so these jeans

So these jeans he had on didn’t fit like they used to. They were faded and there was a frayed patch of denim on the right pant-leg where the knee likes to settle. He didn’t like their new feel. It was that damned washing machine, commercial and economical. It was too simple, and small, he could only fit half of his hamper.

So these dang jeans. He looked at them with surprising contempt. When he tried them on at the store they were so perfect. The wash was dark, a pristine dark wash of neatly folded and sowed denim. There was a guarantee on those jeans. A promise that they would be more than satisfactory to him. He looked at himself from the waist down, following the inseam down to the floor. A great pair of jeans, what a great wash, dark, perfect, a really good wash.

His jeans. He rustled his shaggy hair, the oil lingering on his fingertips. His fingertips rubbing the patch. His knee, alive, living, breathing beneath more than satisfactory material. The oil remained on the imperfection, the soft breach of fabric poisoning the assurance of quality and ruining his opulence.

He took in a final breath through his cigarette and killed it on the patch, thoroughly rubbing in the ashes with scorn. He violently threw the cigarette to the cement, his index and middle finger liberated. They tore through the poison and ripped those dang jeans, that damned washing machine.

He stepped on the lifeless cigarette and squinted his eyes. He had to get another really good wash now, he had to.

a self-portrait

Inside of the shoebox was a spider. The spider had only known the shoebox, and the shoebox had never opened itself for the spider. The spider thrived in the shoebox, relished in its efficacies and materials, until one day when the spider saw that the shoebox was a shoebox. The spider moved toward the edge of the shoebox and pushed its delicate body against the cardboard. The spider felt a sensation and was suddenly overwhelmed with knowledge and curiosity as it saw the gauntness of thriving and relishing. The spider knew, believed, understood that there was something unimaginable beyond the cardboard, the only thing that could bring genuine fulfillment, meaning, purpose. The efficacies and materials scoffed at the spider and began to stifle it. The spider struggles. The spider believes. The spider is still in the shoebox.