Editor 666 has arrived. This bush pilot knows where the poet lives. His cabin ishard to forget, as it is the only free standing structure in several hundred square miles. Wait-A-Bit is about 200 miles away,but there are no free standing structuresin Wait-A-Bit – except Matilda`s double caravanwith dug-out room below… Her former friend drove a smaller trailer into a larger one, pushed insulation between the two walls, doubled up with the screening, cut a hole in the floor to accomodate the foxhole – and voila – the perfect Artic dwelling.. with steel walls…reinforced with angle iron…
My first wife she used to tryto piss me off – clever bitch! I loved her – still do. She figured the only way she could get me to tell the truth was when I was angry. Otherwise… I lied. “True enough,” Astrid insists: “Normallyyou`re a sneaky, duplicitous bastard!” So she`d try to annoy me “Truth is best before breakfast,” she`d say…. See? That`s pretty annoying.
Today EDITOR 666 meets the THE MAD TRAPPED POET OF RAT RIVER.
I can relate to EDITOR666 because you must get ugly with
yourself, with your sentences – with everything in your
life.
I love the street and I love street talk. I love country
talk. I love being in the country. I love to have a cold beer
sitting on a stump.
I LOVE THE `ECONOMY OF PHRASE` SLANG
ENABLES US TO USE!
But do not be deceived. I spent four fucking years
at the University learning how to use this language.
And I`ve spent another ten years learning how
to use street-slang…. I didn`t know that`s what I was doing
at the time – I had joined crack culture, “country of the Now”
But to write well and tell the truth I almost
have to “get my dander up”… this is a phrase the old
folks used….. Get up to face the Virgin Page.
I`m getting older now – a ripe middle age. And I`m
not as patient as I used to be – in fact I`m turning
into a real monster. I don`t let people visit me.
Most people don`t want to, anyway. And that`s just
fine.Works out well.
You see I have to GET IT UP every morning (and
for once I`m not talking about sex). And you know, that
old prick Hemingway (he`s already had more than enough
attention) – but he was right about a lot of things… I like
him best when he talked about writing.
I used to think he was always a bit pretentious about the
boxing matches, the bullfights etc. But I don`t think that way
any more.
Boxing to me is just a metaphor for the fight to face
the page, and derive some truth, squeeze some juice out
of the psyche.
Every morning it`s like climbing a mountain…to mix
metaphors.
I`ve climbed plenty of mountains and, if you`re determined,
the one thing you cannot do is stop
***************************
EDITING
Editor 666 – picks a lame line out of a half-assed poem
and sticks it up on the blackboard.
“SOME WEIRD BEAK AT BEAT IMPLORING”
“Ha! Ha! Ha! What the fuck do you mean by that???
Mad Trap Poet: If I could see the text, I could discuss it.
Ed: You don`t need the text, fruitcake… I`ll put the text
in big letters up above TO EMBARRASS YOU!
MAD POET OF RAT RIVER: He produces a 14 inch
butcher knife which looks more like a Roman short sword
than a knife….He waves the blade in the light from
the Coleman Lamp, so Ed666 can see its razor sharp edge.
“Call me `fruitcake` one more time and I`ll cut your head
off. Right here, right now. I`LL EDIT YOU!
EDITOR666: Ah, you don`t have the balls to cut anybody`s head off. Not you, you`re a “literary type.”
PO: What are you—- you`re a LITTLE editor. (He lisps
as he says this)
EDITOR666: All my life, I`ve worked like a man. You don`t
have the strength to cut off my head — see these .. neck muscles? They`re too tough for you…. You
do not know how hard it is…head cutting.
PO: Oh, but I do. I know exactly how hard it is…. I`ve
done it before AND I LIKE IT….It`s not hard;
it`s easy…. the prick was trying to kill me and
it cheered me right the fuck up lifting his
surly head into the air – by the hair… Hard, nah.
Easy. I liked I felt like a better man after it was
done….. All the women in the club cheered and
and begged to suck my dong…. Did I let them?
What do you think?
(THIS IS CALLED A PISSING CONTEST… AND YES, IT DOES HAVE SOMETHING TO DO WITH EDITING…)
Editor666: No way.. I scan the news for mental oddities
elements of the insane… I`d have seen the
news report…. Did you do it in secret, pansy,
in your own secret closet?
PO: No it was in the news for days….almost 2
years back… Remember a story about…..a head being
chopped off in a public…WHAT ARE YOU, A COP? I`m not not telling you any details….
EDITOR666: “I`m no cop! Your mayor hired me to give you
a hand with your narrative poems and free free
verse…. I hear you`re good but you need help
bad !
PO: What mayor? There`s no town….if you hadn`t noticed…. We`re on Great Bear Lake, asshole!
The only town within 500 miles is PORT RADIUM…
and it`s been a ghost town for twenty years.
That`s what they tell me.
ED6: You never bothered to go.?
PO: Where you from?
ED6: Toronto, New York City, London.
PO: You drop in to Rochester often? You bother to
go there?
ED: Never have, nope.
PO: Well, at least there`s fuckin people in in Rochester.
Port Radium, there no one. And it glows in the dark!
And It`s about the same distance…
ED666: What do you mean, same distance. It`s just
across the lake. I saw it on the map…
RAT: A map? You saw a map did ya? Ha! Ha! Ha!
Yeah, just across the Lake, a paddle of
about 400 miles…
ED666: You`re not kidding are you? No, God help me!
What`s so funny about a map?
PO: No one`s seen a map up here for years…
The map`s not really the problem… even WITH
a map, we don`t know exactly where we are.
We`d better have a drink and Il try and
explain things for you…
Editor666: That first pilot dropped me off
right in the middle of a huge parking lot…
Mad Poet: You mean Wait-A-Bit!
Editor: __________?No. It was just utter
devastation. Not even a blade of grass. It was
a huge stone crusher had passed through just
that morning…
Poet: So you didn`t see the mayor.
Ed: I didn`t see anybody. Wait, there was this one
crazy asshole who seemed to be sweeping
the place up… He was wearing this hat like I`ve
never seen before, and I have been to New
Guinea… And they come up with some pretty
wild-assed combinations over there… But
nothing like this fool! There he was looking
among the stones… With all these screens
hanging over his face…..!
Mad-trap: That was the mayor.
Ed666: Oh, no! You`re mistaken. This guy looks like
the moron janitor no one hired, working in this great
latrine under the sky, scrubbing at the rocky
coast of nowhere!
Mad Poet ( writes it down)
“The moron janitor no one hired,
Working in this great latrine under the sky,
Scrubbing at the rocky coast of nowhere “
MADPO: ” Sweeping under the open sky”…not bad!…. Maybe you`re a poet,also
Editor666: “I WAS a poet… It`s just that my character
is not quite aberrant enough; my temper,
though it is extreme, is not sufficiently
loathsome; and my genitals, though larger and much more
weighty than average, are not quite huge. And though
I enjoy beating innocent animals and persons smaller than I am, whipping them into apologetic and begging submission – I am not quite the sadist that I ought to be… to be worthy the name,”POET”.
Though I am deceitful and enjoy lying,
especially to trusting souls: I find duplicity is not the air
I breathe.
Though I do try to be an cold emotion-manipulating
beast, I am not quite up to par: I do not have that icy grasp
to squeeze each drop of soul out of each person in a situation;
No I am not quite cold enough to deserve the title,POET.
Mad poet: “WHAT? did you just say? Are you mocking me? Did you just insult me??` You`re drunk, aren`t you…?
You`d better be!”
Editor 666: “Oh, no! Drunk? Never! Alcohol gives me the
great clarity. The more alcohol I consume, the
more intelligent I seem to be…
I do not know entirely how the
Cosmos works, but the more I drink, the less
intelligent other people grow to be, other
people in the room with me, the dumber they become….
quite likeable folks turn out to be fools and
morons – the alcohol gives me the power
to discern their retardation easily…
MadPo Man, you`re hammered! Look, it`s
OK to talk to me this way…for a moment…But if you start spouting off this way in Wait-A-Bit….
someone`ll put a bullet thru your brain… and laugh about it… It won`t take very long, either!
Edito666: WAIT-A-BIT does not exist!
MadPo: Ha! Ha! That`d be a good start. They`re sensitive
over there about their town stature
ED666: Statue…?.
MadPo: That, too! It was melted down in seconds!
EDITOR666: “WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU SAYING, MAN?”
Mad Po: I had sex with his wife. He found out.. Broke into my house… I woke up he had a knife in his teeth and
his hands in my pants….
Ed666: So you cut his head off…. and then you ate his
brain…
Mad Po: Quite right. I felt I had to … to prove
the ability that he was trying to remove
from me.
I caught him and I ate his brain.
I felt like a real success that day!
Ed666: They found you covered in blood
a man`s brain in your mouth….
Mad Po: Yes.
Editor: You did all that and got away! You`re a sick
prick aren`t you? Brains, guts, mental illness and
a gory past – you have exactly the traits I hope
to find in a poet… Yes, you are mad -but that can
be a good thing for similes, images and symbols.
Mad Poet: So you`ll work with me?
Editor 666: Yes, I will. You`ve got all the qualities.
Poet: In honour of our deal, I will present you with
this! The Poet from Rat River
holds up the huge knife…
Editot 666: I was hoping for something else”, he
whispers in the poet`s ear.
Mad Poet: That? You want “that?”
The editor nods his head, “Yes”
Poet: Poet nods his head. “That can be arranged.”
They shake on it.
EDITOR 666 – DEFINITION OF A POET: Intelligence of an eccentric kind, passion with a BENT twist —a different way of thinking and seeing the world,
necessarily strange associations. A mean, assaultive character prone to grandiose thoughts. Alcoholics are often best – alcoholics who yearn for
childhood before the age of 5 (Like- Dylan Thomas.) A puerile intellect that makes manipulation
of children and naive under-confident women a simple matter.
A capable individual, a person who devises a plan and can then carry the plan out – no matter how outrageous, violent and sordid the plan may be. A person with massive manic interludes…. an attractive, handsome sociopath (who can really screw the ladies over).
MADPO: “What?” WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY….??? Let me read that! I`VE NEVER HEARD SUCH A STRING OF INSULTS, degenerate thinking in one place
!
EDITOR 666: Ho! Ho! You know I speak the truth!
PO: You`re going to pay for that little joke!
Editor 666: Who`s joking?
Both men are loaded now. The overproof has found
a major place in them both.
Running down towards the river. Mad Trapper Poet
of Rat River asks: “Do you think I`m poet material? Do you think I can make the grade?
EDITOR 666 “A person of your experience, proclivities and background, you will shine!”
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