Prose: El Mirador

Miradore #5

A pipe and a jar and a storm coming in…just finished practice…nothing could seem better. Winds blowing…
can’t see a rain line, wall of water drops in the distance…may not come that
way. There’s a hole in the clouds coming my way. Frank Sinatra did it his way, but
that didn’t stop the thunder I’m hearing now. He’s dead now anyway….I wonder if he did that his way, …shotgun in his mouth like Hemingway? It’s a little windy up my way, and the thunder is getting louder….I’ll put the computer on battery soon…go for a silent running…yes, drops are beginning to blow on me..I’ll have to move soon…start another paragraph….soon….”Where are we going? Planet Ten!!…When are we going? Real
soon!

Once, when I was a kid, we built this fort, see? And it was boards held together by
twine….and the cracks stuffed with tall grass…at the edge of some trees. One afternoon we were there, see? And a wall of water….like someone was dumping a bucket…was coming towards us across this field of grass… it was a storm line… going maybe 7 miles per hour…and the fort was built at the base of a tree, so, we had two look-outs in the tree…and this WALL
of water is coming at us…not that it would have hurt us, but for some fun reason, we
got SCARED, and the two look-outs about fell out of the tree getting down, all of us giggling like mad idiots… and we all got inside the fort, almost before the rain hit….and we all
felt victorious for a moment. Then, someone got the bright idea of holding a lighter to the dry grass….the grass lit…we couldn’t put it out…it burned the string…and the
whole fort collapsed as we scrambled out. That was a very complete day.

Earth changes…right…one time in South Carolina, I was sitting on a porch across
from my house on the neighbor’s porch whose house I was plumbing at the time…
our mutual neighbor…somewhat a timid fellow…was mowing his lawn …a house further down…A GTO…loud music…big fellow behind the wheel….screeches down this quiet street….the timid neighbor shouts: “HEY!”
GTO screeches to a stop….backs up, screeching….Big Fellow in Car, mean looking dude, shouts something at timid neighbor….Big Fellow turns towards me and my friend…also a Big Fellow.
I get up as he’s watching….walk a few steps…..pick up a big, heavy piece of pipe, and
go sit down again casually with my friend, both of us staring at the GTO. Big Fellow in GTO watches us...is quiet for a moment….GTO drives slowly away….

Earth changes….oh….right….I got distracted….from what, I wonder…oh, yeah….the
“Big Deal” ness of earth changes…..Just don’t live on top of a volcano or in a desert..
live where there’s some food….don’t live on an ocean or in a seismically unstable area,
or an area in he path of hurricanes….Eugene will do nicely…..or, Tepoztlan…
YEAY!!!

The cloud eye turned west and the clouds are rather uncertain as to their role in the sky,
as if they were bureaucrats waiting for an assignment…..but they linger over the
mountains, casting a cool shadow and peace. Fucking magic, man, I can feel it
rising up out of the earth…am I drawn to magic now….magic….not coming
out in the words I’m writing now….but it’s here like the wet in the peachflower of
your lover’s secret desire.