Narcisa- Our Lady Of Ashes

by Jonathan Shaw The first time I saw the kid, he was sitting in the front row of the smoking section of the midnight AA meeting downtown. The only reason I even noticed him at all when I walked in the door was probably because he was sitting there, legs sprawled across the floor, leaning […]

Rio De Janeiro, 1973 Not knowing or really caring where I was, or having the slightest idea where to go, I simply chose a direction and started walking, instinctively choosing the shady side of the street, slowing down briefly here and there to glance in a shop window. One place in particular that caught my […]

Veracruz, Mexico. 1974. Her mom had basically told her to bring home the bacon or not come home at all. And for a while she didn’t. She ran the streets and did what she wanted in a spell of adolescent rebellion, turning tricks for food and shelter and spending the rest on drugs, mostly pot […]

Veracruz, Mexico. 1974. She didn’t ask me anything about me. None of the usual shit, where did I come from, where was I going. Why, what, where, when, who, all that shit. She didn’t care, I liked that. Maybe it was because I was just another trick. I just liked that she talked freely and […]

Jonathan Shaw is finishing up his rewrite of Narcisa: Our Lady of Ashes and is suiting up for a cross-country motorcycle trip of Brazil. Over the next few weeks we will be featuring some travel-related blogs. This one was found in an old journal from 1978 and takes place in Suriname. Enjoy! RUNNING AWAY by […]

I’m sitting by my motorcycle at the end of the beach in Ipanema at the end of the day. The waves are breaking at my feet as the last human remnants of the frantic beach day scramble around before fading into the shadows of impending night. Everything is perfect here. The air temperature feels just […]

     A crazy fog has just rolled in off the sea, suddenly converting Copacabana into a humid surreal night time nether world of terror. As if it wasn’t ugly and strange enough to begin with in the middle of this dark carnival of lost souls. Actually the fog seems to have even taken some […]

     I’m listening to the sound of a horn from down on the street. Not a car’s horn but one of those old-fashioned bicycle air horns with the little rubber bubble you squeeze. Toot toot. I hear that horn and imagine the cart it’s attached to and I see a skinny mulatto pushing the […]

I remember all the bad times with the Crack Monster. I remember all the weird deadly moments of toxic lust and destruction and terror. What I don’t remember so well are all the years of my own drug addiction. Not without a conscious effort to do so. Maybe that’s why Divine Providence sent Narcisa to […]