Dave Roskos

The Tupperware Speech

Spent the day with Robert
one of the guys on
my caseload.
He’s moving next week
so we did laundry
& packed up his stuff
We also cooked a turkey
that he had gotten
from the food pantry.
He has TBI ( traumatic brain injury),
& schizophrenia, paranoid type.
His girlfriend Jen was around
most of the day too.
She’s in our program, but isn’t on my caseload.
Toward the end of the day
She started laughing a lot
& “responding to inner stimuli”
(talking to herself).

I carved the turkey
& we placed it all in
new tupperware.
then I gave the tupperware speech,
also known as the aluminum foil speech.
At the end I said
I don’t mean to
talk to ya like yer a kid,
but I been talking about
this for over 3 years now,
& ya never cover yer
food up & half the
time ya leave it out
& don’t put it in the
refrigerator….
I don’t want ya to
get sick.”

He smiled & waved
his hand & said, Ok
& his girlfriend Jen
looked at him and said,
“I like Dave, but he talks too much”

 

The Case of the Missing Klonopin

last week it was
the case of the missing klonopin
“Dave! I can’t find my pills!
Bring me my pills!”
“We delivered yr bubble pack
a few days ago, Michael”
“Well, I can’t find them!
I need them!”
“I’ll double-check.
Hold on a minute”
I checked the medication
cabinet - no bubble pack.
checked the medication log--
they had been signed out.
“They were delivered on
Wednesday, remember?”
“What the fuck!
No, I don’t remember!
Bring me more!”
“You don’t have
anymore. They
haven’t been delivered yet.
They don’t come till tuesday”
“God damn it!”
Click.
he never says “goodbye”
at the end of a
telephone conversation,
just hangs up.
then there are times
like this where he 
hangs up on you. 
an hour later
he calls his case-
manager Mary,
my partner. 
he found the bubble pack 
but the klonopin 
have been taken 
out of it.
Mary puts him on speaker.
Our program director 
intervenes.
she usually has 
a calming effect 
on the consumers. 
not this time. 
he hangs up on her too-- 
later that night
I get a text 
from her--
“M called 
said everything 
is alright now, 
he got a hold of
some xanax”


Tuesday April 23, 2024, 7:50 am
for Andy Clausen

awake awhile
reading Andy Clausen's
The Fabled Damned--
that's us, the U.S.A.,
the Fabled Damned,
like Walt Whitman said.

everyday a blessing – I am afraid
that there is going to be World War 3,
nothing left.

Dion the cat just nudged open
       the partially shut bedroom door
              now has his face buried in his food dish 
                             chowing down.
he is not worried about nuclear war
                                  or natural disasters .

I hope I never see
     a hurricane hurl a house
I hope I never have
     to look a hurricane
           in the eye (again)

Hope never to get caught
   between parenthesis
        (                    )

READ ANDY CLAUSEN

      Legacy & Testament

Francois Villon for President!

 

Dave Roskos is editor of Iniquity Press/Vendetta Books and publisher of Big Hammer.