Spitball Army

The train rolls through at midnight, its horn blasting, “Don’t even dream of getting in my way!” I can’t dream if I can’t sleep.

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Football scores alternate with pre-election polling results in my Twitter feed. Some games end at the buzzer; others never stop.

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With each basement flood, remains of other lives rise from the ground: toy cars, plastic Madonnas, coal chunks. They never leave.

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I. Great Uncle did stunts in silents and shot a man in a cowboy one-reeler, then vanished to the hills like Roy Earle in High Sierra. II. His nephew, my father, could quote all of Fred C. Dobbs’ lines and shared his suspicious tendencies. Perhaps it was genetic. III. Dad called him Hobart Humphrey. I’d […]

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The moon, plugged-in, illuminates the clouds in the dome overhead. I feel it within reach: my own white and gray Truman Show.

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The first cool wisps of Autumn swirl around me in an invigorating embrace. I feel warmer somehow, energized. I must be a lettuce.

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She bundles the kids and sends them out to clean the yard. “Bag them one leaf at a time.” She’s just bought 23 minutes of sanity.

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The last sight leaving Alabama on I-20: a quaint red barn. The first sight upon entering Alabama: a run-down lean-to, peeling red paint, near collapse.

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The toy gun from a Tijuana cart gets its cork removed on the long ride home. He sits behind Mom in the car, taunting: “Pop! Pop!”

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The front of the queue is beyond his sight. He pulls the parka tighter, focusing on the steam rising from the bald head before him.

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