91 MEMOIRS OF A USELESS GOOD-FOR-NUTHIN’
Sealed with a Judas Kiss, 2018
I’m pounding on Salome’s door. “We gotta fucking talk!” She yaps back, “Give me a fucking minute. I’m coming!” She opens up, wearing only a nightgown, pointing her freakin’ flashlight in my eyes. I push it away. “Salome, no Savant slime-speak, whattaya know about Nathaniel and Absurda’s abortion?”
She leans against the doorway. “Oh, poor, poor Ricky.” She’s puts her fingers through my hair and pushes it off my forehead. “It certainly wasn’t Nathaniel’s abortion. Amanda needed our help and love, and we gave it to her.”
“I woulda helped her if she asked.”
“Why would she, after you tossed her away like a tattered hand-me-down doll?”
“Alchemy say it was his kid or mine?”
“I never asked. It didn’t matter.”
“Like it don’t matter if Laluna is tellin’ the truth and Persephone ain’t his but Mose’s, and that’s why they’re movin’ you outta here for good.”
“Not Alchemy’s?”
“No. Moses’s.”
She jumps to the obvious conclusion, which I’d blanked on before ’cause I was so whacked over my own shit. And like she’s thirty, not seventy-five, barefoot and in her nightgown, she takes off, flying down the path.
92 THE SONGS OF SALOME
Nonny, Nonny
Mindswallow’s fierce knocking invaded my sedative-induced state and, in his fury, he revealed the duplicity between Moses and the succubus. How could they do that to my son? How could Alchemy conspire with them to remove me not just from their home — but their lives? How? Running down the path, my bare feet began to bleed and I heard Margarita: Now, Salome, now.
93 MEMOIRS OF A USELESS GOOD-FOR-NUTHIN’
Had to Cry Today, 2018
I chase Salome. I catch her and she says, “Don’t stop me.” Ain’t no point. I trot alongside her. It sounds sorta like it’s chilled in there, and I’m thinking Alchemy done worked his magic one more time, when fucking Salome, so freaking amped, bursts ahead of me and tackles Laluna and is clawing at her face. Me and Alchy dive in and pull her off. She tries to kick me in the nuts. I wrap her in my arms. Laluna, still on her knees, stares at Salome like she’s gonna rip her eyes out and feed ’em to the coyotes.
“Mom, Ambitious is going to let you go. You done?” She nods. I do. Carefully.
Alchemy extends his arms to Laluna and helps her up. Mose starts wiping her cheeks with his shirt.
Laluna asks for some water. I go get a bottle from the fridge.
Out of my good eye I see Salome’s tiptoed up to the console. “Salome, what the—?” The others turn. Too late. The Beretta is aimed at me.
She shifts her sights to Mose and starts singing, “Say, hey, the mother not only rises / she also surprises …”
Mose, he dares her, dead cold, “Do it. Do it.” She cackles. Me and Alchy flash eye contact. Salome, she nuzzles the gun at her head, shrieks, “I can’t! I must!..” Alchemy takes off with a superhuman leap and soars up and over the console. Laluna, Mose, me — we charge at them. In midair, Alchemy clutches Salome’s hands in his — and fuck …
94 ALCHEMY OF THE WORD
Ach du Liebestod
One shot. Wonder.
Pop’s music make me. Sing. Do I wake? Ever. Never. More. I Savant to be. Alone. Full scream. Ahead! Row your row your boat gently down the sleep stream, verily, verily, verily life is but an American. Dream.
Laluna comin’ down, down. On you. In me. On we. Ennui. Woman, behold. Let yer Savant bluz people go. Go free. Go. Down Mose, go down. To the crossroads. Beg a ride. Promised Land. Denied.
Salomay, she say — Get Bent. I’m crying.
Owed to my Nightingale. Beautyless and truthless. All you need. Is. Had to run. Home. Home run. Take a loss. Do away with pity and party, party. Bacchanalian slide. ’Tis not the meat, ’tis the notion. Jump trope.
Persephone! You are not mine as I was yours. I die … for you. You be MTease. Mal Comes. Say Ha-nah nah nah nah, nah-anah nan-anah nana-anah-yaweh. I cry. Lalunabye.
Moseying down the stream merrily, merrily ’til. Hannah No Mo’ Ma and Pa Mal ain’t no faux pas nor no po’fa so la tee. Duh-oh.
Do you know how to lonely? The Mose knows.
I prez pro tempus fugit of the California Dreamin’ society. No fun. Sing. I am. Too largesse to be. Tell me. No lie. Dance!
Roll roll, up roll up to the American history mystery tour. To. Roll down. In paradise. Whoa! No rocks in the soul. Time to stroll. Blessed be the satiable man. J’ai faim. Je t’aime. I thirst.
I consum-ate myself. Oh, soul-o mea culpa runneth over my desire. My kingdom come. Pray. No way. To who? You voodoo to do Yahweh diddy derri-dum derri-do derri-dada. He say, who we baby, ’oo we? Won’t you let me take you on a See cruise? See the zeits. No zeit und sein. To sein or not to sein, sin?
Happiness is. Sing. That’s the same old song all nich nacht long. Don’t nail me down, for I stigmatter at heaven’s door. Knock, knock. Who’s there? Apparent. Apparent who? A parent who’s not there is a parent only in name. Apparently. A child with no name is.
Salomay I ask you a question? Momism? Ism-ism ism go schism miss’im, miss’im go gism, fee fi ego-ism. Cry. All God’s isms got no rhythm. Go get ’em and construct destruct. My spirit. Mama committed. Songless.
Re-Greta all or nothing. Sing. To auld angst synecdoche be. Forgot. Forget me. Not.
Can you see the real me? Doctor. Awopbopalopbopa-bigbang-messy-eye-complex. Pfft. With a simper.
My last chants. Dies Irae. Deus Vult. Oy gevalt. Sing. Forsaken. I go. All fail down. Madness over method. Style over song. So it began. So it ends. Dead is art. It is finished.
I am. Dying to love. My child. Child of love. Love child. Persehoney — live my. Dream. Sing. They know not what. I do. Do you? Ricky. Mose. Mom. LaLoon! Bang, zoom. Go boom.
Still. Dead. Arise. Arise And sing.
For me.
95 THE MOSES CHRONICLES (2018)
Awake, Awake, Put on Thy Strength
Jay dressed and went to wash her face in the bathroom. On the floor she noticed a folded piece of paper that wasn’t there before. She picked it up and unfolded it — across the top it read “Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.” She scanned the blood test results and Moses’s highlighted platelet count: forty-eight thousand. It had dropped by seventy-five thousand, WBC count 17.1. She didn’t know exactly what those numbers meant, except that it wasn’t good. Not good at all. I’m such a fool, she thought. Too paralyzed to ask, Jay had denied the message of his bruises, his increased night sweats.