Literature I

Hellbender the dwarf

After what I’ve seen of life I do not want anymore part of it. I have not smiled since she left

I will not let you kill your self. You are full of life.

If you left this world obviously I could replace you. If you stayed I am sure you could be of better use.

The kids are too young, the streams too polluted, the wars too advanced for me to help anymore. I am now only a nuisance.

Fine. I’ll go on through the ages enacting my will as I always have without you. You may regret it old boy. If you leave this world against my desire I may not help your desire on the other side.

I cannot go on any further without her. Even you know that. Why do you fuss me so? I do not want to fight your battles anymore.

Fuss you so? Such maudlin. I have come to think of you as my own child. There are serious spiritual dangers to suicide. There has to be.

Damn it all. I don’t care. I have no heart left. I have no desire.

Who filled your mind with such stories? Life is not about heart or desire once one loses those things indeed they are gone. You must continue with me in this thing called life. It is the only way.

Maybe you are right. If I have given it another try after I have lost everything before, what makes this time of despair any different? Fuck it. Let’s give it another round you and me. What have you got for me dwarf?

To be honest, not much. No ladies. No love. No passion.

Ok. Thank you dwarf. You know how to encourage a chap. So what? Every time I come back from the edge to our little partnership it does seem worse.

You have to do what I tell you everyday. These pansies, snowflakes, and bullies of this generation are all programmed the same and any antics that come out of them is not personality but errors in the coding.

We must go completely underground and stop writing for today’s audience but for the abandoned children of tomorrow. We must write hope for the unborn.

I have written hope. I have written scripts of virtue. I have lived my life with bravery and courage.

Yet you doubt. You doubt your value. You doubt your legacy. How will you write scripts of hope for the unborn if you doubt?

No. I can’t bear it. I will not be the Father of bastard generations. This is not my burden nor my responsibility.

So your choice is suicide? Your legacy is suicide? Your final act of bravery is suicide?

I have never been brave, dwarf. It has always been you. I have never wanted to be brave, only to be obedient.

Lord have mercy child. A lifetime of brave daring and still a spirit of servility. A coward full of battle scars. A pitiable creature with well-merited laurels.

I have been tired my entire life. Now my dear dwarf. Goodbye.

Ernest Hemingway went to his grave feeling fuller than an unrisen sun. I traveled through the woods, rivers, plains, creeks, mountains, and oceans for a writer that would encourage the world in its dealings when I happened upon Charles Bukowski in California and Hunter S Thompson in Kentucky. Ernest Hemingway was the black sheep boy who could wear the Golden Fleece but Bukowski and Hunter were pure freaks of nature. That was a good thing for they were the last of the literary scene anywhere in all the world for all time.

Hunter come on don’t shoot yourself. All I ask of you is to do one more thing.

Enough! I’ve had it with you dwarf.

Enough of me? I am the dwarf of Hemingway.

Yes. You are Bukowski’s invention of the dwarf of Hemingway. Blah, blah, blah.

I am the inspiration of millions. I am the inventor of masculinity. I am the taking of a woman’s virginity.

Go back to hell. Tricks are for kids.

I left Hunter S Thompson or Hunter S Thompson left me or we eloped into an eternal intimate death napkin, it hardly matters. A little more about me wouldn’t hurt. I am the masculinity of ages. That first time the toddler finds out how to bully another toddler is me. When that bullied toddler learns he can fight back is also me. I am from the oldest school of masculinity. I am an ancient root. I am something always being lost and yet never being replaced.  The men of the ages were all my slaves.

Another case of beer Bukowski. Another woman Bukowski. Another poem Mr Bukowski. Another day at general unskilled labor Bukowski.

Thank you dwarf. You are a gentleman and a scholar.

Another lustful thought about a young girl Bukowski. Another woman not returning your call Bukowski. Another night with no beer, no food and no company Bukowski. Another drunken night in a jail Bukowski.

Ok. Ok. What do you want dwarf?

You seize me whenever I think I have made it, or is it whenever I think I have escaped? Always why can’t I be rid of you? Why must you badger me so?

Why badger you so? Look at that gut Bukowski! Look at your misery Bukowski! Look at your reputation Bukowski! Why you are near complete ruin!

I am a professional. I like my life. I like myself. I do not like you.

You love me. Work harder. Produce more. Fail less. Live fuller.

Oh you are a peach. Give me a hug. I do love you dwarf. For you are mine and I am yours.

For I am you and you are me. Amen.

Now dwarf.

Yes sir.

How are those wives of Norman Mailer and William S Burroughs?

Stabbed and shot sir.

The legacy of Hemingway, Hunter, Mailer and Burroughs?

Annihilated sir.

My legacy dwarf?

You are nothing sir.

Why is that dwarf?

The rise of feminism, illiteracy spreading, inability to think critically, the devaluing of free inquiry and the imminent rise of political correctness.

I think masculinity may have a chance then.

You still believe in me? 

With your last breath?

Yes dwarf.