Where I expected to find heroic statuary guarding the doors, nothing
but lumpy mashed potatoes. It's a cold spoon. So all at once I feel
like Hell, I don't get to stay HERE very long either. Another roadside
resort which will not be allowed to become my home. What I want
doesn't seem to have a whole lot of effect on the things way things go
around here.

The tiger with my face sleeps with one eye open. My monk, puffing up
winding mountain paths points out a stairwell cut into the cliff's
face; transfixed like Spielberg extras, spittle hangs from the corners
of our mouths as we watch an inscribed tablet descend from heaven. I
swear this is no ordinary card. I see funny dots in the foreground,
fine like sand on a beach. Now follow the maharishi tramping through a
handful of street children. Clear winter Paris afternoon. Jealousy and
rage. It was a lie, at least I thought it was a lie. In-house
laboratories. An honest deal every day for fifty-five years: since the
end of the war. Luscious lipsticks: nothing you don't. Nothing you
don't want. Slogans, not concepts... her last role. The Heartbeat Of
America.

The cap fell off my front tooth, and I couldn't help noticing that
there were no roots left on the stub to anchor it to my skull. The
stub itself had actually dissolved entirely. No one where I work was
the slightest bit interested in this although I was disgusted with my
body's sudden decision to decay in a public place.

I told you:
I left town in cruel disappointment at the world, life's empty roads
and empty cups. I felt loneliness well up inside me, tearing my mind
like it was wet tissue paper. I felt The Panic then rising up in cold
black holes where my heart used to be -- the cold of space, the cold
of fear. It has eclipsed my mind and erased my futures.

Once I lived in a tenement building. A gray spray-painted brick
airwell served me for a courtyard. I walked on green-black carpet that
had been soaked too many times in beer and vomit. Stupid iron bed. I
had to listen to him practice his saxophone in the evening, EVERY
evening: "Misty" and "Windmills of Your Mind (Theme from The Thomas
Crown Affair)."

There have been more incidents with John the Dishwasher.

John the Dishwasher lives on the street.
John the Dishwasher's life's so complete.
John the Dishwasher don't take no guff.
John the Dishwasher: he's really tough.

The women powder between their breasts with pink powder. It's very
sexy. My mother and my sisters were lost in their rooms. Endless
convolutions of silk and nylon hid them from each other. I stood in
the motel doorway in my underwear in the blue twilight watching the
cars on the freeway. I said, "California..." quietly to myself and my
heart leapt up in my chest with a surge of impossible pure hope. For
the moment I was happy. I saw the drivers of the oncoming vehicles
watching me watching them. I ran back to put on some pants. First I
picked up the blue ones that I wear to work, but finally decided
against them and in favor of a pair of khaki slacks. Then softly, I
began to softly sang a Grateful Dead with the chorus, "California, I
been knockin' on your Golden Gate..."

If I see a line of action, I follow it. Abe Lincoln used a lot of
downs. Who will remember my static dreams for me ? Mosaic. I dreamed
someone was massaging my spine and popped a vertebra in line with a
painful thud. My thoughts cleared up immediately. Big thick hairy
hands.