I gave myself til sundown to get out of town

This is part one. This isn't true, it's a fiction story, for all those people who think i write biographies.


sat at home and it was raining
so i decided to travel to paradise
strange decision i know
but i'd been drinking all day so there you go
figured i'd have to sail and hike
on account that i'd banged up my car
on the last rainy day-
got so angry when the heavens opened and
felt drowned
so i ran myself off the road
flipped two tonnes of 1960 jaguar mkII into a ditch
came out alive.
sat on the upturned iron carcass
rotting away in the downpour
damp
smoking a limp cigarette
but feeling a hundred times better
that's life.
and that was another day
some time in the past
but on this day
i took a fistfull of coins and
crossed the chanel on a cheap boat
another rotting hulk
so old i could feel it
rusting away around me
but it didn't sink so that's alright.
reached port
disembarked with a smile
to show the sunshine and everyone in it
that i was happier now.
tried to hitch a lift from
cars coming off the boat but
they were all english -
we don't do that sort of thing
so i walked to a garage nearby
stuck my arm out
hoping for a friendly frenchman
pictured a ratty citroen rounding the bend
with red wine and bread on the backseat
decided i'd feast with a frenchman
he never came
waited and waited
cursed the bastards who took petrol but
wouldnt take me
it got dark before i finally got a lift with an old ex pat
smelling of whisky and telling me stories
jumped up tales of army days
that i didn't believe
he drove drunk and he drove fast
and truth be told i was scared shitless
i put up with it -
it's better to put your life in the hands of a madman
and end up somewhere new
than to feel homeless and alone
and end up nowhere you want to be.
he dropped me outside a bar in the nearest town
run down place called le dru
told me to get a drink
and that there was a train station nearby
laughed and roared off down the road,
throwing up clouds of dust when he
clipped the verge.
i went inside and got a drink.
the stools at the bar
were exactly the same as ones we
used to have at school
so i sat in a booth instead
cool air and cold beer -
life was looking up and
there was a cute girl serving behind the counter
too good for me but
so nice to look at.

that night i slept in an old quarry building
stacked with hay bales
so i guess it belonged to a farmer
he never knew i was there but
i rested my head against my bag
and wished him thanks anyway.
went back to the bar in the morning
to say goodbye to my cute waitress
but the only other person in there was
a surly barman
i ordered a drink in english
and he scowled away in french
strange how an expression
can show so much animosity
but i didn't let it bother me.

i didn't really know where paradise was
just knew it would be down south
so i jumped on a train
sped through fields
watched french people doing their french thing
slept a little
watched more lives flash by
through the window
i was god
flying above and beside everyone
and every soul was mine
i could almost reach out and touch them
could see in every window
i was a parasitic voyeur god
intent on breaking and entering
i wanted to SEE their souls
or at least their hands.
i didn't see either
and the feeling passed
i liked being god but
there was a bar on the train.

the journey was long
and overnight
i dreamt about hands and souls.
hands are the same now
as there were a thousand years ago
four fingers and a thumb
those damn irresponsible digits
so human
unique
we kill with them
hold each other
create
hurt
murderes and lovers
that's what hands are.
i decided that holding hands was
a thousand years of humanity
in one gesture
decided that it was for the best
if we just didn't.
i can't quite remember what i dreamt about souls,
it was probably more of the same.

 

*narrative poem

i get a very sort of bukowski vibe, if at least just by style and appearance

and b/c of that, i won't take time to critique by my normal rules of "end words/ line integrity/ etc"

mainly b/c i dig the story, and in a poem like this, i'm more focused on the story anyhow, especially since it's so long

i love it all, but i felt the last two stanzas went very abstract, especially since the first two were so concrete

i love all the observations and all the insights to the speaker of the poem

i'm kind of on the fence about the end, on the one hand, i feel like there could have been a better conclusion to the narrative

but on the other hand, i really love ending on the line "it was probably more of the same"

nice

 

i get a very sort of bukowski vibe, if at least just by style and appearance\

yeah he was really into that blue font

 

this would be really great read out loud imo, ginsberg-style

"it was probably more of the same" great

yeah i like this a lot

 

because, of course, that's exactly what i was referring to


yeah, i like sarcasm too

 

It's nice the way you set the scene hear so well. And the language is so familiar, I fell like I know the narrator, like he's a buddy recounting a tale over a few beers.

I won't go through the whole thing and pick it apart but one thing I really think you oughta change would be to get rid of damp in the first stanza. It completely interrupts the flow and I also think you would be a lot more than damp in the weather you described.

I do love the last line. Killer.