drmstream[writing]

a place for things that don't have a place elsewhere

Month: April, 2011

Serendipitous Soul: A Serial Story — Part 2

Part Two: What’s Going On? Reck­less, urgent, hun­gry? Seiz­ing the moment, mea­sur­ing out rea­son to sus­tain the mad­ness needed to make that true love take root in the dri­est ground? Empty, des­per­ate? — What do you think of me? — You’re going to take over the world. — Is that why you won’t open up to me? Soft, chocolate […]

Jackie & Ethel

They were pulled in by the forces of Jupiter, a potent wind of ambi­tion and oblig­a­tion, less noble than immor­tal, God-like and unwit­ting. They brought the dif­fer­ences of dis­tant uni­verses: the cool dis­may of icy beauty, the clutch­ing grasp of fer­tile loins. They were bound by the rude com­mon­al­ity of oth­ers’ blood: the stains left […]

The place your foot lands is the last step

  First, sink the foun­da­tions.  Pro­ceed slowly, make sure that each load-bearing point is set firm and square.  There’s no vis­i­ble progress and patience, an under­stand­ing of the big pic­ture, is required. Then, erect the frame.  Dis­trib­ute the force of the beams and gird­ers across the bear­ing loads. You have made the skele­ton, strung the tendons. […]

Serendipitous Soul: A Serial Story — Part 1

Part I: Just My Imag­i­na­tion Deep morn­ing city lights, all rounded edges and first sleep. A cab runs by and the chrome tires keep spin­ning. My eyes want to squint. I’m not ready to fall down. There’s a cost to flex­ing your sched­ule to get the last hour of work in. The pur­ga­tory of New York […]

It is time to leave” — the internment at Manzanar

It is time to leave now. When it started, it was time to go.  Pick up and go from your home.  Take a bag.  Go live in this ‘camp’ behind barbed wire fences and men with guns. You have nar­row eyes.  Your lips are thin.  Your skin is dif­fer­ent.  You have to go away. Because you might kill […]

You don’t want to marry a girl who can hit like a man” — A sketch with 3 voices

- Get your gun. — I’m watch­ing… –Get your gun to show the boy. –Hit that record thing for me. –I said,  Go get your gun. –You work that thing then. –I got it, Grams.  I’ll make sure you don’t miss any of your show. — All right then. — She’ll be back before any­thing hap­pens.  Ain’t noth­ing hap­pens on that show […]

Making a political cartoon into a metaphor for creativity

  –I’ve got to make a polit­i­cal car­toon, the sixth-grade boy says to me.  I’m going down­stairs. I’m fid­dling with my iPad and half-watching the end of the US Open.  I’m just happy that he didn’t rope me into work­ing on the assign­ment and that he’s going down to the play­room alone.  Some­times he gets […]

Recognizing someone is complicated:” A conversation about Love

- When you found me, you rec­og­nized me. –What do you mean? –You know who I am. — No, what do you mean, When I found you? — You found me. — We found each other. — But I wasn’t look­ing for you to find me. I was look­ing to find some­one. I just didn’t know what it would mean. — I […]

to leave a signal, a message of my own…”

Peb­bles   Every­thing, every­where, a memo­r­ial seen from the cor­ner of my eye; a puz­zle piece, a part of a recon­struc­tion, a mem­ory. A mes­sage – I am still here with you, for you. Like a spy, I read code left in a news­pa­per or flash­ing past on a com­puter mon­i­tor, rec­og­niz­able only to me.   I carry a peb­ble in […]