Poo Man

Poo Man thought he would make a new hat. He had plenty of things to make a hat. He needed a shave too. He had been so involved in his project lately that he was starting to forget to look after himself.
Israeli power stations seeped into the afternoon air. The park that Poo Man inhabited was small but very pretty. It was along the main street, a lush lawn with a long bed of flowers, shrubs, and trees. At the top end, where the park sloped up to the railway bridge, was a fig tree with thick tentacle roots that sunk into the dark soil. Poo Man lived under the fig tree. From the street, you could see the solar lights, a wheelbarrow, a child’s bike and piles of rubbish covered with tarp. Most people, however, talked about the bags that hung from the tree.
Black clouds swirled over the beachside suburb. Poo Man felt the cold wind pick up and knew he had to abandon his plans of hatting and shaving. Before leaving he would have to check them. He walked over with his hunched, painful gait. All of them were still hanging securely from the tree and looked like they would stay dry in the bags. They were coming along nicely. He grabbed a piece of tarp and the sack, and he left as the first drops of rain came.
Poo Man moved to his secondary residence in the walkway of the shopping plaza next to the park. It was a run-down joint paved with muddy, brown concrete. There was a supermarket, a butcher’s shop and a bakery huddled under the patchy tin roof that let the light in but rain too. There were rumours it was to be demolished and replaced with flashy apartments, but for now it sat there, slumped by the main street like an old, sick dog.
Poo Man laid down the tarp and put the sack beside him on the cold walkway. He was anxious about his project. It was important. There is nothing worse than trying to do something important and people getting in the way. He reassured himself that they would be dry and safe in the tree and that the solar lights were working, but without seeing them he couldn’t be sure. A lady approached him on her way into the supermarket.
‘Hi,’ she said, a little uneasy. ‘Would you like some food?’ ‘Got food.”
‘Oh, how about some water?’
‘Got water.’
‘Is there anything you need?’ ‘Fuck off.’

Poo Man went into the supermarket as the long grey dusk reached its crescendo. It was pouring down, and they had put little buckets on the floor to catch the rain.
The girl at the register watched him glide in with his torn, green cape and bare feet. Usually, the first stop was aisle two to look at the bread and cans of spaghetti, which he would become agitated about and hit. Then he would go to the electrical section and look at the light bulbs. Again, he would usually hit them, mumbling to himself. Then he would settle on a roll of dog food and plain flatbread. He would take forever trying to get the coins out of the ripped and knotted sack. But today was different. His project had him disturbed and anxious. He approached the girl at the register. She must have been about sixteen, with long, curly hair and a pasty face.
‘Where are the pints of human blood?’ Poo Man asked. Despite his present mood, Poo Man was keenly aware of the need to be friendly in his interactions with the supermarket staff. He couldn’t afford to be banned from this store. With his plans, he had to stay in this place for a while.
The checkout girl just stood there, stupefied. Poo Man could hardly down out his scorn for her lies.
‘I know they’re out the back,’ he said, and walked away in disdain.
A woman with her little girl was waiting in line behind Poo Man. ‘Are you okay, love?’ she asked.
‘I’m okay.’ The checkout girl’s face looked like it had been drained of blood. Shy of a pint worth, though.
‘They need to get rid of him. He is a leech,’ the woman said. The groceries beeped. Packets of chips for the kids, a kilo of coffee beans, a variety of cheeses.
‘Have you seen his little camp out there in the park? God almighty. They need to clear it all out and get rid of him. Have you seen the fig tree? I mean come on. What are the police doing?’
‘Well, the police have been in,’ the checkout girl said.
‘Oh really?’
‘Yeah, they told us to look out for anything he does that is suspicious or antisocial.
They’re waiting for something so they can get rid of him.’
‘Good! They need to. And don’t worry,’ she said, looking at her daughter, ‘he’s got more
money than any of us.’

She continued, ‘He stole my neighbour’s solar lights from his garden, took his kids’ toys, it’s just ridiculous. I mean, are we meant to feel sorry for this bloke? This place is becoming a resort for the homeless.’
‘The bloke that sleeps up on the footpath over there is good’, the girl said.
‘Totally! He keeps to himself, he’s tidy. He does his thing.’
Poo Man came back holding a brown paper bag, chewing on a head of broccoli.
‘I’ve got mushrooms growing up the back there, am I alright to take this bag to keep them
in?’
The woman held her nose and grumbled to her daughter that they were probably toad
stools.
‘No, they’re not,’ Poo Man said, and walked out into the night.
‘He absolutely reeks. Is your manager here? I’ll talk to him. The police will find
something in that. Stealing. That will be enough to get him out.’ She was red now.
The manager came out of the supermarket when the rain was patting on the roof. He was a tall, bald man with thick arms of faded swirling tattoos and a big belly. Poo Man was sitting up on his tarp. That’s how he slept. The manager woke him and said something about harassing his staff and stealing and that he had to leave or the cops would be there.
Poo Man slowly hovered out, hunched against the rain. He had the tarp wrapped over his head and he nursed the sack as he looked for a dry place to sleep. As Poo Man walked, things happened inside his head. He had memories, perhaps about his childhood. Out on the abandoned street, in the black rain, Poo Man must have felt something. His mind felt like the dark and empty road, dotted with little kaleidoscopes of light reflecting the rain. He didn’t just look for somewhere to sleep. Maybe he imagined the dead clouds swirling, revolving above his head.
The morning had cleared itself up and the sun was out when the police came to the steps of the library where Poo Man was sleeping. The two officers announced themselves to Poo Man and informed him that he was under arrest. The officers grabbed his arm and he sprung up, trying to shake them off. Someone had left a bacon and egg roll for him, but it got squashed in the struggle. Poo Man screamed. He told the officers that he knew things they didn’t. Events and happenings that they weren’t aware of. But his skeleton frame was quickly crushed. The officers pinned him on his stomach and handcuffed his white, bony wrists.

No one can continue his work in the park. The lights, the tree, the Israeli power stations. No one understands how it is all connected, that he was doing important work. But they will tear it down and everything will be lost.
***
‘Looks like they’ve gotten rid of the Poo Man,’ David said to Cheryl, his wife of thirty-five years.
They were both sitting on the upstairs veranda, like they do most mornings. David was reading the paper and Cheryl was reading a womens’ magazine. It was a beautiful morning. They both faced out at the giant eucalypts disappearing down the mountain into the deep blue of the sea below, taking it all in. It had been raining on and off for the last few days, but this morning was warm and beaming and David loved how the wet and dewy gum leaves shone in the sun. He sipped his coffee and looked down the bush escarpment to the town and the smooth Pacific. A light, warm breeze played on the veranda as he watched the breakers rolling in and the pine trees waving along the shore.
‘Sorry, what?’ Cheryl said. She had only just registered something over the magpies and the lyrebirds.
‘The Poo Man. You don’t know him? That homeless fellow that hangs around Bicentennial Park. It says here he is sixty-one. Jesus, same age as me. I left some food for him the other morning, must’ve been the same day it happened. He got arrested.’
‘Oh yes. Good riddance.’
‘Come on now. He deserves a bit better than to be pinned down and arrested, doesn’t he?’ ‘David. Have you seen the state of that park? Where exactly did the Gibson’s solar lights
get to again? What about that poor hairdresser’s shopfront?’

David sat in thought. ‘Yeah righto. But can’t we get someone other than the police for the poor bugger?’
The magazine snapped shut. ‘Yeah sure! Why don’t we bring him up here? Wouldn’t that be great? There’s plenty of space in the lounge room for him to sleep. But when the place smells like a rotting corpse and those bags are hanging up over the place, you can clean it up.’
‘That’s ridiculous.’
‘It’s not. Anything anyone gives to him will be treated like he treated the park.’
‘I don’t know. I just don’t think the police should be going in there and arresting him.’ ‘You go down and get him then.’
‘I don’t know,’ David said.
‘Don’t worry David, he’s got more money than the both of us. At some point it becomes
a choice to live like that.’ Cheryl went inside.
David watched the sun come up over the sea for a little while and he thought about
whether it was a choice to defecate into plastic bags and then hang them up in the fig tree in Bicentennial Park. He looked back at the paper but there wasn’t much going on so he got up and made breakfast.

*This was originally published in the ‘Tertangala: Horror Issue’ (2023)

Image credit: Michael on Unsplash