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July 3, 2003 projectile I stepped on to the front porch and felt cool tile on bare feet.  A tropical storm bore down on the coast, sixty miles south.  Surveying the porch for projectile-candidates, I sensed within me a lack of commitment.  More to the point, I knew I was faking commitment.  I didn't care what flew or broke or drowned. "Yo, man...why you standing 'round wit your hands all up on your hips and shit?" It was my quasi-ward, the Negro lad named Geoff;Don:Rick!, so named by his mother since tiring of the common apostrophe.  I called him Jeff.  At this moment, Jeff was standing on the sidewalk, black skin against the graying light. "I'm battening down the hatches.  A storm is coming." "Man, you must think you Popeye the Fuckin' Sailor Man." "Shut your pie-hole, Jeff, and give me a hand with this Ficus tree." Geoff;Don:Rick! Jefferson moved like cane syrup.  "You ain't heard?  Father Abraham done set us free!  Why you movin' this nappy-ass tree anyway?" "Because," I replied, "it falls over if you look at it wrong." The boy stopped his ooze and aimed a righteous stink-eye at the Ficus.  For a silent minute, nobody moved--not Jeff, not me, not the tree.  Then he assumed a wide stance and placed his fists on his hips, King-of-Siam style.  He grinned and spoke. "You don't know shit.  Etcetera, etcetera, and so forth."

©  2003 by the beastmaster