The Rose Room ((Stockyards of Minnesota)(English and Spanish))

The Rose Room
((The Stockyards of South St. Paul, Minnesota, 1966) (a Chick Evens Story))



Chick Evens went to work for the stockyards one summer in 1966, near the town-let of South Saint Paul, the summer was extremely hot, and you could bake an egg on the sidewalks.
His mother worked at Swift’s Meats (in the meatpacking department), the company, which he now came to be employed at, made a deep impression on Chick’s mind and he never forgot the thoughts and experiences that came to him during those last months of that summer working at the stockyards inside a packing house (cutting up carcasses of hogs), and especially delivering animal waste to the Rose Room!

The traditional puffing forth smoke, which attracted attention to its tall chimneys as they rumbled along and burnt up the remains of pigs, cows, sheep, and goats, slowly over miles of bones and animal waste, circulated the air, and drifted throughout the huge stockyards, second to the nation’s largest in Chicago.
One could see and smell at any section, division or corner of the town-let this putrid smoke, from the stockyards, all the way down to the Mississippi River, some five-miles away, and even across the Robert Street Bridge, to the other side of the river, where resided St. Paul, proper, the inner city, the downtown area; that dark to light gray smoke, rising into the clear morning sky.
Where some of this smoke came from was a dim lit, small room through which an employee brought in stacks of animal throw away, desecrated meats, from throughout the stockyards. From these stacks could be seen glowing and pale pus from hams, torn hides, discolored skin and unusable bones and infected guts, and so forth, nothing to please an appetite.
There was no wind, or windows in this room—this room they called ‘The Rose Room’, just an iron round plate on the floor, heavy as a Cadillac car, it was opened by pressing a yellow button, and machinery lifted this tonnage door about three feet up…then it stopped as if a person might fall or jump into this inferno pit, and there was hell’s fire. You could hear the crackling of the fire, feel the heat penetrating your pores, and smell the punishingly putrid stink therewithal, and near suffocating in the process: it all was close to gagging the lungs, to a point of collapsing.
The fire was equal to the most blazing spot in a forest fire, it grew along the sides of the pit when the iron door was opened, like snakes running up its sides to escape.

∙

In the afternoons I went to what they called the Rose Room, opened up the door to the house of flames, it crackled and snapped under my feet, even the sole of my shoes got hot through the thick stone floor, the smell of this room was putrid, foul, sizzling. It made a man think about going back to school, it did me anyway, learn a real trade—it was a room I swear rented out by the devil or perhaps God Himself, to express where souls go to decay—the repentance abyss.
My mind captured such an image even before I set foot out of this room, the first time I brought in a wheelbarrow of animal waste—I remember I had little to say, looking into that abyss of flames, pouring my wheelbarrow of rotten animal carcasses, soft tissue, over the edge of the iron rounded door, watching the massive fire consume it even before it hit the bottom of the pot, boldly and freely.
∙

The fatty tissue, he poured down, into the pit, became inflamed almost instantly. This was a house with only one window—the fire window. When he had poured the waste over the edge of the opening, the fire leaped back up at him, swept over the rim of the frame that held the iron door in place, it swept all the way to his feet, he jumped back, stood against the wall looking into the hungered fire, as if it was a living beast trying to harm him, and a voice said something, a voice to the side of him, by the door that was usually shut to the room, except if someone else was waiting to commence in the same traditional work he had just finished…

∙

The Employee


Employee: Come on, come on! Let’s get going here sunny, I don’t have all day—give the rose a kiss and get the hell out of there so I can drop my load! (A laugh.)

Chick Evens: It almost got me!

Employee: It’s a suicide escape! ((he declared shrewdly) (he comes to stand beside Evens)) It creeps in when you’re half sleeping, or daydreaming on the job, stay alert in this room kid—now move on out of here, go around my backside, give me some room to maneuver my wheelbarrow.



Note: the stockyards in South St. Paul, created and built the city of South Saint Paul, establishing itself in between, 1885-1887, and built by Gustavus Franklin Swift Jr., and prior to him, his father. Prior to Swift’s And Company, there was no city south of St. Paul, Minnesota. It was one of the largest stockyards in the world, and second only to Chicago in the United States. This story is dedicated to the Swift Family, who in their way contributed to the employment of so many people in some many areas of the United States, and especially, South Saint Paul, Minnesota.

Written 5-16-2009 ((No: 398) (SA/5ds))


Spanish Version


El Cuarto Rosa
((El Corral de Ganado de San Pablo Sur, Minnesota, 1966) (Una Historia de Chick Evens))



Chick Evens fue a trabajar para el corral de ganado un verano de 1966, cerca al pueblito de San Pablo Sur; el verano era tan caluroso que podrías cocinar un huevo en las veredas.
Su madre trabajaba en Swift’s Meats (en el departamento de empaque de carnes), la compañía en la que ahora él había sido empleado, que formó una impresión profunda en la mente de Chick ya que él nunca se olvidaría de los pensamientos ni de las experiencias que él obtuvo trabajando en el corral, en la casa de empaques, durante los últimos meses de ese verano (cortando la carne de los cerdos muertos) y especialmente: ¡llevando los desechos de animales al Cuarto Rosa!
La tradicional nube de humo—que hacía que llamara la atención de sus chimeneas altas mientras éstas sonaban a lo largo y quemaban lentamente los restos de los cerdos, vacas, carneros y cabras, sobre miles de huesos y desperdicio de animal—hacía circular el aire y se iba a la deriva a través del corral inmenso, el segundo más grande en la nación después de Chicago.
Uno podía ver y oler en cualquier lugar del pueblito este humo putrefacto del corral, todo el camino abajo hacia el río Mississippi, aproximadamente a cinco millas de distancia e incluso cruzando el Puente Roberto, al otro lado del río donde residía la ciudad de San Pablo propiamente, el centro de la ciudad; aquel humo oscuro, ligeramente gris, levantándose en el cielo claro de la mañana.
Había una luz tenue de donde este humo venía, un cuarto pequeño donde un empleado traería, de todas partes del corral, montones de restos de animales para botarlos, carnes malogradas. Podía verse, en estas pilas, intensos y pálidos pus de los jamones, costados rasgados, piel descolorida, huesos inutilizables e intestinos infectados, etcétera, nada para complacer a un apetito.
No había ventanas ni corría viento en este cuarto—a este cuarto ellos lo llamaban “El Cuarto Rosa”—sólo un plato redondo de hierro en el piso, tan pesado como un carro Cadillac, éste se abría presionando un botón amarillo, y las máquinas levantarían este tonelaje de puerta, cerca de un metro de altura…luego éste se detendría como si una persona podría caerse o saltar dentro de esta fosa infernal; había un fuego de infierno. Tú podrías oír el sonido del fuego, sentir el calor penetrando tus poros, aparte de oler esa hediondez putrefacta y casi sofocante; en el proceso: todo esto estaba a punto de asfixiar a los pulmones, al punto de colapsar.
El fuego era igual al punto más ardiente en un incendio en la selva, éste crecía a lo largo de los lados de la fosa cuando la puerta de hierro se abría, como serpientes corriendo arriba a sus lados para escapar.

En las tardes iba a lo que ellos llamaban El Cuarto Rosa, abría la puerta de la casa de llamas, esta crujía y chasqueaba bajo mis pies, incluso la suela de mis zapatos se calentaban por el piso grueso de piedra, el olor de este cuarto era putrefacto, repugnante y sofocante. Esto hacía pensar a un hombre en volver al colegio, esto me hizo pensar de todas maneras, aprender un oficio real—este era un cuarto, lo juro, alquilado por el mismo diablo o talvez por Dios mismo, para decir a dónde van las almas a descomponerse—el abismo de arrepentimiento.
Mi mente capturó tal imagen incluso antes de poner un pie en este cuarto, la primera vez que traje una carretilla de desperdicio de animal—recuerdo que tuve poco que decir, mirando en el abismo de llamas, vaciando mi carretilla de carne muerta descompuesta y tejidos suaves sobre el borde de la puerta redonda de hierro, mirando al fuego masivo consumir esto antes que éstos tocaran el fondo del recipiente, audaz y libremente.

Los tejidos grasosos, que él tiraba en el hoyo, eran inflamados casi al instante. Esta era una casa con sólo una ventana—la ventana del fuego. Cuando él vertió los restos sobre el borde de la entrada, el fuego se extendió hacia él, barrió sobre el borde del marco que sostenía la puerta de hierro todo el camino hasta sus pies, él saltó hacia atrás, estuvo recostado en la pared mirando al hambriento fuego, como si éste fuera una fiera viva tratando de herirlo, y una voz dijo algo, una voz al costado de él, por la puerta que normalmente estaba cerrada, excepto si alguien más estuviera esperando para comenzar con el mismo trabajo tradicional que él acababa de terminar…


El Empleado

Empleado: ¡Vamos, vamos! Continuemos yendo, no tengo todo el día—dale un beso a la rosa y sal de aquí para que yo pueda vaciar mi carga (una risa).

Chick Evens: ¡Casi me alcanza!

Empleado: ¡Es un escape suicida! ((él dijo astutamente) (él vino a pararse detrás de Evens)) Este te alcanza cuando estás medio dormido, o soñando despierto en el trabajo, mantente alerto en este cuarto niño—ahora muévete de aquí, anda alrededor detrás de mi, dame más espacio para maniobrar mi carretilla.

Nota: Los corrales de ganados en el Sur de San Pablo, crearon y construyeron la ciudad de San Pablo Sur, estableciéndose ésta en el medio, entre 1885 y1887, construida por Gustavus Franklin Swift hijo, y antes que él por su padre. Antes de la Compañía Swift, no existía la ciudad de San Pablo Sur, en Minnesota. Este era uno de los más grandes corrales el mundo, el primero estaba en Chicago en Estados Unidos. Esta historia está dedicada a la familia Swift quienes, en su forma, contribuyeron a dar empleo a tanta gente en algunos lugares de los Estados Unidos, y especialmente, en el Sur de San Pablo, Minnesota.

Escrito el 16-Mayo-2009 ((No: 398) (SA/5ds))

Stalking and Ambush of the Amazon Puma (a short story; more truth than fiction)

Stalking and Ambush
Of the Amazon Puma


The Stalking

The trail was a quarter foot deep in the ground and roughly worn where it slanted up, to go down the hill, that looked like an over weeded irrigation ditch, we climbed down it slowly, a short but steep hill, and halfway down on the right we sat there with our backs against the now, two hill tops, and tall grass all about us, and bushes, a few trees. It was very green and warm country, with small hills, embankments, jungle all around: below the rainforest was a thick grassy, bushy plateau, where our lodge resided, just beyond that flatten landscape as the lodge itself was enmeshed into a jungle like setting.
The lodge sat on a cut of land, alongside a tributary that ran— out into the Amazon River, with a few other water courses.
Avelino was jealous of no one at the lodge, as far as guides go. He simply knew he was better than all of them; more of a hunter, a faster tracker, and guide, a no-nonsense person, didn’t drink or smoke, and he had class in almost everything he did, his one fault, if you can call it that, was, he nearly ever smiled. If anyone was jealous it was perhaps his assistants: Jose and Manuel (who managed the boat trips usually), if not possibly Captain Marcelo (the lodges only licensed pilot on the river). It seemed as if or appeared to be, Avelino took command of the show.


This day had almost come to an end, evening was descending all around us; Avelino, myself and Rosa, in the thick of the jungle, had walked about three miles from the canopy, and were a mile from the local tribal village, we had visited in the morning. We had left the canopy area too late to get back to the lodge before twilight—and the trail was becoming hard to see. Avelino said, “This country is like my backyard, I know it like the back of my hands, don’t worry, we only got a little ways to go!”
Even in spite of the puma following us, more like stalking, about one-hundred years to our left side, in the deep, perhaps closer now, it was hard to see.
If it was still daylight, and if you looked away from the jungle, and the hill side, this hilly slope, with its long gradation, of high and low foliage, we were headed toward flattened land down below us, grass burnt yellow and brown, cut in sections by our lodge, so one could see what might be lurking, and across this long sweep, lead right to the lodge’s wooden walkway, and chain of cabins, which lead to the main lodge.
We all sat here, while I got my strength, and energy back, and heart beat went back to normal, and watched the lights go on, one by one, in the lodge, far-off in the distance.

Avelino was looking carefully for the brown, sleek puma, squatting on his heels to see movement in the tall grass, behind a few bushes. We were all weaponless. There was a warm breeze that appeared to come from the direction of the tributary; it blew the tall grass around some, on the hillside. There were many small pale to gray clouds overhead, and there were no trees to speak of, more like tall hedge plants, and shrub, on and round this spot; here the foliaged was so thick—so it seemed—you could almost walk on top of it.
For a quarter of an hour we did not see anything. Then with Avelino’s long white poking stick, as we were about ready to make our descend down the rest of the hill, then to the edge of the rainforest, across the flattened land, and cut grass section to the lodge, I saw something moving over the shoulder of Avelino, towards us. I was sweating so badly, I had to wipe my glasses clear. A flash, I witnessed a reddish-brown-colored something, lighted by the moon, moving slowly, but with quick jerking like motions though the grass, it didn’t seem to me it was the puma though, too near to the ground.
The sky was now filled with dark shadows, and we fought to make each step in the tall grass, pushing head-first, fighting and pushing the grass and bushes to our sides, while we watched for the puma, and at the lights of the lodge.
It was near inky dark now, except for the stars, and the moon, and the lodge’s lights, and we were close to the edge of the rainforest—think, I was thinking, the puma had failed its mission.
Edging down a little further my tennis shoes ruined, feeling roots and rocks and holes under them. I was excited with this night because we had seen the puma, but now it had put me on guard.
The closer we got to the lodge, I could taste the aroma of coffee on my tongue and thought about eating a breakfast, not a dinner; still my heart pounding but now on the flattened land, somehow I felt safer but not Avelino.
“Everyone stay close to one another,” he said, as if the excitement was about to start.
Avelino pointed back towards the edge of the rainforest, watching where he was pointing, his white stick in his right hand, to the left of the stick was a deep gulch, gap in the landscape, and then an open patch of forest, “That is where he is;” said Avelino, and as we a walked towards the lodge, now a shadow and movement followed us in, moving very quickly, and pushing some of the bushes aside, it was now too dark to see a thing, and we all transverse as we walked, we did not see the puma, but we could hear him. We could no longer hear birds overhead, nor saw them flying, but that was all. I stepped in some dung, I could smell it on my shoes, but we saw nothing, not even the green, and no sounds of monkey’s; the lodge and its preemptor was jungle, not as the flatten land we were now on, and we were still 600-feet from the wooden walkway that was attached to the cabins, and main lodge.
I was thinking, maybe the puma had gone back to the main part of the jungle—its home, I knew they were a stalk and ambush predator, and could jump some forty feet, but inside the jungle was cooler, perhaps it wanted to get out of this heat. But that was my ignorance speaking, it was hungry.
I was beginning to feel brave again, and it was nice to be able to walk in an easy stroll, I mean, simply walk, not worried about the puma. Rosa strolled very close to me. Avelino had his white stick resting on his shoulder. And the moon overhead was hot, hot enough to make me sweat, as if its light was burning with the breeze.
Avelino motioned to us two, to stop, in front of us was the puma. It was near eight feet long, brownish coat, perhaps close to 150 to 160 pounds, it wasn’t ambushing now I told myself, it was confronting. But what did I see back on the slope, it was reddish-brown.
Avelino had his eyes staring at the cat’s movement, his stick in front of him waving it, it seemed worthless to do it, but he did it nonetheless. He grinned.
Usually puma’s were shy of humans, so I was told, but I don’t believe that anymore, it was a bunch of hogwash, and we were valuable meat, and the beast was hungry. In a way it seemed natural for it to be here, no longer was it a mystery, nothing odd or unseemly in the pacing of the beast, in a half-circle, or in a man carrying a white stick.

The Ambush


The puma gave a great leap, a jump—Avelino shot his stick up, the cat was several yards from us, he gave a second jump then ran off fast.
“Avelino,” I told him, “What.”
Lying on its side was a large reddish-brown rodent; it looked like an oversized guinea pig, perhaps two feet in length, and forty-five pounds, a rat, a giant rat.
We all stood there a moment, as casual observers, it was a capybara, they grow much larger, and this was perhaps half its size. I think I was more amazed than in shock. To all appearances, he was dead, and the cat had taken what it considered, the least resistant, meaty meal, thank goodness.
I could feel my heart beating as if I wanted to push it back into place—my chest felt hot against my fingers, watching the cat ripping at the beast-rodent as if to show off, “Let’s hurry out of here,” said Avelino.

At the lodge I had scars on my forearms from all the bushes I had to push out of my way; some even on my forehead, some folks asking if I had fallen off the canopy as a bad joke. I had one good, near severe welt on the bottom of my foot, a few broken toenails, holes in my socks, scratched shoulders, torn shirt.
In the morning we all went out to look at the carcass of the giant rodent, Avelino to burying the remains, if there were any. Not sure why I wanted to go along, perhaps to see what the cat had done, could do, does when he’s hungry. The cat had eaten and tore out the rodent’s liver, kidneys as if with a knife, skillfully the cat had slit open the stomach and turned it inside, emptied it out into the grass, must have shook the rat-beast some, like a tree, to have eaten other delicacies in it, I figured, the paws of the cat were large I remember, good for sweeping out the inners.
“You folks go on back to the lodge, and get ready for Jose and Manuel to take you on a boat ride, I’ll get to burying this rodent,” said Avelino, without a smile, just a plain old grin. I was completely happy it was over.


5-8-2009

Eating her Own Death (A chapter story, on WWI)

Eating her Own Death
((A Chapter story from “To Save the Lopsided Sparrow) (Sequel to: “Cornfield Laughter”))



It was funny to Corporal Shannon O’Day to see Leticia shot at close range. There was something strange, almost comic to it—a bullet and all of a sudden an agitated surprise to the mad woman’s face, a surprise to find inside of her, in the center of her lair, to see her drop backwards (than catch her balance), next—to watch her go frantic in dizzying circles at some robotic electric impulse, as if she was racing ahead of death itself, inside of her. But the great puzzle was—for the moment anyway—the great puzzle of all was, the thing Shannon O’Day shook his head back and fourth about, and had to turn away from was—as she laughed (ashamed he was even looking at this mad woman’s humor) —that she madly ripped at her stomach area, tearing at it, until it split open, and pulling out her intestines and then stood there jerking them out and eating them, jerking them out and eating them, taking pleasure in it, relishing it; Shannon just would shake his head, horridly so, as it was unspeakable.

It was an awful sight. Self eating and devouring of the near-dead, herself, as she was dying; it all became stinking, foul. Death had played a dirty joke, so he felt. He looked around for whiskey, anything to drink, to get drunk on, anything kind of alcohol would suffice, and found a bottle of Watermelon wine under the straw topped bed, the one he was sitting on, and the very one he had recovered from his wound on, the very one he had slept on for eleven days. It was a half gallon of wine, the label read, “Watermelon Wine, aged one year, 2-3 large watermelons, up to 7-1/2 lbs, finely granulated sugar, 3 tsp acid blend, 2 crushed Camp den tablet, 3 tsp yeast nutrient packet Champagne yeast…(makes three galloons). It was in: English, French, Russian and German; someone was not taking sides, and selling his stock of wine to all the future, and potential, War Veterans, and anybody who could pay in general.
Shannon, sat on the edge of his bed started drinking the wine, drinking it half empty, looking at Leticia, drinking faster than he could swallow his saliva, having to spat on the side. He knew he had to get out of the lair, lest he get sick, and he never got sick from drinking, and he pulled himself together, sat outside, nervously holding onto the bottle, drinking it empty.
This was not anything to laugh about, openly or anytime, but he felt somehow superior to and wondered at this, as he looked at her, over his shoulder, her body still on the floor, than staggered out of town out of the war torn hamlet, called Douaumont, once and for all. He knew, instinctively so, that the battle of Verdun was over, if only now he could find his French Battalion.

Fifty day, 5-6-2009, written out on the roof, Lima, Peru · A Chapter story for “To Save a Lopsided Sparrow” · 529

The Farm (The Missing Chapter, to the Novel: "Cornfield Laughter.")

The Farm
(The Missing Chapter, to the Novel: “Cornfield Laughter.”)



“Yes, brother,” said Gus O’Day to his younger brother Shannon, “a man sees too much if he lives too long: a lot of fellows in a lot of situations.”
He was chatting in a kindly tone with his brother on the porch steps of his farm, Gus’ wife, Mabel, sitting on a rocker on the open air porch. It was a cool evening, and Shannon had spent a good portion of it out in the cornfields drinking by him self.
“All this farm life gets yaw tired I’d think, up the nose with rules and regulations, and if you don’t produce, the government gives yaw money, and if you do, and you want to sell, and the government don’t want you to raise more crops and sell, you can’t sell them anyhow, you end up storing them in some bin, the government steps in, don’t know how you put up with it, but I love your cornfields brother, I love the crows, and the smell of dirt and the yellowish-green in the cornstalks, and listening to the trains go by on those metal tracks, and even when the breaks screech, and one car bumps into to another.”
“Yup!” said Gus, “we done made a bowl of soup out of ourselves on this here farm alright, now all we are, is recipes for the government, if they want stew with corn we plant corn. If they want stew with carrots, we plant carrots; if they want…oh you know what I mean.”
“Man don’t need a backbone anymore, brother (Gus asks for a swig of Shannon’s bottle of whisky, and he hands it to him, and Mabel says, ‘Slow with it, remember your heart, you’re no spring chicken, Shannon’s twenty-five years younger than you, so take it easy.”)
“She likes to bug me,” said Gus, “but as you were going to say brother?”
“Yup!” said Shannon, “man don’t need a backbone anymore, it’s us old critters that have them, I don’t know how big of a wrench it will take to loosen mine up, no need for it nowadays.”

“I reckon Shannon you’d be right lonesome out here just by yourself.”
“I don’t rightly know what you mean by that, why you saying—what you saying?”
“Your older brother Shannon, Gus, he’s picked out his headstone already, matter-of-fact, the other day, says he’s goin’ to need it real soon,” remarked Mabel.
Mabel lit the lantern, it was becoming dark, moved it over a bit by the two brothers sitting on the steps, shoulder to shoulder.
“Can’t see the steps,” said Gus, “my eyes don’t work much anymore, too many shadows in them, I move too slow, breath too hard, get tired too quick.”
“I need to get up,” said Gus to Shannon. Shannon nodded his head up and down, toward his chest, “Yes” he said, but it wasn’t that he needed to relieve himself; it was he needed to get more air into his lungs, his stomach. And he stood up, and held tight onto the railing.
“Nonsense,” said Mabel, “just sit on back down, the strain is too much fer yaw!”
“Honor, and pride and discipline,” Gus told Shannon, “that’s the recipe for a man, and God.”
“I know all that Gus, and trouble is the best teacher, it always comes back to haunt yaw!”
“You know I got to go, got to leave yaw, couldn’t’ do it without seeing yaw one more time though…” Gus told Shannon in an almost whisper.
Shannon knew what he meant, it was Gus who had raised Shannon per near, he was always patient, calm, with him and figured if he ever wanted to know about God, his brother must had been a carbon copy of him. He was a good model, and always kind of put himself in the background, he had a servant’s heart. —Gus didn’t need to tell Shannon twice, he saw him holding his chest, leaning on that rail that extended from the first step to the third, the top one. Gus asked Shannon to stand up by him. Mabel had laid her head back, Shannon stood up, Gus leaned toward him. And here was two men kissing each other on the cheeks, each hugging the other showing outright love, without shame. He said his last words to Shannon, “It will be a long time from now to then.”
Mabel lifted up the lantern to see why Shannon O’Day was crying, a tall, lean, old man had stopped breathing.



Note on this Chapter Story: “The Farm”: Here is one of the missing chapters to the Novel "Cornfield Laughter" concerning the cornfields of where Shannon O'Day does much of his drinking. But in this chapter, left out of the book purposely, didn't have time to finish it, mentally it was there, just not down in writing, is when he meets his brother Gus, for the last time. He owns a farm next to some of Shannon's friends, whom he drinks in both their fields a river creek separating them. Written 5-1-2009. The other chapters yet not written I consider missing, that I felt should have been written during the three days writing of “Cornfield Laughter,” is of Shannon O’Day’s experience in WWI, which he expresses in the book, but not to any extent (and of course in that first story I had really wanted to center it on a certain all around theme, that being, the gathering of the souls surrounding Shannon’s life, with contentment a seeking goal, and therefore, a few other things like the farm and WWI, developed in the near future.

The Last of Sunset (One Soldier, WWII) A Short Story

The Last of Sunset
(One Soldier, WWII)


((The End) (The Last of Sunset))


Grandfather stood in the last of sunset in the open door, his fingers holding onto the end of his pipe, and his other hand and arm wound strong and steady around a broom, it was the last months of the war, 1945.
When the message came about Frank, he just lowered the broom to its side against hanging jackets next to the screened in door. And went to sit down in a kitchen chair around the corner of the parlor, the table being against the wall, I was eight-years old then, would be nine in two months. Grandpa sat slowly down and looked at the piece of paper, his older son Wally got out of the mailbox on the porch, he had handed it to him. He already knew beforehand what it was. He didn’t speak to anyone in the house. Just looked at the characterless envelope, it had no stamp on it; didn’t need one. He waited for his son, the older one to return, to come down from his attic bedroom.
“I can’t open it. You open it please.” He said to Wally.
“Damn Italy! Damn them Germans!” And then he grabbed his father and held him, trying to hold him. And that was all.

One day there was a call to arms, a war to fight, like my grandfather did in WWI, six-thousand miles away. And he went, and Uncle Frank now twenty some years later, got that same calling. He one morning got up out of bed and had breakfast and he was gone, just like that. He went to boot camp, someplace down south, and then onto Europe, to Italy, and that was all of him.

And in the next months and years to come, he would see pictures at the cinema, and in the papers, of a war that was. Names and pictures of dead soldiers, again, and again, and again. People who loved their sons and brothers, as we all loved Frank.


((The Beginning)(One Soldier))


“I got to go to war Paw,” Frank said.
“Why? He said, hesitantly, “I just don’t see any use in it any more, our country ain’t being invaded.”
“Germany and Italy started one and now Japan hit us in Pearl Harbor, besides it’s the right thing to do.”
“My brother Wally went paw, was a POW, now he’s home, he got a Purple Heart, I need to go.”
“The good it does for anyone I’ll never know. I went to war; Wally went to war, to protect a country that doesn’t need any protecting.”
“Anyway, I’ve got to go, I’m eighteen now.”
“Of course you got to go,” my grandfather said, “those Germans—”
“Go get me a hand full of tobacco out of my bedroom,” grandpa asked Frank.

So Frank got ready. And Uncle Wally came down from the bedroom attic to give him a ride to the Minneapolis’ induction center. Mother washed and mended his cloths before he left. That night I had overheard her talking to Anne, her older sister on the telephone, she said “I want him to go, and paw I think wants him to go, but neither one of us want him to go. I just don’t understand it, and I won’t ever, and so don’t expect me to.”
Then I walked back up stairs to the attic bedrooms, and laid down still and my head fell back into a feathered pillow maw and Aunt Betty, and grandma—before she died in 1933 of pneumonia—filled this pillow with chicken feathers. And I wasn’t talking to myself, I wasn’t talking to anybody, but I heard a voice in my head, “He’s got to go, nothing you can do about it,” it said. And I said out loud, “Them Germans—”
“Shoo,” said Uncle Wally, “we can’t do anything.”
I turned over softly, and kind of heaved over toward the side, looking at the rug beside my bed, on the floor in the dark.
“Anyhow,” said Uncle Wally, “he’ll be alright.”
But I knew, even at that age, folks don’t’ go to war for the amusement of it, nor leave their family for the fun of it, but Wally wanted me to go back to sleep, he said he had to give Frank a ride in the early morning to the induction center, he had to take his oath, I guess. I turned about on my bed onto my back, I told that voice in my head to ‘Shut up,” that secret voice. And fell to sleep.

The next morning we all got up, Uncle Wally, me and Maw and grandpa, and my brother Mike, and Uncle Frank, we ate breakfast, under the dim grayness of the morning, and we all looked a bit grim, all trying to keep busy, Maw trying to put breakfast on the table for everyone and I ate. Then we all finished, and Uncle Frank packed a small suite case of cloths. Maw said, “Honest folks need clean cloths, even when they are headed on to war, and a decent breakfast.”
I brought Frank his coat and hat, it was October, 1944, and maw and grandpa still didn’t cry, somehow I expected them to, but I wanted to, they just stood in front of Frank, and didn’t move. For all she cared, the country and all that was in it, they could have it, so long as they left our family alone. We were not rich, and maw didn’t care to have her brother fight and die for the rich because she believed our blood was as good as any blood anywhere out there, and somehow the rich forgot that, and she wanted to remind them of it. Then she kissed Frank, and Grandpa hugged him, and I hugged him, and held back my tears for later.

4-30-2009 ··

The Vanity of Ernest Hem (or, the Dead Roots Drama) Parts one and two complete

The Vanity of Ernest Hem
(Or, the Dead Roots Drama)


Three time Poet Laureate,
By Dennis L. Siluk Ed.D.

Part One
Of two parts


Chapter One


I had an impulse, when I was nineteen-years old, to become the editor and publisher of a small town weekly newspaper in Stillwater, Minnesota, it turned out to be a little more complex than I had expected. I think inside of most men they think they can be a singer, own a restaurant, or be a small town editor, and I was no different.
Formerly, when I lived in St. Paul Minnesota, I knew a good many newspaper men and women, met them through contacts when I was quite young, seventeen, eighteen and now nineteen. They all dreamed of getting away from the low tone, hustle and bustle of things in these Midwestern conservative cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul, and owning their own little place, running it the way they wanted to, and writing books in their spare time, or moving onto San Francisco or New York, something bigger, not like a generation before them, when now, the old folks, came to the city, and all they wanted was to own a corner ma and pa grocery store, that’s all but gone now. With change, comes new generational goals, comes new dreams, or perhaps it is just one dream for me, the dream I always wanted, to be a writer, a novelist, and in the interim, a newspaper man, and it all would start at nineteen years old for me, and it was starting.
This so called writer, a want to be writer, wanted to be a good writer, and write short stories, fiction, non-fiction, poetry, novelettes, novellas you name it, I wanted to write it, articles, essays and so forth. Just to write. I asked an author once, “What qualifies a person to be an author, or writer?” and he said, firmly, and stoutly, “He or she’s got to have a lot to say, or write about.” And I suppose now I am acquiring that.
There it is, I said it, in a nutshell, you see; a windy call to the brotherhood of ink slingers, and plot builders, and theme moulders. I am among them, few hear their calling at nineteen, but I did, I really did, not for vanity sake, yet I suppose I had a little of that who doesn’t. I mean it is one of the seven great sins I hear, but was mine any worse than anyone else’s? I’d say no; perhaps an objectionable vice, not a Christian teaching, but not in the bible per se, I had never read it, nothing to put me into the Dante’s ‘Divine Comedy,’ surely not one of the seven virtues also. I did not have the other six, if indeed Vanity is one: lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, envy and pride. Woops, pride, might be the other word for vanity. But I had kindness also, and humility, a raw kind of humility. My mother once said, pride is the most serious of all the deadly sins, and the ultimate source of which all the others arise. She said it is trying to compete with God; Lucifer tried that I mean, not me. I know that is what caused his fall from heaven. Anyhow, I’m talking too much on this subject.
In my own case, I had that impulse; I really, truly felt I did. But I knew I would have to learn the trade, I think that also, my head feels numb, but I will write on: I had to make a living, and this was my main reason to try and get a job as a newspaper editor, and in the process of all these elements, I’d become a writer, because I had a lot to say, a whole lot to say and write about. And the job just kind of made itself available. Almost like genetic manipulation now that I think of it. You know what I mean, like, environmental pollution; it just seeped in, like drug trafficking—it was there, available.
And I did get the job, in the little town-ship of Stillwater, after birthday party, with its deep history dating back to the around sometime in the 17th Century; Stillwater, about twenty-five miles outside of St. Paul.
(The Narrator :) I hate to pop in at such an occasion, but I must explain something psychological, behavior change techniques to improve behavior, such as altering an individual's behaviors and reactions to stimuli through positive and negative reinforcement of adaptive behavior and/or the reduction of maladaptive behavior through punishment and/or therapy, this my dear readers can all be reversed.)

Just making a living was not really the big issue, because back then when I got the job, work was plentiful in America, and Minnesota above all, perhaps a little better off than most states.
I suppose I felt making a living needed to connect with what I wanted to become, and knowing this I spent many hours at making my living, and writing at night, and trying to go to college, after my nineteenth birthday, I quite college, at the University of Minnesota at that point and time, never heard from them again either, they never tried to contact me, and so I left them be, I had one year behind me, and the owner of the newspaper overlooked having a degree. And I figured since Ernest Hemingway, and William Faulkner never had degrees, why would I have to have one, I mean I was in good company. Prior to this job, I had worked as a labourer, wandering from foundry to factory, just a common employee, for the most part; I needed money only to pay for my one room apartment, and my college tuition.
The sad thing was, I lost the impulse to write after I took that job in Stillwater, unknowingly why, and my new feelings were simply to publish, drink, try to do my college studies through the mail, Mr. Scriber, the newspaper owner fixed that up for me. Some college I never heard of but it was accredited, and that also took time away from my personal writings, no time for sending out manuscripts of my short stories, and so forth and so on. Oh I did sit at my desk and write out a few stories now and then, less then, than before, and less now than ever before. What I’m trying to say is I did not have much spare time, or sleeping time, cheating my body and mind of rest, for work and socialization. Mostly work and the socialization was with elements of the newspaper. But I was young and wild and like everyone else at my age, which’s to say I was any different.
My employer was naturally unaware of what was going on, because I played the game quite well, my time management skills were good. Or if he knew, I didn’t know he knew, and he was then, or I am inclined to thing he was endearingly sympathetic, with such a fellow like me, but I was growing up. My mother and father had passed on before my 16th birthday, and I was the only child. So I had no one to really keep close contact with but a few friends.
All youth have that edge to be the unscrupulous once in a while, to do the unthinkable, like I did at the party once and drank twenty-shots of whisky, and my friend ran down in his car to Ramsey Hospital, to get my system cleaned out, I remember he had sad eyes, where prior to this he had, or we had joyful faces, or we had something like that. It was like my friends became my caretakers, instead of nurtures. And I wanted to show my appreciation, when we had the contest of who could drink more; funny the things we do to get attention.

My first book a novel, had sold very well, “Formless Darkness,” not sure where I came up with that name, it was in my head when I woke up one morning, just like that, as if someone had planted it there, as if I was under a spell, and the name imprinted onto one of my genes. And now I had money, and I bought myself a duplex, three apartments to it, rented two out to friends of Mr. Scriber, this paid for the heat and electric, although it seemed I was paying for more the electric, to keep the place cool, and the summers were longer and winters shorter. I thought of myself as settling down now, leading the simple life, I was twenty-three years old. Already had published a book, now I could consort with nature, read, and loaf about, as long the royalties kept coming in, and I held my job.
Whatever takes place in my life, I thought at this juncture, I mean with my career as an editor and novelist, I would when need be, do all I had to do to live in this simple, and independent, fashion.
During these years between nineteen and thirty, I was kept busy. It was at thirty-one, I began to pay heavily for my indiscretion, or better put, lack of direction. I was drinking too much, seeing too many lovers, they came to my door, at work, and I had so many affairs one right after the other, I had no time to call my friends, and I had not written my second book yet, had it contracted to do so in a year, the year was up, it was a year and half, six months past the due date, and I was told do or die. Meaning, for an American, grind the book out…I will leave that out for later.
Anyhow, I had to try to do what I thought was the impossible. I guess as I look back now, folks often talk about leisure, I had it at such a young age, I didn’t think it would ever fade, but it does. And to be honest with myself, it turns into laziness, and nobody likes to look at the lazy people, and I was as lazy as the day was long, lazy, lazy, and it was a sinful laziness.
My friend was writing eight to twelve hours a day, everyday, seven days a week, so the postcards said; he now changed from phone calls to postcards said he was travelling too much, all over the world, so he had to write by postcards. I was sleeping those hours away at night, and wake up at noon and partied, drank and well, if I got an hour in to write, I was doing well. Like many writers, I could not write at all like C.E. my friend. What was I doing with Greg Hamilton, my agent, who had the contract in my face every other day? I was avoiding him that is what I was doing.
I wandered through the town-let, went fishing, never did tramp around in St. Paul, or go to those night clubs I used to anymore, stayed in Stillwater. I used to visit my friend in Oakdale, Diane Horn, was going to college to become a teacher, at the time, but we only now talked over the phone; her voice changed from year to year.
My country neighbours talked too much, gossip, so I couldn’t ask for their advice, not like I used to in High School with Diane but she gave it over the phone. They were shopkeepers, farmers, restaurant owners, antique dealers.
These told gossipers, were the old idlers sitting up and down on benches along the street. They talked among themselves as if I was a millionaire; far from it. They thought I was a young man going through life not working, and even suspected me of bring a crook, connected to the mob, or mafia. But if anyone looked suspicious, it was them, not me. I kind of felt I was an open book, not closed.
The thing I suppose I liked mostly was that many of them read my book, and asked, “When’s the next one coming?” So I had forces working on all sides of me, and I asked myself, “How was I to get out of it.”

I do not know how to explain how I felt, but perhaps I can this way, it was the same feeling I had when I was nineteen years old at the party, when I drank those twenty-shot glasses of whiskey: here now, I was living in or near a fat agricultural region, one sits in the cornfields, or the carrot fields, or the wheat fields, or out in his backyard on his grass, you acquire a sense of pulling at whatever is near you, pulling it roots, grass roots, in my case, you see the root, you learn in the country, is really the organ of the plant, in this case grass roots, typically lie below you, under you, under the surface of the soil you are laying on, not always but most often, the root is part of the plant’s body, it bears no leaves grant you, nor can be seen, but it is an important internal structure, if you pull on it too hard, you will kill the plant, if you do not give it water to absorb, you will kill the plant, absorption is a main factor in its life. In a like manner, I was not being nurtured, absorbing anything. How could I write, I had nothing more to write about, as the man had said: he who wants to be a writer, must have a lot to say. I had nothing more to say; evidently I said it all at nineteen. And that is how I felt, as if all my roots were being pulled out of its soil. As if I was not being watered.


Chapter Two


As was my policy at that time in living, and running my life at the newspaper, and drinking, I can say most definitely that I have no policy at all other than amusing myself, making the world around me pay, and keeping myself busy. Maybe I only had one book in me. So I asked myself; because I couldn’t, or wouldn’t and didn’t find time for that, to write it.
You should understand, a small town newspaper is not like a big city paper, we didn’t handle any National or International sensational issues, like murders, and there was to rush for the most part, like a deadline. In general, the paper was filled with the comings and goings of the community, its inhabitants, along with: long death notices (or obituaries), marriages, High School commencements, the events at the churches, lodges, and so forth.
I did most of the work myself, the editorial work and reporting. And now at this juncture of my life, at 35-years old, I still had not written my second book. And my agent had all but forgotten me, and only on Christmas did I get a card from him. The publisher sent me one also, saying, “If you ever do write that second novel, it mush come to us, other than that, you’re a jerk,” signed, “the Publisher.” But he was very kind in that, he kept me in mind, and I liked that, in that I didn’t have to go looking for a new publisher, god forbid.
It was now a year after that last Christmas Card, I would be thirty six, come October, the matter of my drinking was brought up at a meeting, Mr. Gene Weatherbee (who lived in one of my apartments at my house), the head of the town council, spoke very emotionally of me, my condition. He said, in so many words: I hate to go home some nights, alone in that big, dark house. It would be alright, he said, if he (meaning me) could have an occasional evening of quiet. On several evenings, he said: “I came out in the hallway, and turned on the lights, Mr. Ernest Hem had invited the devils into his room and they were all dancing, there was a song they sang, but I can’t remember it.”
A counsel member said (the local judge, Judge Albemarle): “You must, Mr. Weatherbee, think rational on what you are saying, and think wisely over your words. You don’t have to injure Mr. Hem’s reputation, just make arrangements to leave.”
“The priest (Father Jose) from the local church said, in a humorous tone, “We are quite sure everyone here would be happier if you leave the house, and be gone, leave poor Mr. Hem, to his business, and see the local psychologist.”
I was of course in shock, thinking: where was I all this time, I don’t remember having parties, and this was all surprising news to me—and his tone of voice increased amazingly. I knew my dignity was at stake, yet the judge and Father Jose, and the rest of the counsel members, all became contributors on my behalf, I didn’t need to say a word, and it made me feel I suppose more indebted to the well-known group.
As you know, Minnesota is a God fearing state. And such thing like what had been said at the meeting is not taken lightly. The voices of my supporters were hot. And I had never been through one of these ordeals in my life. And I did escape this part of Mr. Gene Weatherbee’s accusations.
In the following months, the newspaper acquired 20,000 subscribers, I felt it all was going to be disastrous: too many too much, too quick, so I told Mr. Denny Scriber anyhow, the owner, and that we needed to hire some more workers, and I wanted to get onto my second novel, I had half of it written already. But he had no desire to reform the paper to my liking, and simple said, “I’ll double your pay check.”
“Fine,” I said, but I asked myself: however was I going to escape this editorial master-head. I felt naked, and nailed to the paper, and he said something weird, Mr. Scriber, “I liked your party, that Friday.”
It was all new to me, what Friday was he talking about, and as far as I know, or knew, the last party I had was on the nineteenth birthday. But I didn’t say anything, or ask for an explanation, it was perhaps a mix-wording of something. I had parties in the newspaper room; I stayed at the paper because I wanted to make a living. And he overlooked them, and I did not want to bring that up to his mind, lest he say I could not have anymore female companionship during late hours at work.


Chapter Three

As you see, I have got myself into something, first because I was young and wanted to make a living, then found I could not connect the dotes to my writing, thinking I might, by taking this job. It appeared to me, after being at it for so long, I lost the fun out of life. I don’t see anymore writers, publishers, or agents. It is or was, as if the devil gave me a gift, and was slowly cooking me alive like a frog.
I knew if I left the paper, writing stories for magazines, or pushing out enough novels to make a living, a sufficient income to live on, was a dreary life, but so was this one. I had never married, and now had begun to feel the curse of the hack writer; I needed to be alone for two months, solidly alone to write. Having already written a novel, half done with my second, now at middle age but if I left my job would I starve? It was a thought that came to mind often. I felt a needed go beyond this job but I hadn’t yet.
The first half of my book was really kind of hurried; my craft was at its low peak. It was sad, I no longer had the desire to write—that is, not like I had 13-years prior, or even work as an editor. But I felt I wanted to do something more that I was doing something but it was less, not a challenge anymore, but I didn’t know what that something more was about.
I did discover one thing, and perhaps a way out; by reading all the local newspapers and the bigger ones of course, the Minneapolis Star, the Chicago Tribune, the New York Times, the St. Paul Pioneer Press. I discovered many of the writers in the newspapers nowadays, were very skilful. And some became writers. And some were better than novel writers. And so I would put a chapter of my book into the paper once a week, that way I’d kill two birds with one stone. And who could make a fuss.
This was a new impulse, and I was in close contact with the community everyday of the year. What could any writer asks for. The name of my new book would be, “The Un-industrialist Town.” A funny name, it just came to me as if a bird dropped it in my ear while sleeping one night.
I agree it was a flare-up of labour and desire to get the book done, and I had hands on information, information at my fingertips now. It had been hold-up much too long; it was in a way, to be very ugly the book. In the following months, I wrote everything I heard, overheard that is, from everybody I saw, talked to. I didn’t give names, just accounts, but I didn’t need to everybody knew everybody anyhow. And the paper turned into a scandal like paper, the counsel liked it, but the town folks complained, as I expected somewhat. They had a love hate relationship with it, and with Mr. Denny Scriber.
The town’s folk had said, “Look here, we are in a lovely town, everything works here, good organizations, working women. Interesting people, and now we are getting news of all the little secrets of everybody we know.” How true that was, the book had thirty-nine chapters of it.
Mr. Denny Scriber, he even came up to me on Mondays now and said, “You should have another good party, Hem.” As if it was part of a joke. Again I figured it must be the winsome girls I was having over during my night work at the office.
I was thinking of moving to Illinois or Ohio, or San Francisco, or even Seattle, just to get away. Here was a town, twenty-five miles away from a metropolitan area, and its paper was selling nearly as many as the big city papers were. We even got big soap advertisements in the paper now, and I changed the name of my book, called it “The Shockingly Young, Old and Feeble of a Little Town” now because the last ten chapters talked about all the youth in the town, what they were doing, drinking, and all the corruption no one saw, the girls they got pregnant, the little boys on dope. This was changed during the second edition, as if it was a new book, with ten new chapters in it.
I talked about the poor, from the hills nearby; and I scorned the older ladies for having nervous debilities, and stooped shoulders, and thin legs. I was going out of my mind in this book. And in 1985, my second book was published.
The critics said it was a combination of the terrible with the magnificent. Whatever that means, believe it or not, the young girls of the town, half fell in love with me after the second book came out, and the second edition didn’t phase anyone in town, not really, their parents hated me, but the hate was short lived, and there is always the old question “Make men rise to nobility, so they can see the nobility of its towns people. And pray they don’t disclose their findings,” and in my case, I told them what I saw and felt, they had no nobility, that was the bottom line. But I liked, if not adored the admiration I was getting, stopped going to church, and Father Jose, and never chased me to get back into the any prayer studies or so forth.

Chapter Four


The town’s folks were not organized as they thought they were. And the book sold 83,000 copies, the first edition. A shrike flared up starting they called it. And I starting to sell more copies of my old book, signing books, and my old publisher, and agent, were happy as to pigs in a muddy pen.
But the town began to organize, Doctor Headman, was the new city counsel’s leader, the Mayor was my friend, and employer, Mr. Denny Scriber. Somehow it seemed those two did not get along. Don’t know if it is called a bit of characteristic stupidity, or what, they argued over every little thing, every issue, like two devils in a pie, and one wasn’t getting it share. Scriber didn’t like the town organizing, or the labour or the industry, or the factory, and he had the local psychologist—I never did get his name, the priest and the judge on his side, and I suppose he had me. But Doctor Headman was getting everybody else. He told Headman, he was going to throw him out of office.
You cannot throw a man out of town because he comes up with a new organization, or way of thinking, or gets a following. I felt we needed a more moderate, if not intelligent mayor, but I never spoke up, he was my bread and butter, sort of speaking, but I really didn’t need him anymore, somehow I just thought I did.
So here were folks now organized that never were, and under the leadership of Headman.
Scriber wrote in his paper, “All of Stillwater is apparently being organized by Doctor Headman…” Now here is the peculiar thing, he writes, “how often I go to dine at his house, and he has parties, and they dance wildly, as if devils, and not only I but the good Father Jose, and our Psychologist, and Mr. Hem’s friend and international writer, C.E. and our good judge, Albemarle, we were all guests, and saw his devil worship.”
It was all a lie of course. None of these folks, meaning, Father Jose, the Psychologist, Albemarle, protested this, C.E., said he didn’t know what he was talking about, as I didn’t know. Mr. Headman, had to lock himself in a hotel room, the towns folk wanted to lynch him. They had lynched someone years prior, the wrong man they found out.

I still didn’t know my position in life, but I was not the writer I wanted to be, and I accepted this, then I found out there was a secret meeting, among the few elite of the city, again the Psychologist, I could not name him because I had not met him yet nor did I come to know his name at this point—as you well know, but they called him Mr. Psycho, and the judge, the priest, and my boss, and several others, merchants of town, these folks all said to me, most of them that is, said to me, many just wave at me—not saying anything, there was a big meeting to be held in the back room of the newspaper, this wasn’t real news, I mean it was often held there, and everyone that came said to me: “Good party Hem.”
People keep saying that, it is turning out to be an unknown mockery almost, as if they were laughing in my face, somewhat laughing, so I sensed, when they said that.
The meeting, there was no doubt in my mind: this was in connection with Mr. Headman.
I thought my boss would let me in, but he didn’t, he never did, he locked the door behind him. There was no doubt in my mind again; harm was going to come to Mr. Headman. There was a wicked side to all these men, I sat outside and did my work as usual.
I wanted very much to go in there, I saw a few more people, town’s folks that are, escorted into the backroom, and it smelled mildew, dirt like. He never allowed me back there, although he told me it was next to the sandstone walls, old mushroom caves, Stillwater is famous for them, and so forward went the meeting.
I got the impression, Mr. Denny Scriber, my boss, had a hand in everything in town, and the longer I got to know him, the more I witnessed this, he was involved with workers from the: factories, and merchant shops, the local gas station, in classrooms, the older kids. He had girls and even his sisters, come over and go in that backroom with him, I think he was a dirty old man, delicately featured. I had more money in the bank now than I needed, near— $760,000-thousand dollars. I said at one million, I’d quite my job, I even told Mr. Scriber that, and he said, “Well, be that as it may, the games over then,” and laughed, I wrote a note to myself in my diary, here it is:

Note from Mr. Hem’s diary: -- They have built a monument in Stillwater; it is at the far end of Main Street, a statue of me. I sense they got a realization of each other. Kind of a religion, brotherhood, they said through my two books, I have brought them national fame, pride. Yet, my life seems very puzzling. Every time I want to leave Stillwater, I get this puzzled feeling, or sensation. The statue is nothing heroic but very fine. There is an inscription on it, it reads “Dead Roots Drama” and has a thin outer coating of cement. Not sure what the inscription means though.

That’s when I was standing by that monument when I noticed a familiar face, yours. One I had not seen since I was eighteen years old, you looked at me, and I at you and then a realization of each other set in:

Part Two

Cheaper Five; End Chapters


(Narrator) Mr. Ernest Hem, had met Mr. Richard Shape, the psychologist, by accident, it was not meat to be. He had died on March 1, 1965, when Hem was eighteen, on November 5, 1966; Ernest Hem was nineteen-years old. How could this be, thought Ernest now standing shoulder to shoulder with Mr. Sharpe.

“I must be in a dream,” said Ernest to Richard, “how on earth can I be seeing you when you’re dead?”
“Ernest, let me explain,” says Richard, “remember when we went to high school, and Mr. Magnusson our Earth Science teacher said: after you’ve checked everything out, and you still cannot come up with the answer, go to the unbelievable?”
Hem looks about, his world looks as it always has, says “Yes, so what.”
“If I’m dead, then you’re dead.”
“I don’t believe it.”
“Why, because all you’ve known is the other world? How do you know what world you’re in?”
“Not completely, but all the people I’ve seen and talked to, they confirm I’m in reality, and you are not, you’re a vision of some sort.”
“I know all the people you’ve talk to: the judge, the priest, your employer, and even Mr. Headman, the Doctor. They are all new to Stillwater, matter of fact, Stillwater is new to old Stillwater, and you are in the New Stillwater”
“What do you mean New Stillwater?”
“We all came into your life when you took the job at the newspaper, but you died at the party, you drank twenty-shots of booze, your close friend tried to get you to the hospital, but you were dead on arrival. It is of course 1987 now, in real time, and since 1966 to this time you’ve been under a charade by others, since you had that sensation of your roots being pulled out, the drama has been being played out, twenty-one years to be exact. Here, life gets boring, come with me I’ll show you. Actually, they’ve perfected the drama, called “Dead Roots Drama” named after you, they even built a new underground stage here for you, follow me, I’ll show you, even introduce you to the actors if indeed I can.”

(Narrator; Doctor Sharp led them to a back room, out and into a big auditorium, through underground tunnels, Mr. Hem still thought he was in a dream.

“Look thorough this peep hole,” He told Mr. Hem, asking, “Who do you see?”
Sure enough he saw the judge, the priest, his employer and Mr. Headman, taking off their cloths as if they were costumes, and they all looked so ugly, with tails and long ears, and one with a pig’s face, another with an elephant trunk.
“These are a few of the demigods of hell,” Doctor Sharp said. They will be angry with me for bringing you here, but the game has outlasted everyone else’s, some twenty-one years, they actually built a town like Stillwater, and they kept you talking to them, and I was to be the unseen psychologist, until they found out I knew you, and sent me to a different section of this underworld, and I bumped into you. They numbed you now and then, like you said, roots from the other end, dead roots, and freezing them.”
“C.H., was still alive, when you asked to see him, so we could not allow this, and Diane Horn, was still alive so they could not allow you to see her either, actually both are still alive today, that is why they were unavailable, and only or out of town, or occupied, or engaged, but their voices were dubbed, over their phone, and when you called, it was Miss Harriet Faulkner who did the transfer of the pretend phone call, with a little help of the Henchman.”
“Who’s the Henchman, and who’s Faulkner?”
“Nobodies to speak of, just bored demon, like me, and don’t mention the Henchman, too loud, lest you be heard and sent to his dock on the pier for whatever duties he requires. You see hell has its hierocracy, believe it or not. These were the demons pulling at your so called roots, to have you for their drama, actually before you died, with anticipation you would die; they were strangers among strangers, like I was, but as you can see they have become demonic friends.”
“So you pulled against my roots?” asked Mr. Hem.
“Unknowing it was you of course, yes I did.”
“What were they going to have me doing next?” asked Hem.
“Kill Mr. Headman.”
“Well, how could I if he’s already dead?”
“That’s the jest of it all, you can’t, but you were still in your other mind set, and that was the whole of the game, to see how you reacted, as they acted. The meeting they were having at the newspaper was about you. Think about it, the only time you went into Saint Paul was once, and in that instance, it was a dream, yet what you purchased they somehow created for you when you woke up from your numbed intrusion, which is called in the living and physical world; hypnotism. ”
“Did they have a name for the drama?” said Mr. Hem.
“Most certainly ‘Dead Roots Drama.”’ Said Mr. Shape.

“Ernest,” said Richard Sharpe, “we might just get along better if we go by first names, tell me how it was, you know, tell me the story how it all went from your perspective, your life in a nutshell, we got lots of time here you know.

“Well… (a hesitation) I feel like I’ve already told my story, but I’ll start again:
“I had an impulse, when I was nineteen-years old, to become the editor and publisher of a small town weekly newspaper in Stillwater, Minnesota, it turned out to be a little more complex than I had expected. I think inside of most men they think they can be a singer, own a restaurant, or be a small town editor, and I was no different…”



Chapter Six

(The Appearance of the Henchman)



The Henchman of Hell, Agaliarept



The instant the Henchman of Hell appeared, the whole “Psycho Drama Section” seemed to stand still. The clamour of tongues, the laughter and noise of the crowd were for that moment arrested, and every man, woman, beast, creature, actor, devil, demon, who stood on the stage, couched, lay, stood at attention and faced the imperial Henchman, the general of several legions of hell.
Ernest Hem, of course murmured, “Are we all in trouble?”
The henchman threw a glance at Ernest and without hesitation went straight over and stood before the demonic actor Scriber, who was really Zimmer.
“Hold out your hand,” said Agaliarept, in a commanding voice.
The Henchman looked at the hand with a knitted brow, continued by saying, “I see you have used vanity to its optimum, and brought the worst out of our new comrade, although you’ve been entertained for over twenty-years in the process, which is a prize in itself. You have mastered the art of deception. Tell me how you did it, and I will consider you for a higher position?”

“In the following manner sir, said Zimmer: the treatment technique I used was a in altering his new environment, to function more fully in ours, by limiting him to a smaller town, like Stillwater, and thus, not having to produce big city skyways.
“This technique required of course one needed to apply it on in everyday life, as he knew it to be, the methods and rationales were described precisely to our actors, as need to be, so we could get the right reaction from Mr. Hem.
“I had learned myself; techniques are based largely on principles of learning spherically, and used their own styles, such as operant conditioning, and respondent conditioning, things they responded to in the physical sphere.
“There was a strong emphasis on scientific demonstration, a particular technique was reasonable for a particular behaviour change. Such as, taking his dreams, wishes, desires, and fears, working them in his dreams, and then in reality, securing them for him. We gave him what he wanted, and that was a secure job, money, fame above all, recognition. And then we could pull out all the other deadly sins, like laziness, and overeating, lust, they were already there, he just didn’t see them, they were attached genetically almost to his general make up, he had moulded them into his psyche.
“This was sir, as you know, a long, very long ordeal for all involved, and as its leader, or director of this department, I put strong emphasis on accountably with my staff, for everyone involved, even the old folks who sat along on the benches and smiled at Mr. Hem as he’d walk by. You see, once everyone was in rhythm with this program, everyone involved in this behaviour modification program, we lived, or got to live almost on the same vibration lines he did. That is what I wanted for my staff. Like a person who has a second language, moves out of his country to that country where he had to live for long period of time, thus, he things in that countries language after a while and forgets his.”
“Very well done, Zimmer,” remarked the Henchman.
“Yes,” emphatically, remarked Zimmer.
“Then leave here at once never to return, go from here while victory is fresh in your heart, you are promoted to the personal level of emissary in my legions, which is equal to a sub commander.
Stiffly but sarcastically, the henchman moved away.
“I say,” he then said to Mr. Hem, “you’re going to like the underworld with no stars, I can tell that,” then shouted “the drama is over, silence is ribald!” And it was as before, with all the vulgar sounds of hell.
“Amen,” said Zimmer.

“It all seems so impossible that such a long performance could have remained hidden under false faces,” said Ernest, to his psychologist friend, Richard (Narrator: who was really never a psychologist, he never got the chance to be, like Ernest never got the chance to be a novelist—not really, but in the pits of hell, many things can be achieved during the meantime).
Said Richard Shape, “It was done by the gods, all us damned gods down here, we all knew your high level of vanity, and it was stronger than your faith, as was your self-interest.”
Ernest looked about, “Why it’s going to be a new order of things for me I see, a new beginning, the beginning of a new order of things between one and all I suppose. I see things do change in hell, no more secrets, yet I almost regret I found out.
Suddenly a stink of air seeped into the arena, and into the hallways, and tunnels, and Ernest was swept away, like a hawk in flight, wind depressing his face, aging as a burning candle, through its winding labyrinth of tunnels and caves, and chambers, and to the docks of Hades, the pier, to meet his masters, officially.





Ernest Hem on his way through
The labyrinth of Hell…









The Characters


Main Character: Mr. Ernest Hem
(Writer, novelist, Newspaper man)
Doctor Headman
Diane Horn
(St. Paul, Teacher)
C.E., writer
The Henchman
(Agaliarept)
Mr. Richard Shape
(Psychologist)
Mr. Denny Scriber
((Owner of the weekly periodical)
(Other name, Zimmer))
Greg Hamilton
(Literary agent)
Mr. Gene Weatherbee
(Committee member, renter)
Mr. Magnusson
(High school Teacher)
Father Jose
Judge Albemarle




Note on making of the story: written the night of 4-22 into the hours of the 23rd of April, 2009 (2:21 p.m.). Cchapter 6, written in the afternoon on my patio roof, 23rd of April; written by Dennis L. Siluk, in Lima, Peru. The Vanity of Ernest Hem (or, the Dead Roots Drama) Copyright © 4-2009, By Dennis L. Siluk (7047)

The Boy Poet from Cayuga Street (a short story)

The Boy Poet from
Cayuga Street



When Mr. Chick Evens turned nineteen-years old, he had now written twenty-one poems. He had Miss Marty Dickenson review them, and retype them for him, along with a bit of spell checking and correcting, back in the summer of 1966. She was twenty-seven years old, and Eddy Bacon, was twenty-nine years old, Marty’s old boyfriend. He was trying to sober up, put his marriage back together. Up to a few months earlier, Marty and Eddy were an item (as he’d often refer to him and Marty; or boyfriend, girlfriend), now supposedly both coming from different worlds, Marty still was drinking heavily.

“You look good today,” said Marty to Evens who had come over to her home on Dale Street to pick up his manuscript of poetry.
“Yes,” said Evens, “I am this morning, I feel great, like a poet I want to be, by the looks of the papers you have really made my poetry look clean and neat.”
“It’s just part of being a secretary, it’s what I do.” She remarked, but was taken back at his comment.
“Yes,” Evens went on “I want to be a great poet someday. I’ve always wanted to be a poet, started writing poetry at twelve-years old; by the time I was fifteen had some published in the High School Newspaper, at Washington High School. That is what I wanted to be at twelve, and now at nineteen, I want the same thing. When I’m sixty, I will still want to be a great poet; or maybe just a good poet; or maybe a good simple poet. For a moment I thought I might be, but I’m too young, and I have only twenty-one poems.
“Oh, you’ll be exactly that, a great simple poet, because when people want things bad enough they get them.”
“I’m unsure now. At twelve it appeared to be simple: at nineteen, I think it takes a lifetime?”
“I’d say you have a good start.”
“No kidding?”
“Of course you’ll be a known poet in your time.”
“No, I’m not all that sure anymore.”
“The odds are for you, that you’ll be a poet.”
“Don’t say I will just to appease me please.”
“Did you see Eddy?” she asked.
“He’s off the booze, getting back with his ex wife, I saw him driving a milk truck. He said you both were no longer an item.”
“He’s going to quite for good, wish I could, but I’m not ready.”
“Maybe you will, I’ll say a prayer for you.”
“I don’t feel like quitting, or dating, or doing much, just kind of sitting around the house seems to comfort me, smoking and drinking, smoking and drinking and going to sleep, and waking up and going to work, and starting all over again.”
“It’s a cute little green house you have here.”
“My parents left it to me, they’re deceased now. I didn’t finish the whole body of work, I did a little over half of your manuscript, I know you’ll understand, I’m just too…just can’t seem to get into it. But you’ll be a poet someday, I can feel that.”
He opened the screened in metal door, walked out of the doorway with a folder of his poems in it, folded under his arm, and armpit, tightly.
“Amigo,” she yelled at Evens through the big bay window, tapping on the window with her fingernails, “If you see Eddy, say hello to him for me will you?”
He could see her, read her lips, her body language, hear her slightly, and nodded his head, confirming a yes, he’d do so. He had a crush on her, she was pretty, thin, short dark hair, but was aging quickly, too quickly, and she was in pain, and she’d kill him with her boxed up emotions; he thought, whispered to himself, “She’d make good poetry like Plath or Saxton I bet.”


4-22-2009