One person seated on the edge of night Why am I here?
Why is anyone here?
Is anyone here?
Is anyone really here?
Can you hear me?
Can you see me?
Can you touch me?
Can you feel me?
Can you? I doubt it.
I really doubt it.
I don’t doubt that I doubt it. But do you doubt it
Do you really doubt it?
How can you doubt it?
What’s that like?
Doubt, I mean.
Doubting Thomas.
Doubting Gertrude.
Doubting doubt. How much dough does that take?
Does bread rise faster in heaven than on earth?
Do feathers fall up or down in hell?
Which way to the ibis?
Which way to the egret?
Which way to the ogre?
Ogre there?
Here?
No, there!
That’s the ticket. Ah, sweet mastery of life.
That makes me feel so much the better.
Like a new man.
Like a raging clam.
Like a hornswoggled nincompoop on designer dredges. The bottom.
The bottom of the pool.
The bottom of the totem pole.
The bottom of the bottomless pit.
My armpits are beginning to stink. I think I smell a rat.
Scuttling along the edges of peripheral visionary sequences of dark and light.
A veritable hodgepodge of cacophonous caterwauls bounding across the main stage of dramatical intercourses not very well spent. And not a moment to lose. No, not a moment of innocence to loosen the ties that bind.
Brittle reminders of eons flashing across the screen, hidden in dark swirling mists of scree plots unraveled by the ravenous thong.
Thigh masters to the stars, every one of us.
Yes, every single, solitary one. But for now, I must be gone.
Be gone!
(drops off the edge of the night to the platform below and out of sight of the audience) And he is gone, gone away, but not gone for good. (an echo effect would be nice right about here) Listen to the voices of the past.
Ignore the voices of the future.
Drop me a line. Help me! I’ve fallen, and I can’t get up!
I mean I’ve fallen asleep, and I can’t get it up!
Oh, forget about it!
You probably weren’t listening anyway.
Or were you?
I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.
I guess we’ll just have to find out. One way or another.
Or so they say.
Whoever they are.
Whatever they may be.
Whenever they decide to come.
Down to the ground in torrents of tears.
Rain swept features.
Windswept creatures.
Of and for and by the night.
A clean break.
With a dirty streak.
Smirking in the bushes.
Lurking in the rushes.
Waiting for the chance to break out into a cold, hard sweat.
Now that’s entertainment!
For a start.
For a fit.
Fit to start.
Start to fit.
Do it now.
Do it right.
Keech Ballard’s nickname as a child, when other children were in the mood to be hurtful, was the old standby - “Four Eyes.” His cousins twisted the knife further with a slightly more imaginative designation, “Earache,” a play on words, or rather sounds. Keech today lives in Las Vegas, where he writes poetry, prose, and other words that sometimes defy description. www.keechballard.com