A joke for the aged

One time I spent a weekend at my grandparents' place.
And it was on Saturday afternoon that my brother, Grammie, Grandfar, and I were enjoying ourselves some quality time together in the den.
Then, all of a sudden, there was a bump that began to gradually increase in the form of a subtle thump beneath the foundation of our feet. As the thump came closer my brother, Graham, peeked between the blinds and saw a black Chrysler town car rolling slow and laying low over the road in a tight rejuvenated suit and some new chrome sporked shoes.
That's when Grandfar, who had his headphones on playing "The History of the British Empire" book on tape, turned his head, feeling the vibration from the street--not because he heard it--and then Grammie noticed this so she said, "My goodness! Is that a DINOSAUR out there?! That racket manages to grab even your grandfather's attention."

The first morning after moving out

I wake up in my buddy's basement.
He's given me a couple weeks to inhabit half of his bottom floor--me and my stuff from the old eastside house. My room is just at the bottom of the stairs to the right, it has no door and it has a window that doesn't close.
That's the first thing I notice after the light hit my eyes through the window blinds at 9:56 AM Wednesday.
I half-consciously remember that wretched crack allowing a cool wind to swoop into the room in the dead of night.
I got up and tried to push it close, from each possible angle and all, but that dadnam thing would not shut.
This is only a centimeter we're talking about here.
It's only your shoulders that were chilly.
How about you get your own windows at your own place, bud?
Okay.
Fuck it.
All right.
Here we are.
I need to shower.
Again, up bright and early for another day at work.
From here the shop's just down the road.
I'll just charge my phone while I'm in the shower.
But the charger is in my car.
So I go up the stairs and out to my car to get it.
That's when things went wrong.
The house I'm staying at has two front doors. Between the doors is the entryway; it's like a little architectural atmospheric chamber meant to save heat and stuff, you know--and the owner's usually lock the second main door to the living room.
So, stupidly enough, I remembered that fact of the second door after re-approaching the house with my charger--
I left it cracked but then I opened the first door to the front yard--which must have sucked the air out of the room and incidentally sucked the door closed, and I didn't unlock the thing.
Fuck me.
So now I'm checking every door in my drawers, a tee and bare feet.
I also check to see if any neighbors notice this idiocy.
The termination dust decided to hit the tips of mountains the evening before, too, and it's cold.
My car had frost on it.
 have just about now made it to panic mode.
I'm locked out.
I'm half naked.
I can't call anyone because all the necessary numbers are in my dead phone inside.
I'm cold as hell.
But then I remember my cold shoulders and the blasted, unsealable slit.
It's a sign, I think--of idiocy, man, idiocy!
Let's just say I got a good laugh out of myself.
So then I took a deep breathe as I took that window of opportunity.

Two Pages of Notes

I see what is, nothing more nor less,
Because upon my sight I'm never not too impressed..
:::
On avid film watchers:
--General inquiry #1
-->How well do you perceive the conception of a perception of life? How good?
--->How good is your grasp of imitation?
:::
The myth of the black suit who walks along the white coast--(Barrett's story)
--He's always talking on a cell phone and looking at the mountains across the bay that shape the horizon line.
--The mystery is who he is talking to at the base of the bluff.
:::
Good ideas are tough to come by because of their fleeting nature..
Don't you remember those nights that you came up with a really good idea but you only remember having a good time? You do, however, remember the mere fact that a good idea was conceived within a specific timeframe but you haven't an inkling to the substance or the ability to recall the details of the good idea...
There's just the fact that you experienced a bright mindstate and transformed that quality into time well spent...
:::
You know you might be nuts when you blurt out,
"OH MY GOD THAT WAS SO GOOD, DAWG!"
after a fulfilling meal, in this case.
The crazy part isn't the fact that I was talking to a dog. That is mere coincidence, but the peculiar part is the seeming notion in my tone of voice at that very moment which happened to be directed at Marley who just happens to be a dog. The key word is dawg obviously, but in my lexicon and in the way I use speech "dawg" is a colloquial and oft-used term interchangeable with the more commonly known term"friend".
The funny part is I was talking to Marley, a dog, but instinctively referred to him (as I would to any friend I know and respect) as dawg.

That new job...

Can't pass up opportunity.
Take it to help out that within.
Do it for them and inner unity
because, honestly bro, it's worth living up to it to the end.
When it's all said and done only
memory  will outlast that last moment.
I thank all that stopped and
said, "Yo, this kids here's got it in him!"
I ain't saying I walk through life like I ain't got plans.
All I got, man, is some wisdom
and it's all yours if you wanna listen.
Nevertheless, bruh, my life has enough reason and rhyme
as it is and each day lays then
thus therefore
you get your
go ahead to preach to me,
new lore.
We've risen!

Freewrite

My voice is back to the blog.
Spencer, that's me. Hi everybody. It's different talking so plainly when you think so flowery.
Nah mean.
Anyways, I guess this blog's come a long way since I started.
I've gathered a lot of my thoughts on this thing.
Albethem playful thoughts, there's nothing like writing poetry.
The try to connect any word to any other is a healthy practice. I think at least.
Numbers aren't as fun. Geometry and economic trends are quite interesting.
But none come close to words. Words are far more troublesome!
Once you find some poetry write it down.
Even if it sounds wrong. Power through. You must make many mistakes, too.
If ever I successfully pass on knowledge the word has said to me and can say I ever taught someone something someday I'm telling you all right now... Write down the good shit.
And only the thinkers know what that is. That's why you scrit it first and explain it later.
One of the most important bits of wisdom I picked up in college was
How do you
know what you
think till you
see what you
say?
...
...write it down is right, my friends.
Write it down.
It's like, "tell me I'm wrong!"
Pun intended.
Speaking of which, before I go, I'll share one of my bit of poetry that I wrote tonight.
It goes
The trot I plot on
the spot aint got me
even to the state of
mind where I can say that
I've taught all that I've brought
to the web shaped whirlpool
a circumferential blot
from my conf'rence table spot.
The end.
PostScript
I was going admit earlier and speak to some of the context from this measure's collection of words, ideas, and poetic phraseology referring to specific posts prior, but it would have been just jumble.
That word makes me hungry.
As for my disclosure of intel: I'd probably have to speak to it in person.
Okay, well, I've been drawn away...... .... ... ..
I'm going to eat a bowl of cereal.
Shit, but we have no milk.
I tossed the rest of the half and half yesterday.
Piece of shit fridge.
Cream stays good for at least a month.
We have no dairy.
Except those slices of cheese
Cereal Nachos: munch brunch con queso!
Anybody?
Then after that I think I'll hit the hay.
And with that, my loyal lowbrow listeners, I bid you ado unto your day as you ought it fit!

Found poetry from The Anatomy of Influence:

Gusto

Leaves waltz with the wind one last time before
foreshadowing winter's white cloaking storm.
The gust springs a dance as a solstice summer
sun does enhance May's spark of thunder.

Everyone does die alone,
but I wouldn't mind getting gone
while someone sits by my side.

Just a substance, you say.
Them chemicals, today...
But when entrails are all
that remain then start solving
science's next resolve.
But what has revolution
left queued for solution?
And where's the paradigm
shiftin'side in this pairing rhyme?
There ain't none, obsolete,
constraint, done, it's complete.

Hidden Epiphany

A poem is pointless, nothing more than
a beautiful description of an
impervious thought or useless fiction.
Yet the point proceeds impotently on,
setting forth whence its conclusion won't do,
can't suffice and shouldn't satisfy you.
Without bottom the poem finds hatred
quickly with quaint ideas mind-stated,
hand-drawn and the language apparatus,
in full proving it inadequate...thus,
ALACK ALACK! So solemn words, words, words
are, are not and could, should or would will swerve
the intelligible beings capable
of consuming fragments infinitesimal.
::
PS
::
Picture in Room of Hotel on Street
The poem will do the portrait no more
than it already is. What it is is
simple; pigment, parchment and shaped vectors
which mimic the street around the Mississ-
ippi housing formerly framed business.
Yet the path is brick, not water nor less
than the clay and grass displaced neighborhoods
which are only known if seen in the woods. 

I love Anchorage because

It can rank it as a town.
It stays so low to the ground.
Underdeveloped. Intentionally.
Unlike the old west's cities
where they've cast the pasture upwards
past gravity's bound due for the divinities;
which is confounding because over there
their world is that developed.
And when you're way the hell up
there your head's in the clouds,
which is what gives me doubts but...
Here in the youngest west
there's no wearing big wigs
and more capaciousness
for imagination's figments.

Today felt like one of those days to see the ocean.

I didn't do it, but I really thought about it. It just felt like one of those days to do something like that. Something simple but something meaningful because when you put yourself in such a spot as the edge of a cliff, where there's so much yet so little in front of you, you really give your mind an opportunity to open up. Even your heart, too, if the vista invokes your insides so.
Pirates have been on my mind a lot lately. That's what's going to be the theme which reigns supreme amongst the lot of content and matter.
But it's not that simple.
The story that is, because both
1 - it's unfinished
and
2 - requiring still massive aesthetic conception and correction of that what will be conceived.
One day...
This whole thing over thematics of piracy and the need to look at the ocean are quite parallel predicaments. The story I've mentioned is a long story, so I'll keep it short and skip to the meaning of my urge to gaze upon the abyssal glorious oceana.
I need a sentimental character for this next alluded-to project. He's going to be a he. He's also going to be the type of guy who yearns to learn about himself while pondering his life's lessons with the sea at his feet. The waterway at the which he peers 'pon 'tis his perfect panorama. And then, while this sentimental sailor muses the aforementioned ideas, another shipmate from the shipyard will inquire into why the hell this allegedly-hard soul at sea is focused so deeply on the too-distant horizon. Then, after the conversation commences and develops, the sentimentally-souled sailor will say something like---

"Maybe the reason why I choose to stare over the depths is to confound my third eye's visage of the world, a world with an end. And that place without is out there across the water. That's forever. The end out there is seldom seen back. If we jumped ship right now for the betterment of everyone then I'm off! Scram! Long gone. That's why I look at the sea, and the sky, and the clouds, 'cause without them there would be no mettle, nobody, no nothing, bot an article in the whole raucous and lurid world worth talking about. But here we are, at the edge of forever."

First Recorded Rap Verse...a prelude to the real welcoming:

The thirty six degrees of preparation
don't even dirty the zert's kicks,
so let's start out with six degrees of separation
whereupon the grid we took a set vacation...
Aside...
Agiin, like a cold case of lackadoin'ism
beginning with a wick as if it were
the commencement of breakfast
but let me wake fast
and blast to the past
whereupon we stick it out
to fix it up, givin' the thick of the friction,
but when you "get it" to the contradiction
like we the English lexicon diction
mixing in on some
of this sixer on our swerve shit, son

The Midsummer Snow

Since midsummer has past I feel inverted.
I get to thinking of winter,
And a flit of the darkest day slips in in a split,
Because just after a split sight of the first fall I cannot but see slices of splintery icing from the broken skies that,
As a mask: like moss on a rock or tone on all talk,
Resheet our ambered Alaskan premises,
I wrote these, where, once upon a memory:

Moss, well at least his character in real time, mentioned something some way which struck a tune, a tune to my liking.
Although I don't think this is applicable for the play (well, not yet) is because it bodes well for this occasion.
Moss, well at least that's how I'll refer to him from here on out, and I were having an ordinary post-working hours conversation in the confines of this slightly foggy room we've been using to cut off completely and clear our heads.
Then he said, seeing was it had started to snow;
"I really don't mind walking home in these conditions," as he had just prior come back from the Blue Fox Bar, "because the world moves in slow motion."
I understood and asked him what he thought about walking in the rain.
He was humored and said, with amity, "That's why I'm glad you're here man. No one else gets that stuff."
I'm not so sure about that, but then again I doubt he thinks that so solidly.
Nevertheless, that was a good talk, a good thought, and a memorable moment.

Leached the end of the rime--no mo' po of ol'

I want your eyes, mind, and even ears all in.

It's a new world, from plays to sonnets.

The first few lines of my Shakespearean

Scribblin' lining up like bolts and what? Knuts.

Yup--

Yo, in the hole you gots only pens and pulp.

If symbols and meanings come between us

Then it's the squirrel's world, nuts and bolts.

Feed the needful thing, pursue it like Venus.

See--

Think a Costanza extravaganza.

Think Seinfeld, Much Ado About Nuttin'

I double-dipped with a pun last stanza;

Have some food for thought! Drink up, too! Glutton!
Whew--

I'm tired, going nuts, a crazy fella.

Third time's a charm, paronomasia.

Old Shakespearean Studies Sonnet

I've made a promise, one poem per blog.

The page is blank, the words in the cavern.

The whoreson Falstaff, that fat, aging hog

Sack and smog each behalf the Boar's tavern.

Hal holds the wealth, the inherent well-off;

Shall he lend coin so the fat may maintain?

The drunk's princely niche pays his rent and trough.

Thee horse spits and nays, so ends this quatrain.

We ask for no end, we desire for more

From this sacked Falstaff, we hire the boar.

It's late, we tire, and  Jack's flat on the floor

Till the morrow we'll retire, the fat horse snores.

A hog and horse, quite a contradiction.

We plead for more, in spite of the fiction.

Whip yur scripture out richer, full, thick, and stout

Disillusion dis fusion of lucre and sweetness
Dispelled inclusion of base above the fleeting mess
Lost. Hush, the bush rustles so pleasant
The pheasant not gone but turnt and tossed
Topsy turve, as the ears steer clear of the eyes
In swerve. The image put forth, believe it not,
The learned service is crude to the blinkless
Who think less and earn more slower, in turn
The balance is in bloom. Knowledge, got some?
Blossom, by ear, listen and void mispells,
Pleasure's endeared to the mind irrawed, as
Nails clipped, the saws of the past are claws as
Veils stripped.

Golf, Song, and Shakespeare

Grow as a tree but stick with Cobra's chrome

Flow as Nickel Creek, these my reasons why:

Drive'n off the tee is the quickest root home

I wish you out of the woods, the club's try

Find in your past a game of lost and found

Might as well be dream'n lest you hear a snore

Time comes at you fast, try to slow it down

One chip to the green'n she's on the dance floor

Find your roots but the capable break free

The story's weave'n is pretty far out

Mind the woods, but escape their lunacy

One putt to break ev'n, a nifty par out.

The myth behind the trees takes quite the toll

Take risks on your leave, with higher stakes next hole.

His and Yours As Mine

So I said, 'why not?'
Confide in your thoughts
So here's what I got.
Hope you're impressed
And anxiousness
Puts to the test
Those fluent
Influence
Since no sense
Is made
Without
Cool aid
Sugar-coated word of mouth.

                                                                  Spencer Stilwell
                                                                      March 2013

Investigation in the truest form is intuitive estimation—Wherein

Declaratives are inductive follies—By golly!—Appeal to definition—

Fie, how thou art stand!?—Which side detective?

Consist resist guestimate or jump ship—Choose either all—Be.

Stand ground. Persist. Live on and prosper…Listen…your sight, it sees.

Everything is and all is a thing. Me

You, the solipsist. the Monarchy; it’s all real and the real is fiction.

Souls are dust and matter masks us.—Appealing to diction—

Therein, beyond, blind eye sees slight directive.

Fakeness lives in the leaves on the lifeless

Street. It’s calm and cold but the coldness weighs

Down, and the first snow falls, the grounds compress

For some odd forever, till winter strays.

Rake-less lives are...

First Love Sonnet

"I guess you say"…dashing eyes, games of play.

She is a know-it-all, per say. Look here.

Say you see..."What can make me feel this way?"

Look empirically, "my girl." My fear.

The vitals inside slither and wither.

Slim impression. Will this one be worth it?

How shall’st such gal come o’er hither?

Then, our eyes click. Initiative’s hit!

This instant, neither good judgment or luck,

Hit me. This moment. I needn’t a coach.

No need to act or move. He’s right there, stuck.

Just be my girl by making the approach.

Y’all’s sight is no worse than hers or mine.

All’s thinkin’ be-shortsighted sometimes.

Follow...

...following filling full whole hollow, not so no more,
Swallow stalling mauling bull sullen as a bear hibernating
In its lair, full satisfaction fall dream action vacating
The void the hole ensnared. Poetic appetite impaired...

Diambic Pent-half-meter

Y'all think Im'ma try

To compose some kind

Of lewd diatribe

Shrewd and unkind

Though unnecessary

For medicinal,

Apothecary

Platitude and all

That jazz, musical

As that blue sun, sol

To Spanish tragics

Whose azul-less tricks

Peruse through no use

Till afterwards' truth...

To deduce the ending to ellipsis

Is to remove anxious expectation.

To reduce the story to its thesis

Is to assume poiesis implantation.

Adieu to you, my audience, spellbound

Under the umbrella's incantation,

Merry and betrothed and lost and new-found.

Patriot of, so-called, labyrinth's nation.

Ciao, my meandering trespasser whose

Now crossed over the Uruguatian Styx

Of flowing thickets you choose to peruse, 

The Palate of sol'd thoughts seeming antics.

Which in time or no convinced a return

Undone, from none, was dusty as an urn.

As the fly there who looks upon you all,

'Fore a swat left a leg up on the wall,

The strong bodes fall hardest while the weakest

Stall, still sticking around for breakfast...

Before breathing for the light at the end

Of the hall, where would be new-found a den.

Demesne as addendum and resplendent

As clinamen reroutes the old ground's ten'ment.

Eminent as another door opens

And rem'niscent at best as from a pest

Incarnate to lifelessness whose poor soul lends

It's bode to a state of eternal rest.

Thus if bliss initiates--more or less--

Then consider this poem of lore's int'rest.

                                 Spencer Stilwell
                                   Spring, April 2013

Alone in the void bodes a roaming voice,

Echoing being, god's imposing choice

Of life or darkness, canonical light

Encroaching lilac anon, call on sight.

It approaches. Image falls short of truth

Because a poem itself is flaw of its proof.

Composition is dyslexically

Solved ere vision empirically

Sets forth materia poetica to deduce

From earth into art, aesthetica rooms in use

To fill until one more door manifests,

Which ends too soon so go pre-plan the rest

That, in aggregate, shall perhaps continue

Into a foreign land from One to venue to...


 Word of the day:
Reprieve - cancel or postpone the punishment of one (such as: calling off capital punishment)

A Conversation

A: Honestly, I can’t tell you what to do or what to say or how to live. But I can ask you to listen. If you can't do that for me then so be it, but do remember that you will have this conversation again and again with whoever you happen to have it with, that is, until the time comes that you’re going to stick with it. Point is, all I’m asking from you is a small portion of your time and, for that time if you choose to accept my current offer, all of your attention.

Z: Why are you asking?

A: I want to tell you a story.

Z: What do you think I’ll learn from this story?

A: I don’t know and I don’t want to know, that is, unless you think so and want to tell me what you know once I’m done.

Z: What makes you think I’ll get it?

A: You don’t have to get it. You don't have to think so hard...You shouldn't have to because it’s my story.

Z: You conceded solipsist. However, what if I am willing and worthy of being a participant?

A: Well then, imagine I asked you this first; is one bird in both hands as valuable as two birds in a single bush?

Z: What do you mean?

A: Hear me out...

"There is no other place on earth with mountains like those so close to the water" ---NOEXQ5I5

Truth.
Alaska is my home.
For now and indefinitely.
I came here for it's natural beauty.
I don't know if that's the main reason I chose Alaska after university, but there's just some known unknown force about this state that keeps me hooked aboard.
It's an incredible place because, it seems, wherever one happens to turn there awaits another picturesque view.
(Ala: Las vistas infinitas de purview).
A natural piece of art waiting to be adapted and captured.
I think, psychologically and motivationally speaking, that's why my initial exit from Alaska for Montana State University some six or so years ago was intended for a degree in Filmography.
Nevertheless...
A buddy of mine said it best last eve.
And, if you see it, you'll have trouble finding another place quite like it.

A Displaced Fairy Tale

There is a farmer living the middle of the state somewhere in a valley who bears a plot of farmland, a crop providing immense sustenance for the immediate area distributing produce such as corn, potatoes, carrots, and lettuce for a small taste of what’s in store. The value of his reputation grew with the integrity of his produce, and this happened so quickly that with little time he built a beautiful home fully establishing his fruitful country. He lived this prosperous life for years, and life was good, complacently good, until one day early in summer when working in the field he found a single dandelion and, without hesitation, picked it from the ground. As a farmer having this flower around is bad. In the business it’s a rule of thumb: mow it if you want to grow it, pluck it or you’re stuck with it. This dandelion was dead so he rushed inside and delicately placed it in the furnace so it couldn’t spread. Then something came over him, enlightenment and things of that nature. He was a pioneer, but he hadn’t seen much outside of his groundwork; He hadn’t seen the lighter side of life. The spherical shape of fluffy seeds reminded him that there wasn’t enough fluff in his life, and with that fluff he would be able to fly like any other sprout. His life is too rooted, too weighed down, so of course his first thought is to lighten up and get out in the world. Then he grabs some cash and lightens his pockets by going to town with it. In a relatively nearby mountain [like Lewistown] community he met a sprightly blonde lady, they fell in love, and in due time they had a son. Soon enough the three relocated back to the farmer’s estate as a full-fledged family of prosperity.

The farm’s production increased each year along with the health and growth of their son. He became stronger and smarter until one day near the end of summertime, easily the hottest season in recent memory, the boy was overcome with curiosity about the outside world beyond home on the range. So after home school harvesting the corn with his dad he asks,

“Dad, what did you want to be when you were growing up?” His dad jokes that he always wanted to be ‘stalk broker,’ but assures his son understand that there are finer things to life than what you do saying,

“I’ve loved what I’ve done for a long time, but the most fun part is finding out who you are.“ He suggests that his son leave the valley behind for some time to find what it is that his son is after and his last words were,

“When you take off that’s when everything will ignite.” The boy wanted to talk more over supper, and that evening he asked his mom what she wanted to be when she was younger. She joked that she wanted to be fireman, but then admitted that she just wanted to find true love. She said,

“Sure honey bee there was a time when I wanted to be a ski bum.” She looks over at the father fostering a worried look giving him a spirited wink then utters,

“By the way honey this corn is uncomfortably amazing. Its sweetness just might keep me up all night!” With a smirk the dad reacts,

“Well maybe you’d be more comfortable having some of the smashing potatoes then? Oh, and now we’re off topic. Son, tell your mother of what we talked about.” Then the boy goes off. Taking his parents his advice he talks of his plots to find himself a wife. His father suggests that if he leaves then he do it over the winter months and return the farm come springtime whether he has a wife or not.

On a rather warm day in November the family went on a business trip, distributing their crop and releasing their son to the world in a familiar surrounding mountain for three months with two full pockets and one goal…

His parents easily returned back because the mountain passes were unusually safe. So the months go by, and unfortunately for much of the winter over much of the state the conditions were quite precipitous. The winter months came and went and the untypical climate, the lack of snow buildup and overall moisture, imminently lead to a drought early in the spring sparking forest fires alarming life on the farm. The son soon after came home, too. He had been in a dry spell as well and his thirst for love was exhausted until one day there was a flash wildfire threatening some homes in a mountain town [like Wilsall] forcing much of the community into the farmer’s valley. A small mass of townspeople came to farmer’s door asking for aid. The mom wore a reluctant grin, obviously unhappy with the developments. She hadn’t even got the chance to catch up with her son, but when she saw her son’s eyes locked on a pretty girl in the small crowd she acquiesces. She and the dad decide they’ll offer their hospitality to the townspeople. Although their quarters didn’t have enough beds to go around they make mattresses with resources such as sacks of potatoes, hay bales, and pelt blankets, things of that sort. When makeshifting these beds with his mother the boy expresses his intrigue for this particular girl,

“She’s just dandy, mom, just dandy like the flower.”

“If she’s like a dandelion then that makes her a weed and her kind only spreads like wildfire.”

                “She’s here because of the them, mother.”

                “Well in fact that’s exactly why she’s here. You had three straight months for sport out there, and now that you’re home here is where you’re going to start playing, in front of your mother who hasn’t seen you in three months?”

                “Mother, I’m not arguing with you and do I have to remind you that beside those three months we spent my entire life together. Let’s just get a bed ready for her, please.” As this happens he grabs the last potato. Then his mother insists,

                “Well if the potatoes are gone then she’s getting a cot stuffed of that awful sweet corn. If she can tolerate this year’s shoddy cream of the crop and sleep through it then I’ll not question her any longer. It will prove she’s hard enough to get through the tough times.”

                “Mom, at least give her extra straw and pelts.”

                “That’s fine. There are twenty bales in the barn and twenty pelt in the den. She’ll need it.” In agreement they hastily go greet the pretty girl and show her to bed where she’s insured that her cot is ‘as comfy as peas in a pod.’

Then the next morning after everyone was awake and eating breakfast the mom asked the pretty girl how she’d slept. The girl replied,

“Not well, my back a little stiff and my dreams were quite eerie.” The mom says in response,

“Ah, well I’m so sorry to hear that. There’s nothing like sleeping in your own bed.” With that her son is summoned over who anxiously approaches the pretty girl wanting to confess his unconditional love her, but instead timidly asks is she’d like to hear a corny joke.

                                                                                                           (Adapted from "The Princes and the Pea")

Got my head in the clouds

and my toes in the air.
Not a thing to think about.
Not even a care

Life is a sail.
The boat below will prevail.

You feel me, like braille,
or do I got you spun outta pure fun
like a spider web, white bread,
like Busta ["misleading you led"]
or just got you caught up in detail?

Like it's a sail
and we will prevail...


(But there is one last prank.
I got Zac Brown Band to thank!)

Religion bit

I believe that we have the history of mankind to thank for inventing two miracles...
1) Bread
and
2) Wine
...
I kinda get where Jesus was going with his preachings back in the impressionable days
You know, his [in]famous "body of work"...
Nevertheless, you could call me a born again Christian.
But Jesus is the one to thank today considering I eat up what he's made of everyday.

Three unapplied stanzas, each about a girl...

She's a transient and he doesn't fancy it.
She's a modern day muse whose intuit
implants an enchantment and enhances his
Disposition because she keeps on fleeting.
His couth admonition is they'll stop meeting.
A stroke of love has awoke a cautious dumbfounded hope
Thrown into the wind within a noxious resounded trope...

If there was such a scenario where we found
the end of this imagination of mine
and she wished to be there with this unsound
poetical mind then race against time

It's my opaque soul that sees behind the windowsills
as I, the wind, whisper swiftly to the trees and mills.
Representing her are the circling leaves. Confound
is her beauty by my wisps spans the willows of a meadow
in the pan beyond the sound there's a small town
where listens my cowgirl wearing those rooted stilettos.


Other words that go well together:
--empress, impress, finesse,
--visage, adage

Other idea:
--I'm going to write a poem inspired by John Milton's Paradise Lost, albeit I haven't collected the courage to take a look through, here's my idea...
"Paradise Tossed"by Spencer Stilwell. An epic poem about the world's greatest garden salad!

In some cultures...

1 Place + 3/4 People + 1 Pen&Pad + 12 Beers + 8 Food + 40 Weed + 1 Gallonawater (1 xonly) = 1 Thinktank

Get thinking, people, they think. Think like us! Think like the man. Think like me.
Think like me, I like to think, too.
I heard Seth McFarlane share on some CNN/Morgan or HBO/Maher or Some/thing internet interview on Youtube that he and his great writing crew [which probably included several more 'writing consultants'], saying something similar to, "we would sit around a table" and use the aforementioned formula to write some episodes of Family Guy.
And those are the minds that have the opportunity to use the power of television!
And it's funny.
Who's to take the fun out of it for everyone!?
Think like me, I think I said.

If you have 1 Thinktank then you have the potential you need to step around the Hollywood picture.

1 Thinktank
=
+ [1]  Brothers&Sisters
+ 1 Pen&Pad (1 Possibility)
+ 1 Gallonawater (1 Greatidea)
(ANYWHERE!)

An Off Year

I dedicate this story to my Mom and Dad for your relentless encouragement, but [similar to my senior year in high school] it’s just been one of those years that the game hasn’t been worth it.

AN OFF YEAR

By Spencer Stilwell

“Beautiful Sunday!” Creach exclaims to the three of us as his girl Anna opens the back door to let she and the three dogs in, “don’t ya know, fellas?”

“More by the moment,” Moss says as he caches the bow.

“Flawless,” I say.

“Dude, we ought to get out and do something before spring hits,” Yak suggests.

“Yeah. I’m down, cousin. What do we think?” Creach asks.

“I want to go see the Spartan Wars sequel in the theater,” Moss says as he squints with the sun in his eyes.

“Come on, dude. Get out for once! Leave the barbaric epics for later, dude. Check this weather, bro!” Yak excites.

“It’s bright as fuck out—which reminds me—it’s the universal day of rest too,” Moss says.

“You aren’t religious, dude. We gotta be outside,” Yak insists. “It’s too beautiful out.”

Moss didn’t like that first remark.

“Let’s go for a hike,” I say.

“Okay, maybe not that far outside,” Yak fesses.

“Dawg, I’m hungry. I need something to snack on,” Moss says. “I don’t care. I’ll do whatever if I get to grab some grub first.”

“I got it,” Yak says and turns to Creach. “Let’s play some hockey!”

            Creach takes a drag off his cigarette and ponders silently for a moment.

            “Come on, dude, I think it’s about that time.”

            “Where are we playing?” He asks.

            “There’s that elementary school off Lake Novice,” I say. “We could go there but if the ice isn’t any good then I think we can settle for pretty much any other school or park in the city if the heat hasn't broke them all down to slush.”

            “Creach?” Yak asks him. “Come on, buddy, this may be our last chance all year. Break-up season is a-lurkin’.”

            “Haah! It’s never an issue for me putting it off another year,” Creach says. “But…Hmm, my gear’s up at the Ravalley house. We have pucks and sticks?”

            “I got pucks but I need a stick,” Yak says.

            “I have like four lefties,” I add.

            “What about skates for Moss?”

            “Nah, dawg. I’ll go shoes. I don’t think I’m prepared to learn yet,” Moss says.

            “That’s fine, and we can swing by the Pond Shop to snag a cheap twig. It shouldn’t take long,” I say.

            “Creach…?” Yak asks one last time.

“All right...There’s The Valley Depot on the way for the stick. I’ll drive out, but it’ll be at least a half hour for me to go get my stuff. Do you all want to ride along?”

            “Shotgun!” proclaims Yak.

            “If we stop by the Tube Food before we hit the freeway I’ll ride,” Moss says.

            Honestly, I wasn’t that interested in either the drive or the hockey. But then an apathetic adage flickering ‘Why don’t care’ ran through my mind, down my spine, and most likely out my behind. Then I thought ‘What the hell’ and said—

            “Fuck it. Let’s play.”

            Finally some stick and puck with legitimate hockey players. Excuse me, hockey player. For some reason I always have looked forward to watching Creach play, or playing with him.

He told me about what happened to his career. Really too bad what happened. Right when he thought everything was taking off—let’s just say it derailed like the ‘o’ in ‘college’. Some schools, including many of the best ones, have the best coaches who expect their best players to be at their best at all times (scouts and agents in the upper echelons). And it’s a cutthroat mentality that young adults haven’t experienced, and for those who persevere—the pressure is on them—until they don’t want to play anymore. Many people even just entering the general workforce don’t understand the philosophy—that the dog eat dog, battle of the fittest, must win now, capitalistic construct—and it’s flaws and byproducts. Like when a team cuts a player they like. Or when players feel vilification produced by their investors and promoters. Sometimes it’s obvious the pace is too much for the player and sometimes it’s an obvious case of systematic savagery. You hate seeing it but it happens all the time every day in all kinds of ways to good people.

As for the rest of the roster;

I played hockey as a kid. Thought I was a decent player, but then things changed.

Yak was raised next to a sunny beach. Baseball and footballer, somewhat coordinated and talented.

Moss is from the consistently sizzling south. Played basketball and football—which fizzled for him. When do you think? Here’s a hint: it rhymes with ‘knowledge’.

But that’s it.

Anna went to The City Depot to do some shopping.

Barrett and Monk weren’t home.

We four were the team. So we hopped up in Creach’s truck—his newly-bought, previously-used, long-bed, faded-black baby girl he named ‘Night Train’ –and hit the road.

It was mostly quiet between us all. A lot of looking out the window. It’s always tough talking in an automobile from the back seat. And, well, in general. But then Moss saw his favorite sandwich shop the Tube Food and told Creach to turn off. He did, but just as we pulled into a parking spot a guy standing next to his car parked in the spot adjacent to ours says to us through our windows, “They’re closed for remodeling."
Yak cracks the passenger side door.

“What he say?” Moss asks.

“They updating the shop today boys,” reiterates another random passerby who has large headphones hanging around his neck proceeding to walk to the end of the building strip.

“All the windows are masked off. Must be renovating,” I say.

Creach puts the truck in reverse.

“Nooo!” Moss says dramatically, “Dawwg, I knew this would happen.”

“Is that dude rocking a CD player?” Yak asks, referring to the passerby with headphones. As we pass him in the truck in parking lot the passerby pulls out a CD player from his stretched baggy sweatshirt and a compact collection of discs from his cargo pants. He changes his CD. Then he slides his humongous headphones back over his ears and starts head banging and lip syncing! Dude's kicking it old school!

“Fuck yeah bro. Rock on!”

“I love it. No fear. That guy’s jamming out,” Creach says as he pulls out of the parking lot and peels across the lanes to beat the left-turn traffic. From there we take a quick right and voila—only freeway ahead for the next dozen miles. We went back to looking out the window after that. I see barbed wire fencing. And I see the trees on the other side. And mountains above and beyond the trees.

Quietude mode for the open road, which got me thinking about the last time I laced ‘em up…

It was our first playoff game of the year.

It was my third year in the league on the Fire & Ice team, and it was easily our most talented and complete team to date. It was the first round of the Bozeman Men’s League championship bracket, and our opponent was the Beavers.

It was the third period of that game. We were up by three, I think it was 5-2, but it wasn’t enough insurance. Not with our reputation after too many past last-minute blowups. I wanted more. We all did, I thought.

But around ten minutes left I intercepted the puck around the Beavers’ blue line. I skated with it for a moment, deking one guy to his right to bring it into their zone, before softly dumping it off the boards into the corner. I instinctively attempted to chase down the puck wrapping around behind the net, but Allie had already been in that position. She had the puck secured on her stick just below the goal line and started to skate behind the net. That’s when I broke for the front hoping for a pass.

Which I got. But just as my stick received the puck their goalie lunged forth to cusp of his crease to poke check the puck off my stick.

Which he did. But what he received in addition to his play was a hip to the facemask and a facemask to the ice.

Concern immediately overcame me, and probably all of the other onlookers, since I caught him pretty solid. His mask cracked as he crashed into the ice. I tried to apologize right then and there but it soon became apparent that he wasn’t going to hear that. His teammates rushed to his defense. They weren’t shy about confronting me either, shoving me away from their teammate while professing that “you don’t play that way in this league” along with a few other considerably more pernicious comments. How was I to defend myself for what I had done? It’s not a contact league, but will these things unavoidably happen given the nature of the sport? It was an accident, but was I being an outright goon out there even if it were for those few unfortunate seconds? Was it a deliberate play if for some reason, some reckless motive? Carelessness and avarice come to mind as if they acted through the strength of myself in this last period?

Even the referees weren’t exactly sure how to call the situation. Were they thinking, “Was the goaltender interference intentional?” Not at first. They gave me a two-minute minor. That seemed fair. It definitely was a penalty, I would guess, and I went to the penalty box no questions asked. But it really was an accident and I sat in the box in shame for one reason. The goalie remained down on the ice. He was hurt.

At about that time my Captain came over to the box to talk. Being a good teammate. He told me that he had already been playing with a concussion. It infuriated me to learn that.

Speaking of carelessness. He shouldn’t have even been out there in the first place. No wonder he fell like a stack of books.

It wasn’t all my fault, was it?

Meanwhile, I sat and waited restlessly. I was worried for what I had done—even for what I had done unintentionally.

But he got up onto his skates. With some help from a couple teammates. From there they guided their goaltender off the ice to the locker room.

He was done for the game.

Others from the Beavers lobbied for the league law, in that if someone must leave the game because of injury caused by an opposing player then that guilty would warrant a game misconduct and subsequent ejection.

And so was I. Upon further evaluation I was asked to leave the game.

That was fair.

I was angry at myself, at the other goalie, the whole situation.

We won 5-2.

Until a few days later I received an email from the BAHA’s president which claimed that the “malicious intent” of my hit was deserving of a two game suspension. He also happens to mention in his email that because “I’m of the understanding that you’re one of the more skilled players on your team” and essentially should have known better.

A two game suspension in a two-loss elimination tournament!

                        This is unfair.

Our team was astounded, too.

I wonder if the black and white were even aware of the orange goalie’s health status? At times, I think they knew but refused to fess up.   

Unfortunately for all sides, the commissioner of the league happened to be playing against us next game.

What a clusterfuck.

We lost that game 7-4.

Our team was outraged.

I heard that game was chippier than usual.

A few nights later we played the Saints. I didn’t even bother going I was so mad.

                        We lost 5-2. Eliminating us from the tournament.

            Bitter way to go out, especially for the passion, respect, and love I have for hockey. But around that time I did some wrong unto others, all intentions aside, but I was wrongly done unto, too. It all comes down to politics, politics amongst our certain breed of beast who are born and bred to compete.

To truly play some hockey, that’s all that I want.

I am classic case of condemnation.

But enough about me so I’ll ask you.

Am I a martyr if I believe Liberty was equally at fault for the incident? Yes.

Am I a cheap shot? Maybe.

Am I still a hockey player? No.

That was the last time I was around the game. Honestly.

That was the last time I really wanted to involve myself in the game. No kidding.

Until today. Today definitely seemed like a good day to play and we were well on our way.

Creach exits onto the main strip through Ravalley, the small town holding down the north-easternmost tip of our city’s anchorage on the other side of the base airfields. There’s another Tube Food, but we pass that one up. Creach didn’t see it. Moss didn’t say it either. Neither did I. Oops. He drives until we pull up to The Valley Depot on our right. Now we’ll get Yak a stick. So we four go inside. Moss breaks off immediately. Nothing keeps the hungry from their food. Creach spearheads the way through the protruding displays to the back of the store where any athlete smart or dumb damn well knows the sports section is! On thumb, the back sections are a man's mecca if they find themselves in a typical well-established department store and Creach’s base instincts led us straight to the source whereupon we would find…

            “Only lefties, fellas,” Creach breaks to us from afar.

            “Fuck!” Yak exclaims, a yawp that echoes off the vaulted ceiling for your everyday respectable shopper to randomly hear.

            “Shut that crap down,” I mutter. “But hey, we can check the Pond Shop for a cheap one.”

“Okay, bro,” Yak says. “But I don’t think I can handle another useless stop. I just wanna get out there and play already!”

            “Where’s the Mal? Let’s get out of this fucking flimsy place,” Chris says.

            “Moss be grabbing some grub.”

            “Well let’s get him and get out of this fucking…this fucking…atrocity. Fuck.  Alright. Let’s get him. Where the fuck is he?!”

            A random store associate meandering the store's thoroughfare passes our isle as Creach projects his poignant feelings prompting us to switches lanes and speed out. After we three weave through some perpendicular isles making for the parallel ones taking us straight to the front of the store where Moss is there to rejoin us. He has with him a small bucket of chicken nuggets. And then we four exit harmoniously two-by-two through the automatic sliding front doors.

            “Oops,” Moss says as we step onto the asphalt.

            “What’d you do?”

“Forgot to pay. My bad, dawg,” Moss says.

“Why’d you do that?”

“I’m helping them still, ain’t I?” Moss follows, “They one of the biggest businesses in America. They successful. They widespread. They good, bruh. All day, every day. They good. Beyond that, dawg I’m telling you, everywhere everyday they won’t hesitate to toss the useless cheap everyday investments if they ain’t ate. Someone got to. Gotta do it. Who gotta? I will. I’ll take that sacrificial job, and oo-hoo-boi just enough of these luscious nuggets ain’t that. They ate. They like me, they gonna be gone soon. They like a part of me now, too. Hah!” Moss takes a bite from one. Then another. He seems to be empowered when playing a scapegoat, but it is strange.

Then my mouth began to water.

“Want one?” He asks me after reading my eyes.

“Yeahh, dawg,” I say and take a bite, “Mmm. Thanks, man.”

Should I have done that, I think? Yah.

I finish the chick chunk on my next bite. Yum.

Is this act actually contributing in any way, hmm? Nah.

Any wrongdoing in this peccadillo play? Some.

Hold that thought, though. Yo…

“Can I steal another?”

            “Yeah for sure, dawg,” Moss says nicely.

            We all load up in the Night Train, claiming our same seats.

            “Whatcha say there, Mal?” Creach says, chiming in from the driver’s seat.

            “Me? Said nothing, bruh.”

            “Whatcha got there, Mal?” Creach amends.

            “Got nothing, bruh.”

            “No. Really, Creach, those there don’t exist,” I affirm.

            “Alright, you two little colluders, I believe you.”

            Creach ignites the engine to the Night Train, exits the parking lot right onto the Raven Road running alongside the river, and we’re off up into the valley. After about five minutes of diesel powered ambiance and focal peering out the window upon the mountains on the other side of the Crow River valley we took a left on Wildflower Road and Creach carved up the mountainside dirt road from there.

Once we reached the turnoff for Creach’s house we saw that it was gated off. It was obvious that Creach had not only not been there for some time but that the subletter bossman had also noticed the inactivity as well and blocked it off.
It was pretty icy, too, and the road's grade is quite steeply pitched.
Never argue with a slippery slope.
Creach put the truck in park at the gate, shut off the engine and we all got out. From there we had to hike up about 200 yards up the hill to get to the driveway. There wasn’t much snow on the road so my footwork felt nice and delicate to start.
"Gosh darnit, dude, you wanted a hike? You got one," Yaks says. "Sunuvabitch I'm out of shape."
That's when I find some old footprints and decide to follow their lead up the hill, stepping lightly print for print with them until approaching the “driveway”. I slowed up and let Creach take the lead from there, it being his “ghosthouse”. We all approached the house slowly, as slowly as seeing the first snowfall in winter, and the first thing I see is shredded insulation-looking material. It's torn up base to a piece of raw real estate. It came from the garage door, which had been hacked and ripped open.

“No. Shit. No! Fucking Christ,” Creach says. “Goddamn place's been ransacked!”

We all went inside, daring that these petty thieves did commit such pettiness as to stealing dear hockey gear unto Creach’s “crib”. Everything in the garage had been thrown about every which way. The only thing which seemed intact was the truck on jacks with no wheels attached. Creach sniffs around for any clues whatsoever to who or what might have done this.
Creach's hockey gear was nowhere to be found. Well, except for his four very nice Reebok composite sticks. Quadruplets. How blessed. Yet the expensive sticks go unnoticed. Amateur pilferers, I think. Yeah, whoever robbed this place ignorantly left those gems behind...Damned fool.
We all look through every nook in that garage, but no gear nowhere.
No skates, in reality.
That’s the real tragedy of it all, too, Creach’s stolen skates…

Moss and Yak lead the way after exhausting the garage in full. Creach rushes up the stairs to the house to check the front door. Then he runs back down the stairs as Yak, Moss and I stand in front. Creach then takes a walk around the house. He crosses us in front again, goes to the east side of the house.

“Those fuckers probably snuck through the cubby hole in the back,” Creach thinks.

“That or the chimney,” Yak adds.

“Could've been…Fuck!”

They got in somehow and it wasn’t the front door. That’s how those godforsaken pirates got out though. The house’s lock was still intact and functional. Those blasted blasphemous beasts!

After the thoughtfully-wretched time of idle we all timidly stride up and into the quarters one by one. Creach swiftly streaks straight upstairs to the main living area. I follow Yak who trails Moss through the front door. The first thing that catches my eye is the drywall dust and muck strewn about below a light socket that had been ripped out of the ceiling.

“Damnn…” I say.

“That was from earlier, dude…” Yak says to me.

“Yeah, dawg, I saw that there when I was here way back when, too,” Moss adds.

“What the…”

I bypass the entryway catastrophe and continue upstairs...where the catastrophe continues...

The mountainside confines were turned over entirely, drawer for drawer. Even in the damn bathroom. That’s how far they went. Nothing was really worth much in there anyways, we figured [except for the fucking vitally-important hockey gear]. That’s how far they went to get whatever it is they needed, but still...

I had entered a plot that I never imagined finding myself perusing and indignantly musing through.

Are people merely animals when it comes down to it, whatever it is, I think?

Who do I really know if all people are really mere animals?

Who do I really trust if mere base instinct is all people really know?

What do I want? I just want to play hockey. For once!

When do I want that? Pretty fucking soon.

Who do I want? Those flipping crooks!

Why do I want that? It’s pretty basic. Time on the ice. Just once! Out of instinct.

How? I do not know. Not at this very moment.

Creach has his sticks but no skates.

Yak has his skates but no stick.

Moss wasn’t even planning on skating…

On a lighter note, Moss found some Philly episodes floating around the crib’s den floor. He’s been hooked on that show. I guess this means we’ll pay less for streaming. We’ll take what we can get at this point.

The sun is shining bright but the day is looking dim…

            What is it that thieves want? To procure.

            What is it that thieves need? To cure.

            I, Zander, believe the two aforementioned answers are philosophically tautological and logically commutative. But what's their relevance...

            Ain’t it a shame? Yes.

            Ain’t it a shame that the thieves did the duty to fulfill their desire? Nah…

            After I saw all that I had I thought out loud to the other three as we descended to the Night Train, “If we pillaged the Valley Deepo that place would still flourish! Everything in there is cheap and replaceable. But, dude—Creach, your things aren’t that. Your fucking skates! Like, really?! Of all they think to take. Jesus Christ, man, that's a profane act...”

            “Please, fellas, it’s no big deal…”

            “Creach, you don’t have to seem so calm,” Yak says. “Those are your effects and cherishables, bro.”

            “Dawwg," Moss adds. "That shit’s wild. I don’t know."

            “I’ll just call the Pond Shop,” Creach says grabbing his phone from his pocket. “Who knows, maybe they'll have some new stuff in stock that happens to be my size.”

            From there we took the Night Train back down the mountain, through the valley, to the highway, into the city, and the sun was nearly an hour away from its pathological submergence behind the range-lined horizon…

            We still needed to get Creach some skates, Yak a stick, Moss some food, and me some ice time…

            Unfortunately that day the basic need of each of our train went unfulfilled…

            On the way home I feel a warm winter breeze indicative of spring, but in my head I see a scene—there’s a red carpet rolling out onto the center of a beautiful, freshly hot-mopped ice rink for the singing of the national anthem. Then, in the darkened arena, the singer steps onto the red and makes his way into the center circle. And then, at the very moment that the singer breathes his first breathe before ringing out to the rest, the red royal rug is tugged right out from under the their feet—before the show even got started.

That’s just how I saw it.

It had to be an off year.