I'm in a mood. I'm spoiling for a fight. Doesn't matter who.
Put on my leather anti-mugger's jacket and cruised over to The Four Kings on Western looking for some action. There's always action in bars on Western Boulevard. Ask Bukowski.
Reconnecting myself to THAT gritty atmosphere might jumpstart my coleslaw fart poem. Yes, I have a coleslaw fart poem. What's a fat homeless poet to do? You write about what you know. I know coleslaw farts.
I already have the storyline, since all my stuff is nonfiction, but lying around in the relative luxury of a weekly rate motel for a couple of weeks has disconnected me from that funky, desperate, fertilizer-in-the-air feeling I knew so well when I was living under a bridge last month.
The Four Kings didn't do it for me, the place was dead--- a polite crowd for some odd reason tonight--- so I decided to deposit my day labor hall paycheck at the darkest, most remote ATM I knew. That should be good for some action. Muggers are always hittin' up poorly lit ATMs. Ask The Los Angeles Times.
Drove up, parked in one of the clearly marked assigned customer parking slots and just as I was signing the back of the check while still sitting in the car I borrowed from my weekly rate motel neighbor, an obviously affluent businessman pulled into the lot and parked his fancy SUV right in front of the ATMs, in the driveway, blocking traffic.
He hopped out and started his ATM transaction. As he was finishing, a belligerent fat man approached him and asked in a very loud voice to see the schmuck's 'Special Asshole' permit.
The businessman said something like 'f* off' and the fat man said, "No, I want to see the permit you got to park in the driveway and block traffic. You gotta be some kind of special asshole."
The businessman said he didn't have time for this bull----
The fat man popped the businessman right in the face. Hit him HARD and fast. The businessman went straight down like the twin towers. THUD!
The fat man stepped over him and walked over to his piece of crap car, which was parked in one of the assigned customer parking spots, casually got in and left. Didn't even bother to rob the special asshole. Just gave him a lesson in street manners and drove off.
The violence spurred the tactile memories I had set out to find tonight. Details. Details. Good poetry is fertilized by details.
Suddenly, I remembered the vinegar-like nature of the watershed coleslaw fart of my life, the one that got my ass whipped so long ago because I was homeless and hiding in a trespassed portojohn in the wrong place at the wrong time.
How that ill-timed flatulence squirted up my nose like pepper spray and made my head snap back involuntarily in that tiny little water closet!
That damnable coleslaw fart gave away my hiding place. People heard it. People who wear ties at night like the ATM businessman and think it's okay to piss on homeless people because, after all, they're not real people, are they!?
They heard my fart, these tie-wearing vigilante people, and dragged me out of the construction site portable toilet and beat the crap out of me. I don't know why. But that was a watershed night in my unending night of homelessness. Never again would I hide from special tie-wearing assholes.
And the coleslaw fart poem started writing itself.
Put on my leather anti-mugger's jacket and cruised over to The Four Kings on Western looking for some action. There's always action in bars on Western Boulevard. Ask Bukowski.
Reconnecting myself to THAT gritty atmosphere might jumpstart my coleslaw fart poem. Yes, I have a coleslaw fart poem. What's a fat homeless poet to do? You write about what you know. I know coleslaw farts.
I already have the storyline, since all my stuff is nonfiction, but lying around in the relative luxury of a weekly rate motel for a couple of weeks has disconnected me from that funky, desperate, fertilizer-in-the-air feeling I knew so well when I was living under a bridge last month.
The Four Kings didn't do it for me, the place was dead--- a polite crowd for some odd reason tonight--- so I decided to deposit my day labor hall paycheck at the darkest, most remote ATM I knew. That should be good for some action. Muggers are always hittin' up poorly lit ATMs. Ask The Los Angeles Times.
Drove up, parked in one of the clearly marked assigned customer parking slots and just as I was signing the back of the check while still sitting in the car I borrowed from my weekly rate motel neighbor, an obviously affluent businessman pulled into the lot and parked his fancy SUV right in front of the ATMs, in the driveway, blocking traffic.
He hopped out and started his ATM transaction. As he was finishing, a belligerent fat man approached him and asked in a very loud voice to see the schmuck's 'Special Asshole' permit.
The businessman said something like 'f* off' and the fat man said, "No, I want to see the permit you got to park in the driveway and block traffic. You gotta be some kind of special asshole."
The businessman said he didn't have time for this bull----
The fat man popped the businessman right in the face. Hit him HARD and fast. The businessman went straight down like the twin towers. THUD!
The fat man stepped over him and walked over to his piece of crap car, which was parked in one of the assigned customer parking spots, casually got in and left. Didn't even bother to rob the special asshole. Just gave him a lesson in street manners and drove off.
The violence spurred the tactile memories I had set out to find tonight. Details. Details. Good poetry is fertilized by details.
Suddenly, I remembered the vinegar-like nature of the watershed coleslaw fart of my life, the one that got my ass whipped so long ago because I was homeless and hiding in a trespassed portojohn in the wrong place at the wrong time.
How that ill-timed flatulence squirted up my nose like pepper spray and made my head snap back involuntarily in that tiny little water closet!
That damnable coleslaw fart gave away my hiding place. People heard it. People who wear ties at night like the ATM businessman and think it's okay to piss on homeless people because, after all, they're not real people, are they!?
They heard my fart, these tie-wearing vigilante people, and dragged me out of the construction site portable toilet and beat the crap out of me. I don't know why. But that was a watershed night in my unending night of homelessness. Never again would I hide from special tie-wearing assholes.
And the coleslaw fart poem started writing itself.
Tags: poetry, bumfighting, bum, homeless, vlogging, odd video, spoiling for a fight, Western Blvd, Bukowski, homeless poet, weekly rate motel, living under a bridge, The Four Kings, day labor, Los Angeles Times, muggers, special asshole, street manners, street cred, pepper spray, vigilante, factotum, jarvis, ill-timed flatulence
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