The Sixth of the Thomas(es)

Angry, transmogrified, livid, drunken, the writer has just closed an e-mail which he was reading. It was an e-mail sent him by Austin MacCauley Publishers, "accepting" his piece. AM Publishers: one of those fake, disease-ridden (co-)publishing companies which exist to steal from all starving, naïve, and ignorant artists; the poor foolers. The poor fools, too.

The writer leaves it, hear: like a shitepaper on a shoe'sbottom:

"Dear Mr MacLane, Settling a Classic Novelette, your manuscript, was brought to our attention at the latest Editorial Board meeting when we discussed the confident state that your work was found to be in. It exists as an inspiring and immersive short story collection, very well written, and it will definitely, we think, captivate a wide audience. The Board was keen to comment on your unique voice and felt that it conveyed a positive message to the reader, remarking that this book has the power and style and the effective language which make a work a contender in its detailed genre....."

Oh, to hell with their lying. I will write for this lovely blog: Reedsy. The turret, here: again. Oh, yes. Yes.

Oh! Ah! Ah! Remembering those times sober, when I tried to gain a scent of the drink by reading Thomas. I would tell anyone I came into contact with who cared about books in the slightest, "he's just like drinking," though I'd be sober as God's day. It was a habit. Since undertaking that sobriety on myself (something which I am not wearing here in this motel room, blasted), I had also undertaken the habit of telling those literary connoisseurs whom I came into contact with that Thomas really was the antidote to any alcoholic cravings. Read him while you crave and it goes away. A few words of Thomas and you feel drunk without a taste of the stuff, in a way that makes you feel semantically drunk but repulsed from any beergoggle-implicatory actions. But really, though, I was only building myself up. You're the blasted one who reads Thomas, I'd say to myself constantly. And it was true, during those beautiful times of purest sobriety. Whenever I'd pick up a book of prose or poetry by Thomas, I'd immediately fall into a blasé caretakeriety of words and ideas, a feeling, to me, so akin to that dear feeling of drunken notwithstandingness. Now, now......

No not Wolfe, I'd respond to myself, schizoidly and timely.

Dylan.

You're the one who told everyone who asked, "Oh, Dylan Thomas? He reminds me of drunkenness, really being drunk."

They didn't ask, but you told.

And now you're sitting here, in this motel room, writing essays on this, that, and another, hoping you'll win the fifty dollar composite prize, so that you can buy another book, or two, or maybe three. Visions of Cody, hardback, thirty dollars. Very good, then. Keep telling, them.

Burguesque: Enderby is the patron saint, he is, up your arse.

Dylan Thomas was a Welsh poet. Other than that, I only have a few things to say about the bright bastard. One, his rhythm matches or beats Kerouac's, and two, his rhythm is a goddamn great one. Really. Nothing like him anywhere. Not only the words, the language, but the images, the ideas. Pure sight, he is.

I'm the one who told everyone who asked or didn't, "Reading Dylan Thomas is like drinking a half pint of Scotch Whiskey."

Well, seeing as how we've written a few shorts, one about love and another about Americano sitcoms or something, it seems best we finally get down to business.

I am one who thinks it best to call a spade a spade, and to really take life by the horns. It is for these reasons that I constantly refer back to Thomas's genius, both when asked and when not asked. What I'm trying to say is, I've had enough Scotch Whiskey.

A few years ago I dated a stripper. No, she wasn't a stripper, but used to be. She wouldn't like much me talkin' about her past like this, nor would I, matter of fact.

A few years ago I dated a nice, stately, plump gal named Sean. She worked at a strip club in South L.A. but there's no need to mention that, now. The time I was dating her she was (mostly) working as a red for a comp which specialized in cleaning asbestos out of people's attic and stuff. Anyway, she, at one point during our brief but hilarious escapade of explorative romance of sorts if you can call it that (oh, dating today is a joke, I'll just throw this in here, yes), came up with the wonderfully bright idea of exchanging books. Fine, I thought. Just great. I was reading Hesse at the time, but I didn't want to give myself away, of course. So, I scrounged about and found her a copy of Thomas's A Prospect by the Sea.

A week later she returned it to me, a wild look in her blue eyes, always searching, saying to me, "What the fuck was that about?"

"He was always shit-faced when he wrote," I answered, full smiling.

I mean, really, a full smile. Real full.

Good 'ol Dylan Thomas.

Anyway, one of the stories in the Thomas collection, A Prospect of the Sea, was about a young girl at a carnival. She gets lost, makes friends with the carnies, and generally meets their personalities, as they unveil themselves. Great story.

The thing about Dylan is, his words, his imagery, his characters, they all merge in some type of mixing-pot symbolism which doesn't necessarily serve as a compendium but as a flux.

A lemon.

An Englishman.

A flow of fastflowing river.

A writer.

A fish, "a big one."

A writer.

A sitcom.

An inspiration.

A lonely yet not-so-lonely young (yet, not really still so young) writer, sitting on his queen bed in his motel room, anonymous (but not really), thinking to himself:

I must get these stories out, before doubt assails, before I take-off to France, before the world turns into the bottom of my foot and I callus the rest of it to oblivion since my microwave burrito tastes off and my American midnight sitcom won't keep unstaticfied.

.....& here the young yet not so young writer goes back over his words.

He is sitting on the bed, writing. His dreams are, as it were, still flowing. The gang members are shouting at each other outside his motel room. He locks the door and walks back to the shabbybed, taking up his laptop.

He is wondering why he is still adding stories to his blog on Reedsy. No use, it seems. This is the fourth one oggi. He cannot stop, it seems. This one, what's it about? American sitcoms? True love? The domani of Foreign Countries? Yes. It is about.....

Yes.

Improve it to the moon!

If I were to go off like Dylan Thomas or F. or F. O. or Shem or Sham right now my words would inspoet you to the moon, by God.

Thar be thence a finkly nick of furth-thimely nue-sunce.

Oh, pillpenny morn, oh clogs not a bit a pussel..... Agh!

Ah! Yes, a turtlescrub sunwarmth. The sixth of the Thomas(es).