“Broken Bed, 1977”

  

c. 2026 Rod Ice

All rights reserved

(1-26)

 

Out of bed, nearly one o’clock

On a morrow blustery and chilled, no thaw in sight

This is the way

That doors swing on their hinges

Embracing creative binges

That tax my reserve

A snippet, sampled

Of what it means to be seen and heard

I used to look forward, longing for such an escape

When sitting in that plain, ranch house

About three miles out

From the city’s edge

Unknown, unloved

Unaware of what awaited

An adventure written in ink

A cough of circumstance, over the kitchen sink

Nursing a bottle of Wild Irish Rose

Things began to appear from the ether

When this trick was employed

I was an oddball schoolboy

Shunned by popular friends

Quill in hand

Jotting down notes, like formations in marching band

I kept a bound book on the typewriter table

A sheaf of short takes

Scribbled, when I was able to write

Trading lost hours, overnight

In exchange for a warm glow of patronage

A salutation to sorcery, of a kind

Delving into crevices of the subconscious mind

The homestead was quiet

But not in that corner room

Not while I sat by the light repurposed from an aquarium hood

And channeled words, unspoken

Silent at their inception

Yet vocally amplified

With the majestic tone of an eagle’s cry

Careful and quick

Mother and father must have wondered

What reason I had

For breaking bad

Sister in her comfort zone

Brother in the basement, nodding off

A radio under his pillow

Its tiny, tinny speaker loosing the flow

Of a broadcast bruiser

That moment passed with the intensity of a seasonal gale

Lingering just long enough

To remind me of morning, and a rote routine

Back to the classroom, in my bell-bottom blue jeans

Legs akimbo, in a back row spot

Pencils flipped from end to end, and back

The lesson plan made me laugh

A messy moral, yielded from a mimeograph

Intended to inspire

When all I wanted, all I needed

Was to be awake when the day reached its daring denouement

When the vacuum of a vacant eve

Gave me what I was eager to receive

A restless ride, with eyebrows raised

A run toward the shadows

A preamble in the margin

Noted and knotted

Dutifully ink-blotted

Before finally surrendering to the fade of fatigue

Torn-out pages across my knees

Pens on the rug

A trace of cheap wine left in my coffee mug

A telltale sign of magic, deployed

Standing wobbling, stiff and slow

Back to the broken bed I go