Elvis Deal

THIS IS A WORK IN PROGRESS, THE FIRST CHAPTER OF A NOVEL, ANY
FEEDBACK APPRECIATED. AO.

Just All the Americans

Chevy Baby 1

Adventure for Edge City alcoholics, part slob, part fucked-up hippie,
bums on speed, catching the highway lights, rapping to passing
automobiles. FORD, fucking great car, fucking tank, fucking autobahn
bitch dictator of a car, got to be a Republican buy, got to be a lizard
behind the wheel snorting coke, shooting crack and sucking off a
plastic carbon cloned copy of Eva Braun. CHRYSLER, open top party
bitch, pop her hood, crack the can, catch the waves, ride the
interstate, throttle the American white trash and her bastard kids.
CHEVY, c-h-e-v-y pickup, c-h-e-v-y pickup, c-h-e-v-y pickup-beast for
screwing blues, fat fingers caught in bra clasps, eyes caught on
monster flicks, cock grinding against zipper, jeans grinding against
jeans, premature on the clutch and the bitch is dead, beam-me-up
Scotty, open up a vein and shoot the alloy. CADILLAC, surfing time,
surf's up, guts in, hit the coast, hit the station, hit the tank, wax
up the boards, shoot in the gas and ram those motherfuckers in to the
engine. Catch the waves, contract the skin cancer, slip through the
pistons and flap like a dead fish behind the exhaust pipe. BUICK,
buckskin, butt naked b-u-ick, the beast and the bastard behind the
wheel, holiday hunting strapped to the bonnet, a car with attitude, a
car with power, a car with antlers, revving up, rutting in the fast
lane. Getting it on with an angel in a parking lot, hitting the
accelerator and dumping the wings, pumping the gas in to the forecourt.
FORD-CHRYSLER-CADILLAC-CHEVY-BUICK. FORD-CHRYSLER-CADILLAC-CHEVY-BUICK.
FORD-CHRYSLER-CADILLAC-CHEVY-BUICK. Nought to sixty in an American
built car. FORD, fuck you, history is a crock of a shit. CHRYSLER,
invented air conditioners and cancer. CADILLAC, burger, fries and apple
pie mom smiles. CHEVY, low board, high load moving down the road. BUICK
deer hunting, family saloon with a twelve-bore riding shotgun. Edge
City fuck-ups in American built cars, A-M-E-R-I-C-A-N cars, pushing it
home in to the sunset, driving the line between fiction and comic book
hero, a man and his cape, a man and his special powers, a man and his
buffalo bitch radio, an American Man and His Car: fucked-up hero tunes
blasting the passengers, pushing the dope in to the setting sun, golden
brown, riding that nuclear powered bitch in to the earth because
they're A-M-E-R-I-C-A-N dreams, do you hear me? A-M-E-R-I-C-A-N. Ain't
no HYUNDAI. Ain't no TOYOTA. Ain't no FERRARI that can take that a way
and ain't no car as big as a CHEVY baby that can haul the sun in to the
night sky.

Captain America 2

Captain America and his shit kick sidekick, handle with care, and
manoeuvre with violence, a touch of fist, a grind of gear for the sixty
cigarettes a day comic book hero. Fuck fiction, fuck the Dudley do
right readers in the outside lane, inbred fuckers in a Buick with dead
deer chewing up the grill; going to blast 'em, going to vaporise them
with laser beam eyes and nicotine breath. Going to crank up the radio,
get the sidekick to chant Reagan slogans, going high, going low, going
to ram my fist down their twelve bore.
"Isn't this the greatest feeling?"
Captain America? Calling Captain America to -
"Put out your nerve endings, it's a blast"
- of a twelve-bore shotgun, a little bit of shot in the deer and a
pebble dashed cruising tank Ford, fucked off in the Luftwaffe, the good
nazi pilot reaches in to the glove compartment for his luger, takes
aim, and plugs the Reagan slogans like any good Republican would.
Captain America on the homeside smiles at the Cadillac boys as they
move down on to the field to champion the American way of life; guns,
ammo, surfing and baseball on their side. Captain America twists the
wheel and the Chevy up the approaching turnpike and leaves the game,
the sidekick giving the bird to the mini-Hitler in the Ford. Jazz on
the radio. Bird lives.
"Feel that power"
- of the Chevy baby. Off with the super hero disguise and back in to
the country cancer doctor puffing away on the dead end of a smoke, with
boy wonder still riding shotgun and bitching the Bible1. Doing the
religious two-time shuffle in the footwell, rucking up the fake shag;
got ants in his pants and stones between his toes, as the doctor pushes
the merits of tit-tasseling and monkey fucking.
"We'll show them, boy".
We'll show them the wonder hero, the comic strip, the joint, the point
of the tail and the search for the Holy Grail, we'll show it them all.
Two super heroes and a bottle of bourbon for the doctor, some smokes
for the cancer, some tokes for the lows, some lay me down in green
pastures with my pants around my ankles shit and we have a story.
"We'll show them who controls their destiny".
Gunning it down the highway, shooting away from the open season on the
interstate, beach boys become home boys, hunters fill up with lead,
Republicans behind the leather dashboard, read from the book of the
Aryan dead as the Chrysler slides by with nuclear capabilities and air
conditioning for a nuclear winter. Speeding bullet holes melt away in
to a thin line of coke and bats pour out of the sky but Captain America
will save us all, as his pickup flies by the shit pile highway homes,
as the owners stand in their yards and their gravel drives, waving at
the boy wonder and his Bible, smiling and waving, watering their dead
lawns, burying their spouses, waiting for their TV dinners to get
lukewarm, waiting to buy the bullet.

FOOTNOTES
1What if God was one of us? Just some bum living down back of the
tracks, eating his tv dinner, looking over the downtown area and
smiling, catching the eye of some heavy blonde, catching the clap from
the tinsel town, dime a fuck, whores. Banging it out with some dirty
old bitch who farts rotten cabbages. What if God was sold old? And he
is that, that he couldn't get it up, all he could do is stroke his limp
dick, puke out his guts in a shitty toilet bowl and watch the hooker
split with his empty wallet, catching a late night rerun of celebrity
squares on the set with her fat ass, knocking the channels in to some
sick fuck-up of a sitcom about a preacher and an actress. What if I
found him like that? His hair full of vomit, his face full of shit, tv
blaring away, studio audience laughing their tits off. I could hold up
a polaroid, a simple four by four, show the fuck what he used to be,
what he used to mean, then crank up the studio laughter on the set and
drag his useless ass in to the shitty kitchenette, find the dullest
blade there and go at it. Slice open his guts, fuck-up his face, bury
an old shotgun in his mouth, make him chant his catechisms around the
barrel and blow his fucking head clean off.

Las Vegas 3

You only have to be here, only have to cruise down into Las Vegas to
know that the King still lives, Elvis is in the casino juke boxes, in
the elevator muzak, in the gumball boot boys and dime a tip bus boys,
revolving in the cylinder of the fruit machines with the slot jockeys,
clutching loose change to their middle-aged sagging tits, hidden behind
floral print caftans, feeling lucky, feeling hot tonight on the
roulette wheels, on the black jack tables, another dollar, another
divorce. Waiting in the lizard lounges for the King to return. To hang
out with him in the Honolulu lounge, to toke with him in the Tropicana
toilets. The casino King comeback special is still hitting the streets
of Vegas, muttered by junkies and winos, drunks1 and hookers, Elvis
lives, repeat after me, Elvis lives, and the King is coming back in
fucking style, munching those burgers, blocking that u-bend, karate
kicking under the casino lights and sliding out of the building. Elvis
will leave the building again. Turn his pink Cadillac down the strip;
catch a game on the twenty-four hour miniature golf course. Eighteen
holes reclaimed from desert, built on quick sand, merchandised to suck
in the family holiday, the broke suckers: the gambling pop, the drunken
mom, the needling son and anorexic stroke bulimic daughter, caught by
the windmill shot, contemplating their mutual suicides at the hands of
each other's putter and the sound of vomiting. Whiskey rye mom with
streaking makeup, waning beehive and floral print Bermuda shorts, lines
up her shot as her daughter emerges from the bushes, eating, readying
her self for a second round of bush whacking vomiting, the little white
ball is the first to go, to sink, followed by mom's sneakers, mom's fat
ankles, mom's cellulite thighs, mom's jelly belly, tits and head,
drowning in the green baize quick sand, saluted by her family, given a
helping hand, down. Then it's the King gospel time, rescued and dry,
saved by the hand of Elvis and ready to divorce. A lawyer on every
corner. She splits, leaving the remaining members of the family to
finish their round. This is Vegas. This is Elvis country. You ain't
nobody if you haven't seen him in a mall, in a vision or on television.
God runs a close personal second, along with gambling and drugs. You're
a nobody to me if you haven't played a lounge in this city, haven't
taken in the toilets, haven't taken in the clap from a cocktail
waitress, who got it from the King back in seventy-six. I love it. This
is rat pack heaven, Elvis is on your shoulder, Dean Martin is in your
mouth, Sammy Davis Jnr. is in your head playing catch with Jerry Lewis,
Sinatra is in your soul, and all of them, all of them are making you
out to be the most charismatic fucker in history.

FOOTNOTES
1 If I got to Las Vegas and the angels were there waiting for me on
God's porch, supping back some buds, just sat waiting. They'd give me
that gun and tell me that it was my duty to kill God. That he'd never
done anything for anyone and that they did all the hard work as God
grew fat and stupid.

Boy Wonder 4

Boy wonder and Captain America have slid along the dirt walk, trick
talk, baseball conversation and returned safe, in style waving the
American flag and drinking the American coffee and shitting the
American shit in the four stall slick back diner. Shooting the breeze,
keeping the score high, lasting out the Yankees and waiting for the
coffee to come, waiting for the cigarettes to run dry and the villains
to appear on the comic book playing field. This is cartoon super hero
day. Captain America, the original gymnastic super hero shits all over
the webbed wonder, takes Wolverine out with a smile, demolishes the
fantastic four with herpes and spreads Batman on flypaper and steals
his sidekick. Boy wonder waiting for the day to play out, waiting for
the arch-enemies to turn the page and watching Captain America sliding
in to little house on the prairie mode. Tomorrow will be Landon cancer,
ticking time bomb, and boy wonder will become that goofy little kid
tumbling down the hill after her sisters, falling down the hill in to a
new life of coke and whoring on sunset boulevard. But today it's Edge
City, sitting pretty in both their minds.
Boy wonder is following the bubble speech cartoon page and the
brainstorming head shrouds, his lips move with the words, hoping that
in this strip the stranger in the next booth is the Penguin. Ready to
waddle leap from his third cup of coffee and sixth consecutive
cigarette in a souped up caffeine nicotine-killing spree, whirling a
drained pot and dead end with a lethally aimed umbrella for the
waitresses. The spike spewing gas, killing the diners and sparking the
commissioner in to a fit. But this is Edge City and not Gotham. This is
Captain America and not Batman. Batman is dead. Long live the boy
wonder. Maybe the fat guy is an overweight joker, or a prankster in
disguise. Maybe he's the kitten with claws, a bit of Eartha Kitt's
thigh in spandex. Maybe the fat guy is a travelling salesman. Maybe he
eats too much pie and smokes too much weed. Maybe he'll pitch them on
the way out and the boy wonder can go for the save and win the pennant.
Or whatever the fuck you win in a baseball game. But the fat guy sits,
the fat guy smokes, the fat guy eats his fries and hugs his briefcase,
hugs it like a baby bomb, a bomb that makes you sad and fat.
Boy wonder should move in, grab the briefcase, slice it open with his
trusty Bat knife, oh where are you now when we need you Batman? Stuck
with a geriatric Captain America, boy wonder decides to slide around on
the seating, he forgoes leaping in to action, drawing those crazy
action BLAM signs.
POW, boy wonder opens the plastic briefcase.
WHAM, he rips out the bomb.
KAZAM, he shoves the nuclear device down the throat of Captain
America.
But the original man of steel has his hands full and a smoke between
his lips, so the fat man goes untouched and boy wonder shines his butt
on the leather seating, like a little kid on Poppa's access day.
SHUDDER.
The potential penguin-cum-joker-cum-cat squeezes from behind his table,
flashing a hidden code from beneath his leather jacket.
YAWN.
A series of letters fading in to yellow
HIT PENS
boy wonder wonders whether this is a new kind of evil master craftsman.
SCREAM. A biro conspiracy of vast magnitudes that will leave Edge City
and Arizona without any pens, creating a million-dollar deficit that
Reagan will ignore.
POLITICS.
Maybe he should swing in to action, if only Captain America wasn't
slipping in to spurs before his eyes, ordering beans on his place mat
and breaking wind whilst fucking around with condiments.
"The trouble with salt and pepper, boy," he says.
The transference is taking shape, the voice twangs, drawls out across
the line, inches the fat man from his seat and the boy from the
wonder.
"Is that never mind how many times you rearrange them, they always
seem off course".
Captain America is loosing it and the biro hoard, the fat man aka the
blob, is making a break for it, heading for his lair constructed from
bics and the boy wonder is being put on by an rapidly ageing superhero
in a Stetson.
"Really?"
"Out of whack".
Edge City is peeling from the walls; the little house on the prairie is
sneaking in by inches as the fat man inches out of the diner by miles.
The comic book is fading and Elvis has left the building.
"Never mind how many times I've moved these here pots whilst you've
been daydreaming, and that's been approximately one thousand five
hundred and two times, I know because I've been counting. And each time
they're totally out of whack".
The fat man bic conspiracy has made a clean break through the screen
door and is doing a high-speed penguin waddle across the parking lot,
dragging Edge City behind him.
"Maybe that stopped you from getting the perfect balance, sir".
It's started, that southern hospitality has crept in to his voice,
yessum, soon he'll be white washing fences and counting buttercups and
daisies in the field. These are the Tom Sawyer days.
"Nope, I blame the gingham".
Captain America has gone hick red neck pot-bellied pig, fuck my
in-laws, strange. Edge City is turning in to a state rodeo and boy
wonder is the dancing clown.
"You know what really pisses me off, boy?"
Maybe he should go for the cartoon gun before the Stetson slips in to
Jack Palance mode, this is Shane time, get the gun before he says it,
pick up the gun, jump for the colt, pick up the gun, scramble across
the linoleum and between the legs of the waitresses moving down the
aisle, pick up the gun, slide out of the door as Palance takes aim,
pick up the gun, high tail it across the forecourt as he squeezes the
trigger dry, pick up the gun, chuck a full metal jacket in to the skull
of the blob, pick up the gun, hold on to the comic book dreams, pick up
the gun, feel the man of steel rip through the back of his skull, you
all saw him, he had a gun.
"Gingham?"
This is country and western hour with all the best tunes and thrills.
This is rodeo time. Time to ride and rope that bull sliding behind the
wheel of his Cadillac, time to bring the biros home to the ranch.
"Nope".
The pork-bellied chudder is yanking his chain and straining the
ignition; time for this cowboy to ride, kill some injuns and mans in
the name of family entertainment.
"Condiments?"
Ride the range, push that big ol' bitch horse down the wire brush
streets of Edge City, Texas, you come back all and we have a white
sheet burning spree, grab us some brothel creepers, don't forget the
chitterlings for the fat man in the Caddy, raising up a dust storm as
it skulks out of town.
"Nope, never used them and never caught me no venereal disease
either".
Ven-near-real.
"People," snaps the Stetson.
"What?" asks the Clown.
Palance and Murray at the state rodeo, side by side, going for the draw
in the sunset, colt against laser beam, cowboy against
ghostbuster.
"People, all types of them. Get my goat. Need to string up the lot of
them and feed some juice through them, just in case they're still
kicking. Present company excluded".
Yahar we're having a barbecue now, got me some pork belly and spicy
chicken wings, got me a pillowcase and a grand wizard to fuck. Just
show me a cross, I'll supply the petrol, boy.
"Thanks, sir".
"We want to barbecue the lot of them and then sell their worthless
hides to those third world countries we all hear about on the
news".1
"But if you kill all the people, who'll be left to sell to?"
Cowboy time is fading and the question is a killer for the state
rodeo.
"Well, when I say people, I didn't think you'd take it so literally as
all the people. I wouldn't want to do away with all the people".
"Thank God for that".
"Just all the Americans".

FOOTNOTES
1 Jack Palance stands in Cote d'Ivoire with a dead Texan tourist on his
back, this is trading time, pick up the Bermuda shorts, the tribal
elders standing around him, pick up the Bermuda shorts, confused black
man in business suits staring at the ageing celebrity and the convoy of
corpses that he's brought with him, pick up the Bermuda shorts, white
men cooked black being exchanged along the coast for beads imported
from Taiwan, pick up the Bermuda shorts, the Americans always dump
their shit here, you all saw them, they're barbarians.

Fusco Pictures #1 5
A crowd of blacks clutch their shopping bags, brown paper bags with
melting ice-cream and tinned dog food inside them, their hands and
mouths playing with the torn brown corners, sucking off the smooth
cream and smoke from a hundred cigarettes. Hungry for corn dogs. Hungry
for fame. Greasy hands reaching for cold wet fingers, torn through with
handle grooves, mouths opening, dribbling out ice cream and smoke,
pointing to the train, pointing for the cameras, for the million
flashbulbs that burst in to life. Arms wrap around waists, hands around
necks, around chests that heave, that breathe in the smell of the fast
food stall parked at the end of the platform, just out of sight, just
outside the edges of the photograph. The smell of the city mixed in
with the cars below, undercut by the stench of the late worker, the
stressed out executive, half-butcher, half-baker and half-candlestick
drug taker. Rushing beneath the crowd, the gathered farewell from
people hoping to make the news, the cover of Life, a personal Hiroshima
picture, a personal family portrait of running child, running from the
city, running from the press, hoping to be caught on camera before a
bullet catches them. Caught on kodak with a white librarian, holding
another brown paper bag, double bagged, with a book boy smile, double
bagged boy, hand in his pocket, his white hand caressing his stiff
cock, double bagged against the mans. A carton of milk, a bottle of
bourbon, one for his ulcer and one for his nerves, a bag of potato
chips and a gun, just in case he gets hungry, just in case the bag
splits and he gets the jitters, hoping that the bus boy at the store
double bagged. All in arms reach, a slide of the hand, a slope of the
shoulders, a slip of his glasses, that continually slide down his thin
sweaty nose, reaching for the bottle, reaching for the gun, just in
case the mans notice, notice a white amongst them, instead of
beneath them, rushing for work; a honky motherfucker, feeling bad,
feeling nervous, feeling for his peashooter in their neighbourhood as
the two special agents, behind the Puerto Rican cop, zone in on him,
ready to book him for not crying for the cameras, for smiling and
waving to the press. But not for the gun. Not for the booze. He has the
right to bear arms. Get tanked up and blast away in their little corner
of the city. He can shoot anyone as long as it's not white and it's not
a cop. But they have the right to book him, drag him off, beat the
living shit out of him for not crying, bear down on him in that
undercover, plainclothes detachment, off the peg special agent look,
straight out of the pages of an Archie comic. Except they aren't funny.
But then again neither are comic books. Nerds in glasses and peewee
plimsolls, snot green tops and flannel shorts, the elastic band holding
in their donut guts and guns, edging across the photograph. A Jew and
good ole' boy, Hoover fucks, moving in on the laughing librarian,
waving, just waving in a crowd of mourners. Fusco people frozen on
film. The librarian waiting to make his break from the photograph and
in to the mainstream killing action, adding paedophilia for a twist of
humanity and self-loathing, for a kick, as his fingers itch to touch
the black child beside him, maybe eight, maybe ten, maybe young, maybe
asking for it, he doesn't give a shit, he has the right to bear arms
and bare himself, blocking his balls from the black business man
between him and the Federal goons. The business man in Malcolm X mode,
all righteous, a black knight in pinstripe, who shields the fallen, the
weak, the fainting and the shocked ones from the bureau boys. Nixon
kids with colts. People in shock photograph. Still life. Some lifted
up, buoyed up on to sagging shoulders, sucking on smokes, cine cameras
in their hands, catching a post party Zeepruder film, five years too
late, a post event copy at retail for a brother, a senator and a son.
Some stand in shock. Some stand in anger. Some stand and wave.

Little House on the Highway 6

Boy wonder is running down that hill to Landon, little house, on the
gulch central, a small apartment block in the Bronx with a secret
Batcave in Vegas for broads, gambling and coke; thirties gangster
rapping style. From broads to bitches and a little bit of white hits
the strip. Hitting the hill in britches and pigtails, doped up on speed
and television evangelism: only fair that a sinner should gamble, only
right that an ex-comic book sidekick down on his luck should learn to
salute the stars and stripes, bending over. Catch it on the strip, fuck
the King on a mini-golf course, get high and screw the pretty blond
boys of downtown Vegas. Catch the deal. Got a limp dick? Then morphine
man is your kick, reel out and shoot up and ease the pain with a boy,
need you a comic strip fuck, need to find religion between those smooth
pillows.
Heed the word of the Lord, television at its best, souped up preachers
with large wallets and luxury condos scratching between the pillows,
though the preacher on the set makes it sound like pillars. Fucking is
for sinners, for the perverts of the world, for those who choose to lay
down with their own kind. See it all on television and abandon the
strip, head home to the range, where the deer and the buffalo roam, on
the hoods of Buicks, where mom is by the oven, cooking lunch and
listening to howdy doody on the radio. Got me a Bible and a motor lodge
and a piece of shit earth to call my home, gonna ride that bitch in my
four wheel, gonna bang her in on the range, roam the strip bars for
some titty action, pick up the clap from some whore and drive my old
steers with Jimmy Stewart and his six foot four rabbit; they're always
at it are rabbits, fuck themselves if they had a thumb. Then the drunk
stands at the bar, thumbs the television set and collapses off his
stool in wave of vomit and swearing: gonna run down that hill with Gary
Cooper, God rest his soul, gonna hit the whores on the strip, God
forgive them, gonna write their names in a little black Bible, God
smite them, gonna keep it next to my heart, gonna spread the word and
their crabs&;#8230;
"&;#8230;would you like breakfast with that?"
Bend for the stars and stripes, boy, and we'll let you go to the
cafeteria; look for the schoolteacher, hold your hand to your heart, I
swear allegiance to the flag, feel him push it in, and for what it
stands for. A comic book hero in britches, in a cafeteria, with an old
fag heading out west, bought and paid for in a highway whore house.
Come on in and partake of our grittles, boy, Nancy Sue, that's my
youngest, only twelve but with child, will cook you up some sweet
sugared pork belly, gonna smear it with shit and shove it up your ass,
just the way you like it, you little fuck. Junior's out back taking a
hatchet to that whore you called your ma but he should be finished
right soon and ready to serve you two New York faggots with coffee, now
have a nice day ya all.
"Would you like one of well renown all southern fry and grilled
breakfasts with that?"
Bend for the flag, boy, feel your feet give way, look for the
schoolteacher, feel your balls slam in to the desk lid, the coldness
between your eyes and the warmth between your thighs. Look for the
schoolteacher. Simple subtraction means attraction, boy, ain't that
pretty pillows? Bend down and touch your toes for America, see the
schoolteacher between your legs, hear the starting gun and leave the
field. Strike out with a fist and run from the track, hit the forest
hard, rip your body raw and head west for the prairies and the little
house on the highway, the caf? diner. Listen to the heifer in polyester
chewing on her sales patter and falling through the pansies to get at
you, to make you a man and her a cradle snatcher.
"With what?"
"Your coffee, silly".
Pink girdle bulging, holding the fat back from the table, with
breakfast and fucking on her mind she ignores the pepper pot king and
goes for his rent boy in britches. Something kind of cute about a grown
man in boy's clothes, kind of gets you flustered and sweaty, she can
feel the sweat on her neck, slipping down between her breasts and over
her belly. She knows their kind, seen them a thousand times a week -
old man with hired help, if you know what I mean, a quick kick for
movie star lookalikes, call it the Jimmy Dean complex. Pick up some
clean cut, cute, affordable boy in the city, drive them out in to the
desert, promise them money, promise them the stars, promise them a
break in Hollywood, just climb on this couch, boy, and then rock the
suspension, burn them with the cigarette lighter, tie them to the
bumper, drag them across a cactus field, fuck them hard, fill them up
and burn them out across a highway.
"You should have more than coffee for breakfast, sweetpea. A big,
strapping, growing boy&;#8230;"
Oh and how must he grow, if he could see her naked, how much she craves
the lookalikes, the Dean Martin boys, the James Dean kids, full of
spunk and hot headedness. She desires Jimmy Dean behind the wheel of
that old Porsche Spyder or in that little lost movie star pose in Time
Square, collar upturned, cigarette hanging from his mouth as she rounds
the corner, flashes her thigh at the cruising Spyder. Watching the car
lose control, vomit plastering the windows, the smell of shit hanging
in the air as it screams past for a date with destiny. A bummed smoke
in Time square, a flash of the pearly whites, the scent of rain, the
smell of ozone, the flash of light, a smouldering smoke and the smell
of sweet pork in her nostrils. The dead ones are always the best,
either way she knows that Dean would have bought it, if not in the
Spyder, she would have got him. All this fills her mind as she sweeps
down on the carbon copy, arms flapping, cellulite thighs squashed
against the metal rim of the table and rucking up the gingham. Callused
hands reaching out for the smooth face, the pink polyester uniform
rustling, giving way, easing out the drawbridge, revealing the sweaty,
drooping, blancmange desserts - available at no extra cost - as pink
and ugly as the uniform, traced with the road map of the state, etched
out in purple cracked veins. Glossed lips part and she farts with the
excitement, the joy of seeing Dean once more, the smell of the highway,
the shattered glass, the twisted metal and the broken body beneath her
own, legs spread and wrapped around his face, grinding her pantyhose in
to his face.1
"&;#8230;like you".
If only she was naked, if only she could tear off this uniform and show
him what a woman really looks like. Fingers play with the buttons, pop
one, pop two and then&;#8230;
"Oh shit, I've knocked the fucking salt over".
The drawbridge is yanked back and the cow is back in the field with the
gate closed and yelling to the farmer for more hay.
"Don't worry sugar, it's only a bit of spilt salt".
This is the pepper pot king storming out of the house on the prairie,
the shouting barely audible from this distance, his stethoscope
swinging around his scrawny neck, his doctor's bag banging against his
knees.
"Fuck off, you old witch and pour me some more coffee and leave the
boy alone".
You Goddamn whore, cook me some food, get me some smokes or I'll beat
the shit out of you, run you black and blue across my fist, I'm coming
strong and I'm coming hard right out of the prairies. So don't stand
there slack jawed, get us some food, spin that fat ass around and watch
you don't knock the table or I'll come after you with my belt
buckle.
"That's fucking Southern hospitality for you, they'd sleep with their
own family as not to cause offence".
Spit in her face would he? Tell her what to do? Goddamn men, pour his
fucking coffee in his lap, burn his balls and ride the boy if she wants
to and she wants to.
"Here Billie-Jo you just go fuck your brother in the barn and pa will
be right out later to finish you off. You just spread those pertty legs
of yours and give 'em honey, ya hear?"2
Spin those fat thighs around and snort like a donkey, ya bitch, knock
the remaining pepper pot over but I'll still be king in my house, you
couldn't knock anything over with that skirt, your fucking thighs are
too big, your cellulite has greased to the insides, sugar.
"Ain't that the truth?"
"I guess so".
"You guess so! Yooueee&;#8230;I know so! Jesus, I was born in the
south, boy, I was raised in the south but I sure as ain't going to die
in the south with these bunch of fucking red necks".
The coffee cup and the words spit at her, the pepper pot king wraps his
fingers around his cup and jams the fist at her cleavage, want some
coffee, honey? Sweet java loving with the filth on the top, giving it
hard to the waitress and the diners. All three of them: a middle-aged
couple catch the floorshow, swing away from their own argument, he's
called Dwayne, No he's not you stupid sonofabitch, it's Wayne, Who the
fuck is Wayne Newton, the fucking lawnmower guy you've been porking? Be
he Wayne or be he Dwayne, they still stare from their mixed grills and
mid-week morning chicken wings to blow gas at the old loony and his
son. Still think it's Dwayne, Roy?, Shut the fuck up, Sharlene and
phone your mower buddy. They watch the boy now, hiding behind the menu,
shying away from the fat ass waitress, slow to serve but fast for the
tip, It's Dwayne you dumb bitch, I saw him play Austin in the late
sixties - on his "they shot Kennedy" tour&;#8230;got me a communist
to grill, remember that Sharlene, huh eh?, Shut up and eat your
breakfast, Roy. Next booth down and there's the original confederate,
the original handmade General Billy Lee himself, chewing baccy,
dribbling that sludgy coffee down his whiskered chin and give off fumes
like the devil, gonna take out old Grant with his walking stick, gonna
score some pussy with it, seen some action in my time, been behind the
lines, and I gonna see it tonight if you come home with me, gal, show
you my cavalry charge, heh-heh, if she doesn't mind the smell of booze
and the spit soaked beard scratching her face as it scrambles for gummy
purchase. Heh-heh. Spits on his dog and watches the spit roll down its
nose as he gooses a young blonde waitress passing the table with his
cripple stick.
"Fucking red necks the lot of them, boy".
"If that's what you say, sir".
Yessum.
"I say it, boy".
"Your pa is awful excitable".
Pour the coffee, witch and stay out of this lovers tiff but she has to,
she needs to add her piece to the puzzle, fuel the speculation, coax
something out, to shaft them with.
"I'm not his pa, you dumb heffa".
Bingo.
"Oh".
Say it loud enough to be heard. Say it with a mixture of shock and
disgust, lay out the cards on the table and wait for the trumps, the
five card shuffle and royal flush shaft.
"No, we're just friends, mam".
"Oh!"
"NO".
"Oh I understand&;#8230;it takes all types, sugar".
All types are welcome to pass through but don't ya think of stayin'
now. Tables turned, coffee poured, protesting dismissed, she can turn
from the card table having won the game, reclaim her dignity at the
swing doors and head out from the saloon and saddle her a John Wayne.
She turns with the pink polyester shimmering and the static charge
building up in her pantyhose, born from frustration, punching out from
the failed floozy role and back to serving, leaving the couple of
queers at table six to get it on.
"She thinks we're a couple of hoe-moe-sex-u-shuls, boy".
Hoe me down and grease me up, if that ain't true because I'm a doctor,
boy, and I've seen them all, queers, dykes, lesbians, trannies, shit
shovellers, including that dumb whore laughing with the other
waitresses. Fuck me, boy, she bore down on both of us, plum paralysing
your right hand with her ugly titties weighing down on it, pouring
coffee, talking nice, slopping on that Southern fuck me
hospitality.
"I'm not".
Say it louder, I'm not, say it loud enough to be heard in the out
field, so the couple on the next table can play catch, Wayne, Roy,
Dwayne, Sharlene, You've never bint ta Austin, Roy - I'M NOT - What de
say? Don't worry about him, probably some fag. Bet he bint ta Austin
thow, Are you sayin' I'm a shirt shitter, Sharlene? Because if
so&;#8230;still Wayne, Roy. SHUT THE FUCK UP YOU DUMB BITCH.
"Well, boy, unless you're fixing to take her on this table right now,
she ain't going to believe you".3
"But&;#8230;"
"And even then she'll tell all her girlfriends that she cured one of
those New York Jewish queer boys. That she straightened his
arrow".
"I'm not from New York".
For the benefit of the crowd in the cheap seats, I'm not from New York
- It's Wayne, Roy, Just 'cos I went to Austin don't mean that I'm no
queer, No that New Yorkers, dear, &;#8230;And Jews, honey, Of course
that goes without sayin', like Wayne Newton - I'M NOT FROM NEW YORK -
Wot he say? Who? The queer over there.
"It doesn't matter where you're from. To them all queers come from New
York. Jesus, boy, if they thought they had one of those homosexuals in
their neighbourhood they'd have a fit, just before they put on their
white bed sheets and cut eyeholes in their pillowcases".
"So what am I supposed to do?"
"Ahhhh boy, ignore the bitch. She just wants to salve her goddamn hick
ego. Don't know the word 'no', just thinks that any man who won't fuck
her must be bending the other way&;#8230;She has enough shit between
her ears that I'm surprised that we haven't witnessed the top of her
whole fucking dumb head blow off with the methane build up".

FOOTNOTES
1 Caught him on the highway, that's her fantasy, caught him in a truck
stop, up against a broken rest room mirror, her uniform torn off, her
knickers forgotten, her give it up legs sweating around his hairy back,
his boozy beard jammed against her face, bristles in her lips, one hand
clamped over her tit and over strangling her. Never looking at her
face, just fucking her hard in the pit stop. No names, just hard
fucking from anyone and everyone she can wrap her legs around, just
passing through? See you in the rest room. Fuck them in the basin with
the faucets running, fuck them on the floor in the spilled urine and
wadded toilet paper, claw it out of the cracked tiles, shit under the
nails, butt ends between her toes and frozen to bowls. Ride them as
they crap, a real turn on for most, take control, crack the bowl, blow
their minds as they blow chunks. Ride them dry. Drink off the caffeine
stained semen and lay your eggs across America. Welfare will pick them
up. Just keep on fucking.
2 They always dragged me out to the barn, every night, just after
dinner, Monday was pork chops, Tuesday was lamb, Wednesday was tv
dinner night, Thursday was burgers and fries, Friday was fish, Saturday
we got our own and Sunday was the Lord's day so we had beef, everything
had its place and every night I was tied down, gagged and waiting for
my brother, ma would watch and pa would take pictures for his friends
down at the bar, for twenty dollars he would print them up some copies,
for a hundred they could have their own private session but they were
always introduced over some kind of meat.
3 Torn pink uniform hanging from his fingers and blood on his dick,
reading from the Bible as he thrusts it home, making sure that she
knows, that everyone knows that he's a man and that he's a religious
man, and that all this fucking and whoring and sex is against the good
book. Amen.N
N I'll find his house real easy and I'll sit on the porch and have a
couple of bottles with the angels, hear their grievances, their
convictions and favourite tv shows. Then I'll have the courage to face
him. Enough courage to ask him why? Enough courage to use the gun that
the angels placed in my hand. Enough courage to free us all.

Fusco Pictures #2 7

The red, white and blue, bend for those stars and stripes, the
huckleberry stripes. We. Love. You. By the side of Western Maryland
gravel dumpers, getting it on with the black kids and working your hump
on the railroad all day. Working the railroad all night. Picking up
hobos, beating the shit out of them, making them bend for the anthem.
This is national security work. Writing home on tiny cardboard signs.
Catching the motherfucker on film. Caught the suckers on the track.
Holding up the card. R. F. K. W. L. Y. Some commie code to break our
ranks, bust up the scene and get the Kremlin in the back door. They're
already on the railroad. They have the mans and the white trash in
their backyard eating from their garbage. We've seen the evidence. The
blurred pictures and the slurred ramblings of the track wanderers; if
the commies come then satan ain't too far behind and you better believe
it. It starts with mans crying and white crackers tipping the thumb.
Letting it slide down to three black boys in red commie t-shirts,
waving and laughing, holding on to the white cardboard code message. R.
F. K. W. L. Y.

Old Dominion 8

CHEVY boy by the road, dust bowl lapping time, catching a trip down
route 29, feeling fly, feeling high on that baseball field in his head,
staring at the cars pour on by, with fans a waving and honeys' shaking
that bootie in their TOYOTA type models, fine and fuckable in a chink
way, the loving newlyweds fighting over the radio stations, Jonny, I
hate jazz&;#8230;Fucking best music in the world and if you don't
know that you're dumb. Dumb thang to say boy, dumb thang to say, gonna
be sleeping in the doghouse tonite. That little old wife gonna tear up
that road map in your face and tell you to fuck yourself somewhere
between Amherst and Amarillo. The TOYOTA types mouthing fuck you as
they soup up the air conditioning, blast the cool breeze past your
sorry ass out in the field, storming a glimpse at the ultimate joy toy,
a CHRSYLER and a suit behind the wheel with high wheeling whore by his
side, a little trip with the secretary, dear, I do need my secretary,
it's such an important conference-cum-fuck in Vegas. A bit of gambling
and who knows how hot the little walking Dictaphone will get. Swing her
by some Martin or Lewis on the strip and let the show begin. A full
BMW, blonde, blue-eyed and Bible bashing radio station filling the air,
a never stop for hitchers' shit, radiators can steam, radiators can
blow, but they'll still limp by at five miles per hour with the windows
sewn up tight and the eyes staring forward, forever forward. TOYOTA.
CHRYSLER. BEAMER. All thinking the same shit - this is a CHEVY boy
hitcher, an oke in the city, a turd beneath their feet, the back seat
fuck-up, the full moon retard, leave him behind. Push on by with a
scowl and a hunting cap. Parents bitch and feel embarrassed as the
kiddies' wave. Suits crawl, slowdown and hit the kerb for action,
hunker down with their wallets out, the window wound down enough to
suck his dick. Now a BUICK shit screaming down the highway like he's
some Buck Rogers at warp ten, a fool bastard behind the wheel, drunk,
drugged, paying alimony and a doctor, steering with his eyes behind him
and his hands on the windscreen, pushing out, trying to escape, with
both feet on the gas, gear crunching with a shotgun jammed in the side
view mirror, passenger side. Ain't stopping for no one, no hitcher, no
honey, no model gonna rise him to the side of the highway. Watch that
BUICK spew shit from its tailgate and that little old shotgun squeeze
off a round, just to add to the blown out side panel in the backseat of
his fucked up car. CHEVY boy; step back from the limelight and the
roadkill headlines on the channel six news. This is Indian Summer shit,
time to get in Tonto and Custer to sort this fool out, when the dust
settles we can have a bring and buy yard sale, buy a piece of the
highway killer. Stay on the field CHEVY boy, stay on the field, keep
the sun on your back and your eyes covered with that baseball cap, let
the dust settle and see a little old man ready to boost you along the
line to home - hack up that bad shit in your lungs and slide on in, in
a reliable Oldsmobile CHEVY.
"You want a lift, boy? Or are you just going to spend the rest of the
day hacking snot in to the dirt?"
Good call old man, the umpire is on the field and you're out for the
count CHEVY boy, slide home to safe and in to the bleachers, run the
boundaries, baseball in catcher's mitt, the winning ball for the CHEVY
boy. A little something for all the fans watching at home. The wonder
boy let the BUICK bastard slide in to the cheap seats, watched him
squeeze off a couple of rounds, take out a few scats before revving it
over the bodies and in to the cops and the channel six anchor. Boy
wonder let that one slide.
"You screwed in the head, boy? I offered you a lift".
A little bit dumb but ready to slide it home, CHEVY boy is on the line
and heading for safe, the umpire is gonna give him a lift to the next
base, slide on in to the beer and the good times.
"Sorry, boy, But I'm in kind of a hurry".
Move it CHEVY boy, get your sorry ass on the right side of the game or
be playing softball in a cell with the BUICK killer.
"Where you going, boy?"
"West".
Where the cowboys are and the cheerleaders.
"Where?"
The umpire behind the wheel may be boozing, may be smoking but shit
hard of hearing too. Chewing gum, fiddling the shit with the radio,
tipping off some cool sounds from a hippie jockey, riding the vinyl and
spouting the shit over Hendrix, moving the dial on in to comic book
world, Superman and his amazing powers. The fool never got Lois Lane
between the sheets though.
"WEST".
"Look son".
"I'm not your son".1
"Oh-eee, we have us one pedantic sonofabitch, dahn't we? Look
son&;#8230;"
Feel the heat turn up under your ass, fool, this the head honcho, the
man, the hood, the umpire, the supremo being riding the game and
sliding you home.
"&;#8230;you can sit there and say nothing, be an asshole for all I
care, but if you want off this pleasure cruise, then be my guest
because you're sure as hell going the right way about it".
Listen to the sounds from the box, you're driving the ball out of safe,
Superman has been replaced by the shielded war wonder, Captain America,
fucking Hitler in the ass and endorsing war bonds to hapless fuck-ups
who chew gum and think they're GI guys and not even the Captain can get
you back in to safe now.
"Fucking gum glues up my top set".
Glues up Captain America's shield.
"Shouldn't chew it then".
"Nope, I guess not and shudn't pick up hikers either, put I do, so be
grateful&;#8230;"
Can you feel the heat, boy wonder? Captain America is on the radio and
behind the wheel, gonna get you home, gonna slide you over the final
base and in dry, so quit staring like a retard.2
"&;#8230;what you looking at, boy?"
He ain't got no bugs on him.
"Nothing".
"Like hell you are, boy, I may be getting old, I may not have my own
teeth, but my brains and my senses still work&;#8230;either you spit
out what's bothering you or you get out. Make your choice, boy. And I
ain't going to slow down to put you down, so your head best be made out
of rubber".
Pushing seventy-five down route 29, not much of a choice, brother,
unless you like to see the contents of your head etched for fifteen
miles down the highway. Morse code for the roadkill show.
"I was just wondering&;#8230;"
Whether this was Captain America and what the hell is he doing in a
CHEVROLET? Just wondering where the superhero is heading and whether
CHEVY boy can tag along? Just wondering why the Captain is covered in
blood and wearing rubber?
"&;#8230;why you're in such a hurry".
"Sheeet boy, why didn't you say that before? Can you not tell that I'm
a Doctor?"

FOOTNOTES
1 Can you hear the chopper coming? I can hear it when I close my eyes,
that old whirlybird war machine cutting up the jungle and coming in
low. Daddy is waving to the soldiers, waving from behind the 16mm
cannon, just before he opens fire, napalms their butts - he called it
edging your bets and cleaning the mans out of this man's army. Got
the fool court marshalled, screamed Momma, got his ass thrown in the
pound and the cheques went along with his fat hairy behind, but the old
whirlybird comes every night to our trailer park. Sometimes it wakes
Momma with her new men, son, this is Uncle George, this is Uncle Ste,
Just call me Ste, boy, Now Ste, I feel that it be mighty right for the
boy to call ya Uncle and all. Hush woman, I ain't no goddamn "Uncle" to
the boy, jeezus didn't I pay you enough last night without having to
play happy families in the morn? That chopper shows up every night,
flashing its searchlight, catching glimpses of Momma under the sheet
and some fat old Uncle riding up top, daddy behind the cannon, training
the sights on them both, just call me pa, son. He comes flying in most
nights with God by his side, just waving on down at us in this trailer
park, blessing us with napalm and the word of the Lord, 'cos my pa died
serving the democrats, 'cos my Momma would cuss that old soon to be
dead Irish fucker in the White house. Pa came the night that Lyndie
dog's Pop got the job from the Irish man and I knew that this was a
good sign, that and Momma nearly dropped dead on account that she'd
been cussing the old Irish for too long, spent the next season in
church most Sundays. That's the way things go. But still I have the
whirlybird to come on down from the mountains and lift me out of my
trailer window and take me out west.
2 You're a bastard, retard. Foghorn Leghorn is on the set again,
paddling the behind of that old wheezer dog, ya hear me, retard? the
chain is straining as the dog goes for the guts, I'm talking to you,
you little bastard, now the Rooster is fixing to paint a false gate on
a wooden fence to fox the old dumb dog, Maureen is this retard, deaf?
the dog falls for it. I'll take my belt to you, retard, if you were my
own I'd, smash, that dog, straight in the kisser, right against the
fence, I asked you get me some beer from the ice box, retard, the body
peels off, pancake flat and the eyes and mouth remain stuck to the
wood. Here's your goddamn beer, leave the boy be. It's the end of the
cartoon and I can hear the studio laughter melt in to the cartoon, I'll
leave him be my ass, where my dinner, woman? the kids are clapping as a
big friendly face fills the screen and beams out in to mine, change the
fucking channel, retard, I ain't fixin' to watch no polack fat fuck
clown, he's doing goofy stuff with juggling balls, for fuck's sake,
retard, switch over, the fucking game is on, the clown walk, he's doing
the clown walk and smiling and waving, goddamn it Maureen the kid's so
close to the set I can't change the channels, waving and staggering
through the studio. It's only highlights of the game, the goddamn
Stealers won anyway. Squirting water at the kids, wwwell thaank yooou,
spen' all day busting my balls, do I get any action? No just some goof
up on the set and retard, the kids are laughing and the clown is
smiling, waving at me, wot next, Maureen, gonna poison my goddamn beer?
The clown staggers in to his home, smashing through the door and
laughing, that ain't no real door, he goes to the sink to get some
water, jeezus this goddamn beer is warm, the sink explodes in his face,
there's water everywhere, nowt anything more worse than warm beer, the
clown is flying back against the tv screen and the set is rocking with
the explosion. Put some ice in it then or else go without dinner. The
clown is staggering around his house, bouncing against the sides of the
set, rocking the screen backwards and forwards, it's like piss on the
rocks with goddamn ice, the kids are laughing and screaming with
excitement, send the boy to the store, the clown is grinning wildly and
clawing at the glass between us, hey retard, want earn a dime? his
white fingers scratch across the screen. He ain't going nowhere, it's
four blocks to the store and I'm not letting him do that on his own.
Clawing down to his chest, jeezus woman, he's nearly eight year's old,
I had my first job when I was his age, the kids in the studio have
stopped laughing, hey retard, get me some beer and I'll give you a
dime, I can hear a girl sobbing through the glass, get me some nice
cold beer and be fast and you can get something for yourself, the clown
has fallen on his ass and is clutching the side of the table with his
right hand. Leave him alone, dinner's nearly ready. The glass of the
screen is cold to the touch as the camera closes in on the clown,
goddamn it, warm beer with hot food, that's a pisser, Maureen, the
screen goes dead, Maureen, the goddamn retard's broken the set
again.

Ken and Babs get a divorce 9
Hey GI Joe with your Edge City superhero friends, hitting the bottle
too much on the interstate? Downing some Bud with Ken and looking for a
quick way back in to the Vietnam comic book fix? I want to be inbetween
the legs of Barbie, getting that Taiwan feeling somewhere down below
for the plastic babe. Catch the spin on this trip, fool. Marshall up
those napalms, drag Ken out of the bar, put him a corp. uniform and tow
your ass back to Korea, get down in the rehearsal for the Vietnam
strip. This is 1956, GI Joe and your little old wife has taken the trip
down to Tijuana, south of the border, down Mexico way. A day trip with
GI Joe junior and mini-Barbie, before Ken became a reformed alcoholic
and fucked it up with his clean cut, I never banged a whore in Saigon,
way. Just a quick trip for the little woman in your never-never
convertible, Peter Pan bang your heart out colour finish, move that car
down the coast, cross over the border, dot your eyes and sign on the
line that says divorce. Momma got herself a brand new man and Daddy got
the clap from the jungle, down Korea way but without the brass and
tequila, just praying that your platoon will be entertained by Monroe,
since she signed the line, she kissed her GI Joe baseball boy away,
kiss the kids goodbye, Joe, kiss your ass au revoir. This is the
Vietnam strip, pages away from the bullet that bit Superman, and a
thousand story lines removed from the Captain, channel hopping those
Pacific islands with an A-bomb up his ass. No gung-ho kung foo atomic
shit for those boys, no superhero to save their ass on those tin tiny
Jap islands. Wipe your ass on Korea and shit yourself in Vietnam
because we're taking you back to the year Barbie dumped Ken, a little
bit of history for those tripping marines, scratch it on the toilet
cubicle wall, get those car keys out and start rooting around for the
shit they put up your ass in Vietnam, you know it's there because the
toilet wall told you so, just like Ken got dumped by Barbie, Superman
got bit by the bullet and the Captain died of cancer, George Baker
scratched the toilet wall a little too much and that device went off in
his ass.1 It's that WWII thing for George Baker, those Japs jumping out
from under his bed every night, hunting him after a night out on the
tiles, a sniper shot between the eyes and that would have been it for
George Baker, gunned down in town, by a dirty, lurking Jap.2
In the jungle, by the river, the tiger prowls for George Baker, in his
comic book fantasy, the Japs are controlling it with brain implants,
powering it to eat him but they can come because tonight is gas night.
Take a long slide down those banks by the river, George Baker, take a
slide to the john, wave goodbye to good 'ole Leo, watch the tigers come
and the petrol flood out of the tanks, slam the door behind you and
lock it. Then light up sparky&;#8230;coughing, spluttering, watch
the fumes catch, the tigers scream and the Japs burn, this is firework
time, watch the red, white and blues, piss your pants with the flames,
shit down your legs with the pain, watch the methane catch in the
sewage tanks3, and goodnight GI George.

FOOTNOTES
1 That bitch took everything I had, Leo, took the house, took the car,
for fuck's sake what does the dumb bitch want with an army jeep, Leo?
She can't even drive, let alone find the gas tank, she'll let that poor
bitch go to rust, she'll let it go to shit like our marriage. Fucking
bitch&;#8230;did it in Mexico, probably got one of them greasy spic
creeps to bang her afterwards, I hope he tore her a new asshole, she
sure as hell did it for me&;#8230;stole my house, my money, my kids,
goddamn it my fucking kids, what kind of life will George junior have
without me? I provided him with everything, the ungrateful bastard,
took him to baseball, but I don't like the game daddy, shut the fuck up
I said, shut the fuck up and watch the game, what kind of life is he
gonna have?&;#8230;do you know what the bitch left me with? Do you
know? A fucking gas station, Leo, a fucking dead beat, run down, shit
shed in the middle of nowhere, that sees a car once everything fucking
season, nobody comes to me, and I know why, that bitch poisoned them
all against me, Leo, I know you're listening, you hear me? She poisoned
you against me, said I was a fucking drunk, that I hit her, jesus Leo
ain't a man allowed to have a drink and put his wife correct when she's
wrong?
2 I know those Japs are still after me, couldn't kill me in the
Pacific, fucking too right they couldn't, Leo, so they're after us all
now, all us boys who came back from the war, came back from those
shitty islands, they're hunting us, Leo, I've seen them out in the
forests, down by the brush, shitting under my porch, warning me that
they're gonna snipe me out, but I'm ready for them.
3 Those goddamn Japs would hide in our latrines, poke a bullet up our
asses, blow shit out of our brains, fuck that war in the east, Leo, we
should have finished those slanty eyed bastards off when we had the
chance, never trust them, cut your balls off, the bastards, we fought
them, Leo, we saw action, god it was beautiful when you tossed a
grenade in to the latrines and watched those bastards fly, tiny pieces
of Jap everywhere, just like fucking sushi.

Fusco Pictures #3 10

Down in the dirt, she was, down on her knees, get down to worship the
railroad, I'm a working on the railroad&;#8230;found God in the
dirt, past the safety tape, praying to the train going past, hoping to
hitch a lift to Los Angeles, dumb bitch, I says, it happened there,
they ain't taking his sorry dead body back there, but she prays, the
fucking daughter, fat in a God awful too tight white t-shirt, I'll
never get rid of her fat ass, should be wearing black, but she's
wearing white as if she's some goddamn virgin, with a pair of jeans
that is tight on her ass, you can see that she ain't no virgin but at
least she stays behind the safety tape, not like that dumb bitch, I
never understood why I married her. I knows I should send the girl over
to drag her back but it's just too damn hot and part of me hopes that
she'll throw herself under the fucking train, with her black spongy
head turned west, as if God is coming over the horizon, has to wear
shades to keep back the tears, got to keep her bag by her side and her
fat ass sister down wind. God why did she invite that bitch? My wife,
down in the dirt, looking for God, what did she get? Sunstroke and
stench of diesel in her pussy for the next six months, she prickled her
knees and tickled her toes but God ain't gonna come just because some
white fool bought it, still I can't help wondering why her sister
didn't give her the umbrella she was carrying.

Baseball Buddies 11

Back in the paddy fields and the marines are playing baseball with the
Japanese, soaking up the sun and hunting the field at night, this kind
of baseball is mined, need a good catcher to take out those snipers,
but things are getting unlucky for the home team, the marines are
spooked in the second, got the unluckiest whore on the field in their
team, a blubbering away in the dark, down wind of their defences. Gonna
put a goddamn bullet in him, sarg, Leave him, He's a coward, sarg, May
be but he's an American. An American coward, red, white and blue,
seeing Stars and Stripes and flares and shelling and scattering through
the village. Guns blazing, grenades exploding, houses, huts, families
burning, then rise up above it all GI Leo, runaway, watch the platoon
get cut to ribbons and watch out for those mines.
It's a home slide for GI Leo, leaving behind his baseball buddies, out
wide in the open field, ducking the cross-fire from the crowd, waiting
for the pretzels boy to toss them the bag full of grenades and level
out the score, waiting for their final boy to make the grade. Gibbering
on to the plate with his army boot out long, knocking off the field and
winning applause from crowd. Flying the kite with his size ten and
watching the earth bow out, the crowd to storm the field, the medics to
drag him through the dirt, by the bleachers, through the undergrowth
and in to the field station. A reunion with the boys and their bodies.
The chance to gut the winning pennant, to grab the crutches and to lose
a foot. The American way. Went in blazing. Came out in body bags. The
American way. The long slide home in to the bottle, in to the drugs,
the drink and the idle dicking of the widow Baker, picking bits of
George out from between the false teeth and bits of the mistress out of
the zipper. All Stars and Stripes. Eighteen months to respect the dead.
Eighteen months of talking baseball with George junior, watching his
shitty little league games, getting the bone over the daughter and
nuzzling up to fried momma. Got shit for brains and an air carrier for
a pussy. Eighteen months of bullshit sentiments, I love you and I want
you shit, eighteen months of playing it clean, then a whirlwind of I
do's, fucking rings, raising the glass to the GI in George and to where
ever his fucking body landed. Wake up next day, turn over, see the snot
nosed junior and the tight assed missy and the mom with tits like water
balloons. But the balloons burst. The sweat trickles out and she runs,
she slides, she misses the lesson about dashing in the corridor and
then it's a slip slide goodbye for momma and hello missy Patty1. Pat a
cake. Pat a cake Baker's girl, bend it over and give it a whirl. Shit
this is like winning the series. So sudden, so right, so tight and
juicy. All the neighbours wailing. All the neighbours, mourning their
dead momma. The loss of your new wife, Leo, must have been a shock,
must have been hard. Every night since the bitch fell2 it's been hard
and ready. What you're gonna do with those two lovely children, all by
yourself? Teach one to run and the other to run for me, honey.

FOOTNOTES
1 Shit I'm scared, he drinks, Lord knows I knew that when I married
him, Patty, but I never knew he could be so bad, if he wasn't an
invalid I think we'd all be dead by now, God knows he's took a shine to
you two kids, but it's only the running away that's saved all our
necks, if I didn't run he might start thinking about coming after you
two in your sleep, I know, I've seen the way he looks at you both when
you're in bed, and there's only love in his eyes then but how easy for
it to turn to madness?&;#8230;I'm afraid of that Patty, afraid that
he's found somebody else, afraid that she's turning him against me,
you'd say something if you saw him with another, wouldn't ya, Patty?
Sometimes I think that she's got him so hot that he's gone stir crazy
like your pa, starts spouting bullshit, half booze and half sickness,
saying that we killed George but everyone knows that your pa was plumb
gone out of his mind by the end, christ Patty, I swear that he never
knew about me and your step-father and if he found out after our little
trip to Mexico then that's something they both have to live with, but
Leo screams and cusses, blames me for killing George, for killing him,
just as if he lit the match on your pa and got burnt in the
process&;#8230;that don't bare thinking about, if it wasn't for his
foot I'd probably think that he did have a hand in it.
2 Catchy catchy bitchy rabbit, hunt her in the dark, with her little
fat ass nose, watch the kiddies sleeping in their dens, the small and
silent, the round and ready, snug as a bug in drugs, heary rabbit,
pointy eared little mekon bitch, grab the bourbon, strap on the old
foot and get to hunting the whore in the home, the house wrecker, the
husband killer, the rutting bitch, hear her in the walls, commies in
the insulation spaces, got a fucking red in my bed and a rat in my
house, gotta hunt it down, flush it out and stamp on it, hard and long,
stamp on its fucking rodent face and piss on it. There it goes,
smaning, scampering, scratching, stammering: Leo, I love you, I love
you, don't do this, we can work it, backing up against the stairs,
telling her commie shit lies and her red little eyes glimmering out of
her fat fucking head, up against the stairs, waiting for the drop,
hanging the commie out to dry, push the bitch, watch her fall: Little
domestic officer, she went as crazy as a racoon in a hen house, I would
have grabbed her if I had the old foot on but the first thing I knew
anything was when I heard the thud. And the crack. And the sight of
blood dribbling from her pointy ears and her eyes rolling back in their
sockets: must have scared her so bad that she wet herself. Zip it back
up. Catchy rabbit good. Catchy rabbit by the cellar stars, watch it
fall, watch it twitch, then pissed all over that fat old bitch.

Village People 12

The step-father, the son and the holy daughter take the vows in '59,
get low before the local chaplain, bullshit about their age, take a
honeymoon in Reno, polaroids and happy camper films of beach Barbie.
Cutesome Ken and Ken's Pop, catching the grope on that skinny butt
because his step-son hasn't got the plastic in his pants. Too slow is
junior George on the up take until he signs his holiday visa out of
Reno and in to Vietnam. The sixties mini shows and the step-son is
shipped out to Saigon, GI junior, A1 and out on the Ho Chi Minh trail,
smelling out the gooks and playing catch with the clap, shipped out on
the television in '63 and snuck back in by Christmas in a body bag.
Thoi. Di, di. The VD got cured in Mekong Delta by a gook with a trip
wire. Tight and skinny cries at the funeral, tight and skinny cries at
home, in his fucking dinner, over the fucking game and in the fucking
bath. GI Leo spends more time at the gas station, playing boss, top
hog, bitching over the name of the place, fucking off the customers.
Truck Pitt. A one-stop shop for all, cheap booze, cigarettes and
condoms. Got it all down at the Shit Pitt. Tight and skinny cries her
self in to loose and floppy and everything below boss hog's waist turns
to mush by the Fall of '69. Middle-age is a bitch and it comes thick
and fast for this old soldier. In the same season Patty "tight and
skinny" finds God and the female orgasm all in a hayloft1 and a fat ass
fuck up in her house, the decision is easy, by '71 Patty is living in
Austin with the preacher and riding the religion every night. Leo is
left with his mushy waist and the gas station and his bitching: fucking
factory workers, shit&;#8230;all they do is bitch about the prices,
if it ain't good enough for them, let them fuck off up to Richmond,
find themselves a bargain up there, I ain't no goddamn charity, I ain't
one of those motherfucking hippies with their fucking love buses,
fucking on school bus seats, shit that makes me want to puke, fucking
up my forecourt, then there's them fucking tourists with their puke pie
ain't they sweet smelling of shit&;#8230;all through the seventies,
the afro thang happens, Shaft is asked not to used the washroom,
Hackman is called a pussy and the YMCA2 come in for a slamming for
promoting perverts and dancing, disco comes, disco goes and the whole
country goes to shit in seven months3. Shit Pitt. Thoi. Di, di. Enough.
No more.

FOOTNOTES
1 The hay is riding up my ass and it feels so good and there's that
preacher, the one from down Texas way and it ain't no roll on roll off
shit going on, I mean he's down there, you know, he's down there, doing
stuff, fuck knows what, but for fuck's sake is it fine? I can feel the
bales against my head, the scent in my nose, the hay up my ass, in my
ass and he's crawling around, down there, and he's not letting up and I
can feel all of it, every movement, every finger and lick, by God, did
it feel good, Leo.
2 Now I ain't no racist but some man is on the set telling young
'uns to get down to the YMCA for something no natural boy should be
doing, then don't think harshly if I get my gun out and start cleaning
those barrels, it ain't natural, some guy in a cop uniform, with some
red indian, telling us to get down to the YMCA, they shouldn't be
promoting that shit on television.
3 The flag is burning on the screen and in the background the hostages
are being pushed around, trussed up in their shirts, blindfolded, their
faces covered in dirt, streaked with tears, Americans abroad with
Arabs, sixty-six men ready for the drop in the name of Allah and
television entertainment

Roar Rooster Roar? 13

Rockabye Rooster, rock on by in that VW love thing, psychedelic hip
shit on the boot and Captain America on the bonnet, love and power
trip, those hippie shit days, cruising the freeways, bumming out the
cops; elbows out, windows down, spreading love down to Kally-forn?-I.A.
Putting the metal to the floor, the juice to the moose, the Brando to
the bike, Joplin on the eight-track and an activist, a love maker and a
wannabe Kesey in the back, bitching about the banker, the baker and the
bomb maker: I want to be a writer, Rooster!, If that's your thing I dig
it, man, just go with the flow. Rockabye Rooster on the tree top,
Captain America gonna kick your butt and when the shit breaks the
hippies will crawl and all will become bankers and throw you the ball.
Catch that ball, man, gonna leave you in the open field, gonna leave
you waiting for the action, waiting for the flow, the sweet smell of
bourbon, Kentucky style, the way it hits the back of your throat,
chased up by the beer, the AA meetings, the clinics, the emergency
rooms and the courts. Gonna leave you in the bleachers Rooster, gonna
give you the cheap beer and the stale pretzels, gonna watch you get
whipped by a superhero who goes by the name of Jim Beam, gonna leave
you in Shitsville, U.S.A. Rock on by Rooster Red because some days are
just pure pissers&;#8230;should have kept the beetle, should have
dumped the love maker in San Jos?, done the trips, taken Cassedy out
with the trash and turned the merry pranksters to mush, but you went
with the flow and dried out in the east. Never got to Fran. Got
marriage, got religion, got kids, got softball, got the usual merry go
crank shit round of life and got drunk, got a wife that hates him, got
alimony, A-L-I-MOANY, got three(?) two(?) one(?) kids that despise
him(?), got a shit jockey job in the retard woods of Virginia, got an
AA chip, got a little black book with nothing in, got real fat. Got
another afternoon of Red Rooster bullshit, with horny old bitches
wanting to ride his pecker, farmers with blight, crackhead kids and
perverts offering blowjobs at a dime a time. Got to feel good, Red, got
to feel sane next to them, got to level those eyes at a pimple faced
punk in the sound booth, tweaking the levels, woofing the speakers,
flossing his teeth, grinding his cock, humping the table and working
on1 a Blondie from the office, kind of cute, kind of high school, kind
of thin between the ears. Kind of a Dagwood thing. Dagwood and Blondie
sitting in a tree, drinking on malts and holding back the pee. Wearing
her down for a date and shafting the old hippie for a rise, for a bet,
for a way to impress her. Never blow the chance of shitting out an old
hippie. Got to have style, got to have a badge that says you're a God
fearing Republican. Got to be a Lizard boy in sensible clothing.
&;#8230;Feeling old but legally laid, thinks Red, gotta smile at
the boy, show him what a nice guy I can be, show him you believe in
peace, love and all that shit, wait till the bimbo splits and
then&;#8230;
She chatters, mouth moving but nobody's home, the boy smiles but it's
all in the bone, all in his pants, all in the chance that he can get
her in the sack before the record ends2; corporate shit bussed in from
Europe, bland beats, synthesised shit, no Hendrix, no flange, wha-wa or
soul, no diva, no eight-track boost. Muzak. Makes you sick, two love
birds and a hippie hitting the decks, cutting the song short,
scratching the vinyl, culling the Dagwood and Blondie bit: the bimbo
jumps, the boy swears and the hippie tips the bird to the couple as the
sign flashes. ON AIR. Need those Lucky Strike Death tabs to remember
the boy's All-American name: Chuck, Chet or Chip?
&;#8230;shaft him&;#8230;
Take your pick, who the hell cares? Hey Chuck! Hey Chet! Hey Chip!
You're fucking ugly, boy. Flip the boy the bird, Rooster, show the boy
why you're the Detroit devil, show him why King thought you were sharp,
thought you were a righteous man in a honkies body. The kid gives
him the thumbs up and the Blondie giggles. It's a Dagwood thing.
&;#8230;Yeah, fuck you, thinks Red.
"You're tuned to&;#8230;"
$200 worth of jingle, bouncy fucking cheerleaders from the high school
spelling out the stations name - the show was brought to you by the
letters S H I T and the number 2 - happy, horny and hymen free.
"&;#8230;the first with the tunes, some British band there, I
forget the name but who wouldn't after listening to that pile of
crap&;#8230;"
START TO COUNT&;#8230;1
"&;#8230;what kind of band puts this trash out?&;#8230;"
&;#8230;2
"&;#8230;their mum's probably dropped their melon like heads on the
kitchen floor too often&;#8230;"
&;#8230;3
"&;#8230;should have killed them at birth&;#8230;"
&;#8230;4
"&;#8230;and then I guess there's the retards that find them
cool&;#8230;"
&;#8230;BINGO&;#8230;The callboard lights up with one
caller.
Well, fuck 'em, thinks Red, what the fuck happened to the great music,
the fuck bands like Zep, Bonham on skins, kicking it in, making it hot,
shafting you home, The Beatles, fuck they were a good band, no art
house shit, just rhythm and blues at the heart and Lennon before the
big apple party.
"&;#8230;hey, what a surprise, folks, we have a little baby caller
and guess what punk if you're listening, if you're capable of doing
more than one thing at a time, you're not getting
through&;#8230;"
CUT OFF&;#8230;1
Blondie and Dagwood sitting in a tree, hoping to fuck for free, first
comes lice, then comes crabs, then comes Daddy full of VD.
&;#8230;2
Dagwood waves Blondie goodbye.
&;#8230;BINGO&;#8230;shafted kid is back, two seconds to redial
and mighty pissed&;#8230;
"&;#8230;and the fool's phoned back, hey kid, you're momma and
daddy are they related? Like kissing cousins that stepped over the
line? Because that might just explain why you're so stupid, because I
can just cut you off&;#8230;and there you go, God I love this
job&;#8230;"
Dagwood in the booth, Blondie gone, only the table to hump, only gum to
chew, slipping those sneakers on to the sound desk, flipping the back
issue of a comic book out of his bag, the one where Spiderman gets
laid.3
Shithead, thinks Red.
"&;#8230;now all you young folks know that Thursday afternoon
belongs to the older loons in our town, so if you've got a gripe get to
college, get educated and put it in writing, if not, jerk off and go
and play on the freeway, either goddamn way I don't give a
hoot&;#8230;come on you monsters ring me up and chew the crud about
what's ragging you out&;#8230;now, so far, Tom Spires, single, old
and probably insane, but still a faithful listener, God bless his
little woollen socks, has pointed out the fact that May Thackett might
have been butchered by Scooby-Doo or some other mad talking dog and is
haunting his kitchenette on game days, all I've got to say, Tom, is lay
off the hooch or else phone a Catholic priest or better still phone May
Thackett, she lives in Norfolk with her sister, she moved,
fool&;#8230;
There must be better ways to earn a buck? thinks Red.
"&;#8230;so the phone lines are open for any other crazy fool
without spots, ya all know the number&;#8230;"
Cue crappy jingle with crappy happy teenage voices, out of time.
Come on cheerleaders give me a reason to buy a gun, visit your homes
and mow down your family, then hit the bottle and claim red necks sent
me over the edge, ya all&;#8230;maybe today is a good day to start
drinking again, thinks Red.
"&;#8230;so get dialling folks and tell me your
jokes&;#8230;"
Weak pun Rooster, even Dagwood in the booth winces through shooting the
breeze with his strip, probably saving some honey from off the top of
the Empire State and then banging her in the broom closet at his
mom's.4
"&;#8230;to take us in to this golden afternoon of highbrow chat,
let's spin a song to relax those jangled nerves, a real song, with
lyrics, that's words for the retards, a real slice of 'American
Pie'&;#8230;"
&;#8230;Apple Mom smiles in kitchenettes all over the town, trailer
parks rocking to whisky and rye, army types pitching out their A-bombs
in the cornfields, farmers yammering on about dusting and death, high
school kids reading twinky comics with kinky heroes in to spandex,
tight fitting heroines, with tight fitting agendas, monkey boys on work
experience, chewing gum with thumbs up their asses, dreaming of
cheerleaders and marrying their mothers&;#8230;Roaring Red Rooster,
the Detroit Devil, a black man in an ill-fitting honky pimp suit,
brother, he ain't no comic book fool, no cartoon caricature, no strip
for him, no caped crusade or avenging hippie shit, no purple heart to
show that he turned tail on the Viet Cong, doing that Ho Chi Minh bug
dance, no gook shrapnel in his head, no armour plating covering his
mushy brain, no jumping as high and as fly as a black man shooting the
hoops on top of the Empire State. Taking the court by storm in his pimp
slick suit, shooting the bitches down with his dick, taking the whores
for the stride and robbing the kid blind as Dagwood and Blondie shit in
a tree. Didn't take his ass out on to the line, didn't tool up in a bid
to outsmart and out fart the average Commie in the hood, wasn't buddy
buddy with McCarthy, didn't go in to pro-wrestling with the cops,
didn't burn his draft card, didn't dodge the ball, not this Commie
hugging hippie white fucker.5
He lied for King and country, a true blue democrat to the end, too
many bass bins, too much grass had sent the red hippie deaf, no way
would this junkie have made it against the gook, this would be a party
monster in camouflage, spouting shit about insanity, farting and
shooting the breeze over his tinnitus&;#8230;Ho Chi Minh lunch meat.
He was a love me and get me laid hippie, trying to get off with the
chicks, bumming out the heads, writing for rags, calling it music
journalism, cutting some crap deal with a Detroit radio station and
pouring his bum trips out for the Ford workers&;#8230;hanging on to
dead head philosophy, wailing on about taking the freeway to Vegas,
doing the love power thang, said it like that, thang, banning the bomb,
fucking your mom, against Vietnam, hello honey, wham bam thank you
hippie shit man&;#8230;in the jungle&;#8230;in the
bottle&;#8230;crawling for the can&;#8230;voting for Reagan like
all good AA chumps did&;#8230;went on bender&;#8230;fucked a
whore&;#8230;downed some beer&;#8230;went to Vegas on
Percodan&;#8230;ticked a little box that said Ronnie&;#8230;it
seemed so funny at the time&;#8230;with the Lizard dragging him
through party congress, spouting some shit about Breshnev, about it was
the duty of all ex-commies to vote
Republican&;#8230;R-E-P-U-B-L-I-C-A-N-BOY&;#8230;re-arm and get
laid with the party whores or we put your commie ass in the can with
that shit stirring motherfucker of a vodka bang to the ass, let the CIA
go to town on you, fill you up&;#8230;if nuclear weapons and mass
paranoia's ya thang then the cowboy Ronnie's your man in the hood, pimp
boy. Fuck you, name an alcoholic star who didn't do the Lizard parties
back in '79? Snorting coke from the bowl in the restroom with a dippy
cheerleader called Stacey or Stadey? Stadey put! Putt! Putt! Mexican
joke, Mexican lingo, dip your wick and get the alcoholics privilege
card, a one way trip to Tijuana with the CIA, to dance with the worm in
tequila and a hash skirt&;#8230;vote Reagan? No way of getting out
of it, lined up with all the other cocksuckers and prayed for
Armageddon&;#8230;the generation that preferred to get on their
knees.
Poor Stadey Putt! Putt! down on her knees in the piss tiled restroom
of the Lizard party, head bobbing up and down, catching the smell of
the politicians crap, the film stars fucking in the shit stained
cubicles and limp DJ dick in her hand; the fucker that crashed the
lounge, the has-been Detroit Devil, the shock jock, quick fuck spinner,
bitching the ride off her, giving her coke for the finger poke, a two
way lick to the restroom politics&;#8230;urinals are for men,
toilets are for ladies and coke is for parties&;#8230;tossing the
Tequila worm between her teeth as he sucks on his handkerchief, on the
turpentine trip, the meths membrane memory loss ride, his balls
creeping in to the bus of his body, the penis shrivelling in to piss
and laughter&;#8230;you dirty fucker, you dirty, dirty
bastard&;#8230;gagging on it, flowing down her chin&;#8230;coke
is for parties, women are for relief&;#8230;the meths bus ride, a
quick piss slide for the funny fat DJ, filling his trousers, splitting
his bladder, bottle fed baby on Bud and drugs. From Stadey Putt! Putt!
to another Lizard Fest, another gathering of the law and order bill, a
leather lounge for the 80's, a little piece of paradise, a little piece
of bondage, a little bit of ass to call your own, dig in those spurs
and ride the cowboy trail, rubber Ronnie's in Tennessee, Senators in
drag, in gingham dresses, riding the range and the rent boys with an
old hippie tending bar, drinking the profits, pissing his pants and
making jokes about Stadey Putt! Putt!&;#8230;who the fuck is he
going on about?&;#8230;cruising with the wild boys in Bible punch
central and doing hard time with the bottle. Dumping the AA chips for
exports. Cheap piss tasting beer. Stadey Putt! Putt! Laughter. The
beer. The booze. The broke. Tending bar watching the rubber Ronnie's
dig their spurs in some bitch boy&;#8230;coke is for
parties&;#8230;no parties&;#8230;.women are for
relief&;#8230;no women&;#8230;this is the Detroit
Devil&;#8230;was. Kids have heavy metal and heroin. Kids have
fucking and MTV. The drunk tending bar has a Lizard in his head and the
sweet taste of a brown paper bag on his lips as he munches down in to
the meths&;#8230;I knew Hendrix, man&;#8230;roll in the fast food
years, the wino kick, the shaved face and head, the crawling crabs, the
pubic lice, the red raw balls. Stadey Putt! Putt! No price for a beer.
No carton of smokes. A list of caseworkers, wise asses with clean AA
sheets and bullshit psychology&;#8230;I think coming off the booze
was the best thing for you&;#8230;fuck you! I liked a drink, I liked
get so fucked that couldn't see who I was banging. Fuck YOU! The late
night phone calls looking for wrong numbers&;#8230;hello, is that
Stadey? If it is I want to say sorry&;#8230; SORRY Stadey Putt!
Putt! The shitty list of dead end drying out jobs, suburban table
tennis for alcoholics on Thursday afternoons: TAKING OUT THE
TRASH&;#8230;3 days&;#8230;DETOX: 2 months&;#8230;self-help
groups on Wednesday afternoon with Methodist
congregations&;#8230;THE CHICKEN FARM&;#8230;2
hours&;#8230;ER: 7 hours and thirteen stitches&;#8230;unlucky for
some, a self-awareness guru trip for drunks in a beer
factory&;#8230;THE PORN SHOP&;#8230;46 days in a county lock up,
dried out and divorced: stay away or die - STAY A-W-A-Y or
DIE-fucker-bastard-asshole&;#8230;FARMING COMMUNITY DISC
JOCKEY&;#8230;FOR-EVER&;#8230;STAY AWAY FROM THE BOTTLE OR DIE.
Die to kill twinky kids on Thursday afternoons bitching about attitude
and fuck you ideals. Friday evenings, SORRY, housewives who spent the
entire day vacuuming their tits whilst getting off to Richard
Chamberlain, STADEY, Saturday afternoon, neighbours listening for the
Commie bastards next door to dig another inch under their property and
hit the mines, PUTT! Just reds under the bed with no screening. PUTT!
And Superman in the cupboard with Lois Lane and little Jimmy taking the
dive on to Broadway. There's no business like&;#8230;
On my own again, thinks Red.
Signal Dagwood, SORRY STADEY, gotta piss, PUTT! PUTT! gotta piss all
over Dagwood and comic book heroes.

FOOTNOTES
1 He dreams, he dreams of leather seating, malted milks, dead
dashboards and turning the heat up in her skirt, sliding off her
panties, pinning her down when she says NO, painting the car windows
solid as she says YES, YES, YES, as she puts out, opens her top, slides
his hand in and takes him for a spin.
2 She should put out for him, she shouldn't string him along because
that could make him angry and he's no goddamn fucking kid, he's a man,
he's got everything a man needs to satisfy a woman, he has his father's
car, he has his father's liquor, he has his father's titans.
3 He swung down from the church roof, the evil Professor Doom was
beaten for another time, now it was Peter Parker's turn, that wimp was
ruining the Spider's dates, the spidey shit was nothing more than a boy
but sometimes a man has to do what a man has to do, and today it was
cowboy time.
4 He took Lois Lane in his arms, dancing her through the office, the
Chief sat tied up in the chair near the entrance, the back of the chair
wedged the doors closed, that punk kid reporter, Clark Kent, had taken
a trip out of the window and had been followed by that snot-nosed kid,
this time Superman was going to bang out Lois's brains and he didn't
gave a fuck who saw him, he was going to give her the ride of her life,
as soon as he could figure out how the broom cupboard lock
worked.
5 Man, it was soooo coool, so I'm hanging at Woodstock with this 'Lotte
chick, and we're getting down the mud, touching each other up and
'Lotte is gonna put out, man this is so fucking cooool to tell, so I'm
in the mud at Woodstock with the love maker and she's totally naked by
now, did I tell you that? I mean totally in the together, got her shit
together, man, God that chick's soooo coool and she's dancing with some
Vets and I have to spin the army stories out, ya know that I was
declared 1Y, don't ya know? That's cooool, man, so I'm telling them
about the head shrinks and the drugs and the crap they sent over to
test on the troops back in '68, full metal jacket and all, man, the
government bastards, but you know what? Those mothers don't give a
shit, they're just getting down to that bastard Leary, who's on the
stage, spouting some turgid crap, man, and he's really bumming 'Lotte
out because she tells me, she tells me, to fuck myself and splits with
the Vets, some women are so fucking fickle, man. I went to Woodstock,
man, and got gate crashed by my future mother-in-law with her bummer
trip Bible classes.

Kidsville USA 14

Peddle power in toy town Virginia, Old Dominion territory though the
Devil drives a convertible in up state New York nowadays. Leaving the
kids to hustle on the homestead and beat on each other with their two
wheel sports bikes, low strung foot power, easy grease chain on a
silver sheen, riding the potholes north towards the Shit Pitt. A Shit
Pitt candy trip for the ten year old at the controls, chewing gum in
his hair, chocolate in his nostrils, rain in his eyes and his kid
brother hanging on his ass in the retard mobile: a bike with four
stabilisers, side mirrors, spoolies, in-built radar and air
horn&;#8230;the rearguard in Captain Robert MacLeod's attack on the
marauding Klingons down at the Shit Pitt&;#8230;TARGET: the Leo
Wallace creature&;#8230;OBJECTIVES: steal candy and allow brother to
piss out the restroom cubicles&;#8230;SITUATION: craft in heavy
cross-fire from the Klingon weather battalions on the starboard bow,
army soaked to the skin, miserable as hell, talk of mutiny in the
ranks&;#8230;
"Bobby, I need the john".1
&;#8230;talk of urination in the ranks, pissed off soldiers make a
bad battle&;#8230;RECON: Shit Pitt gas pumps empty except for truck,
no sign of enemy but a civilian is making their way in to the store,
repeat, civilian making their way to the candy, abandon mission,
abandon mission&;#8230;BUT THIS IS TOY TOWN VIRGINIA AND THIS
CAPTAIN ROBERT MACLEOD OF THE STARSHIP ENTERPRISE, NO FUCKING WAY,
GOING IN.

FOOTNOTES
1 Ralphie MacLeod, five going on fifty, scared of the dark, frightened
of the days, lays traps for the mail man, puts wasps in his brother's
bed, claims innocence under questioning, flutters his eyelashes like a
big girl with baby blues, puts on little boy lost scenario for his
Mommy, drops the shit at saint Bobby elsewhere, plays out in the yard,
in the rain, blames his brother if he catches a cold, blames with blue
eyes, blond hair, tips the bird at Bobby. Ralphie not stupid, seen
Bobby, seen Mommy with the foul mouthed dark hair, brown eyed boy
D-A-R-K-H-A-I-R-E-D-B-R-O-W-N-EYES, sinful boy not watching his younger
brother, his cuter brother - Ralphie seen, Ralphie known that Bobby had
been blue and blond, free and easy, not looking like Pop, not like Pop
at all. Ralphie saw the bitching, seen the bullying, watched the
mirror, viewed his blond drain, caught flecks of shit in the blue; the
gravy train is gonna derail oh Lord, the gravy train is gonna derail oh
Lord and hear the word of the Lord, Oh Momma&;#8230;Momma gonna get
angry now, gonna get two little Pop's where one is missing, gonna
bitch, gonna scream, gonna bleach his hair, poke out his eyes and kick
his balls back in to his chest and call him her baby, her beautiful
baby&;#8230;this is slack alley USA and Ralphie need to pee.

Gummy Bears 15

One of those days for papa bear Rooster, sore in the head, lonely in
bed, Goldillocks has fled the coup with the chief rabbi and some
goddamn wise ass punk kid has stuck up the faucet with the left over
chewing gum from Goldillocks glove compartment. Papa bear got a bubble
gum bomb right in the crotch, all down those grey terry towel sweat
pants, piss pants, piss pants, pissy pants pants-pants, with a walk
through the forest past the witch in the candy house: the station
manager and his hooker whore secretary, one of those fucking fads mad
men slide down in to in their thirties, exercising like crazy with
dictation techniques, fucking like a seventeen year old, running like a
seventeen year old, swimming, toning, rowing, jumping, jacking off like
a seventeen year old and taking coffee trips out in to the forest
corridors every seventeen minutes like the caffeine don't fuck with his
ticker talk but gummy bears with piss down their pants stop them in
their tracks. Piss pants, piss pants, pissy pants pants-pants papa bear
sloping by the coffee machine with the ticker tape tongue dead,
munching slowly over the instructions to the coffee machine, INSERT
MONEY, no eye contact between them as he goes on reading, MAKE
SELECTION FROM CONSOLE, a bear Rooster and his incontinence is its own
thing, LEAVE CUP IN DRIP TRAY, need to say, DO NOT OPEN THE SPLASH
GUARD AS HOT WATER CAN, get you up to your neck in piss and that can,
BURN EXPOSED SKIN, flop on by Red Rooster muttering about goddamn kids
with their goddamn gum and HAVE A NICE DAY.

Oldsville USA 16

Taking the steps two at a time, I'm taking those steps two at a time
and I'm seventy-nine? 69-59-49-39-29-19&;#8230;God I'm nineteen
again and I look like shit, I'm running in my house and mom ain't
screaming at me to slow down because I look like an old man
19-29-39-49-59-69-79&;#8230;I am an old man, jeez louise how many
beers have I drunk, why the hell am I running again? Take a look at
yourself, you old fool, you're as white as a jack rabbit and sweating
like a whore on a mattress&;#8230;the heart, jesus, the heart, take
care of the heart, the Doc said, and the rest will keep care of itself,
gotta stop fooling around, goddamn beer, what the hell possessed you to
buy beer? God I felt it skip a beat then, skipped a goddamn beat for
Budweiser, they're gonna find me on my back with a crate up my ass and
sez he was looking to save lives, break my neck up here and nobody will
find me for weeks, ya hear? For weeks you old fool, goddamn that beer,
I'm gonna pour it down the sink this minute, right now, gonna
run&;#8230;gonna walk to the kitchen&;#8230;ette&;#8230;the
kitchen? The voices, the fucking radio, that's it, got to save lives,
yes, yes, YES, save lives, drink beer, listen to short band in bedroom,
listen to Carpenter today, tomorrow truckers, Carpenter and the Sheriff
talking cream cheese in my spare bedroom&;#8230;we have a situation
here John, repeat we have a situation&;#8230;too many beers in the
afternoon frazzles your hearing, turns your brain in to mush, Tom, Tom
don't you be running on my stairs, you hear? You could break your neck
and where would you be then? Yes momma&;#8230;drinking beer in your
kitchen momma and letting the old heart skip a beat once in a
while&;#8230;the heart, the Doc sez&;#8230;the radio, that boy,
that boy who does the papers and Carpenter&;#8230;those
words&;#8230;need to sit myself down, need to think what to do, need
a beer.

Law &; Order 17

Running barefoot in the rain, that's how Joe Carpenter found him, with
his jeans torn and the remains of his socks clinging to his ankles, red
faced and howling, a creature playing chicken with his cruiser. Nearly
crushed the kid in the downpour. Running barefoot, must be a booking
offence: get out of the car, out of the warmth, clip out the gun, go in
to procedure and chase the little bastard down 29&;#8230;catch him
and get kicked in the nuts, the little bastard MacLeod kid booted him
right in the nuts&;#8230;ran&;#8230;slipped away in the rain with
Carpenter watching him from the ground and the sound of John Gray on
the cruiser radio&;#8230;shut the fuckup Sheriff&;#8230;got balls
like fire in the belly and pain behind the eyes, ten minutes of that
shit in the gut before he can carry on, before he can stagger after the
kid&;#8230;now flying south for the winter and honking all the
way&;#8230;still running when Carpenter kicks his legs out from
beneath, cuffs him and tows him head first back to the car using the
bad cop, good cop routine: I'm gonna whup your ass, son, and then your
parents gonna open a can of worms on your head, sure as hell don't want
that, so why don't you tell old Joe what got you so spooked to kick an
officer of the law like a little punk prick&;#8230;the fingers
tightening their hold in the greasy hair, black to the touch, gummed up
and muddy, stuck together with some sort of shit, screaming: just tell
me now, son, it ain't gonna hurt but the more you holler like that the
harder I'll yank&;#8230;this shit worked on Hill Street Blues. Show
them compassion, give them a shoulder to cry on, then break both their
fucking legs and book the assholes for traffic violation and resisting
arrest, heap the whole shit on them, throw in some educated hair
pulling and the perfect day in hell's kitchen is complete, home to food
and fucking&;#8230;then the kid pisses on his boots, crying on his
shoulder, pissing on his $80 boots&;#8230;the MacLeod kid stands
there like he's delivering the papers, pissing on his boots and
gabbling some tall tale bullshit, some doped up fiend story with a moon
face and the cat and fiddle, pissing on his brand new eighty fucking
dollars boots&;#8230;fuck this&;#8230;this is a shit sticking ten
year old on crack&;#8230;this is a juvenile on dope&;#8230;this
is a boot pisser on LSD&;#8230;this is a swift trip in the cruiser
to a caseworker and juvenile court&;#8230;this is: my brother's
still back there with Mister Wallace&;#8230;
"What'd you say?"
"&;#8230;Mister Wallace".
Leo asshole Wallace to his friends, son, the fucking limping freak of
the basin, with his bullshit asshole jokes, his merry prankster
fuckups, his dicking around with kids to shit them out with everything
but his dick.
"Leo Wallace?"
Yessum.
"Get in the car, son".
This is police business now, this is fucking up Leo time&;#8230;what
shit was he pulling again? This is the law&;#8230;gonna bust his
ass&;#8230;gonna take that bastard down a peg or two&;#8230;gonna
put him in a paddy wagon&;#8230;gonna slip a gun between his butt
cheeks and clean out his sinuses&;#8230;gonna see how he likes
it&;#8230;gonna: my kid brother&;#8230;
"What's that?"
"&;#8230;with Mister Wallace".
Goddamn it, that does it, that takes the biscuit from a child's
mouth&;#8230;gonna piss his self when he sees old Joe come through
those doors with both guns blazing&;#8230;gonna take out the
trash&;#8230;blow some holes in his dried goods&;#8230;waste his
detergent shelves and the kid's gonna bring up the
rearguard&;#8230;CAPTAIN ROBERT MACLEOD IN A BAD SITUATION, BEING
GRILLED BY THE ENEMY, AM WOUNDED BUT NOT HURT, BEEN SAVED BY A COP,
REPEAT, A COP, POSSIBLE SUBVERSIVE OR INFILTRATOR, WAITING FOR RECON,
REPEAT, WAITING FOR RECON&;#8230;cabbage brain in the back of his
cruiser&;#8230;DANGER, REPEAT, DANGER, YOU ARE ENTERING ENEMY HELD
ZONES, REPEAT YOU ARE ENTERING ENEMY HELD TERRITORY, RETREAT, RETREAT:
hey kid, calm down back there&;#8230;turned in to a fucking animal,
teeth and shit hitting the grill, pushing his face through the gaps and
his feet are kicking like a wild thing, tearing up the leather, this is
crazy shit here&;#8230;OBJECTIVE: SHIT PITT&;#8230;PULL
OUT&;#8230;PULL OUT&;#8230;hey kid, calm down we're here, we'll
just have a little word with old man Wallace&;#8230;that fucking
crazy bastard, what the hell has he done to this kid, soon as mention
him, the kid spooks out, goes dead and hits the floor like he's in some
goddamn army game&;#8230;.REPEAT YOU ARE BEHIND ENEMY LINES TAKE
SHELTER, TAKE SHELTER: shit, do what you want, son, I'm gonna go in an
have me a little talk with Leo&;#8230;no rag-time shit, no Dixie
land we should have won the war crap, no mangy voice trying to carry a
tune, none of that bullshit that Leo pumps over the tannoys twenty-four
seven&;#8230;BEHIND ENEMY LINES: stay in the car,
kid&;#8230;gonna kick Leo's butt&;#8230;TAKE
SHELTER&;#8230;gonna throw him in the county lock up and piss on his
shoes&;#8230;DANGER&;#8230;gonna shoot some of his pussy
bags&;#8230;RETREAT: yoo-hoo Leo honey, I'm home HA
HA&;#8230;COME IN CAPTAIN ROBERT MACLEOD, DO YOU READ US? Yes.
REPORT SITUATION. We have lost contact with Spock and the retard
mobile. WHERE IS IT? Resting by the Shit Pitt, Enterprise. WOUNDED?
Yes. RETALIATION? Yes, one cop and his gun, repeat, COP and GUN, have
gone in behind enemy lines. RECON? Coming in, the cop is pulling out of
the Shit Pitt, this is not a retreat, he looks pale, repeat, looks
PALE, could be excessive candy eating at the hands of the Klingons, cop
is chundering, repeat, CHUNDERING, need Doctor, repeat, NEED DOCTOR,
cop is on his knees, am locked in cruiser, need immediate beam out,
repeat, BEAM OUT: gonna kick your ass Leo HA
HA&;#8230;gonna&;#8230;gonna&;#8230;COME IN CAPTAIN,
TRANSPORTERS OFF LINE, NEED CANDY FOR ENGINEERS, REPEAT, GET US SOME
CANDY YOU LITTLE FUCKER. That's a negative, Enterprise, behind enemy
lines, repeat, BEHIND ENEMY LINES: hold tight kid, I'm gonna get some
help&;#8230;COME IN CAPTAIN, NEED CANDY NOW, handcuffed to cruiser,
repeat, handcuffed to cruiser: we have a situation here John, repeat we
have a situation&;#8230;COME IN CAPTAIN, WE NEED CO-ORDINATES TO
PULL YOU OUT WITH CANDY, I have no candy, repeat, NO CANDY, I'm going
mad in here, he's calling for backup, repeat BACKUP: backup, John will
someone get me out of here, repeat, WILL SOMEONE PLEASE BEAM ME THE
FUCK UP.

Radio Days 18

Milk that turned, that's what he looks like, you're getting your end
away with Lois Lane in the utility cupboard, watching the mops bang,
smelling in the bleach, shooting off over the comic strip and the
bubble writing: oh God, Patty, OH GOD I love your tits, I love your
tits, only to be rubbed out by a fat hippie pissing his pants on your
turf, OH GOD PATTY, OH GOD LOIS he's PISSED his PANTS. What a scoop,
what a story, a by-line for the bondage chief of the Daily Planet,
scrape little Jimmy off the sidewalk and get him to write copy, what a
tale to tell at the Seven Eleven, over coke on the toilet seat, credit
card cutting and dragging the plot, oh Blondie, he pissed himself, OH
DAGWOOD, let me fuck your brains out, GOOD DAGWOOD GOOD. Like all comic
book heroes do in comic book cubicles, catching comic book VD in their
balloon speeches, oh PATTY BLONDIE, the heroines caught in the tale,
erased of clothing, pumping up with silicone, naked, tight and
speechless, like all comic book ladies, catching the line of a hippie
hero bumming a light from them as some teenager cums all over their
inked in chests.
"Okay, you're tuned to&;#8230;"
Another headacher of a jingle, a gaggle of jocks in tight shorts,
roaring out the colours on the radio BLUE WHITE 21-22-23 hup-hup-hup
HUMPERS all the way.
"&;#8230;and it's another afternoon of buddy to buddy calls with
your fave DJ, Red Rooster, an afternoon for all you old woodchuckers to
squirrel out those problems and show us how nuts your&;#8230;"
28 THROUGH TO 50 FLASHING with TWINKIES, TONKS, TRANSVESTITES, TRACTOR
WHORES, HOUSEWIVES and TUNE LOONS. Be careful old Red, pick a switch,
any switch, hit a light and hope you've picked a winner, backed the
right horse, let luck be a lady tonight and let it get you laid with
the honey hiding behind 28?
"&;#8230;neighbours really are&;#8230;"
32?
"&;#8230;the problems you have with your&;#8230;"
36-24-36?
"&;#8230;brothers&;#8230;"
38-40-34?
"&;#8230;bosses&;#8230;"
41-34-36?
"&;#8230;mothers&;#8230;"
49-28-34?
"&;#8230;or me&;#8230;"
28-28-28?
"&;#8230;so let's go straight to the lines and cut to the
chase&;#8230;"
28&;#8230;BINGO&;#8230;YOU'RE ON AIR&;#8230;BE A HONEY
TONIGHT.
"Hello caller, you're talking to&;#8230;"
"Red, is that you?"
BINGO FUCKING CHRIST.
"&;#8230;it sure would be, Tom, you phoned the station, so it kind
of follows that you get me, don't it?"
PLEASE SHOOT ME&;#8230;LUCK BE A BITCH TONIGHT.
"I've got something real important to tell you".
FULL HOUSE&;#8230;roll you eyes, sigh in to the microphone because
God is taking a bucket full of piss today, this is dumb luck day, numb
nuts week and Dagwood is smiling&;#8230;
&;#8230;no, the little fucker is grinning, thinks
Red&;#8230;
&;#8230;behind the comic book&;#8230;PICK A LINE, ANY LINE:
28-36-41-50? ALL fucking TOM SPIRES with UFO's stole my washing, ghosts
drank my beer, gerbils are the first wave, all nice, all apple mom, all
polite ways of advertising that he's a drunk: then the alien, he came
in to the kitchen through the back of the house, cracked open the
fridgedair, as you know I padlocked it after the last time, anyhoo, he
took all my Bud and miniaturised them with one of those ray guns the
government's so et up about getting their greasy hands on. BASTARD
DAGWOOD.
"Now Tom, if it's about May, she's out Norfolk way and she asks that
you stop pestering her&;#8230;"
"I know that, fool".
FOOL HOUSE&;#8230;the nut has chucked, Tom has finally climbed on to
the rollercoaster in a bikini, taken the elevator to the basement, cut
the cables and opened a wiener franchise, BARBECUE WIENER BRAINS. B-B-Q
FOOL HOUSE.
"Now Tom, I don't think you need to be rude&;#8230;"
"There's every need, boy".
DAGWOOD and the CHESHIRE CAT sat in a tree, laughing and laughing at
the old HIP-PEE.
"Now calm down&;#8230;"
"You know the Wallace place?"
SHIT PITT.
"Yeah sure, everyone knows Leo, is he still selling that bad beef
jerky that gives you gas?"
"This ain't no laughing matter, boy".
"Look Tom, next you'll be telling us that old Leo is poisoning you
again&;#8230;"
CUE LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE ON TAPE.
"He's dead, Red. He's dead".
DOA. THEY'RE STILL LAUGHING, oh my GOD, THEY'RE STILL CLAPPING, but it
isn't funny anymore. There's an old man on the air and today he's not
talking about spotting Elvis at the K-Mart or Aliens humping his leg,
there's an old man on air and he's scared and being applauded by a
jingle tape.
"Are you sure, Tom?"
STILL LAUGHING.
"They&;#8230;"
STILL CLAPPING.
"&;#8230;they&;#8230;"
STILL WHOOPING.
"&;#8230;those d-d-d-dirty b-b-bastard killed the young MacLeod Kid
as well&;#8230;"
STILL ROARING.
"They killed a child, Red".
"Oh&;#8230;fuck".
OH FUCK&;#8230;1 sound&;#8230;1 word&;#8230;STILL
ROARING&;#8230;equals 1,000,000 calls at the exchange as the show
becomes hot news with OH FUCK. DAGWOOD and the CHESHIRE CAT sat in a
tree, laughing and laughing at the old HIP-PEE, watch the branch break
and watch the show fold&;#8230;OH FUCK&;#8230;mouthing OH JESUS
(OH FUCK) OH JESUS (OH HIP-PEE).
"Yeah, tell me about it".
(OH FUCK) caffeine kid station manager in the sound booth clearing out
the tree debris (OH FUCK) kicking out the cat (OH FUCK) hitting Dagwood
(OH GOOD) pulling the plug (OH FUCK) killing Red Rooster's career in
toy town (OH FUCK) here comes the law (OH FUCK) coppers, killers and
career (OH FUCK) coppers, killers and career (OH FUCK) coppers, killers
and career (OH FUCK).

Comic Book Heroes 19

Tap tap tap tap-tap tapping down the delta blues with Captain
got-me-the-Klux-in-the-Klan America, gonna blow that white harp shit
from heaven down 29, listen to the Detroit engine, listen to the deep
south interstate, catch the roadkill in the grill, sing it a lullaby
and then zap its ass with his x-ray eyes tap-tap tapping thud, tap-tap
tapping thud, pow! Captain America notches up the strip, strikes
another smoke, eases back on the throttle and then slams home the gas,
bunny hop, bunny hop all the way to the top of the speedometer, a kick
of nicotine and the CHEVROLET strains on the leash, slip sliding
through those rich rubber gloves that melt with the ash, pollute the
air, rise a high from the mind, trips on down through the delta in to
the mud flats, the Cray fish and the killers, trips over the dead delta
bodies, rests on the hard thigh of the boy wonder&;#8230;ever wonder
where Batman went, boy? Did he go goof off with Elvis do you think?
Down in Vegas hitting the bars, hitting the broads, fucking the whores
and skipping town for Reno, for Tijuana, for anywhere but here? WALLOP!
Maybe you do, maybe you don't, maybe you saw the King at the end of the
bar, maybe you saw him in the hypermarket pushing zucchinis with his
thumb, maybe you saw him in a comic book, hanging out with heroes,
drinking back the foam, dancing with Eartha Kitt and Andy Kaufman. But
there is always you boy wonder, always you to slide back in to, as the
caped crusader leaves town on a rape charge and Captain America picks
up the King on 29 and pushes the CHEVY baby across the state line,
moving west, moving deep in to Edge City at a cool ninety panels a
second, windows down, wipers on, rainstorm in the rear view and Elvis
on the radio.