Awaiting What the Train Brings
I stand on my front lawn
In a residential development
In a power stance
My chest heaving, my teeth bared at the moon,
Wearing my authentic orc chainmail
That I bought
From Etsy.
"Tonight we will taste man flesh!" I bellow,
As I sprint towards my steed, my war horse, my
2002 Hyundai Accent.
The curtains sway next-door and
The neighbors are staring again.
But they know not of this mission,
My journey across a desolate wasteland of
Suburban cul-de-sacs and the swirling dusts behind the tires of
Mad Max soccer mom minivans
Teetering across the apocalyptic landscape
Destined for Baby Gap Valhalla.
They know not of my mission to endure the limits of man
To purchase a
Wegman's six-pack.
What would they say, if the office folk saw me?
Would Beverly tell Danielle to tell Dorothy to tell Cathy to tell Brad that J is unhinged?
Or would they leverage this opportunity to circle back
And discuss what onboarding a wild orc man onto the team
Could do for quarterly growth?
They cannot judge me!
For I know of the sins they have committed,
The atrocities against humanity each of them has covered in shame.
I know for a fact that
Brad saw Nickelback in concert in 2007.
I hear the distant whistle of the train in my head
The wheels slowly chugging around the mountain pass
And my brain switches tracks.
I unfurl the swath of black cloth that has been wrapped under my arm.
Tonight, Main Street is International Waters.
My skull and crossbones flag flies proudly from the rear antenna.
This flag was rightfully earned, through combat and murder and ship-pillaging,
And by that I mean
Michael's Crafts had a sale on fabric.
A prize I will have tonight.
The Wegman's sits, a wealthy merchant supermarket
Stocked with fresh provisions of
Salt pork and hard tack and
Doritos to prevent scurvy.
A brazen animal, I will raid the beer aisle.
The humble sea peasants will cower
And they will empty their pockets of doubloons.
We will fire pistols in celebration
As I pluck up a tasty box of local gluten-free IPAs—Er—I mean, black rum.
A wild horn screeches in the night, like an angry seagull.
Boy, it sure is hard driving with this eye patch on.
I hear the distant whistle of the train in my head
The wheels slowly chugging around the mountain pass
And my brain switches tracks.
In the grocery store parking lot, a thunderous downpour
Pounds the roof of my car.
I hustle inside and see that leg-of-lamb is on sale.
Politely, humanely, I
Stand in line with my six-pack and hunk of lamb,
A Mad Max orc pirate galaxy traveler
Cowed by the bright lights of civilization.
I catch eyes staring at my outfit and
It's Cindy from church.
Cindy always asks how I'm doing.
She always brings cookies.
Cindy = nice lady.
I can feel my foot anxiously tapping the floor, fighting the urge to
Scream at nice lady Cindy:
"FIND THE HALFLINGS! FIND THE HALFLINGS!"
"Hi, Cindy," says I, and raise a wan little half-wave.
I squelch out of the store in my prosthetic orc feet,
Leg-of-lamb on my shoulder and
The customers are staring again.
In the thunderous downpour of the parking lot
I ask some teenagers to
Unwrap the lamb leg and toss it on my car windshield
In precisely seven minutes.
PRECISELY SEVEN.
"Seems like a waste of meat," they say, maturely.
"I know you are but what am I?" says I.
Boy, I showed them.
Here's five dollars, I say.
PRECISELY SEVEN.
I scurry delightedly to my car
And wait.
I can feel the ground tremble
Giant footsteps approaching slow
The tension rises and my lip quivers.
I check the time.
At six minutes and 55 seconds
I stare dramatically through the window and curiously ask:
"Where's the goat?"
The hunk of meat smacks the windshield,
Slides down slow.
A low guttural growl and
The T-rex bellows and approaches.
A single yellow eye lowers to my window
Breath mists up the outside glass
I scream, high-pitched and shrilly like a tiny baby otter pup.
I prepare for this monster
To flip my car and bite my tires and...
Someone is knocking on the window.
It's nice church lady Cindy.
"Are you okay?" she asks.
"Oh Cindy," I laugh. "I thought you were a dinosaur."
Cindy is alarmed.
It feels like this is the right time to leave.
I should probably take the lamb off the windshield.
I speed out the lot and yell from the window:
"Don't tell church!" I laugh maniacally. "I know you will!"
Back home, I fill the tub with the hottest water
And bring all the plants in from outside
It's jungle time.
I turn on Spotify playlist "Jungle Sleep Aura Energy River Tree Naps".
"Ca-caw! Ca-caw!" screech the Myna birds.
I dump the Wegman's six-pack in the tub,
Watch the bottles float,
Bobbing like barrels cast off from a shipwreck,
Kegs of grog unattended,
Hopefully to wash ashore
On Zanzibar.
I rumble downstairs to the basement
And return with a bag of sandbox sand.
Don't ask me why I have sandbox sand.
Here's why I have sandbox sand:
I slit the bag open with my cutlass (butter knife) and
dump the Tahitian fine-grained sand (Lowe's sandbox sand)
I spread the sand evenly around this mystical pirate beach haven (grimy toilet floor)
Later on when the sun sets,
I will search for seashells.
I climb in this porcelain ocean
And nestle in like a small child
With six pints of rum (gluten-free IPAs).
I close my eyes and envision
The distant echoes of seagulls
The soft and assuring whisper of waves
The—
"THERE BETTER NOT BE SAND ON MY FLOOR AGAIN!"
Mom's calling.
"HUH?!" I yell back. "No, I think the cat just brought sand in on its feet."
Moms. Such over-reactors.
At the office AKA Zoom meeting Monday morning
Co-workers joke about "not having their coffee yet"
And "Is it Friday yet?"
"It's not, it's Monday," I correct them. "It's only Monday."
Team leader Dawn addresses me directly:
"You must feel just as crazy as the rest of us,
All cooped up like we are."
Oh Dawn, if you only knew.
She asks me about my weekend.
And I ponder this thoughtfully
As the distant sound of waves and seagulls swirl
And I say:
"Well, Dawn, I dumped a bag of sand out in the bathroom,
Put on some jungle sounds with my hot steam bath,
And pretended I was an orc pirate lounging on a distant island jungle shore."
The whole team laughs uproariously. Such a funny joke.
"Now Jon," says Dawn, "your imagination is what we all love about you."
I join in laughing along to the big hearty funny I made.
We need this, the laughter.
But all that fades behind the distant whistle of the train in my head
The wheels slowly chugging around the mountain pass
And I watch for the plume of smoke
Awaiting what the train brings.
