phantom

phantom 

The safety manager 

got around to an audit

and came up with discrepancies 

between HR’s paperwork

and what I carried in my wallet 

and took me as well as 

five other drivers 

out of our trucks,

a day off

in the middle of the week

made me feel like a kid again

even if 

I had to make a trip to the DMV.

There is much more 

to being immortal

than money,

a trip to target

when the only people 

you see 

are soccer moms 

and kids,

a moment in time

when a connection you made 

in DTLA

begins to look like it might payoff 

for a screenplay 

that in two years 

you’ll make,

or 

the fact that your memories

are filled with enough color

to light a tree on Christmas Eve.

I knew this guy

who upon our first time meeting

challenged me,

“My son,” 

he said.

“Should have had your job.”

He was 

taller,

stronger,

and older than me

and 

had only a right arm;

his nickname 

was lefty.

I worked there

for four years

and spent the majority of my time

in the seat 

of a front end loader

in a dirt field,

a once dusty windshield 

became partially rain spotted 

as the man’s low pressure system 

turned out to be only hot air.

It’s kinda like 

holding back a tear,

you turn the wipers on

in an attempt to clear

a mind in which 

they say you should fear,

but your thoughts 

only smear;

eyes that once saw possibly 

become blurry 

in their cloudy atmosphere;

a path from then to now

and a few beers in

brings up the feeling 

that something 

might be missing;

a talk with an Indian last week

and he spoke about a baby’s laughing ceremony,

“The tradition is that when a baby is born, 

he belongs to two worlds,” he said. 

“The spirit world and this one.” 

“Yeah?”

“The first laugh,” he said.

“Is seen as the baby’s desire 

to leave the former world and join this one.”

A man with one arm,

an 18 year old Navajo,

and a writer looking for it to break.