Jim Bean

Jim Bean is standing on a traffic island in Oracle Rd. facing north th dry Rillito River & th Santa Catalina Mountains before him. To his left Auto Mall Drive, a 1/2 mile of car dealerships. On one corner there used to be an old ranch, furthest penetration of Apache raiders in 1875. Now it's a Babies-R-US, a Coco's, a Lenscrafter's. To th right th entrance to Tucson Mall. It is late afternoon a bright sun low over Holmes Tuttle Ford. Jim Bean is a short middle-aged compact man, grizzled, skin dark from living out doors. Clothes, whole appearance an even gray like th sidewalk has entered him. He stands alone amidst th dense fumes of commerce holding a sign. It sez:

POET HAS FREE POEMS TO GIVE
PLEASE ACCEPT MY FREE POETRY

Cars come & go. People heading for th Disney Store or th Food Court. Occasionally someone will fold up a dollar toss it his way. He nimbly snags th bill steps across traffic to press a wrinkled sheet of paper into unwilling hands. Before th block is over this too crumpled up, tossed, but Jim Bean doesn't notice he's looking th other way.

Jim Bean, people call him Bean, is not his real name. He's forgotten his real name. Th name Bean is he's from Boston. Get it? Boston Bean? Th surname from his favorite beverage Jim Beam. Sort of clever. Th poem is called:

The Story of the Flags
by Jim Bean
a poet from Boston, Massachusetts

It starts about the prophesy that th generation that saw Israel again become a nation would not pass away then goes on about wars of this last century to a long rambling bit about th Parable of th Fig Tree. Israel started May 14, 1948, Bean's birthday. But what is a generation? He sez th Bible means Noah's generation 120 years. So another 67 years. Bean has another 67 years to go, to live forever. Bean has TB, he has heart trouble & prostrate cancer. He has been homeless since th 80's. He will not pass away.

After high school Bean joins th Marines, finds himself in Vietnam. During th Tet Offensive he is hit by sniper fire on th banks of th Perfume River. A clean shot, recovers, waiting to go home. In a bar in Saigon a bomb explodes, blows shrapnel at waist level. They remove ten feet of intestine, attach a piece of gristle in place of his dick, can't do much about his testicles.

Bean goes back to Boston. It is as if his father blames him for losing th family jewels. He has a brother that's got a college deferment, who is intact. Th family puts all their effort in him lets Bean drift away to nightmares & holy drink. & drift he does finally to this Southwest town. During Desert Storm he is living in th sagebrush east of th base. Th shriek of F-15's taking off finally unhinges his mind. It is then that he writes his poem:

Flags were raised just half the way?
The biggest bombs now sit in place.
Who knows the day when they will say,
Was there a flag that won???

Th document rambles there is little to connect his poem about war & flags to his rant about prophesy on th same page. At least it doesn't rhyme. Bean is waiting for Rapture at least he wuz once. Now his mind is blank as a Food Court French fry, blank as car salesman's smile, blank as th countless eyes, eyes behind windshields, eyes avoiding his. Consumers out for an afternoon at the Mall. A colorless homeless man, a poet, a giver of free poetry, of free advise. There. In th street. Two & 1/2 pay checks away goes I.

Evening finds Bean heading to his home, a drainage culvert emptying into a dry river. Steep walls of cement, river channeled now just for run off. A small trickle of sewage provides a soft phosphorescent warmth. Before he arrived this place a shrine to evil. A fourteen year old girl found dismembered here, th walls r covered w/a crabbed script spewing every form of hate. But now Bean, innocent, blessed by prophesy, ageless. Things come by in th night but they stay away.

Morning. An intense sun is topping distant Tanque Verde Mts. It's gonna be a hot one. Clouds like angels like airplanes stacked up over th airport of Eternity. A distant trumpet calls. It is Rapture. But not what u'd expect. Flung out from their Lexus' & SUV's, their million dollar foothills homes, it's th rich that r going to Heaven. Th smug, th powerful, wheelers & dealers, all 'good' citizens th air is filled w/souls like a reverse snow storm all dangling arms & legs. Cries of dismay from believers, from th truly pious. But look around! Look at th way th world works! How cld it be any different?

It is quickly over. Sky clears to a pure egg-shell blue. God only taking th top ten percent. Bean looks out from his drain pipe. He looks out but sees nothing. Fifty yards of raw earth a few rocks then an 80 ft. wall of soil cement at th bottom of which a crushed shopping cart & a mattress rotted to rusting springs. Bean gathers his poems climbs an angled goat path to th surface. Man of th last generation, poet, he heads over to th Mall to join th rest of us - in traffic ...