Shoney's

II.

When I was born in Columbus, Georgia, a few blocks away from Ma Rainey's old place, I entered the Kali Yuga via forceps, and immediately caught a broken collarbone. I was groggy and pretty out of it, but I saw it all happen. The people behind masks put silver nitrate drops in my eyes and it stung like a motherf*cker. The year was 1974. Bob Dylan's "Planet Waves" had just come out. Bob Dylan was drunk on wine.

Silver nitrate is a chemical compound that is supposed to help prevent blindness in case of sexually transmitted diseases that can pass from mother to child. Because one of my first few terrestrial experiences was an alchemical one, and because Dylan was touring with The Band, it made sense that Dylan l.p.'s got played a lot on lazy Sundays at our home, as I was growing up. Dylan and his alter-ego, Rod McKuen. Rod McKuen had a poem about an old man taking a piss. It always made me laugh. "His balls hung low..."

Because alchemy happened in my eyeballs so young, I saw it happening wherever I went. When I was fourteen, I found a book of Dylan lyrics & drawings at the public library. When I was seventeen, I recited "The Ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest" for c.p. English. A year later, I was on my own in Athens, Georgia.

Because alchemy and pain seemed tied together, when I discovered the work of Garcia Lorca, his theory on the "duende" made sense to me. Basically, he wrote that all good art came not from the Muse, but from something called the "duende," which is a Spanish word. Nevermind the literal translation of "duende." Lorca called it "the dark root of the human scream." That shit moved me.

Oh okay, I'll tell you. Literally, "duende" means "imp" or "troll." When I met Janelle, my bride, in Colorado, I was still way into Lorca. (His alchemical way with words had gotten me through some dark nights and fluorescent days .) One of the first inexplicable things she ever did was to give me a miniature statue of an imp. Who can explain such things? Maybe Bob Dylan could, in his hazy, prophetic way.

I made eye contact with Bob Dylan in 1997. He was onstage. I was in the crowd, but right up front. He seemed to smile. He held the gaze and I imagined I was the protagonist in a movie and felt the transmission, the way of saying "It's all right, man. The world's on fire, but you'll be fine. Just stay true to the way you see things." That's how I read the gaze. We were at the municipal auditorium in Columbus, Georgia. Just a few blocks away from Ma Rainey's old place. I had failed at my attempted life as an artist in New York and was now earning money by washing dishes at a family-style buffet-type restaurant. My parents were there at the same Dylan show, up in the stands. Afterwards, we went to the Shoney's over by the Wal-Mart and ate chocolate cake.