 | |  | |  | |  | |  | |  | |  |
by Willie Smith
A scrawny drifter crawls in to spend the night. A rare but not unheard-of
treat. He squirms a moment, then settles down. Mutters half asleep treatment
locked him out. Because the social worker sent him first to Harborview.
Where he encountered the wrong desk.
Security frogmarched him off because he was drunk. Took till sundown to
convince further authorities he had come because he was drunk – needed a
medical pass.
Subsequent to the Second Coming of Christ, a nurse appeared. A nurse
neither cute, female, nor polite. But who, after lengthy abuse, duly certified
him an alcoholic.
He leaves pass in hand. Weaves downhill smack into a tart. Receives from
her pimp a cauliflower. Breaks his wrist on a parking meter attempting to
retaliate. Shoplifts a quart of Schenley’s to kill the pain. Fleeing a cop,
ditches the gin in the gutter after one lousy swig.
Loses the pass in a gust that seems to affect nothing else in the area.
Recovers pass from Second Avenue, inadvertently causing a bus to
sideswipe a Mercedes. Observes the paper to be now covered with blood,
gin; somehow fecal matter.
Hides in a doorway to cleanse the document with urine. Is in the process
accosted by a razor-toting crack freak with thing for penises. Escapes jewels
intact – even zipper zipped – in some fashion currently escaping memory, as
he mumbles near dawn into a garbage-strewn slumber. But not before
divulging he finally did rediscover the door to treatment. Only to learn his
bed, in the meantime, had been awarded to some other inconsiderate addict.
Although direct sun won’t reach the alley till high noon, shapes have become
visible. The pigeons are awake, puttering about. Out on First Avenue rush
hour clamors. The truck has rumbled up; having squeezed down the block,
narrowly missing scraping mirrors on the rears of shoulder-to-shoulder
buildings.
The prongs take hold. I am given my weekly lift up over the cab. Held in
midair above the opened body of the truck. Comes the hydraulic jolt that
shakes wide my lid.
But as I thrill to the mechanics of being emptied to the last egg shell,
cantaloupe rind, coffee ground, cigarette butt, tin can, kitty litter bit – fear
and pity cloud the ecstasy…
The compactor – reacting to a switch thrown up in the cab – whines, groans,
screeches… the poor bum!
Already I had grown fond of his warmth – my lily of the alley, my fecal rose
of pus and phlegm. Looked forward to his arriving night after night, setting
up housekeeping, dozing through familiar snores, wet-dreaming into my
bowels. Perhaps one day I would even become his personal ferry to the
beyond…
When at last above the clashing steel I detect a scream. And so does the
driver, I realize, as the compactor stops dead.
Continuous shrieking proves he lives. Relief washes over me, as I hear –
hung upsidedown here above the truck – the frantic driver on the radio,
swiftly followed by the eruption of a siren a few blocks north.
This time they will take him straight to the right desk. And he will survive the
loss of limbs, shattered ribs, broken pelvis, ruptured spleen, popped
intestine. For in this our beloved country, though addiction baffle the
experts, trauma we know precisely how to treat.
BIO NOTES:
Willie Smith is deeply ashamed of being human. His work
celebrates this horror. He has probably reached the last fibonacci
number of his life and likely will not hang around too much longer. He would
consider it an honor should you be so kind as to read his material while he is
still alive. If you are so foolish as to want to spend money, visit
oneleggedcowpress for his DADA AFTER MATH.
Free stuff is at various other web sites. The chef recommends SUBMACHINEGUN
CONSCIOUSNESS at semantikon.com, various stories at corpse.org, sticky, gooey
sickening little poems at sites like myfavoritebullet.com, zygoteinmycoffee,
thievesjargon, bloodcookies, fifthstreetreview, etc.
For more stories from Willie Smith, click here:
Essay On Wheels
Benny Saves the Day