The Funny Thing About Death/Metal

Here’s the funny thing about Death/Metal:

killing softly is outside the bounds

over and above everything else

harder than you think

When submerged in dirt death and metal shake hands. That hand is Tulsa, the

biggest little city in the Midwest, as you know, my loving townswept. Nihilists love it.

They go crazy for it, which doesn’t make any sense if you think about it. Honestly, if one

believes in nothing, then how can you believe in Satan and the End of Days and skin

charring away and severed heads. But if one believes in something—death, steel, the

severed skin of an old Oklahoma Model Ford truck—then how wonderful it must be,

rising up from the dirt, from the middle of one’s Satanic days, to find oneself newly born,

slathered in the oil of the mainstream righteous. Then one shakes hands with the very

Venice of Oklahoma.

Dip one toe into the canal and dry it off.

The dirt is warm and waiting.

Do you believe in scarification by fiat?

You know the type. They say, “Oh crap, the sun!” like a gin-scarfing Rin-tin-tin .

Can we tolerate that kind of riff-raff in the Caboose of the Upper Lower Middle Plains?

I watered my lawn on New Year’s Day and hoped my Hoppin John made a difference.

The canals here need more water. Dig deeper. Doesn’t matter, the wind blows more

sand chokes it off. And the wind has got nothin’

on the sun. The sun beats down like metal and death

turns me into someone I’m not. On a good day,

I give in and listen. After a while, you learn to hear it coming.