Three Miles Off

Town was about three miles off and Jack knew he couldn't make it walking, so he sat alone at the edge of throad throwing rocks at the end of a culvert which stuck out a good three feet from the embankment. No water fell from the culvert only dust would cloud when Jack would actually hit the metal object with his projectiles.

The Last Embrace

She ran to embrace him as her few friends looked on in disbelief. Jack wrapped one arm around her as she kissed him. This time was the last, the last time he'd stand up for her honour. His ribs felt like broken walls with jagged corners where they met and his brains had been rattled and flattened. Jack knew he had broken his opponents nose and possibly his hand as well, but in each step Jack felt pain from the big fellow twisting on his foot which had transferred to the popping sound in his knee.

Dust

The fight broke out mid afternoon at a local party house and just as Jack made progress a big beefy muscle of a man would intervene. Jack was holding his own against the pair, at least that's the way he saw it. Surely he landed a few but his entire body ached as he walked the dirt road leaving the party behind.

Time For Change

She had been his first lover and his hers. She had strayed over the years with her blond hair luring different men.Currently, this one was just fucking her for pride, but never the less he was obliged to fight for her. She was sleeping with them both, only Jack carried a history with her.

Summer's End

She sucked the cotton candy right out of the inside of his mouth. South of the border lies the state of obesity, deep fried food, water parks, roller coasters, jaw breakers, truck drivers on speed reflecting lights and engine brakes off R.V.'s lined in semi-circles around propane campfires and cans of Budweiser.

It's the last week of summer holidays as people cram in one more vacation. They come from the North, the South, East and West to ride the steam trains to staged robberies. Me I'm no different, rounding the edges of reality, looking for one last buzz to escape my son's fear of entering high school. Adventure rides calling out like the thrill of jumping from a plane falling through the sky.

There's not many places I'd rather be than with my small tight-knit family in our little 1990 Ford van parked amongst the sleeping giants with their pull-outs and flat screens. To cloud the illusion, I drink low alcohol content American beer which I must admit is a hell of a lot cheaper than it's Canadian counterpart.

We are all part of the process, whether we come from Calgary to Invermere, or escaping the crowds of Invermere to become a tourist in the U.S.

To someone we are all dollar signs or problems.

South

time to fire up Lucinda
roll due south
it won't be Magnolia
but it will be a
breath of fresh air

The Shit That Surrounds Me

i can't think of a place i'd rather not be
this shit hole town
with gangsters and fat tourist women
telling me to shut my mouth
or she'll shut it for me.
I'm about to execute someone
family here for 100 years
and i can't wait to leave
what an endurance
who will pay
me i'll pay for this
by becoming jaded
i swear it's this town
i left it once
and felt like a king.

No Parking

Right now life is like a roll of trick shit paper
where all you can pull off are fragments of it
insomnia with no picture to post of it
and thank god i don't have to read any of my own writing
buggering me up the ass as i try to sleep
and nowhere is the road smooth paved
the one that's rewarding to move on
so i drink and drive the hard drive
and drink at 4:01 in the A.M.
and struggle for words like a defunct writer
and struggle for poetry like drinking from a dried river
and drink too much to ride
and hide in a book about another writer
searching for words
on that head on corner
where I'd be remembered poorly
and how New Orleans
is only a street corner
where no one cares.

Top Of The World

Away from the shit
in the bottom of the valley
It hurt like hell coming
down.

Jack

I want my last days to be in New Orleans
The idea had fell down a long set of stairs.
New Orleans
I await.

Head On

felt like getting hit by an ice truck
lying in the ditch slowly dieing
the other driver in the middle of the road crying
back broke
and whining
I'm a junk yard junky gunna die round the bend
from where I fell twenty five years before
A white car filled
skids
Two niggers, a bald little French man
and a big fucken Indian swing'n a bat
Don't come at me with that
I'll stop you in your tracks
it was your home boy that
hit me dead on
head on

Cuffed

He's a friend of a friend and every time I take a shit I can smell his breath. I met him at the salvage yard, he was pissing into the wind with a broken nose and a mug only a mother could love, I knew right away some guy had gotten sick of listening to him. He's weak, he'd never spent time inside yet he claims he's a leader, but who'd fallow someone who's never wrong.
That was my problem, I drank too much.
A tradition willed upon me accompanied by lack of judgement.
The sun burnt orange as it rose and the blood ran downhill, I was cuffed and knew where I was headed.
I'd been there before.

Moose Lake

Big Trout & Bad Weather

You make it look like
something they want to eat
and then you eat
them

Gone But Not Forgotten

He had a column
called Underwear
the chief publicist
must have shut him down
for lack of pornographic content
I thought about burning my T
in honor
but opted not
as it may be a worthy trade
for a cold beer
one day.

Adios

she slipped away
we parted as I gave her one last make over
she ran off with a man from the low land
so she'll feel at home down by the rivers edge
and I'll hear her cry as she passes
it was certainly a love hate relationship

The fish are calling

Rain, wool pants and the last cigar
catching raindrops on my sox and a buzz in my ear.
Headed for the mountains and lakes
first to cut down some mighty trees
and roll some weeds.

It's All In the Water

Jack was making home brew, it was cheaper and better than off the shelf. The first batch came off without a hitch, so he headed back up Bishop's side of the valley for more mountain water. When Jack got to the spot where the road widened he could see something laying in the the creek bed, as he came nearer he recognized Bishop laying face up and pissing into the air. "What the hell are you doing?" Bishop was literally pissed drunk and singing as he lay in the shallow stream pissing. "Pissing in the wind", Bishop replied. "Well that's my water source for the home brew and now it ain't fit to wash in". "Suit yourself, just thought I'd sweeten the taste a little"

Today

Rain and rainbows and wind blows a coffee stone in the morning.
Old pants with patches and blanket stitches call from the bottom of the pile.
A day as young as baby skin when the pants wore holes in the knees.

A Michi for JD

There was two cold beers when we got home, I thought "That's great Jerry's always up for a Michi". Kelsey's song "Gone" plays in my mind, Sambo's forehead print on the door glass reaches for Japhy and Sue's coffee mate wont start a fire. Like the hail that fell and melted, our early summer rendez-vous has past.

Out West

Where the trucks haul shake blocks
and the hillbillies drink home brew
where towns have been flooded
for government reward.
Where darkness falls early
with failing light
it's hard to shoot road signs
through the likes of one eye.

Gerrard Trout

They are difficult to pull from a photo
but they exist.
20 to30 inches a piece
jumping and splashing.
This years run totals 1000.
They live deep in the wild
where soil is so rich
it once grew gold.

Headed West Again

Time comes to a head
the river calls my name
fresh water for the home brew.
Blood in my veins
moves me to the mountains
music brings me to myself.
Solitude in my cereal bowl
floats the current
pulling me upstream
lost in an eddy of time
with rain on the stoop
and a clouded sky.

Up the Creek

Not a bight, but the lake offered sight of Bishop's old canoe. Jack hadn't seen him in a while nor had Bishop's wife, there was rumour of bishop rowing upstream to an old cabin on the rivers edge where he kept secrets. A candle light the din of the cabin, cards lay on the pine wood table and Bishop held tight to a 5th of whiskey. He knew his cover was broke and they would be surrounding the old cabin in no time, he was spinning and grinning and welcomed the joust. Jack saw the dust cloud just behind the cabin and heard the whinny of horses, their guns were loaded as was Bishop's and when the candle was blown out Jack knew Bishop would prevail.

Jack's Last Dance

Jack came home for his friends wedding reception, it would be good, he hadn't ate well in months. The hall was filled with old friends, food and booze. Jack was thinner than he had been in years. Toasted ketchup and Ichiban soup his main staple. A couple of old skanks Jack had screwed years prior, were lingering like stale smoke. Jack was filling himself on free whiskey and ham and cheese sandwiches when the prettier of the two came to sell their wares, Jack grabbed at a hand full of ass cheek that had fallen from its keeper and slid his finger in just enough to taste a smell. That warranted a slap in which Jack lost a mouth full of ham and cheese. So he snuck a whiff of his finger and ordered another drink. Soon skank # 2 was buttering his bread and ordering his whiskeys. Jack stumbled off the tables with his untucked white shirt soaking up spilt drinks blowing kisses of chewed bits at the lovelies. Soon the food was being packed away and skank #2 had a firm grip on Jack's crotch, he followed her to her beat up Maverick and she whisped his drunken stupor home to her condemned palace of pleasure. She lit candles and lay a bed spread on the floor, she was a romantic and Jack was a horn dog with a bone, he thought he would make it simple and went for it from the top side with vision through one eye, one maybe two strokes into it, he belched from deep within, then as he tried tried hold back he came like a volcano erupting ham and cheese all over her hair. It was a bloody mess but Jack had not had sex in quite some time either, so he kept on stroking until he collapsed in her puke covered hair, four or maybe five strokes later.