in the dread vast and middle of the night?

soft marsh light. in the soft marsh light. japanese double camellias swam in the soft marsh light. all around was a tropical forest, red breasted, green tailed parrots fluttered from liana to liana, as african drums soared to their own precise rhythm, hup, boom, hup, boom, boom, go, go, go! swarthy horns engraved with curious leopards were blown by natives, and under the abstract sky a man stood before the mic, the salamander-conjurer, the lizard-king, rhyming to the drums in broken crescendos and intimations of low-fi deftness as the players played low, and the brush swayed and bobbed and blew in the? wind. describe anton newcombe. allude to the crowd. spin your bracelet. quick, say something.

she looks pretty.

you know her.

he starts the first chorus.

everything’s lining up, everybody’s mind crazier and knowing, rehashing speeding nostalgia, places, people, yeah, yeah, bottles clanking, whiskey spitting to the stars, the feeling of free idea, infinite in the mad crowd, roaring and rocking now, he grabs a horn, kicking to the sudden jolt of the sound, sweat sweating, the drummers pick up the chorus, “slow, sway, slaying, murder in the romance of your art – understood – clooossse your eeeyes,” two girls stumbled in, starry tattooed smiles and clapping, non-committal junkies, ghostly in the fiendish light, as he picks the horn up high, braying a golden blast like a long, high laugh in the air, quivering now and holding it, entranced, dueling with the crowd, high and wide and blowing his top sending messages around the world and to john twenty times, back and forth, angling and careening, crooning when someone let out a foghorn, “whoooo!” heard straight to algiers, and the singer jumped off the bandstand stood holding the horn, drooping to the side in his hand, looking at all the people, slowly staring as the music died, gazing somewhere far with the saddest expression as if to say, “what are we doing in this dusty, ramshackle world?” someone gave him a beer and he walked slowly over to sit off to a side table as the great crowd clapped and cheered and he sat by himself holding his head low in his hands, moving back and forth.

last chance to describe anton newcombe.

(a cheap ripoff, i agree, but let's make do.)

too late.

white roses in a red puddle.

whenever it rains, the nation is flooded with poems titled RAIN, and every young writer thinks they’re baudelaire

in fact, you’re the sun of basho.

there were cobwebs in the corner of the wood-planked ceiling where a glowworm dangled magically in the moon-licked kitchen outside a pig roamed carelessly in the tall grass far off two horses feasted in the breeze blowing nonchalantly carried in from the dark bright ocean ruffling the ferns below the window pecan pie boasted egomaniacally, fresh out the oven and we sat down with chinese tea yes hmm she settled over the mountain and began to descend casting a glowing phantom like aura over the land as many some many millions kissed her goodnight. azaleas in a glass vase.

when I awoke, she was sleeping next to me, a faint trace of a smile, remembrance of drunken dashing clumsy sweet people. I got out of bed, put my jeans on, and walked to the kitchen. emma and danny were sipping coffee and the dogs were eating lazily out of their bowls.

“lookie here, this guy, you betcha, and there’s some coffee my man.”

“i think i lost a piece of my soul last night,” emma said.

“something you can ill afford,” i said, “oops. joke”

“we’ve got a few errands to run, but after, we can cast some lines in the lake, the dogs love it, what’s your plan?” danny asked.

“violet’s sleeping, and i might go dig the town for a bit.”

“yessir, yessir”

so i walked into the day. dominoes on the stoop. i walked towards downtown with my book, looking to dig, get a coffee, read in the shade of a big oak tree in a churchyard, love the sun. the cleanliness of the city still surprised me. lake champlain dazzled to the right. all the shops and restaurants were lined in a row, and the place was buzzing, (noticed many awkward tattoos.) i stopped into a small coffee shop called speeder & earl’s, ordered a café au lait, and then left to look for a place to lie down and read. it was late spring, and everything was bright. the air was not too hot, you know? i walked in the direction of the big, white church i had passed on the way down. there was an old hippie looking drifter sitting on the church steps, and i laid down in the yard to read. i was reading “the master and margarita” by mikhail bulgakov but what I really wanted was the story of that old drifter, and so i’d sneak peaks wondering where he’d came from, where he’d been, the old ghost of the green mountains with fire on the soles of his sullied boots. “what’s your story ol’ bard of the mountain? tell it quick.” i thought.

and then my phone rang. violet. wondering where i was. and me going back to the house because really there’s nothing more chemically mad for a man than a girl with flashes of enigmatic fire in the way she looks, the way she talks. the dream of a country house, flowers, cobwebs, a pig,

“i woke up to barrenness.”

“sorry. danny and emma will back shortly, and we’ll head out to the lake.”

when they returned, we all sauntered down to the lake. the dogs ran wild, fetching sticks, swimming, and sniffing the little, pink parts of other dogs. danny and mark were crushing cold beers, and I was too. we fished on the edge of the lake, off a narrow pier. we fished with mullet strips, but the fish weren’t biting in the afternoon sun. we didn’t care. emma and violet played with the dogs. mark talked about the space shuttle scheduled to land on mars that night.

“should we buy champagne on the way back, mark?” emma called.

in time, everyone had their fill, and we walked back empty handed. we’d nothing planned that night and sat around in the house. mark followed the mars landing on emma’s computer, and i was dreading the drive back to cambridge in the morning. violet looked anxious, too, and I felt some tension in her voice. but baby I’m going to here and now and heaven and back and tripped and how.

when you were there, and you, and you, happiness crowned the night; i too

danny was waiting outside, his tattooed arms hanging, handsapocket, he looked different, his long hair cut now, wearing dickies and sandals, "a regular old vermonter," i yelled out the window as we parked and got out of the car. he smiled and just looked at us.

"man, frisco to vermont. how's living? and this is violet," i said.

they shook hands, and he asked her what the hell she was doing with me. she smiled and pushed me.

we went inside.

emma was in the house playing with their dog, and danny's friend mark from back home in boston was sipping a beer. violet and i sat down, emma got us beers, and we got to talking. emma had a job that allowed her to move to city to city, and danny tagged along, getting odd jobs along the way, working in hardware stores, cleaning toilets, spending his time writing bad poetry, seeing the country. they were a couple from back home but split when she began working and moved away. danny stayed in town, getting drunk, making all sorts of girls, but they kept in touch, and danny met back up with her in boulder, colorado. they'd been back and forth across the country by car three times, and when they decided to move closer to emma's family back home, mark joined them. i didn't know mark too well, but he seemed happy to be out of boston, as he sat there smiling, his red sox cap backwards.

"yeah, the water is just down there, a short walk, and downtown is right around the corner, and across the street they play dominoes on the stoop all day and all night, and liam told me a lot about you, miss," danny said turning to violet.

"gosh, it is awfully pretty up here. the city's clean and nice, a lot different than cambridge," violet said.

"yes, yes, you betcha," he said.

"and just how do you do?" i asked emma.

"i'm kinda happy to be out of the city, but danny's already talking about going back. he's all circles and you betchas."

"you betcha!" danny belted.

"so, what's good around here," i asked, getting to business.

"well, there's a bar where mark gets drunk and looks for a wife just over there, and all the bars and restaurants are all together just down the street," emma said.

danny got up to check on the ribs he was grilling, and mark was playing with another dog who bounded into the room. it was his dog. i don't remember his name.

"i got these ribs ready, and then we'll hit the town. you betcha."

we ate the ribs, they were fine ribs, had a few more beers, everyone was comfortable and happy, and then danny led the charge out of the house.

"where're we going, mark?" danny asked. "what's good, what're we to do, dance, dance, dance."

the streets were clean, and there were a lot of people out. many of the students at the local university were gone for the summer, but there were plenty of holdovers, and we stopped into one of the little pubs along the way. the music was blasting, people were laughing, bumping into each other, and it was still early. we grabbed beers, danny and i started talking, and the other three likewise. we talked about people from home, movies, books, the country, plans, more beers. we watched the boston celtics on one of the tvs then bolted for the next joint. more beers, too crowded, next bar. danny was moving now, and so was i. violet and emma were talking nicely, and mark was getting nice, talking to girls as they walked by. we entered a big irish bar. there weren't many people, and we were feeling good. danny, mark, and i talked about mark's nights on the town, and he grabbed a bouquet of flowers, which were sitting in a vase on the table. "this is how we're going to do it," he said, "let's hit it."

we all left and walked down the street to the next joint. mark was handing out flowers to girls walking down the street, putting them in their hair, then he started running and whipped a couple flowers at a group of girls.

"smooth, man" emma yelled.

we entered the next bar. and everyone was dancing. i grabbed violet, and spun. michael jackson was playing over the speakers, mark was throwing flowers, "you betcha, you betcha." we spun, spun, spun. spin, sugar, spin!

when mark ran out of flowers, we were ready to go. we walked back, noisy in the crystalline night. we got back to the house, and danny took out a bag. "brought this from frisco, man" he rolled it, and we smoked, the dogs jumping on us wanting to play. soon we all crashed, violet and i in the guest room. we laughed in bed, and then fell asleep.