberg
could spin a bottle of whiskey
like a juggler with three balls,
and I often saw him plastered
and down and out. I even had
to help his predicament a few
times  -  I've written of that
hole in the floor episode, and
his occasional women, in past
chapters here. Booze was
just booze. If you tried, back
then, walking through the
Park (Washington Square),
alcohol immediately took a
back seat to the surreptitious
and whispered trade of joints,
marijuana, and any other name
for hand-held drugs of that
nature. Unlike now, when
most all of it's legal and
probably even pasteurized
for you, in the years I'm
speaking of, it was all a
secretive, and dangerous,
trade, mostly proffered by
seedy looking black guys
who always talked low
about what you may
have been seeking. Or
not. Quick cash changing
hands, or a quick sit-down
at the bench, for the
transaction. There were
always cops lurking, it was
still a real crime, and the
busts and fines and lock-up
times were serious matters.
All of this was delineated
by sections and corridors,
and just out of this area
was the Bowery. That was
an entirely other raft of
Medusas : Men lost, and
I mean lost. Soiled, fouled
and dirty, wearing their
own excrement sometimes,
as a cloth. There used to be
a word often heard, though
it's no more in use  - 'uncouth.'
Yes, and what a premise is
that. Like the old uncle you
bring to the table, who then
burps and barfs all over it,
these guys danced alone at
their own small parties of
woe and dread. Sad cases.
The street was littered with
them, for sure right up into
the late '80's. Drunked, or
passed out, zombified, or
dead. You'd see them in
doorways and frontages,
or bent over curbs and
hydrants; barely alive. I
can recall  -  this is a bit
different, but it catches the
quality  -  being there with a
friend from Sewaren and his
girlfriend from Minnesota.
The guy had to pee. And so
he did. Right there, on the
side of a building, broad
daylight. It was a category
of event I'd never thought of
before, and I was astounded.
No one cared, looked up, or
squinted. It was just as natural
as a dog pees. Since 1967, I'd
never once given a thought to
doing something like that. These
Bowery guys, and this Sewaren
guy too, they just rolled right
into it as human-aspect moisture
behavior. Floored me near to
death. I must have missed
something all those years.
-
Everything has certainly been
flipped. Now, 25 years later, if
you get caught peeing in public
they'll drag you away with a
hand-cuff necklace; but you
can stroll through Washington
Square Park with a joint in your
mouth, and a spare single one
in your pocket, and get the 
high-five, hail-ye-fellow routine
as you walk along. I don't
know where all those black guys
went and what they do for a
living now, but that world
is a different place.


Saturday, September 29, 2018

11,199. THE WAYWARD CHILD OF GLEASON FIELD

THE WAYWARD CHILD 
OF GLEASON FIELD
Like maybe the wayward moon
thriving high but ever lonesome
in all its stages to full and wane
and full again we turn our heads
up to the light we see from Gleason
Field. It is nearly October first.
-
An old motorcar, the old, old type,
sits unmounted in the open clearing.
The dimmest of old metal tries to
shine. But there is nothing there, 
and the rubber has rotted from off
its rims. Weeds grow up around and
through what once was called a 
'running board.' Beneath this sky,
it too scrunches forward, determined
for something to be there for it.
-
It is nearly October first, and
this is Gleason Field.

Friday, September 28, 2018

11,198. RUDIMENTS, pt. 455

RUDIMENTS, pt. 455
(mistletoe and redwing)
My God may have made me
an entity, I'll admit, but the
burden of responsibility was
for me to, or not to, pick up
the mantle given to me. My
situation was whatever it
was : Goodbye Bayonne
harborlands, early. Hello
Avenel. Rhymed with
'What the Hell,' so I took
the young-boy cudgel. And
now here I am. The message
I've taken up of late is in
the finishing of the story,
however it goes. I may gag
on a tuna sandwich tomorrow.
My heart might stop here  - !
!! -  in mid-sentence (ha ha
fooled you). Or I may have
12 more years some some
sanctimonious pussyfooting
yet to do. I used to tease my
Mother endlessly, in two
ways, as a young guy. She
was very impressionable,
and naive. I'd tell her I
was going to die, and that
I knew it, at age 42. She'd
gasp, and get all upset.
One day I awoke, and I
was 42. 'Oh damn,' I said
to myself, 'now I've done
it.' At least she was glad I
was surviving. And the other
thing was, I'd be talking to
her, or standing around, and
I'd just fall over dead. (It was
an acting trick picked in the
Drama Dept.). Playing dead
was the easiest thing in the
world. And then one day,
waiting for the Princeton
train, at the Dinky Station,
I was reading the Meditations
of Marcus Aurelius and I ran
across that quote I'd forgotten
about; some version of 'Live
your life as if you were already
dead.' That hit me hard, woke
me right up from a dream.
So, since then, I have.
-
Now, as I mentioned, it's
end-game  -  as I enter those
final scenes deep in the last
act, it's all good. I thrive.
But I have still to write an
ending. Hard parts coming
up, a big plural, one after
the other. All the things
once established in the early
parts of the play are long
gone. There's a line in old
theater-writing training,
that says something like,
(I poorly approximate here),
'The gun that's introduced
in Act 1 must go off by
Act 3.' That makes sense
and means nothing
'superfluous' should be
entered in, scene-wise,
if it's not to play a role.
Trouble here is (hello
real life) everything put
up in those early scenes
is all gone, torn apart and
asunder. Try getting out
of this mess, you creep.
It's now a complete re-write.
-
No one has ever claimed
that I'm clear, but why
should I be  -  this life
itself is a mad jumble,
and things get scrambled
up and mixed around right
before your eyes. It's a
giant with whom we all
must wrestle. Nothing
really stands on its own
two feet  - there are flows
and currents always running
beneath, alongside, and
over things, They two
must be reckoned with.
Only rhetoric wins the day :
Well, I'm not sure what I
mean by that, but I'll let
it stay. Is all this comic?
Or is it pathetic? The sort
of thing this all is a bit like
a mystery volume you win
at a fair. Some strange and
oddly alluringly young lady
hands you your prize : A
book with no ending, one
that refuses to tell you the
end of its story, and which
also won't let you in on what
the author thinks might be
the best end for the story.
Like Avenel, it makes
absolutely no difference
whether you laugh or do
not laugh. Here you are,
either way. The mythic
proportions abound. Those
here, as I am, who say the
place is a dismal horse's ass
of a wreck, and the ones here
who say it's the most wonderful
horse's ass they've ever seen.
And they love it. Then you
have all those faraways who,
given five dollars, pipe in :
It's a dungheap; I'm so glad
I got away. And the others
who  say, I grew up there, I
miss the place, my best
memories were there. They're
blockheaded enough to act
as if that place still existed.
Jesus, where's the gun from
Act One? Give it to me.
-
I never transformed? I never
returned? I thought I'd done
both. One time, at the old
library location when it was
n Rahway Ave., my girlfriend
worked there and I had been
teaching her to drive, my '62
VW. She got the hang of the
stick-shift pretty well, but had
some trouble with the push-down
sequence needed to get the
lever into reverse. Well, she
missed this one and started
out in reverse, except it was
first. Right into the building
at about 5 mph. The metal
bumper took a hit, but no 
big deal. And she probably 
woke up a few nappers inside. 
(I told here there was a book 
in there, by a guy named R. U.
Napping, called, 'Sleepers
Awake!' There wasn't really,
I made it up). But in like 1984
or so, there really was a book
called 'Sleepers, Wake!' I was
15 years ahead of the curve.
My gun went off too early.
(Hey! I think that's how I
became a father too).
-
Mistletoe and Redwing?
You're probably wondering.
That's the title of a play I 
wrote, in Avenel, while sitting
night after night at that dingy
library or Rahway Avenue,
(it's Woodbridge really, but who
cares. I claim it for Avenel).
Redwing is a prison in
Minnesota, a large, boys'
reformatory (a big place, not
fat guys). It was about love
and caring (thus the mistletoe),
in the miserable life of kids
who've gone wrong. Yep, I
wrote it, it was pretty cool,
and I've never seen it since.
I put it somewhere, and there
it's stayed. Like a gun in
Act One that never went off.






11,197. WHEN THE PESTILENCE

WHEN THE PESTILENCE
When the pestilence came to stay
we all fell to the ground, realizing
no place else to go. Crimes against
the Republic, they called it. There
were some men in the tower, lost in
their space. We called them James
and Giuseppe and sought their grace.
But there was none to be had. Just
the silly meandering of people who'd
broken out in the same warts that the
pestilence brings : crimes against both
thought and reason, the secular faults
of an idiot race; men squirming to
fail, in an idiot place.