Timothy Robbins, “The Line

“No one ever mentions his flesh opening to take the three nails.” The line came just before the foreman entered me and I breathed it on his neck, causing

him to pause for just a sec. I tried it on a few other guys and got puzzled grunts and a pair of sighs that were either irritated or not related to this

erotic proto-haiku. Marvin reacted as though he’d been waiting to hear it since his first sticky sheets, and had planned what to say and do. “Oh Kitten, your

mind’s as sexy as your flat tummy,” his voice quivered and he trembled. “Yes,” I confessed, “I’m lily-livered; I’m your brave little coward.”

He shook like a Whirlpool dryer with an unbalanced load, a car whose flat tire pulls it convulsing to the side of a sketchy road, the last un-sired

Shaker touched by God before being covered with barren sod. I had accidentally called him a powerful name he didn’t know he had and

so he clutched me with all the strength of panic, as though I were his only kid and we were trapped on the Mary Rose, the Lusitania, the Titanic.

The Opiate, Summer Vol.18 Prophecy

The escape hatch ready, his cellmate said: You’re a free man, my friend. Let’s go. But he declined to go and stayed behind. This one, too, showcased deviance to the core. His peculiar strain? Long years confined, a chance to flee, he spurned the break, surrendering to incapacity by what he apprehended. Weeks before, asked to join the plot, his weird behavior recurred, troubled by something big.

Aloof in the courtyard. Silent in the shop. Always deep in thought. He stared outside, gazing blankly past the walls at a blind spot on the horizon, mind turning and churning as though appraising the net worth of the world out there for him at the margins where the earth’s rough edge curved at the rim like a blade and cut off the sky. Returned to his bunk, he snuggled in a fetal curl, sleeping away fear and the reprise of nightmares for days on end.

Did he lose his mind? Pressed why, he once replied: It is easier this way. Even here. Even now, like this. Years ago, the grim signs appeared. Sentence served, his parting promise was foreboding. I will be back, he said. On the way out he looked for a way in. He stabbed a guard. And just as he pledged, he was back, as if seeking asylum. A comfort zone of belonging somewhere fulfilled a prophecy.

A tailspin. And then the crash landing. The private plane approached too fast in dimming light and winter rain. In real life the pilot plays a superhero, onscreen vaunting titanic strength, self-satisfied, a triumphant smirk on his oily, dusty face. On landing, his blood, like his speed, proved toxic. A long skid, for him just a big scare. But in real life, as he routinely does on film, he walked away unscathed. Only mortals airborne on the other flight. No stuntmen. No one enhanced with celluloid coating to shield from harm’s way.

In real life, the captain swerved a moment too late. And on the runway, tire streaks askew, debris scattered for miles around. Luggage. Seat-strapped travelers. Wings disjointed. Fuselage skin ripped apart like a tin can peeled open. Tarmac slick where fuel and blood and guts spilled. Remnants splattered down on earth like detritus dropped from a disintegration of stars. Telltales bare all. In this show of strength, some are endowed too much, some too little to fill the brawny roles they flaunt. Lightness burdens humankind with more humanity than it can bear.