Three Chord Boogie: Scene I

Boogie One: Whimsy Jones

Scene One: there are three scenes: Scene number two is called : Abra Dabra. Read this one and if you like it maybe I will tell you the rest: Scene three is called: The end again: The end is just the beginning upside down.

WHIMSY:

I see a pretty rock and I wanna swallow it. Feel it slip cool and heavy

down my pipe and into my gutty. This rock is good for skipping too. If you rub the mud off with your thumb.

I didn’t swallow it.

I didn’t skip it neither.

I slided it into my jeans pocket for later.

It cuddles on my two copper pennies.

Pennies for the train track

next time I walk down Ditch Street to the railroad train yard.

The scabby on my knee is starting to itch.

I have to sit down on the step a minute.

I put my head on my knees and I can smell dust.

I wish I sweated and had wet spots under my armpits.

I dig all my fingernails into the crusty on my knee

and scratch until it bleeds

and lick it through the raggedy hole.

This is how it is when no one is watching me.

I like it when a dog watches me.

Dogs watch things with their nose mostly.

Their eyes are just to see if you are going to give them something.

Dogs like me because I always give them something

if I have anything.

Like a meatball under the tablecloth.

That’s mostly why they like me at dinnertime.

Sheila has a dog. His name is Brother.

He likes me because I bring him a meatball

or a sausage from breakfast.

Sheila doesn’t like me.

I think because her dog likes me.

She wants him to only like her.

It’s called jealousy.

She has jealousy for me.

Her name is Sheila.

She’s really damn old.

But she still has blonde hair.

She has long red fingernails too.

all yellow on the ends

like her fingers

from holding on to burning cigarettes until it hurts.

I’ve never been in her house.

She’ll never ask me inside because Brother likes me.

She likes it better when she has to hold on to Brother

and tell people he won’t hurt them.

He jumps on the screen door and growls when she opens the big red wooden door.

He broke the screen door.

Brother is called a boxer dog.

That makes me think he needs big red boxer gloves

the same color as the door.

When he stands up on his back legs he is as tall as Avery.

Red boxing gloves would be good I think.

I try not to notice his dog balls.

He would be embarrassed if he knew I saw them.

So I don’t.

Even a dog wants some private time.

Avery sits on the porch and knits.

Sheila calls him her boy, but he is a man.

He’s getting old even though she calls him her boy.

His head is tanned brown on top and shines like a hot biscuit.

His hair on top of his ears is shaggy.

It sticks out like clown hair.

He has a nice smile.

He says I can call him Avery.

I don’t do that.

It would make Sheila damn mad if I called him Avery.

Kind of like how she doesn’t like it that Brother licks my hand.

She would not like it if I call him Avery.

It is the jealousy she has.

I don’t like it when she watches me out her living room window.

She sits and smokes and watches me

while Avery sits and rocks and knits in the front porch rocking chair.

If she let me pet Brother I wouldn’t mind her watching me.

But she won’t.

She thinks I’m going to throw a rock

through her big living room window

so she keeps a close eye on me.

I might walk right up on her porch

and kick the guts out of the white goose that guards her mail box.

She likes that white goose

and the germamiums that grow out it’s back.

She waters them every morning with her tea kettle

while she still has her nightie gown on

and her hair is all rolled up

in little pink spongy things.

One morning Avery brought out her bathrobe and told her

to put it on before she catches death.

Sheila hollers on Sunday.

She likes to holler on Sunday when it’s quiet.

I think it’s because her soapy shows aren’t on tv.

Avery can’t knit when she hollers.

He walks back and forth on the porch.

Then he sits on the step holding his ears with his hands.

He cries but I try not to notice

because this is how it is when no one is watching.

Brother slides quiet like a cat out the screen door.

He cuddles his head on Avery’s shoulder

and licks his hands and ears.

He likes to taste tears.

Avery laughs like a girl.

He smooshes his face into Brother’s tongue

and laughs louder and louder.

Sheila hates happy noise and she comes stomping.

She’s yelling.

She has a face like an old dead

catfish with sand in its eyeballs

and flies crawling all in and out.

She’s still wearing her nightie gown.

She smokes and stomps and I can see her skinny

through her nighty gown.

Avery gets up.

Brother is jumping up and down and barking.

He is barking in her face.

Red boxing gloves would be good.

Avery slaps the side of his leg on his jeans and

Brother sits down by his knee

all panting and slobbery.

His face is drippy big slops of slimy.

Avery pats on his head and wiggles on his ears.

Brother smiles.

Avery goes inside.

Brother just looks at Sheila

not to see if she is going to give him something.

Sheila throws her cigarette butt in Avery’s sugar daddy flowers.

Avery comes back with Sheila’s breakfast robe.

She wears it all day mostly.

He’s tall like a giant when he stands next to his mommy.

Maybe he should be the mommy.

He holded her robe out for her and wraps her around like a

baby in a towel.

Sheila slaps Brother on the head and goes into the house.

Avery talks in Brother’s ear

and they both go sit down and knit.

I need to sit on the porch a minute

I like to sit and hold on to my knees.

The knees in both my pants legs is busted out.

I pick my scabby again and blood starts to drip out.

I smash it with my hand.

Sheila is watching me and smoking and watching me and smoking

and sitting by the window.

The tv is black because there are no soapies today.

I wipe my hand on my pants and put it in my pocket and the rock is cool and it rubs against my copper pennies. I still want to swallow it but instead I step all the way down to the cement bump that touches the street. This is the farthest I’m allowed to go.

I’m going to stare at her until she has to go potty. Then I will skip my rock over the air like its the top of the lake .

It will hit the glass it will crash and smash and I will be able to feel it in my gutty.

That is how it is when no one is watching me.

The end.