Night Sights The French call dusk, the time “Between dogs and wolves,” because dusk’s degree of light/dark makes it hard to tell if an approaching beast is a dog or a wolf – a friend or a threat, brings help or mayhem. The various depths of night include many other unique time-zones of ambiguity – special periods when different arrangements of dark are conducive to magic, forgetting, insight, doubt and terror. Night is rich with questionable contexts when phenomena can self-fabricate. To list some of the weird night occurrences that I’ve heard of, there are Monster Margins, Angel Shadows, Fire Fogs, The Sustained Karl, Mexico City Chocolate Hour, Pulse Heats, Apple Cats, Bird Dancing Time, Neon Thrusts and Paper-Made Alley Ways. My years of driving at night has given me chances to witness some of these firsthand – namely Fire Fogs, Apple Cats, Paper-Made Alley Ways and The Sustained Karl (which occur when your headlights create a pattern on thick mist that is unmistakably Karl Marx’ head, and it goes on for different lengths of time. The image is sustained, thus the name. I once saw a Sustained Karl for about 15 minutes. Another guy said he saw The Sustained Karl for a whole hour. Those ones I listed are the most famous Night Sights. You can ask any night cabby about them. But, there are many more I’ve never seen. Other night drivers have told me about other mysterious subtleties that the night can facilitate, calling them such names as: Diamond Skin : (which is when a certain type of nighttime humidity combines with a certain flicker from a certain type of street light to cause a woman’s phone screen to make her skin shine like bright crystals), or Radio Shades : (these usually happen in winter in areas where there are no street lights but the density of the darkness deepens enough to cause a noise that sounds like a distant radio playing), another is Absent Corners: (these occur only in cities that have an excessive amount of traffic signals at intersections, but no street lights. Some kind of strobe frequency created by a certain combination of the traffic light colors causes the road surface to seemingly vanish when making a turn close to the curb. The road in front and beside the car just loses its surface. This phenomena also affects people walking and sometimes causes them to freak out when stepping off the curb. They lunge back like they suddenly find themselves walking off a cliff. Of course, the street is still there, but just can’t be seen, or it looks like it is missing. This supposedly usually happens about two hours before sunrise.). A phenomena that I’ve seen and which is one of my favorites is called a Skeleton Moon. (It occurs on vividly crisp winter nights when there is a moon that is just past full, maybe about one day past full. Some light clouds need to be in the sky with a slight wind capable of moving them. At such a time, when I look up, it looks like I can see through moon, as though its lunar skin has been removed. And, when a cloud passes across the moon, the cloud appears to pass behind it. It feels like I can see the cloud floating by, through the bones of the moon.

Candle Man The passenger got in the cab from the left and quickly moved to the opposite side by kind of crawling across the back seat — you know, kind of dog-like. Riders like that always give me the creeps. Seat-Scootchers are weird, but not as bad as the “Canines.” He sat up straight, real close to the door. Too close. Too much pressure on the arm rest, Dude. Another sign that the night was a long one. “Drive east,” he said, “I don’t know the address, but I’ll tell you directions when you get around the airport.” He tossed a few large bills on the cash-tray like an offering. I shouldn’t have, but I took them and drove. (“Baby needs shoes,” — which isn’t true; there is no “Baby.”). After about 5 minutes, he started rustling around in his pants and I worried that he was going to be like that, like you-know-what. But, he wasn’t. He was just looking for his lighter. “Sorry, No smoking, Sir.” “Yeah, it’s smokeless,” he said as he lit the wick on a candle. He set the candle on a tiny red saucer that he spent less time to find in his pants. He was right. There was no smoke, but I suspected it still violated the spirit of company rules. I just drove, and kept an eye on the flame in the rear-view mirror. As I drove, the candle shrank into a pool of melt. The rider relentlessly stared at the candle light. His eyes flashed of fire. I watched him fanatically watching the flame. When the fire finally flicked flicked flickered and went out, he said, “Turn left here.” He didn’t even look up to see where we were. But, there was a left and I took it. The cab was now dark. No more romantic candle light shaping the car’s interior. Just the motor’s tuned purr and the smell of wax. I drove down a road that was no where near the airport. After going farther than I imagined could be reasonable, I asked, “How far?” There was no answer. I switched on the interior light, and I was the only one in the cab. No passenger, candle pool or red saucer. The only trace was a scent of flame, which my boss blamed me for. Oh, and the cash “vanished” as well, but I know where that went.

Vampires I don’t believe in vampires, but I know some people really believe they are vampires. I drive at night, and so I get a lot of night people. Of those, some say they’re vampires. Of those, some really believe it. They’re usually high-as-fuck, but not always. Some motherfuckers are committed, 24/7, to their vampirism. I usually chalk it up to way too much getting high and being way too high for way too long, so these motherfuckers end up spending more time as “vampires” than as bankers or bakers or cocktail waitresses or whatever the fuck they need to do sober. So, I’d say, they basically behaviorism themselves into BEING vampires. B. F. Skinner would likely nod in agreement (which is equally a behavioristic programming. And, I have long thought that with a name like “B. F. Skinner,” he must have had a lot of first hand experience with people automatically reacting with the same dumbass anal sex jokes. B. F. likely concluded that these motherfuckers just couldn’t not say shit like, “So, does that mean you wear a condom or you don’t?” But, of course, B. F. could have just gone by Burrhus Frederic. It was his free choice to use “B. F. Skinner” as his fame name. But, maybe he liked to see people react to their rat-brain triggers). And, I must say, the real vampires are great tippers. That’s how I can really tell them apart from the wanna-bes and Halloweenies. Real vampires even seem kind of confused by how they got so much cash. They open their wallet, see a bunch of money and seem to have an urge to get rid of it in acts of ultra-generosity. I also chalk these behaviors up to being WAY TOO HIGH, but it definitely contributes to their vampire self-beliefs. It adds convincing evidence to their personal narrative. And, bankers, bakers and cocktail waitresses all do the same thing. They believe what they are because they get to go inside the vault or slide dough into the oven or set a dry martini in front of a stranger. I get the keys to this cab and stop for freaks wandering the night streets with a hand raised; it makes me believe what I think I am. Anyway, as a night driver I get night people. Some of those are vampires, as far as they know.  Of course, you want to hear an anecdote. You can’t help yourself. There was one female vampire who hailed me from a corner opposite the morgue. I kid you not. She was dressed in black-out jeans and a silver Addidas zip-up with maroon Drei-Stripes (Vampires seem to like Addidas, for some reason. May be brand loyalty related to eastern European history). She was barefoot and her toe-nails looked very worse-for-wear. She had no purse, but was clutching a two-liter PET bottle of some viscous red liquid (I wonder what?). The bottle had the original label removed, but the shape and black cap hinted at Coke Zero. She got in in a way that indicated she was mainly just trying to get off the street. I’ve seen that Help Me Escape face on various women fleeing from someone — either a would-be date-raper, random creep or a stiffed restaurant waiter. I don’t get into passenger motivations. My job is to serve the hailing hand.  She made up an address downtown: “The We’ll Fore-go Bank.” (Really, that’s a quote). “I show you way. Very near library. Please.”  The way she said “please” was the only honest thing she said. So, I drove to “Very near library” where there are no banks by any name. She got out and pulled out a tarnished silver locket from inside her jacket. I didn’t argue. Those toenails looked vicious.  Stopped at a red light later that night, I looked closely at the locket. Corrosion had greened its hinge. I pried its door open using a key’s edge and found a small piece of aged paper inside. A single red finger-print on it. Should I wonder what was used as the ink?

Dream Taxis By now I’ve learned how to recognize some of the patterns. There is always a taxi, and it’s always a little bit different taxi. The color or car model or interior details that I notice let me know I’m in a taxi dream again. The driver is always different, but it’s always the same being. I won’t say it’s a “person,” because there are many different possibilities when outside the flesh-n-bones world. Dreams aren’t populated by people, so “Being” feels most accurate. But, so far, the driver has always appeared in the form of a human.  Of course, it would be very hard for something like a deer to drive a taxi, so maybe the dream’s scenario requires certain logistical compromises.  What I’m saying is the slight differences in the dreams indicate a recognizable pattern, a linked series of continuity. The different nuances and details that I notice are where the taxi dreams hint at meanings, or they bring up valuable questions.  In the dreams, I’m always the passenger and I’m always me. I easily recognize myself. One time I was dressed in a silver business suit. Once as a thick-fingered construction worker, with my sack of heavy steel tools on the taxi floor. Three times I knew I was a researcher from a past era, riding in a future taxi and interviewing the cabby. In those three dreams, the driver of the future took the form of a woman with an accent and a detailed knowledge of poets I’d never heard of. She quoted elaborate lines from poems and a passage from an essay. I remember sitting in the back seat and taking perfect notes, writing them in a small red book. But I forgot the book on top of the cab when I got out at my destination – some large grey factory building. She drove off — back into the future — with my red book fluttering on top of the cab. I don’t know if any of those poets really exist, or at least yet. I know it’s the same driver in the dream by tiny flamboyances of fashion: a glittering wristwatch, a pair of round eyeglasses designed in the shape of small bronze handcuffs, a hair band made of colorfully tattooed skin, a single finger nail encrusted with tiny ivory angels, etc. Only one time there was another passenger in the taxi. I don’t remember the driver that time (so maybe it was a deer). The other passenger was a young woman wearing a shimmering blue dress. She sat in the other back seat and teased me to entertain her with improvised poetry, to which she would effortlessly add a line or an elaboration in response. To the degree that I got stuck in planning my next poem or tried to remember a particularly good phrase, she giggled with playful distain. I remember she said, “I understand you want to hold on to these, but this ride only happens now.” When she said that, the taxi suddenly vanished and I found myself holding my breath at the bottom of a fish tank (but that’s no longer a night taxi dream, so you’ll need to ask me to hear how the tank dream ended). In my most recent taxi dream, the driver sped wildly through an edgy city that had no street lights. The taxi’s headlights flashed upon objects and situations occupying the streets. I watched as that world appeared and vanished in the dark. A barefoot woman riding a foldable white bicycle. A cluster of dogs tearing something apart, their heads thrashing and their tails all lowered stiffly. A couple in a car going the other way – she looking at he. Another dog’s eyes glowing. A man carefully setting a stack of books on the back of a dark brown sports car. Metal posts jutting up from the sidewalk. Peeling yellow curb paint. A large glass shop window reflecting the taxi back at us – me seeing me sitting in the back of the cab. The taxi driver a man with a withered but fierce face. The taxi’s headlights flashing into our faces like a photo’s snap. A bright red dot of paint stylishly marking the center of the driver’s forehead. To big and misplaced to be an Indian accessory. Some private assertion of beauty or identity. Some birthmark or openly expressed secret. Another dog dashing out of the taxi’s recklass path. The cab’s lights panning across the sides of parked cars and the bodies of people lingering outside a dirty building talking and smoking and who-knows-what. The wild drive went on and on, turning the city into a swirl of unmappable angles and shifting replacements. Until at one point the city suddenly vanished and the cab’s lights pushed straight out into a neutral void – into a flat expanse of uniform desert for as far as the lights could reach before fading in black distance. At a certain depth, the night resists being formed into names purposeful for furnishing my mind.

The Three Blues From above the moat, I saw three crows flash  between barrier-water and my eyes. The sun illuminated their luscious blue sheen. How many definitions collapsed in my memory? How many beauties start as a sliver of doubt breaking  the skin of this body  I believe within? by Jerry Gordon 11.18.2023 ————— The ornaments of  exotic creatures dangle so close to the drumming receiver of silences and songs, of syllables tainted with meaning’s cloy  and the purity of noise.  My ear turns towards  the curious cries  voiced by beasts, leaves  and train doors — all  these mutually urgent messengers of death  and other poetry.  by Jerry Gordon 11.19.2023 ————— The fog believes in us like an erasing flood, drowning all the ghosts and to the degree I am also vapor I am also lost as its  saturation. What of me is not  reaches through this  vaporous terror to touch what of you is also  not replaced by the delete.  I find the soft knot of your wrist and hold you holding me together amidst the loss of us  absorbed by moist tumult.  Don’t move lest fog flows  into our lungs. Don’t thrash, as  each erases us. Thus let’s settle to the firm floor to not fight it — cling and vanish from the panic of invision.  Let’s survive on touch.  by Jerry Gordon 11.20.2023 ——————— A line of drifting smoke  becomes me through  these years hours minutes moments of reversal and self-curl. Float and eruption from some  ignited ember, from some  source of what’s combustion. All I know is tangle, swarms of  deflected light flash this  miraculous trash — memory.  What isn’t to and from it?  Each “beginning.” Each  “completion.” I want to slice the fog with the edge of my hand. As though I could recognize some new species of dragonfly from the gap, some world of freedom between the seam.  Romantic me.  by Jerry Gordon 11.22.2023

Hill of Hell I heard it climbing the slope from behind me and thought it had a broken muffler. The sound was a manic scream, but it wasn’t the first car I’d ever heard in need of repair.  I just kept running, focused on keeping my breathing calm and my legs pumping at an even pace all the way up the hill. That was my training goal that morning of hill intervals. Smooth breathing and even leg turnover. Things were going good.  I was almost at the peak of the slope when the taxi passed me. The racket it was making was deafening. I kept focused on my body, and only looked over to see the cab go by when we both reached the hilltop. It wasn’t an exhaust problem; the roar was from screaming animals jammed inside a taxi cab.  The taxi was packed with exotic beasts, like some kind of 21st century gas-powered Noah’s Ark departing Osaka’s Konohana district. And all the creatures were screaming like bloody murder. A collective HOWL of fur and fancy feathers. All packed in that shiny black taxi. Back seat, front passenger seat, on the dash board, heads hanging out the windows. Just before the sun broke into day. Not unlike roosters, I guess.  My pace slowed as I felt the slope level off. I deserved the body-break for all my hard work pushing it up The Hill of Hell (as my personal trainer likes to call that span of road bridging between Shikanjima and Fukushima). I watched the cab full of beasts roll by and estimate that it had around a dozen animals stuffed inside — none within any cage.  While it was a junglesque tangle of wildlife in there — and thus hard to tell for sure — I’d say I saw a small horse, two deer, a baby elephant, two hyena, three peacocks, a young tiger, two chimps and a Siberian husky. All expressing dissatisfaction of one form or another. A big loud menagerie of complaint.  The doppler-effect warped the animals’ howling/growling as their confined transit unit rolled by. My shirt was sweaty but not overly soaked. I felt the morning air cold on my chest. My core heat pushing through the polyester. The sun brewed pinkish below the edge of the darkened east. “What were they upset about?” was the question that popped into my head. I looked at my smart watch and stared at the digital icon for my heart beat beat beat.  Oddly, it wasn’t until I reached the bottom of the Hill of Hell that I started wondering, “Who’s animals are those?” Then, “Why move them in a cab? Must be a safer way.” I walked around in a few circles to let my body rest but not tighten up. I watched my watch again and let my heart rate drop to close to resting. I checked my core temp. I needed to run one more Hill of Hell interval before going home for a shower. My watch indicated that my breathing intake was very good for my age.  The sound of the cab animals’ voices had vanished into the distance. “Are they heading to the zoo? Wrong direction, I think.” I sucked in a quick breath, touched my watch’s lap timer and started running back up and over The Hill of Hell.