Grape, That Red Whore Daze

GRAPE, AIR “You like the rain?”

Stricken by the memory of when I was asked that, I almost said No:

Yes.

“What do you like about it?”

I smiled, shrugged: The possibilities---

That it can wash away and cleanse haunting. And it makes me sad, the memories that come with it.

How long have you been back on it?

“A week or so…”

And before that?

“Nine months ago.”

I laughed: You count.

Yes, you have to count.

“And you?”

Nine, going on ten years.

“Apparently, I can’t handle things off it…”

What things, these things---- life that pulls us down into spins of the ridiculous--- yours--- and my preposterous.

“You cut your hair.”

I had it hacked,

memories. And now I need grape to sleep. It has come once more to this--- substitutes for what can enable us to live instead of pills.

Life is about being off them. I’m double-checking sobriety, you know.

“They like you.”

I’m glad. They were your friends, after all.

“It was a good performance.”

It was, wasn’t it?

Ah, but see, I don’t pretend anymore, Miss…

Miss…Miss…Missed you hunger and hissing it in this exhaustion---- I sway in this, twirling in a grape haze.

RED WHORE EFFECT, “How I like this Red Whore Daze…”

The quietness of a sitting after being a feast for fingers and lips longing for seven years…I think about the wind and the air.

Air replied, “Incomplete info. Y?/Was (am) I Air OR Wind to you? Lemme know, ja? D’avero.”

I reply, That was my brain blathering Red Whore and deconstructing the two. The question was---

“Air.”

I smile, Ah…You know, I missed you yesterday.

“…And do you miss me today?”

The Red Whore says yes… And to a thrall unwilling and reluctant to be more enthralled--- I am wind.

It is just I and this--- reading while a hand holds me the way it has always wanted, dreamed, now this: Barcelona Jazz lulling me to sleep. I’ve spun off the edge to this flat line, what is dead, the trepidation of the violin, this veiled anger. Do I answer what has been cut dead?

I am air and if one can breathe without me, then I am wind. And even breathing becomes mechanical.

How is breathing nowadays?

Time is running the ground of boxes and lines all connected by strings. Rain and sun, rain and sun--- they all run from each other, off.

How is breathing nowadays---- cold, mechanical, anger.

AFTER, MATH

Pleasure from a rainy afternoon---- sleep after fingertips and lips. To be loved by a hand and that mouth. And I--- I am still locked to you, unlocked only to you--- this impulse to tell but what will it do? Dead and ended: I am hearing opera, I am hearing loss, I am being fed by loneliness I ease. I am hiding--- jilting birthdays without guilt, incapable of feeling in this daze--- until Monday comes to ground me.

Laughter, “I know it hurts…Want a pill?”

I croak, “No thanks…I’m a masochist, the drunkards say. This reminds me never to do Red Whore again.”

Laughter, “Spinning, huh?”

I mutter, “Catch it before it spins out of control. Gotta reach the flat line to begin.”

I am Damn Skippy--- skipper to you----Damn Chippy, chipper you. I laugh and shake my head at this place, this space where no one knows--- a hole. I remain this distance and time, this dream, this nightmare of life.

I confuse all these hearts: I am poisoning.

Laughter, “That’s usually your effect, you know…You confuse… Oh these faces…”

I snort, “Why the heck would I be confusing?”

Laughing answer, “Exactly…Oh these faces seeing what’s beyond their little perceptions of X and Y…That you have places like this where you can just go…”

I shake my head, smile, “You look good. How many sober days has it been for you?”

Smile, “Three. It was going to kill me. We all agreed.”

I sigh, “Shit, I told you. And you’ve been forgetting. But he says that you just pretend to forget.”

Laughter, “Got me on that one. Tells me to learn how to vomit. I don’t.”

I wince, “Some of the guys tell me the same thing. But yeah, it’s the only way life’s tolerable nowadays. And I do it thrice a week now. Man, this hurts. And I’m beyond hurt already. Glad you’re back in the wagon…”

Laughter, “How many has it been now?”

I scoff, “I’m not counting the ticking bombs aloud.”

Sigh, “All right, which ones are these this time?”

I struggle over each word that counts human numbers in the daze, like business strategies called decoupling or how a guitar with nylon strings would often sound off jazz.

S…H…O…W…E…R

Concern, “You need hot water?”

I shake my head, “Cold. It has to be cold. Snap me out of the daze.”

More concern, “You want to vomit it out?”

I gag, “I hate vomiting. At least I’m not freezing. There’s that bracing though, every day. And I’m not doing charcoal, you hear? I’ll fucking kill myself first before I go through that crap again. Seriously…”

Which is sadder--- never finding love or finding it and knowing that you can’t have it?

A heart had once said to a heart inside a restroom, “I found the woman I will love as long as I’m alive and she’s right there, outside.”

The other heart kept its silence, I can’ t have her, too.

Outside of the outside, there I was--- drunk and screaming the sleeping name to wake, “I DON’T HAVE MY KEYS! I DON’T KNOW WHERE I PLACED THEM!” Opened Boxes, Opened Jars--- Opened---- Opened that gate, Opened that door. And I stumbled into those arms, crying gibberish about being sick again, of being grounded every ten days by lives depending on a life, of being dismayed at human words, of being the same love of these hearts, of sleep. Being led to the bed like an old lady, stooped and feverish, mumbling to tell where I was…

Whispered calm, laughter, “…Yeah, she’s here. I don’t know where she came from. Not asking. Safe but really, really, really drunk. And very tired. I don’t know why…”

I hiccupped, “Oh shut up…It’s called spinning…It’s been eight months since I slipped. It’s a fucked wagon, a screwed saddle, and I’m back in the saddle again, right where a friend is a friend…Or is it the end…”

“Uh-oh, looks like the Red Whore…” DAWN AND THE NEXT

NOON

She entered the living room and stopped--- seeing a woman’s gold high heels.

A smile, placed fingertips to lips, “She’s here. Asleep.”

She smiled--- knowing that the woman of this house had come once more--- and silently cleaned.

The woman of the house was asleep on the bed, naked under the sheets. The first time she woke up, she asked, “Why the heck am I naked?”

Laughter, shake of the head, “Hot and cold. Don’t you worry…You have to eat.”

The woman of the house mumbled off to sleep once more, “Jesus Christ…Later when I wake up… Thanks…”

There are no snakes in Ireland---

THE NEXT DAY

I wake up to this and asking, “Why are there no snakes in Ireland? And the only reptile is the newt?”

A startle, “You’re awake…Good. It’s St. Patrick’s soil.”

I say, “No shit? Can we have someone ship soil from there? I think I’d like to have a vial of it in my person all the time.”

Laughter, “Was it the Red Whore? It sure looked like it.”

The Red Whore--- kissed by one, loved by two, wanting to be penetrated by three, no memory of details like kisses but the body remembers being touched and stretched---- the foolery of Lady Jane, the pain of the inside poisoned by the Red Whore.

I mumble, “The Vikings were really a marauding lot, huh? Terrifying to live in those times. Just terrific. Yep.”

Laughter, “How many did you have?”

I concentrate, “Not even a lot. Three? Four? It just hit me. Poison added to toxicity.”

Laughter, “That’s a lot. What the hell were you doing drinking the Red Whore?”

I swallow, “Just detox. But I couldn’t taste anything. Substitute. And really, after much grape, beer tastes like horse piss. I imagine because I haven’t tasted that. Yuck. Reality testing. Did you know that Robot is the Czech word for Worker? And Slave comes from Slavic…Or is it the other way around…St. Jude is in my head now… ”

Laughter, “Really? Etymology again, huh? You should come over more, you know.”

I laugh, “Yeah… I should make more time from no time. Keep you sober.”

Laughter again, “You’re gonna kill yourself one of these days.”

I groan, “Yeah… You think air can be killed?”

Laughter once more.

CLIMBING D

O

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N

FROM SANCTUARY TO THE S

T

A

I

R

S

OF REALITY :

I say, “I have to go home. They might be worried already. Or pissed.”

Concern, “Pissed? You think so?”

I answer, “Besides missing her birthday and her feeling hurt, no. I did say that I was way too drunk and where I was. I’ll be asked what’s the problem and I won’t really tell.”

Leaving in borrowed green and gold boxers, Elvis shirt, and my own gold high heels, I shake my head, “Well, shit, the last time something like this happened was ten years ago…” Spinning after, unraveling realities, freezing. I say, relieved, impertinent, cheeky, “Thank you for the sanctuary, always. Love, Your Red Whore.”

Later, asked, “Where have you been?! You’re persona non grata in her book!”

I remember the last time I skipped Sorry, I can’t face any of you when I’m like this, laugh, hug, “Sorry. Hey, I told you what happened and where I was.”

Sigh, laughter, “Hah! I told the parents about you!”

I ask, “Yeah? And what did you tell them?”

Snort, “That you went out and got wasted.”

I sigh, “Yeah, just dealing with some shit. And what did they say?”

Laugh, “They were asking what was your problem.”

I laugh, “You should have told them I’ve gone crazy again.”