Sunday, January 15 (cont'd)

I wore my brogans to the reading.
They're scuffed, from asphalt shingles,
that acted like sandpaper.
I don't polish them. I use saddle soap.
They have character. They're like
the potato-eater shoes van Gogh drew
in the Borinage. Is that correct?
I wrote a book that compared Jack Neff
and me to van Gogh and Gauguin.
SCHOOL OF THE SOUTH. STUDIO?
I've written so many books
I have to look the titles up.
Vincent's canvases had to be cotton,
and so many threads per inch.
Did he whitewash them with Gesso?
I don't remember. I once knew,
but close only counts in hand grenades
and horseshoes.

AFTER BLUE-COLLAR REDNECK: AN ONLINE JOURNAL (OLJ). January 6 - January __. In progress. I drive to Page and Palette bookstore in Fairhope, Alabama, to read. I see that my next book is about the Class of '57, and bluegrass. I send off for a weekend (three-day) pass, rough camping, at the Everglades Bluegrass Festival, off Ives Dairy Road, in Ojus. I'll drive through my old hometown of Delray Beach while I am there. Visit Old School Square. You can't go home again. One must. Someone has to deconstruct postmodernism. Fannie Flagg on her back porch, cleaning fish. [Flagg wrote Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café in Fairhope.]

My dad and I used to watch
the Friday Night Fights,
sponsored by Pabst Blue Ribbon beer,
or Gillette Blue Blades, or Mennen's Skin Bracer.
The barber would apply witch hazel,
perhaps a scented talc. You'd smell like Catherine
Deneuve. You'd sweat like a whore in church.
This was before air-conditioning. I can remember
when the only thing that was air-conditioned was Burdine's
department store and some movie theaters in Miami.
I can remember when only two things came in cans:
tomatoes and sardines. So what? Who gives a shit.
Talk is cheap. What war are we in? What corruption scandal?
How bad is health care? How bad is social security?
Have you seen the new reality shows? A recent theme is
Missing White Women. Sexual predators, recently released
from jail. It was always there, we just didn't codify it
as a leitmotif. It wasn't an industry, with commentators,
and immediate response teams. Victim publicists.
Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?
She's in a new feature film, a revival in
the dinner theaters, a rerun of the miniseries,
on teevee. What's old enough is young.
What's stale is fresh again. New, improved.
The graphic. The theme music. The holdovers
from the O. J. Trial, or Michael Jackson.
The crawl. The multitasking. It reminds me of
Ballet mécanique, Le Journal, nonobjective art, atonal music.
Postmodernism must be deconstructed.

You can't go home again.
One must. Someone has to
deconstruct postmodernism.
It's a shitty gig, with no
job security or fringe benefits.
You might get some strange pussy.
You might get a sexually transmitted disease (STD).
You might get venereal warts, or herpes. Or lympho-
granuloma venereum (LGV). Bubo. Dandruff,
fallen arches, athlete's foot, the piles, cataracts,
the heartbreak of psoriasis. Acid indigestion,
bad breath, dental caries. Morning terror
and large bowel complaints. As Walker Percy says.
Brain declines your article on the quantitative/
qualitative ontological lapsometer try Rehab Weekly.

Fannie Flagg wrote Fried Green Tomatoes
at the Whistle Stop Café in Fairhope, Alabama.
When she wasn't on her back porch, cleaning fish.
Nostalgia isn't what it used to be. Why can't I do that?
Am I balmy? Daft? Who wants a deconstruction of
postmodernism? Nobody but English majors,
and they're all nerds. I am not a creep.
I'm a regular person. I watch boxing.
I buy razor blades and aftershave.
I drink beer. I get my hair cut
at a barber shop. The stylist asks me
if I am retired military, and I say,
"Lord, honey, two hitches was enough."
I'm old enough to call young women
dear, or darling. Sweetheart. I don't.
I don't stereotype people. For all I know
she is a xylophonist, after duty. She tap-dances with
a ventriloquist's dummy while playing the accordion.

The receptionist at The Colony Grill,
the maitre d', and my waiter
all called me by my name,
which the receptionist asked for
when I appeared, without a reservation,
for supper. They asked if I was local,
or just passing through. I got to tell them
I was in town for a reading at Page and Palette
bookstore, and hear them say, "Oh, are you
a writer?" You know. The full magnolia.
Paid to come and read? Published? A published arthur?
As Molly Iivins says. Eat your heart out, you plebeians.
Just before the soldier punched his lights out,
at the USA dance, in Barton Fink, John Turturro cried,
"You monsters, I create. This"--pointing to his head--
"is my uniform." I'd point to my crotch. The head, the heart,
and the balls, all working in sync.