This Old Banger

I had always thought typewriters were glamorous, not heavy and difficult things that smudge onto your fingers. I had thought them to tip tap like a soft and distant chatter while you compose your immortal verse, not chime and clank like a drawer of silverware. Between the wooden box that this thing is hinged into and the bulk of its steel frame... The ink thwaps halfheartedly onto my cheap paper, springing back to its position when my fingers still - the smell is like an old burnt coffee with a hint of stale winter air. God, why drag this all the way up the stairs of the water tower - was I going to watch the people push through the streets, or dodge careless drivers and write a poem about the rain? It was a silly notion, something I'm sure I saw in a movie about the solitary writer bringing his surroundings an examined new life while pouring his heart out.

I wrote a line about an older lady walking her great dane; it wasn't happening it now but I remember the sight in the park. I drove by, it was the last rainstorm and the dog was pulling her towards a puddle to get itself a drink.

Next I tried a little bit of rhyming, a couple of the letters got too close though and stuck together in mid air. I laughed a bit, pushing the old thing off my lap and looking into horizon like a bored fool, the sun still spitting a bit, a little glimmer of light at me from the purpled sky.

Then I heard the explosion.