Desert Debacle

work in progress....rough draft. Ideas and constructive crit welcome.

I

My aerodynamic Japanese god breaks down in the middle of the desert. It’s the Texas desert. The lizards all wear 10 ounce cowboy hats. I ask one Banded Gecko geek where the nearest mechanic can be found. He rolls his eyes sideways, flickers his long tongue like a broken party favor, and crawls to the hidden side of his cactus mentality. There’s a billboard with a tattered face that reads, “there’s no place like home.” I laugh, but, as I do, a salty tear slides into my mouth. I take the proper pill, and fiddle with my cell phone: OUT OF SERVICE AREA. I suppose I’m doomed, but I don’t feel very doomed. I don't feel much of anything.

 

II

I’ve never seen myself completely naked, but I’m sure I have a lovely skeleton. Especially after a good sandblasting and sun bleaching. When they find me, I’ll look like a well-ironed tuxedo. No sins hidden in the cracks, and no unidentifiable body parts floating in stinky jars. Just my raw wood frame, and my pale blue Mazda splattered onto the khaki sand pallet. In my soon-to-be post mortem opinion: I'm a black comedy masterpiece of epic dimensions. I’ve always wanted to be a knockout punch line.

 

III

Her name and number are the only ones I’ve stored in my phone. Go ahead, call her. She won’t be surprised. I’m just a faded scar on her waxy old belly, and a rogue tear swimming in her half-shut eye. Just some rotten extremity that fell off of her a few decades ago, and finally landed in this yeehaw litter box of a grave. Nobody will mourn my crooked smile. No flowers will be planted around my marble head. But, the worms will grow fatter, the trees will grow taller and the world will have one less tumor to irradiate on Judgment Day.

 

IV

Now, before the beasts feast on this turkey carcass, I will sing a coyote hymn, and finish this pint of soul-fire. No need to go to Hell without premedication. No reason to sink in the sand whole. I’ll face Death with a clownish smile and a whisky slur. This way, he won’t expect much from me when the torture begins. That's how I've handled all of my earthly nightmares. Why change now?      

Reviews

[Kenneth The Poet]

I can't offer criticism. This reads like a surrealistic journal of a man's last four days on Earth. He's in the desert about to die of thirst, but he ate the same plant Beavis and Butt-head did in "Do America". That's what I see here, with a ton of crazy, ironic sentences thrown in for good measure.

I really think Kerouac would be proud.

[roarke]

Situation/time passage, stream of consciousness. Inner and outer realizations. Four parts... Lots of good stuff, places to take it. Reality and surreality are fun to play with, just don't forget the grounding rods. How much and how little are like spices in a soup. What to include is always hard for me, Should I write a bazooka Joe or War and Peace..... All thought is too abstract, Kurt Vonnegut always said "make your character do something" Do you need background to the story? does it need an unrequited goal? Here, death seems immanent and collides with the MC's resident attitude.... What makes this moment in time sharpen in focus to the universe? An epiphany is that focus come in time, but it makes past and future more relevant.
I think there's lots here, I wish I had as much material going when starting a piece. Sometimes just letting it set and coming back to it makes all the difference in the world.... er,whatever world that may be. lol.