day 8: invention is invention is invention

invention is invention is invention. the math score times the word count times the third chord times the substitute teacher and the substitute teacher's diploma divided by the substitute teacher's current day dreAM. living off pickles and oatmeal in tennessee, we didn't stand still or stay sober long enough to lose our cool. and paige was so thin then, wearing lycra leggings, you know, the drugs really took her and i guess she must have been suprised. free cartons of cigarettes and serving ice cream. $1.00 for a pickle in a bag of juice, we'd buy it at the gas station. you get a certain pride about living as free and as dirt cheap and barely as you can, easy, you get a certain pride, its a kinda test so i don't blame any one, i don't feel sorry. one thing about living on the road, you lose the old anchorage and the heavy feet, you are weighted by the hours. sometimes they mistake me for this though, the boy thinks hes falling in love and he's never falling in love. he's always just falling, tries to make it so i can't stand up. tries to drape his sandbags over my shoulders when i wouldn't notice. i do not curl into a peachpit. i am tired, so tired, so tired, i say and fall down like a puddle and sleep like a puddle and evaporate silent and stealth-like a puddle. one thing about life on the road is the one day it rains in montana, the next day the rain picks up and puddles up new york. first it was knoxvilled and tennessee and we weren't sure it would all work out even when it did. i remember the glass elevator and paige at the desk counter, zonked, and saying stuff about a boyfriend and a missing key and knowing she thought it was real smooth, you know, and zonked, and knowing the guy would just do it, probably would always do it. sometimes you're getting away with it and you don't even know it, sometimes you're not getting away at all. i'm not sure what it was then. meaghann cannon in the shower stall with the door closed and sitting on the tile by the drain. she was wearing a fur coat, giving me the gist of her low self esteem. im sure we were connecting, but i was too high to be nervous. better to drink the clear drink in the day and if they take your picture or put you in the camera you could be drinking water. you could be in the campgrounds, shitting in the woods. on ecstacy onetime, i forget about the urinary tract and have to pee so bad i nearly go, have to kneel down on the grass, have to wait in line. thing is, once you pee, its all ok again and nevermind. like the time we took the bus to amsterdam and the bus stopped. i thought it was a cigarette break. they were all putting their coats on. so i put my coat on and walked off the bus. turned around and looked at alma through the window. she was rifling through her purse. pulled out a cigarette and catching her eye, the bus pulls away from the curb. like it wasn't even happening. like there was some mistake. like the driver would just pull up a bit, because someone needed part of the curb. but no, the bus keeps going, pulls out of the stop, brussels. brussels, i am running down the street- no money, no phone, no id, no words, just running and like its not even happening. three times i lose the bus, three times i find it just ahead turning the corner. minutes before the highway she is stopped at a light and i am running between the cars, praying at a red light and then banging on the sides and then gasping for air and supported under each arm. one minute running through brussels and the next minute everything fine and beautiful. not a cigarette break, so it goes.

i built a little businessman out of steel wire, braized him together, dressed him. i strung him up on a swing and strung the swing to the ceiling. i said swing and i pushed him. my father spends most of each day in the office and used to steal my hair dryer, drying circuits. once had a car with a broke ignition, strung up the wires so the ignition started by pressing the floorboards. the squirrels were so big in michigan, they foraged in packs. we called them snow gophers. bent down and watched them eat. invention is invention is invention and so on.