Profound Meditations
by Ryan Held
If I ever look up in the sky and see a cloud in the shape of a hand with it middle finger protruding in what appears to be an obscene gesture directly specifically at me……………………come to think of it, I’m not sure how I’d react to that.
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Stupid Questions
by Ryan Held
There’s no such thing as a stupid question. At least, not until now.
If swans are swimming down a river and they turn a corner and see a family of ducks, do they just turn around and go the other way?
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Thanks to the kind editor(s) who featured my latest prose-poem pieces, between(tonight) and ingress (two days prior). I am ever so grateful, humbled, and flattered. _Tim
**
writhing in the familiar forever of a soaring blackout. that moment in the middle of inebriation where the next swallow means first tenderly tracing the neck of the bottle. the exposition of oblivion is itself the climax of bladdered grief. waving forgeries brimming with chattering words. falling for his parables though she had always known the gospels had been ghostwritten.
her portable slander circulating cold allegories that wear off quickly. breathing in the madhouse tension where cleanliness solves most problems while tastes keep changing yet gambling on the odds of imminent offspring never goes out of fashion. everyone covets a taste of eternity but no one wants to bargain with the devil in their twenties anymore. they’d rather just hang out and mooch off his unpredictable lassitude. the volumes write themselves when all one has experienced is an embryonic nip of suffering. and so the old verbs and dangerous adjectives linger on.
her desire was an abstract expression of tampered merchandise. dangerous forces compelling her to chase landscapes only lovers would dare occupy. she was a young vine and not yet ready to bear the kind of fruit the vintner would find useful. thus the simplest words would have to do when translating accents without the use of individual letters. her faith in Newton waned every time he held her. love has its own laws pertaining to gravity and inertia.
there is the preening rush of ideas. mention the desert and reap the tides. it is a dirty little business being so attractive. though the windows were well off the ground and though in daylight she had looked across the clearing and only seen a crush of trees, she pulled the curtains closed. and still she felt that eyes were somehow peering into the room watching her every sozzled pirouette. she had once cherished the thought that her oceans of love could sway him, but it turned out indeed he was the moon and even from improbable distances had managed to keep her at low tide while never quite turning away.
when his eyes seemed to suddenly become diamonds was her first moment of clarity, when she realized the drinks he kept pouring were turning her tongue to ash and amplifying her thirst, a lull that comes when sobriety gives way to invisible delusions betrayed only by dumbstruck giggling. those first fleeting glimpses of truth that line the rim of sobriety are the ghosts that haunt later when the famished bedsheets try to swallow you in one gristly bite.
somehow as she bravely plunged to the ocean’s depths eventually she began rising again and at last came up for air on the opposite side of the world. crawled to the distant shore, welcomed by lost refugees of Atlantis. they lie and tell her there is no going back. she marches anyway on slippery legs carrying the weight of parting words yet unspoken. she had traveled far from home, cast her lure, and caught her catch, but in a moment of weakness she returned him to the sea and would spend countless years trying to drown the sorrow of that parting to no avail.
**
*
the dull laughter
disinfects cautiously
arguments unraveling
the contour of concern
inhaling clouded exultation
distracted by routine
the impossible words
cut through thick prefix
only gestures can decipher
the ecstasy of aches
muffling unpaid confession
an articulate suffocation
*
Stray Notions Podcasting presents:
Fantasy Box Office 2013: June Draft (05/22/2013 - 19 min)
Summer is almost officially here and it’s time for Tim and Ryan to charcoal grill some food and some of the films of June, within the structure of their Fantasy Box Office construct of course. Crank it up as they talk about the box office prospects of Man of Steel, The Heat, The Internship, Monsters University, World War Z, The End of the World, White House Down, The Bling Ring, and mucho mas. Mmmmmm, smell those box office receipts.
Thank you for straying with us!
For Fantasy Box Office 2013 rules, click here.
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Profound Meditations
by Ryan Held
It turns out that it’s a lot easier to get away with playing solitaire in the office without the boss knowing than it is playing disc golf. Still, you never know until you try.
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Stray Notions Podcasting presents:
Mad Men: Season 6: Episode 8 (05/22/2013 - 20 min)
This week on the Mad Men podcast, Tim and Ryan enjoy vitamin shots of their own as they cover Don’s silent tantrum over Sylvia, the art of throwing Exacto knives, Peggy’s propensity to kiss just about any man at least once, how to console a young girl’s grief over the death of her father, Sally’s tween status, the difference between chicken salad and tuna salad, Megan’s drive toward being the “bread winner” in the famlly, every man’s propensity to kiss Peggy at least once, Ken’s fabulous underground dance moves, the plot of Rosemary’s Baby, the overusage of flashbacks, how to say “no” to your bedside nurse, the rise of Cutler, office footracing techniques, and so much more, all while enjoying some of Grandma Ida’s delicious fried chicken. If all goes well, they might even run for office. Hey, does anyone have the time? My gold watches are all missing.
Thank you for straying with us!
For more Stray Notions, visit our homepage or like us on Facebook.
Stray Notions Podcasting presents:
The DC Sports Roundup (Vol. 30 - 05/22/2013 - 20 min)
In this edition of the DC Sports Roundup, Tim and Ryan discuss what the Wizards will do once they’ve recovered from their NBA lottery shock. Then, a little bit of ho hum as to why the Nats are having such a poor vacation to the left coast.
Thank you for straying with us!
For more Stray Notions, visit our homepage or like us on Facebook.
**
she seems calm until the light shifts and colludes with her profile. sipping a cigarette in the doorway one arm perched on a sconce trying to look tough. feels she shouldn’t advertise personality with the luxury of a loud volley of compliments. the song needs an interpreter for the exotic harmonies that sprawl across reluctant bouts of private sympathy. she takes herself seriously turning to the comic relief of careless rage. the moment he left coincided with the full moon rising and she continues to check her reflection in the mirror behind the bar to make sure she is not turning into a pumpkin or maybe a werewolf. there is still the tang of bloodrust. she tried to remember back to days past their date of expiration when she was a morning person waking with the sunrise.
strung out in a vertical memory. disgust was an opinion she could not wash out of her hair. he tells her he is afraid of her cats and she believes him. she brought up the subject of religion but he laughed with a mechanical grin. hers was becoming a diseased fairy tale narrated by the voice of her muted mother. she tried to convince herself that she could live happily ever after if he would agree to plant gardens with her. it was clear he was making plans but that he was pretending he did not have any. their timing was off. his big hand was revolving counter to her little hand on the unremitting clock implying minutes to him were hours to her. she began a tour of her own self-destruction with explosive fits of laughter that sounded like coughs then sneezes. laughing tears always scald worse because they are always unpredictable and unfold with a largo tempo.
his love may have been blind but his lust was visible in all spectrums. she had handed over the key willingly but rather than use it to calmly unlock her doors he would try to wander about the property finding a new window to shatter and crawl through each time. she was tiring of the forced entries. eventually the thrill of those first furtive trespasses felt less like pursuit and more like the kind of heist where the plunderer ignores the valuables and chooses instead to abscond with stock from the pantry that could never be missed.
it was impossible to see the daily changes conquering her in any semblance of real time. she was becoming less judgmental and slowly giving herself permission to accept the contradictory feedback loop of her passions. he was changing too and she was envious that she was not tacitly invited to bear witness to this gradual metamorphosis. he had left a caterpillar and returned a moth. in the sanctuary of the hotel bar her fictions were crumbling. buried beneath a perfect day was an omen of impending loneliness. she struggled to remember dreams in which he took part, their bodies writhing between identical shadows. the light blesses the trees but does not settle in them. she greedily absorbed his carbon dioxide and by turning it into oxygen tried to convince him how much he needed her just to stay alive.
but he had been holding his breath the whole time.
**
