2008 Woodie Awards
On Craziness
Jihan Jude
Issue date: 11/29/07 Section: Visions and Voices
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If I were standing atop the Empire State building, looking out through one of those rusty, coin-collecting magnifying machines, this is how I would see the world: fits of violence and passion, fits of confusion and pure psychosis.
Queens, New York
My eyes land on the corner of 99th Street and 57th Avenue in Queens. Outside of the moldy and creaking Laundromat, next to the bank, there aren't many cars today. The long stretch of road is clear until it reaches the highway. Cascading trees sweep the streets and sidewalks like giant brooms. Their branches and leaves are the only things swaying in the background. The crisp clapping of thong sandals against the back of my heels and pavement grows louder in my ears as I see the hobo screaming at the black road in front of him. His gangly arms flail and his head ticks left and right-his throat clogged up with so much agitation only huffing and squeals escape. His legs kick up straight and thin like golf clubs and drown in his dingy short trousers.
Maybe he's upset because the streets tripped him, stuck out a leg and made him fall hard, made him skin his knee. Maybe he was up all night snorting coke or shooting up crack in the dark alley where my friend from elementary school named Ira Scott got shot. The alley where children take a shortcut to the swings and slide and sandbox behind. The sand there is dirty: bits of glass, cigarettes, dirt-brown stuff. Swerving his fist in the air, gesticulating like Hitler during an angry oration-pacing back and forth-the pauper points an accusing finger at the road, ordering it to man-up to some vile, unthinkable deed. The black smudges on his skin-dark and tough-looking like beef jerky-say he's unclean, hasn't bathed in who-knows-how long. The clapping of my heels is almost unbearable now as my sense of hearing seems to be the only thing functioning. Something in the back of my mind tells me to avoid him. I think quickly and cross the street-hearing "I'll kill you" as I walk away.
Queens, New York
My eyes land on the corner of 99th Street and 57th Avenue in Queens. Outside of the moldy and creaking Laundromat, next to the bank, there aren't many cars today. The long stretch of road is clear until it reaches the highway. Cascading trees sweep the streets and sidewalks like giant brooms. Their branches and leaves are the only things swaying in the background. The crisp clapping of thong sandals against the back of my heels and pavement grows louder in my ears as I see the hobo screaming at the black road in front of him. His gangly arms flail and his head ticks left and right-his throat clogged up with so much agitation only huffing and squeals escape. His legs kick up straight and thin like golf clubs and drown in his dingy short trousers.
Maybe he's upset because the streets tripped him, stuck out a leg and made him fall hard, made him skin his knee. Maybe he was up all night snorting coke or shooting up crack in the dark alley where my friend from elementary school named Ira Scott got shot. The alley where children take a shortcut to the swings and slide and sandbox behind. The sand there is dirty: bits of glass, cigarettes, dirt-brown stuff. Swerving his fist in the air, gesticulating like Hitler during an angry oration-pacing back and forth-the pauper points an accusing finger at the road, ordering it to man-up to some vile, unthinkable deed. The black smudges on his skin-dark and tough-looking like beef jerky-say he's unclean, hasn't bathed in who-knows-how long. The clapping of my heels is almost unbearable now as my sense of hearing seems to be the only thing functioning. Something in the back of my mind tells me to avoid him. I think quickly and cross the street-hearing "I'll kill you" as I walk away.
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