American Indians

We were American Indians
In the hot summer heat
Playing and dancing and
Stomping our feet.

We washed in the river
Got mud in our eyes
Stole feathers from pillows
We made our disguise.

The woods called to us
And to the woods we did run
Moccasins on our feet
Backs warmed by the sun.

With an old arrowhead
We bloodied our hands
Brothers forever
As tradition demands.

Crouched on a hill
In summer’s hot grasp,
We beat a toy drum
While burning sweet grass.

We played games ‘till the sky
Was tainted with red
Our mighty war cries
Could waken the dead.

American Indians
Now late in the night
Our war cries grow quiet
The moon gives us light.

With notepads and pens
We recount the day’s glory
So we’ll never forget
Our Indian story.

New Blog

Hello. I just wanted to let you know that Cold Bullets Inc. is still active.

I plan to continue using this site as a portfolio for my written work. I also started a new blog over at Tumblr for fun/intriguing/bizarre discoveries. It gets updated pretty much every day.

http://cailjudy.tumblr.com/

When I have new written work, I will post it here first. Thanks for reading!

-Management

Bullets

Gravel crunches beneath my boots and buckshot ricochets off the cement wall beside me. I crouch down behind an overturned army truck, waiting for the next break in gunfire. I don’t even know if anyone else is alive in my squad. I lost radio contact a half hour ago. When we got seperated, Johnny and I circled back to the rendezvous point, but we’d already been cut off.

Sins of the Father (Part 2)

I've been running my entire life.
Ran away from home when I was seven.
Cheated on my high school girlfriend
To push her away.
Now I'm walking out on my wife
My son.
I've never been good with words
And even less with goodbyes.
I packed my bags while my boy was at school.
At least I waited until he got home.
But now I'm leaving.
Don't ask my why.
Let's just say I'm cashing in my chips for a new hand.
This life was too small for me.
But the road ahead is wide open.
The freeway is calling my name
So I'm washing my hands of this life.
Maybe you'll understand when you're older, son.
Maybe not.
God, I pray you turn out to be a better man than me.

Sons of Nevada (Part 1)

A heartless bastard
Is what I called him
When his feet hit the floor.
He headed out to his dirty blue pick-up
Where he'd already thrown
His army duffel bag
Filled with his flannel shirts
Marlboro cigarettes ("What a real man smokes, son")
Leatherman knife
And his compass.
My mother's tears stained the kitchen linoleum.
She asked him not to go
And I said he was
A heartless bastard and
Don't come around here anymore
Or I'll kill you.
Those were the last words I said to him.
He walked out the door
Taking my youth with him.
He drove off into the burning Mohave landscape.
I watched from our porch
And spat on the ground where his boots had tread.
I was nine years old
And more of a man
Then he would ever be.

Stone Rose

I gave my love a stone rose. It was cold and beautiful.

She planted the rose in a concrete lot
in a New York City slum.

My love was like the stone rose. Cool to touch, with a beauty that could not fade.

I would hold my love's hand and tell her how beautiful she was. She would smile and whisper in my ear, her voice spiced with secrets, grown in a garden behind her eyes.

We lived in the heart of Brooklyn, above a soul food diner. We could see the river from the rooftop. In the summertime, we would bask in the heat, smoking cigarettes, listening to Marvin Gaye, high in the friendly sky.

Sometimes my love would ask about the stone rose.

Did you find it in a pawnshop? Was it abandoned in a dark alley?

No. I sang a ten-story love song to a gypsy in Central Park. She began to cry and showed me her wares. She kept them in a burlap sack, tied to her back.

Why did she cry?

She had never heard such a beautiful song.

That's a lie. You can’t sing.

It's a story. Let me finish. She tried to offer me fools gold. I said no. She could read my palm and tell me when I was going to die. I declined. She showed me the rose. It was the best she could offer. She told me to give it to my lover. And so I did.

That's very sweet.

It's the truth.

I still don't believe you.

That's okay.

And my love would wrap herself in my arms. I would hold her close, telling her secrets from a world only I could see. A world beneath the city streets, where myth and legend run rampant, like wild things.

She would laugh and tell me about her dreams. She would whisper her secrets in my ear, offering me an elephant stone or the words to songs sung in heaven. I would smile and hold her closer still, her hair across my chest, like a dismantled angel wing.

A stone rose is unfading, unchanging. Just like my love.

So I gave my love a stone rose, cold to the touch and beautiful.

Motorcycle

A belated birthday present for my buddy Jordan. He enjoys motorcycles.