Loony Ben

Ben, cooped up after decades on a mountain side because desert winds take your mind. Someone gave him a TV to be drawn as moths to that blue, glowing zapper. I found his wife's ashes in a plastic bag inside a box at the back of the bottom shelf, corner of his garage. So I put her in a terracotta pot where Ben use to sit at sundown and sunrise, which took place on his left and right shoulders.

His fingers explored acrylic paintings, rolling the tips over old oak textures. Ghosts hid his belongings. Otherwise, he'd have flushed them to the septic tank, not emptied in twelve years and I remember the smells permeating from those backed pipes.

Sipping Beam with him, hugging each arm around his five foot frame, twice, with caution. He loved to see us come and loved to see us go. Alone with his thoughts, Ben was taught, quite rightly, that that lady is the weather trapped in a frying pan and three people in his bathtub is exactly how he feels today.

Ben, out there telling Billy Mac how things truly are. His suspicions relieved when he gave away the lock-box to strangers, but friends sent him to the half-way house.