John Marsh House
John Marsh House, Marsh Creek Road, Brentwood, Contra Costa County, CA Los Medanos Rancho3
Randy’s house was old, large,
individual, Bates on a hill,
surrounded by a neighborhood of
one-next-to-the-other row houses.
On this low sky Halloween evening
it was perfect, not only for its character
but because Randy’s Dad was out of town.
We prepared the procession at Kotova’s.
Charlie Z. procured an antique coffin
with the casing they packed ice around
for viewings in the living room.
We had four pallbearers, grey robes,
a satanic high priest, Bernie W. with a
coffee table size bible on loan with the coffin.
Dracula followed these hooded Renfields.
Black robe with red lining and the collar,
make up, dark hair slicked back, teeth.
Bringing up the rear, Dee as a small, cute,
submissive Morticia, following her man.
We turned on Kenyon in a slow march up the hill,
Black Sabbath blaring from the porch.
If there had been cell phones,
there would be movies, as it was there are only
the memories and mine is not so much about
the preparation or the impression we made
on the neighborhood and the party, my clearest
recollection of the whole evening was
finally connecting with Ricky Christ.
Ricky was always a couple of years and steps
ahead of —graduated the toughest high school,
never cracking a book. A local politician
found him in the brig in Iceland for punching
a sergeant in the face who had the temerity
to give him an order, so he could tell him he had
been accepted to the Naval Academy.
I was standing in the corner of the porch behind
the front door in the dark, smoking a joint,
the makeup hadn’t melted yet,
and I was a dead-on Lugosi look-alike.
Ricky came through the door, looked to his left
and seemed to leave the ground in fright,
uttering a guttural auughhh that sounded primal.
He got himself together and told me we had
done a great job with the props. It was the
first time we had talked one-on-one and I felt
like Steve McQueen had acknowledged me.
I offered him a hit of the large joint Fenton had given me,
thinking some people were harder to impress than others.
Fifty-six years later I’m finally writing it down.
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