Stairmaster to Heaven
EvilToasterElf
Posts: 1,119
I'm gonna give this one it's own thread - it's looooong, and needs some work still.
Stairmaster to Heaven
“the status quo” my father would often say,
“is exactly as it should be,”
it pulls at us like gravity
the siren song of the remote control
“everybody’s the same”
he was so fond of pointing out
life is something that was just given out
like slop at a soup kitchen
and so many work to find a bed in their bi-level
“delicate snow flakes, my ass” he belched after his third beer,
“you didn’t fight to be born,
if anything you fought to stay unborn, we
had to cut your mother open”…he would trail off
his favorite metaphor for my birth, my mother’s
only c-section, was popping the hood of their Chrysler
and pulling out the engine
my mother died during child birth
he would only say it while he was drunk
but it always made me cry
I was only becoming immune at the age of 15
I often wonder how a newborn reacts
ripped from the warmth and darkness
to lay eyes upon death, how indelible
is that first memory
when birth is a tragedy, what can life be?
born into a basement, I was always climbing
stairs in the dark
I reach a landing,
blow out the candles on my cake
and move up the next flight
“Who needs college?”
said the man, the mechanic
after a while, he wouldn’t wash
his hands before cooking dinner,
always pasta, always with the slight
aftertaste of motor oil, of car death
“If it’s good enough to buy your clothes,”
he would mumble, “it’s good enough
to eat.” When he stopped finding solace
in beer, he replaced his dead wife with liquor.
I went with my friends and their parents
to look at schools,
pretending their questions to the tour guides
were worries about me.
By my sixteenth birthday, I was becoming
a good cook. I got a weekend job. I learned
the right way to water down whiskey and bourbon,
without effecting the taste.
None of my friends have ever been inside my house.
“I can’t believe a raised a fag,” was his new phrase,
almost incoherently between swigs. When he noticed,
“You ain’t never brought a girl home.” Or anyone
for that matter, this house is a leper colony.
None of my scholarships came through, I would have
to commute to school, and work full-time.
I don’t know what I want to be, my only desire
is escape, the one gift never offered by the state.
By the time I chose my biology major, I had almost
decided the loans for private school,
were worth the release.
Then he came home with a hooker
The two of them stumbling arm and arm,
A holy union of cash and cum, he turned to
me and said, “If we play our cards right…you,”
at this point he tripped going up the stairs,
two worlds trailed off behind the slamming bedroom door,
“new,” and “mom.”
The new one at least had better taste than the old one.
She left with his wallet in the middle of the night.
He may have hit my “stupid, faggot ass,” once for
every one of the twelve dollars he probably had left.
By the time I graduated he was collecting unemployment.
I climbed up through medical school and during my
Residency I stayed at home again. I had been poor
A long time, but the first time I stole, it was charcoal
pills. So I wouldn’t have to get his stomach pumped
every weekend.
Without knowing it, my path veered toward the
maternity ward. Watching birth for two years,
watching women hold their new borns, whitewashed
the walls of guilt, hidden in the dark space on the
back of my eyelids.
Six months after my first unsupervised birth,
He finally died. The doctors tried to explain
The cause, but I didn’t care which series of
Organs finally stopped functioning first.
The relatives that had abandoned us for so long,
Finally came back for the wake, and they would
Patronize me with their mock sincerity, telling
Me, “You’ve been so strong.”
I didn’t cry.
I couldn’t tell them the only thing I was holding
back was rage. I was glad for the closed casket,
so I wouldn’t have a final chance,
to spit in his fucking face.
Then it happened, when his memory had faded
Into an ambition to avoid his life, I lost my first
mother. My first c-section – her last.
A few days later I had my first drink.
A month later I realized I had inherited more,
than my father’s name, and his debts.
By the time I had finished every drop that his
failed liver left in the house, my license to practice
was revoked.
After all these years, I finally realized I was climbing
the stairs of an Escher painting. Never rising or falling,
only moving in the shortest line from death to death.
Maybe I was dead the day I was born, and I was the only
one who was fooled into believing otherwise.
I climbed my last set of stairs to the edge of the pier.
As drunk as my father had ever been,
smarter than he’d ever been, as blind as love,
as blind as justice, waiting for a brief lapse in the wind.
Stairmaster to Heaven
“the status quo” my father would often say,
“is exactly as it should be,”
it pulls at us like gravity
the siren song of the remote control
“everybody’s the same”
he was so fond of pointing out
life is something that was just given out
like slop at a soup kitchen
and so many work to find a bed in their bi-level
“delicate snow flakes, my ass” he belched after his third beer,
“you didn’t fight to be born,
if anything you fought to stay unborn, we
had to cut your mother open”…he would trail off
his favorite metaphor for my birth, my mother’s
only c-section, was popping the hood of their Chrysler
and pulling out the engine
my mother died during child birth
he would only say it while he was drunk
but it always made me cry
I was only becoming immune at the age of 15
I often wonder how a newborn reacts
ripped from the warmth and darkness
to lay eyes upon death, how indelible
is that first memory
when birth is a tragedy, what can life be?
born into a basement, I was always climbing
stairs in the dark
I reach a landing,
blow out the candles on my cake
and move up the next flight
“Who needs college?”
said the man, the mechanic
after a while, he wouldn’t wash
his hands before cooking dinner,
always pasta, always with the slight
aftertaste of motor oil, of car death
“If it’s good enough to buy your clothes,”
he would mumble, “it’s good enough
to eat.” When he stopped finding solace
in beer, he replaced his dead wife with liquor.
I went with my friends and their parents
to look at schools,
pretending their questions to the tour guides
were worries about me.
By my sixteenth birthday, I was becoming
a good cook. I got a weekend job. I learned
the right way to water down whiskey and bourbon,
without effecting the taste.
None of my friends have ever been inside my house.
“I can’t believe a raised a fag,” was his new phrase,
almost incoherently between swigs. When he noticed,
“You ain’t never brought a girl home.” Or anyone
for that matter, this house is a leper colony.
None of my scholarships came through, I would have
to commute to school, and work full-time.
I don’t know what I want to be, my only desire
is escape, the one gift never offered by the state.
By the time I chose my biology major, I had almost
decided the loans for private school,
were worth the release.
Then he came home with a hooker
The two of them stumbling arm and arm,
A holy union of cash and cum, he turned to
me and said, “If we play our cards right…you,”
at this point he tripped going up the stairs,
two worlds trailed off behind the slamming bedroom door,
“new,” and “mom.”
The new one at least had better taste than the old one.
She left with his wallet in the middle of the night.
He may have hit my “stupid, faggot ass,” once for
every one of the twelve dollars he probably had left.
By the time I graduated he was collecting unemployment.
I climbed up through medical school and during my
Residency I stayed at home again. I had been poor
A long time, but the first time I stole, it was charcoal
pills. So I wouldn’t have to get his stomach pumped
every weekend.
Without knowing it, my path veered toward the
maternity ward. Watching birth for two years,
watching women hold their new borns, whitewashed
the walls of guilt, hidden in the dark space on the
back of my eyelids.
Six months after my first unsupervised birth,
He finally died. The doctors tried to explain
The cause, but I didn’t care which series of
Organs finally stopped functioning first.
The relatives that had abandoned us for so long,
Finally came back for the wake, and they would
Patronize me with their mock sincerity, telling
Me, “You’ve been so strong.”
I didn’t cry.
I couldn’t tell them the only thing I was holding
back was rage. I was glad for the closed casket,
so I wouldn’t have a final chance,
to spit in his fucking face.
Then it happened, when his memory had faded
Into an ambition to avoid his life, I lost my first
mother. My first c-section – her last.
A few days later I had my first drink.
A month later I realized I had inherited more,
than my father’s name, and his debts.
By the time I had finished every drop that his
failed liver left in the house, my license to practice
was revoked.
After all these years, I finally realized I was climbing
the stairs of an Escher painting. Never rising or falling,
only moving in the shortest line from death to death.
Maybe I was dead the day I was born, and I was the only
one who was fooled into believing otherwise.
I climbed my last set of stairs to the edge of the pier.
As drunk as my father had ever been,
smarter than he’d ever been, as blind as love,
as blind as justice, waiting for a brief lapse in the wind.
Post edited by Unknown User on
0
Comments
Yeah, they always disappear. Like lending a hand would taint thier ever-so-perfect lives, right? :rolleyes:
I really liked the part above too!!! Excellent!!!!
You were right, my friend, this hit me.
Even if it's not from your personal experience (which I sure as hell hope it's not!), I just wanna give ya a big hug right now! You did a wonderful job potraying a typical alcoholic and the effects his drinking has on those around him. It's such an ugly disease. :(
I think I have more to say but it just won't come out.
I should put the disclaimer in - this is just a story - but I thought it came out pretty well - thanks for reading.
cheers to any who rise above growing up in an emotionally shut down home
myself included (this father so much like my stepdad)
love it, evil.
i mean, i could pick at it if you're interested... with my limited expert-*cough* tise... but i wont 'less you want me to.
ciaocito
Please do - I was just concentrating on laying out the story for the most part - but it can certainly do with some slicing and dicing to say the least.
I was pretty sure it was a story but you never know. Especially when the writer captures someone's life like that, like it was their own. It came out very well.
No thanking me, thank you for sharing, my friend!
cool...
i'll take another look a little bit later
thanks... i love critique... makes me a much more conscientious writer... i think
No one needs a smile more than someone who fails to give one,
After you die...you know how to LIVE!
I really no absolutely nothing when it comes to writing, but if you want an uneducated opinion, I will give it. There is only one piece of the story that didn't seem to flow quite right to me and that is this section...
Then it happened, when his memory had faded
Into an ambition to avoid his life, I lost my first
mother. My first c-section – her last.
A few days later I had my first drink.
A month later I realized I had inherited more,
than my father’s name, and his debts.
By the time I had finished every drop that his
failed liver left in the house, my license to practice
was revoked.
the first part is excellent, the last part is great, but something about the linking of the two, that single line, just didn't sit right with me. I can't say why. Maybe it seemed like a leap, or maybe it was just too obvious what would follow. Or maybe it was because it was his FIRST drink. I don't know. but that's all I can say. I like to know what you think about what I just said.
I kind of assumed toward the end that the threads were start to wear thin, when you write a long piece like this sometimes, you're just so anxious to make sure you get everything in your head on paper than especially toward the end - you start to rush things - I think it's a very valid point