I have just started a busking site that I think you will love. It's called The Sidewalk Performer.
It's going to be my new home base, I'm combining all my content on that one site, so go over and look around at what I put up so far and sign up it's free.
But for all my followers here At The Office I know y'all will love my new secret newsletter that focuses more on literary, philosophy, and religion, it's called Hither Go There.
Also I gotta Buy Me A Coffee and you can go over there and sign up and get free stuff and discounts.
And lastly you may have heard about my fund raiser for my van.
Well, we are half way there, I'm almost out of the hole, please don't forget me. I want to thank everyone so far that has helped me out. I have been able to get medical attention, pay off outstanding bills and pay off most of the old wrecked van. I just need to pay off the remainder of the old van and go shopping for a new used van.
I'm hoping for this soon, I want to be able to travel again to good spots and get my family back up on our feet.
The grey wiry smoke, spindled and writhed, creeping through the darkness, from the small glow of the sputtering bulb, that was failing to light up the room.
And at the tip of the smoke, was a small wormy face, looking slowly, and darting back and forth.
And out of its side came slender feminine ethereal arms, with dainty hands, coming around the front of its head in an O.
Like it was dancing in water, and moving elements in the room.
Then someone opened the door, letting in the light and wind, and in a puff, the smoke exploded, into tiny whispers, as the voices of men entered the room, discussing important things.
Things of business, things of worldly affairs, and they all had watches.
In the hot night, in that dark place, with the bad walls, and no good footing.
The five o'clock shadow knows, and chews his cud, and makes the cigarette bob, and makes the smoke bounce, across the chard leather face, of the old time In-mate, serving the term.
His terrored eyes, with the flames inside, they're screaming. And the fire down below, it saturates the being, because there is no fire like it on earth, he's right down there next to Hell.
And a thousand years is a day, and a day is a thousand years, and he don't know when it'll stop, but unlike the Damned, he knows it will.
He knows he has it better now, then the happiest day he ever had with us. He's just waiting for the consequences to burn off.
He knows, because the judge told him so.
So he rolls another cigarette, screaming, and hopes again today, that someone on the outside will put some money on his books, for a glass of water, or a cool breeze, or a firm ground, or, if God wills it, an early release.
And if you put your head in the clouds, and listen real close, you can hear him screaming, up from the bottom of the ground, wailing for candles, wailing for prayers, wailing for mercy.
Just above my spot on the sidewalk, I was held up in another run down hotel room, and my past was jabbing at me again, as it had everyday since she left.
"I miss my wife, I miss my wife," would spew from my mouth uncontrollably every now and again and at least once a day, for seven years.
Mental scar hiccups, nagging shame, but not as bad as it used to be.
Shortly after she left state and took the kids, I would wander around New Orleans with outbursts of frequent screams and sobbing. I couldn't leave the city, because anywhere else, the police would have taken me away. The fifth of whiskey a day, did little back then. So at night after the fifth, I'd go out drinking.
Even travelers have a home, for me it's cheap hotels that let you smoke. It's a never ending search for a spot on the sidewalk and a hotel that'll let you smoke cigarettes.
Sometimes days and nights sleeping on buses and trains searching.
Sometimes a good spot, but no cheap hotel.
Sometimes cheap hotels, but they wont let you work the spot. So back on the bus to another city, so I can sleep on the bus.
It's a gamble.
In the winter a thick tough suit jacket and fedora, cargo pants and slip on sneakers, not white ever.
In the summer cargo Capris, sandal flip flops and a vest I make out of a jacket coat. After the winter the fedora has usually thinned out enough for the summer heat.
I buy as I go, I don't lug.
One bag is all I need, it holds my rig, and personals.
Working outta the pockets, sleight of hand is the gimmick, for the quick ten minute show, for the curious, or for those with time to kill, ten fifteen minutes, then the hat is passed. Usually the first
show pays just less than the price of a room.
Four or five shows could get me through the day. But if I can, I work all day to forget my problems.
In the states I would prefer to live outta my van. Driving hundreds of miles, from pitch to pitch. Truck stops with cheap private showers in the morning, and a cup of tea.
I come from a long line of sidewalk, shifty eyed losers.
When I'm in a crowd, you can find me, I'm the one who looks like trouble from your grandpa´s past, maybe your great grandpa's past,
maybe worse.
I remember when I was younger, looking at old guys like that downtown, and thinking, That's what I'll be!
Well here I am.
For us it's harder now, private property regulations, and less foot traffic in the states, and the spots in Europe are closing up.
Cops and shops and bad guys, are the setbacks of the job.
Cops and shops, wanna shut you down, and the bad guys, are looking to take what they saw you make.
So here I am, on my back, looking up, and staring at the cheap neon lite on the ceiling of my room.
The smoke and the steam leaked out, from dark abandoned buildings.
There were third world vendors set up on the sidewalk. The old man walked through the dying city. It was dying into a broken down cart. With only hints of it's once proud stature, like a museum, that had packed up, and left a couple displays and posters behind.
He walked with his dirty drab suit, through the foot traffic, everyone looked poor and
desperate.
It was the reason he chose that town. It had nothing left, but it's culture.
He had dirt and a two day shadow on his face, but he could not see me.
I followed him back to his room, and into his room, and into his closet, where I hid, where I could see
him in all his glory, that Reporter, banging out visions, on his machine.
Little Beto woke up on the side of the road, he had abandoned the modern world. He rejected the Dialectic.
He had a muddy drab suit, and he lay searching his pockets, doing his morning inventory.
Fixing his tie, he slicked the sweat and grime back in his hair, and stood up.
Slapping that dirt off his suit, he looked on down the road.
That road, that held him like a baby, that held him like a baby every night.
And he began to walk on down that road, that weaved through the long and empty desert, stretching out before him.
And as the days and the months mumbled by, he walked and walked and whittled, and prayed, and grew old, mumbling.
Mumbling.
And his beard began to grow.
And it grew and grew.
Past his arms, past his legs, down the road, and on down that road, like a river, like a train, rolling across the desert, rolling across the sky, blowing out steam and whistle clouds. blowing out steam and whistle clouds.
And,
Hear Ye! Hear Ye! Oh Man.
He was blowing out clouds, of gratitude, worship, purpose, and joy.
It was a humid, angry, broken down city, and it had lost its mind.
It was screaming into the night, and somewhere off in the distance, in one of it's old quiet forgotten corners, there was a motel room, with an old man making visions, secrets, and madness.
It was a dim lit room, with filth stained walls and yellowed windows, and the fleas were jumpin. And there was moans next door. And there were gunshots outside, in that wet stale air. And someone was laughing in the alley, outside, down below, I think it was laughing?
There was no fridge, no food, and nobody, just a small cot, a desk, and a sink to pee in, and the old man, in boxers, on his back, sweating like a pig, in that hot night.
He was staring at the yellowed walls, covered with stains and water marks, and he could see faces in them.
Faces in the filthy walls, haunting the room, with all the desperation they've seen.
And he could hear them.
Wailing together, in shame, from the other side, putting on a show, for thirty thousand nights.
And this night, was his night, to see the show.
"After I'm gone, Will I be up there too?" He wondered.
The old grey sedan barrels down the highway with a cigarette in its mouth.
The old man's suit and five o clock, stare down the road to see the future.
Tall trees whop whop by, like giant pendulums, as far as the eye can see.
It's The Eternal Corridor, Ladys and Gentleman, there's nothing but trees and road, and sky.
The engine wails and the wheels roar, on down the road.
But he's still under the tree, in front of his house. Tree sap and bird droppings litter the car, marking it for purgatory, marking it for all the years down the highway.
His head is static, squealing, clicking, buzzing, and regret is stabbing over and over. White knuckled on the steering wheel, he goes, stoic, barreling down the highway he goes, trying to get home.
And the vents in the dash, blow hot hot winds, in his face and heart, off the engine, and up from the furnaces of hell, in the hot night, in that old car, down the highway, down the eternal corridor.
Staring into a thousand years, but he has no currency here.
Pray for him, my brothers and sisters, that he might have change for the tolls.
I saw old men in dirty old suits, with slightly
overgrown tapered hair cuts, slicked back with grease.
I heard raspy voiced, wild tales,
about adventures on the road. It was like a private club out there, on the sidewalk.
I saw them conserving cigarette butts, by rolling. Eating two dollar breakfasts and
drinking one dollar drinks all day. In make shift "holes in the walls", with businesses built
from hallways, with bar stools, and a long counter.
Ash trays and condiments down the
counters, like an exhibit.
And every seat filled with a worn out man, huddled over each
plate.
A dingy, chatter, smoke filled, tight fit. Sometimes with lines of men out the door
like a soup kitchen.
I saw this when America was free.
I saw them eke out tomorrow's living, by peddling, pitching, and performing for small
bills.
I saw them working manual labor, looking out of place in their suits, dirty and torn.
Like saints.
They were that town, right down to the accent, it was written all over their faces, you
could smell it all over them and every town has one of them.
Every night before I sleep, I hear that night train far way. And it's crying out, like whales do for sailors. And I know, one day it comes for me, to go to the other-side. To that place all men dread, because we know Hell is there. Hell for those who don't pack well for trips far away.
We all hope we packed well, but judgement is stark.
In that day, it's naked and real, and final.
So hear ye hear ye oh man!
Pack well for trips far away, for no man knows the schedule.
Pack well for trips far away, for no man knows for sure what he'll need.
Pack well for trips far away my brothers, it's time to find out, what to believe.
Surrender your comfort now, because we can't hide from the truth over there.
Worry about Hell, because our vanity beckons it.
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