The Argument by Jay Passer (ALL ABOUT MY MOTHER Series)

The Argument
by Jay Passer

They’ve been at it for years,
my unborn sisters
who didn’t make it,
who roomed before me
in the hotel of the womb
with penthouse views
and oceanside access.

With a view of the earth
from the moon
mere astronomers
only dream about.

But there’s a rift going on
they can’t seem to resolve
about who gets control
of my body once I’ve gone.
I try to interfere
with a word in edgewise
offering the idea that it’s really a moot point
but they ignore me.
I don’t know why I bother.
Neither one ever breathed air in the first place,
conceived yet stillborn.

By the time it was my turn
the Taj Mahal had downsized to a Motel 6
off an I-5 exit
across from the 76 station
and a KFC.

Fresno? Bakersfield?
The argument resumes;
Shakespeare?
Coco Chanel?

I finally get their attention
vis à vis with Russian Roulette.
They don’t need to know
I’m short of ammo.

I suggest asking Mother dear
what she thinks about it.
After all, they must dwell in a similar realm.
Mom proves a quick study
in resurrection:

Silly girls!
That boy would sooner
refuse the Pulitzer
than spit his soul into a petri dish!

End of conversation.

Thanks Mom,
for quieting the crowd at last.
You make a damn good referee.

If ghosts had lips I’d buy you a whistle.

PAINTING: Motel, Route 66 by John Register (1991).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: The poetry of Jay Passer first appeared in Caliban magazine, alongside the work of William S. Burroughs, Maxine Hong Kingston, and Wanda Coleman, in 1988. Since then, Passer’s literary output has graced several anthologies and numerous print and online publications worldwide. He is the author of 14 collections of poetry and prose, and his first novel, Squirrel, appeared in 2022. His most recent work can be found in Don’t Submit!, Five Fleas, Fixator Press, Otoliths, Horror Sleaze Trash, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, Piker Press, Poetry Super Highway, and Urban Pigs Press. A lifetime plebeian, Passer has labored as dishwasher, soda jerk, barista, pizza cook, housepainter, courier, warehouseman, bookseller, news butcher, and mortician’s apprentice. A native of San Francisco, he currently resides in Venice, California, with a legion of imaginary cats and some very real houseplants. His latest collection of poems, Son of Alcatraz, was released in February of 2024 by Alien Buddha Press, and is currently available on Amazon.

PHOTO: The author with his mother, Rose (1984).

Winning at Solitaire by Elaine Mintzer (I AM STILL WAITING Series)

Winning at Solitaire
by Elaine Mintzer

At the motel, I laid the four kids
sideways in a bed like wooden matchsticks.
the oldest with her feet sticking over the edge.

I warned her to lie still so as not to disturb her brother
who matched her arm to arm, knee to knee,
next to their sister who thrashed in her sleep,

stirring the covers, finding her own order over their limbs.
And the baby on the end, curled into himself,
lips sucking a dream breast.

I propped a pillow at the foot of the bed
to keep them from falling,
from meeting the stained carpet,

the cracked foundation,
the dust and spiders
that spin in the dark.

I am still waiting for passers-by to pass by,
for the strobes in the parking lot
to roll down the street.

When the night quiets and the kids settle,
I pick up a deck of blue bicycle cards,
soft at the edges, and shuffle.

I hear the breath of their intersections,
the soft slap as I lay them
on the wobbly table in rows, in piles,

aligning each new one with the last.
In the palm of my left hand,
the remainder of the deck

turned by threes.
Turn after turn.
Game after game.

PAINTING: Motel, Route 66 by John Register (1991).

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: I remember my grandmother playing solitaire, in the rare moments she was not working.  My mother, too. These days, my mom plays on her iPad.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Elaine Mintzer lives in Los Angeles.  Her work has been published in journals and anthologies, including Gryroscope Review, Last Call, Chinaski, Beloit Poetry Review, Panoplyzine, Slipstream Press, Perspectives, Borders and Boundaries, Mom Egg Review, Subprimal Poetry Art, Lummox, Lucid Moose Lit’s Like a Girl anthology, The Ekphrastic Review, Cultural Weekly, Rattle, The Lindenwood Review, and 13 Los Angeles Poets. Elaine’s collection, Natural Selections was published by Bombshelter Press. Visit her at mintzer.org.

Maids Are Bickering…, poem by Jim Morrison

MAIDS ARE BICKERING…
by Jim Morrison

Maids are bickering in the hall
The day is warm
Last night’s perfume
I lie alone in this
cool room

My mind is calm & swirling
like the marble pages of an
old book

I’m a cold clean skeleton
scarecrow on a hill
In April
Wind eases the arches
of my boney Kingdom
Wind whistles thru my mind
& soul
My life is an open book
or a T.V. confession

”Maids are Bickering…” appears in The American Night: The Writings of Jim Morrison, Volume 2, available at Amazon.com.

Photo: “Pink Curtains, New York City” by Terrie-Johnson, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Leaving the Motel, poem by W.D. Snodgrass

LEAVING THE MOTEL

Poem by W.D. Snodgrass

Outside, the last kids holler
Near the pool: they’ll stay the night.
Pick up the towels; fold your collar
Out of sight.

Check: is the second bed
Unrumpled, as agreed?
Landlords have to think ahead
In case of need,

Too. Keep things straight: don’t take
The matches, the wrong keyrings–
We’ve nowhere we could keep a keepsake–
Ashtrays, combs, things

That sooner or later others
Would accidentally find.
Check: take nothing of one another’s
And leave behind

Your license number only,
Which they won’t care to trace;
We’ve paid. Still, should such things get lonely,
Leave in their vase

An aspirin to preserve
Our lilacs, the wayside flowers
We’ve gathered and must leave to serve
A few more hours;

That’s all. We can’t tell when
We’ll come back, can’t press claims,
We would no doubt have other rooms then,
Or other names.

NOTE: William DeWitt Snodgrass (1926-2009) won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1960. He is considered a leading figure — along with Sylvia Plath, Allen Ginsberg, Robert Lowell, and Anne Sexton — in the confessional school of poetry.

Photo: Built in 1946, the Olive Motel is an old-school motor court motel located at 2751 Sunset Blvd. in the Silverlake area of Los Angeles.

Night Out: Poems About Hotels, Motels, Restaurants, and Bars

“…our restaurants, motels, and watering places represent a kind of charged field where ordinary events — ordering a meal, spilling a little wine, remembering a certain bird — take on a significance that can only be called mythical, and that our writers, when they enter that field, know, instinctively know, that they are in such a significant place.”  From Gerald Stern‘s preface to Night Out: Poems About Hotels, Motels, Restaurants, and Bars, Edited by Kurt Brown and Laure-Anne Bosselaar

Night Out: Poems About Hotels, Motels, Restaurants, and Bars — published by Milkweed Press in Minneapolis — features the work of 125 poets, including Billy Collins and Charles Simic. Originally released in 1997, Amazon is currently selling copies of this 362-page book for 19 cents plus $3.99 shipping. Find it here.

Maids Are Bickering…, Poem by Jim Morrison

MAIDS ARE BICKERING…
by Jim Morrison

Maids are bickering in the hall
The day is warm
Last night’s perfume
I lie alone in this
cool room

My mind is calm & swirling
like the marble pages of an
old book

I’m a cold clean skeleton
scarecrow on a hill
In April
Wind eases the arches
of my boney Kingdom
Wind whistles thru my mind
& soul
My life is an open book
or a T.V. confession

…”Maids are Bickering…” is found in The American Night: The Writings of Jim Morrison, Volume 2, available at Amazon.com.

Photo: “Pink Curtains, New York City” by Terrie-Johnson, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Leaving the Motel by W.D. Snodgrass

LEAVING THE MOTEL

Poem by W.D. Snodgrass

Outside, the last kids holler
Near the pool: they’ll stay the night.
Pick up the towels; fold your collar
Out of sight.

Check: is the second bed
Unrumpled, as agreed?
Landlords have to think ahead
In case of need,

Too. Keep things straight: don’t take
The matches, the wrong keyrings–
We’ve nowhere we could keep a keepsake–
Ashtrays, combs, things

That sooner or later others
Would accidentally find.
Check: take nothing of one another’s
And leave behind

Your license number only,
Which they won’t care to trace;
We’ve paid. Still, should such things get lonely,
Leave in their vase

An aspirin to preserve
Our lilacs, the wayside flowers
We’ve gathered and must leave to serve
A few more hours;

That’s all. We can’t tell when
We’ll come back, can’t press claims,
We would no doubt have other rooms then,
Or other names.

NOTE: William DeWitt Snodgrass (1926-2009) won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry in 1960. He is considered a leading figure — along with Sylvia Plath, Allen Ginsberg, Robert Lowell, and Anne Sexton — in the confessional school of poetry.

Photo: Built in 1946, the Olive Motel is an old-school motor court motel located at 2751 Sunset Blvd. in the Silverlake area of Los Angeles. I’ve driven past this place countless times and always figured it was abandoned — but from what I gather via Google, it’s still in business.

Motel Chronicles by Sam Shepard

Excerpt from MOTEL CHRONICLES by Sam Shepard

       He stands still by the smashed suitcase peering down into all his one-time belongings. Crushed soap bars saved from motel showers. Flattened cans of string beans. A mangled map of Utah. Hot tar and blacktop ground into the pure white towel he was saving for his first long bath in a month.
       Nothing moves from one end of the highway to the other. Not even a twig flutters. Not even the Meadowlark feather stuck to a nail in the fence post.
       He pushes the toe of his boot across the burned black rubber skid mark. Follows the crazy swerve of tires with his eyes. Sour smell of rubber. Sweet smell of sand sweltering.
       Now a lizard moves. Makes a fragile fish-like wake with its tail. Disappears. Swallowed in a sea of sand.
       Should he try to salvage something? Some small token of the whole collection. A pair of socks? The batteries from his flashlight? He should try to bring her something back. Some little something. Some memento so at least she’d think he’d been doing more than nothing. Just drifting all these months.
       He pokes around in the debris with a mesquite stick looking for a present. Nothing seems worth saving. Not even the undamaged things. Not even the clothes he’s wearing. The Turquoise ring. The wing-tip boots. The Bareback buckle.
       He drops them all on the pile of rubble. Squats naked in the baking sand. Sets the whole thing up in flame. Then stands. Turns his back on U.S. Highway 608. Walks straight out into opened land.

FROM THE AMAZON BLURB: Motel Chronicles reveals the fast-moving and sometimes surprising world of the man behind the plays that have made Sam Shepard a living legend in the theater. Shepard chronicles his own life birth in Illinois, childhood memories of Guam, Pasadena and rural Southern California, adventures as ranch hand, waiter, rock musician, dramatist, and film actor. Scenes from this book form the basis of his play Superstitions, and of the film (directed by Wim Wenders) Paris, Texas, winner of the Golden Palm Award at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival.

Note: Motel Chronicles was originally published in 1982 by City Lights (San Francisco).

Poems about Hotels, Motels, Restaurants, and Bars

“…our restaurants, motels, and watering places represent a kind of charged field where ordinary events — ordering a meal, spilling a little wine, remembering a certain bird — take on a significance that can only be called mythical, and that our writers, when they enter that field, know, instinctively y now, that they are in such a significant place.” 

From Gerald Stern‘s preface to Night Out: Poems About Hotels, Motels, Restaurants, and Bars, Edited by Kurt Brown and Laure_Anne Bosselaar

Thoughts: What a great concept for a poetry collection! The book — published by the outstanding Milkweed Press in Minneapolis — features the work of 125 poets, including Billy Collins and Charles Simic. Originally released in 1997, Amazon is currently selling copies of this 362-page book for 57 cents plus $3.99 shipping. Find it here.