An old man with red eyes

An old man with red eyes
tired face tauter
the awkwardness of small talk gone serious.

only two only two
life's precious, you know
red eyes now redder.

The pain of seeing a old man cry, the world goes awry.

But business never stops
and I pay as he sobs at the counter
I am ashamed of my paying and her indifference.

He smokes outside
eyes still red.
seems to think:
Are you still a grandfather when the child dies?

XXXmas

So I awoke this morning in a very interesting fashion:

(sound of multiple sets of galloping paws in the hallway)

(voice) FIONA!!!!

A hiss, a bark, cat on my head, a sharp pain across my ear.
OW! Blood runs down my head.

I stumble, slightly dazed into the bathroom, my ear is bleeding. A lot.

Just moments before, it seemed. I was sleeping and cuddling with Lint, my favorite cat. Now I was in pain and confused. Great Christmas.

Then I got a ukulele and a messenger bag. Sweeter Christmas. There's a German here too. That's always fun.

Dokeosphere part II

Suddenly, a voice that sounded as if it was constructed purely of static, like a box of vibrating pins and needles found its way over the radio. At first, the astronaut ignored this voice, thinking it only one of the ten radio checks he'd receive that day. But when it persisted, he began to notice an unfamiliar quality not present in his standard calls from earth: desperation. The Pins and needles voice on the other end was asking for help, crying out to anyone who would listen. The astronaut listened in with voyeuristic curiosity so common among humans. He desired to reach over and press the button in order to respond to the distress call, but something inside of him caused him to hesitate. It was his sense of duty creeping up on him, mentally reprimanding him for being so distracted by such an inconsequential happenstance. So he forced himself away from the help, and back to his makeshift laboratory in a side room on the upper deck. The only sound there was the clinking of test tubes against one another, and the gentle hum of the engines filtered out any excess noise that could possibly distract him.

Dokeosphere part I

Behold the astronaut, who's forced to leave the earth staring out the porthole at the beauty below while knowing that no matter how diligently he works, nothing will bring him back before he's due to return.

So to fill the time, he busies himself with experiments, goes through motions and tests alternatives that are ultimately meaningless. To him, he knows his time is being wasted but the voice that crackles over his radio insists that it's all important, that he has no choice but to remain apart from the things that until now made sure he stayed firmly on the ground. Sometimes the antenna picks up a songs from the radio, and the cabin is filled with the woeful sounds of an old standard, and the astronaut reminisces on the last time he heard this song, long ago.

Suddenly his mind conjures up that time when the song meant the most to him, back to when night only lasted so long, and young bodies huddled together in twin sized beds to warm chilly sheets. And how they'd cram as much excitement into those fleeting nighttime hours! When intimacy was as foreign as the deepest unexplored regions of space, when everyone played Ferdinand Magellan on an insatiable quest to understand their immediate world. And as the sun began to rise, how they'd all pretend that they didn't notice, how they'd push on until their limbs grew weary and their mouths were parched from innumerable heavy breaths. Oh, and how they'd collapse, never to rise before the sun reached its daily apex in the sky above!

And now, how' he'd kill for just ten minutes of true daylight.