USA
| David Alpaugh’s first collection, Counterpoint, won the Nicholas Roerich Poetry Prize and was published by Story Line Press. His work has appeared in over fifty literary magazines, journals and anthologies, including Exquisite Corpse, The Formalist, POETRY, and ZYZZYVA. A selection of his poems entitled The Greatest Hits of David Alpaugh is forthcoming from Pudding House as part of their Gold Chapbook Series. A graduate of Rutgers University and the University of California, Berkeley, he lives in the San Francisco Bay Area where he runs Small Poetry Press, a chapbook-design and printing service for self-publishing poets. He also teaches poetry writing and appreciaton at the University of California Berkeley Extension. |
Herbie was almost eighteen years old. He loved to wear the kamikaze aviator’s cap his uncle had brought home from Guadalcanal with the flap always dangling down under his chin because somebody wasn’t paying attention or didn’t know how to snap the buckle in.
One day Herbie asked if he could ride my little red tricycle. I looked up and shook my head, “No.” Next thing I knew Herbie was pedaling my trike up Mariners Place — and I was sitting in the middle of the sidewalk, crying for my mom and justice
while Howard and the other boys ran after Herbie, throwing stones and calling him names — like sparrows pestering a red-tailed hawk
though our big bird had barely spread his wings before one of my pedals broke off under the thrust of his size ten sneaker and Herbie’s Wild Ride was over.
This is my earliest memory: a Mongoloid in an enemy aviator’s cap, pedaling up the street on a tricycle.
I remember the benign smile on his face as he turned and looked back to let me know it was nothing personal — just a matter of pure joy.
You can have my fucking tricycle, Herbie.
Hunger Artists When I stopped eating my food because it was something I hated (fried smelts or spam or last week’s stew) or because I’d had a vision most kids have at five or six when they stare at their forks and see not meat but the flesh of a lamb, a pig, a chicken my father would give me a good reason to finish every morsel on my plate: because of the poor starving children in Europe who had no food, who were lucky to get stale bread and a cup of dirty water. What would they not give to sit at our table and eat fried smelts off melmac plates?
I learned that fish was brain food; that milk would strengthen your bones carrots make you see like a leopard in the dark but beer, ah, beer would put hair on your chest something I couldn’t see much use for at the time. It was 1948. It was still a sin to waste food. And having watched Grandma wrapping Christmas presents — flour and sugar and dried beans — for our relatives “in the old country” the guilt hit home. I licked my platter clean.
Years later I found my own way to encourage my kids to eat. I transformed their plates into theaters of the absurd — where peas, carrots, hamburgers could strut their hour upon the stage disguised as parents, children, household pets. When one of my daughters dropped a fork and refused to eat — I’d raise the curtain and whet her appetite: “Janet! See that stringbean? It’s little Tom Dacre. You’ve already eaten his mom and baby brother. Today’s Tom’s birthday. His friends are waiting in your stomach — to sing and open presents and eat cake.” Janet’s eyes would grow large. She’d raise her fork, stab Tom’s slender body, tenderly, pop him into her mouth, and smile. Fish, fruit, vegetables got starring or supporting roles as needed to achieve a balanced diet. Down in Janet’s stomach the mood was festive as Grandpa Joe, Aunt Lil or Cousin Spike came splashing down her gullet to join their relatives as if they were riding the Manteca Waterslide.
Still later when Dad lay dying I sat by his hospital bed and tried to get him to eat the hospital fare; and when that didn’t work, I hid Mom’s pot roast under my coat and snuck it past Reception to his room. It never occurred to me to tell him about the poor starving children in Europe or the nuclear family singing Happy Birthday in his gut, waiting for their cat to reappear.
He had had it with chewing and swallowing; with taking six different kinds of pill; with spills that got him into trouble with the nurses. I tried to be a hunger artist; to whet Dad’s appetite; to coax the mischief back into his eyes. I told jokes. I sang songs. I played the clarinet. I raised his fork to his mouth again and again till there I was standing not by my father’s bed but by a highchair watching a grown child cry. Strained beets. Glucose. The intravenous truth. Eat your food, kid. Or you’ll die.
Electronic Epitaph Hi! Sorry I can’t pick up the phone now.
I’m dead.
If you are shocked and want more details on my struggle with the avenging angel — press 1 now.
If we have had sexual contact in the past ten years and you want to be sure that I really died of cancer — I’d press 2. If I were you.
For pithy deathbed sayings, including a stunning rendition of my death rattle rising nobly over a Windham Hill soundtrack, press 3. Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
You who are calling to collect old debts or initiate new friendships, what can I say? I’m dead.
Or if you’re that telemarketer who keeps leaving cheerful messages regarding what you call my “portfolio” — maggots are up ten points, pal, I’m dead.
Most alluring of my long-lost college sweethearts I knew you’d phone me by and by to say hi and whisper directions to your bed. I’m sure you’re still a knockout. Sorry I missed your call. No, I can’t join you for a drink tonight, I’m dead.
Teacher who assured me my poetry was nought and urged me to write a book on Piers The Plowman, the “C” version, that is, though “B” needed me too, as did “A.” Lauda, Laude, I’m dead.
Like Dante, dead; like Villon, Rabelais, dead; like Chaucer, Shakespeare, Joe G. Schmo, and poor Wally Stevens, the insurance man and Emperor of Ice Cream, dead.
For a brief biography, press 4 … to hear me read my poems, press 5 … to find out what the eternal silence is like, press 6 …
7 … 8 … 9 … for the images they said would flash before my mind in the final moments, they were right, they did … though why one’s history should be burnt into the brain even as memory fails is an intriguing parting question.
And you whom I have injured … you who are impatient to join me … you who like hapless Stevie Wonders have called too late to say “I love you” and wish you could return to the original menu please press the star sign, now.
all from COUNTERPOINT, © Copyright, David Alpaugh
The Man Who Loves Better Homes and Gardens is puttering, evenings, weekends, inspecting his gutters, plucking out loquats, acorns, eucalyptus leaves, so the still far-off November rain can leave his roof quickly, with elegance. He hales forth bindweed from the chinks between sidewalk slabs, starthistle from the caulking around the pool where gangster grasses shoot their way to glory. Sometimes during high wind a shingle breaks loose in the night and clatters onto the patio. Could he see in the dark he’d leap out of bed, climb his aluminum ladder and wedge the cedar shield back in place—before the roof rats got wind of it. He lies there waiting for dawn.
Like model before mirror, he cannot sit on his deck Sundays without discovering fresh enemies to Beauty. There’s a gopher hill beside the spa, sprung-up overnight like a mushroom; and on the lawn a real mushroom he’d swear wasn’t there last evening. The forces of darkness have flung a beer bottle over the fence. It’s lying among his roses, crying, “This Bud’s for You!” A shrike has eaten a finch or sparrow and left beak, legs, feathers dangling from a twig on his ornamental pear. His right hand flashes forth in love and anger—drops bird in trash can, bottle in compactor. What a war!
from Coracle, © Copyright, David Alpaugh
Statement Today I am throwing old checks away That lay in a shoebox five years, fearing audit. They’re free—free, at last, to burn or decay.
Money still talks, but her ghouls simply say, “Something was sold at a price and you bought it.” Today I am throwing old checks away.
Each bears its signature; year, month & day; And pays to the order of Mammon: due profit. They’re free—free, at last, to burn or decay.
Here’s one for Sears; here’s one for ballet; Airfare to Rome; a homeless benefit. Today I am throwing old checks away,
Saying “Ciao!” to old wolves they kept at bay While they tended our credit and fed it bit by bit. They’re free—free, at last, to burn or decay.
I crumple the papered past. I murmur, “Hurray.” It’s my shredder now must reconcile chit, chit, chit. Today I am throwing old checks away. They’re free—free, at last, to burn or decay.
from The Formalist, © Copyright, David Alpaugh
All Rights Reserved. Printed By Permission.