IN SEARCH OF ARCTIC HORNED BEASTS, RUMORED FOR CENTURIES, POSSIBLY MYTHOLOGICAL, BUT PERSISTENT ENOUGH IN THE LITERATURE THAT THEY ARE DISCUSSED AS REAL BY SEVERAL SCIENTISTS ON THE FLOOR, THOUGH ONLY IN THE BREAK ROOM, NOT IN THEIR ACTUAL OFFICES

Take nothing for granted. Leave ranting to others. Come northward to Greenland. Go forward to Nordland. Grant access to no one. Revoke no one’s access.  Take something for reading. Mark others with reddle. Start on life’s riddles, and then stop at nothing.

ROOM 327

By Ben Greenman 

From forthcoming thing

“Yes, I know, it’s not very diplomatic. It’s not in the rule book.” An actress was standing on set refusing to be interviewed in her skimpy costume. There was no comment at that time, but now the commission is putting a report together. There has never been a toy with a higher upside. All of us agree on the recipe. It’s not very diplomatic. The new guy has no question he can get her goat. Her costume was on set. A poison released from an overhead vent quickly filled the room. They hopped into the car before emerging and giving in to a bumper-to-bumper passionate public display. “Metaphors subdued the day.” There was no comment at that time. A jazz player feels his way through a melody, unless the melody feels its way through a jazz player. An actress was standing in the rule book. “When he put her saucer on the table, he did so roughly, in clear violation of the organization’s protocol, not to mention common human decency.” I thanked you. I am sure of it. On the magazine cover a body in repose proved on closer inspection to be a corpse. An actress jumped into the car before emerging. A jazz player provided a bumper-to-bumper passionate display. The new guy put her saucer on the table before they jumped into the car. A skimpy costume is a recipe. A public display is a protocol. The new guy has no question he can get her goat. On closer inspection, all of us agree. Yes, I know.  I thanked you. It’s not very diplomatic. I am sure of it. An organization was standing refusing. There has never been a question. There has never been a new guy. A melody was released from an overhead vent to subdue all of us. The commission is putting a metaphor together. All of us agree. There has never been a comment with a higher upside.

EVERYTHING FELL

By Ben Greenman

from random notebook, mid-nineties

Everything fell.

Everything fell because there was nothing holding anything up anymore.

Everything fell and everyone looked at it where it fell and shrugged. 

Everything fell and there was nothing that anyone could do.

Everything fell and everyone noticed that specifics had ceased to matter.

Everything fell and every noun that had once described a scene first faded into the background and then fell onto the ground.

Table, man, interrogation, for example, or airplane, missile, explosion, or even husband, wife, tears: everything fell and there was no dividend in description.

The nouns were on the ground.

The scenes were on the ground.

The ideas about those scene were on the ground.

The ground held everything, but passively, with a cruel indifference.

The ground held power by removing power from everything else.

The ground began to sink, almost as an afterthought.

Everything fell further.

THE BALLAD OF CAMP DAVID

Come up to Thurmont

The Taliban's here

We're ordering pizza

And drinking light beer

We're arguing over

Ideas of heaven

And counting the days

Until 9/11

Camp David, Camp David

In the Maryland hills

The party keeps going

The Feds pay the bills

Camp David, Camp David

With the pond and the geese

That's where we will broker the peace

In Frederick County

The ridges are blue

When I'm here alone

I feel sad, too

So I called up some friends

Now I feel less gloomy

They're Muslim but I'm not sure

If they're Shiite or Sunni

Camp David, Camp David

In the Maryland hills

The party keeps going

The Feds pay the bills

Camp David, Camp David

With the pond and the geese

That's where we will broker the peace

The ramparts, the fishing

The proud timberline

All of this nature

And all of it's mine

I told my new friends

I'm the king of this place

They smiled when they saw

The smile on my face

FRAGMENTS FROM A MASS OF HOT AIR! THE MUSICAL

[Hurricane Dorian approaches. DONALD TRUMP is watching TV. At first, he is confused why the shows are all so boring. Someone explains it to him. He gets excited.]

TRUMP:

Winds, winds, blow blow!

Westward, ho, ho!

Wind, wind, howls, howls!

I’ll throw paper towels.

[Early maps, long in advance of any real information, show Dorian most likely heading up the East Coast, with statistically insignificant models that raise the tiny possibility the storm will cross Florida into the Gulf of Mexico. This excites Trump.]

TRUMP:

Maybe it’ll slam a

Part of Alabama

Maybe it’ll gnaw

On Northern Arkansas

Maybe it’ll coat a

Stretch of Minnesota

Maybe it’ll go

Right to Idaho.

[Trump stares at the map, realizing that he does not know more than maybe a quarter of the states. He begins to map possible courses for the hurricane. His heart is racing.]

TRUMP:

Next it’s off to Utah

Then south to Illinois

It jogs back east toward Oregon.

Who knows what else it will destroy?

[For some reason, Trump gets fixated on the possibility of the hurricane hitting Alabama, maybe because it was the first rhyme in his song. He tweets about the danger. By this point, the storm has set its course and actual hurricane authorities quickly correct him. He doubles down, first on Twitter and then by producing a map to prove his point.]

TRUMP:

They think I’m in error

But they’re full of crap.

Just look at this totally

Non-doctored map!

I swear that’s an official line

And not one drawn in with a Sharpie

That looks exactly like the one that’s

Clutched here in my metacarpi!

[Caught fat-handed in his map-altering scheme, he triples down and then quadruples down, ranting on Twitter and in press conferences, derailing otherwise sensible meetings to make his same invalid point. He retweets an old map from a South Florida Water Management organization that says on it, in no uncertain terms, that it should be superseded by any National Hurricane Map.]

TRUMP:

The truth is simple

The truth is so plain

Alabama was threatened

By this hurricane.

I don’t care what they say.

The experts know zero.

Look out, Alabama.

I’m your number one hero!

[The hurricane proceeds up the coast. Property is lost. Lives are threatened. The president of the goddamned United States of America remains fixated on his poor understanding of storm plots, even devising a new vocabulary to justify his behavior.]

TRUMP:

Grazed or hit

Hit or grazed

I was correct

I’m right for days

Hit or grazed

Grazed or hit

I see the truth

From where I sit

All these liars

On the news

Think I am wrong

But they’re confused.

All these liars 

In the press

Think I know nothing.

They know less.

[Trump retweets an old Alabama National Guard tweet. He tries to invent a time machine to take him back to when Dorian was not yet a tropical storm and still could potentially have passed into the gulf. He hires a choir of children to ring around him and sing.]

CHOIR:

Dorian, Dorian,

Where are you going

With your vicious storm surge

And fearsome winds blowing?

Dorian, Dorian,

You bypassed Miami.

When is your landfall

In old Alabammy?

[One child steps out of the choir and faces Trump. “Mr. President,” she says. “We learned that lying is wrong. Why didn’t you?” Trump holds up his hand to protest. He is about to explain. You are not a liar if you believe that you are right, he will say. You are not a liar if someone else ever makes an error, he will say. And then maybe he will attack the girl’s appearance. She’s wearing a shirt that looks ridiculous. But something in her eyes stops him cold. He collapses to the ground, clutching his head. When he stands again, he is changed. He is, if not remorseful, at least temporarily honest. He calls in to Fox & Friends and admits his deception.]

TRUMP:

I took the damned marker

And I drew a damned cone!

Then I felt triumphant

And deeply alone.

What kind of man resorts

To map-based graffito?

A man who is actually

Mapping his ego.

[Trump hangs up on Fox & Friends, goes to his bedroom, sits in a plush gold armchair, bends his head, and weeps. The top of his head resembles a hurricane of hair. Like all hurricanes, it has done damage. Like all hurricanes, it passes. The choir of children returns to stand outside his bedroom door and sing a medley of “What a Fool Believes” and “The Tears of a Clown.”]