Or: An excerpt from ‘xerox over manhattan’
Plumes of soot on the bed-spread. President Ricky has alabaster skin. He has hazel eyes. He breaks down. President Ricky stinks of Budweiser, Kools and tear-stained eyeliner. I can’t comprehend his unclean attitude. President Ricky removes the bandages from his chest. The assault of corrective surgery. Implants made from plastic bags. You possess my firm mouth with red lips and warm laughter. The unseen menace in a dogged drug-market. Yellow eyes, worm-eaten eyes, a mouth full of tobacco juice and toothless gums. Girl with an animal growl who works as a spotter in Midtown Manhattan. The muscles of a middle-weight boxer emaciated by myasthenia gravis. Your yellow hair whipped with a silk hand-kerchief. Men without external sex organs. A sliced penis and scrotum in a coffee cup full of endocrine. Southern mansions repurposed into abortion clinics. Human hands in dark hallways. Worker plunges down elevator shaft in Brooklyn building. We meet in the lobby of the Gramercy Park Hotel. You primarily cope by shutting down your emotions. Manhattan. Empty stores. The familiar shuffles of subway platforms. Slow memories in my empty mind. My duffle bag full of Dendracin lotion. Plastic baskets of iodine. You decided to catch a train to Washington. It is two hours after your departure. You feel the earth around you. This ground isn’t soft. Your coarse voice rises, and then falls in a ceaseless wave, it recognizes my bad mood. You become silent. You didn’t go to Washington. The movie camera has an underwater case. I cut a length of copper wire. You whisper in the darkness. You enter the inner room. The air is heavy. I dig into your skin. You bang you fist on the wall. You’ve had a haircut. Yu shut the door. You have bought a bottle of every kind of perfume. You purchase some long-distance electronics. I order double rum. A large squirrel in Central Park. Furry, its eyes are watching us, it has an inscrutable expression. You put your feet on my stomach. Your shout dies in a gurgle. President Ricky bathes in wine barrels in the basement of his apartment block. The hot impression of the light switch. President Ricky has small red eyes. He assembles precious stones that have greenish coils around them. President Ricky cuts his blunt nose. His hairpiece has grotesque wings. His eye sockets have reddish-brown fins. He sprints around the carpark with amazing speed. His imminent crash goes unhindered and he floats backward over asphalt and red grass. Luminous vegetation cover’s President Ricky’s reflective lenses. Happy smiles beneath the hairpiece. Nervous faces full of phosphorescence. Assassination notes written at frantic speeds. Warm vapours inside a large sink-hole. The complete perversion of North America. Woman grabs a newspaper. Plasma pours into sub-way grating. Train slowly pulls out from platform. Woman raises a large suitcase. Dark figures, who whistle badly, prowl the corridors of the police department. Perfume bottles inside cosmetic jars. Blank paper burns in an inhospitable atmosphere. Photographer outside the window pane. Camphor beneath your nose. A bulky newspaper being read by the bartender. The elevator boy makes enormous shadows. We meet in the lobby of the Gramercy Park Hotel. You primarily cope by shutting down your emotions. Manhattan. Empty stores. The familiar shuffles of subway platforms. Slow memories in my empty mind. My duffle bag full of Dendracin lotion. Plastic baskets of iodine. Woman grabs a newspaper. Plasma pours into subway grating. You call the meeting together. You suggest we wear masks for future meetings. I ask what colour they should be. It doesn’t matter what colour they are. Cocaine and teeth gleaming. You insert the key into the lock. My lips. You ask me to interpret your dreams. You are clever. Shutdown at the East River Generating Station. You draw me an illustration of a man having a coronary. I’m sniffling in the Manhattan sun. I tell you I’m going to catch an Amtrak to Phoenix. Train slowly pulls out from platform. A woman squats over the pavement. A hurt woman with sore breasts. Long black hair in sharp photo-graphic images. Unforgettable moments from these distant years. You take long absences to delve into deep thoughts. New machines on the Trans-Manhattan Expressway. Homosexual boys fuck the cruel bridegroom. You like mischievous laughter. You undress out of a black dinner dress. I wear your high heels. Light through the ventilating shaft. Scalpels into the skin. Destruction of the body with every body blow. Robots run for political office. Professional men tear down their immoral past. The possibility of fire hazards. An embankment of stones, almost a levee, holding back the seawater. Woman raises a large suitcase. Your spectral fingers smeared with newspaper ink. Hot temperature, police ponder burglary suspicions. Football skills on display in New Jersey. Stasis heart is not an intelligent organ. The Earth’s gravitational field. The Earth’s geomagnetic forecasting method is now in crisis. You come see, come via the Staten Island Ferry. Crates of rum on pontoons towed by the ferry. My limp cock in a leather mini-dress. Lipstick on your boxer shorts. Your body throbs with a sick feeling. Law enforcement slipping into black markets. European woman with a Chinese husband. Chinese husband discovers his shoe-fetishism while holidaying in London, and while in Germany for work. Husband’s eyes. Woman’s feet. Small army gathering in an ugly place. Passengers in bulletproof vests cause disruptive airplane flights. Countless species contracting mania and unproductive psychosis. The dark spaces in a horse’s eyes. The magical spaces of abomination. President Ricky takes many notes. Weird shit discovered in colour photographs. A sample video file of nude men. Telephone numbers to subscribe to an online adult magazine. President Ricky calls, hungry to get the limited offer. A sexy centrefold selling valuable things. Sunny postcards from polluted places. Plastic outdoor furniture melt-ing in Hell. You’re surrounded with smoke, some fire simulation set off by fuse-lit grenades. Oil smell in the night air. Your cornea. You get me back to the hotel. White shirt tight against my chest. President Ricky is on all fours, dumbfounded. He drinks Budweiser from a coffee cup. Blood trickles down the bathroom wall. I share a Budweiser with him. I smoke a cigarette out in the parking lot. I hail a taxicab. I snap at President Ricky. Rectify your mis-takes I tell him. President Ricky is maligned. President Ricky is suspicious. He loves the badness. He plays different musical instruments to a packed auditorium. His hair slick with blood. President Ricky takes me out to an exotic club. We get private dances. I’m burnt up. You open your mouth. I wear men’s shoes. Scrawny male shoes. Blood on your thighs. The sun comes out. I don’t want to be buried alive. I apply my makeup. I’m becoming ordinary meat. Paste on my nose. Colour smeared on lips. I need to slow down. Stiff in further sexual advances. You wear a cloth nightgown. A cat meows. I stack cardboard boxes. Cool night air. Stimulants. Cham-pagne. Muddy footmarks on the carpet. Photographs. Discharge from my mouth. My ear to the ground. Sinusoidal waves. Sound pressure. Loading dock. I lose my cool. Solar flares inside my brain. Pos-sessed by an old gnome. There are people here. I close the door quietly. Moss and plaque and dry toothpaste.
https://www.apocalypse-party.com/xeroxovermanhattan.html Shane Jesse Christmass is the author of the novels, Xerox Over Manhattan (Apocalypse Party, 2019), Belfie Hell (Inside The Castle, 2018), Yeezus In Furs (Dostoyevsky Wannabe, 2018), Napalm Recipe: Volume One (Dostoyevsky Wannabe, 2017), Police Force As A Corrupt Breeze (Dostoyevsky Wannabe, 2016) and Acid Shottas (The Ledatape Organisation, 2014). He was a member of the band Mattress Grave, and is currently a member in Snake Milker. An archive of his writing/artwork/music can be found at http://www.shanejessechristmass.tumblr.com Instagram:@sjxsjc Twitter:@sjxsjc