Browse Topics

The Living End

What I remember most about Sarah Collins is her face pressed up against the back window of the El Camino as the car sped down our street. A big hand was reaching over her forehead, trying to pry her from the glass. On the middle finger was a silver ring that caught a ray of sunlight. I squinted from the glare, and the car was gone.

Virus

We hold our support-group meetings in a room with Oriental carpets and deep green easy chairs. I arrive a few minutes early to set out chips, cookies, a foil tray full of fried-chicken dinners, and a liter bottle of Coke. Food is a big draw. One by one, they drift in.

Sunbeams

He’s not the finest character that ever lived. But he’s a human being, and a terrible thing is happening to him. So attention must be paid. He’s not to be allowed to fall into his grave like an old dog. Attention, attention must be finally paid to such a person.

Arthur Miller

Bread Of Heaven

The secret ingredient in the cathedral’s communion bread is beer: twelve ounces of Miller, Budweiser, Olympia. Today I am using Anchor Steam left over from a fund-raiser. I am not supposed to drink. Some think even one beer can reduce your T -cell levels, and my count is already down to four per cubic millimeter of blood — less than half a percent of normal immune capability.

The Vulgar Soul

As his sessions with the psychiatrist progressed, the stigmata bled less frequently. Hogue was getting more sleep, and though he continued to lose weight, he managed to eat something every day. He felt cautiously hopeful.

Eric, Recovering Wino

The jail, the acid, being alone — it all starts to get to me. I feel ashamed, no good. I shit in the toilet; I fish out the turd; I take my spoon and eat a piece of the turd. I drink a spoonful of urine. I break the windowpanes with my elbows, cutting myself in the process. I try to cut off the fingers of my left hand, but succeed only in producing a deep gash across them. The blood floods out in big bright red drops. The air fills with the smell of my blood. I write my name on the wall with it. Thick gobs cling to my gray cell wall. I’m trying to think of a way to cut myself deeper when the guards come and haul me to the hospital.

Sunbeams

Today in America — and every day in America — seventy-six million Valium will be swallowed. In addition, some thirty million people will glue themselves to soap operas on television. It would seem that our culture is not well adapted to deal with pain.

Matthew Fox

Sources Of Nourishment

All week long at my job I’ve been telling people to eat. I’m supposed to be counseling them about HIV, talking about condoms and the needle-exchange program, but instead I find my eyes drawn to the hollows of their collarbones, to the sticks of their wrists and elbows, and I ask them when they last ate.

Ode To A Serotonin-Reuptake Inhibitor

The last time I went to my psychiatrist’s office, he asked me how I felt. I said that with the pills he was giving me, I felt as happy as a clam.

Pills

Pink laundry, kidney stones, tapeworms