blanket.

“Last call my good man.” 

The words come from an unidentifiable creature. A towel in his hands. A voice worn and soft from age and too much second hand smoke. He was Santa Claus without the beard and a belly full of jelly. 

“So much for ‘everyone knows your name’.” I was surprised at the drawl and slur of my words as they gurgled out of my mouth.

     

A warm distilled blanket closed over me somewhere during the now unknown number of drinks and trips to the restroom. I had succumb. I came here with a purpose. The voices kept choiring in my head, the thoughts kept stomping around my brain, and responsibilities kept reminding me of living. 

I needed more to drink.

     

Santa waved me away as gravity spun me like a top on the spinning barstool. Weakly and foolishly I grabbed the bar and raised my three ton body; my feet seemed to dangle five miles above the ground before making contact. There were more faces in the room. All snug in a distilled stooper with visions of sugar plum fairies dancing in front of their eyes.

     

I wasn’t sure where all this Christmas imagery was coming from, it was mid July and this would be the last place I’d see a

reindeer. Yet, I swore I could hear sleigh bells somewhere.

     

Yes, I think I had drunk myself stupid. So now the question would be; how stupid was I? All I have is memories and nothing else. Memories and anger, no more; memories, anger, and loneliness, that’s all; memories, anger, and loneliness, and revenge, that’s it; memories, anger, loneliness, revenge, and regret, maybe; memories, anger, loneliness, revenge, regret, and sympathy, nothing more. 

I wasn’t stupid enough.

     

“Right nooooww it all seeeeems to beeee arguing inside meeee!” I managed to sing it in tune as I fumbled to the door. My warm womb-like blanket had turned cold and my stomach felt as if a birthing canal had ruptured opened. Knocking over a chair, maybe two; stumbling over a table or maybe someone at the table, I threw myself at the door, feeling the atmosphere surround me and the cold pavement come to me. Soon followed by everything else in acidic pools of yellow and green, black and red with Lord knows what else had been trapped within me. My mouth was an exorcism of carnal overindulgence.

I followed the walls of the buildings; I needed the support as I left digestive what-nots along the way. It made a perfect trail to wherever this body landed. I wasn’t even sure I was going the right way. After what was probably the one hundredth fall, I gave up. The point of getting up had escaped me and the ground was so much more comforting. Solid, cold, stable, it was simple joy as more convulsions followed and the soul was now purging itself through my nose.

josephmcabral

dead letters for living people

beginning

She laid there. 
A warrior with a thick candy coated shell.
She was more than just depraved and starved; 
he was nothing to himself; yet, 
unwilling choices brought them together.
She smiled in a passive pleasure at the blood trickling off her flesh. 
She was no one when they met, yet he wanted to be her, 
touch her, 
her perfume swelled in the air. 

He looked at her, he saw himself; she knew who he was.
She allowed him to use her and yet refused him this desire. 
The sweat spilling over his body, dripping down his back, 
her flesh taunting in a perfect way that demeaned him of his own vanishing manhood;
crawling onto her, 
inhaling her, 
how he wanted to consume her and all that she meant to him.

There was the smile, 
emanating like a beacon from he knew not where. 
He grabbed at her throat; the girl could see heaven in his eyes. 
Whatever was left of her innocence was bubbling to the surface. 
After all these years, she now knew where she was going. Her release was with this
prosthetic-angel that had lost its way from heaven but could guide her home.
The man moved deeper, 
holding her tighter, he could smell her aura upon him, 
her unwashed hair, and the bruises. 
Broken pieces of her were sticking to him 
like so much garbage that it began to disgust him. 
If the eyes are the windows to the soul, he could see himself in her reflection.

So much of him was in her, and vise versa, that it made him scream out, 
she never made a sound and simply invited him in.
The control broken, 
the illusion reversed, he fell on her, exhausted, 
defeated, beaten, he let go his hold on her.
The man began to shed his own tears, the saline washing lines on her body.
His stomach wrenched, his heart, sore and darkened.
This man-child lay upon his eternal mother of us all. He lifted himself off of her,
a trail of snot, spit and tears following him from the pooled reservoir on her flesh.
Her eyes went blank,
he could see it, and they turned cold at the realization of his own inadequacies;
her face undid his own frailties.
The man knew, but was not capable of achieving
that which she had inaugurated him to do.
Her truths closed in and shadowed the light that was in her.

He moved onto the floor, lying atop the coldness of the room;
hearing the voices around him and below him,
all life contained within this building and taken away on the outside.
He lay naked upon the grime and dirt of worn souls and past lives;
he could hear her breathing and feel her heart beat in his skull.
He saw her move in the darkness of the room, the only light filtered in from the street.
The man realized her salvation was close,
the door within reach and he failed to show her the way.
He saw it shine in the dirty light.
Unbeknownst to him she had a piece of someone else’s love,
meant to protect her, and with that love, she opened her own door
and entered with a smile.
Her thoughts splattered on the wall
read by everyone who could decipher the language.
In with a bang and the building fell silent.

josephmcabral

dead letters for living people

sequitur

I paint.

Because I have to.

I go to work.

Because I have to.

I brush my teeth.

Because I have to.

Not always do I feel like brushing my teeth.

Not always do I feel like going to work.

Not always do I feel like painting.

But I have to.

I create.

Moments of time encased in pigments, ink, canvas, and or paper.

These are things never before seen

And never will they be seen after they are gone.

Yes, they are similar to many seen before,

Similarities in style and technique,

But none like this.

Because this is me.

I write.

Inspired scenes of the life that passes around us.

I see that life, as an artist, in composition and value.

Hours spent in front of vases and nudes in an attempt to capture that which is most ephemeral has given me the ability to watch a crowd move like the ocean, to examine the tiny gestures people act and the play of light on a decayed surface.

The words come, descriptive, symbolic, wholly nonsensical,

And I write.

Because I have to.

I work.

Odd jobs like most of you have and will,

I have work with the mentally ill.

Both adults and children.

The kind of people that hear the voice of George W. Bush telling them that the funny taste in their mouth is the blood of Jesus. 

The kind of people who ask if the trees will eat us today, with a look so sincere, that you have to wonder, has this person seen a tree devour someone? 

The kind of people who have Superman and Aquaman as best friends, and they themselves are members of their own personal Justice League.

The kind of people who hear screams of such horror and contemplation, day in and day out, that they have no choice but to scream back at those voices, just to block out what is being said.

I see myself in these people.

I don’t question what they see or hear.

I graciously take the bouquet of flowers picked by the fifty seven year old woman who spent the afternoon with Katherine Hepburn.

I may even comment on how lovely the daffodils are this season.

And I cautiously take the Ray-Gun that was given to the thirty six year old man by the unnamed government agent or the fusion bomb built by the forty two year old man out of toilet paper rolls, Kleenex boxes and snack wrappers.

I promise to put these things in a safe place where they will be returned to their rightful owners upon being discharged from the facility.

They believe me because I believe them.

After eight, sixteen, thirty two, forty eight, one hundred twenty hours,

My people leave me ragged and skinless.

I draw.

The lines are nothing more than road maps and guides out of a place that can be both brilliant and dark.

I write.

Their voices, and experiences, memories and fantasies mix with my own and I learn who and how it is to be human.

I paint.

Because I have to.

Seeing the world through the eyes of an artist

Means to see the world as sacred.

It all speaks to you in the hope that you will tell its story,

Because Artists are the myth makers,

When asked, what in the world is a Snohzberry, a wise man responded,

We are the music makers

And we are the dreamers of dreams.

josephmcabral.com

dead letters for living people

its all in the packaging…

The front door creaks

its wooden frame

against the weight

of compulsions that spill past the threshold.

Goat trails cut from cartons of mental attachments

masking shopping bags full

of under priced sale items

impossible to be ignored.

He explained the meticulous detail

that went into organizing the collected artifacts.

She said that sometimes

it was easier to just walk over things

then to find where they belonged.

Larger piles consume smaller piles

and even larger piles flood over

iconographic logos

meant

to represent

the best for us all.

She picks through each attachment 

from dust-strangled figurines to past dated processed foods,

the smell of organic acids fermenting the air.

He tells us how everything has a purpose,

even if he hasn’t found what the purpose may be,

its best to be prepared for anything

this self-destructing world could bring.

Meticulously manicured lawns

hide the abundance of cheaply made goods

sold under brightly lit signs

and well placed advertisements

promising enlightenment in a sale.

Sexual gratification in automated transactions.

He explained how many times

he had gone hungry

to buy the object of affectionate necessity.

The given greater comfort.

He felt power,

he felt good,

it felt right

in buying what he wanted,

when he wanted it.

An unforgiving compulsion feeds a ravenous addiction

A Promised Land mentality has spawned

a population beholden

to a bored apathy over the ignorance of need over want.

Capitulating the fantasy

of a blessed land of milk and honey,

provided by the righteousness of Commerce.

Manifest destiny evolves into vast quantities

of plundered merchandise at below market prices

for self-defeating conveniences

granting us the one last Freedom

to buy what we want.

Hazmat teams enter toxic homes

built on the refuse

of a propagated desire

to be what you purchase.

The Capitalist model feeds on itself by managing the illness in place of curing the sickness.

He can no longer discern the trash

that builds up within.

She has acclimated to breathing in the decay

from isolated corners where animals have gone to die.

The listlessness over material waste that collects in drifts and mounds.

He’s no longer aware

of the scurrying scritch scratch of cockroaches

maneuvering through the atrophy of compostable material.

The fetid air condensates on your skin.

Health inspectors and state authorities

get calls from neighbors who fear

loosing their own property value.

Rescue workers battle down doors searching through rooms
to find survivorswho are unaware of their own catastrophe.
Victims of something they had no idea could happen.

It all crests on a wave of condemnable history

that ends up in dump trunks

headed towards new mountains

of landfills and contaminated wastelands,

Four thousand pounds

of mentally compounded garbage,

excuses fraught with denial,

where packaging gets loosed

and caught on breezes,

on branches,

under fences

and in rivers.

josephmcabral.com

dead letters for living people