Perm Vacation

Perm Vacation

32 pages, self-published on May 28th, 2020

No copies remain, but I can print and mail (within the US) if you throw a couple bucks my way. Email hisnameisdan @ gmail dot com, if interested.

Poems from Perm Vacation:

Perm Vacation

Three Poems

Free Throws: End Game

 On Saturday, Halloween night, I stayed home while Elizabeth took our son trick-or treating. I waited in the drive way, assuring that our candy bowl, placed at the end of the driveway between two pumpkins and in front of a smash-faced plastic hawk, wouldn't be greedily raided by princesses and super heroes. The children must be rational with their candy grabbing. They must not follow in the footsteps of their toilet paper hoarding parents.

While waiting for trick-or-treaters, I shot free throws. It was getting dark outside. I shot some shots. I made 34 consecutive free throws. While shooting these free throws, my mind found a space outside of space. I think this is what the mystics refer to as "catching fire." My body on fire. My mind on fire, but the fire was air. The basketball on fire, but the fire was my touch.

Obviously, I missed a shot. Shot #35. It was in and out. I stopped shooting for a while.  I put on a Bill Clinton mask and a hot dog costume over that. I called myself Bill Clinton Hot Dog Thanos. I snapped my fingers and half the basketballs on earth disappeared. I sat in a lawn chair and hydrated, calling attention to the candy as the princesses and super heroes passed by. There would be no excess of candy in my house, I thought. 

Friends, there remains an excess of candy in my house. My son brought home as much as I gave away, and you have to strictly control the sugar intake of a 3.5-year-old in order to avoid undesirable behaviors. I snapped my fingers the next day, but half the candy did not disappear.

I haven't shot a basketball since that night. This is mostly because my car is parked underneath the basketball goal, and I've been doing other things.