The Time Has Come To Make All The Machines Fly

Vic Shingles’ Ghastly Puppets
The Compassion I Used To Have Is Gone Now
The Broken Hearted Vampire
OK, I’ll Never See You Again
America Is Mars
Yor
When A Friend Falls Asleep Forever
Written And Left On My Apartment Wall In N.Y
The Time Has Come To Make All The Machines Fly
Vic Shingles’ Ghastly Puppets Encore

Vic Shingles’ Ghastly Puppets

He pulled the curtain aside and the crowd
screamed in horror. All the terror that could be
expressed by human beings at seeing their
worst fears. Then he closed the curtain.
They had paid their dollars and there
were more waiting in lines outside.
They left shaking and holding
each other for support.

9/1/90 7:30 PM




The Compassion I Used To Have Is Gone Now

I had to laugh at 2:23 AM
when I heard the phone ringing upstairs
and someone crashing in the dark
across their apartment room
like Bela Lugosi flagging a taxi.




The Broken Hearted Vampire

John Dracula was born in a small town
outside of Akron, Wyoming and 50 years later
he was still living there. His house had been
falling apart since it was built. In the ceiling
there was a hole he could see the stars through
and for the last two weeks the cold winter wind
rattled the tar paper he had nailed over the hole.
Every morning around 3:30, he woke up freezing
with visions of Transylvania: black mountains,
a raven, a steep silver road that went to a castle.
Through a sharp gate and cobwebs, down
mossy stone, dripping water and torches
casting long shadows, to a circle of candles.




OK, I’ll Never See You Again

I went into a smoke-shop to get change for the bus.
A voice behind bullet-proof glass asked me, “Yes…
Can I help you?” I turned and there she was,
an old woman, with a tube running around her head
and into her nose, like someone from the Amazon
adapting to medical technology.
“Can I get change for a dollar?” I asked.
“Only if you never ask me again.” Her words
had an eerie and dangerous tone.
But I stared into her science fiction face
and I passed her the counterfeit dollar.
After she gave me four coins, I said,
“OK, I’ll never see you again.”




America Is Mars

It was the science fiction of the late 20th century
that allowed him to cook food with microwave
radiation and watch color television at the same time.
Something was on TV he’d never seen before,
it was the strangest show he had ever watched.
An albino instructor with blue teeth was talking
to a group seated around her, some sort of lessons
on human behavior. While he listened, he read
the directions for his microwave dinner.
1. Pierce pouch 2-3 times with a fork to vent.
“There are certain steps to take to convincingly
infiltrate human society, specifically American
society.”
2. Place pouch on a microwave safe dish;
cook on 50% power 5 ½ minutes. Carefully
shake pouch; continue cooking on 50% power
3-3 ½ minutes. Do not overcook.
The white dish spun inside the oven.
“Do not attempt to stray outside the guidelines
established in Articles 1-10 of The Conquest of
Earth.”
He stared in disbelief at the flashing colors
on the television screen. Somehow he tuned into
Martian TV. The oven pinged and he jumped.
The dish stopped spinning and it was steaming.




Yor

Yor,
the headless horror mutant
from space’s long distances:
he foretells the future
in the palm of
his werewolf daughter.




When A Friend Falls Asleep Forever

He found out he could get money
from the government by pretending
to be insane. So he told the doctor,
“Shhh, the trees are speaking to me,”
and he opened windows in his mind.
“The world speaks to those who listen.”
Then he got checks through the mail
because they proved he was crazy.
But I wish I told him not to play
their game that way. It poisoned him
like riverwater and it was riverwater
he fell into and drowned with
the saddest fate of 70 sleeping pills
to weigh him down.




Written And Left On My Wall In N.Y

The Chinese crane is
a chicken for communism.




The Time Has Come
To Make All The Machines Fly

1.
He lives on the street
and carves small
flying machines
that send out sparks
and whirr with smoke
and blue lightning
and drop back
to ground.

2.
He’s the one
who can find footprints
through the cement
where long ago explorers
walked for the first time.
Sometimes he puts
his ear against the street
and hears horses instead
looking like he’s asleep.

3.
When the universe is only
as small as a place to sleep
out of the rain and cold,
like satellites exploring
a blanket and cardboard,
newspapers and glass
pushed in a corner.

4.
They make it
so hard
people pay
for water
for warmth
for a place to rest.
He can ask
for only so much
with nothing
in return.

5.
The time has come
to make all the machines
fly and take him away.
He winds up small motors
tied to his body
and whirls into the sky
like a mechanical rainbow.




Vic Shingles’ Ghastly Puppets Encore

For an encore,
he whirled the planet
in the palm of his hand.

He left it spinning recklessly
on the beak of a crow
and went out with a showgirl
on each arm.


9/1/90 7:35 PM





cover illustration: aaron gunderson
writing: allen frost in 1990