Chalk Answers

Chalk washes away with the rain.

One would hope that tears could erase the past so easily.

Fingertip to palm base pressed against the spine of an amazing woman. A thumbprint on a power source so valuable to your own heart that it seems a shame to even risk the ticket. There is no flight plan.

I’m a doorway that I have to coax myself through, a living threshold. The duality of the person I want to be and the person I’m afraid of becoming straddle the present to make me see double.

As sure as language is wind and our throats are instruments, some are left staggering and unremembered in the haze of today. If misery were fire, people I know would be burning, going up like the torches they’re carrying.

I’m no expert on how to manufacture nights. I’m a horrible counterfeiter. Radar sings within me, pinging the old growth. The days are dreams.

There are times in the garden when a person has to choose between the ring of truth or last night’s leftovers, between betting it all on black or laughing at the penny slots. The balance beam offers no answers, only a way forward.

Consequence is a sneaky little villain with cold, patient hands. If I had a dinner table, he wouldn’t be welcome there any more. I’m a kite-flying cartographer looking for a lightning storm.

These are waves crashing.



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Three Dog Barbers

The dogs charge money for haircuts. This is the dog barber shop.

You pay in dollar bills and the money has pictures of bones in the corners and famous dog presidents in the middle. Labrador Lincolns and Wiener-dog Washingtons. Husky Hamiltons and Great Dane Grants. The economy is based on bones. There is a Fort Knox buried underground in the middle of the country filled with rooms and rooms of neatly stacked femurs.

The chairs in the barber shop are highly adjustable for the variety of customers. They can be lengthened for the daschund’s sausage bodies, shortened for the Pekinese, and widened to accommodate the bulk of the Mastiffs.

The first barber is a Doberman. He still has a thick German accent from his time back in the fatherland. He is a lonely dog. His doghouse is clean and sparse. The small talk he shares with his customers is the only social interaction he has. He desperately wants more friends but has not idea how to make that happen.

His haircuts are precise and pleasing. His name is Raus.

There are two other dogs in the barber shop:

One is a slobbering red-eyed Saint Bernard. The fact that he has a problem with the drink is obvious. He’s always been a talented barber but his paws are developing tremors from his addiction, even when he’s not in detox. He’s on the way out. His name is Olaf. He has an easy smile and a loving nature.

He is the peacekeeper in the shop.

The other dog is an aristocratic and energetic terrier. He’s dark black and well-styled. His name is Angus. He is the most expensive. He has a degree from a grooming school. His haircuts take a while but they’re worth it. He sees this place as a fall from grace. The other two dogs tolerate his presence for the occasional high-paying clients he brings in and Angus stays because he’s afraid of the real world.

He’s bitter.

Between the three of them, they cover the needs of their regular clientele. They’ve been here at this shop for ten years now, maintaining a tenuous professional friendship.

It’s springtime outside the front window now, the shedding season, and the three dog barbers are looking forward to clients.


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