It’s our second annual Podium to Page event, where writers get a chance to read their work onstage with some of the state’s best poets and get a chance at instant publication and a cash prize! Everyone is welcome, of course. Whether you’re a poet or just there to enjoy a night of great writing and fellowship, we’ll see you there.

This event features a special reading by Colorado’s Poet Laureate Crisosto Apache, along with local poet and Denverse contributor Nancy Viera.

It all happens on Wednesday, May 27, at 7pm at The Corner Beet.

NOTE: SPACES FOR POETRY READERS ARE CURRENTLY FULL AS OF 5/21. YOU CAN SIGN UP JUST IN CASE A SPOT OPENS UP, BUT WE CAN’T GUARANTEE A SPOT. AUDIENCE SPACE IS STILL AVAILABLE. COME HEAR THE CO POET LAUREATE!

Click here or the picture below to RSVP with a +1

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Join your community for an unforgettable evening with the Colfax Art Underground Showcase on May 31. This first-of-its-kind public art program on Colfax Avenue will introduce a lineup of fantastic Denver artists, from emerging student creators to well-known, celebrated names. The collection reflects the diversity of our community, with strong representation from BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ artists. It all happens from 4pm-7pm at 1915 E Colfax Ave. Admission is free, but donations are encouraged. Learn more!

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Pit Fiend Barbecue is a live fire, all-natural wood smoke barbecue restaurant located in Denver's RiNo Art District, serving sustainably raised heritage pork and USDA Prime beef brisket. They also have a loyalty program where you can earn cashback on BBQ purchases. Visit https://www.pitfiendbbq.com and get some of Denver's best BBQ today.

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This Week’s Song: “Heart of America Pt 1” by The Jon Brumm Musical Experience

Just a reminder that we have an exclusive event, just for you, coming up on 5/27!

It’s our second annual Podium to Page event, where writers get a chance to read their work onstage with some of the state’s best poets and get a chance at instant publication and a cash prize! Everyone is welcome, of course. Whether you’re a poet or just there to enjoy a night of great writing and fellowship, we’ll see you there.

This event features a special reading by Colorado’s Poet Laureate Crisosto Apache, along with local poet and Denverse contributor Nancy Viera.

It all happens on Wednesday, May 27, at 7pm at The Corner Beet.

NOTE: SPACES FOR POETRY READERS ARE CURRENTLY FULL AS OF 5/21. YOU CAN SIGN UP JUST IN CASE A SPOT OPENS UP, BUT WE CAN’T GUARANTEE A SPOT. AUDIENCE SPACE IS STILL AVAILABLE. COME HEAR THE CO POET LAUREATE!

Click here or the picture below to RSVP with a +1.

Read more

I did a triple-take, groggy from the night before. Up to that point, I’d been sleepwalking, reluctant to embark on my paper route, but in three blinks, a crisis! Thousands of magazines. Thousands of dollars. They were all gone!

The concrete floor of the 5x10ft caged area was completely bare. I stepped into the space, thinking I was hallucinating and that any moment I’d trip over the stacks, but no.

Someone at the complex must have cleaned the thing out by mistake!

I rushed from the storage area to the office, panicked, cursing, pissed. Admittedly, it was nice to feel alive that morning though. A punch in the nose! A splash of bright red in a world gone dark. As an old teacher of mine used to say, I like the action.

Once in the office, I assumed the posture of a wronged but dignified American–a stern but reconcilable customer, confident he would be made whole because he was worth it.

I crossed my arms. I puffered my fish. “Yes, I know it’s not your fault, but it’s absolutely crucial I speak to someone in management today. This is an emergency.”

I added “CEO” to the signature of my emails as I fired them off to upper staff. Calls were made, Saturday calls, which would test and confirm the limits of my perceived value as a resident and citizen. There was no response.

The next day, getting desperate, our entire inventory plundered, I dug around for cell numbers. I can get anyone’s cell number, I like to say.

I called a number associated with the name of the leasing agent who’d given me a deal on the storage unit. A Sunday call. Another test of my power.

“Hello?” a voice answered drowsily on the other end.

“Hi, —, this is Paul French in Unit —. I was wondering if you’d been getting my emails.”

“About what?”

“About the inventory taken from my storage unit.”

“Oh fuck you.”

He hung up.

For a second, I was on the verge of becoming a victimized and angry American customer, truly an ugly sight, but I realized the voice on the other end had sounded nothing like my guy, who has one of those clear, bourbony baritones, like our radio host Anthony Elio. I found out there was a local lawyer with the same name, and “fuck you” must have been his way of saying “wrong number.” What kind of fish was he?

I filed the police report and told our creative director Shane what happened. We began puzzling through the case. The apartment complex was still suspect #1, but, if not them, could it really have been theft? Who steals roughly 4,000 magazines, and why?

The issues were in strapped bundles, so it wasn’t as if the person taking them was playing some mystery box game. Also, as I’ve mentioned before, paper is heavy! When we pick up the magazines from the printer, we usually have at least three people and three vehicles helping. I almost totaled my truck, in fact, when I let one of the dock guys load an entire pallet (over 3,500lbs) into the bed (it sank the whole thing almost flush with the wheels). All of that loading and unloading, of course, takes a long time. This would have been quite an operation.

By this point, we’d already circulated most of the copies of the spring issue to subscribers and participating businesses, so it wasn’t the full 10,000 we print–just the 4,000 remaining. But that’s still a ton of magazines (literally), enough to take at least half an hour or so to porter to a necessarily heavy-duty vehicle.

All this to say, whoever took the magazines had to do so very intentionally.

I began questioning my original theory of the apartment complex, as who in their right mind would commit such an undertaking without sending an email? Stranger things have happened, but still.

Shane and I theorized some options in order of likelihood. It was either:

1. A mistake by the apartment complex’s storage team. Likely: because it was the simplest answer. Unlikely: because of the effort involved and (one would hope) communication protocols preventing staff from throwing away residents’ belongings en masse by mistake.

2. Attempted sabotage by a competitor. Likely? Well, not really at all, I would think. Media can be a petty and smarmy business. Even so, it would be a massive reputational risk for some competitor to do something like this, and what would they even gain? We can print more magazines. Yes, it’s a hit, but unless they knew that we were one theft away from being irrevocably destroyed, it would be a bad idea to try to burgle us. Also, they would have to know where I live, where I stored the magazines, etc. Finally, for all of the self-deprecating trash talk I spit at the media, I do think many of us are conscientious folk, who at least want to believe we’re doing the right thing.

3. Attempted sabotage by a slighted article subject. Likely? Also no, for many of the same reasons above. It’s a lot of trouble to do something like this. And besides, we’re not really a gossip rag. Most of the critical views our writers have leveled at people, places, things are usually tempered with an exploration of the other side (ours being a more longform journalistic enterprise, and not exactly packed with editorial hot takes on issues). I’m sure someone’s been irritated by something one of our writers penned (that’s just unavoidable), but you’d have to have quite an axe to grind to commit this kind of theft, and, again, it’s so high-risk! When I talked to Patty Calhoun over at Westword about this (longtime supporter/advisor, by the way; she’s the real deal), she said she was aware of cases like this sparked by miffed subjects. However, being a regular reader, she admitted that she hadn’t seen anything in our publication that would arouse such contempt.

4. Pure theft. Likely? Not at all, unless the thief was either a complete moron or insane. Unless you can sell the magazines through a website or other means (which you couldn’t do without getting caught pretty quickly), there’s no way you could get any value from these copies. It’s not as if there’s a robust black market for print publications out there. I’ve seen people selling stray copies of past issues on Ebay (and I really don’t care about that; it’s quite flattering), but there’s no way you can just sell 4,000 copies of Denverse on the street (if you can, please send notes).

My mind was still set on option 1. After two days, the management at my apartment complex finally got back to me. I had a sit-down meeting with them. They weren’t the culprit, they stressed, adamantly after lots of grilling. Nobody on staff had removed anything from the storage containers, and, as I imagined, there was a rigid protocol about removing items from the units. It was theft, they said. The only question was whether the cameras at the facility had caught a glimpse of the perps.

I waited for word from the Denver Police. There was none. I waited for information from the surveillance company contracted by the apartment. After a week, they sent a curt email saying that, despite multiple cameras being nearby, there were no visuals. Since this was patently absurd (no way someone could have gotten all of those magazines out of there without being on camera), I tried pestering the police to see if they could request the footage. I received a reply saying that our case had been marked inactive. When I asked why it had been labeled inactive, the police told me that they needed information from me. And when I asked what information they needed from me, they requested much of the information I had sent in my original report. I sent the info again, along with some paperwork from the recent purchase we’d made to reprint the magazines we lost. Then I waited again.

Finally, someone from the district (without providing a name) said they were reaching out to the apartment manager, but that they were on vacation…

And, alas, Dear Reader, that is where things sit at the moment. Hopefully, the footage can be retrieved and will reveal something about the perps. I’ll keep you updated if anything interesting happens.

Naturally, I was tempted to use this case as fodder for our next print edition. However, I don’t think lingering on this woebegone topic is good for us, and I have other interests I want to pursue for the next edition. We’ve got to press forward.

That could change if the case gets interesting though, of course. We’ll just have to see. I’m very grateful for all the interest this caper has brought us though. Not exactly free press, but I’ll take it! Subscription rates are looking great! Not nearly enough to compensate for the loss as yet, but, hey, that’s business. I have no doubt that if we stick to the fundamentals and keep putting out great work from talented locals, we’ll make up for it in the long run.

As always, thanks for being part of this adventure in independent media. It’s fascinating, personally, seeing how tricky this entire enterprise is. But so far, so good. And, if our print pirate is reading this, you should know there’s a song in our hearts:

Yours,

Paul M. French, editor

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Join your community for an unforgettable evening with the Colfax Art Underground Showcase on May 31. This first-of-its-kind public art program on Colfax Avenue will introduce a lineup of fantastic Denver artists, from emerging student creators to well-known, celebrated names. The collection reflects the diversity of our community, with strong representation from BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ artists. It all happens from 4pm-7pm at 1915 E Colfax Ave. Admission is free, but donations are encouraged. Learn more!

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Denver's favorite choose-your-own-adventure arts extravaganza is back for the seventh year June 3-7, 2026 with dozens of original shows at creative venues around the city, including comedy, clown, theatre, dance, aerial, puppetry, immersive and so much more. Save the dates - you don't want to miss out on this much fun! Tickets and passes go on sale May 1st at denverfringe.org.

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Featured Song: “The Quiet” by The Bright Collide

Read Paul Karolyi’s investigation into DoBetterDNVR: https://5280.com/why-is-everyone-so-scared-of-dobetterdnvr/

“As a great man once said, it’s welfare for the rich and rugged individualism for the poor. If you can sleep at night licking their boots that’s between you and yours, but that type of thinking isn’t freedom. It’s mental slavery… Judge a man by how he treats the poor and those who he views as being able to do nothing for him. Don’t forget why Muhammad Ali said ‘I am America’ Remember the coal miners of Harlan County, Kentucky. I believe in what we can be. Ride on.” – Charley Crockett Feb. 6, 2026

I soared into Mission Ballroom feeling 12 feet tall, with a new pair of Dan Post cowboy boots. It was my first time in raised heels, and so far the two-inch boost was pairing nicely with my prior ingestion of a highly potent tab of locally brewed LSD and half a fifth of Old Forester—two tools strategically selected to heighten an evening of good music and straight reporting.

Charley Crockett was in town and, more immediately, somewhere backstage prepping his mojo, probably sipping a fine liquor, most likely whiskey or tequila. In country music, whiskey is the industry standard, but, given Crockett’s roots, I figured whiskey only a 2–1 favorite.

San Benito, Charley’s birthplace, lies in the southernmost reaches of Texas, only 20 miles from the border and tucked in the eastern edge of the Rio Grande Valley. With a population of 25,000—90 percent of whom are Hispanic—I figured 2-1 may even be too generous to the brown stuff. But considering Crockett’s affinity for Waylon Jennings and the whiskey-soaked lyricism of his longtime opener Vincent Neil Emerson, I was confident in my projection.

The opening act was a colorful mirage of long hair and Western sound. Denver’s own Extra Gold oozed with authentic swagger, putting on a cosmic performance of country rock and introducing a synesthetic blur of sandy rust into my headspace.

Yes, I was now pleasantly twisted. Steadily tuning into the familiar frequency of an onsetting acid trip, but classically tasked with fending off an onslaught of inappropriately philosophical thoughts. I began to reflect on the beauty of the moment, and how all the previous variables of the past two decades had stationed me here, just moments away from the presence of Charley Crockett, and under the influence of this artisan neuro-potion. To think that without a beer here, or a dose of Golden Teachers there, I might be at a Morgan Wallen show…God bless.

The lights dimmed and the atmosphere thickened with the collective anticipation of a full house — a permanently exhilarating moment familiar to all who frequent live music.

Charley now stood square with the mic, seemingly chiseled out of stone, his jaw bearing an impossible density, his legs carved trunks of dark indigo.

“How we doing, Denver?” he boomed from the speakers with grand bravado. The show was on.

Time seemed to slow as the anticipation became palpable.

Crack! His voice shattered the tension, like a bottle to pavement. I was jolted from my hypnotic reverie and hit with a wave of impossibly full sound. The lyrics “been in Kentucky too long” ricocheted around the room. I ducked swiftly to avoid being hit.

The band was tight, each member contributing their own unique zeal and operating with a proud composure. Crockett floated across the stage with divine cadence. I was struggling to grasp what I was seeing. Music can look like this?

Things were heating up. Crockett went backstage momentarily. His band, The Blue Drifters, filled the lull with a smooth instrumental. On return, Charley brandished what appeared to be a piece of alien weaponry. A brief surge of panic overtook me as I envisioned him going rogue,

popping heads, and reducing the mob to jelly via bonemelting laser — through later research, I identified the instrument as a JERRY JONES ELECTRIC MASTER SITAR (GREEN CRACKLE).

I snapped out of it and drowned the fearsome image with a long hit of bourbon from the brown leather flask tucked at my hip, looking to the stage just in time to see Charley swill two shots of a clear liquid. Tequila, or maybe Mezcal, I reasoned…The boys played on.

I looked right, checking the status of my three dilated comrades who had accompanied me here. To my dismay, I found them being cajoled by three randy-looking older women. I was far too loaded to attempt a rescue mission, so I figured them dead meat and turned my attention back to the band.

Thwack! Directly in front of me, a lumpy middle-aged man hit the floor hard. I stared in disbelief. He was swiftly helped up by a nearby gentleman. The lumpy man teetered momentarily, then plummeted back to the gray concrete, this time face-first. The shock subsided, and I was now fascinated by the poor fellow. Had Crockett struck him with a spell? I knew he had lived in New Orleans in the early 2010s; it wasn’t impossible that he had picked up some Louisiana voodoo along the way—or maybe he had been hit by a materialized lyric.

“They call me the Muhammad Ali of country music.” – Matthew Charles Crockett, Feb. 6, 2026

Damn right they do.

Charley Crockett is among the few public figures today who fear the reality of leaving truths unsaid more than the potential repercussions of challenging the crooked. It is with a deep understanding of this country, acquired through decades on the road, that Crockett calls spades spades.

With an unflinching boldness that would make his disappearance no mystery, Crockett stated in February, “They keep saying I’m a cosplay cowboy but they love a cosplay president… The President is a grifter who bankrupted six casinos. That’s pretty extraordinary considering it’s a rigged business in favor of the house… Last time I checked Elon Musk was an immigrant from South Africa, but there he is standing in the White House buying our elections. Let’s deport his ass and send Peter Thiel back with him since they both openly believe in a post democratic society where men of their class are above the law. Forgive me if I have a problem with a 34 time convicted felon running this country when I lost the right to vote or own a weapon for years over marijuana. As long as you’re hating the oppressed and loving your oppressor you’ll never know why our generation is poorer than our parents and grandparents… I truly believe this isn’t a left or right issue. There’s something else happening here.”

What’s that “something else,” Charley? A cult of socialites, politicians, and business tycoons running the world and raping children? No, that’s crazy talk. You’d have to be an acid freak to believe something like that…

It is with composure, conviction, and a textured past that Crockett speaks in pursuit of justice, not agenda. He has cemented himself amongst the rare few who do not rest idly in fame, but use notoriety to pursue greater change.

He once wrote, “‘Charley, why do you put out records so fast?’ Because the suits go on forever, and prize fighters last a short time. Cattle kings own the spread. Cowboys only work it. Look around. Politicians take money from the rich and collect votes from the poor, while promising each protection from the other. That’s what I call a conflict of interest… If I did it their way, you’d never even have heard of me. Fenced in, sold off, and played out. All for a ‘Dollar A

Day.’”

You’ll have to work hard to decode these themes within his music, but I believe it won’t take long for Crockett to be producing anthems of unity and rebellion like his predecessors Woody Guthrie and Bob Dylan, both of whom wielded music like a blade—rallying the masses and cutting conformists at the knee.

The range of references embedded throughout Crockett’s writing makes it clear that, as a high school dropout, he is better read than most PhDs. Sourcing inspiration from a complex array of individuals, ranging from Elie Wiesel and Martin Luther King to heroes of the old West and biblical scripture, it is apparent Crockett never intended for “successful country singer” to be his final destination.

A man of mixed heritage, brought up by a single mother in a trailer park, who did not wear shoes until the age of 10, he picked up two felonies in adulthood but continued to pour his faith into himself and America. His story represents the greatness that exists within the bones of our country. An American hero, a title you can’t buy—even with a small loan of a million dollars.

To epitomize this crudely dense assessment, here’s one for the road—from a man far more articulate than I:

“An institution that should always fight for progress and reform, never tolerate injustice or corruption, always fight demagogues of all parties, never belong to any party, always oppose privileged classes and public plunderers, never lack sympathy with the poor, always remain devoted to the public welfare, never be satisfied with merely printing news, always be drastically independent, never be afraid to attack wrong, whether by predatory plutocracy or predatory poverty”

— Joseph Pulitzer, May 10, 1883, in an editorial upon becoming the publisher of the New York World

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Danceportation: Bass Invasion returns to Meow Wolf Denver this Saturday, 5/16. Sub.mission is bringing global talent in bass music for a multi-stage takeover throughout the entire building.

This immersive dance party pulses through the converged worlds of Meow Wolf Denver, featuring four main stages and more hidden surprises. Be entranced by otherworldly art installations while stunning live performances, psychedelic projections, and sentient universes welcome you. Learn more at https://meow.wf/4njigUg

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Denver's favorite choose-your-own-adventure arts extravaganza is back for the seventh year June 3-7, 2026 with dozens of original shows at creative venues around the city, including comedy, clown, theatre, dance, aerial, puppetry, immersive and so much more. Save the dates - you don't want to miss out on this much fun! Tickets and passes go on sale May 1st at denverfringe.org.

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Featured Song: Zombie Song by Aratik

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Denver's favorite choose-your-own-adventure arts extravaganza is back for the seventh year June 3-7, 2026 with dozens of original shows at creative venues around the city, including comedy, clown, theatre, dance, aerial, puppetry, immersive and so much more. Save the dates - you don't want to miss out on this much fun! Tickets and passes go on sale May 1st at denverfringe.org.

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Join Cultivate CRI 2026, a weeklong online auction supporting local education and mentorship for Denver Public School students! Running May 11–16, you can bid on items like a Meow Wolf adventure or tickets to the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. Your bids fund mentors and science nights for Denver students. Visit givebutter.com/c/CRI-spring2026/auction to start bidding!

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The fourth annual DeCAF (Denver Comics and Arts Festival) is happening on May 9. See local artists, comics, zines, and more at the Schoolyard on 1115 Acoma Street from 11am to 7pm this Saturday. The event is free, and your friends from Denverse will be there too! Visit https://www.coloradocomics.org/ to see the full list of exhibitors at this year’s event.

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This Week’s Song: “You Should Smile More” by Natasha Melton

Locals Aloud is proudly recorded right on the legendary Colfax Ave in Denver, CO.

A historic fad fades away, only to be resurrected by the underground

At first glance, Denver might seem a million miles from the tropical beaches of Polynesia, both geographically and culturally, but the Mile High City has a surprisingly rich history of tiki bars dating back to the 1950s. Our introduction to tiki is all thanks to two titans of the tropical cocktail named Donn Beach and Trader Vic Bergeron, who birthed a craze that swept across midcentury America before succumbing to the merciless fate of all fads.

However, this is a tale of redemption. Tiki culture rose from the ashes, and the scene today overlaps many other underground subcultures, including old-school punk, burlesque, hot rods, pinups, goth and rockabilly. Tiki’s aesthetics challenge the notions of high- and low-brow culture by elevating what bourgeois tastemakers dismiss as kitschy, gaudy, and polarizing.

–– • ––

The word “tiki” is derived from Māori creation mythology. Like biblical Adam, Tiki was…

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Denver's favorite choose-your-own-adventure arts extravaganza is back for the seventh year June 3-7, 2026 with dozens of original shows at creative venues around the city, including comedy, clown, theatre, dance, aerial, puppetry, immersive and so much more. Save the dates - you don't want to miss out on this much fun! Tickets and passes go on sale May 1st at denverfringe.org.

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Immerse yourself in The Stars We Do Not See: Australian Indigenous Art, the largest display of Australian Indigenous art ever presented in North America, now on view at the Denver Art Museum! This exhibition offers a captivating, multi-layered experience, featuring 130 works by 142 artists drawn exclusively from the National Gallery of Victoria’s world-leading collection. These works will introduce you to the art, resilience, and depth of the world’s oldest continuous living culture. On view now through July 26. Visit denverartmuseum.org to purchase tickets.

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Located in the RiNo area, Nocturne is a bi-level lounge & eatery serving up eclectic plates & cocktails amid live jazz music. This acoustically designed room in the heart of Denver plays host to live jazz nightly (Wednesday through Sunday). Nocturne’s distinctive Artist in Residency programming is at the core of our lineup. This old-school approach to programming combines the unique opportunity to hone one’s craft with regular stage time, while also establishing an elevated rapport with Denver music fans. Nocturne is proud to be the only venue in Colorado that features jazz exclusively, and is also pleased to feature national touring artists on special occasions. Check out the show calendar and make a reservation at https://nocturnejazz.com/

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Featured Song: Open Doors by Major General

Put your ear to the ground out by the airport and you might hear the phantom barks of small-block V-8s. In Castle Rock, you might catch burnt rubber on the breeze or that hot-metal brake-dust bite, like the patron saint of the backstretch is still clocking laps at Continental Divide.

Last year, I found myself hiding by the kosher endcap at the Sprouts on East Colfax. It had been fifteen years since I’d seen Shorts McGraw, but it was him. The posture. The skateboard tucked under his arm like an extra appendage.

I’d just come from reading an essay at Lighthouse …

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JUG was detention, but instead of sitting in mandatory silence or doing arbitrary busywork like writing an essay, you got assigned cleaning duties. Go pick up trash in the parking lot, for example, or shovel snow from the sidewalk for an hour after school.

Each student carried a wallet-sized rap sheet—a “demerit card”— that a teacher could demand to see and inscribe with rule infractions as they occurred. For every fifth demerit, you served JUG.

Goofing off in class was common cause for a demerit. Disrespecting a teacher might get you two demerits, if not more. Forgetting a textbook, using vulgar language, showing up to school unshaven, wearing your shirt untucked …

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“Roll onto your back,” he instructed, stepping back to watch the woman struggle onto her elbows, shifting her weight on the narrow bed. “This next one can be uncomfortable.”

The woman settled, a frown folding her forehead. “Great.”

She didn’t talk much, and that troubled the physical therapist. Sometimes his clients wanted to discuss the weather, or sports, or politics, and he prided himself on being well-liked. But he didn’t know anything about the woman, and knew making a connection would keep her coming back, bolstering the possibility of a positive review. He hoped today he could finally crack her.

Thumbs together, he pushed down and under her pelvis, digging at the psoas muscle. “Any exciting weekend plans?” He thought of his wife as he maintained pressure, of the way her hair had quivered across her face with slow sleepy breaths as he slipped out that morning. They made love every Friday evening and he licked his dry lips in anticipation.

The muscle surrendered soft under his hands and he glanced at the woman, whose eyes were scrunched, her lips tightened into a pale pink flower bud. Sleep crusted at the corners of her eyes and a tawny mole curled against her nose. She wasn’t attractive—not like his wife, who carried herself with swanlike grace and still drew glances from far younger men. He tried to be neutral about the bodies that came through the office, but he was human after all.

“Sorry, I—” The woman stammered.

The physical therapist released his hold, rubbing the splotch of red skin with the heel of his hand. He’d manipulated the muscle for too long. “Yeah, that one isn’t fun.”

The woman shook her head, like she’d resigned herself to pain a long time ago, and met his eyes. “My weekend plans are to take a long bath and catch up on emails.”

“At the same time?”

The woman’s cheeks flushed and he tensed. The physical therapist had been so pleased to get more than a grunt out of her that he’d asked the question before thinking it through, startling himself. He was a calculated man and the misstep moistened his armpits.

“Ooh, that’s a good idea. Efficient.” The woman’s jaw line disappeared into a fold of chin that jiggled as she laughed.

For a moment, the physical therapist considered pressing his mouth against it, imagining the softness against his lips. The thought passed as quickly as it’d arrived, becoming rancid as he stepped outside it, horrified. “Sorry, what?”

“I said we’re also going to make tacos, and I asked about your own weekend plans.”

The physical therapist patted her ankle as he glanced at the clock, hoping the woman wouldn’t notice her session was ending five minutes early. “I’m not sure yet. We’ll see what my wife has planned.”

On Saturday, he went to the gourmet grocery a few blocks from Wash Park, a shop he chose because it was too expensive for the baristas who loved to park their silly little Honda Fits in front of his house so they could walk around Smith and Grasmere Lakes and take pictures at the boathouse and pretend they were rich. His wife’s list was written on the back of a dry cleaning receipt in barely legible cursive: hummus, celery, oak milk, grn salsa. He paused, irritated. Was omitting the two e’s really necessary? Had it saved her adequate time amid her busy life? Then he chuckled at himself. Two e’s didn’t matter one way or another.

Pomegranates were back in season, and he knew she loved them, so he sniffed a few before placing a perfect specimen in the shopping basket. He loved his wife, loved making her feel cherished. Together, they were a well-oiled machine: while he worked on bodies, she had a show on the local public radio, interviewing the state’s movers and shakers. She did the laundry and made dinner; he grocery shopped and tended the yard. Their daughter had recently graduated college and moved cross-country for her girlfriend’s job. Normally on Saturdays, she came home, and he’d check the oil in the Subaru he’d bought her, and they’d play a game of chess. In her absence, he’d felt a little off, restless even.

The green salsa was tucked on the bottom shelf, under fifteen different choices for red. He preferred red salsa—it was classic—but Vera favored green so that’s what they ate. As he reached, his knuckles grazed against a box of taco shells and he thought of the woman from work. He wondered if she was using a box like this or if she preferred making things from scratch. She seemed like a from scratch kind of person, like him.

He needed a haircut and a white strand swept across his eyelids as he shook his head, clearing his mind. His wife often commended him for his ability to leave work at work, and yet here he was, thinking about a client. Annoyed, he knocked the box of taco shells, leaving it on its back.

By the time the physical therapist had seen the woman for four months, they’d established a repertoire. He knew just where to dig his fingertips to manipulate the gluteus medius, and sensed that he no longer needed to ask permission before pushing her jersey leggings down several inches and tucking them into her threadbare cotton underwear while slipping into atypically easy conversation.

When they talked, he was genuinely curious as to how the characters in her life were faring, how she was navigating the wildcards thrown her way. As far as he could tell, the sentiment was mutual. She asked him questions, not just about the weather, but what he was excited about, what was hard.

And so many things were hard these days. The economic downturn meant fewer people were able to afford frivolity like caring for their bodies, so the physical therapist regularly had swaths of blank hours in his calendar.

“I’m just not sure what to get her,” he muttered, pushing his thumbs against her spine.

The woman folded in half, reaching for her toes without having to be asked. Her obedience quickened his breath.

“How old will your wife be?”

His hands inched up and she bent forward again as he chuckled. “She’d be mad at me for spilling secrets, but she’ll be sixty.”

“Wow.”

Her wonder left him feeling exposed, like his wife’s age shone a spotlight on his own thinning hair, or the deep grooves under his eyes. He wondered how the woman saw him. “Does that seem old to you?”

“Not really.” She shrugged, her thoracolumbar fascia tensing under his hands, a snake of muscle running alongside her knobby vertebrae. “Just seems like a big milestone. After my accident, it seems like a feat to get to sixty.”

“How old are you?” The physical therapist knew he could look this up in her file, and hoped it wasn’t a question that brushed unduly close to something too casual between them. Maintaining strict boundaries was a tenet of physical therapy, whose practitioners suffered the highest rates of sexual harassment or assault in the entire medical field. His office had protocols in place to ward off handsy clients: avoid being alone with them, avoid personal connection. When all else failed, a therapist could simply hand a note to their front desk manager, who would blacklist the patient for future scheduling.

“I’m thirty-two.”

Wind whistled from between his teeth in astonishment. “Almost half our age.” Where had the time gone?

“You definitely need to get her something special.”

“Lay on your right side,” he said. As she climbed onto his table, he scratched at a rough patch on the back of his neck. “I know I do, but I’m stumped.”

The woman hoisted herself onto her elbow, her eyes lit with amusement. “It has to be really good.”

He scooted her legs where he wanted and then leaned forward, pressing his chest against hers while pulling on an arm, her other hand resting casually on his shoulder blade. Her back cracked three times in quick succession, like a rock skipping across a lake.

“What makes a good gift?” As the physical therapist asked this, he thought of his wife and how she always got him what he needed, even if he didn’t yet realize he was without. The problem was that his wife didn’t need anything, and if she did, she got it herself.

“Something that makes her feel cherished, that tells her that you really thought about her.”

“Does your husband give you gifts like that?” He knew he was toeing the line again, that he should’ve used the more innocuous word partner.

“Sometimes, but he could do better.”

“Roll onto your stomach.” The thought of the woman married to some young idiot made the back of his tongue go sour, but he knew better than to entertain such thoughts, so instead he reached for the needles and pushed her pants down past her hip.

“I suppose we could all do better, though,” the woman mused, before peering over her shoulder. “Wait, are you dry needling again today?” She groaned.

The physical therapist nodded, ripping into an alcohol swab. He’d recently been certified in the technique, using monofilament needles to agitate trigger points in muscle tissue, and had started using it on the woman, who hated the procedure. When other clients expressed dislike to dry needling, he’d pivot and introduce another technique instead: heat, tennis balls, massage. It wasn’t for everyone. But he knew the needles were helping the woman, and she didn’t fight him. Her vulnerability was a tangible current coursing under his hands, and he wanted to gather it up like a hose, looping it against a hook on his house.

That weekend, the physical therapist’s wife surprised him with dinner reservations at his favorite restaurant. He never wondered where he stood with her, which was one of her many ideal qualities. She was a powerful woman who earned his admiration. He referred to her as his equal, as his partner, to his colleagues. Which is why, when the physical therapist caught himself mid-daydream, anticipating Tuesday morning when he’d be able to tell the woman about his steak au poivre, he was startled. Yes, he’d had her schedule memorized for weeks now, but surely that was just an indicator of his superior treatment and client repertoire.

He swiped at his mashed potatoes with the tines of his fork and wondered what it was about the woman that’d captured his attention. She was a wounded bird, was all. Though it was more than that, of course—it was the way she looked at him with sad-eyed reverence, the way she nodded eagerly at his every suggestion. He dragged his fork again, watching gravy bleed into the paths it carved. She needed him.

With a gummy swallow, he realized that must be it: he felt needed again. His wife didn’t need him. His daughter didn’t need him now, either. He dabbed the cloth napkin at the corners of his mouth, assuring himself that it was perfectly natural for a man to need to be necessary.

The woman really did need him. Once, recently, she’d even cried, convinced she’d never get better. He’d hugged her, too long maybe, but no—it was his job to care for his patients.

He took a sip of red wine, glancing across the table to wink at his wife, and wondered how long the perfect union between him and the woman could last. Eventually, she’d get better. Eventually, she wouldn’t need him anymore.

His wife reached across the table and found his hand. “I sure do love you.”

“I love you, too,” he said. He really did.

Two days later, he was on his knees in the exercise room, demonstrating a bird-dog strengthening exercise for another patient. A post-natal mother, young and blonde and spandexed, was struggling with diastasis recti and needed abdominal strengthening to rejoin her muscles.

He only half-listened to the mother’s questions, breezing through exercises with indifference because his next appointment was with the woman. He never brought the woman out here and imagined her sitting in the exam room, waiting for him. Exhibiting the correct form for a plank, he wondered if the woman’s shoes were still on, or if she’d already slipped them off in anticipation of his arrival.

His mouth was wet so he swallowed hard before knocking twice and entering the room. The woman’s socked feet were stacked one on top of the other, and she reached back to gather her curls into a messy bun on top of her head. The physical therapist didn’t like buns, thought they looked like uncouth cats curled atop women’s heads. His wife would never have worn a bun, had shorn her hair short and chic decades ago. A disappointing knot of annoyance toward the woman settled in his bowels.

He glanced at his clipboard. “Remind me, which hip is still bothering you?” He knew full well it was her left, and exactly where, and exactly why. But he tried to ask her an off-canter question every few weeks, to convey a sense of unfamiliarity, to let her know she was just one of his many patients.

“Oh, it’s my left.”

“That’s right, that’s right.”

He’d never admit it, not even to himself, but he’d been looking forward to dry needling the woman since he woke up. Protocol required that he examine her first, determine if she really needed it, but the procedure couldn’t damage her. It was helping her.

He rushed through the assessment, prodding her lower back, the palms of his hands warming against her. She’d grown more vocal about her disdain of the procedure, but she never asked him to stop.

“On your stomach,” he instructed, his heart fluttering with plans to target the iliotibial tract. Hooking a thumb at her waistband, he pulled her sweatpants down first, halfway down her thigh, before repeating with her underpants, rolling them together to keep in place. Typically he’d lay a blanket across a patient’s backside for modesty, but he knew he didn’t have to with the woman.

The physical therapist had forgotten about her hair-do and was in such a good mood he decided to treat himself. He’d do ten needles, and use a combination of the pistoning and winding techniques to really make her muscles dance.

The woman clutched the cushioned edges of the plinth table as he tapped the sterile tube encasing the first needle, and began twisting the monofilament toward the bone.

She grumbled and in that moment, he wanted to stroke her hand and tell her everything would be alright. He wanted to dig the needle deeper.

“I’ve been thinking about your wife’s sixtieth birthday present,” she said between gritted teeth.

Tap. Another needle. She’d been thinking about him. He grinned, grateful she couldn’t see his joy. “Oh, yeah?” He tapped a third needle, rubbing at her ilio band as it vibrated under her skin.

“You said you don’t do PT on your wife, so why don’t you get her one of those massage guns?”

Tap. “No, she wouldn’t want one of those.”

“Didn’t you say her shoulders are sore all the time?”

Not only had the woman been thinking about him, but she’d really been listening during their time together. The thought was so warm, butter rolling across cast iron, that his grip went limp and he dropped the fourth needle.

It landed soft as snow on her upper hamstring and time suspended. His breath caught, snagged in his chest, and he watched helplessly as the fine needle rolled toward her gluteal fold and disappeared.

For a moment, the physical therapist was at a total loss. He couldn’t ask her to get up, she had needles inserted. But he couldn’t just go rummaging between her legs, either.

“Uh,” he finally said, and it sounded more like a dog’s growl. He wanted to apologize but knew this was one of those moments when he couldn’t, shouldn’t, admit wrong-doing. He cleared his throat and tried again. “I dropped a needle.”

“Okay?”

“If you could just,” he tapped the inside of her left leg, and she obediently scooted it to the edge of the bed.

He could really see her then, and maybe even smell her, though in his panic he couldn’t be sure. He’d never admit it to himself, but he’d wanted this, her like this. Now that he had it, just inches away, nausea swelled at the back of his throat. If the nosy front desk manager popped in right then to tell him another patient was waiting, he could lose everything. He’d never be able to explain this to his wife. Scorn roiled across his chest and he wanted the woman gone.

Grabbing a reflex hammer from the cabinet, he fished the needle from where it’d landed on the table deep in the canyon of her thighs. He threw it in the sharps box like it was hot.

“Your body decided it was done with needling,” he sneered, barely able to contain his sudden contempt for the woman. He grabbed a folded sheet, hastily covering her backside, and plucked the other needles. There were still ten minutes left in their session, but he had to be done. It was over. “Sorry, uh, I don’t feel well,” he mumbled, and flung himself into the hallway.

He hid in the bathroom, sitting cross-legged on the toilet, until he was sure she was gone. While waiting, he bought a massage gun for his wife, and wrote a quick note suggesting the woman seek other treatment. When he emerged, he handed the paper to the front desk manager without making eye contact, and headed to his next appointment.

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Immerse yourself in The Stars We Do Not See: Australian Indigenous Art, the largest display of Australian Indigenous art ever presented in North America, now on view at the Denver Art Museum! This exhibition offers a captivating, multi-layered experience, featuring 130 works by 142 artists drawn exclusively from the National Gallery of Victoria’s world-leading collection. These works will introduce you to the art, resilience, and depth of the world’s oldest continuous living culture. On view now through July 26. Visit denverartmuseum.org to purchase tickets.

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Located in the RiNo area, Nocturne is a bi-level lounge & eatery serving up eclectic plates & cocktails amid live jazz music. This acoustically designed room in the heart of Denver plays host to live jazz nightly (Wednesday through Sunday). Nocturne’s distinctive Artist in Residency programming is at the core of our lineup. This old-school approach to programming combines the unique opportunity to hone one’s craft with regular stage time, while also establishing an elevated rapport with Denver music fans. Nocturne is proud to be the only venue in Colorado that features jazz exclusively, and is also pleased to feature national touring artists on special occasions. Check out the show calendar and make a reservation at https://nocturnejazz.com/

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This Week’s Song: “Strangers Maybe” by Dear Luna

Let’s say there are two types of entrepreneur. No, let’s say there are two extremes of entrepreneur.

The one extreme grows up affluent. He goes to school and socializes with the boys and girls who will be the political leaders, bank presidents, and thought leaders that he will do business with later. From an early age, he sees from the inside the systems that make his success not just possible but inevitable. He understands the strategic use of tools like bankruptcy and the calculated deployment of extravagance. He has an aerial view.

The other extreme is someone who grows up poor. He has a ground view. Frugality is a tool not just for success but for survival. This kind of entrepreneur knows that his success is dependent, singularly, on his boundless energy, on his ability to spot small and large opportunities to make a profit. Like a skilled boxer, he is always looking for an opening. He is terrified of bank…

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It was the climax of a good Jack Macco. We’d made a habit of prank-calling high-level executives, and Charlie’s character Jack was our hero. After a week of getting beaten down by the boss, there was nothing better than meeting up in Charlie’s office overlooking the tennis courts on Bayaud and exacting the people’s justice. Together, we’d make the masters of the universe pay, and we’d do it by laying waste to their dearest asset: time.

Who knows how many millions of dollars’ worth of minutes we stole from America’s corporate elite over the years.

We were just kids, twenty-somethings fresh out of college or retail jobs. Before being hired at the national magazine, Anthony had been a towel boy at a local spa. Charlie had worked at a hockey store. And I, having received my masters in fine arts degree, had recently been employed as a waiter at the Stapleton Olive Garden.

But that office made us feel like we’d made it, as did the idea of working at a magazine, a glamorous thing to announce on Facebook in 2016. (Note to younger readers: beware the glamorous job).

I had a fancy title and was interviewing Scarlett Johansson, but my salary started at $35,000/year, less than I’d be making if I’d stuck to slinging breadsticks. As “managing editor,” I was working 70+ hours a week and always on-call via a noisy Slack chat. By Thursday/Friday, our brains were slag, and, since the boss would usually check out early, we took refuge in Charlie’s swanky office–he being the company’s most successful employee and still the best salesman I’ve ever known. And it was there that we’d hatch our schemes for harassing the people whose professional status we could only pretend at.

Since we were in the media business, we had a variety of sleazy tactics to get your cell number. Most importantly, we understood the psychology. Even though we were young scrubs, we were acquainted enough with the business class to understand how they ticked. And this was how Jack Macco was born.

When you’re pranking C-suite executives, yes, obviously you do want to have some traditional crank call fun. Absurd scenarios, funny voices, all that good stuff. But the most important thing is wasting their time. This is what makes the CEO prank call such a worthy comic enterprise. If you’ve eaten up even a minute of their seven-figure day, you’ve already won, joke’s on them. So when you formulate your strategy, your first priority is how to keep them on the line.

See, Charlie understood that global-level CEOs are often type A psychos, who are every day surrounded by sycophants and yes-men. They’re smart, vicious, and highly analytical creatures–velociraptors testing the fence for weaknesses. And because their time is so precious, they’re tuned to every detail of your voice–minor inflections, cadence, diction, anything that might give you away as someone who’s not on their level.

But Jack Macco would not only be on their level. He would rise above it. Jack could speak to billionaires like inferiors. He would bully them, and, because most serious executives are smart enough to refrain from acting in the blind, if the voice on the other end seemed like an equal (or a potential superior), they would meet it as such. In other words, they would let you talk long enough to drag them deeper into the joke. For Jack, this would usually involve telling the CEO that they’d forgotten some major partnership, and why hadn’t they signed the damned terms agreement?!? And then, after a long, confusing, and heated back and forth that would sometimes result in a screaming match, he would abruptly pivot to trying to sell them an absurd product that didn’t exist in the corniest way possible, saying that they were fools for not working with him (our favorite was to pitch a CEO a banner ad on our personal blog website), at which point they would hang up (ideally 10-15 minutes later after we’d gotten our yucks).

Here’s an example (with names and numbers bleeped out). Please excuse the laughter. We were pros at muting the line during giggle fits.

JACK MACCO

Was it childish? Absolutely. But there’s something to be said for good old-fashioned fun. And when I reflect on Jack, I also think that it was a way of relieving a careerist tension we all felt (and still feel today, but especially back then). Every week, we were on the phones, in meetings, etc., saying the words, wearing the mask, going to tradeshows, pressing the flesh, and it was so nice to inject some silly humanity into the dance of the dead by regressing to the teenage delight that is the prank call.

Ah, I wonder if the kids are still doing it. It’s got to be much harder now, since people rarely answer their phones anymore, which I don’t understand. Could the person on the other end be trying to scam you? Sure. But you should answer anyway. Life is a scam. Get into it! Have some fun. Tell someone no! Exert what little power you have; it feels good! Or maybe get dragged into an adventure with Jack Macco! Anyway, I digress.

Charlie and I are both soulless CEOs ourselves now–though his enterprise is much more lucrative than mine. We both still live in Denver, and whenever we get together for beers, we’ll inevitably talk about all the laughs we had as overworked kids, desperate for juvenile humor, petty revenge, and alas, yes, advancement.

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Immerse yourself in The Stars We Do Not See: Australian Indigenous Art, the largest display of Australian Indigenous art ever presented internationally, now on view at the Denver Art Museum! This exhibition offers a captivating, multi-layered experience, featuring 130 works by 142 artists drawn exclusively from the National Gallery of Victoria’s world-leading collection. These works will introduce you to the art, resilience, and depth of the world’s oldest continuous living culture. On view now through July 26. Visit denverartmuseum.org to purchase tickets.

Since 2006, The Clocktower Cabaret has been the heart of downtown nightlife. Hidden beneath the historic D&F Tower on 16th Street, this independent venue has hosted world-class burlesque, comedy, live music, and theatre for nearly two decades. This month, check out the show Oracle, presented by Taka, where the audience chooses the cards—and the cards choose the show. Each reveal unlocks a new path as tarot archetypes come to life in a blend of magic, chaos, and hidden truths. No two performances are ever the same. Saturdays in April: 11, 18 & 25. Learn more and get tickets at https://www.clocktowercabaret.com/shows

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This Week’s Song: “Living on Denver Time” by Sarah Mount & the Rushmores