It's Nice To Be Nice

it’s nice to be nice. people around here always say it. it’s nice to be nice. it’s kind of our motto. and our town is nice. the post office is unlike any other in the country. no one gets upset. everyone goes at an even keel. and no one troubles one another. i heard of a town where everyone’s nice to one another. well that’s where i live.

it’s not that trouble never falls on us. i got my car repossessed. but the man was very nice about it. i was upset. but i was nice about it. there’s always a nice way to do anything. if you slit a man’s throat and offer him a smile, he smiles back. he sits and smiles. and in a very short amount of time, the man is dead. but at least he’s nice about it.

it’s nice to be nice.

our town was founded on this principal. its in the town charter dating back three hundred years. we like it this way. and we keep that tradition alive.

there is one amendment to this clause. if you can’t be nice. if you need to be mean. like you’re grinding your teeth down to nubs and it’s been building and building for years behind a smile that just feels so damn weary. it’s a great effort always smiling, the bones in your face ache with it. but yea, if you need to be mean, you are free to be mean. you are free to spit curses and drool madly at someone. but that someone gets payment in return.

in our town, where everyone is nice and for the most part happy. we trade nastiness in kind. if you prod your finger in your wife’s face, she gets to chop that finger off. if you’re just so damn mad that you’re willing to part with a finger here or a toe there, then so be it.

it’s nice to be nice.

in our town, where everyone is nice and for the most part happy. it is our civic duty to carry a cleaver with us at any time. this is very important. every man, woman, and child carries their cleaver with them. the punishment must be meted out at the moment of offense. it’s like when a dog shits the carpet. you smash that dog’s face in its shit. immediately. so it knows that it did wrong and can associate that wrong doing with its punishment. its the same thing with the citizens of our town, where everyone is nice and for the most part happy.

it’s nice to be nice.

ritual is key to our prosperity. when i do wrong. i know i did wrong. because my neighbor severed what was left of my wrist the moment i cursed him for keeping me up all night with his cousin’s birthday party. they are a wild bunch. but it was my fault for not addressing my neighbor with civility. i know i did wrong. i just let my temper get the best of me. i guess i’ve always been this way.

everyone in town knows me. i’m the mean one. the hot head. the one who doesn’t really smile anymore. they fixed that. my smile. i can be a mean one. and the more they take, the harder it is for me to keep my cool. i have to learn to keep my cool. i lose my cool. i can’t lose my cool. got to learn to stay calm. and smile. oh yeah. i forgot about my smile.

doreen the smiling queen. she helped me with my smile. pigtails and a grin as wide as the day is long. doreen in the yellow dress. it was her eighth birthday. her mother baked her a big angel food cake with bright yellow frosting. just how doreen likes it. her mother felt sorry for me. sitting all alone on my porch. propped up carefully in my special chair. reggie from the pharmacy built it for me. he cushioned it just right so i wouldn’t get bed sores anymore. nice guy, that reggie.

it’s nice to be nice.

anyway, doreen’s mother, nell, felt sorry for me. just a heap of nothing, all by my lonesome. so she sends doreen over on her birthday to give me a piece of that big yellow cake. she was scared, i think. but who could blame her. little girls at her age can be squeamish.

my flies got a whiff of that big yellow cake. and started fluttering about happy as can be. i could see beads of sweat on little doreen’s brow. she didn’t know what to say bless her heart. she just stood there mumbling. muh-muh-muh-mumbling. now i wasn’t as happy then as i am now, so i may have been a bit coarse. and on her birthday, the poor thing.

she said ‘why don’t you smile’

i said ‘why don’t you sit on a fire hydrant and spin’

i was just so mean. all the time. i should have said:

i don’t smile because

your beloved neighbors

chopped off my fingers

and then my toes

and bit by bit,

and year by year,

i became less and less

your mother chopped off my foot

when i cursed her

for not joining me at the town dance

she did it, right there

at the dance, for everyone to see

and my face was flushed

and my blood was up

so i cursed her

and bless her heart

she had to mete out

my punishment

as i spoke it

so that i would know

that i had done wrong

not just to know

but to feel it in my gut

that i had done wrong.

and poor little doreen. doreen the smiling queen. pigtails and a grin as wide as the day is long. doreen in the yellow dress. with tears in her eye, hiccuping wildly, never losing that big old cheshire cat grin. she knew what was required of her. and she took the edge of her cleaver, almost as big as her. she dragged the cleaver along my lower lip. and just like that i had a big old cheshire cat grin. just like her. and bless her heart, now i don’t have to force a smile.

The Quiet Death of a Low Creature

I.

i would get a call, late at night

with an address and a time.

a dull voice croaked at me

these little instructions:

where to enter, how to do it.

i made certain i was there.

i was desperate, getting worse.

days counted off,

i blink and watch my life pass by.

i was running my mouth off at the bar

to anyone that'd listen.

and this one, little guy, would just

sit there

and listen.

never said a word, just listened.

he stared at me and through me

but at the same time its like he wasn't there.

the wallpaper stood out more than this guy.

later that night i was watching

the shadows still in the corners of my room.

if you watch long enough, they come to life,

they seem to shiver

like boiling water that darkness vibrates.

i would wait like this

til the sun scared them off.

my record player was still spinning

long after the album was over.

how long had i been sitting here

watching dust cake?

a chill brushed past me and the faint

sound of paper made my ears prick up.

a small square envelope appeared

on the floor in front of my door.

someone must have slipped it there a second ago.

i walked over

unlocked, unbolted and opened the door.

no one was in the hall,

no footsteps fell on the stairs,

no one breathed,

no one made a sound.

i stood there in the hallway

just watching my neighbor's doors

readjusting myself to the silence.

if i stood still enough i might hear

a breath or the gentle beat

of a heart; someone on the other side of the door

waiting for the chance to move.

i just stood there, still as those shadows.

a minute passed

or maybe it was an hour.

i shut the door

locked and bolted it.

i turned around resting my back on the door

and slipped a finger in a gap along the envelope.

a slip of paper turned on its side

was all i found

with the words,

"sit and wait, and i will call," written on it.

lack of sleep, and my mind ground to a halt.

so i went to the kitchen,

filled a glass with three ice cubes

and a few seconds of gin,

turned a lime in my hands

with my fingernail up

and placed the ragged

green rind in the glass.

i stood in the doorway to my living room

trying to make sense of these small hours

a sip of juniper

and i sat down on my couch.

what could i do?

i waited.

II.

the ice didn't melt

it hardly had a chance.

i drank the first two glasses

as fast as time slips away

but the third lingered.

those shadows on my bookcase

got back to shaking

as i stared them through and through.

they were just as nervous as me.

i got up to pace, not feeling safe

behind that lock and bolt.

i stared through every inch

of my home to see

if there was a tiny camera

trained on me.

checked every speck of mortar

between the bricks in my wall;

peered through the blinds

to the building across the way;

studied the alley below

and each darkened car;

i labored over the frost

collecting on my window pane;

i studied the room intensely

as if it might get up

and jump

at any moment.

my phone

jumped to life

in the stillness

of the room.

it echoed

..

in the room

and in my head.

it jumped to life again

and i grabbed it quick

before it fell silent for good.

i didn't say hello,

i didn't say anything

..

a voice on the other end

cleared its throat.

"well," he croaked

"did..you?"

"yes"

"who are..what do.."

"oh now, let's not waste our time with all that"

his voice was thin and low, he sounded like death.

not foreboding and grand like the death of Man

but dull, like the quiet death of a low creature.

"i take it you are a..desperate man,"

he lingered on the word 'desperate.'

"how could you know that?"

"trivial things, best not to worry"

"but.."

"what is important..

is that i am someone in a position to help you"

"i can help you

if you are willing to"

he let a breath slip,

"attend to a matter for me"

"what sort of matter"

"there is a building on the corner of 19th and evans..

and past this corner is an alley..

and down this alley is a door that never locks tight..

and through this door is a very large and very flammable loft space..

and if this very flammable loft space were to disappear,

you would find an envelope

full of many

hundreds of dollars

would appear under the door

of your three dollar room"

"what are you offering here?"

"well," he paused, "a job"

i stood there

holding the phone

for quite some time

before he croaked,

"i trust the corner of 19th and evans will disappear, then"

"i'll have to think about"

"good, next tuesday morning"

"but i.."

"i trust i won't be disappointed"

the phone went dead

and i was alone again.

my glass left a large, dark ring

on the coffee table.

i stood there

watching the shadows shiver.

Insignificant and Small

insignificant and small. stuffed in an old coffee can that rusted just right.

i found it in the midst of one of my moves. its home was between an ‘i like ike’ pin and a small letter folded tiny and tight; letters written, never meaning to send. i systematically throw out the old nostalgic garbage i acquire, only to replace it with new nostalgic garbage. the theory is that this garbage is the best possible garbage to represent the sequential failures i refer to as my life.

it was one of those days when the momentum of a hectic life stops and you’re left reeling. emptied of everything, i sit down and look at my shoes. i debate if i really needed to put them on. or if what i really needed was to lie down for a bit. i stare at them and lose time. i snap back when a sliver of drool falls on my shoes. at least i’ll make a great flycatcher with my mouth slack and not a thought in my head.

i look back through the old coffee can and pull out the book of matches a customer of mine gave to me some years back. how did this make the cut? how did i not toss this out so i could acquire more garbage?

kosciuszko hall: “where the party begins and ends”

big bad wolf

a phone number

i dialed the phone number, compelled to speak with a long dead polish bar owner from 50 years previous