1. |
Title
03:11
|
|||
The rain is abducting children –
gone into the night cloaked in garbage bags,
floating paper boats past the gutters,
wading knee-deep in tomorrow’s puddles.
Daddy’s sitting in the garage holding a beer.
He’s been watching the storm for hours –
marking the dwindling distance between
lightning streak and thunder clap.
“God’s up there bowling, did you hear that?
He just got another strike.”
Mr. Vanuch’s standing next to an overturned canoe
in his front yard, leaning against a long oar.
His shirt is soaked, dark hair showing through
“Boy you better get back inside –
the rain is abducting children, it said so on the news.”
I go into the night with a scorched mouth,
holding it open to the sky, ready to drink the storm
down and keep the children safe.
The grass drops away from my bare feet – it’s deeper
than I think.
My daddy drops his beer as the water sweeps me away.
The rain is abducting children –
gone into the night cloaked in garbage bags,
floating paper boats past the gutters,
wading over their heads in tomorrow’s puddles.
|
||||
2. |
Jonathan James Randy
05:36
|
|||
i took the elevator up to the psych ward where they had randy dressed and waiting. we went walking in the old neighborhood and saw what they had done to the old house (oh my god, the cats are still trapped in the basement, they are burning alive). we went into the woods somewhere on the other side of heritage and got lost trying to find clay mountain.
i says, “randy when i was your age they had me bored into a dorm room. a generation before, you would have been snipping off trigger fingers.”
we came out in someone’s backyard down on smokerise. randy jumped into the lake behind FOHA and i jumped in after him.
|
||||
3. |
Billy-Boy
02:48
|
|||
billy-boy wanders the streets after school. he listens to phil collins on his walkman and rubs his scent into the trees. emerging from the backyards of our suburban homes, he wears a smeared black mask. he sticks his head up the bottom of the tube slide and screams, “i’m going to eat all your toes
little boy.”
|
||||
4. |
hashmandean
03:01
|
|||
he talks to the washing machine talks to the washing machine talks to the washing machine talks to the washing machine talks to the washing machine
|
||||
5. |
||||
In the lobby of the downtown library, the marble floor accepted the afternoon sunlight and spun it back to my eyes like braided yarn. Jason was standing there so fresh – he smelled like Irish Spring. Looking past him, I saw the red nylon tent, the coffee table and the camping chairs in an open area just outside the genealogy room. They were letting the homeless live in the library now, and Jason had all the books in the world in his house. He just stood there laughing at me because he loved me. Of course he already knew that the Swans are putting out a new album.
|
||||
6. |
||||
dear elizabeth,
i wanted to tell you about the empty glasses that were accumulating on my desk – the rusty rings in the bottom of mugs and wine glasses. it just gets messy with age, and if there was something i learned from you, it was how to exit a party without skin on my knuckles.
she said it was déjà vu. she said it was eight o’clock, but the clock was ticking down the minute hand, and i know she wasn’t reading anne frank, but... BLOOD SUCKER!
she said it was my face, the line of questions. she wasn’t reading anne frank, but i stopped for a second, and it was there – a time.
and a place.
|
||||
7. |
Randy Pt. 2
05:35
|
|||
randy lost his eyesight for five days. his mom put his picture on a telephone pole and the sandwich-board men came calling. in their blinded living room she kept the video camera running, she put staples right through his eyes. in the back of his closet randy went to space camp.
now randy’s head rolls around like a marble. he lifts up his gown and shows the nurses his wiener, twisted up in catheter tubing.
randy and i have the same
dad.
|
||||
8. |
Jason Pt. 2
05:06
|
|||
he gave up his one truebody to see the ocean
he stood on feathery toes on the pumiced shoal
he said, “my name is Jason, I am dilated pupils,
I am numbness of the extremities.
my name is blank, my biceps are retracting.
I am twenty-three years old.”
the first hit was in habit,
his mother taken in red light
flattened lacewings around the apartment
the second was in series,
thin blood floating in his veins
in a hospital room they drank charcoal,
the cuttings clinging to his neck and shoulders
in his beloved’s bedroom the curtain came crashing
in her closet, in her clothes, he came crawling
he fed the dog. he watered the plants.
he mouthed the words, “i’ll do anything for you.”
he said, “I am a young man open to experiences.
I like the feel of mud between my toes
and lace against my genitals.
I smoke cigarettes and don’t need to take
medicine.
I am twenty-three years old.”
|
||||
9. |
||||
i. mark
the breeze off lake erie blisters bowling green’s student body. subsidized, downgraded, pins probe the flaky overgrowth like fingers of inflated latex condoms. mark was a guy i knew in college. he blew a balloon over his head. he got his stomach pumped during new student week.
ii. andrew burger
andrew burger lived next door. he was a soft boy who shuffled home after school like a penguin and rolled into his mother’s ruff like a cracked egg. as an adult, andrew is unhappy.
he breaks bottles in the garbage can.
he lies down on the sidewalk and lets the ants carry him away
piece by piece.
|
||||
10. |
Pool Water
02:56
|
|||
the trolley bell is clanging sharp around the block
it pains without fireworks and i’m a closed circuit
i’m that Isaac kid with a wagon full of Koosh balls
Laurel Glens to Berkshire to Deepwood to Falling Oaks
to Laurel Glens
|
Streaming and Download help
If you like *spandrel, you may also like:
Bandcamp Daily your guide to the world of Bandcamp