Musings of JR Simmang

As mentioned in a previous post, the shadorma supposedly originated in Spain. While my wife and I were sitting entranced in the Palau di Musica in the balconies of a flamenco concert, I got inspired. Here's a shadorma series written during the concert. They don't smile, but who could when you sound like a gunshot in a thunderstorm? The sound comes from a deep desire. But for what? Because even when the song is built on true happiness, she is dressed in passion, licking at the air for her love. Her arms spell lust, extended in the shadows: permanent reminders that when the sun comes up, she will no longer be. Salvando una historia, son de los gipses, they are salvaged from night, born from its sacred magic.

My wife and I just spent 11 lovely, spellbinding days in the heart of Barcelona, Spain. We stayed in this lovely apartment in L'Eixample, what can be considered the business center of Barcelona. The temperature, though touted as being extreme heat (which to all of you in Austin this will sound ridiculous), didn't peak above 85 Fahrenheit. There was a constant breeze blowing, and while the weather was amazing, and the people were gracious, I couldn't help but think to myself that this place is the birthplace of Texas. This is birthplace of the frontera. Spain has such a unique history, being one of the first countries to organize themselves well enough to travel across the Atlantic Ocean and establish a claim in the New World. From there, they attacked the southern United States in the same fashion the Spaniards reclaimed their territory from the Moors. Since then, the country has seen numerous revolutions, the most recent being the Spanish Civil War, in which hundreds of ...

Dying old man, you've made your life a pistol, the rounds spent and smoking, gathering at your feet. Do you hang your full metal jacket on the coat rack there in the hall at the end of the day? I pass by it before my blacken'd old watering can drips my noose onto the weathered floor. I have to ask myself how I made it to this point where the oily black polish rubbed itself silver and the weathered floor lost its lustre. I can only think it was time for me to limb up with the oaks, sky, lands, and seasons and find a way to gently sway in and out of the birds' nests. Polish your pistol, dear dying old  man, and search out the ends, riddled and scattered, scarred and smoking, gathering at your feet while I ponder the world beyond your doorstep.

From the nursery, the lantana was yellowed. Why we bought that one, is beyond me, but my wife was insistent that that be the one we take home. I wanted the one with the blooms. They create a berry before they create the flower; it's inedible, but then again, so are a lot of things. In the midmorning, before the sun hits its zenith and boils over, she is there in the garden, her fingers slowly working the soil like a baker. The plants grow in her footprints, making it easy for her to move. I sip my coffee and watch her float from the fennel to the ferns. So this lantana, blackened as it was, was probably perfect for her. She took it into her arms, a doting mother, not looking down at it, but straight forward, confident, modeling confidence. I dig her hole and she nods her assent. Good enough, she says, and smiles at me. I step back because I can't watch her transform. My eyes cannot grasp her. Every night, this thing, this lifeless tw...

Flash fiction! I am a chuckler. You know, one of those guys who just randomly lets out a chuckle on the bus, in the park, in bed. I was helping out a friend of mine (who is not a chuckler, but more of a giggler, but only when aggravated) put up a brick wall in his basement when I let out a chuckle. "What's up, Mal?" The beautiful thing about Smitty (not his real name) is that he hasn't gotten tired of asking me why I chuckle. I, clearing my throat, "have you ever read 'The Cask of Amontillado?'" I layered in another brick to the top of the wall. "Nope." "Really? Not even in high school?" I put some more mortar on the brick I just laid. "Nope. I didn't go to a fancy school like you. Public education right here." "Huh." I chuckled again. "Why do you ask?" He was working the bottom, checking the mortar with his finger. "Well," I said as I laid down the next brick. "There are these tw...

I cried for you today, the childish dreams of an old man, wishing to see you be in the new world while the scalding drops drip and dribble fermenting and embalming our footprints in the tile. You've made it. I should be proud of that. Instead, I am afraid. I am afraid I have left you in a place where your little eyes cannot see and your little hands cannot hold. But I soon realize that your vision is clearer than mine, your hands stronger than mine and it was I who brought you there. We no longer play like children; we work like adults.

Read me, she said as her hand slid down past my knobby hips. Read me like a book and feel the red rush into my mouth. You will taste my red, my lovely red, that becomes the air I breathe and subdues you while you taste my red. What does it taste like on your tongue in between your teeth and soft palette? Does it taste like desire? Does it taste like passion? Or, does my red taste like death slowly creeping into your bones and drying out your intestines? You shall sit on my red, my blood red, my pain and anger and love and passion and become a god inside the core of me and my body. Touch my red. See it swim in sin and drown on the cool black of forest. Then, and only then, when the moon lights upon our extended torsos, will you feel the heat coming from boiling from seeping from deciding from where only the being inside does my bidding. Touch my red and make me cross that line.