paintedcave

Mother and the Drunken Ants

by Jon Vreeland

The glass is cracked and dirty spots of toothpaste and snot and lipstick and blood and steam stain the old and broken mirror the crack is getting much loftier over the long and morbid years seven years is much too fleeting to hide valiantly from yourself

“I cleaned it yesterday all day and threw the dirty rag away,” he told his young drunken mother full of orange piss and vinegar

His only glimpse of a woman was his well-oiled shallow mother  the town slut who quietly shrieked and failed to recall what the boy said

Every day his eyes saw something he sadly did not want to look upon His face was red and his eye had one dark shadow from her kiss

“Fuck you mirror you’re a fucking lying piece of shit and you can die and go fuck yourself silly with a rusty giant pitch fork or a silver knife”

The crack is growing fast and crude vast so the ants can crawl in and out so they can stumble across the sink drunk, from nibbling at the toothpaste

If he didn’t kill them in time his eye would match the shadowed one he was only a scrawny little boy his mother was drunk all the time

He ran away; hid in the neighbor’s yard the man found him in the tool shed he can still see his acquitted face on the wall of his lonely cell and his skin has boiled to a sickening red.

About The Author

Jon Vreeland was born in Long Beach California and raised by his parents in Huntington Beach, where he became an accomplished musician and struggled with addiction most of his life. His writing paints a picture of the struggles he faced and eventually overcame. Vreeland now resides in Santa Barbara where he attends City College and is the father of two beautiful daughters.