Wetappo Creek, Kemp Cemetery Road,
22A bypass, go by Dead Lakes Speedway,
the trailer with the hot water heater outside
on a fork-lift pallet, Gulf CI. L. L. Lanier,
tupelo honey, honor system, leave your money
in a Mason jar. Supposed to help with pollen allergies.
Do you want to know the plot, the characters,
the setting, and the theme of an immobilized hero novel?
Uncle Baby pawnded Grandpa's concrete nigger molds.

Brenda lived in a trailer in Stone Mill Creek,
near the prison, Gulf CI. All her neighbors were
correctional offices and amateur race car drivers.
You could hear them at the Dead Lakes Speedway,
Saturday night. Just down the road was a man who raised emus
to sell breeding pairs, and ended up with a freezer full of emu meat.
Might as well keep a llama for its fur. I thought I was going to work
at Suent Scientific five more years, then retire to Wewa to be
a Wewahitchka, Florida writer, but I was cashiered.

Bubba wasn't doing so good.
He was on a walker.
He went over to Panama,
to get his back operated on,
which is what they told him
was wrong with his legs,
but they gave him an EKG,
and found out his heart was bad,
and there was nothing they could do for it,
because he had sugar diabetes. He sat behind
the cash register in Bermuda shorts and flip flops.
He had a helper who was hard of hearing or simple,
and needed everything said to him twice. Avec
hand signals. Bubba wasn't po-mo,
he wasn't even modern. He was classical,
possibly baroque. Southern gothic.

There's a bridge at White City
across the intracoastal waterway
that an ocean-going freighter can pass under.
Port St. Joe is a deep-water port. Used to serve
the paper mill. The St. Joe Company is now
a land developer. Out of silviculture and paper products
and into selling the sizzle, not the steak. Lifestyle management.
Amenities extra. Infrastructure courtesy of the ignorant-hick taxpayer.

Brenda said to write in the mornings,
go out and see things in the afternoons,
talk to people, read, watch rented videos,
and I thought of Albino Grizzly, dusting in
a French maid's uniform, or apron, a big prong
out in front of him. Hausfrau Power!
Drizzle Pro-V shampoo on her tits
for the cum shot. Take that, you slut.
You bitch. You piece of shit.
Some men have a problem
with relationships.

As you enter Port St. Joe from the north,
Highway 71 becomes four lanes, with a median strip
containing sabal palms, some tall and straight, some leaning.
If you turn right on Reid Avenue, the Port Theater is now
an antique mall. Auction every Friday night. But the St. Joe Bar
and Package Store still stands. Dixie Belle Curve is now
WindMark Beach. Posted, no trespassing. St. Joe Company
is working on getting Highway 98 moved, at taxpayer expense.

There used to be nothing between Port St. Joe and Mexico Beach
but the Wonder Bar, at Beacon Hill, where the time zones change.
Not any more. Ezra Pound wrote in a poem, "Shit used to be
blacker and richer." I wonder if that's true. Nostalgia isn't what
it used to be. The goodle days are past and gone, John Hartford says.

Not a good day
to walk on the beach.
A crazy southeaster whipping up
a gale, making the winos rub
the back of their necks, and cast
a weather eye at the bay next to
the public library. "Circulation,
thank you, let me give you Reference."

Albino Grizzly is putting together his look.
White hair, white beard, slightly yellow teeth, a white T-shirt
with a picture of Black McGoon rescuing Miss Weekiwachee on it,
white cotton painter pants, with a hammer loop and slash pocket on the
pant leg for a folding rule or a cell phone. White athletic socks, white leather
Rockport Prowalkers. Gray gimme cap with an anatomically correct boar hog on it
from B & B Feed & Seed, Wewahitchka, Florida. Arrangement in Gray and Black
No. 1. Whistler's Mother. I owe this mother $5, I owe that mother $10.