real men fear spiders

 A subtle sunlight feel on the lawn

as if Dad was putting C batteries in the Hess truck again

and the lights popped on, half bright, knowing that the

batteries he took out of the flashlight were old ones. Sometimes

calm is what is necessary to love beautiful things

because sometimes there is security in the little things

of substance.

Beauty will decide for you which side you choose;

which fake interstate you sail along in dreams while

the little rest of you clings to childhood and pre-puberty.

I've studied the glossed pages of the Sears catalog

so long that the women in long legged girdles

started to speak in the tongues of adolescence.

I scream when I realize just how close

sex and milk duds mingle in memory or just

how far away the sun seems accidental to me. And to

all those who dream after Coltrane and Ginsberg

blew us up in the stained sheets of flying things and

thru the stale air of Bedford Stuyvesant

swamp land.

(perhaps were mistaken to think of beauty at all.

Perhaps it's the premise of beauty that matters most. I mean

those who cling to the certainty that a thing will happen

then write about it happening. That a moon in

an otherwise distant sky will matter a tide so perfectly

to release clouds into the silt filled air. That that

filthy air will tingle the flesh of the loneliest spider

below the  felt leaf, and that that same

spider will unknowingly, frighten the

town).

Reviews

[jacob erin-cilberto]

i never have that certainty of something happening, and end up writing about it afterward...but i do hand on to those milk dud memories...dream of being ferlinghetti sometimes...
but i do love little things, and remember little things my dad did that make me smile now...

like me looking for one of his tools in his tool closet when he asked...and he getting frustrated with me because i couldn't find it....then looking himself because he thought i was so helpless...but eventually admitting it wasn't there but in the garage where he used the last time...

thanks for stirring up such memories...this may be my favorite write from you dana...i relate so well indeed, but am thinking i must not be a real man...cause spiders don't bother me at all...i find them fascinating.

j.

[h d e rushin]

thank you dear brother....and obviously we had the same kind of Dad. A carpenter by trade
and thinking me far too effete to understand and worship wood as he did. I remember popping
a milk dud under my tongue when I felt unappreciated. Corset said they still make them and sent me a picture to prove that they still exist....Thank you for those great words this afternoon my friend...dana

[Corset]

as they should, real men should fear spiders...lol, cause real women EAT Milk duds

[h d e rushin]

thanks for that picture corset....I didn't know if such a thing existed anymore...Or Lemonhead's, or
Squirrels, or Mile and Ikes....all just wonderful memories.....thanks my friend...dana

[Corset]

Do you remember those candy necklaces that had the elastic that you could put around your neck and stretch up into your mouth that left your entire chin and neck sticky? good times. :)

[h d e rushin]

I do remember those....the kids today with their video games and smart phones are just missing out on American culture .....love you...dana

[Cory Barrett]

weather in memory or in a moment, beauty is a dangerous thing. It compels and only becomes more volatile over time, its potency more compound the longer it simmers in our minds. The impurities skimmed off, the watered down portions reduced, and we just keep seasoning the sauce... until it tastes better than it ever did, and all we want is what we thought we had.

[h d e rushin]

excellent review Cory. Beauty as danger since all beauty has that perverse, contrariety about it.read moreexcellent review Cory. Beauty as danger since all beauty has that perverse, contrariety about it.
Thank you my dear friend.....dana