'Twas a Miserable Night Before Christmas

’Twas the night before Christmas

and I was alone drinking gin,

Evicted from my apartment,

now at a Holiday Inn.

The bar room was empty

except for a lush,

and the bartender sighed

in an obvious rush.

I hunched on the bar, 

confounded with woe,

with nothing to do

and no place to go.

I paid my tab and

wandered outside,

not to see the world

but only to hide.

When out in the parking lot there

arose such a clatter.

I cautiously ambled to

see what was the matter.

I tip toed silently, sticking 

to shade,

in the hopes that I wouldn’t be seen or 

be made.

When what to my shock

did appear:

a Cadillac-driving pimp

drinking a beer.

An odd little fellow 

with a feather-in-cap,

he had a pet marmot nestled

in his lap.

He smiled at me and 

called himself Slinky,

and pushed up his yellow glasses

with a cocaine-nailed pinky.

From the motel his train of ladies,

they came,

and he whistled and shouted

and called them by name.

“Hey Angel, hey Autumn,

hey Zoe, hey Mindy…

Oh Desire and Summer and

Candy and Cindy!

Off to the bars and clubs,

to go find a john,

Now get away, get away,

don’t make me wait long!”

Then Slinky sped off like a bat

out of Hell,

where he was off to I couldn’t

quite tell. 

I moved back to the motel

in search of my room,

overcome by depression from this 

holiday gloom,

when I was ambushed by the junkie Jack

and his girlfriend named Jill:

who demanded my wallet with a gun,

and threatened to kill.

As I raised up my hands and was

turning around,

a humongous club-wielding biker

struck Jack to the ground.

He was covered in tattoos with

chains from his belt,

and fists the size of rackets

which junkie Jill surely felt.

His black boots were steel-toed

which he used to kick Jack,

until crazy Jill killed him with a shot

to the back.

His eyes, how they clouded,

as he bled out and died;

Jack and Jill they did split

while I sat there and cried.

The cops and paramedics on his big belly

did press,

but his life was long gone

and he was a killer no less.

I continued to my room in desperate need of a 

drink,

or a shot of morphine and a quality

shrink.

From the elevator entrance I could see from

afar,

the door to my motel room was splintered and

ajar.

I found inside a woman grinding a man’s lap,

but she secretly worked vice, was a cop,

the poor sap!

My shoulders were sagged as I left my

motel,

essentially convinced I was truly

in Hell.

When walking to nowhere I met a fat drunk bum,

dressed like Santa and pissing while guzzling

rum.

He smiled at me with a drunken delight,

My god he was filthy, his teeth such a fright.

Without warning he threw his bottle at my

head,

shattering and making me wish

I were dead.

The bum rolled me while down and then ran

up the street,

obviously facing a last call

he was eager to beat.

Before he departed he looked back to me that fat shmuck,

and said “Merry Christmas to you, 

you miserable fuck!” 

-Contemptible holidays, ye coke-addled freaks.

Shelter From the Storm

"Twas in another lifetime..."

Man... I've never heard more prophetic nor strangely fatalistic words in my life. And considering they were blaring out from my left leg pocket while wandering lonely nocturnal streets in an abandoned city and... well, I can't help but get introspective. After all, who else could muster such self-analysis and nostalgia as Bob Dylan?

It's been a long time since I've taken a stab at this thing called writing. I know what you're thinking and no... I have not been procrastinating; I have not been stalling due to lack of inspiration or creativity or any other bullshit aphorism that self-acclaimed "artists" utilize to rationalize their laziness; I haven't been tripping on LSD while setting up elaborate, 'Mousetrap'-esque obstacles for Barbary monkeys on Gibraltar; Hell... I haven't even been wasting my time strapped to an inverted crucifix while a leather-clad, red-headed maiden wielding a cat-o-nine tails.... well, I think you get my point.

No... I have not been skirting around the topic at hand. Instead, I've been standing aside... watching with a combination of a voyeur's gusto and a scientist's curiosity as the events of life continue to unfold. Whatever sardonic, self-flattering fuck decreed that life is but a play and we must all play our parts can go sit on a grenade and count daisies as far as I'm concerned. Because who is content to play the role assigned to them; to play the cards dealt? Just as I played the prodigal and anticipated chance turning my way and the dice to fall favorably, I was blindsided. Completely devastated. Broken beyond repair and redemption, if I can play the overly dramatic. The entire framework I had structured my life around had been blown to gooey bits like a goose through a 747 turbine. And that seemed to just be the first mile marker in a very long, very unfortunate, and very, very trying road  I've been walking. The only solace I could take from it all was that I was long since a goddamned whiskey-soaked cynic who expected the worse and said "I told you so" every time I was proven right.   Had I been an optimist... there would have been no chance of salvaging meaning, reason, and motivation.

But I won't deny that I was in some weird non-combat version of PTSD. Days were spent under the cover of a bed sheet and a hangover, nights lost to a kaleidoscope of fermented elixirs; sight became some cruel adaptation of a Rorschach test. I pushed away those who mattered most and squandered my time with the damned shadows and squeaking floorboards of isolation. After all, misery is its own best company. Or however that goddamned platitude goes.

The moral of it all is... how the fuck should I know? What am I? Some sort of stoic sage sitting under a bodhi tree? No... I'm a sarcastic jackass with the same amount of issues as everyone else and one method of coping: writing. Yet, during this tirade of tragedy... the little cabal of Indo-European voices that reside in my head and are considered muses went silent. And yes... I'm just being glib: as if I'd trust Indo-Europeans to guide my pen! I'm pretty sure the voices are some sort of Polynesian derivative. But I digress... again. Hey, if you don't like it, you can leave any damned time you like! Go ahead, see if I care!

Okay okay, let's not lose our cool. Every relationship has its quarrels.

Basically, I'm saying that I found myself in an abandoned parking lot in the middle of Utah, screaming till I coughed up blood and molars and pummeled the asphalt like I was high on PCP. And I was left voiceless: I lacked the will and way to manage the tribulations of my fucked up tragi-com life. When such a thing happens, it's only natural for us, as mildly intelligent and less hairy apes to question, doubt, and even resent the past.

And then my apartment buzzer shrieked out at 11:30 on a Monday night. It was a relatively new friend who, despite the brief duration of our relationship, had proven to be beautifully unique, marvelously wise, and immensely profound. She swept in so leisurely, as if no time had passed since our last encounter. As always, I was captivated as she slowly sipped a rocks only Scotch and pondered her current circumstances. We drank and we talked and we sat in silence; we shared our stories and exchanged our past griefs.

When she stood to leave, she paused and looked at me.
"I really regret my time in New York," she said, the apathetic shrug not present but completely implied. She then smiled as we entered the twilight wasteland of sleeping Somerville. It wasn't until I was heading back home that her words really struck home. "Regretting time," I muttered to myself repeatedly, causing two elderly women who had been walking beside me to cross the street and fall silent.

It was then that I realized: I wish I could regret my past. I wish I could hold onto my anger and my disappointment and my frustration. But life just doesn't allow it. In the past few months I have seen the extent to which life wiggles its chubby little fingers. I have watched families shatter and its members fall into ruin, I facilitated the union between two young, earnestly loving people and watched as they solidified bonds for eternity; and I have seen hope in the darkest dustpan.

Life is nothing we can anticipate. It isn't a roadmap that we so easily follow. Instead, it is a corn maze with no solution. But we can only learn from the wrong turns we make.

As for the relevance of this all? To quote myself: who the fucks knows?" All I know is that though we don't necessarily have to play our parts, we can certainly utilize our skills for the betterment of ourselves and well... I guess... mankind. My part is to bring entertainment, humor, sarcasm, and critique to all things. So goddamned it... you haven't lost my words. Even if, on occasion, I do...

...but not for long.