Go Off
I can talk Thich Nhat Hanh and Pema Chodron and all kinds of loving kindness, but let me step around the corner into the shadows and stand with Jung. Let’s walk a little further where I meet my homies, Lyle Alzado from the Raiders and Brian Bosworth from his college days and maybe if we get deep enough into the reaches I will become George the Animal Steele, tearing padded buckles of the rings away with my teeth.
Be careful, my man, for I will hide tonight in the shadows of the rain barrel, and when you come for that next tree, right before you dig into the ground, you won’t even see me coming until the last minute, when you turn your head, just like those quarterbacks of old, and I see in your face an oh shit, and I scream, “That’s right, bitch. You’re Phil Simms, and I’m your Lawrence Taylor.” And before you can get up, I rub your face into the ground.
“Smell that! I made that soil.”
“I was just trying…”
I don’t want to hear it. I’ve had a dozen bikes taken from my yard. I’ve had twice that many trees dug from the ground. That papaya you took this weekend, that was started from seed in March of last year. The roots survived the winter and that baby was just starting to flower, but you already knew that, about the flowering, didn’t you? What? The other papayas you took weren’t enough? You selling them to that guy in the 1500 block of Needle Street? If so, he better keep them alive.
You want to hustle? Come to me. Let’s work together. If you’re creating your own oasis, you’ve missed the point. You see, that papaya was meant for the kids, for them to taste the flesh and then start the seeds, for them to know the cycle of life.
I’ll tell you one thing, cool daddy, ain’t no way you’re going to pull up Elsa. That mulberry tree I planted with four year olds. And those roots have sunk deep in the last two years.
I want to meet you. I wouldn’t really rub your face in the dirt. I would buy you a cup of coffee. I would try to understand why you did what you did. I have considered putting up a sign to invite you to quote unquote turn yourself in, not to face any consequences but rather that we might talk and share knowledge.
If you’re stealing to put a needle in your arm, I understand this. I’d prefer you steal my truck or my TV if I had one. See, these objects have much less sentience than the energy of a plant started from seed. And while the rain dumps down in buckets, the anger dissolves because I know that we will likely never meet and that my anger toward you will only harm me.
But who knows. This is a different world. This letter might spread on social media. Somebody who knows somebody who knows you might see it.
You know, it’s been a few years since the trees disappeared from right near me, and at that time I wanted to create a comic book that showed a man whose super power was crack, how much like Clark Kent, he ducked into a port a potty, hit a rock, and then popped through the door, able to leap the sign flyers on Elysian Fields with ease, to bound through a group of guys posted up with pockets of money and nearby spots of hidden drugs, to dart around traffic waiting in front of the corner store. I never came up with a name for this comic or for you.
I don’t think that I would call you super anything, but I also don’t want to be too derogatory for I know you must be in pain, in service to your addiction, whatever this addiction is, for the root cause of behavior like this is the false belief in separation. I don’t need to know your name right now, but I will. You will come to me, your name that is, and that’s enough.
