Quarter to Three

By Sparrow

The Glow of Sports

The Glow of Sports
In youth
I had the glow of
sports.

Now I have
the glow of
newspapers.

Elvis’ Secret Wife
Deb Spizin [a pseudonym] is a short woman with long brown hair, and a faint Southern accent. She works in a supermarket in Kingston.
Sparrow: So, you’re Elvis’ secret wife?
Deb: Yes, we were married in a small chapel in Pareville, Tennessee on April 16,1969.
Sparrow: But you never lived together.
Deb: No. He visited me every Wednesday. I lived in a boarding house in Memphis.
Sparrow: And he would spend the night?
Deb: No. We only had conjugal relations once. Elvis believed sex weakened a romance.
Sparrow: Where did you meet?
Deb: In a bar. Actually, I didn’t recognize him. I barely knew who he was. Sparrow: You didn’t know who Elvis was?
Deb: No. I was immersed in the world of classical music.
Sparrow: Did you play an instrument?
Deb: Yes. The oboe.
Sparrow: Did you ever play music together?
Deb: Yes, several times. Elvis accompanied me on guitar. He was a wonderful musician. He could create harmonies as complex as Handel’s.
Sparrow: What was Elvis like?
Deb: He was a simple man. Very religious. Always on pills. He had strong opinions. For example, he hated Santa Claus.
Sparrow: Hated Santa Claus?
Deb: Every so often, out of nowhere, he would shout an obscenity at Santa Claus. He often called him “that fat fool bastard”.
Sparrow: Do you know why?
Deb: I assumed this was an emotion from childhood.
Sparrow: Anything else you remember?
Deb: He loved Nixon. He often would say: “I wish I could kiss Nixon.”
Sparrow: Why was that?
Deb: He was impressed with Nixon as a strategist.
Sparrow: Anything else?
Deb: Elvis had a fondness for sheep. His greatest regret was owning no sheep.
Sparrow: Why couldn’t he buy sheep ?
Deb: He felt it was unacceptable for a rock star to own sheep.
Sparrow: But Paul McCartney owned sheep.
Deb: To him the Beatles were not stars. They were imitators.
Sparrow: He left you no money?
Deb: I asked for no money. I believe money corrodes a person’s dignity. Look at very rich men—Bill Gates, for example. He has become a joke. Donald Trump. John Travolta. Rich people become fatuous cartoons. Money turns the human soul into a joke.
Sparrow: Thank you.
Deb: God be with you.

Tree of the Month: the Sansuma
The Sansuma is a small tree—never taller then nine feet—that grows by waterfalls and airports in the Pacific Northwest. The markings on the bark resemble geese tracks, and the fruit is yellow. When pulverized, the large, flat leaves smell like cottage cheese.

Name Man
Anna: Here comes the Name Man.
Hello! Hello! Name Man!
(He can’t hear me.)
Here! Name Man! Give me a name!

Pink Roof
I saw a roof so pink—so instinctually pink, pinker than peppermint, pink as a towel, so trapeze-pink, criminally-insane pink, turn-right-on-red pink, high-overhead pink, lonesome-bartender-in-Spokane pink, overacting-in-Macbeth pink, God-damaged pink, double-indemnity pink, headline-grabbing pink, chocolate-soda pink—so pink I paused.

Contest
This is the first Quarter to Three contest. Answer this question:
Why is there no such thing as pear sauce, only applesauce?
The winner will receive a one-in-a-million unique, signed edition of a book by Sparrow himself! Please write Sparrow c/o Chronogram, Post Office Box 459, New Paltz, NY 12561. Or if you are very lazy, go ahead and e-mail: Sparrow44@Juno.com.

Dreb-Carving
Close readers of this column are savvy to the term “drebs”—those tiny pieces of soap which remain after a bar of soap is nearly consumed. However, they may not know dreb-carving, the artful sculpting of these soap shards.
Much dreb-carving, taking a cue from scrimshaw—the traditional whittling of whalebone—employs nautical motifs: schooners, mermaids, buoys, lighthouses, dockheads. Other dreb-carving is more fanciful. Brant Plasnir, of Columbus, Ohio, created dreb busts of all the American presidents. (He’s currently carving George W. Bush and Al Gore, just to be safe.) Mel Gasb of Unuik, Alaska specializes in insects, especially centipedes. Sally Mage of Warhnon, Indiana creates courtroom tableaux, including juries, judges, witnesses, security guards, lawyers and court stenographers.
Abstract dreb-carving also exists, especially in San Francisco, where “the 12”, a group of miniature dreb sculptors, gather monthly at Kelly’s bar in the Tenderloin, to trade soap stories.
Which brand of soap is preferable? Ivory, say most dreb artists. “I’ll take anything but those health food soaps with oatmeal in them,” Brant Plasnir avers.
And where do their ideas come from?
“The dreb itself tells me,” explains Sally Mage. “I’ll look at a dreb, and I’ll know if it’s a lawyer or a security guard.”

Summer Journal
6/17
A woman with a head shaped like a dogbone.
2:12 p.m. New Paltz

6/18
A guy in a baseball cap walks onto my bus, and I smell the Camel cigarette he just smoked. (Note: He wears a “Camel” jacket.)

Tuesday
a bug flew
into my eye

and died
in my eyelid
NP 8/1 11:30 AM

8/7
A woman on the bus—I thought her T-shirt said LOVE MACHINE, but it said LAKE GEORGE.

8/8
I feel the presence of a bicycle in my room (though there is none).

8/10
Why it is all fish called “seafood”? Why is there no “lakefood”? Or “creekfood”?

8/9
The sound of a skateboard outside—like silverware rolling in a barrel.