Indulgence

Think Vaudevillian

      I had a pleasant little gab one night with the beast of the earth in a downtown honky tonk under a brimming Nashville sky. The bar reeked like stale Pabst while two foppishly dressed cowboys howled, wailed, plucked, and twanged a rockabilly swing tune. I looked Diablo straight in his eye and made a flinch. I had an itching question for the conceited angel of torture, but he made a reply before I could open my mouth. The tables shook, feet stomped, the bar ware jiggled and the words he spoke fiercely howled, wailed, plucked, and twanged.

     He told me he was an hallucination within a dream. A mirror of humanity. A mere product of the primitive ape returning yet again to haunt the evolved. That if I wanted to have some sense of the devil I had to look deep within myself and once I knew my substance I would undeniably have knowledge of the ghost of indulgence.

     I was confused and suddenly lonely, but this was of little consequence. My attention was stolen in part when a slovenly drunk cocked his hat and sexed the barmaid in a dim lit corner of the dive. His face was nondescript, but hers was wild and vivid. Eyes popping wide open fixed themselves on me without so much as a blink sending shivers across my body. Her face was unusually twisted and flushed. Some illegible script was scrolled in brief across her forehead. The derelict had her skirt above her waist and licked his chops, holding firmly onto her disproportionately large behind. The bar swayed with every shove and pump inside of her to the roof of her mouth.

      I glanced back at my acquaintance who appeared humble under a grin of pearls. Downing my blue ribbon swill, I slid my hand into that of the one who bore the light and stumbled like a maladroit gimp through the back of the bar and into my beaten down Chevy Chevette. I pressed the gas and fled like a beast in the night as though I were hunted.

Reviews

[Sparrow]

I felt like I stepped into your dreaming mind with this one. I saw something similar in your "Chagrin" poem actually. Your view of the devil was excellent, I'm especially partial to his reply to the main character's unspoken question:

"He told me he was an hallucination within a dream. A mirror of humanity. A mere product of the primitive ape returning yet again to haunt the evolved. That if I wanted to have some sense of the devil I had to look deep within myself and once I knew my substance I would undeniably have knowledge of the ghost of indulgence."

Beautiful language as always, gritty is a good desciption. I love the substance of your writing, it always leaves my mind with an aftertaste if that makes any sense.

[emmajoy]

My, what a series of pictures you've written! I can virtually see where you are, your words are spare but descriptive to the nth degree. 'Humble under a grin of pears' - one of a few great phrases.

[Susan M]

And then what happened?

I like your writing style! It's like grit and flowers all at the same time!