Gaga & Permanent Records Roadhouse
BY BENJIE SALAZAR; ILLUSTRATION BY SARAH GROTH
Car wheels rolling on the 110 North
Good Year Blimp is hung above blue-eyed
Skyscrapers, wretched horns, dirt and windshield
Fluid-
One
Two
Drops on your windshield
It is raining for the 5th day in a row as the mouth
Of the sky opens in-between the Hollywood Mountains
You shove your car next to a barb wire fence and there.
You are in your body again
Your car is no longer holding you
We take off our clothes inside the ballet studio
To my rain-soaked boats, hair-ends,
Brown collared jacket, bare-arms
Up around my neck, a hand on my chest
“Up here, imagine there is a string attached at the top of your head”
Raise those legs, talking, sensing, 2nd no 3rd position,
Hot chocolate down the street, downpouring,
Red colored hands and a nose
The next morning windshield looks even worse
Cars can’t stay in their lanes
The studio is empty except for four of us
There is a leak from the roof panels
A wet spot we all avoid from our socks and bare toes
A month earlier, on the east side of Los Angeles
Sundown, leaving cloud lights carrying hemispheric tones
Of air bubbles all on a singular point in the sky
Car door shut, dad tennis shoes from Austin
A knitted sweater from Santa Cruz, eyebrow piercing,
Undershirt, Bat airy sleeved shirt, champion sweats
Hung loosely about my thighs
Pushed into the black floor
Moving from our pelvic bones
Twisting spines among our hands
Drum pedal machines on the surround sound
Use less, feel a shake within your gut, your car, Ana says,
Shake it all out, move about the floor, look at others in the room,
Run in place and about our explosive legs,
Turn and bounce in random directions
Know where you are in the room
Find where you are in the room
Pull your gut along the bed of your stoney legs
Groan, moan, mull yourself into a shape
Reform it, allow it to create and disappear
Learn from those around you, feel their sweat and their shoulders
Hold your hands out, offer something to the person next to you,
As though it is the weight of feathers, golden, brown,
Hoover, softly, tightly, loop yourself among your arm tendons,
Hurl into your face, smile, laugh, push your knees up and down,
A roadhouse of permanent records boxed in a house
A hill as large as a single-family home
Brown Acid, Zipper Cover-Sticky Fingers
Emily Yacina, Gracie Gray tuning guitars, beer caps,
Cigarette butts, lighter fluid, campfire stench,
A friend at my side, talking about exes and Washington state
Eastern turnpikes.
Easing your hoofy shoulders,
Loping about your ribs,
Feeling, fitting them into place,
Keyboard switches and an electronic device
In your feet
Shuffling about the sunken, checkered floor
The rain, heaving on your front mat,
Grasping at El Sereno caked roads
Laughing hysterically
Singing across your dashboard
We all breathe together
We sink deep into our core
We lurch a heavy hand on the ground in front
As though creaking-floorboards
Easing into our necks
Rotating, airy thighs
Moving about the pelted window
Draining, raincoats, warm heat
A few bodies and thank you for comings
~~
Benjie Salazar is an aspiring writer and dancer currently residing in Los Angeles. In their own words, “I grew up in North, Texas, as a Mexican-American. I am young, I drive across the southwest too often, I fall in love easily, I love oak trees, I love watching people walking by in cities I can disappear into. I write about ecology, bodies in close spaces, live music, and becoming a person. I write on different ways of loving and the spaces we occupy and revel in.”
Sarah Groth is an interdisciplinary performer, choreographer, teacher, poet, and mixed medium visual artist. After achieving a degree in Contemporary Dance and Intercultural Communications from the University of New Mexico, Sarah set out as an independent artist and traveler. She has had the privilege of moving, creating, and performing with renowned international artists across the world. Sarah has been published in the Albuquerque Journal, Blue Mesa Review, Daily Lobo, Stance on Dance, and Forty South. Sarah is committed to addressing the complexities of humanness in conjunction with self and community — aiming to bring the intensely intimate forward, creating openness within juxtaposition and identity.