Imagination ignited

Hong Kong gave us hope- pages 1-2

2008-12-27T11:19:00.000-08:00

Aye-Aye’s weren’t native to Africa. They were native to one of the islands off the coast
of Africa. They were native to Madagascar, but I had seen several near my home in Tanzania. I
wondered if they jumped ship and somehow ended over here with the local cargo. I could hear
them at night, but had never seen them.
I was told never to wander out into the brush at night. I had listened when I was a young
child of five, but I refused to listen anymore. The night life, in general, was so different from
some of the creatures of the light. I had heard of Aye-Ayes, bush babies, hyenas and the like. I
had heard that some of the day creatures were more active at night. I would find out as soon as
my parent’s fell fast asleep.
I waited until the moon was so bright, it shined into my room like a night light that
refused to shut off. I gently tossed the covers off of my bed and tiptoed through the hut. My
older brother heard and caught me. He promised not to squeal if I took him with me. I obliged.
The door creaked as I slowly opened it. “Shh,” I told it and just like that the door stopped its
incessant chattering, the owl outside the house stopped hooting and the crickets crooned their last
melody for the night.
We lived in the deserts of Africa. The night life looked, smelled and tasted different.
That’s right, tasted different. I picked up a rock that lay near the side of the river. Salty. My
brother caught a firefly.
“Tastes like wild boar,” he said.
“Everything tastes like wild boar,” I replied. “That’s not normal you know?”
We were sneaking around outside. I don’t know why. I was afraid to scare the wildlife
off. My brother was afraid of waking the elders. Ironic for the guy who caught me sneaking out
in the first place.
Nestled on one of the tree branches was an Aye-Aye. I knew of them, but had never seen
one and it was right in my own backyard. Its long fingernails jutted into the prickled tree,
piercing the Boabab tree’s insides to find its nightly feast of peel bugs and worms. I called it the
“upside down tree,” because the branches looked like the roots, but many natives called it the
“monkey-bread tree,” because the dry fruit on its branches were edible. Maybe that’s why the
Aye-Aye sat on the Boabab tree instead. They loved eating fruit. It wasn’t sitting on the branches
of an Acacia tree. It, too, had edible seeds, but then again maybe its branches were too potent.
My mother burned the Acacia wood to make perfume for herself and the other local woman. She
sold it in her beauty parlor. It traded quite well.
I held my guts in pain for the tree. It couldn’t fight back but if it could, I knew it would. I
wanted to scare the Aye-Aye, but didn’t. I had never seen one and this might be my only
glimpse at it. I crept closer. It smelled like wet monkey and its eyes were vivid and huge like a
child who had just seen real food for the first time.
My brother and I didn’t stare at the Aye-Aye for too long. The lights on the neighbor’s
house had turned on. Mr. Yambi came outside with a large piece of wood in his hands. We ran in
the darkness of night. Huffing and panting all the way home. We opened the door which politely
did not creak and fell back into our beds thinking about the night we saw the world’s ugliest and
most endangered primate. I was growing up right before everyone’s eyes. Soon I would be five,
and parties were tradition.

The Outcast torn girl- work in progress

2008-12-27T11:05:00.000-08:00

I once saw this girl wearing a Power Puff girls T-shirt. No doubt a little girl at heart, still torn between reality and fantasy. She was sitting by herself near a clock at school, no doubt eavesdropping and spying on other girls, normal girls. Not weird girls like herself.

I often watched her. She would watch girls talking to one another and on the cell phone at the same time. She often wondered how real girls could carry on multiple conversations.

"Well, so you don't."

"So I can't either."

"So don't yell at me."

"Cool."

She told me she never understood those cell phone conversations and never would. The ot her girl was clapping in a fit of laughter and excitement obviously over the guys taking their shirts off near the quad.

"Hey baby, woo, woo. I see you. I see you #2."

"Number 2, #3 is the cute one."

"Whatever."

Those jerseys had to be numbered. How would she know he was a two.

The girls began tilting their heads looking at the other person who was obviously chomping on his gum the way those dumb cows, brainless really, chomped on grass. Mouth wide open, disgusting.

The MTV generation, generation X disgusted her. These people could not think for themselves., the computers, cell phones and cars thought for them.

The girl seemed less than amused with his caveman ways for the glare in her eyes indicated otherwise. You know the grunting, the chewing, never really talking. So she decided to watch one of the dancers, while twirling her hair and crossing her legs at the ankles. No doubt, trying to get one of the guy's attentions. Obviously holding her feelings for him inside, never letting go of that moment, that moment of pure ecstasy.

And this is why I am an outsider, Katrina once told me.

I never understood them, nor will I.

Power Puff girls are for me. Just me and my fantasy. Understanding is for girls; girly girls. Understand this, she said to me while pointing fingers and got up and disappeared.

Oh, I understand completely, I thought to myself.

I understand.

Pop, pop, flip, flip, woo, woo. Yeah I understand more than you will ever know.

"Girl, I know."

"I know."

One brief moment

2008-12-27T10:59:00.001-08:00

Day bleeds into night,
night gurgles through the back of my throat,
choking, hyperventilating, can't breathe, can't eat,
can't sleep, the dark mahogany booths call my name,
"Come here, rest your head awhile. I won't bite...much."
The cushions fold into one another. Head spins round and round,
stumble, fall; "wait, where am I? God is that you?"
"If that's what you want to call me then 'yes.'"Body trembling, sweating...Oh no, wait, No! Oh God, no, No!
Silver satin sheets tussled on the floor and I sit here
in the midnight's light hoping for just one miracle,
one minute, one moment to take back;
just one.

Lost in her Wonderland

2008-12-27T10:46:00.000-08:00

It's Thursday and my day feels green. It's the only day I don't have to work and work and work; my catch-up day, my day. School and work, work and school, that's all I ever do. I'm poor and spend all my money on frivolous things like manuscripts, movies, plays, music and lots of things.

My favorite is makeup, Stila to be exact. The library is where I put it on, never to be seen again; lost in my own world, my own time, my own space. That makeup led me into the world, the imaginary world. And near the bookshelves I see this tall, dark and handsome man glancing my way. We decide to start playing a little game of peek-a-boo with the bookshelves. I walk with my lipstick in one hand and free the other to pull the books from the shelves. We play a game of peek-a-boo, but I am always one step ahead of my Latin tango lover. He pulls a book off of shelf B and I off of C. He catches on though and slowly he sees one eye and then the other. He sees sparkly blue diamonds in the sky and I see green grass from the meadow down the street.

My tango lover reaches the end of the row and grabs my hand pulling me closer, the lights dim and the music blares. Our hips start moving in sync with one another's movements. Oh my tango lover. Oh no, damn it, my lipstick is gone. My imaginary world is gone; my lover is gone.

I sit back down at the sandy tan colored table and sift through my Coach purse. Oh good. My favorite is Stila #16 lip liner and Nicole lip color. I pull out Nicole and begin to place it upon my top and then bottom lips and my dream starts over again.

My makeup, my music, my world, lost in insanity, lost in me. Just like Alice was lost in her Wonderland and the Muppets took Manhattan, I became my own character, freelancing my work; work of lost worlds, dinosaurs, apes and kitties. Worlds of unknown. Yearning to be free, to be my own person, not someone else's model of perfection. Green with envy, with jealousy, with sadness, with no real model of perfection. Life changes constantly we should never look back, dwell on the past, only dwell on the future and never look back.

Moonlight

2008-12-27T10:40:00.001-08:00

Blinding white, halo-like
men claim to have landed on you,
Martians seems to live inside you
shooting stars beam around you,
but I am different. I fear you;
breathe you in. Love you, hate you,
can't live without you. Many nights I lie awake sleepless
staring up at you. I envy you. I want to be you.
Alive for thousands, maybe millions of years, but
alas I bleed red not dust like you.
The air doesn't make me alive. It slowly kills me.
Werewolves change form around you.
Vampires worship you.
My enemy is your friend.
But I am moral basking in your light.
Tonight whether dream or nightmare you will be there,
and I will be waiting.

The truth?

2008-12-27T10:35:00.000-08:00

Too much downtime will cause a person to go insane. We think of ways to distract our time, it doesn't work. We think of ways to kill ourselves and we quickly stop those thoughts. We sit in silence hoping someone will speak to us...someone will care. The silence is deafening and the whirring of the air conditioning drives us mental. It takes us to a sleepy state; droll, drab, boring. We open our mouths and blasphemy spews from every crevice. Speak! You're too silent. But I couldn't. The truth would hurt. Fibbing seems the way to go, at the time.

The What If's

2008-12-26T11:42:00.002-08:00

What if there was no music, no laughter. Where would we be today? No smiles. No nothing. Just sadness and depression. Where would we go? What would we do? How could we look for love if we have no sense of humor or no music to sleep to? There would be no music to soothe the soul and calm the heart. Where would our soldiers be if they did not have those SOS girls to sing life back into them? How could they live, breath, survive? No one knows.
No more Saturday Night Live. How could they? Honestly. I mean really. Where would half of America or the world for that matter be on Saturday nights without Madtv or Saturday Night Live? Then there would be no more comedies at the movies like There’s Something about Mary, Jack Black or Rush Hour. No more comedy category at any of the award ceremonies and many people would be out of a great job, a rewarding job. One that requires a sense of humor. No fear, not afraid to make fools out of themselves.
Then, what about the jesters in medieval times? How would the King and Queen be entertained? Who would bring the Queen out of her rage of tears to pure happiness? No one else.
And, where would Batman be without the Joker? He was the true evil villain and that laugh of his proved everyone’s point. But, how could you really hate a man that made you laugh? You cannot. It’s impossible.
Oh and the use of makeup would cease to exist. Sorry, MAC, Aveda, Lancome, Benefit, Estee Lauder and Stila, you’re out of a couple of billion dollars. Sorry. Please come again. I mean how could a woman buy makeup anyways when everytime she cried her face would become blush, her mascara would run down the sides of her cheeks and she would look like a sad faced clown doll or crying porcelain doll, who we all can look at, but not touch. If they only made actual waterproof mascara that worked and not some cheap imitation crap like Wet and Wild or Bonne Bell, oh well. Cest le Vie. That’s life. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

You're ugly and you're out

2008-12-26T11:42:00.001-08:00

No one respects me, but you will. I am Darwood Merill and I hold the fate of the World Series in my hand. Treat me right and I might just let you pass go. Don’t yell obscenities at me, you pompous ass; I call the shots, not you.
With that attitude buddy, you’re out of here and you’re ugly, the worst case of ugliness I’ve ever seen.
You players better be listening because I can be two things:
I can be your enemy or I can be your friend, either way chump, I get my way. What I say goes newbie! I have been on this damn field longer than you and will be here long after you hit a couple of home-runs and strike some people out, so listen and listen good, boy, with no ass, You’re out and you’re ugly too!
You’re outta here!

On the wall

2008-12-26T11:41:00.003-08:00

Mirror, mirror on the wall
who will be my next victim after all.
That stupid choo-choo train that chugs along
Or the clang, clang, crash of mom’s dishes
“Buttons” knocked on the floor.
Oh no, John, not again!
Stupid cat.
Or the swish, swish of people’s feet outside my house.
Wobble, wobble, swish, swish, clang, clang, chug a lug, choo-choo, ooh, ooh, la la, dada, nana. Noisy sounds that plague my mind.
Mirror, mirror on the wall,
I am my next victim after all.

In the Land of MAC

2008-12-26T11:41:00.001-08:00

The Lord is my crash test dummy I shall not wiggle.
He maketh me lie down in green back seats:
He leadeth me in the paths of here for his name’s sake.
Yea, though I walk through the MAC counter at Macy’s, I will fear no evil:
For thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou annointest
My head with oil; my noodles runneth over.
Surely goodness and shoes shall scratch me all of the days of my life:
And I will manipulate in the house of Jupiter forever.

My life as a former head piece

2008-12-26T11:39:00.000-08:00

Do you believe in reincarnation? Do you believe that you can be anything in the world if you
want to be? Well, I was. But not what I wanted to be. I was one of the snakes on Medusa’s head.
She was so vindictive. Our reaction, you know, all of the snakes on her head, were solely based
on the mood she was in. When she was angry, we hissed at onlookers. When she was ecstatic, we
smiled and shook our rattlers. We were supposed to be a symbol of death to all that crossed her
path, but we weren’t really. All we were, and this might surprise you, was princesses from
foreign lands. That woman may have been a “Greek goddess,” but she wouldn’t look into the
future like many thought.
She was just some insane washed up beauty, who like the evil stepsisters in “Cinderella”
couldn’t win the love of one Price Charming so she decided to take up the art of witchcraft and
began casting spells on all those who did live in that, “…and they lived happily ever after,”
situation. She was a bitter woman. She set out seeking revenge on all the European castles
including on their precious princesses who lived inside. How you may ask? She transformed
them into serpents and placed them upon her head, laid upon her feet and coiled the rest around
her arms, all 101 of us.
This off the wall woman managed to poison us by taking some evil concoction and
spreading it around our rose gardens. She knew we couldn’t resist picking flowers in our garden.
It calmed our minds and heightened our spiritual awareness.

So why didn’t this potion effect our male servants? We all started to converse, in snake
speak of course, while sitting upon Medusa’s head and came to realize she made it to effect only
women, rich women, beautiful women.
I am princess of Godiva, like the chocolates. It’s a small kingdom that harvests corn and
grows water lilies and red roses. I was born of royalty, laced with a red rose gown and golden
blonde hair and blue eyes. I mesmerized onlookers. Many of the others were the same hair,
royalty with blonde hair and blue eyes. Each one more radiant than the last. These girls were
from kingdoms that were known, but small enough that if the girls were missing it would take
awhile for anyone to truly take notice.
One day all of us became tired of Medusa’s evil ways. Perhaps, because she made many
think she was all powerful when in reality her cauldron was more powerful than her pinky finger.
We all tricked that women into turning us back into our former selves again.
I know you’re wondering how we could do such a thing. But we did. It was simple. Once
she was asleep, we whispered softly into her ear, all one hundred and one of us. We whispered of
the times when she was kind and gentle. We whispered of our husbands and of the armies who
were set out to take a bow and arrow to the base of her heart and the top of her head. We let her
stew in her own thoughts and nightmares. We let her become insane that believe the only way
out, the only way to sanity, was to let us go, to let us be free. She scrambled frantically one day,
beating her head up against the wall and cast a spell while doing it. We all began to fall off as she
hit up against the wall, falling fast to the ground and all at once becoming ourselves again.
And, that’s how I am able to tell my story today. Not many will ever be able to say they
were a snake on a madwoman’s head, but I can. Oh, but I can.

West of Tip Top

2008-12-26T11:38:00.000-08:00

Once upon a time, long, long ago in a far away land. Scratch that. Just kidding. It was
last week inside the brothel, which coincidentally was located across the street from the porn
shop and behind the church with the bells that constantly rang, that Heidi decided to give up her
job as the local mortician and become an exotic dancer at the Tip Top brothel. No more
beautifying dead guys now she would make guys gasp at the sight of her illuminating lips and
voluptuous body and derrière.
Heidi was one of those girls you never really talked about or spoke to, you’d just sit there
and stare, burning a hole straight through her. She lived in an apartment on West 82nd street, in
the seedy part of town. It didn’t matter what town. What mattered was that Heidi was stuck.
Forever stuck. Helga, her apartment manager, was so strict, she couldn’t and wouldn’t let poor
Heidi have any animals. That didn’t matter anyway. Heidi kept Cuddles, her Peruvian pet pig in
the kitchen and Quakers, her manatee, in her porcelain bathtub. Both were females. The
hormones in that apartment raged sometimes, but it was normal. That’s what Heidi kept telling
herself that.
Every day Cuddles would escape and enter the washroom in the basement of the
complex. Once he accidentally fell into the washing machine. At least he was clean, Heidi told
Helga when she hollered at her while pointing at the “No animals allowed” sign. Underneath the
sign, it said unless for dinner. Heidi picked up her clean pig and rushed upstairs and locked her
door. She could still hear Helga bellowing through the complex. She stayed inside the apartment
for the next couple of days until she knew Helga was gone for business. She had off from the
brothel anyway.

For once, there was a surplus of girls and Heidi was glad. It must have been season. It
was when all the married men left home on a business trip looking for a holiday honey. She
wasn’t one of them. She could see the tan line that formed on their finger. It didn’t take a genius
to notice that. Most of the girls she worked with didn’t though. Then again they thought Mars
was just a candy bar and that a Mojito was an exotic form of mosquito from Brazil. Heidi didn’t
try to explain. She just did her job and left every day when her shift was through.
It was inevitable that something would go wrong. One day Quakers slowly slipped out of
the tub and managed to slither with her flippers down the hall and the stairs into Count Topper’s
humble abode. Count Topper was originally from Croatia, but he left years ago to look for a new
life in America. What he found was that royalty didn’t count here unless they were in the
public’s eye and the paparazzi were constantly outside their door. He was rich. He had money.
No one knew it though by the way he dressed. He looked like a bum. He didn’t want people to
know he had money. He wanted people to like him for who he was. It proved to be challenging
though. He became so lonely that he had his nephew moved to the United States as well. No one
minded though. He was muscular with flaxen hair and emerald eyes. He made the women go
wild.
Count Topper’s nephew was in love with Heidi and Heidi had a soft spot in her heart for
him as well, but he didn’t like her job. He wanted her for himself only, like anyone of royalty
would.
What he didn’t know was that Heidi would do anything for him. Besides, she hated the
grabby men. It was fantastic money, but it was getting old. Always with the grabbing, the
wanting and the needing of something they couldn’t have, but would never let go of. She only
wanted one man to want her that way. It would happen soon if she had her way.

It didn’t take long for Cuddles to escape again. This time he hobbled into Count Topper’s
secret space, a room full of gold coins and rum guarded by another pig named Vicious. Vicious
wasn’t really rude or mean. He just had sharp teeth that could cut into anyone’s skin. It wasn’t
hard to find Cuddles. Her squeal wasn’t soft. It could make a deaf man hear again. Dogs hated it.
It seems that Cuddles and Vicious had a budding romance. Cuddles had been escaping for
weeks. This was the only time Heidi had caught her. It worked to her advantage though. She
finally met the Count’s nephew, Tip, and after several dates they were wed. So were Cuddles and
Vicious.
It worked out in the end because Count Top gave Heidi and Tip the gold coins. All he
wanted was his precious rum. And Heidi didn’t have to work at Tip Top brothel anymore. Some
of the customers were angry, but they’d get over it. And if they didn’t, oh well. She couldn’t help
who she was. She had her ever after with Tip.
Or at least until Quakers escaped again. For a manatee, she moved quick.
But that’s another story for another time and they had a catching up to do. Lots of it.