Three Patrols – Stuart M. Ross
July 15, 2021
1. Echo
We were playing footsie, last night at Culver’s, when you said, that escalated quickly.
You called me the little Jew with the big head. The boy who continues playing Brahms when the Nazis
run away with his Bösendorfer.
We met on Facebook, in a Bruckner shitposting, although we’d both been meaning to delete the evil
thing.
We shortlisted, with crinkle cuts, the five essential patrollers of America.
The buckhunters who patrol the wildlife.
The butchers who patrol the food supply.
The politicians who patrol the emotions.
The pornographers who patrol the youth.
The police who patrol the echoes.
Back at my place we listened to a rare mediocre jazz LP.
Now I’m watching you on TV and realizing America is going to hate me, the only Jew who knows you
subscribe to the Minnesota Orchestra.
And I am watching you as I blow yellow pack smoke into a Home Depot cactus.
Mommy said you were America at its best, singing Jack Handy into the Handycam.
And I am remembering only hours ago when sunlight hit my tongue in your asshole spelling Priscilla
Zuckerberg.
And I am watching you descend on the echo with plaintiff effort, kneeling on the echo’s pew, for kicks,
you jerk, they will never let us delete Facebook now.
If only you had stayed with me this morning and made us your Mommy’s kind of blueberry pancakes.
Why waste my life with big books when you sink a scroll heavier than anything in my codex.
After your death your Mommy might receive a recording of your heartbeat.
Yes, your Mommy will say, my son’s heart did beat with a mind of its own.
When I leaned into your chest I heard oy, yo, I heard yhw, why.
2. New York
Similar to Anorak Morgan in Emily Karenina and Saul Bellow’s Saul Bellow stand-in in Tolstoy of the Ju-Jus.
Similar to Sally Draper in Conversations with Student Loans and Natasha Plus One in Similar French Girlfriend set against the downtown art scene on the cusp of the 1980s.
Similar to Adam Sackler setting the breastplate of the luncheon brunette.
Similar to Nathaniel P’s scratchy delight observing West Indians at picnic and Philip Lewis Friedman
refusing a recommendation for the slush pile reader at Consecutive Bricks Press.
Similar to the many good people of Queens unscrupulously observed by the many decent writers from
Hedge Fund University where showboating traumatic ethnicities with commas gets cancelled as a gap-
year elective yeah I mean that bad good ulcerous coffee at the Colombian, Ecuadorian, Belizean
bakeries.
Similar to the Stillerism unto death in Jeff Goldblum’s version of Woody’s deepest buried filmic self
executive producer of Baumbach’s riddling auteuriority.
Similar to placing the cranberry tampon on Harvey Weingard’s lips hidden in Lower Egypt paused in
Byzantium referenced in Italia and checked out of a Squirrel Hill library once the printing press changes
the world.
Similar to the colonist learning something forgettable about the African and the African learning /
something / forgettable about Portugal.
Similar penned in ballpoint Sylfaen comic novel with long gun Jew holocaust parallel structure exploring
Obama’s rhetorically inspired trip to an Amazon packing facility dragging a rusty two-way radio through
the hippest East Berlin streets before dawn never again.
Similar to Jacob & Naomi purring beneath an infrequently observed New York City during the laconic
revival of garage rock in the late summer of 2001.
Similar to Whitney Solloway learning the fizzling truth about pop from a business-class turtleneck.
Quite unlike any other hate-skimming experience in post-blame mastheads penned by our jack Lutheran
Namibian MacArthur fellow Obadiah J.N. Flanagan some of it on the colony of Yaddo most of it w/o a
403(b) at The Ohio State University acknowledging black male writer tears scribbled on puddle jumpers
leaving Windhoek for Luanda breathtaking yet life-affirming and already in treatment for an original
series and winner of several major awards not even fourteen months before its cover reveal.
Similar to jive James Baldwin in the John Muir mountains.
Arousal piqued, adds to cart.
3. Retail
White subject, blue plan.
Step into any hotel ask to use the can.
Step into any Kiehl’s they hand me free samples.
Put it all on this card.
Good wi-fi here.
White subject, blue citizen.
Step into any boutique ask for the crapper.
Walk upstairs behind yoga-skinned whippersnapper.
Shawty knows I’ll perfume her shawl when we get to the lounge.
Good wi-fi here.
Walk into any CVS that used to be my brain
that now is a Jimmy Johns
that used to be my age
that now is a Linens-N-Shit
that used to be my liver
that now is a sweetgreen
that used to be my Spleen.
No I’m in the Walgreens.
Now I have no reason to be in this Walgreens.
Later that situation could change, although I don’t need shaving cream.
Maybe I’ll stay in this Duane Reade brought to you by Walgreens, yeah.
Just get really zooted and stay in here for like an hour.
This Amazon Go is a little bit closer to my place than the other Amazon Go I could also be in.
Tried to explain Amazon Go to my pops he said he had to go.
This Walgreens is open for like 24 hours now.
I think I’ll save my points for next time that’s how an optimist like me views the street.
Listening to Illmatic I’m wearing a short skirt so maybe Illmatic will go out with me.
In the Walgreens reading the nation’s bestsellers.
Catherine Coulter yeah she never disappoints, always a page turner straight to the delicious end.
Ain’t no time for new canons trying to blow up mine.
They sell tuna fish in this Urban Outfitters.
White subject, blue life.
One woman’s relationship to the internet.
And the brothers turn out to be twins.
Good wi-fi here.
White tongue, Jewish tent.
Similar to remotely rehashing never smashing your phone.
Walk into any Nordstrom for the nordstromosity of the AC.
Good wi-fi here.