Presidential Afterlife

“. . . like an orange Don Rickles . . .” Reagan was saying. 

      Washington leaned towards FDR and whispered, “Who’s Don Rickles?”

      “. . . obsessed with crowd size! Well, you know what I’d say to that. ‘Mister Gorbachev, tear down his pants!’”

      This got a laugh from the more recent arrivals. 

      “Then he says he’s better looking than his opponent. They never said that about you, did they, Abe?”

      Everybody laughed except Lincoln, who gazed over their heads at a cloud. I had a whole lifetime of that, he thought sourly, and now an eternity of it from these guys. ‘Better angels of our nature,’ my ass!

Inspired by Sister Warriors and the numerous afterlives I've imagined, the first one being here. Painting by Andy Thomas.

Sister Warriors

I went to school with a black eye. We’d been play-wrestling on the bed and my sister kicked me (by accident I’m sure). Once she pulled me off the couch by my hair. In an old photo, Lianne has a great scratch on the side of her cheek. Mom had probably planned the visit to the photographer’s months before and I can just hear her voice: “Of all the days, girls!” In the picture we are little angels—off camera we were warriors. That scrappy spirit has sustained us through life, and we’re still fighting—just not against each other.

Inspired by Rocky Mountain High. Photo of my sister (on the left; look closely for the scratch) and me, circa 1965 or 1966.

Rocky Mountain High

Born three days apart in the Spring of ’69.

More than just cousins, and best friends.

We put on lavish plays and sang John Denver in the back of the RV.

You loved the city, and I the country; and how we loved the boys.

Our childhood years flew—a crevice of independence opened between us.

Poignant and painful, we were lured separate ways.

The road to reuniting lay before us. But I couldn’t find it and you were forced to detour.

We spoke once briefly and softly near the end.

So brave you must have been. Only 27.

Inspired by A Great Looking Couple. Image from Britannica.

A Great Looking Couple

Could it really be that she had never been out with a regular group of guys before?
      “I suppose that’s how heterosexual men behave when they get together,” she said on the way back home.

That was the word she used—heterosexual—to distinguish her new boyfriend from the gay male friend she preferred hanging out with; or at least that’s the impression she gave him, what with comments like that. And comments like this: “People tell me that Alex and I make a great looking couple. Isn’t that funny?”
     Funny, he thought, that no one says that about us.

Inspired by Jan the Jammy Bastard. Photo by Microsoft Image Creator.

Jan the Jammy Bastard

Jan met his future wife on a Spanish beach: They shared a Seville orange under the blistering sun and fell in love. Of course they did, because Jan had a horseshoe up his Belgian ass. We were in a graduate historiography course together and while the rest of us donkeyed through lengthy presentations, Jan would hold the offending book aloft, roll his grey eyes and ask, Do you buy it?
     Our prof, rendered squiffy by his Ubermensch intellect and veiny biceps, just trilled, Yes!! Yes!! That’s it, Jan!
     And we would clop back to the library, hapless and ordinary.

Inspired by Rave. Photo by Eugene Chystiakov.

Rave

She found me in the writhing mass. We danced. Strobe lights, pulsing bass beat, gyrating bodies surrounding us—we spun and moved with them. She wore a black crop top and short skirt, showing off body, booty, fine legs. We danced. Wild hair, eyes darkly lined. She came closer, put her hand to my bicep, brought her lips to my ear. I strained to hear what she said. Closer still, arms now around my neck, eyes locked on mine. I felt heat and sweat. Our heat. Our sweat. She smiled and led me towards the exit, soft fingertips on mine.

Inspired by Eye Soul and Black Roses. Photo by Kena Betanchur, AFP.

Eye Soul

Eyes are the mirror of the soul.
Souls are reflective?
What of a soul darkened by a life of misery caused and earned
such that any light which enters is grasped like greed grasps lucre
such that no light escapes to give reflection?
What of a soul bereft of friendship, loveship, familyship
– malnourished and shriveled –
how does that reflect in the eyes?
Are these the eyes of an ever-stranger?
These flinty eyes accompanying a forked tongue,
such flint of the kind that’s used to ignite corruption.
And can a cheap skin-tone matched foundation and mascara cover that shit up?

Inspired by Black Roses. Photo/illustration by Fred Ni.

Black Roses

“Jesus Murphy Mary and Joseph”, he muttered, admonishing her. “Where do you think you’re going with that black eyeliner on? . . . The sight of you. . . . And those clothes. . . . You’re not leaving the house like that.”

     She threw on a sweater and washed her face. She tried to drum up an ounce of defiance but sank silently in the breaking waves of unremitting Irish shame. 

Shrunken, she rang her friend’s doorbell. “Come in, let’s do up our eyes like Benatar”, Jayne said gently. 

     They pulled out the Clairol lighted mirror and belted “we are strong, no one can tell us we’re wrong”.

Inspired by Pat Benatar and the Corpse’s recent posts. Original photo by Lynn Goldsmith. 

Murphy

“I thought things were going good,” she said. “No pressure. No commitments.”
     “But you practically make me hide when your friends come over!”

     “Can’t you just enjoy our time together?” she said. “Besides, you hate it when I ask you to dress nice, and you think my friends are stupid.”

     “I never said that.”
     “And you probably think I’m stupid, too.”

“That’s not it at all,” he said. “All I’m trying to say is that I don’t like being treated like a fucking Murphy bed.”
     “There you go,” she said. “I don’t even know what a fucking Murphy bed is.”

Inspired by I’m Speaking. Image from Detour (1945).