A few months ago I attempted to write a long form narrative poem about a security guard at a massive parking lot faced with difficult and consuming events. My attention span is unusually short, so I struggle with narrative, but I thought it was time to give it a try. While I don’t consider this poem completely successful, I do believe it has some very decent moments. I’ve included it here for your viewing pleasure, since I have no plans to publish it elsewhere.

In Florida, large parking lots are abundant. The more elaborate parking lots that surround malls and theme parks are usually accompanied by very organized French-inspired gardens and rows and rows of lights that never go out. Occasionally, I would spend time in these parking lots at night and so this poem was particularly inspired by those visits. Pinpointing my inspiration is usually a fool’s errand, so, in accompaniment with its narrative form, this piece is unique.

The Parking Lot

Down the third corridor of cars
past the pothole by the inlayed lawn

And then another right depending
on the route and inclination
to the south west adjunct office
where the bolt
is locked and left ajar The primary
shift has been open for the months
I have worked here

there have been no break ins
I have worked here
for as many months as I can recall
and there have been no break ins
because I am an officer of the lot
without arms or station
and as far as I know there have been
no break ins under the passing
doppler waves of distant motor ways

and when my electric cart is done
I am delivered to this outpost
with a hole in the desk for a computer cable
an electric kettle that offsets energy costs
with a board of indeterminate keys
and sheets of mockery
signed each night and perhaps checked
by the man who calls some nights

he calls now
         Henry
which he believes is my name
         I need you to check on the southern adjunct
         before you check out
a time he thinks is soon
before I go there are hours
that playback as minutes
with no change in light

I’ve looked at the stars
and I can’t tell where they’ve gone
since the last I looked
Odhran’s belt is heavy with a sword
and one of these gourds is a bear
I look at the cars and count Acuras
or somedays Suburbans and I see
that they have realigned since yesterday
because some person came back
from a late lunch if they have those here

for my shift, I should explain, the cars
hold their patterns and I see no walking
persons or moving vehicles
and if this is simplified than I am not honest
For my shift, there is a printed check left
in a white envelope under the telephone
and condensed tea from the afternoon
suspending the hot metal branch
in the white plastic carafe

When I turn it on I hear ice cubes
on a hot coil after the foods done
and curiosity wins

I keep a paper cup with wax
lining on its second day
I think I’m best on my own
because I cannot serve a customer
without an obscene feeling
and I cannot serve the obscenity
of conversation, excuse me

much as you’d expect I fill the time
by walking with a flashlight and seeing
the inside of cars filled with papers
and wrappers and strung up CD cases

         I have taken a car I am at a vacuum
         I push apart the leather cleavage
         And thrust in the suckling-worn-
black plastic head to pick up the crumbs
maybe this isn’t so bad after all
and I look in the back seat at a broken toddler’s chair
It has an indifferent pattern, I suspect I am a journalist

so I take time to notice the wheezing bugs
and take notice of a headlight in the landscape
that unwillingly excites my face lifts up
I am aware he is not coming down this section
It is too far to make out his face, but it is a sedan
nonidyllic wheel wells, my full moon, my half moon
how tired I’ve gotten
I head back

And now I drink my tea that is warm enough for two full drinks
and I sleep in my chair
by pressing my long torso against the half back of the rolling chair
by letting my head settle on the wall
by wedging my legs into the top corner of the desk
and closing the door

         when you prepare for takeoff
         sacrificing your neck for sleep
         and the hope that the hours will pass
         and wake up for a weather report
         today we are headed away from home
         where we go it is balmy and still
and there is a sudden urgency to the swelling bugs
         when you wake up you are in the air
         until you see an open window and a horizon
         makes your consciousness seem wasted

my dream is unmemorable, but I fear that
placidity may become permanent
I know that I would let it now
because I have no guilt about unmemorable dreams
and my right arm is asleep so I touch my ear
pull it down and touch my top lip
         it seems like it can feel
         unadapted and rudimentary
         a brush with a thick body
         that has never dried

so the phone rings again
I pick up
         Henry
         were did I have- I’ll call you back
and I hope that he does
I want to bury my head under those bushes
I want to stick my hands in the cold dirt and learn to eat it
Until I am a water tick sucking on all the grit
and grinning with pinned mandibles and only pupils
under those square bushes- I look out again
there is a line of smoke
to the east of here big cello rub

fade in
Water Tick is quiet
he calls the office, the phone rings
and his head is in a camera
cut to Water Tick’s pistons
and cut to the electric cart
and cut to Water Tick’s ride
two white car. a silver car. a bright red car
each of these cars carries a person
         I don’t think I’ll be able to do it again
         the chicken is a carcass
         they fed it eggs and dried out corn
         this little chicken with chalky bones
         I eat the bones and the sick meat
and each of these cars carries a limb

it’s away from the building
but close to the southern adjunct
and all the cars are still
they must be cold inside
this big cow has a hole in it’s roof
black metal windows four feet back
from where the other cars sit
out of line

the southern adjunct is empty
the phone is ringing
         Why didn’t you pick up.
         Is there a fire?
This is Water Tick. I came here from the west.
         Where’s the fire?
         Can you check on it?
I came here from the west.
         Alright.

the seats are gone
it must be hot right now
none of the cars speak
there is an elk on that island
and he will not break eye contact
back in the cart and back to the west

the exterior parking lot night
Water Tick is traveling without a door
to the shack, the lights are out
someone’s cracked each car’s windows
safety glass held in place canyons in the solid
every car is loud right now Water Tick goes in his adjunct
The light bulb has been removed
the phone will no longer dial, the dial tone
is gone and replaced by a busy tone
it can not be hung up the pulsing
hits the exact harmonic frequency of Water Tick
causing him to vibrate uncontrollably
he sits under the desk
his heels bounce on the tiled floor
         his sneakers are black and white
         they seem to be made for walking

Water Tick looks up through the hole where the computer cords
would go and there will sometimes be a moon
but not tonight and Water Tick is glad
the moon is not an obstacle

every window cracked and slowly spreading
from the south west adjunct in a crackling circle
making obscure the windows
and a little story came to mind
from a wax covered letter
from a postcard that never got mailed

         I was in my hands when the Lord came to me in Spirit 27
         I was filled with bones, pleased to select my place.

         He walked in my direction and looked at the surface I stood on.
         How dry.

         He said, Son of man, can these bones come to live?
         I said, You answered what I know.

         He said, They say these bones are more than dry.
         Only Tar Bones can hear the word of the Lord.

         Alright, God and Lord grabbed Tar Bones: Behold!
         We brought spirits to keep you looking up.

         I was in his body, and grew in his skin
         I was tendons in a skeletal mind. It is my Lord,

         I was told I predicted the flow of sound
         together with the Tar Bones running past all crossroads.

         I have them now covering my skin, they are new organs
         pumping contents into my mental health.

         He breathed horror prophecy and son of man.
         I predicted four winds and came to life again.

         Maybe just smoking would turn it alive
         Maybe I learned my breath in these sessions.

         I say: Open your graves! Please.
         Lord God say: I am the tomb people know.

         I can live my mind for you, I can spread this country thin
         That is it, I am my Lord. I promised and I do it.

         In this envelope Mr. Joseph Wood set
         The Lord God’s manuscript.

         I have mountains and have given country for concrete.
         I must be a prince and split my women into men.

         I must march and Jacob must march
         Jacob the transposer living forever

         I broke a promise of peace and lived inside
         every killer with complete compassion

         My people the dirt sifting to the sheet rock
         My sanctuary be in Tar Bones

         These are Tar Bones alive
         My people are in the data.

when he awoke
his thumb was cut open in a smooth line
that crossed this tile and spread apart
the phone was growing into the wall
the spreading glass broke in exponents

still sounds like locusts taking wing
the deadbolt is unscrewed and dismantled on the desk, the kettle is gone
my cup is overfilled
my shift is over
it is still night