Dan Fante

Selections from ‘Kissed By A Fat Waitress’

 

 

 

Dear Editor:

 

 

You complete idiot moron asshole dufus -

do you actually believe that what writers do - what I do - is some sort

of disposable - quick-trick slight-of-hand mechanical keyboard

flim-flam

like the shuffling of a deck of cards or lip-sinking my novel into a

computer program or punching a goddamn GPS address into the

dashboard of your powder blue ninety-thousand-dollar 4-door BMW

 

Next time -

dear subhuman thoughtless editor -

when we meet

when I submit something I've written to you

maybe

I'll simply stand on your desk and press a gun barrel between your

wide-set eyes

so we can have a real conversation called

what I do as an artist is cut away pieces of myself and smear those

dripping chunks of flesh

across a page so that anyone willing enough - tuned-in enough -

to connect their mind with mine

can see inside

my

heart

 

Believe it or not dear editor -

I do not give a rat's dick whether my rejected new book of stories

fits into your projections for next year's publication list

or

not

 

You may trust this:

I will continue to do as I have always done -

to open myself up as much as I can - to tear away at my own self-

importance and delusion

a layer at a time

and to seek and speak my deepest

and closest truth

 

until

 

the day my wife

and kid

pack my body in dry ice

sew my lips and eyes closed

and file my stinking remains

in the breakwater off Santa Monica Pier

 

And one last thing Dear Editor:

 

thanks

again

for

taking

your

time

to

consider

my

work

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ASKING

 

 

For years I thought that

talking to the Gods

was an exercise

done privately

under

unforgiving

 

distant stars

 

ridiculous unrequited prayer

done by staring

at old cold books

with mean small print

 

But then I discovered

that just

ain’t

it at all

 

God can be found in the ‘thank you’ voice of the guy at the counter

at the 7-11

or

the quietness of a stranger’s parking lot smile

or

the rattle of weeds across a dry summer Mojave

or

watching my untethered fingers jump jump jumping

across the keys

deep in the middle of typing three hours worth of truth

 

God – for me – turned out to be

a conscious choice

a self-evoked experience

 

just

like

love

 

 

 

copyright © dan fante

2008

 

 

Dan Fante is the author of three novels , ‘Chump Change’, ‘Mooch’ and ‘Spitting off Tall Buildings’, two plays, ‘Boiler Room’ and ‘Don Giovanni’, a collection of short stories about life driving a cab in L.A called 'Corksucker' and the incredible poetry collection, ‘a gin pissing-raw meat-dual carburetor-v8-son-of-a-bitch from los angeles’. His newest collection of poetry 'Kissed By A Fat Waitress' has just been published in the United States by Sun Dog Press.