The Diary of Mitch R. Singer

Somewhere over the rainbow, where skies are blue
Gangs of nazis drag people down the street, fat, fetid man-boys clad in sweat pants and army surplus camouflage. Spittle flies from their lips; when they speak, nothing comes out but haggard squeaks, mice-like squeals of discontent and fury. I sit around the table, nestled indoors, while my family sings for my thirty-second year. Thirty-two years seems too long--I feel as though I have crawled through sewers for eons and wandered dead woods for eternities--but I wear the sad face of acquiescence, smiling the toothy-smile for fate. One of the gangs has decided to beat a man in my front yard. Everyone keeps singing, even though his screams pierce through the thin glass and reverberate in these long halls. "Happy birthday to you," they say. Indeed. Happy birthday to me.


In the orchard, the smell of rotten apples in the air
One hand rises up while another comes down. Into the sack it goes, a fecund piece of fruit. After a while the weight of the picking bag hangs around your neck like a yoke. Around I go, a busy beast, my labors quiet and mechanized like the efficient piece of heavy equipment I have become. When the bag is full, it is emptied with great care, its contents as beautiful as any painting in a museum. I stare and become mesmerized by the red stripes, the splattering of color across pale, white flesh. Sometimes I can't help myself and eat as many as I can. Under my boots the failed droppings of the harvest melt into the earth, releasing an odor of vinegar that seems to linger for months, far after the memory of picking has faded. It is a pleasure being a tool, a senseless, yet useful, thing.


Outside my house, looking at the night stars
I come outside with a piece of birthday cake. It has white frosting and red and blue sprinkles. My neighbor has a huge American flag strung up on a pole in his yard. A night breeze rustles it, sending waves through the stars and stripes. I spot a hole in a white stripe the size of a bullet. There is shouting and chortling, and the gang that was out earlier walks down my street. There are about five of them, ugly boys, gangling or overweight. One of them sees me watching with my birthday cake and shouts something crude about my mother. It is strange; nights like these feel limitless, as though I could be any person if I only reached down into the depths of my history and pulled out a face to wear. A smile cracks my visage. The fork in my hands has ragged prongs, as though someone has taken the time to pull each of them into twisted metal teeth. "Happy birthday," I say as they stop and watch me approach. Happy birthday to each of us.