Barker selling spot remover for
rugs...bottles of stains arranged in a colorful row...an elderly couple is taunting him,
the old man laughing merrily at claims and prices...
Abortion extremists, pictures of fetuses line the cubby. A group of
young males are watching a third term abortion video. They have the slack-jawed
hollow-eyed expectancy of a crowd at a porno movie...
John Birch
Society, haven't heard about this group since high school, wonder what they're into now? Couple of thin lipped
fellows w/ bad haircuts wearing cheap staypress pants and blue polyester plaid shirts.
Three or four poorly printed pamphlets...
Taxidermy outfit, the tiny space filled,
piled, overrun by all manner of stuffed creature... elk, deer, bear, antelope, skunk,
beaver, ferret, coyote, rabbits, weasels, wolverine, porcupine, eagle, hawk, raven,
wolves, cougar, buffalo...whole bodies plus various parts, heads, hooves, ears and butts,
butts of female deer a big seller this year, grab your pad and pencil Doctor...and try to
figure that one out...some ultimate connection to the true meaning of hunting...
Amid the unnatural stillness of this "Peaceable Kingdom"
and somehow fitting into the clutter are three people. I flinch back when one of them
moves...alive...I want to ask them if they have any Jews, a bar of soap or maybe a lamp,
but they might not like the implications of my connection, hunting being an ideology like
all other American pastimes. I might end up in the lobby of a bank stuffed inside an
elk...looking forever out from behind the round brown glass eyes...
