OLWG# 357- Great Uncle Ned’s Theatre

Written for OLWG# 357

###

My family moved to New Mexico shortly after the territory became a state in 1912 and set up as hill farmers outside Santa Fe. It mostly was subsistence living in those days. It was not an easy life, but the land was generous, life was good. Leastwise, my Grandpa always told me that. The farm isn’t ours any more. It wound up being absorbed by a big corporate ranch, and is now just a part of Rancho del Ancianas.

My people moved to town. Some of them became shopkeepers. Some went into government; Santa Fe is the state capital. Others became hoteliers, saloon keepers, rapscallions, and petty criminals. Town people, for the most part, not country folk.

In 1915, my great uncle Ned built and opened the first theatre in the pueblo. A large adobe building that he named after himself, Sublette Theatre. Uncle Ned’s theatre was grand; the only real competition in the state was The Lyric in Lincoln County. Shows at both places consisted primarily as variety shows. Separate, unrelated acts grouped on a single playbill. The likes of popular and classical musicians, singers, dancers, comedians, trained animals, magicians, ventriloquists, strongmen, female and male impersonators, acrobats, clowns, jugglers, one-act plays or scenes from plays, athletes, lecturing celebrities, minstrels, and films. Throughout the duration of Uncle Ned owning and operating The Sublette Theatre, the most popular shows were the scandalous shows. Shows that featured dirty jokes and provocative women dancing on stage. Such shows always brought out protests from the Christian Temperance and Morality Movements.

Uncle Ned welcomed the demonstrations and protests; he saw them as free publicity, and he made a lot of money.

He sold the theatre in 1945 to a man who was, frankly, in over his head – who didn’t know how to run it. That was when the old place began its decline. The city owns it now. They keep the building in good condition, but don’t really know what to do with it.

About ten years ago, the city of Santa Fe advertised a free poetry reading at the theatre. I gathered some of my best work and headed down, expecting an open mike experience. At the front door, I was handed a book by Thomas Chatterton, and asked to sit by the stage. The theatre filled quite rapidly, and I was getting excited.

When Mayor Vance Camaron walked onto the stage, the house lights dimmed, and a hush fell over the crowd. The mayor spread his arms wide, “Welcome to the first annual Santa Fe Poetry Reading. Without further ado, I believe it is time to begin.” 

I was a little confused until I heard the soft rustle of pages turning. At that moment, I realised that, although this was technically a poetry reading, it was not quite what I had envisioned. Everyone was sitting in their seats reading the books they had been issued at the door. 

Chatterton was a joy, although the language was a bit dated. He had passed in 1770 at the age of seventeen.

The first annual Santa Fe Poetry Reading, turned out to also be the last.

#####

This week’s prompts were:

1. listen to the pages turning
2. at the Sublette Theatre in Santa Fe
3. Hill Farmers

OLWG# 356- Assessors of Maat

Written for OLWG# 356

###

The forty-two Assessors of Maat sent lightning to tear the night sky that flowed above the river.

This was done to frighten the farmers, and the merchants who lived along its banks, and to fill all their hearts with sadness

It didn’t work

Perhaps, the stars were not aligned properly

Maybe, Bernice had neglected to secure the storeroom of Mangas Coloradas, the wealthiest trader along the river

Bernice was a sealer, a responsible position within the bureaucracy

As there were no locks, or keys; seals were used to safeguard the property of the wealthy

Bernice was one of the most important sealers in the country, but perhaps Mangas Coloradas had been robbed, and anything the Assessors might have done would not have been noticed on account of the robbery

The farmers continued their festivities

The merchants barely noticed, they continued to drink

#####

This week’s prompts were:

1. fill your heart with sadness
2. lightning rent the night sky
3. tell me what laughter means

OLWG# 355- Drift Pins

Written for OLWG# 355

###

It had been twenty-five years since Ruby’s fiancée, Asher, told her he had landed a new job at the shipyard. She took him out to dinner at the Oso Grill to celebrate. Asher liked the Green Chili Chicken Enchiladas. They came with mounds of jack cheese, guacamole, and sour cream.

Ruby, for her part, could live on the appetizers. “Tonight,” she announced, “I’m having the Jalapeno bacon-wrapped Shrimp and the fried Green Chili Strips. They had a fine selection of wines that she liked, and Asher always enjoyed a dark, robust beer. Oso carried “State Pen Porter” from Santa Fe Brewing Co.

Ruby got all dolled up. Asher put on a clean shirt with a collar, shaved and slicked his hair down, which, if truth be told, is about as dressed up as he ever got, but now, with a new job at the shipyard, he had boats to build. Submarines, to be exact.

Turns out that the job wasn’t quite what had been advertised. As promised, Asher took a position in the ship fitter’s shop but was assigned to work with the Drift Pin Quality Assurance Team. He knew, up-front, that it would probably be years before he would get to do any welding, but the experience was what counted, and it would look good on his résumé.

Asher grew old at the shipyard, and in twenty-five years, he worked his way up to Drift Pin Quality Assurance Shop Superintendent and never did get to do any welding. He got a gold watch when he retired. He and Ruby moved to Titusville, Florida. It was closer to their daughter, Anne and her wife in Kissimmee. It was also closer to Davy, in Alafaya. The whole retirement thing came as a shock to Ruby. She had not prepared to be spending so much time with Asher. They are working through it, though. They have signed up for pottery classes together at the Senior Centre.

#####

This week’s prompts were:

1. not really something to hang on the wall
2. boats to build
3. he’s grown old

Zozo 29.02.24- Writing With Words We Don’t Know

Written yesterday, Thursday, in 20 minutes, with the Carrizozo group.

###

Me and Martha was talking about cars last night while she was fixin’ dinner. She opened the conversation by saying, “I really like them fancy new Antialiasing cars she said. You know like the one Beth and her no-good husband, Denny, bought. I wouldn’t want it in silver though, I think it’d be better in green.” She dumped a can of corn into the saucepan.

“Are they real ‘spensive?” I asked.

“They sure are,” she answered. “Beth told me they paid more than $75,000 for theirs and they bought it used!”

“Damnit, Martha, that’s incomeimpossible. If we gonna get a new vehicle we need to think about a truck, or sumpthin’ like a truck that’s incompossible. I ain’t like that kinchy, Denny. I weren’t born with no silver spoon. I don’t got no fancy job.”

I glanced out the kitchen window to see a silver Antialias parking at the curb, blocking our driveway, in front of our house. “Speak of the devils,” I said, “there’s them scamblers now.” I glanced at the clock on the back of the stove, “just in time for dinner. You better water down that soup, add some more tomato’s, or sumptin, and be stingy with the meat when you dish up bowls for them.

I frowned
got up from my chair,
hobbled to the front door and opened it.
I waved to Denny and Beth,
“Evening folks,” I said,
“We’s just fixin’ to sit down to dinner. Come on in, It’s only soup, but we got plenty.”
“Think you might be able to back up your car so it’s not blocking the drive?
The cops have been swarming the neighbourhood and clamping down on parking violations.”

##

The prompts were single words that only one of us knew the meaning of:

1. incompossible (Karla’s word)
2. antialiasing (Steve’s word)
3. kinchy (Jean’s word)
4. scambler (my word)

OLWG# 354- Head-Turner

Written for OLWG# 354

###

I was standing in the wind out front of The QuickLink Store, waiting for someone who looked old enough to buy us some beer. Madison was sitting in the car listening to the radio.

I had been standing there for about twenty minutes with no luck. Slowly, I picked up the sound of a powerful engine coming in from the East and watched as a 1964 convertible Chrysler 300 Series slowed and wheeled into the lot of the QuickLink.

It was a luxury automobile, russet coloured, low to the ground, sporting a long hood and a ton of shined chrome. The top was down, and I could hear the powerful sound system rumbling jazz, low and throaty, competing in volume with the big V8.

When the engine shut down, so did the sound system and the resulting silence left only the chirping of crickets in the night air and the slow ticking of the big engine cooling down.

The driver’s door opened slowly, and a long, thin, well-turned leg carried four-inch heels to the car park pavement.

My eye followed the long leg upwards and found it led up to a tall, thin woman wearing a short dark skirt that looked good from the back and a tight green camisole. She had a scarf, the same hue as the camisole, tied over her dark hair. Her eyes hid behind black oversized thick-frame bug-eye sunglasses. She was a real head-turner.

I struggled for words, “Excuse me, ma’am,” I stuttered, and she stopped to listen, “My girlfriend and I…” I pointed to Madison, waiting in my car at the end of the lot. “We wondered if you could buy us some beer.” I paused as she turned her head towards Madison. “We have money, but we left our IDs at home.”

I smiled and then fumbled in my pocket for some cash. I pulled out a wad of crumpled bills, three tens and a twenty, which I held out.

“This will buy a lot of beer,” she said as she reached out and took the cash. “How much beer do you want? Are you sure you just forgot your ID?” When she came back, she handed me two six-packs of Kostritzer Schwarzbier. She offered no change back. “I think you’ll like this,” she asserted, “It’s the only beer I drink anymore.”

I reached out to take the proffered drink; she leaned in closer and gave me a peck on the cheek. Even though the kiss was chaste, I felt a bit of desire colour my cheeks, “Thanks,” I said.

“You’re welcome,” she sang out, “I gotta go,” then turned to climb behind the wheel of her car. It rumbled to life, and she backed slowly out of the spot and left.

From our hideaway on Scenic Drive, me and Madison discovered that the beer poured dark brown. It smelled evocative and tasted clean, finishing with a touch of bitterness.

#####

This week’s prompts were:

1. Madison
2. I gotta go
3. a twenty and three tens

OLWG# 353- News, Sports, and Weather

Written for OLWG# 352

###

Arthur Clement screwed the top off the cold bottle of Triple Reign Lager that he clutched in his hand. He turned on the TV and heard…

Coming up next: Late Breaking NEWS at 10.

There was the Channel 7 jingle:

“Welcome to News at 10 with Ange Salmon covering sports, Slaine Lopes – weather and me, Johnnie Wescott, with late breaking news.

“Police responded this evening to the 3000 block of North Lynam Boulevard, investigating a report of an injured owl along the side of the road. Responding officer, Dick Tidey, found nothing but a large mushroom. Over to you Slaine…”

“Thanks Johnnie, let’s take a look at the local weather map. A fair weather front is expected to slide in from the west early in the morning and continuing until around noonish. With, maybe, some snow sometime next week; more at 11. Over to you Ange…”

“Tonight on the gridiron, Frozen Lake Tech hosted the East Bridge Badgers for their homecoming game. The Badgers ran away with it, humiliating Frozen Lake, by handing them a fifty-four point loss ending when the game wound up being called by officials invoking the mercy rule.”

Arthur’s beer slid from his hand and landed on the plush orange shag carpet, “Holy shit, Blanche,” he called out, “Lake just got their asses handed to them by the Badgers. You gotta call your sister and laugh at her.”

#####

This week’s prompts were:

1. fair warning
2. fair dinkum
3. fair enough
4. fair and square
5. county fair

I couldn’t choose one of these many fine prompts, so I used “fair weather” instead.

Say Something Dirty in Spanish

caballo
grande, blanco
correr, deslizarse, caer
en aguanieve de caoba
corcel

OLWG# 352- Aphrodite

Written for OLWG# 352

###

Her name was Venerem, Latin for ΑΦΡΟΔΙΤΗ. Daughter of Ouranos, the Sky. The goddess of love and desire.
Worshiped by poets, prostitutes, warriors and sailors alike
Beautiful all day
Alluring and tempting in the eve, when she chose her lovers
Truly desirable, in the full sense of the word
and yet…
by morn…
her hair juts wildly from her head. A shock…
her breath whispers, “dragon sulphur” and “egg farts”

As does mine – perhaps we are all goddesses

#####

This week’s prompts were:

1. the bonds of Aphrodite
2. Mama named me after her favourite horse
3. stuff that just works

Missing State Writers- February 2024

Written in a short time, with some friends in Capitan

---

---

Echoes of the poets
Sometimes, it’s Wordsworth, Wilde, Neruda, or Rich
More often, though, Kerouac and Ginsburg
I hear the sometimes dulcet reverberations bouncing, corner to corner, off the walls of my room
Right before sleep overcomes
Waves – provocative ideas washing my consciousness
penned  and spoken sometimes,
to soothe
to piss me off
to make me think
to make me forget
to embrace my life
or your life…
your life and my life could become “our life”

Something to Consider

---

The prompts were:

There were no prompts. The assignment was simple, “Poetry”

Zozo 08.02.24- Untitled

Written yesterday, Thursday, in 20 minutes, with the Carrizozo group.

###

I took her to our favourite pub along the river, The Goat and Vasectomy. I had hoped for a romantic meal and a few rounds of darts, I was planning to propose. But she ruined it. She chose that day to tell me that it just wasn’t working for her any longer. That she wanted us both to start seeing other people. That it wasn’t me, it was her.

She broke up with me.

I kinda lost it. Right there in the lounge room of Gavin’s place. I smashed the piano, and she ran out of the pub… down the road in the direction of the river. I let her go.

Gavin and some of the others finally got me calmed down, but not before the piano was firewood. Myra, the barmaid kept pulling me beers, because she knew that as long as I was drinking, I wouldn’t be breaking anymore shit. It was a long afternoon and I don’t remember much of it…

After breaking the piano, that is.

I regained my senses after about two and a half days. Least, that’s what Gavin and Myra told me. That whole time, they took shifts. They kept me confined in the cellar and plied me with beers and shepherds pie.

She’s gone now

Haven’t seen her since and hope that I never do. I wanted to hold her head under water. I wanted to bury her alive. I wanted to revive the use of guillotines.

I am much better now, though.

I’m thinking about inviting Myra down to London. Gavin says that if I do, he’ll hold my head under water.

He says he’d never find anyone who could replace her.

He says he’d hate to have to kill me and that he hopes I won’t put him in that position.

##

The prompts were:

1. a long afternoon
2. broken hearts will linger
3. the piano is firewood