The Demon Lover (A Poetic dialogue between a demon and his lover)

The Demon Lover
((A Poetic dialogue between a demon and his lover) (witticism at its best))


In their apartment, in ‘Times Square,’ NY, NY


I.

A woman wailing, “No—not a bit bad!” she exclaims.
“Not bad at all—d’you think?” she adds.
“Rather good,” said the demon.
“What time did you say it was?” she asks.

((His eyes tapering—hideous like) (expressing dim
displeasure.))

“Seems I’d said something wrong?” barked the woman.
Said the demon, in a hoarse like voice, “Can’t you
try to concentrate?”
“You bore me to tears,” murmured the demon lover.


II.

The demon, bobbling his head up and down,
back and forth, doing a double-take on that note,
says (with a solid firm tone to his voice)
“What did you say?”

(The lover is fixing her hair, painting her claws;
overlooking his statement, for the moment.)

“I told you already,” she says (bright eyed), you
should have written it down.”
The demon (a noble aesthete) “We never pass out
we just keep going on and on…!”
“I bet,” says the lover, “you think your endurance
is impressive? That’s particularly silly, when you’re a
dead duck! You boast too much, and lay about like
a tank, roll under the table, where you belong.”

“I’m going to the theater,” says the lover.
“Why?” says the demon.
“Here I can’t do any deep thinking! Plus you need
to learn the thing you’re making love to is a woman!”
“My god,” says the demon “is that what it is.”
“I’m tired of you,” she tells the demon, annoyingly.


The demon, as though talking to him, himself that is,
says: “I think after the next round, I’ll go to a musical
comedy.”
“I heard that,” said the lover, “that is your kind of
intellectual libretto.”

Now you could hear the demon groan and grunt,
“You are,” said the demon lover, “a dull meaningless
figure in a dull meaningless world.”


III.

The Demon: “Sex isn’t dull!”
“In itself it is,” she explains, “it does although, make
life more playful!”
The Demon: “Good show baby, you love it!”
“On the contrary,” says the lover, “it’s a lot of work
especially for me with you! You give it a purpose,
otherwise it couldn’t stand on its own.”

“Well,” said the demon, inhaling the unpleasant
atmosphere “in any case, I’m a pragmatist and so
grant a poor demon a… a little you know what?
Matter-of-fact, if everyone believed in what you
say, we’d be out of business.”

“I suppose so,” said the demon lover, “and to anguish
with conventional morality, we’re all borderline heretics anyhow, and you think you’re so sophisticated.
We don’t need demons to teach us this
rot, if anything, it’s our gift to you…!”
“How can that be, I don’t even know what that all
means,” said the demon.
“If only people really knew, how dumb you really are,
they’d not put so much value in your, demur.”


(Here then, came a knock on the apartment door, the tickets arrived for the musical and cinema theaters, and who know what might have gone on, and been said, had they not arrived.)


1-23-2009 (No: 2557)

Midnight Lost (a poem)

Midnight Lost

In youth one seems to have an immortal river,
to rise at dawn and never to see midnight come.
It is life on the rainbow, from dust to dust, or
dawn to dawn, and all you hear are echoes—
resounding, booming back and forth, and you
wonder: “What happened to midnight? Where
has it gone?” Somewhere, somehow, along the
way, it simply got lost!


1-23-2009 (No: 2556)

A Curious Afternoon in Tijuana, Mexico ((1969)(the Whorehouse))

A Curious Afternoon in
Tijuana, Mexico (1969)



At 1:30 p.m., Chick Evens is sitting with a close friend, his amigo, Mick Gunderson, at a common bar, in Tijuana, Mexico, drinking down a heavy, almost syrup like Mexican beer; it is the first time for both of them to be in Mexico, and Chick is exceptionally watchful, his eyes are if not imposing, near to it, everyone can see him, the red head, with sharp blue eyes, ‘…the gringo…’ someone mumbles at the other end of the bar. His dried out, protracted blinking eyes, hurting from the bright sun; he rubs them, as if trying to readjust them in the low lit tavern.
He is with a man he considers his best friend, and who is a friend of his brother’s, whom he is visiting in Montclair, California, and who will be accompanying him back to Minnesota.
During Evens’ time in San Francisco, at the karate dojo, he was considered a top contender for the next belt, the Black Belt, being the most original with his karate style, quick and deadly.

•

They are glad to see one another, it’s been over a year, when Chick moved to San Francisco, at which time, so did his brother and his wife, along with Mick move to Southern California, they are all from the same old neighbourhood back in St. Paul, Minnesota, Cayuga Street.
Thus, their eyes are full of kindness for the most part, both feeling effect of novelty, after the long separation. They finish the beer, relax a bit on the bar stool.
The Mexican bartender, behind the bar, is purring behind that smirk, as his catlike face checks out the redheaded gringo. Check nervously and restlessly senses it, there is not much conversation between Mick and Chick, so Mick suggests,
“Let’s go check out the whores?”
Chick: Sure! (Impatiently.)

(Outside the bar walking around)

Mick: You’d think the whores would be walking about, trying to get customers.
Chick: Look at the man over there (to his right, he points) his cart fell over; he’s picking up his food from the ground, tacos or is that a tamal cart, whatever…!
(They both laugh.)
Mick: sure is hot!
Chick: Over there, look over there (he points to the far left) that girl she’s waving at us (a dark-haired, Mexican girl about nineteen, with a short black skirt on, looking pleasantly at them both)
Mick: Yes, it’s us she’s looking at, let’s see what she cost. (They both walk slowly over to her; it is about two-hundred feet away.)
Mick: No speak Spanish, I hope you speak English?
Chick: How much will it cost for sex?
Girl: Ten-dollars for you señor…
Mick: Sounds like the right price! Ok, where do we do it?
Chick: Me, too!
Girl: Of course, honey! (Chick and Mick both look at each other as if to say: what are we getting ourselves into?)
Girl: You go señor into that room over there and your friend (Mick) he comes with me.

They had walked down an alley, and in the back was four three story brick buildings, and a low, one story wooden structure built up against a wall, with several enclosed rooms, there was out in the front, within this enclosure area, a dirt like empty lot, mysterious to say the least, thought Chick. And they both went into the two separate rooms, individually, and separated from one another.
Just prior to Chick’s entering the green door, to the one room, with only a bed it, which stood in the centre of the room, up against the wall, a chair to one corner of the bed to put his close on, and a skimpy looking rug, for a lone moment, it was a thought, that this was all stimulating, exciting, just the process of doing it, not the sex he thought he was going to get, but the building up to it, the development: there was something breathless about such an unknown moment, like abruptly going up a hill on a rollercoaster, and knowing in a moment you will be going down at a hundred miles per hour.

•

As chick waited in his room, a different girl came in, smiled, said, “Take off your close señor, I’ll be back in a minute.” And then she left, accordingly, he took off his trousers, and his shirt, now standing and waiting for the girl with only his under shorts on and his socks. At this point, he sensed there was more to this than meets the eye. And he would be right. For it was just a matter of minutes between the girl leaving and a knock on the door, and three He-men, Mexicans, with guns came in…

Ten minutes later

There they sat, Mick and Chick, a few blocks away from that so called Green painted wooden whorehouse, telling each other their stories, vowing to each other they’d never do that again (with a tinge of laughter in-between every few syllables).
Both had been robbed by the three armed he-men, but Chick had his money hid in his socks, $300.00 dollars to be exact. And there he stood almost naked with the three gangsters, guns loaded, as they asked, “More money, where is your money?”
He had told them, he only had change, he had paid the girl the ten dollars, and only change left, didn’t need anymore, because he was going back home. Mick on the other had, had $40-dollars left, an that was his contribution.
If there was to be any satisfaction out of this episode, it was that Chick got a measure of superiority on that side of the fence, that he outsmarted the Mexicans, who had ambushed them.

Written at Starbucks, In Lima Peru, 1-22-2009

The Portrait of W.S. ((Raison d'être) (reason to be))

((Raison d'être) (reason to be))

The Portrait of W.S.


Chapter One

You could barely at times, during the onset, stand the crying, the noise the razor-strip made across his back, I speak of those who could hear the slashing and echo the thin leather strip strap made; it was made for sharpening a razor not for whippings. Those in the extended family, learned to acquire deaf ears while the old man was in his mood, the neighbors in the summer with their windows down, open to the air, could hear, they also learned to tolerate the ongoing affair, calling it a ‘slight disturbance’; perhaps the truth, the whole truth, was, they were getting accustomed to it, thus in such a process one minimizes, if not completely putting it into a dead chamber of ones mind—you know what I mean, the old saying, “Out of sight, out of mind.” Something likes that. No one knew what the reasons were for his beatings, why he battered with the razor strap W.S., perhaps not even the old man knew why he did, what he did, nonetheless, he did it.
His wife, the old man’s wife, W.S. ’s mother, had been dead now for some years, double pneumonia—the Minnesota winters can be hard on ones body, and it was on her’s—she gave the old man eight children to raise though, perchance that played a role in why the old man chose W.S., to take out his frustrations on; sometimes we do that, pick out a certain individual, person—save we don’t take it out on all—to displace our anger (and yes, anger can come out sideways, if it is not directed toward the reason and person one is angry at, in many ways, as I mentioned before, frustration being a lighter form of anger, like trying to push a door open and someone is behind it as a counter weight pushing it in the opposite direction, thus comes the anger, the frustration the irritation in life, it comes from not being able to open the door), and now that his wife was dead, his help mate, and not being able to speak English well, being from Russia, and having the children at hand, working two jobs, W.S., was his release.
In the cellar, where he kept his pigeons, he raised a horde of them, that is where he took W.S., quietly down a wooden flight of stairs, pulling him by one ear, stretching it out as if he wanted to pull it off, yet he didn’t allow himself the pleasure, lest he be considered inhuman, a beast, and he assured himself that—he was not.
He had him lay over the edge of a table, shirt off, pants down, and he whipped him, upper legs, buttocks, lower and upper back and across the spine, up to his lower part of his shoulders, but not on exposed areas, only areas that he would cover up later with his cloths.
The rhythm of the leather razor strip, rapidity went smoothly across those exposed areas, almost spaced perfectly in time, as if he was playing a piano in 4/4 time, from one to the next hack, as if he had it tuned perfectly, that being his arms reached the proper distance with the wave of the strap, and the slap of it on flesh, to produce little red marks, on his pink flesh, but not cutting him. He endured these beatings several times a year, for years…


(Interlude) We look for reasons why people do what they do, sometimes, when we can’t find them, it simply comes under, reason to being, a motive for existence. Perhaps the old man knew, things give in, fall apart, and he could (as in his homeland of Russia), they always have, like the falling stars, the shooting astounds in the night sky, fall, never to be seen again (he was sending money home to his mother, now in Warsaw, and he’d never see her again, and his father who fell off a roof in Russia, he’d never return) possibly he felt he was in a strange sea, and if he stopped doing what he was doing, he’d fall off that same roof, or disappear like the asteroids, the falling stars, he was as if sanding under a lit lantern, tied to a mast, and forgot what happiness was, and when things don’t work out as you plan, where was he to go, he didn’t read, study the news per se, he didn’t drink much, he couldn’t go back home, to Russia, had he done that, it would have been like jumping back into the depths of the sea. Consequently, W.S., was his discharge, his savior, his way to get back to sanity.

and he who beat the strap so cunningly, from years of practice now, being 82-years old, looked everyday of his age. His legs were beginning to become wobbly, unbalanced, and weak in strength and endurance. His thin straight hair, lay flat on his balding head, and his dark eyebrows, once bushy, now were thinning out, like loose threads, just lying dormant almost to his eyelashes, with no flexibility to bring them back up to life. His forehead extended backwards, as if it was a receding glacier, unrelenting and soon to be completely balled. His eyes were being pushed back farther into his eye-sockets, and the sockets were deeper and wider than they had ever been, almost as if they were tapped onto the skull itself by a hammer—, spot-welded on for survival sake, like a tapered pair of pants, then ironed onto the skull. His eyes had dark pinholes for irises, thinner than a ghost’s mist. He was shockingly cadaverous looking in posture and looks.
W.S., didn’t know his father’s daytime hopes and aspirations, other than they were most likely connected to his insomnia, and for each person, it is different, it comes in essence, in a different package, not sure if any one person knows the other person that well to figure out that package but between he and his father it was an ever widening interval, and perhaps his troubles commenced with the war, scarcely did he talk about it, and when he did, he got deeply engrossed, as if awakened from or into a nightmare, pin-pricked in the finger (often times we think we know the other person, only to find out later one, we have simple reviewed our own personal suspicions of the other person, something W.S., never did), and those nights, the ones where prior that day he talked about the war, he, W.S., would end up usually,
flipping on the bedroom light, as his father would be uttering something (something haunting), and a wild scream would follow, as if he was charging, devouring the man in front of him, and after that he was very, very tired, and W.S., would walk him back to his bed, in the morning never knowing a thing about anything the previous night, he though, the old man thought, he was in a total sleep, never figuring out, the intermittent horrors—of his sleep-walking; such an undertaking, interlocking circumstance, for W.S., yet, they generally seemed thin to him, diminished in force and urgency, and viewed in his mind more as a coincident for a lighter subject: conceivably more on the order of ills of an old man’s functioning body.
On the other hand, W.S., was sympathetic to his father’s ill and eternal quivering in the bed, trying to get to sleep, again imagining but not quite honoring his imagination for realism, he thought the war might have stayed with him, the Civil War, and those great battles he talked about, to the point of bringing him to the edge of an abyss, and should he fall face first, forward and viciously down into that abyss, an endless grimy tragedy was waiting, he saw his demons there, singing him a lullaby, and their only wish was to enfold him into their nightmare.

But the old man was aging, his skin starting to sag; forearms were forming lasting wrinkles, muscle tone deflated, and the muscles knotting up from lack of use, and over use, and outstretched skin. And those once thick Russian bones were now bending, he lost height, none that he could really afford to lose, he was only five-footed two inches tall to begin with. Even his silver watch, around his wrist left a thick impression in his flesh when he took it off at night, twice as deep as it was a few years back, and the watch, was dulling as was his skin tone.
“Oh yes,” he yelped, as he punished rapidly with his descending whip and thrust of the strap on the back of W.S., muttered something (with the eyes of five-thousand hungry dogs) and the old man said,
“Oh no, I know you did!”
Ah, W.S., muttered something back, and the old man said,
“Oh no, I know you did,” and caught his breath, then added “I’ll take the devil out of you yet!”
But W.S., would not disclose his sisters name, the one he did this and that with, his so called sidekick, and had he disclosed here name, I doubt, the old man would have done anything about it anyhow, he would have blamed W.S., for leading her astray; thus, whipping him more, and at the same time, wiping her soul clean, sanctifying her by proxy. Sometimes W.S., and his sister, the third of the eight in age, would run off and into the city, returning late, or not returning until the next day—this was a peeve with the old man, amongst other things.




Chapter Two

The old man cursed worse than a dying warlock, he had a hard time with the English language, but not with the English cursing words. It was as if some evil spirit cast a spell upon him, during his voyage over from Europe, to New York City.
The old man had run away from home when he was only ten-years old, a stowaway on a ship, it was 1864, when he arrived in the United States, and somehow found himself in a war between the states at eleven years old. Thereafter, in 1866, he found his way to St. Paul, Minnesota, along the Mississippi, making his way up from New Orleans and St. Louis. What happened in-between, was all hearsay, the old man was never that coherent to put the pieces back together for anyone to create a complete and finished story out of those years.
But getting back to W.S., he simply endured like a dutiful and proud son he was, from a stock of Russian and Polish descendents, his grandmother being of that second order.


The father, the old man that is, shameless in his degraded anger, buried a lovely and church going wife, a woman of some breeding, a second wife that is, he had ridded himself of a previous wife, whom he had no children with, and was only married a short time to in comparison to his second wife, whom the first was nothing less than a drunk. He had kicked her out of the house, and went looking for a new one; almost as if it was a commodity he was looking for.
After his wife had died, he had gathered most of her things, so many things, of fifteen years of buying, and therefore he had only the things around him he was fond of, which was to the old man very edifying, a black mantle clock, a picture of him and his wife by the clock in the living room, and in his bedroom a medal from the Army he was given. He had very few impressive photographs of old, but the one he had, he’d look at very preciously, of course at this point and time, it was late in life for him. Hidden in his sofa chair W.S., had found one some pornographic black and white pictures, photographs of a young woman, she looked familiar, from up the block, W.S., put them back in the same location, it was a shame he thought, he had even found them. He looked already as a man on his death bed, yet he’d live longer, W.S., knew this and was hopeful he did, such folks always do, it seems, it is as if God himself, is giving them an extra chance to repent. He had kindness in him, otherwise he’d not have raised eight kids, save for it was simply kindness stretched out ineffectual. All in all, he had the good taste, not to marry a third time, lest he endure more frustration, anger, and dissatisfaction, and that would just not do.
The woes of so many people, in his life haunted him—W.S., was sure of that, from Russia to the Civil War, to his first drunken wife, and then onto his beautiful beloved second wife, and her death, as if this was some theatrical introduction to a classic drama to be played out on state, so W.S., often would ponder on, undertook to reissue his old thoughts and collect his new ones. He was always trying to figure out what made the old man tick.

•

There was at this time, the neighbours who honourable stood by staring out their windows, laughing at the cries of the boy, as if ready to applaud, if only they had an actual eyeful of the subdued in their mist. This was never on his mind though, the old man was many things, but he was not trying to feed the pleasures of others, but most frequently did, in his underground hush-hush, and these cries were of course prior to the boy’s teens, once he reached the adolescent state, he never cried again, matte of fact, he was taller than the old man, and stronger.
Oh yes, W.S., endured and even murmured to his father as he was being beat on his 15th birthday, the old man breathless,
“Take me to the shed pa, so the neighbour’s won’t hear and say bad things about you.”
But the old man never paused to listen, and therefore, the beatings remained in the cellar.
W.S., made no attempts to run away, not for good anyhow, he and his sister E.S., were tied together like Amos and Andy on the Radio broadcast they had weekly, they were sidekicks, sort of, but too often this gave the old man more reason to beat W.S., to punish him, to slash him with the leather strap, and listen to the blows, but now with no tears, or cries, silent was his victim, and accordingly, much of the pleasure dissolved.

About this time, 1940, the boy being seventeen-years old now, the old man asked W.S., “Vhy yo no cry?” (The old man now 93-years old)
The old man was exhausted from giving W.S., a beating, he even dropped the leather strap to the floor, his fingers stiff, didn’t even feel the leather fall out of his grips. He then caught his breath back, shook his head.
“It doesn’t hurt that much any more father,” said W.S., the old man had lost his strength, his ability to put that much force into the wave of the leather strap, and half the slashes, hit the table, not the boy, his aim was off, his balance was terrible, he almost fell on top of the boy.

This day, the old man stood stone-still, looked about, he was disorientated, couldn’t figure out exactly where he was. So much anger, so much death in the back of his head, swollen skies, not much life, he murmured, “…everythin’ goin’ to hell…!”
He was dizzy; his head felt like it was crashing, like thunder falling from eardrum to eardrum. W.S., helped his father to sit down in a chair nearby, then halfway down—bending his knees, he stood straight up, pushed the chair away from him, now regaining his strength.

The boy, if anything was very proud of his father, proud he had fought in the Civil War, to him a hero, and W.S., being the last, and youngest of the eight children, born in 1923, having missed the great War, told his father, “Pa, I’m going to enlist in the Army, I want to fight in this new war in Europe.”
That was the last of his beatings that day, he’d never get another.
The boy smiled when he told his father his ambition, and for the first time in his life, he smiled back. Matter of fact, he would comment to his neighbours in due time, of his boys intentions which would be reality in a matter of month.

As W.S., stood there, waiting to get a second beating, thinking his father was going to give him a second beating, now that he had his strength back, and especially for talking back to him, the old man simply turned about, walked quietly up the old wooden stairs, mumbling and swearing, but proudly this time.


Chapter Three


The boy knew, it was hard for his father to live amongst the herd (society), where there was more wolves than lambs—and his communicational skills were dull at best, and that the wolves get hungry and have to eat, and we cannot stray too far off, lest, finding the lambs may eat us also. He had no special gospel to teach his children such things, or the words, he knew they had to learn this on their own, let us assume, he didn’t like it, or half didn’t like it, having to teach them, having no teaching skills, and if the leather strap helped teach W.S., how terrible his father could be, then how bad could the wolves be, or even the lambs. He was somewhat relieved when he was told W.S., was going into the Army, this would be his teacher.
For himself, he was a man wrapped up some, with domestic rats, his ways were cut from an old carpet you might say, and in a few months his boy would be gone. “How strange,” he mumbled as he often did, “I didn’t suspect it,” he uttered to the mirror as he walked by his black mantle clock, looking at Ella, his wife; seeing how old and ugly he had turned into, all those 90-plus years weighing on him.
Once there was a whole lot of him, by and by it disappeared, like his sleep was doing, if anything, to want for sleep, and not have it, and to be in bed, and sleep not, was his worse curse you might say.
He loved Ella, she was the only perfectly respectable girl in his life, no matter how long she lived, she would never leave his mind, well I suppose it isn’t quite true, Oh-h-h! he found that one young girl, some thirty-years younger than he, up the block, the one W.S., found the photos of, and he W.S., had talked once to the girl, visited her one afternoon, who introduced him to her three children, and when he left, she said in passing, quietly,
“Your father bought me this house, and these children, belong to him.”
He never mentioned it to anyone, it was as if he got slapped in the face, but then each man must live his own life.
She had said to him, as he sat in the kitchen listening to her,
“I’m giving a dinner tonight, I want you to come.”
But he refused, nicely. Not so much because he wanted to, nor was he trying to be rude, he just felt out of place,
“Look me up in the future,” she said. But he never would.

•

That summer was a hot moist summer, 1940, the air with gossiping with mosquitoes, and the mosquitoes were attacking every living thing, and the thunderstorms brought bitterness to two cities, of St. Paul, and Minneapolis, destroying homes in the countryside, and folks slept outside on the grass it got so hot, foreheads sweating, people dying of heatstroke, it was the summer W.S., would join the Army.
If W.S., was angry at his father, it was because he would not let him love him, nothing else, matter of fact, E.S., often asked,
“Why aren’t you a bit heated at father, I don’t understand, he never treated you fairly?”
He couldn’t answer that question, he didn’t know the answer, but E.S., understood, with his staring eyes of forgiveness; to E.S., it was like the old man poured black rain on him, and the more he poured the more bright he became, he wanted if anything, W.S., wanted for his father that is, happiness, something he lost along the way of life.
E.S., was no longer a woman servant either, as many were in those far-off wondrous days, she had worked for four-years as a servant (as her other sisters had off and on) in a household, living at home when she could, and staying in the master’s household, with their children, and cleaning, and so forth, when they needed her, she had been paid very little, but was fed, and clothed, and that helped her father out.
Now she was going to go work for the munitions plant, they were hiring. Thus, things were chaining for all.
In the old man’s household, there was neither frost nor famine, per se, he was a hard worker, a painter of houses, buildings, and half owned a restaurant on Wabasha Street, in St. Paul, there he made his Russian stews, and so forth. His job paid him well, and he took on some side jobs, that paid him cash in silver dollars. And he worked up to the last three years of his life.
This was indeed a changing summer for everyone, for E.S., and his sidekick sister, E.S., and the oldest sister had gotten married, Ann, and even for the old man, he was making more money from the restaurant than he expected, and now on Social Security, as he must have thought, ‘why now, why at the end of my life do I get what I really don’t need, success, I should have got it back when…?’
And it came to pass, W.S., departed for the Army, and would spend most of his time near and at the end of the war, in Florence, Italy.



Chapter Four

No matter which way one thinks of it, W.S., had inherited from someone, perhaps his mother, the character in large degree, namely, patience, call it a virtue. Having said that, he received in the five-years he was in the military, or near five-years, the rank of Sergeant. By and large, he was a sharp trooper, and all who knew him liked him, he was the driver for a Colonial.
On occasion, he conservatively sent home some money to help feed the extended family, his father now slightly ill, and unable to work at his restaurant.

The war was a pale mooned war, for W.S., he dreamed on, and of the summer he had with is family, that being, 1940, the one he had spent with his sisters, and father. It was the summer he was treated as an equal by his father, or at least, he put a light in his eye.
On the other hand, the war grew faint the first few years, it would sweep over though…and he’d find some shade by a tree in the afternoons, and dream about going home with his uniform on, and standing proudly by his father, as if to be among men, gods and ghosts.
During the last days of the war, he got to see the gorgeous Vatican, sharp against the night light of the moon; he listened to the organs tremble during the day, and loitered through the corridors thereafter.
From the moment when, as a young boy, handsome, he’d gaze out of his bedroom window into the imaginary future, as if he had an audience, watching his progress, he imagined he was in some kind of accidental glamorous life, and it was just that now, he felt he was almost a star, in the cinema, but he wanted to go home and see his pa, that took precedence.

•

Upon W.S.’s return home from the war, 1945, he found his father in his sofa chair dead, neck stretched and head lying against the back of the chair.
W.S., stood in shock, his mouth open, wide open, his uniform on, his brass shinned, his heart pressing against the walls of his inner being, he gasped for air—he noticed he was thin, too thin, but no pain on his face, he was 98-years old, he held a letter in his right hand, which laid across his lap, it had the insignia of the Army on it, he had received it a few hours earlier, it was now 11:00 a.m., June 16, 1945.
W.S., felt his father’s arms, his blood was still warm, he took the letter, it had his name on it, he seen from the side of his eye, at a glace, as he scanned his father’s body, tears rolling down his cheeks as if a lock from the Panama Canal had been opened, and a flood of water was being released, he saw the part of the letter that read, “…killed in action, in Italy, May 29, 1945.”
Today would be the second time in W.S.’s life he’d notice a smile on his father’s face. A withered smile, but a smile nonetheless.
‘God had been kind,’ murmured, W.S., he died with little to no pain, and he died thinking his son was a hero, like him; that was the happiness he could not give him directly, but somehow his father got it indirectly. For once in his life, he pleased his father; and if there was anything analogous to this, it was just that, the letter indicated he died in some great battle, likened to the ones he must have saw, and maybe even partook in, he was quite young in the Civil War years.
Had he knew, the old man known, W.S., was a Colonel’s driver, things might not have been so spectacular for the old man, at that vital moment, he might have died from a heart attack because his son was no more than a driver. Even if it wasn’t true, and it wasn’t true indeed, W.S., was no hero of that sort, although, had he been given the chance, he may have been: in any case, he filled his father’s expectations, by another man’s death.


Written throughout the day, 12-20-2009, Lima, Peru

Gray January (With Commentary)

Gray January by Dennis L. Siluk


A lot of gray was in the city yesterday, a puffed-up skyin this dreary January, brings forward memories.
My boys, brood still in that dark blue room, won't come out—

Everything fell apart, years ago in that dark room like a boiling pot, their minds flooded; yet, they will not rise and roll down, the puffed-up sky.They are still in that room, mauling old memoriesperhaps reading my poems, turning pages. Even if I die
today, tomorrow, they will not come out…They just don’t want to, they like their prison—
don't you know I loved you more than words, but am helplessat fixing your anger, expectations ? You’re grown up nowI loved all my days with you, back when: gray, dark or sunny:
I still relive them, now and then, the sweltering air, the travelthe chasing of insects, and swatting mosquitoes,and the cobblestone streets—none with bitterness…So if you do sometime emerge from that dark gloomy room,parting your ways with the puffed-up sky,lift up your forehead in prayer to God ,
Show him eyes of forgiveness and all will fadeeven though you will not let me love!I would have leant you my love back then, but it was as
bright as yours, not like the gray yesterday, here in the city;
now I love only happiness for you, and I can live without
your love, as I have—I hold onto the past those far of memories
swatting mosquitoes, travel, and cobblestone streets.


Note: Dedicated to the Twins. No: 2555 (1-19-2009)


Commentary: sometimes children, when they grow up, charge their parents for the returning of their love, oh yes, you who are reading this, believe it, it is so. But what goes around comes around in time, and sad to say, they get in return what they thought, they never would, thinking it was a one sided deal, it never is. And my suggestion to the parents who are walking in these shoes, take the best years out of what they gave you, and you gave them, and tell them beat it, why spoil a good thing.

Siluk Horror writer: Bram Stoaker Award (2009)

Siluk: Bram Stoker Award

Announcing the Horror Stories and books by
Dr. Dennis L. Siluk, Ed.D.

Under consideration for the Bram Stoker Award

For best short fiction collection, 2009

See his horror books: the Tiamat trilogy, series, plus several short story horror books, “Death on Demand” (to include the renowned story, “The Rape Angelina of Glastonbury, AD 119” read by many of his 150,000-monthly readers) (and: “The Seventy Born Son”); “Dracula’s Ghost,” has eight trying stories, and “The Tale of the Jumping Serpents of Bosnia, another Colleton of eldritch short fiction (to include the growing interest in “Night Ride to Huancayo” a horrific supernatural tale). Also, the psychological thriller, “The Mumbler,” and “Manticore, Day of the Beast” And his book on visions “The Last Trumpet…” and “Angelic Renegades…” he is the unknown crown horror writer of the decade. Also see “After Eve” [a book of historic adventure].

His books can be seen on Amazon.com; B&N.com; abe.com and all the other internet big and small book dealers.

For those interested in the readings of Mr. Siluk’s books, he invites you to email the following:


stokerjury@horror.org stokerjury@horror.org
admin@horror.org

See Reviews by Benjamin Szumskyj on Dennis L. Siluk (and visit his many websites http:// dennissiluk.tripod.com


BENJAMIN SZUMSKYJ is a qualified teacher (Bachelor of Arts in Education / Bachelor of Arts in Social Sciences, minor in English) at a private high school. He also has a diploma as a librarian technician/assistant and a graduate diploma in Christian Studies. Szumskyj also acted as convener on the horror panel of the 2005 Aurealis Awards. In addition to being a member of the Australian Horror Writers Association, he is also a member of the (American) Horror Writers Association. His blog can be found at SSWFT, which is updated irregularly.



"In the Pits of Hell, a Seed of Faith Grows" - a review of The Macabre Poems: and Other Selected Poems (Volume III) by Dennis L. Siluk for Calenture: a Journal of Studies in Speculative Verse (Volume 1 # 1: September 2005).


"Interview with Dennis L. Siluk," for Lost Sanctum #2 (Wild Cat Books, 2006).


“He Is What He Writes: The Weird Tales of Dennis L. Siluk" for Dissections: The Journal of Contemporary Horror #2

(http://www.simegen.com/writers/dissections/February%202008/dissections_page_06.html>, 2008).

Three War Poems: Al-Qaeda's Dark Chiefs, Off the Coast of Somalia & To Vietnam

Al-Qaeda's Dark Chiefs


From gravid dugouts and brooding ramparts,
Blasphemous they wound the lands and minds with death!
They have turned upon the world with cannons’ from Hell,
Until many millions of mother’s eyes are wet!
Ravage they say, even God’s holiness…!
For the gates of Paradise are open now:
Another ruin for their youth on earth,
And ashes they fined, and shall not forget:

Some by the devastation of their guns,
Some by the tempest-shock, of rockets,
And yet some by the slow removal of their children
Thus, the downfall comes, betrayer to their own kind!
But at the inauguration of their credo
The lying words of their Clergy,
Sink their honor and their souls to dust.

(1-8-2009)(No: 2538)




Off the Coast of Somalia


Near all evil that the tongue can name,
Somewhere in the pits wherein we think resides Hell,
Oh! Deep, deep, deep below the crust of the earth
There is a secular abyss called the Coast of Somalia,
A place secular, of human shame:
Here is where the monster ships of the earth sail
And the worms and snakes may find a cell:
They are called the Pirates of the sea
And they capture the ships, for ransom.
But now the pirate hunters have come
(The Russians, Americans, and Chinese)
To eat the fancied devils, where they dwell
And find their honor and thine own the same.

(1-8-2009)(No: 2539)



To Vietnam

The names that time shall turn one’s stomach to recall,
Now polluted in the jungles and waters of Vietnam,
In which, not so long ago, armies worked their dark desires,
And in whose slime each soldier had to crawl,
Today, I remember them all!

(1-8-2009)(No: 2540)

War poem: Before Dawn in Iraq

Before Dawn in Iraq
(1-7-2009)(No: 2537)


Now breaks the night on Iraq and America
Over the heal of the world, I know
What bloods gleam on recording sands
(That page of Hell’s scrolls that lay so impure!)
So, dedicated to a race, a huge misfortune,
Men die, O America, that thou endure
O Liberty their eyes are obscure!

To the Palestine War-Lords (a Poem)

To the Palestine War-Lords
((1-6-2009/ No: 2536) (by: Dennis L. Siluk))

I

How have you fed your people upon lies,
And cried “Peace! Peace! And knew it would not die!
For now the iron demon takes to the sky,
And in your new-found city and lands,
Vigilant and fierce a deadly dragon flies.
Twenty-thousand cannons echo your ruling,
To whose philosophical exhortation to you bend your knees
And lift unto the Lord of evil your eyes?

This is Hell’s work: lower you hands from heaven
Lest those hands melt, from holding up the sword!
There stands another blood stained alter,
At your bowing, there stand the infernal seraphim
Give unto Satan, your conspiring secrets,
For the blood of nations, flow by your mandated credo.


II

Be yours the doom Palestine’s voice foretold
As unto Babylon, O ye has cursed the Lord,
Cast the evil sword, its shadow upon you own kind
And for whose pride a million souls grow cold!
You shall reap what you have planted, and hold!
You have murdered and claimed God’s permission,
And at your judgments, desolation stands;
For in your hearts, minds and souls, God has left them grow cold.

Your soldier’s parish and your civilians drown;
You are the vulture, and the fist, beating on the weak.
It is ye, whose words have sickened the clouds,
Infected the rivers and the people’s hearts:
Your prayers mislead, nor give good will:
Hide on the brow of the murder-Satan, or Cain.

III

Lift not your voices to the gentle God:
Your god is of shambles! Let your nation
Moan, they shall be your sacrifice to your king and deity:
Bel and Moloch, who offer fire and death,
A world in which ye preferred, with lies;
Learn now from horror and truth,
What God has tried to teach you!