Mr. James > Recent Status Updates

"Where you pick up a wild woman?"
"In the woods. Where wild women grow." -- TM

To think about (and wrestle with) the full implications of my situation leads me to consider what happens when other writers work in a highly and historically racialized society. For them, as for me, imagining is not merely looking or looking at; nor is it taking oneself intact into the other. It is, for the purposes of the work, becoming. -- TM"

Writing and reading are not all that distinct for a writer. Both exercises require being alert and ready for unaccountable beauty, for the intricateness or simple elegance of the writer's imagination, for the world the imagination evokes. Both require being mindful of the places where imagination sabotages itself, locks its own gates, pollutes its vision. Writing and reading mean being aware of risk and safety. -- TM

Poker Night: The poker table has nothing but sharks; late stage throat cancer has Eddie coughing up blood. The players are heedless, being three deep into their Old Fashioneds. Despite the blood on his hand, Eddie throws down a King-high Straight Flush: Suicide King -- winning the pot. Life is good.

When he picks up the reins he cannot help noticing that his horse is also black, naked and shiny wet, and the feelings about the horse are of security and affection. It occurs to him that there is something odd about that: the pride he takes in his horse; the nausea the woman provoked. He is a touch ashamed and decides to make sure it was a vision, that there is no naked black woman lying in the weeds. -- TM

The quiet money whispers twice: once when I slide it in my pocket; once when I slide it out. -- TM

It's the time of year when the City urges contradiction most, encouraging you to buy street food when you have no appetite at all; giving you a taste for a single room occupied by you alone as well as a craving to share it with someone you passed in the street. Really there is no contradiction -- rather it's a condition: the range of what an artful city can do. -- TM

Slippage: Men in coral castles sleep soundly as an earthquake rips through the borough below, dismantling wood hovels. A common man with a black beard -- speckled gray -- sees a woman before him. Her sharp jaw and curved body in a wrap dress silhouettes the sun. The earth trembles and begs. His tongue shakes, daring to speak what he always wanted to say. His lips part as the earth swallows him whole.

For who could keep him down, this defiant birthday-every-day man who dispensed gifts and stories that kept them so rapt they forgot for awhile the bone-clean cupboard and exhausted soil; or believed a child's leg would straighten itself out by and by. Forget why he left in the first place and was forced to sneak into his own home ground. In his company forgetfulness fell like pollen. -- TM

No, It wasn't the War and the disgruntled veterans; it wasn't the droves and droves of colored people flocking to paychecks and streets full of themselves. It was the music. The dirty, get-on-down music the woman sang and the men played and both danced to, close and shameless or apart and wild. [...] It made you do unwise and disorderly things. Just hearing it was like violating the law. -- TM

On those nights Joe does not mind laying awake next to his silent wife because his thoughts are with this young good God young girl who both blesses his life and makes him wish he had never been born. -- TM

Like the time Miss Haywood asked her what time could she do her granddaughter's hair and Violet said, "Two o'clock if the hearse is out of the way." -- Toni Morrison

Poachers: There’s a silent language deep in Louisiana's swamps: a jawline tilted right and slightly up, the downward curve of a closed mouth, the left shoulder standing higher than the right, the placement of feet at an awkward angle, a restless index finger twitching down, and pupils that slide left -- seen through crescent moon lids; this is an optic tongue to a man’s sins.

The chair's frame was made out of copper pipe: the triangular seat and rectangular backrest were silver -- both were tarnished. The legs were uneven, rocking from the back left leg to the front right. "Close your eyes," Jade said. Jeremy looked away and said, "No." Jade stared at her red insignia pin on Jeremy's chest. "No," Jeremy repeated.

High tide: waves crash onto a black stone shore; the boy flinches and stands as water tickles his feet. Clip clop; the boy turns to face a black mare with one blue eye. He grabs the mane, pulls himself up, and settles onto the horse's back. The boy bends, inhales, and hugs her neck as she slowly walks into the sea.

Jeremy stood behind Jade; the queue went boy-girl, boy-girl. The couple in front made their choice then walked around a cedar desk and through a steel door. The administrator smiled as J&J approached. Both looked over the items on the desk: a noose, hammer, paper weight, flail, and a vial. Jeremy reached for the vile; Jade slapped his hand away. She pointed to the noose; the clerk grinned and said, "Fascinating."

4.48 Psychosis: The fluorescent bulb blinks with a twist of the wrist: a floor of cockroaches scatter. Your naked body watches a black mass scurry up your legs and across your chest -- midnight organic armor. The sun tears through the bay window; the roaches run: abandon. You hesitate, then fall forward onto a metal spike, impaling yourself before the afternoon picnic. (No one asked for poetry.)

"It rots your brain boy; none of it in this house. You flip through it day and night, getting all sorts of nonsense. I never would have thought something so small would shove so much shit into your brain. It's the devil's doing. Give it here." The father snatches a book out of his son's hands and replaces it with a smartphone. "Use this instead."

There's more there -- I swear to you... more. It wants here; it wants you; it wants language. Not to just breed and feed: more. Look at the curve of your mouth. It tells me more. Now look at what's standing behind you. Take this knife and use it. I swear to you... you are not safe. Cover your eyes and look. "Double your pleasure, double your fun – with Doublemint, Doublemint, Doublemint Gum!"

Introducion: The faithful Bard looks to play, hoping Earth's past will fade away. Earth's Answer: I curse your sight for what you've done; the plague of man has destroyed my fun.

After Z class, Jeremy went to his locker, pressed his face into the gel panel, hummed for three seconds and watched the locker door slide open. He stepped inside, the door closed and he said, "Twenty minute sleep." An artificial voice replied, "Understood." A needle went into the back of his neck; before he blacked out, Jade's voice said from outside, "We need to talk... now."

The Bishop: Bret had been an altar boy for two weeks. Two hours before mass he went into Sacristy and opened a cardboard box filled with bags of unconsecrated hosts. Bret stuffed several into his backpack, opened one and ate ravenously; when he stood Father Cliff appeared, holding a bottle of wine. With slurred speech he said, "This," he paused, taping the bottle, "Is mine."

The fiber optic lawns shifted from fluorescent green, blue, and purple as Jeremy walked to the bus stop. As he approached, Jade waved stiffly; a black button up shirt choked her throat; a tight corduroy jacket tormented her rib cage, and her black pants could easily be mistaken for skin -- the red insignia pin above her left breast was broken but still sparkled. "My turn to hurt," she said. Jeremy sighed and nodded.

"A small impediment, to be sure, one that grew steadily less." -- Franz Kafka

Crave: Sarah rips open my rib cage and twists my heart. She can explain: "F*** this up and I'll haunt you for the rest of your fuc**** life."

A tokoyama applies bintsuke to a yokozuna's hair and pulls it into a tight ponytail. The oil is repeatedly combed in until it's absorbed evenly. The tokoyama ties a topknot, and with careful precision, sculpts a symmetrical bulge, crowning the yokozuna's head. An efficient tokoyama will have practiced for ten years, but a master will apply bintsuke until death. The yokozuna is now ready, not to win, but to dominate.

Jeremy was so hungry he ran down the stairs, slipped on the bottom step, and slammed into the water floor, causing ripples to spread through the house. "Sit and eat," Mother said, standing next to an octagon shaped table; portions of food resembled ant hills. Once Jeremy sat, mother filled his plate. Jeremy said, "I hate you mother." She replied, "I hate you too. Eat fast."

In the Ravine: You're looking scruff... stand straight... that forearm hangs loose: stand still. (SNAP!) Don't grimace; it's unbecoming. That ankle needs fixing; time is small -- later perhaps; you're pretty. Take this plate of caviar and feed it to your husband. The caviar, not the plate. When he smiles, nod. You'll be stuck in the ravine, but when he comes to your chamber, he'll realize, so is he.

Haruto is in a minka sitting cross-legged; an elderly man sits across from him: eyes partially closed. A bowl of ramen is between them: chopsticks stand erect in the middle. Two days ago, the man said, "Eat when you're hungry." On the third day of sitting, Hartuto grabs the bowl and brings it to his lips. The man smiles and nods. Haruto pauses, puts the bowl back between them, and waits.