Rewriting Stella

by Tuttle, Dan;

  The pages listen, Stella thought, it’s me,

  my problem’s me. Too gassed, I’d never opt

  to speak to them. Gone now’s exam blitz. Three-

  ish hundred Annals pages yet lay white;

  Stel now had stuff to write that might incite.

  126.

  In shop, crew parroted consensus in

  Tee’s ‘Oppo’ name (at least, those conscious still)

  support, of course, both voiced and densest when

  each member vied to climb hierarchy’s hill.

  They hadn’t quite yet reached the age when such

  attentiveness to social order ceased,

  and so their own considered views were clutched

  in fetal state to chest and unreleased.

  Stel learned all this quite secondhand next day,

  once Cade ensured her safely home in bed,

  and she awoke with questions mind delayed

  till times of sober clarity. He said,

  “They didn’t hear your rap against their food,”

  explaining each toward leader Tee had cooed.

  127.

  Once water and caffeine began their course

  to Stella’s veins, enlivened, she replied,

  “Thank goodness. No surprise that they’d endorse

  the stuff she argued. Her charisma, pride,

  and force of personality make crowds

  of any type befriend her. That’s a gift.”

  Stel’s token guilt was having disavowed

  new friends’ consumerism, foregone thrift

  that paired with lack of gratitude, eclipsed

  by mem’ries of a world where infants starved.

  The Cheetos, Lays, and Pringles, new teff chips,

  and puffy lentils, gluten-free, flat, carved

  in tasty little shapes gave greater choice

  to stoner than world did to poor in voice.

  128.

  At this, Cade asked, above the speakers’ hum,

  “If you don’t know what happened at the store,

  the tonic, ice, and handle of Seagram’s,

  the chilling next to Buena Vista, or

  the run away from that coyote howl,

  then how were you awake till four a.m.?”

  “Huh? I thought you slept.” “I know you night owled.”

  “Ugh. Pass the water. Slowly. Sore day.” REM

  still strongly lingered after she had woke.

  “I’ve got some scenes from each, I wasn’t blacked

  out. And what I do when I’m home’s not spoke.

  You ought to be ashamed your lack of tact

  has let you tell a lady you keep track

  of lights beneath her door.” Cade took aback.

  129.

  “Ha. Hold your stones, check 50’s ‘Patiently

  Awaiting’ for the reference. Stel, you cranked

  the stereo and kept it blamelessly

  that high till you were done! You should have thanked

  me – probably Yeye too – for passing out.”

  Though mental fog was lifting slowly, this

  spurred recollection that she’d chose to flout

  convention that nighttime should be mute bliss.

  Cartoonists might have drawn the scene with ‘WHOOPS!’

  in bubble thought above embarrassed hunch,

  as Stella’s mind began to jump through hoops

  to recall why she’d needed sonic plunge.

  Excusing self, she traced back to her room

  to see if she could find buds anger bloomed.

  130.

  In space’s physicality, she found

  no single artifact that could attest

  to some nocturnal fanciful spellbound

  mellifluous creation. Not outguessed,

  she opened window wide to see if seat

  on gently-angled rooftop had inspired

  her overplayed fortissimo of beat

  and yet again not single clue acquired.

  In giving up the search, she sat on bed

  and opened up her laptop. That was it!

  The frontmost screen post-password loggerhead

  was text arranged in structure, rhymed clause split

  across two lines ten syllables apiece.

  She’d penned a drunken sonnet as release:

  131.

  Imagine world as open, free as could

  be grown with capital, consumers all

  addicted to the message that they should

  acquire from HSN and outlet malls.

  In such society, the very wants

  of populace await the marketer.

  She knows psychology, design and fonts,

  and shapes you to crave patriarchate’s myrrh.

  In its consumption, so you closen ties

  in your life and in those you’re talking to

  with narrative big businesses’ supplies

  are happy ends themselves, no balking due.

  The buyers thus detach from value they

  ought on their own ascribe to goods. OBEY.

  132.

  The Shepard Fairey staple poster hung

  above her desk had offered that last line.

  It struck her that the artist had a tongue

  so fierce as to make verses realign.

  This message came from colors’ boldened blot

  and minimum detail in other parts.

  The mind itself filled in the message, not

  depicted, of how They control the heart.

  In every man and child and woman who

  tunes into Spotify or radio,

  or dozen others, They’ll seek to undo

  the story me alone can make me glow.

  It hung, reminding core assault was on

  identity of we ourselves, long-conned.

  133.

  When Stella read what she had written drunk

  a set of goosebumps stood upon her back.

  It seemed to be expression of the funk

  her conscious mind had yet to quite unpack.

  Those thoughts that came to head in super-mart

  were all too early to be well-expressed:

  she felt like shopping friends were duped, in part

  by normalcies unpicked by Cornel West.

  The views that Stella brought, naïveté

  of outsider were sharp enough to gash

  and hot enough to boil, not seethe away

  from balms commercials spread of sale-saved cash.

  It felt like second, vast subconscious mind

  had stolen typing fingers to opine.

  134.

  The paper’s digital inscriptions were

  as odd as graphite’s glyphs at Wangjiang Park

  that introduced the poet Xue Tao and her

  millennia-encrusted wise remarks.

  She checked her recent playlists, found that Rage

  Against the (damn) Machine was in the queue

  around the time she slept. LCD page

  was left half-written, notes from days Chengdu

  delighted and depressed as partial thoughts.

  The marginalia was Rorschach test

  whose indications were she was distraught

  and feared that sleep of muse would dispossess.

  ’Twas old to Stel, from Annals: dissident’s

  nocturnal meditations left in print.

  135.

  Amusement beat out bashfulness. She cried,

  “Hey Cade, come up! I figured out what I

  was doing last night.” She felt to confide

  in him her sauced-mind’s hobby fine. Gut shy,

  he climbed the stairs and braced himself for sights.

  He lightly laughed when realizing that

  the thing was metered syllables. “She writes

  when woozy? Fooled me!” Kneeled, with prize thing at

  eye-level, he read Sonnet One and paused.

  It took a sec to que
ry body and

  pinpoint its rigor mortis proper cause:

  “Your verse is shiny. That’s gold Talib’s panned,

  and Zion I, Sage Francis, Eminem,

  Blue Scholars, Common Market, ten o’ them

  136.

  on independent labels, Tonedeff shit.

  You’ve rapped what happens when an alien

  is dropped in as observant. Lone, left, split

  from culture’s cant sesquipedalian,

  you weave interpretations of your own.”

  Now Stella hadn’t known that Cade could drop

  that GRE vocab like Cicero,

  since canon till then referenced was hip-hop.

  It rather pleasantly reminded: views

  are only helpful insofar as they’ve

  accounted for the full array of clues

  available to show how folks behave.

  Stel brightened, hearing hidden hobby held

  in such regard by brethren who there dwelled.

  137.

  The cocktail socializing, alcohol,

  elastic evening, and a laptop’s light

  precipitated high morale and scrawl,

  inked crystalline memento of the night.

  The chosen topic channeled Prodigy

  in outrage at the system. Questioning

  reach brainwash tentacles had clawed was plea

  for an alternative progression. Zing

  of message lay in challenge to the crowd:

  examine how the narratives they hear

  are crafted so the audience is wowed,

  their authors corporate cogs, and not Shakespeare.

  Mayhaps opposing Opposition meant

  she’d pen eye-catching lines more self-ward bent.

  CHAPTER 21

  138.

  The tungsten radiated tiny lux

  from bulbs hung down to candles complement.

  Another Tuesday night at Club Deluxe,

  bar where the Opposition’d come frequent.

  Cigar box pub partitioned from a den

  where panoramic Californian views

  were painted to horizons. Its bullpen

  was leather bench seats circled into U’s.

  They sat a shoulder-length from perma-stage,

  piano standup, PA system, seats,

  and wicker tipping basket, worming wage

  from first date couples feigning as elites.

  Two bands a night, and seven nights a week,

  it held a red, dark, neighborly mystique.

  139.

  It also held a standing group of youth

  arriving after first band wrapped its set

  to get their well gin shaken with vermouth

  then raucously debate the internet.

  They touched on social media, on rules

  compared to norms, neutrality of bits,

  philosophy applied not taught in schools

  defining techno-worlds they’d grown up with.

  No single conversation’s end resolved,

  they threaded into endless data stream,

  recursive depths of which at times appalled

  the late-come guests who tried to join the team.

  Within, without, beyond the net, they strayed

  toward human rifts Boy’s politics had splayed.

  140.

  “Let’s start with little Boy,” Tee primed the group,

  “Do you remember just how normal news

  once looked? I mean, you’d get a weekly scoop

  that merited a long-form look. Now who’s

  on every headline, making light of brawls?

  And sometimes twice a day, the lunacy

  redoubling to the point where Tylenol’s

  the only surefire route from loon I see.”

  “No joke,” said Cade, “this stuff brings Sadville close.

  Each time I see the news this dopey Boy

  brings idiocracy. An Advil dose

  won’t do it justice, reach for opioids.”

  “Too soon,” said Benny. “Heard his hush playdate

  with some professional longtime playmate?”

  141.

  Joe asked, glossed over conflict. Cade said, “What

  you gotta look at’s fact he’s lost his friends.

  I mean, think of the other tykes now shut

  out from his sandbox! Poutyface pretends

  like he took over, told them all to go.

  Well, maybe throwing sand in all their face

  was signal that they oughtn’t stay fo’ sho’.”

  “Nah, not a chance,” Mo said, “palms need more space

  for those small hands to fling a thing.” Folks laughed.

  Tee barreled on, “They might have trusted him

  had he shared list of all his toys.” “That’s daft—”

  said Joe, “no rational observer thought

  the Boy was there to make the playground nice.

  We and they know his tempers, toys, and vice.”

  142.

  “I’ll tell you, Cade, the part perturbing me

  does not pertain to Boy directly,” said

  a clear-voiced Benny, “disability

  of learning should be managed by the Ed

  instead of perpetrated from the top.

  You saw that interview? Gold can’t buy smarts.”

  “That’s not the thing evoking my teardrops,”

  said Mo, “we’ll rebuild equity and arts.

  I fear we’ve given godlike dynamite

  to little tyke who lies to the adults

  until they go away. He’d try to light

  that shit so he could point to some results.”

  Nods ’round the table ended looking down,

  apocalypse as topic earned ring’s frowns.

  143.

  Restarting after down beat, Cadence hit

  from different angle: “Flip-flops days apart

  on bump stock ban revealed his feeble wits

  reverse with two good naps and one good fart

  to make more space for thinking in the brain.”

  Tee: “Hey, we’re piling on. Let’s figure out

  the things to do this week to fight.” “Complain?”

  asked Mona dryly, wry smile doubling clout.

  Tee dropped her gaze and almost cracked, her grin

  in recognition of the bait. “That’s first,”

  Tee said, “and done, Olympically. To win

  we’ll maybe need to have done more than cursed.”

  “I’m tired of making phone calls to my rep

  who’s already decided his next step.”

  144.

  The dearth of new ideas brought an end

  to brainstorm ’round the time the band came in.

  “Our lack of monies clearly will portend

  demise of our attempts to brand-shame him.”

  Said Tee, “We’re poor, Benita. That’s why we

  make friends with bartenders. We only get

  one vote to change stuff each two years. Aye, fees

  to steer democracy are known, steep bets

  the likes of which our ‘exit’ brothers pay.

  The rest of us got jack in pocketbook

  and get outspent by crapbag NRA.”

  Stel: “Better to be Davy Crockett, hook

  the masses with mythology aligned

  to goals you have for wider humankind.”

  145.

  “Of course that’s better, being scion of

  a demographic feeling unexpressed.

  But that’s unlikely when who’s high above

  is dominating discourse of the rest.

  Cade posed a plan a month ago to slice

  that fragile image that Boy holds so dear.

  I still believe that would itself suffice.”

  And fit, Stel thought, the ethos Pioneer.

  Cade said, “Ignore the way he prattles on,

  he’s clearly clad in emperor
’s new clothes.

  The only kings are Presley and LeBron

  and counterarguments are empty prose.

  Poke holes in Boy’s balloon while stoking rise

  of other heroes, lead to his demise.”

  146.

  House special greyhound lingering in glass,

  Stel hadn’t joined debate’s more active parts.

  It felt to her like psyches were harassed

  by Boy’s headline radioactive starts.

  Of course a human being who believed

  the world was out to get him would so act,

  at every corner publicly perceived

  as distanced from reality and fact.

  “It makes no sense you’re so incensed when there’s

  such bureaucratic insulation here.

  When California flag arrives and bears

  its grizzly, celebrate. Translation’s clear:

  economy’s the king, and Cali’s fine.

  States rights ensure your lives won’t be maligned.”

  147.

  “That view’s mature, I’m glad you shared it, Stel,”

  said Tee, who looked sincere. “But, understand

  you’re not a citizen. You’ll bear it well.

  You’ve got your visa, paperwork in hand.

  You go when pleasure strikes you. That remove

  is not a thing that Nicaraguans have

  or Salvadoreans, or many who’ve

  risked life and limb and savings so to nav-

  igate past Mexico, past border wall.

  It’s those lives that we’re close to and protect

  in trying to find a way to speed the fall

  of Boy before at polls we reelect.”

  “To act for others is the mark of saints,”

  said Stel, “but don’t you think the better feint

  148.

  is rather, now, to focus on the things

  that you control directly, right ’round here?”

  “You underestimate the power phone rings

  en masse to Washington’s vote profiteers

  can have. Calls can change legislation’s word,

  and legislation’s words change what we do,”

  said some green friend-of-friend. Stel: “That’s absurd.

  The logic fails. It’s that myopic view

  that forces you to Opposition. Tell

  me ten reps’ names in hundred who’ve campaigned

  as centrists to the point where some new swell

  of public feedback’s done a smidge to rein

  in partisan alignment with some bill.

  You vote for bundles, not wise reps’ shrewd will.”

  149.

  Stel’s knowledge of the goings-on and past

  was aided by a ritual that she

  adopted in late China days. She’d asked

  Tao meanings of post-dinner news TV,

  its telecasting always outpacing

  the speed at which her brain could process thought.