Belated Christmas Post

Forgive me, the Christmas season got in the way of my writing.

I'm trying to think of a good creative topic sentence and I'm getting oranges in the stocking toes.

None of us got oranges in our stockings, but I think we discussed it during the stocking opening.

The first stocking opening. I got two this year.

This year, Christmas made me tired. In fact, I enjoyed more just sitting around with family way into the night before and after Christmas.

I received everything I wanted, and my birthday is coming up. I really can't remember what else I asked for. Turning 23 isn't so big anyway. Mostly everybody does it sometime.

Perhaps a Christmas poem inspired by my family…

12 drunkards drinking

11 Winos whining

10 unopened gifts

9 broken down boxes

8 family members

7 Friscos frolicking

6 stocking stuffers

5 darling daughters

4 sets of bowls

3 text messages

2 gag gifts

and a brand new pair of jeans.

This is how my family does Christmas…

Merry Christmas everyone! I promise I'll be more on my game next weekend.

Unsleep

As he pulls you from the abstract well…

Shoot.

Sit straight up.

Tick tick tick. Goes the wall clock.

Hear that and that.

Sirens in the midnight clear.

Clacks and hums from the heater.

Bzzzzzz. The broken freezer.

Your neighbor vomiting by your and his shared bathroom wall.

His alarm beeping. And then quiet. And then beeping for hours.

The crank of a door down the hall at two.

Laughing.

Creak goes the mattress as you turn over.

Hum goes the air.

Whoosh goes the air next to your ears.

Static-like.

He magically pulls you from the well wheel dry…

A foot.

His foot tapping in your ankle.

An elbow in your back.

A heavy breathing.

A turning, turning, sighing.

Springs in your mattress.

Blue glow from the clock.

Fluttering lights on the window pane.

The surge protector's orange switch glow.

Twisted sheets.

Turn over and over.

Along the well he magically pulls you.

Blankness

You sit and stare at the computer screen. Go on, type a little. Type: Reasons Why I've Lost My Marbles.

Sleep like a memory machine on overdrive…which means not at all.

Eat like a rabbit who eats ice cream.

Shower twice a day or not at all.

Stare at the page five times until its blankness turns black.

This is who you are. You are a crazy creepy author with no marbles and blackness for words.

You grab a cup of tea. Not grab exactly. Not pour either. Turn on the machine? Turn on the tea. Turn a cup of tea on?

So you don't get tea. Scoop a bowl of ice cream. But scooping bowls makes them break.

Go back empty handed. Scroll through text messages. Scroll through names. Schedule a date for two weeks from now and plan on emailing twelve people to let them know you'll have to rearrange things next Sunday. Occasionally glance at the document with the neatly typed heading and the soon-to-be catchy title and think: maybe there is something, anything else I can do right now.

Move the computer to your lap. Move it to the bed. Put it back on the desk and view it from the kitchen. Begin a step. Then empty the dishwasher. Try again towards the desk. Go around the corner and sit back on the bed. Glance from there. Its still blank, no mistaking it. Still blank.

Tap your fingers. Attempt to tap your toes. Whistle air and spit. Look down at your hands. Look back at the screen. Set a firm brow. Run towards it before it's gone. Sit. Settle. Lay your fingers to the keys. Smile. Type the word the.

Let the rest flow outward:

Don't stop for fear of never starting again.

Blink your eyes to be sure its really there.

Do not edit until the end.

Insert the heading.

Write the references.

Email it out.

Don't breathe until it's finished. Then take one last long look. And never go back.

Twitch until the computer screen goes blank again. Start over.

Call

I write in second person in general. Just so you know. This one felt different though.

That has to be him. It's his back.

The way his hair stands up just at the crown and he never shaves his neck except for when he goes to the barber.

Call him.

            Call.

                        Call his name.

You yell it, those two syllables like fire on your tongue from three blocks away. Make sure he hears you. Feels the heat.

But he doesn't turn.

Call again.

His name.

The man just walks on down the block. Even pace. No twitches when you call out.

Again. For a third time.

What man wears a purple coat anyway? On a Sunday.

With a damn blackbird.

Raven.

Ravens and Poe.

Poe was from Baltimore.

He was from Dallas. Couldn't of been him.

Pull out from your wide knowledge of literature and your short knowledge of sports.

Definitely wasn't him.

Poe is Baltimore.

Dallas must be something else.

Must not be him.

Reach and try to find him.

On a street corner where he's never be in the middle of the day on a Sunday. 

In a city he wouldn't go to.

In this heat.

See him at a café on Boulder, a blank billboard around the corner from your market. At the door when the UPS guy drops off the mail.

Always it must be him.

Call him.

            Call. Call his name.