Belinda got addicted to morphine.
\nBelinda got taken out of the hospital
\nin cuffs.
\nBelinda did two years.
\nNow Belinda drives taxi with us
\nand does cocaine off the passenger seat.
\nBelinda’s family won’t talk to her.
\nBelinda cries a lot
\ncalls people on her cell phone
\ntalks about how she has come down in the world
\nand how she has it rough
\nand how nobody loves her.
\nBelinda lives at the Parker Suites
\ncomplains about the high price
\nbut won’t move.
\nBelinda got her hair fixed at Gadabout.
\nBelinda got new shoes.
\nBelinda is broke.
\nBelinda eats nothing but ice cream sandwiches.
\nBelinda makes fun of people constantly
\nmakes a dozen friends a day
\nand loses them the next.
\nBelinda is too good
\nfor this job.<\/p>\n
It’s all about Belinda
\naround here
\nas you can see.<\/p>\n
Jack has Gallstones<\/strong><\/p>\n and is not quite sure Tucson Monsoon<\/strong><\/p>\n The venerated rain and all of us off their feet and taken down the wash running around like escaped convicts, thunder like mass moving toward us and over us, the rain staked smiling at each other, headlights winking in the din, the wipers, where’s the de-fogger, butterflies people yelling simply to be understood, their hundred dollar hair in the shrill wind, us raw, umbrellas like race car parachutes, in slow motion, then, as suddenly as it came, the sun rays cutting down, sovereign again, a last toward Casa Grande, toward Phoenix, falling and breaking along the horizon, a rainbow, By Mather Schneider<\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":119,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/119"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7449\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nwhy he’s alive.
\nHe’s only twenty six
\nand is putting off
\nthe surgery.
\nThere is this feeling in him:
\nwhen the gallstones are gone
\nthere will be something else.
\nHe’s going
\nbald already
\nand moans and groans
\nwhen he walks.
\nHe is like an old man
\nhis handshake weak
\nand cold.
\nHe’s decided to quit cabbing
\nand this is his last day.
\nI don’t know where he is going
\nor what he is going to do.
\nHe doesn’t either.
\nThe thing is you grow
\nfond of people
\nand do not like to say
\ngoodbye.<\/p>\n
\ndriving in two feet of water, children scooped<\/p>\n
\nwhich was bone dry an hour before, laughing, dogs<\/p>\n
\nsemis crashing, the whole black lashing<\/p>\n
\nby the wind like tent ropes, enemies<\/p>\n
\neveryone helpless and giddy, where’re<\/p>\n
\nwhile hydroplaning, the fever of humidity,<\/p>\n
\na billion fingers on an aluminum awning, girls pawing<\/p>\n
\nclothes like runny paint, mother nature stripping<\/p>\n
\nelectricity, trees shaking like giant wet dogs<\/p>\n
\nedge of the cloud, a butt of pumpernickel,<\/p>\n
\ngrumble, the circus moving on<\/p>\n
\nfading lightning like great pillars of neon<\/p>\n
\nthe miracle of dragonflies…<\/p>\n![\"dscf0027\"](\"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/dscf0027-300x225.jpg\")
\nABOUT THE AUTHOR<\/strong>
\nMather Schneider<\/strong> is a 40 year old cab driver in Tucson. He isn’t
\naffiliated with any university or magazine. His work has appeared for the
\nlast 15 years in places like NYQ<\/em>, Nerve Cowboy<\/em>, My Favorite Bullet<\/em>, Chiron
\nReview<\/em>, Slipstream<\/em> and many others.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"![\"dscf0068\"](\"https:\/\/www.3ammagazine.com\/3am\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/04\/dscf0068-150x150.jpg\")
Belinda got addicted to morphine.
\nBelinda got taken out of the hospital
\nin cuffs.
\nBelinda did two years.
\nNow Belinda drives taxi with us
\nand does cocaine off the passenger seat.
\nBelinda’s family won’t talk to her.
\nBelinda cries a lot
\ncalls people on her cell phone
\ntalks about how she has come down in the world
\nand how she has it rough
\nand how nobody loves her.<\/p>\n