Moonstone Mines

The mustachioed cowboy, cheerleader for a democracy
living only in memory, mingles in white-walled galleries
with impossible judges: people behind bars
erecting partition walls to ground the tangible.

The mural is fantastic–interactive youngsters
painting in total anonymity: digitized slaughter–
exploding pipes, cables and chemicals.

He proposed ten days ago, scrambling downhill
to get to the mountaintop. When she stopped,
he began to drive, to turn toward the runway,
ready for a quick plunge, gradually preparing
a big dive home.

02/14/09

From "Random Reports" Barbara Henry (harsimuspress@yahoo.com)

A collaboration between "Random Reports" and "Music From The Film"

Stumble It!

She said: "The women are going to work. Most of the women pull small coffins on wheels behind them. Some of the men do, too. It is to remind them of what they have left behind or lost along the way. The coffins go where they go, along with the phones so that they can call home, and the music to drown out the sound of the phones. The women move with purpose through the train station with their coffins. There is only occasionally a crash. The women are happy to be free, but not as free as their children who are the most free of all because they have no coffins on wheels yet to pull behind them."

Stumble It!

Barbara Henry

Stimulus

In vintage diners, over platters of lamb and rice,

a galaxy of agencies continues the siege;

photographs show cast-iron eagles once adorned the walls;

wheelbarrows brimming with payment in grain and beer

link the long chains of evidence crucial to the legend–

the blood found on his clothes tested positive.

The union’s top officials add chicken to the stew.

The free food leaves more money–

working long hours in magic marker,

families with children spread the money around

.

02/08/09

From "Random Reports" Barbara Henry (harsimuspress@yahoo.com)

A collaboration between "Random Reports" and "Music From The Film"

Stumble It!

He said: "Burn the paper! Burn all of the paper! Let there be not a trace of us left behind. Let us abandon what we've done up 'til now. We need to stop where we are. We need to take a long, hard look at what we've done. Then, we need to start over. We need to apply what we've learned from this. We need to remove ourselves from our history in order to be reborn and to get it right this time. Burn the paper, but save the books. The books will be what will guide us. The paper is only a record of our misunderstandings, or forgetfulness, our pain and our stupidity. We could have done better. We know this now. We could have done better but we were too lazy. We were too engaged in our own song. We simply didn't listen to the other songs. We didn't even try to fix it when it broke down. We just plowed ahead as usual. And, that was our mistake. That's what brought the house of cards down. That's why we need to start again. We need to plan how to do it right this time. We need to burn all of the paper. Every last sheet of the paper needs to go, so we can start fresh; so we can get it right this time."

Stumble It!

"Some say that the words have to come first, but I don't think that is really true at all. In fact, I don't think it matters all that much one way or the other. It's like asking "Which Came First, the Willow or the Vine?" or the widow or the wine. Who cares in the end as long as it ends well."

Stumble It!

Certain Sequences of integers set the world on fire

The honeymoon began to sour.
A desperate woman, dressed demurely in a turtleneck,
secretly taped a conversation. A broken wine glass, several knives
were found in the kitchen. Disappointment, loss and death.

An honest man.
Two wars raging.
Three grown daughters.

Antifreeze, fireworks, popcorn, cigarettes and light bulbs.
A dozen assailants remained at large.

From "Random Reports" Barbara Henry (harsimuspress@yahoo.com)

Stumble It!

After all those years had gone by it still didn't feel right. He still didn't feel right in his skin. The things that he heard inside of his head still didn't sound right; they still didn't make sense to him. Sometimes he would think that he was going crazy, maybe, or that maybe he was just imagining the things around him; that they weren't really there, that reality was just a projection on the wall and that sooner or later the lights would come on and the slide show would be over. And at other times he'd forget about doubts and questions that he knew he couldn't really ask anyone about. It seemed to him that if we was going crazy, maybe everybody was too. If he was going crazy, he'd have lots of company with him. At the same time, he knew that there wasn't a lot of comfort in that thought. If he was going crazy, it would probably be better if he was the only one. It wouldn't do if everyone lost their minds all at the same time. Who would fix all of these broken minds if everyone was crazy too. Or, maybe if it were normal to be crazy, that wouldn't matter anymore. If everyone was crazy, that's what would be normal then. That's what life would be like then. It would be crazy.

Stumble It!

She said: "Well, maybe it'll work out this way: We'll just go back to the way things were before it got so easy and everyone went crazy all at the same time. You know what I'm talkin' about; when we were in school and no one had much of anything, but we all shared what we had. We rented cramped apartments in the city and we lived there with people sometimes that we didn't know real well, or like a whole lot, all of them, but we got along and we had real good times without having any money at all. And I mean zero money. We cooked for each other and we shared what there was to share. Maybe we'll just go back to being 19 or 24 or something and we'll remember how to have a good time just being with each other, just like the hippies and all those other folks. Maybe it won't be so hard after all, once we remember again how to live."

Stumble It!

She said: "Well, I guess I had to give up a lot, but I never really thought about it in those terms. I just did what I had to do. I mean, I couldn't just stand back and watch what was going on. Nothing would've changed if I did that. They were killing the water, killing the land, killing the birds and other animals that depend on the Gulf. They already hated me because I was a woman, so I never really thought about what they would do to me that they hadn't already done. I was never one of those people that could watch something terrible happen and just walk away. I had to do something. So, I set my boat on fire to block the entrance to the commercial water lanes. That was the beginning of my protest. Now, mind you, my boat was my whole life. Without my boat I couldn't make a living. But with my wreck of a boat sitting right in the middle of the shipping lane, they couldn't deliver their poisons to the Gulf. It's surprising at how quick a body can get used to being put in jail. It got to be just a regular part of my life. 'Course, being a woman in South Texas wasn't much better than being in jail anyway."

Stumble It!