Tina :) posted:

	"Me-air," mussed the sleepy fat man, "la cervesa mas fria."  
The billboard disappeared in the pre-dawn cold.  His belly wobbled 
like a plate of cold huevos on the kitchen table in a tenement flat 
as the train rumbles by.  Inside the train, the man watched warm 
yellow windows sway past and day-dreamed of sitting at one of those 
chipped formica tables.  He could smell the tortillas on the griddle 
and see the shy flirting eyelashes of a brown-skinned girl.  El Dupree 
was heading for the Monroe Street stop on the Blue Line.  Instead of 
his usual greasy serape and sombrero he wore a red flannel suit with 
white polyester fur trim.
	The rattle and whir of commerce droned forward beneath a 
florescent light buzz.  Petra yawned as shiny brown mints rode by.  
Her job was to spot misshapen candies, capture them, and throw them 
over the edge of the conveyor into the reject bin.  What a waste, she 
had thought, for four years now.  What a crazy, wonderful country on an 
inland sea.  Today Petra had picked up a crackly plastic bag from the 
floor of the packing room and slowly filled in with rejects.  She was 
breaking only one of the rules, not so much.  She thought of the Santa, 
standing all day long in the swirling, icy downtown winds and crowds.  
When her shift ended, Petra ran her time-card through the grey clock-box 
and shuffled to the locker room.  She removed her white smock, wrapped a 
bright, flowered wool scarf about her head, pulled winter boots onto her 
feet and a heavy coat around her tired shoulders, and headed to the 
train station.  As always, she saw the peculiarly short Santa along the 
way.  Today she stopped and held out her little package - the bag, with 
'Frango' printed on its side, now closed with an old red ribbon.  Santa 
slowly reached out to take the package and a staggering smell flowed 
toward Petra.  "Is this what reindeer smell like?" she thought.  As he 
took the bag of mints, Santa smiled a smile that both scared and calmed.  
Behind tilting grey teeth that looked like poor men's tombstones lay 
the serenity of wisdom more distant than the world itself.
	"GIANT  WREATH  FALLS:  FLATTENS  SHOPPERS!" screamed the 
headline in the pony-tailed, black-clad young man's head.  Wouldn't 
it be great?  "Celebrating the fictitious birth date of a third-rate 
carpenter who decided that the prophet business had more growth potential 
- feh."  Slash had no room for such anachronistic religious idolatry.  
His post-modern, pre-apocalypse, urban discronstructionist rationality 
had no crumbling pantheon, no sacred screed; can't misinterpret what does 
not exist, he always said.  No gods, no sons, no talking mountains, 
no center - just edges, everything is edges.  Lines, corners, divisions.  
"They have this delusion that they can balance on tight-ropes; go to the 
circus to see it done. That's what it is, all this holiday stuff 
included, a circus.  How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?  
How many bozos can fit in a miniature car?"  Slash saw a short, fat 
smear of red in the corner of his eye.  "Santa - feh.  Consumer culture 
can't even make its own bozos, gotta co-opt one from Scandinavia."  And 
a smelly one at that, he noted as the crowed pushed him closer. "Whew, 
this guy really reeks.  Now this is the Santa for me!" thought Slash as 
he pulled a gold-coin earring from his ear and tossed it toward a nearby 
Salvation Army bucket.  The coin sparkled in the sun as it arced through 
the cold winter air.
	Black, black, black.  Black as the coal they made us dig in the 
belly of the beast.  Black as blood stopped flowin'.  "Cain't see the 
mark of my trade on these old, coally hands," Abraham muttered to 
himself.  Dying trade, setting type.  Everything's done with computers 
now.  Wind whipped through Abraham Lincoln Brown's thin coat as he 
crossed the bridge on foot.  He was on his way home, across the river 
to catch the number 6.  Yesterday he had waited downtown well after dawn, 
until stores opened for the day.  He had been Christmas shopping.  Or 
rather, he had been thinking about shopping.  This was his favorite 
season, the time of childhood reunions with family nearly forgotten 
through the rest of the year but his daughter Mary, and son-in-law Ahmad, 
were Muslim and might not approve of a Christmas gift for his 
granddaughter, Marissa.  Young men in tailored coats and beautiful women 
in jogging shoes flowed by Abraham on the cold street corner, like the 
swirling flakes of snow in the air.  "Will she be one of them someday?" 
he wondered, "is it my place to wonder?"  He was about to turn his back 
on the opening stores when a brown-skinned Santa with eyes that sparkled 
like stars in the night lumbered up to Abraham and shook his hand.  The 
stench was horrible, like the manure Abraham had shovelled as a child.  
He said "God Bless" to Santa and turned toward the computer store.
	Magdalena hopped out of the way of on-coming pedestrians.  
Couldn't they see?  Great-great-grandmother?  Nice little cubby hole.  
Big, big, bridge.  Out to the street for food.  Food, food.  Not safe.  
Not safe as before.  Not so much food.  Feet, feet, get away. Feet.  
Magdalena saw a wide clearing on the sidewalk and hopped toward it.  
Inside the safe island in the river of pedestrians, she looked up into 
the curious eyes of a round, red mountain of a man.  Safe, safe.  Food?  
The mountain plunged stubby fingers into its coat and spoke - "para tu."  
Brown-flecked bits of tortilla fell to the ground before Magdalena.  
Quick, quick, snap food.  El Dupree watched the tiny brown bird devour 
the bits of tortilla, thought of sun-baked deserts, summer storms, 
and bashful girls, and smiled.
	Looking down from above, the Sears Tower was enlightened.