songless bird

a songless bird

that would be the nicest
name she’d been
called

the others,
far more common,
being
that little wench
your bastard kid
the little rat
useless piece of shit that came outta you
and others

She liked the term
songless bird
It was a title worthy of her in
all the good and the
bad ways

The songless bird stands
locked in her room
and knocks and waves in
the window
for she has no voice to sing

She gives silent cries to the
neighbors and
the passersby when the noises
from the other side of
her door
get too violent

or when it smells
of smoke

Which happens
every now
and then

feeling the train

A pretty thick
slice
of hell

That was life
so far

But today things
will change

Today he was six
years
old and that meant old
enough to
guide his blind father
on the streets

The old man was only
blind for
a year after some work
related accident involving acid

And there was a mother
somewhere too. She left
shortly after
father’s accident

Today father held on
to his son’s shirt
at the shoulder and told him
to walk towards the
railway

“I want to listen to
the train,” said father

but it turned out he
wanted much
more than that. He wanted to
feel the train. Against
his face

So he stood on the rails
and told the kid
to go back home
and return after an hour or so

“Okay,” said the kid. But
he didn’t leave. He watched
from a safe distance

Didn’t even find
the
event particularly disturbing

Then he went back home
and had some
fruit loops with milk
and his first taste of
beer

He had become a
man

Saint Bernards are big, heavy dogs

he opened another beer
and sat on
the couch
but turned off the TV

He watched the kid

The kid was on his knees
before the coffee table
busy with
an orange pencil and a
piece of paper

Tongue poked
to one side and held
firmly between
the lips,
he was writing letters to
the pet dog
he’ll never see
again

And he did that
all day long

Dad sipped at his beer. The
years of action
were far beyond him now
but by all the gods
he swore
tonight will be the
night
he sneaks into his ex-wife’s
home and kidnaps
the dog

He even rented
a van
for it

an old instrument with rusty springs

he sits alone in the
darkness

on a wooden chair

The walls surrounding him
have no
mirrors and
the windows are covered
by the thickest blinds

He doesn’t want to see his
old age

and the decay that already
started consuming
his body

In his mind he’s still
young, still
in his early twenties

still dreaming

He’s listening to music

He’s playing the music
and it exhausts him

The music comes from
within

An instrument with strings

His growling guts

He lubricates them with more
beer

spend the quarantine at your girlfriend’s house, they said

the atmosphere in the living room
felt classic

He kept asking what was
wrong
and she kept saying
nothing was wrong
when clearly there was something
very wrong

He counted
and it took precisely
74 questions, true
detective’s work, to make her
say it

“Well perhaps I am a little mad,” she
said

“Jesus Christ,” he said, “why?”

And she asked, “Do I have my
panties on or not?”

“What? What the…? How do
you want me to know?”

“Exactly,” she said. “You can’t possibly
know because you didn’t
check. You think I’m wearing
a skirt because I
wanna look trendy while staying
indoors? Why must
you be so blind, man?”

“Well shit, I don’t know,” he snapped,
“perhaps it
has something to do with
the fact that your
nine-year-old kid is around and I’m
trying to be a decent
human being. Have you considered
that?”

“Oh, so you’re saying you’ve
got no skills?” she said

“Skills?” he raised his voice
higher. “Oh, so reaching
under a woman’s skirt without her
kid noticing is a skill now? Is that
how you view the perfect man, darling?”

“Hey, lower your
volume. He’ll think we’re fighting.”

He threw his
hands up. “And we aren’t?”

She rolled her eyes.

The quarantine lockdown
had just begun

a woman named Cactus

high school dropout

out of a job

out of options

soon to be out of the
rented studio
apartment

he went to the local bar
and drank himself
to the point he had to vomit
to make room for more
and next thing
he knew
he was dating a woman
named Cactus

Life can get pretty
weird when
you don’t live it
consciously

I knew the guy and heard
he moved in
with his lover
and started a new life

I really, really hope the
headline
“LOCAL ALCOHOLIC DEVELOPS SCHIZOPHRENIA,
DISMEMBERS GIRLFRIEND
PLANTS HER LIMBS IN FLOWERPOTS,
STICKS NEEDLES IN THEM”
is not about him

cat shaking the paw

She could say it if
she wanted
to but
the words would
carry no
weight behind them

like a cat shaking
the paw with
you
and not understanding
the real meaning
behind
the gesture

so was her
every
“I love you.”

Enough to make an
old boy cry
but he
preferred suicide

Needless to say
her response
was
“Meh.”

they are legend

the little girl was scared
at first
but now she was terrified
and about to have
a panic attack

He kept her tight
in his arms and covered her
ears and
told her to calm down
and that everything will
be all right

It was 02:24 AM and the
knocks in
the door and all around
the walls and windows
still carried on

And there were howls
coming from
outside and
curses and a constant sound
of nails scratching
on wood

“Daddy, I’m scared! I’m…”

“I know, dear, I know. But
you have to
calm down. Remember to focus
on your breathing like I told you.
Deep, deep breaths, okay? Deep. In
and out. I promise you,
tomorrow everything’s gonna
be fine. I swear.”

“Is it zombies?” asked the
little girl.

“No, dear. It’s something else.”

“What’s it called?”

“An ex-girlfriend, dear.”