Bikes line the curb in front of the hospital. They came through the grapevine, a swarm of tarantula hawks from the high desert. Their men have the cropped ears of pit bulls and their eyes are radish hearts hurting in the lights. “Hey! Hey Baby! My love is stronger than a water buffalo!” from the bike with Hardblood painted on its tank, the color of a bruise.
Nurses in emergency walk the man behind the curtain. His chin streaked with grease, his back tattooed with a blood dripping swastika. His ear held by eight stitches, opens in the doctor's light. Damn coon, if I ever see him again I'll pull his head off and shit in his neck!
Sweat falls, a glass strand of hair across the cheek of a nurse. Her fingers a bundle of corn stalks as she holds …show more content…
Cleaning my carburetor, I run a brush inside the float chamber.
I rinse it, dry it, blowing a bead of gas off its lip. I set it in a box. Wipe my hands, forming the rag into the head of this man. He'd wear an ivory cross on the chain around his neck, have a scar on one cheek, the shape of a funnel. He'd follow me into the kitchen, into the living room, down the gorge behind my house.
If he showed me sores on his hands, he'd tell me they are from engines, wrenches, and his fights for supremacy over women, blacks, Jews. He feels a siren's wail pass over his shoulder, a vulture's wing gathering wind. He remembers doing time, unfolds a creased photograph of him and his woman camping. Their clothes dry near the fire. She sits on his lap, wrapped in a towel, her head on his shoulder. A black wolf troubles his dreams with floating roses in its gray eyes.
His mother in a green plaid skirt pulls a basket of groceries.
Her cane's handle, palmed dark, rests on her forefinger. She stoops for a paper clip exposing a Y of veins. Slips her finger nail under one end, pushes it into a crack. Presses her thumb to the clip, and …show more content…
Laughing, he says, “She didn't find it for years her and her gold teeth.” His father when supper was late, would yell, "Beth! You can piss me off!" and toss his lunch pail on the cupboard. Then, he went for his son, punched him in the face.
"Don't start crying now," he'd yell, then he'd make him bring him a beer, sit beside him during the news. A welder, he died in the ship’s hull, the sun resting between thel wings of dark clouds. His son slides his tongue over his chew, picks, and crumples a eucalyptus leaf. He’d beat me like I was his slave.
When he hit his pregnant woman in the eye, it turned into a peeled plum. He split her lip for three stitches. She locked herself in the bathroom, looked in the mirror. Her mouth opened as if to see the baby's head, red with purple veins, and five tufts of hair. He won't listen to "Dedication of a Plot of Ground," or "The head on a Pole." I would pluck the emerald bit from Orion's horse head nebula, and with a knife he slices, Williams, Neruda, Patchen, Vallejo. Their pages are pieces of leaves caught in the
Nurses in emergency walk the man behind the curtain. His chin streaked with grease, his back tattooed with a blood dripping swastika. His ear held by eight stitches, opens in the doctor's light. Damn coon, if I ever see him again I'll pull his head off and shit in his neck!
Sweat falls, a glass strand of hair across the cheek of a nurse. Her fingers a bundle of corn stalks as she holds …show more content…
Cleaning my carburetor, I run a brush inside the float chamber.
I rinse it, dry it, blowing a bead of gas off its lip. I set it in a box. Wipe my hands, forming the rag into the head of this man. He'd wear an ivory cross on the chain around his neck, have a scar on one cheek, the shape of a funnel. He'd follow me into the kitchen, into the living room, down the gorge behind my house.
If he showed me sores on his hands, he'd tell me they are from engines, wrenches, and his fights for supremacy over women, blacks, Jews. He feels a siren's wail pass over his shoulder, a vulture's wing gathering wind. He remembers doing time, unfolds a creased photograph of him and his woman camping. Their clothes dry near the fire. She sits on his lap, wrapped in a towel, her head on his shoulder. A black wolf troubles his dreams with floating roses in its gray eyes.
His mother in a green plaid skirt pulls a basket of groceries.
Her cane's handle, palmed dark, rests on her forefinger. She stoops for a paper clip exposing a Y of veins. Slips her finger nail under one end, pushes it into a crack. Presses her thumb to the clip, and …show more content…
Laughing, he says, “She didn't find it for years her and her gold teeth.” His father when supper was late, would yell, "Beth! You can piss me off!" and toss his lunch pail on the cupboard. Then, he went for his son, punched him in the face.
"Don't start crying now," he'd yell, then he'd make him bring him a beer, sit beside him during the news. A welder, he died in the ship’s hull, the sun resting between thel wings of dark clouds. His son slides his tongue over his chew, picks, and crumples a eucalyptus leaf. He’d beat me like I was his slave.
When he hit his pregnant woman in the eye, it turned into a peeled plum. He split her lip for three stitches. She locked herself in the bathroom, looked in the mirror. Her mouth opened as if to see the baby's head, red with purple veins, and five tufts of hair. He won't listen to "Dedication of a Plot of Ground," or "The head on a Pole." I would pluck the emerald bit from Orion's horse head nebula, and with a knife he slices, Williams, Neruda, Patchen, Vallejo. Their pages are pieces of leaves caught in the