RUDIMENTS, pt. 1,054
(transcript...)
"...And then like some unsought-for
pterodactyl he would suddenly seem to
come to life and be around everywhere
I went. Like some hillbilly in disguise
with a flannel shirt for parents and
two mud-boots for twin sisters, he'd
just be there hanging around listening
and misunderstanding and then
misrepresenting things and talking
out of turn and he'd never read a
newspaper - he said - that he could
believe and even the 'car ads were
mostly wrong' but he'd sit around
eating candy and hard rolls whenever
he found them to be available and
the crusty old people at the general
store down the patch by the river-bend
started taking to him and letting him
in on rainy days and the like and he'd
become such a fixture at Bilobay's
General Store that no one ever flinched
anymore, even if he came in covered
in concrete and cement dust and with
big patches of dried stucco and paste
stuck onto his shirt - as long as he
could still talk he would. And then
he started smelling as bad as he
looked but no one would ever tell
him; but there WERE people (it was
said - after a while) who wanted
him dead and who'd talked about
shooting him during hunting season
or mistaking him for a deer or
whatever, (but I said 'whoever saw
a deer with a fluorescent-orange
farmer's cap on?'), and then they'd
argue over where to put the body
or how to dump his remains (and
I'd say 'take him back home in
your wagon and dump his dead
ass in the corner of that shit-shack
he's living in and leave him there
covered with leaves for a month
or two, until some bear or animal
gets him and then blame that -
NO ONE ever convicts Mother
Nature!" and they laughed me off
and said "shut up or there'll be
two to kill") so I did and - maimed
stupid or dead or not - I began
seeing much less of him after
this sort of talk got around.'
-
'But people always told me it's
like that in small towns and
small places where everyone
gets in everyone else's business
and there's no reason for talking
except to answer others' questions,
and if you start talking to yourself
they'd just say you were crazy anyway
and it would all be the same thing;
and I realized that was true in its
way but so was the big city - every
elevator floor on every stupid landing
with people at every doorway,
watching who you are and what
you bring or who and the deft little
suggested things they mention in
the elevator alone with you - who
Mr. Johannsen's been seeing or
how 'loud' that Betty Jansley in
224 gets sometimes: (the subtext
of that being she's a true sexual
animal with all sorts of men laying
pipe to her doorway 'if you know
what I mean'). And so, just because
the subject matter is a little different
it's all the same too- the communal
doorway of some crummy walk-up
smelling of soup and potatoes or
incense and peppers, and the boots
piled up in the alcove belong to no
one at all, but the garbage bags
thrown about never move and Melly
Katz in 28 is a nasty bitch screecher
and Murray Sabol on the third floor
runs around bare-ass naked all day
in his rooms, and the O'Bannion
Brothers keep a filthy place and
should be for certain run out. It's
everywhere the same but in the
small country-places. I suppose,
MAYBE, it's easier to just SHOOT
someone and put the problem aside
but America's always been a place
of weak constitution - pun, I guess
intended - and the Bill of Rights
ain't never been paid and marked
'overdue' it's probably ignored.
It's more like a Bill of Fare now
anyhow, getting all eaten up now
as it is. If you have to do something,
you first have to grease the palm
('good ole' Americanny cash please'),
of some or another local magistrate
intent on the boozing and with his
finger in some dike, some Dutch Boy
from Hell, bamboozling Mrs. Fedders
while her husband's away. But the
INFERENCE is never the same as
the obvious distraction of what's
being said - and just down the
road is the turkey farm with
two thousand white gobblers
alive in the yard-pens every
year until October comes around
and they start taking orders and
BOOM BAM just like that by
mid-November there's not a
fresh one to be found all orders
for Thanksgiving having been
already filled: 'fresh kill is the
best kill' the motto being. And
the cutest thing around for sure
'is the babe who tends the
turkeys and it's her family farm
that's been around for generations,
and they were the ones who started
the entire mess by going commercial
and paving some areas for parking
and trucks and turning their farm
into a death-factory for turkeys
and quail and geese and the rest;
but whatever she's beautiful as
she goes about her late September
chores looking like some homing
angel from Heaven with a gleam
in her eyes. But she never steps
out never gets about and the
only boyfriend she ever had
is the guy she met at Ag School
and he now lives 45 miles away,
but all that stays in her mind as
memory fresh, and she scoots
off every chance she gets to see
him once more and his maroon
BMW too is quite often on the
scene right there in the yard,
and it's often been known the
things she's done and the
bedroom light upstairs comes
on at the damnedest times -
and right next to it that little
bathroom light they keep. And
now, out front, they've put a
'Help Wanted' sign and everyone
knows what THAT means Ha Ha
Guffaw Guffaw : that's the talk
at Billobay's when they get the
chance to talk, and when every
small-town crime like this is
always the same: LUST AND
ENVY AND SLOTH all being
mixed together like some
gruel or slop one feeds to
livestock and hopes it sticks.
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