The Maasi

The Maasi saw
from Kenya's land
their river falling
couldn't understand
the wildebeest
or the hippo
would die in this heat
with nowhere to go
without water
without a voice
dead indifference
leaving them no choice
great migration
sadly ended
while African tribes
in smoke decended
forests were cut
charcoal was made
cattle were grazing
without ancient shade
in an old land
with a new pain
without much food
without much rain

the final cry was 'Broken Arrow'

it was once all about Saigon
but now it's gone
the muddy river once slept and burned
and what have we uniformly learned
painting it jet black won't get it back:

the body bags filled with Asian dirt
politicians said it wouldn't hurt
watching the helicopters at the embassy!

a young woman with her crying baby
grabbing the barbed wire wall
dodging shots before the inevitable fall...

and all the President's men
each with a white face
their conference table with expensive pens and frivolous lace
and a perfect powder room
where the happy hour drunks sang delirious songs of doom
in the stone temple.

the gods sat hard and cold
trading places which could be bought and sold
outside the parlors of the free press:
readers were forced to guess
what in the streets of an American city
was real and what was merely witty;

and on the television screen
cigarette smoke filled the stale air.

in Vietnam the midnight sparkle
was a phosphorescent flare,
and young men lived and died there.

while in the Pentagon,
it was once all about Saigon
but now it's gone
when the flesh gave way to marrow
the final cry was 'Broken Arrow'

Le Tricorne (22 July, 1919)

her thin fingers were magnified,
while tiny lines of Russian smiles
were seen dancing on the stage,
waving to the audience from a 
perfectly classical ballet position.

and there was sincere applause for the flesh-and-blood
physicality, but grace and beauty
shared all the jumps and spins and bows.

in the scene-painting studio on Floral Street,
Picasso had mixed light chrome with pure white,
to produce the beauty of old ivory, which added richness
to the sets of Le Tricorne, which needed it especially in London.

Massine played the Miller, speaking with his feet
in a stomping fit of flying sentences, tipping his hat
to the ladies and the admiring men, all thinking
they were watching the future Gene Kelly, while dreaming
of an umbrella and a cup of warm tea.

apparently it was raining,

or soon would be,

but all were warm and dry inside the Alhambra Theatre.

La Boutique Fantasque

La Boutique Fantasque
and the silver pipe beneath the derby hat,

the dandy little guy with his deep sharp eye
his formal tie
black before a bright white light
tied tight
inside a blond French mistress
with a youthful hunger for his cock

his fast brush and his wry smile slide
wide
with practiced pomp past the Russian dancer
into the wilds of Provence

and parade

the woman in tears displayed
on his Spanish canvas
weeps with magnolia memory
pure as a lake bottom

the sun cold with shades of nuance.

closing our book

no turn of the screw

straight ahead i could catch 

the briefest glimpse of you

wearing your favorite red

it wasn't only what you said

that turned me blue

so what had i heard

when you flashed me a smile?

i tried to hear each word

running on fertile ground

it wasn't only what i found

that seemed absurd

you gave me that look

and a toss of your hair

but something else you took

meant more to me than life

i felt the stinging of your knife

closing our book.

drugs floating in the air

Jack said there was a dog in the tree,

howling at the moon;

but when i looked it wasn't there,

although i saw a haiku

hanging from a hanging branch:

if it fades away,

how will i know what it meant?

i can't see in the dark.

but Allen said he saw the dog,

who was barking like a hipster:

he said it was wearing a French-style beret,

reading a poem called Howl,

occasionally sounding like a mad man.

what was it about?

there was a lot of applause.

i had much to learn.

then Burroughs said there should be

intoxicating drugs floating freely in the air,

so he traveled to Tangiers

with his net and a tourist guide book,

looking for an African ass to drive home his point:

he often had sex at night,

and in the morning felt fine.

his breakfast was fish.

he tried to eat like a native, he said,

between bites of flesh.

Joseph Heller

what exactly did he mean by the phrase

CATCH-22?
from my lips directly to you:
a Willie Mays center fielder's running grab?
a discovery in the National Institute of Mental Health lab?

Joe avoided a violent military death
wrote a best selling book many years before he drew his last breath
a long, slow, measured exhale
but he got to chase the girls successfully for more than one piece of tail

his B-25, a fine airplane
coming in low and fast, weaving through heavy enemy flack totally insane:
it was very sane to want to stay inside an Air Force canvas tent
crazy to fly in formation if that's what he really meant

during WWII, the thin man and the fat
the bald guy and the clown who never removed his hat
the wop and the Jew
who on Sunday morning didn't know how to act or what to do
the black aviator and the brave Mexican from San Diego
neither wanted a tag from graves registration tied to their big toe
and the freckled kid from cold Minnesota
drinking a warm coca cola
between briefings and the next flight
they all felt deep down inside their guts an incredible fright
and wondered more than once if they'd get out in one piece
to become whole again and be discovered by a lover and live in peace

Yossarian.  Major Major.  CATCH-22?
it's what they did heroically and awkwardly still continue to do.

Kennedy and the CIA

And they all died!

Any further consideration would be postponed
Until tomorrow.
A total of twenty two hundred men lied!
One was big nosed Charles de Gaulle
Who was last seen sipping heaping teaspoons of arrogance along
With ripe strawberries which came from Dalat.
Who else?
The French legions at Dien Bien Phu.
That's who.
The Emperor, Bao Dai, constantly smiled 
But never went wild
when the sneaky Japanese sat eating his rice.
They weren't very nice.
Uncle Ho knew which way to go.
And millions of peasants soon followed.
The Buddhist Group went up in flames
Playing gasoline games
In the public square.
I wasn't there.
Ngo Diem was, however, along with his brother and the
Dragon lady, who wasn't very blue.
Who else knew?
In Saigon, Nguyen Van Thieu,
Continued to work on his resume.
Kennedy and the CIA
On the river's embankment,
Ordered the bogeymen into action.
And the rain might have stopped as suddenly
As it started, but the B-52s
Were just warming up on Guam,
Their cold bomb racks filled with misery for the
Vietnamese on the ground, without qualm.
It became very clear that death could drop from
Thirty thousand feet
And kill a thousand people as they sat down to eat.
Truman had no policy, Eisenhower none, but Johnson
Pulled his pants on like a true Texan.
Nixon was no Texan, but in 1972
He celebrated an early Christmas
With Henry who flew home from Paris
With a secret merry card.
On the cover it mentioned that Hanoi and Haiphong
Would not have a merry time
tonight or for the next several weeks and
Not a single word made a rhyme,
But the men acted as though one did.
Whom did they pretend to kid?
President Ho Chi Minh died in '69.
He was no friend of mine.
The US Embassy lost a sign.
It was carried away by a staffer, who jumped
On the last helicopter leaving for the coast.
Where is it now?
That's what I want to know the most.

looking for Sonny

the ice was dull

but my blades were sharp
the water underneath a bottle of Perrier
floated the classical woman on her Viennese harp

the thin man on his Fender bass
kept bringing another cold case
for poor Sonny
who died when his head hit a tree
like an arrow splitting a knee:

it was in the dead of winter
in the American west
but we go on with our lives
imagining they're the best

they could become a dime store novel or a penny
a farthing or a pound 
a fatal fall from every grace
or a trampoline rebound

when lifetime runs down
and the entrance runs on and on
each day after day
and most are willing to pay

the price

is always right

glued to digital visions

a Russian SU or a tank

watching the Ruble wiggle and squirm

as it sank

with an earthquake or volcano

buffalo stampede or a shark

rising oceans, and a waterfront park

filled with happy campers

looking for Sonny

the Mosque wall

in Kashmir

a thoughtful Indian picked up a hefty rock

while i stayed on the sofa 

playing with his Pakistani woman,

but only in my dreams.

it often seems

there's a lingering dawn

before the fateful rising sun:

the actual sound ringing in my ear

is of a car explosion!

i see people

running past the Mosque wall,

many bleeding upright while others crawl.

this is definitely not a dream,

it would seem,

as i see soldiers with the Star of David,

hear them shouting commands

above the clamor and the swirling dust.

i must

remember how this unfolds in reality time

so i might use my rhyme

to describe the madness and the genocide.

there is no where to hide,

the innocence.

i must

remember to heat water for another cup of tea,

watching civilization flee.

on my tv

there's currently a bulletin coming from the Red Sea

about a missile strike on a Panamanian-flagged oil tanker

and another drone shot down,

having been launched from an historic Yemeni town

now curiously devoid of hungry tourists.

thousands of actors are rehearsing their lines

but no one is paying their fines:

it's overdue, the settlement cost.

much is lost!

during an intermission,

i must

remember the thuggish warlords

and the frightened underdogs,

both eating everything they can dig their teeth into,

as they drink

and sink

like hard noodles into their own fragrant broth.

the Golden Gate Bridge

but
her breasts keep getting in the way

so i couldn't sleep worth a damn
and the music was too loud
even if it was Kashmir
each heavy note came tumbling bouncing off the entrance door
i saw the stenciled sign splashed in hurried paint i hurried in
drizzled colors piled onto a dirty glass canvas announcing
Harmony Bar & Restaurant but i wasn't buying it
none of it none at all

her white shirt remained unbuttoned
while i fumbled 
i dropped the ball but had a ball played the game
went into extra innings 
she felt cold hot luke warm hot again
her nipples got the beat
each one
inclined swayed winked and nodded as i smoked
waiting on my park bench wearing a French beret
met a photographer who soon became a painter
read the newspaper headlines about the disturbance
waited until she touched me touched herself
i became erect & stayed that way

i couldn't sleep worth a damn
had a stiff one had a drink had a dream
i remembered Joseph Alioto and the bomb
his prostate cancer a bitch a hole in the invincibility wall
the streets of San Francisco pulsing up and down
round and round the Transamerica pyramid wild-eyed
his grave and everywhere parades of kids and more shadows
looking for the mafia but finding hills and bags of pills
and the Pacific Ocean and suicides
the Golden Gate Bridge the perfect foil
where inspired hippies danced by the incoming tide
outgoing too and in tune with their war
their camouflaged faces and Indochinese histories
black cats and panthers sitting on ice listening sweating the draft
their inner city jazz coming undercover coming underground
to Dizzy and Miles getting a fix on things some very good things
with sharp wit and sharper needles all at the appropriate time no less

i couldn't sleep worth a damn
living in my crummy flat by the fire department
on Haight-Ashbury with a famous singer
i can't recall his name his face just doesn't appear to me anymore
he played the drums in a white band not well but
only for a short while before dropping his sticks 
into the depths into the drug culture into the abyss
ringing my bell at all hours on each every almost any floor
at the window
by the stairs
on the road
tugging at my brains spilling my guts onto the cop's desk by his answering machine
questioning me and digging for deeper mysteries that no man should ever want to know
most any time the elevators to the 13th floor sit waiting for the middle finger
and i started to write in a cold sweat typing a combination of words
emphasizing color, light, and the need for a change of pace a change of direction
i felt i needed a job needed a push a muse a mother a mouth a moment of genuine solitude
but no flawed insight please no three piece suit please no college campus guidebook
in plain view on a polished dining room table, no stained glass front door, no father knows best
no the prevailing mood wasn't enough no crowd control no ten commandments
no zeitgeist no leitmotif no full monty to unwrap the final vision to explain everything
in one big yellow star-bursting fireworks explosion so we can all just go to hell! 
& so it goes for general motors general electric and the general population
all the crazy politicians jerking off in the planetary house of representatives
doing to us what they're doing to each other over the air waves and over cocktails
and over there and here in their hands a new generation looking for a masterpiece.

but i know where Jefferson once whispered to his black mistress, so maybe that's enough.

but

her breasts keep getting in the way 

the Ohio National Guard

the Lusitania, a passenger ship, was torpedoed by U-20,
a German submarine.
it sank not far from Queenstown, Ireland,
in the spring of 1915,
before Guernica, Spain, was bombed;
before Picasso married Olga,
but after Van Gogh lived briefly in
the south of France with his amazing canvas,
splashing paints, and his injured ear.

in Flanders Fields the flowers bloom.

tombstones there are now growing as tall as fresh spring flowers,
the difference being that the headstones are engraved with names.

i thought about this while walking
my dog on a hard gravel trail
which wanders, deer-like,
through a nearby woods.
it was a hot morning, although not on fire,
when i climbed over fallen logs,
sidestepped the poison ivy,
my legs growing increasingly weary with the
weight of my Army-issue combat boots.

in my head was Dresden, a once beautiful German city, burned to ashes and
jumbled piles of blasted stone
in the spring of 1945,
and very few local people survived the fire storm 
to save their tea pots from the flaming catacombs.

i remembered
the forgotten war 

which was forgotten by the many millions
who didn't fight in Korea.
there were dead bodies on the cold battlefields who are now pieces of thin bone,
small shards of memory, forgotten loves of childhood
lost in the drifting winter snows
on the south bank of the
frozen Chosin Reservoir.

looking ahead,
toward a fenced orchard,
i saw bright ripe sour cherries being harvested by
young men on ladders.
young men, not the present busy ladder men, died
while wearing sweaty uniforms in the oppressive humidity
of the Ia Drang Valley, South Vietnam, in the fall of 1965.
Vietnam is a beautiful country
with a rich history and kind people
who are humble and loyal to their ancestors.
their rice is grown locally.

the helicopters didn't notice the rice as they came in
on their speedy Medivac approach to grab the many body bags 

filled with dead and to aid the wounded.

my dog doesn't know about this:

she cavorts with flickering shadows and chases alert chipmunks,

rabbits, running groundhogs.
she's busy with her own interests and oblivious to
the history of man.
she carries no baggage.

the Ohio National Guard has baggage,
having shot to death unarmed college students
who were protesting senseless killing.

you're IT, Kerouac, Jack!

 "Straight from the mind to the voice,"

said the mad-eyed man with whiskey
on his lips and cigarette smoke blowing
up his loose-fitting pants where the lovely hand
of a lady journalist from Italy was busy
while contemplating her life on a Colorado Buddhist campus.

she asked him in all earnestness sweetly
if IT was because of the war or because of a need
for change or simply because the dragon tattoo
on the early morning side of his unshaven face
kept spitting fire even during the heaviest New York rains,
when everyone else went running for shelter?

while at East 9th and 3rd Avenue there was a baby boomer carriage
and he rocked that boat like a titanic wave crashing 
through the intersection of his sad generation of brown
shoe wearers' looking for a pair of uptight white socks and
Slim playing hot on the nearest radio set high in the
rafters of the famous Harmony Bar and Grill, where
the girl with the unbuttoned blouse kept bouncing her brown hair
into his face and it was the largest crowd he had seen on Harlem
streets in over a week of searching, but it was a Friday night
and their music was jumping into and out of cars and fast trucks,
and hipsters on the road were looking for a good time in no time at all,
shooting around to find something that wasn't perfectly boring,
so they finally asked him to be IT

and he said yes.

Any time now, dear

there was a time in California
when i thought i had an extended reach
so i went walking with a musical woman
to an insanely beautiful Pacific beach
where we built a huge fire
and read Russian poetry
while watching the fiery sun
lower itself into the still-glowing sea

i asked her to sing
the Beach Boys who came first to my mind
but she sang Dead Man's Curve
and i didn't want to seem unkind
so i had another quick drink
while she played her B Flat clarinet
like the famous little French bird
who escaped her net

she started to dance like the puppet Pinocchio
wet sand between her toes
i considered heading to San Francisco
to see their variety shows
but the wild surf made a steady roar
Big Sur darkness held me to the floor
and she asked for a foot massage
said both her feet were damp
so i lit a Coleman lamp
and settled into our cozy camp

i found another cold Guinness
but it wasn't just a beer:
she handed me oil and spices
and said "Any time now, dear."

the vast Russian steppes

while the snows fell heavily upon the ground,

the eleventh moon
turned to face Matisse
in his famous studio near Paris.

and the flower seller walked away with his basket full,
his scarlet eyes silent at the end of the day.

a skinny body stared numbly out to sea,
to watch the moon's reflection on the turbulent waters;
her angular arms clasped in the fifth position above her head.

the northern light, a thunderous gray,
showed no glimmer of mercy
when the ballet season ended in a pillar of chalk
carved from the cliffs of Pourville.

in a steady rush of solitude the solitary person
withered and fell on the vast Russian steppes:
the moon slowly rose like a bird in its' cage,
puzzled to discover there was no easy way to fly.

Max Jacob (1876 - 1944)

Max was in his ill-lit room making fetishes

for his friends:  little things with strange

hieroglyphs, given for money or as treasured gifts.

his poetic air was patiently dark, with drugs and rough house sex

enjoyed at a Monday evening get-together

held inside regardless of the moody weather.

lurking in corners smoking away, his menacing friends

wore white gloves while watching amateur guests from afar

in an atmosphere most totally bizarre:

they would laugh at all their excesses, and their lack of scientific

thought.

encouraged to be inappropriate and morbid,

they fingered whatever they brought.

the Dharma bums

The Dharma bums

over and under

taking it as it comes:

loaded six shooter and dove of peace.

will it keep on raining

or finally cease?

weeping as the levee breaks

while wondering what it takes

to save the flooded land:

writing poetry to help understand

what's the rush to center stage?

sitting by the campfire turning the page,

reading the Sunday news:

sports or entertainment?

it should be easy to choose!

wearing sun shades

polishing the blades

going down

avoiding the center of town

sitting by a mountain lake

avoiding the fake

taking it as it comes

the Dharma bums

playing in the key of G

breathing easily.

multiple shooters

multiple shooters

like dead-of-night owl hooters
stealthy and quiet
on the wings of a riot
holding an AK47
dreaming of a virginal Heaven
inside a shopping mall
watching innocent victims fall
in the new toy aisle.
and when the bloody bodies pile
a sullen smile
breaks underneath a black mask
running for the black SUV
from sea to shining sea.

hanging with your picture

i'm not a known artist, but

i'm still hanging with your picture

it's been another cloudy day
and all the hours have sped away.

is it too late tonight to get a fast bite
by checking out the drive in?

my fast car is smoking its' tires
burning rubber to your outstretched arms:

you're the woman working all her charms!

shifting every gear

but i'm drawing near,

still hanging with your picture

suddenly, i just want to ride my bike
so don't ask me what i really like:

it's a two-wheeler, not a trike.

my motor is running like a power jet
pedaling furiously across your radar net

still hanging with your picture

suddenly, i'm standing tall on my tallest ladder
reaching for a tool to make it matter

is it too late tonight to get a fast bite
or has your fire turned to ashes?

a flirtatious wave of your eye lashes

is all it takes

for me to apply the brakes:

still hanging with your picture

China doll

China doll

resting her head on the seashore

watches the bather take a bath

hoping for more

than glimpses of his brush

she wonders how in the world

he could withstand the incoming tide

of all her propaganda

as she lied and lied and lied

about the size of her breasts

but he shows no interest beyond his toilet

as it flushes his indiscretions away

which gets her so angry

she wonders what else to say

or how to use her charms

to entice his arms

to embrace her:

if only she didn't powder her face red,

he said,

or angle her eyes in hues of midnight black,

then a tryst could stand a chance.

he adjusted his pants

as perhaps a flirt might do

but held firm.

he watched her squirm.

she was hoping for more

but would never take to the floor

in her imagination.

he combed his thinning hair

with an air

of innocence

before crossing the strait

where fate

would find him with another woman.

stark raving madness of America

Ginsberg saw the punch of heavenly insanity

through glassy homosexual eyes
across immense oceans of distance while nearing death

He wrote from his head the trade wind Howl
of demon smokestacks and collapsed cities
screwing a Buddha universe full of astronomic atoms
where lived man who spit bloody blood and broke hearts
among hard machines created by hard machines
on the hard surface of their temporary world

pregnant with firearms & hypodermic needles
in need of fast cash and the warm hot fix
of a thousand wing-flapping angels in passionate frenzy

Ginsberg saw the stark raving madness of America

& the false copy of New York cruise ships
underneath their starry night
where cots full of spent sperm and false hips
and wigs with plastic faces danced before He died

beyond a prison wall and border fence on the edge of now

His tender men wrote their poetic scrawl on brick and mortar
confessing mutual love while shouting from the speaker's box
powdered dry on a park bench of the Sahara desert in Times Square

without relief by convenient suicide or happy June weddings
with frosted cakes of many colors & wall street traders
pumping for their gymnasium memberships

on the sweaty avenues of the big money center banks

and spying reception hall couples standing guard by the enormous Briar Rabbit hole
wherein was found a clever habit without a nun attached
near the Harvard yard of nothingness

with faculty signatures etched on the wailing diplomas

Ginsberg chanted OM on His string of inspiration

with throngs of fellow Beat poets bear-chested in contemplation

studying the crowded beer hall hordes

spilling clouds of foamy thought across their wizard brows,

observing, with ever-penetrating eyes blurred by rhetoric,

ashcan lids blowing

craftily spinning

across the hard-surfaced street
to where the Brooklyn Dodgers once played

before an admiring crowd of immortal souls
who cheered lustily inside Ebbets Field 

where memories grew like Hell

Joan Didion cringed

The death of a salesman

didn't come suddenly, and it wasn't until I was reading my mail

that I heard the surprising thump of his body drop to the floor.

I could have played A Day in the Life

or read the news today, oh boy, a thousand times

to fill the hole in my heart,

but still, the pain of his passing would have persisted!

Joan Didion cringed, watching me on my power chair twist and shout,

acting completely anxious.

You see, without the salesman, I am lost.

She seemed lost, too.

And being lost in our modern world full of sign posts is not a good thing:

no one will come to visit without detailed instructions,

and we'll find nowhere to shop.

So, we sit together smoking our cigarettes, blowing rings of pathos at each other.

She soon asks what we should do between class, and I remind her

it is Pass or Fail;

eyeing me, she said she hopes to fail.

native prairie grasses

there is something to be learned from this trial by fire

IF one is nude and tied to the most important stake
in the overwhelming presence of anxious enemies,
regardless of the time of day and in spite of several
persistent appeals to a hoped-for shared humanity.

not even half-hearted support seeped from the Speaker,
who had an embarrassing hand holding the doomsday gavel.
it doesn't matter if this speaker is masculine or feminine,
as a lusty sex is never part of their equation.

i heard the deep bass sound of a 1980's Pink Floyd
tune and "I'm all right Jack keep your hands off my stack"
slipped insistently inside my spinning head, bounced me on The Wall.

When i moved closer to a full time job inside the virtual heart of darkness,
the beating roomful of intensity draped a blinding hood over my eyes,
and from that moment on, i could not see from sea to shining sea.

the coffee chit chat space reminded me of a television reality show,
never to be canceled in spite of woefully low ratings.

outside, our great smoke is still visible, largely caused by fossil fuel burning
and often conjoined at birth by the charred corpse of a terrible irony:
during break time, a few souls volunteered for Yoga class and didn't seem
to mind trying to be mindful without the past or the future interfering.

their proud city high on a hill decked in white in spirit if not in style,
sat tightly connected in a fast 5G network, unconcerned that
the curtain is coming down, even while the audience shifts
uncomfortably in ever smaller seats and all the house lights turn dim.

here, ocean fish no longer go to school in abundance & glaciers melt.

no buffalo roam over boundless stretches of a once familiar world once
greenest with wildest native prairie grasses;

the untamed Indians are long gone but the high rises have come,

banishing the hide-bound tents to lonely reservations.

no soft touch violet round-lobed Hepatica can be found flirting
with its' slender white eyelashes as a simple hiker paused in search of spring beauty.

there is much to worry about when the natives dance in circles
and Wednesday is always known as hump day,
even while the island sinks into the bay.

Sergei Diaghilev (died: August 19, 1929)

he died in Venice:

before the floods swept away the chairs,
and the perfume princess brought her broom
to sweep away his cares.

she was on a yacht
cruising the Adriatic with a friend
when his telegram arrived from across the sea
to suggest this was the end.

he had eaten too well,
with rich food and sugary desserts,
and diabetic pain exhausted him,
yet he claimed it didn't hurt!

on the Isola de San Michele,
his grave site sadly
had only four mourners by the muddy hole:
two were Misia Sert and Coco Chanel;
also Lifar the clown and Kochno the troll,

while Massine, far away, was hastily trying
to persuade wealthy Beaumont to keep Diaghilev's Ballet Russes afloat.
but he said no,
and Picasso refused to gloat.

Sun Ping said

Oh, yes, Sun Ping said,

if you are a die-hard Taiwanese separatist,

you can be killed, but not by her personally,

for she is a coward who hides behind verbal boasts and threats.

she is employed by China's Ministry of Public Security,

which is a comedy show for couch potatoes.

a sharp sword of legal action will hang high, she said recently:

no one on mainland China laughed, but Taiwan chuckled.

listening for an encore

Sydney, Australia

and the opera house
at dawn
was singing 'Good Day' to a
regatta of sailboats
which i saw and heard
while walking to the famous bridge
out of my way
but not too far
at the end of the summer of
1970.
for nearly a month
i waited for my flight from
Saigon;
in spite of everything,
i was able to board,
and on landing,
the Aussie girls were waiting
after i cleared Customs and
found my army duffle,
their big round eyes shining
brightly in fresh happy faces.
they waited to dine and dance,
to walk and talk,
to peek and probe,
to be close to me, to touch.
did i ever say how much
it meant?

war and peace, so close together.
and in the crisp springtime, future months away,
with the opera house filled with song,
the evening harbor aglow with lights, sails and stories,
i'd be dug in under a misty jungle canopy
far to the north,
listening for an encore.

into the wind

i rode my bicycle into the wind
And you followed me like a swan in flight
Maybe slightly less graceful but right
Before we reached the hill
You gave a determined look and still
Managed to keep the pace
Even though we didn’t race
Like crazy we tried to look quasi-pro
And people who’d see us would say “Oh!
They’re so colorful and obviously fit
How do they find the time to keep doing it?”
But on the hill we focus and pedal
As we pushed our rolling steeds of metal
Because something was in the air
As we rode we found it there
And it was good for our spirit
So we kept riding farther to better hear it
To the top of the hill and away
Into the distance of another day
Where you rode your bicycle into the wind

And this time, i followed. 

Crane's Midwest Nebraska town

ten minutes on my bicycle is worth more than a week at the Jersey shore walking the sandy beach leaving imprints a good detective could gather hints from how deeply my bare feet sank 

so no, i would never go to a full services bank 

i'd go directly to a chair to read and drink 

watching the tidal pool i'd think of Latin phrases and the root word of the most recent medical term i heard i couldn't imagine myself in a cave 

i would be tempted not to shave 

if i became sweaty and hot, 

i'd still pedal instead of trot

i'd want a kiss from which i'd reminisce 

it's considerably easier to ride with an ice-filled water bladder on my back wearing my Giro helmet and sunglasses 

enjoying the afternoon as it passes 

ten minutes on my bicycle is worth more than a single bed at the Blue Hotel 

walking around back to see the bloody fight not far from the railroad tracks at night where the Swede really got what he deserved 

ten minutes on my bike i braked and swerved 

because it was snowing and i was down in Crane's midwest Nebraska town

making circles in the sand like a circus clown.

Hawking

with the nearest star filling his eyes with magnificent light,

Stephen Hawking knew it would be impossible to talk
in a half-hearted way 

and so he perceptively
continued exploring the universe 

which was found
spinning on his shoulders.

i understood it was his universe, but i kept looking at my own shoulders
while shifting my eyes left and right.

i discovered there was little to be learned by studying his face,
or listening to the inflections in his curiously
artificial voice, 

but nonetheless, he struck me as brilliant in the manner of Cousteau.

while in his presence, i found myself
directed to a well-regarded book which he recently added to
his collection.  

he encouraged me to read it.

and so i learned that all my last moments were streaming
into eternity.  

i wanted to visit them,

but he reminded me i was already here and there.

time, he said, was bursting into shards of exploding star particles,

and from any room

in any location, 

this expansion of speeding nature

broke human rules 

which hadn't yet been formulated.

as Stephen talked about infinity, he smiled his smile, 

his words dancing on
faint breaths of air,

moist nouns and trembling verbs racing 

beyond the hard, high rock towers of
nearby Stonehenge.

i began motioning with my hands, rearranging tiny pebbles of time.

and i stretched, and found my own voice, 

although i never saw a genuine Deity, 

even
though
i did hear
Stephen,

in his special chair, 

hair unkept, humming a tune,

perfectly in rhythm with a passing butterfly.

smalll boy in white

Out beyond the boardwalk
the air was warm;
the sun was hot in a boiling mess
and i felt like a whistling teapot
swimming to the beach.

i was forced to confess
when you asked me to consider the future
that i could barely tread water.

But I digress,
Sitting on a spot of wet sand from where i watched the tide:
It never tried to hide.
It went out first,
came back in stride.

In and out.

You were by my side
pointing to a speeding boat.
over the noise, i heard what you had to say.
A repeat from yesterday.
i wanted to leave, to run, to play.

i saw a wide moat
between us where the swirling waters swirl.

i had to leap over it to get to the street
where interesting people sometimes meet.

There i saw a small boy wearing clean white clothes;
he mounted a bike which had training wheels attached.
i wondered what plan he just hatched
as he coasted by on the sidewalk,
but he didn't look around or talk.

When he came to the moat where the swirling waters meet
he didn't stop, either,
so i figured he knew how to swim.

And the air was warm
which might explain why he wasn't wearing any shoes,

but whatever he did, it was his to choose. 

it's easy enough when you know

 it's easy enough when you know:

playing in fourteen part harmony
she was looking good from head to little toe
and i wanted to shake her live fruit tree

but i had to grab her by her truck
she gave me a little squirm

like a famous Hollywood Hills drunk
i wanted to hook her like a glow worm

she asked me to take a second guess
ah, i heard her breathing on my Hawaiian shirt
as though we were on an afternoon recess
could i be sure this wasn't a school yard flirt?

so i asked to play hardball with my new Anna Bell Lee
she tossed me her softball
i hit it as far as anyone could see
over her head and down the shirt of Jerry Hall
and i wanted to shake her live fruit tree
but a police car came to a screeching halt
we were dancing in the street
she told a cop it was all my fault

and he started to shake and tap his feet

it's easy enough when you know:

playing in fourteen part harmony
she was looking good from head to little toe
and i wanted to shake her live fruit tree.

Auschwitz

Auschwitz on a sunny day
was stirred into activity
upon hearing
of Hitler's Berghof estate
in Bavaria
and the priceless art hanging
from the walls of his apartment
at the Chancellery in Berlin.

He tremendously enjoyed fresh
cut flowers and marble statues
of classically posed nudes, 
demanding the presence of such
treasures throughout his living quarters.
But the powerful Nazis do live a lavish
home life, while their most
unfortunate subjects fall, choking on thousands
of pounds of deadly gas,

fragments of splintered bones found underfoot.

Auschwitz on a sunny day!

There is no champagne in a gas chamber.  

No joy.  No flute.

The candelabra, having been lit, was unseen
as workers swept the floor of dust 
where the young girl's heart was found
burned within her scorched shirt.

the blueberries from Peru

the blueberries from Peru

gave my hunger an early morning wink

as i picked up their plump promise

from my kitchen sink.

i offered up my mouth,

and enjoyed a special lap dance

with sweet young things

and it felt like romance

as they slid down my throat

before tumbling away

into my smiling belly;

it felt like foreplay!

and nothing else that i swallowed

had such an personal impact;

i asked them all

if we could reenact

this first bite of each day?

and i'd applaud their blue beauty,

their dancing moves like operatic ballet,

satisfying my appetite

like a lover at a candle lit cabaret.

as a naked man

sure i sat there listening

after my shower with face newly-washed & glistening

feeling somewhat loco

hearing the strange wails of the infamous Yoko

when i grabbed a tobacco-laden pipe

using its' smoke to hide from the sudden sight

of my wandering soul 

about to pay the highway toll

to take a ferry ride to Heaven's bar

which i knew couldn't be very far:

i could almost see the bartenders

who were adjusting their spiritual suspenders,

snapping each one in turn,

asking me what i hoped to learn

when it finally became my turn

to sit with God while drinking a cup of sweet tea

and he'd smilingly question me

about the shampoo leftovers in my hair

and how it had ended up there

since i was naked and obviously well-fed,

still sleeping in my own bed,

pretending that i wasn't dead?

so i took another deep drag from my smoking instrument

wondering where Yoko went

while rewinding the 8 track tape

to a metropolitan phone booth and a lonely Superman's cape

where the hanging phone is constantly ringing:

i can hear a black chorus singing

in spite of everything having gone wrong

and i am in awe of their beautiful Freedom Song,

so putting down my pipe and removing the last traces of shampoo

i'm remembering what's important and what I still hope to do,

answering the call is just the beginning and a decent start,

blowing smoke rings as a naked man with his human heart,

watching and waiting, but i'm no longer anticipating

seeing how the twinkling stars in the night skies shine

as they take their celestial seats to align

with all the mysteries carefully written on the hands of time.

ready for the next page

i've already been 49
and WILL
soon be 76 years of age

i'm ready for the next page
of astonishing images
representing the human body
and the potty
where yellow isn't the coward
that Noel was
when he slept on a fat mattress
playing electric bass
and meeting experienced people
who kept their pulse
inside a well-seasoned wallet or a stylistic purse
either of which could be found hanging in an art gallery
in Hoboken, New Jersey, USA.

the images i saw in my childhood
include the red-backed sofa in a small living room
underneath which was found
tomato soup spilled like Rothko paints
on the cheap carpet threads
and simple hard beds
and baby peeps unable to fly
dropping fast without a sound to steel steps
descending sharply to the Mediterranean Sea
for their non-stop service to Barcelona
and instead of dead within the hour
they became a white center leading to the Rockefeller Center
and real ice
which for a young explorer was especially nice
shaded from blue to pink
like a jumping rabbit in my neighborhood
holding a rose in his mouth to better think.

i once led a horse by the neck
climbing from the smoking galley to the upper deck
to find the ladies in a brothel
who spoke Vietnamese with a fluent ease
as i kneeled to my knees
and met the massive oversized ears of a girl
who lived in Paris with her lady friend
although she was in constant hiding
like a distorted cube
in shades of muted grey and brown
stripped down and streamlined
an hour glass figure
there in the mix with an accordion
making music with scraps of metal and wood
odds and ends
folds and bends
when this becomes that
the three dancers becoming grotesque
and i could just about recognize myself
ripped apart by a brutal civil war
jagged grief and childless
on the narrow road to a bull fighting studio
where overhead beams and white-washed dreams
provided sanctuary near the French Riviera
on a tall bed
onto which i jumped
to find my hand holding the strongest one of a special friend:

at 85 i will feel
more fully alive
than i ever did at four.

we will lounge on the warm sandy shore
the dove of peace flying like a soft balloon
overhead
without wearing hat pins

and we'll laugh at the sight and our grins

will spread like inviting female legs often do
when welcoming a favorite lover.

General Do Cao Tri

lam son 719,
or Dewey Canyon II,
an operation:

as was

Birmingham
El Paso
Hattiesburg
Springfield
Shenandoah I
Amarillo
Attleboro
Lexington
Baton Rouge
Quyet Thang
Resolve to Win
Toan Thang
Certain Victory

in an uncertain place
where the road meets the air
there was a certain death
but wasn't it everywhere?
23 February 1971
a hero's life explosively undone

General Do Cao Tri
died swiftly
in a helicopter crash
in Cambodia
i saw the funeral procession
from atop my compound wall
when i arrived just in time
with an army friend of mine
i could see the armored personnel carrier
and wonderful bouquets of brightly colored flowers
and i heard the marching band serene they played
spreading upwards and outwards music with a mournful edge
enticing, but there was nothing here to bomb,
half broken walls and a stony dirt road and the hot sun
and it seemed the war fell parallel to the road
where all the answers sat when there was no danger
i watched merely thinking what a damn good show it was
the General was buried in Bien Hoa's military cemetery
with his dress hat, gloves, sword, and baton
used "to spank the Viet Cong,"
he once said, before he was dead.
and Nixon said, before he was dead,
"Tonight I can report that Vietnamization has succeeded."

and very logically, i thought that he was conceited. 

Maxime de la Falais

the death of Maxime was of natural causes 

at 86 it wasn't considered extreme 

her life was colorful artful in fashion and exquisite 

with really good friends and food 

she fed the Warhol brood 

in her loft apartment 

she lent 

Mapplethorpe encouragement in New York City 

she was a rare English beauty 

and silent lover 

lived her life proudly without unnecessary cover 

worked for Vogue magazine where she was often seen 

writing long lines for columns 

she moved to France to dance 

to write her memoirs in her golden hours 

when she died 

high society sighed 

in Provence, she was buried 

in rhythm and completely unhurried. 

Glory to Hong Kong

Glory to Hong Kong

a wonderful song

banned for listening to

by you know who

sitting on his earthly throne

like a devious gnome

while the 14 who've been in jail

dreaming of their Holy Grail

are being railroaded by a kangaroo court

storming the people's fort

of freedom and democracy:

what has happened to compassion or mercy?

having a voice?

freedom of choice?

Glory to Hong Kong

a wonderful song

which I hum

while I strum

remembering the bravery of the street bands

holding hands

in the face of police brutality.

is this the ultimate finality?

or will the human heart

beat again with a fresh start

and of course it will, with the song

Glory to Hong Kong!!

the Vietnam war ended

baby
maybe
i am not offended
that the Vietnam war ended
as it did because for my part
i gave my heart
i danced, had a drink
fell into the Mekong stink
cried, lied
felt terrified
lost my arms and feet
tasted numbness and defeat
it grabbed me by the hair
forced me into a razor-wire chair
laid me bare
until i sat dreaming
& steaming
in the afternoon breeze
muttering please
save me, honey
but i don't need your fucking money
i don't want your morning kiss
i prefer my worn mattress
and the cigarette burns on my polyester suit:

what a hoot!

north of Tam Ky

The recon platoon

was in the bed
of a nearby creek
and still being led
by Captain Joe
& Sergeant Bill
but they had to stop
on a steeper hill
when they heard noise,
then rifle fire
and decided not
to climb any higher!

an air strike call
had to be made
before advancing
with their base camp raid:

Happy Valley,
north of Tam Ky.

September 15th
Nineteen Seventy.

Vincent van Gogh: Painter (1853–1890)

i took my shovel from the shed,
also the wheelbarrow 

and a garden rake;
i loaded bark mulch in full sun thinking of you
sitting on a cabin porch 

overlooking a secluded lake
one could only reach with a slow drive over a rutted road
deep into the back woods of Maine.

it proved to be a long drive for a quiet time with a special book,
but you had nothing to lose 

and everything to gain.

i cleaned nesting houses for the wood ducks and chickadees,
found a fallen feather from the red-tail hawk by the slow-moving creek;
it repeatedly circled low overhead with broad hunter's wings.
the field mice sensed the danger and seemed too afraid to peek.
you asked me about Vincent van Gogh and i mentioned Theo,
as you drove away packed with gear and a GPS device
plugged into an outlet like it had been the previous summer.

you had the driver's window open for a kiss and i gave one to you twice
and i thought about that when i cut the dead evergreen branches,
scattered the mulch and the dried leaves over dry, bare ground.

there was so much work to do to prepare for a healthy garden!

you would soon hear the wild loons make their most enchanting sound.

i sat alone at my evening table while you made a distant vegetable soup
with zucchini and tomatoes and yellow corn and kale.

i read your most recent letter and would happily accept your offer,
but also knew i didn't know how to blue water sail.

i took a look at the online guides about being a Captain and a mate
and made mental notes about the purpose of each special knot
and how wind could be harnessed to propel our boat when it was in perfect trim.

i wrote you a reply in which i simply said "Yes, why not?"
and thought that together we'd get to read about Vincent and his days in Paris,
which were spent largely with his brother in a tidy apartment along a busy side street:

like he, i worked many days and weeks alone and when asked 

would always or usually say i wanted my art to feel more wholesome and complete.

while i waited for you.

Kingdom of Jordan

He wouldn't listen,

that much was certain.

"Don't you see;

I don't agree!"

he said.

She wailed, and sobbed, and howled, 

tossing a soiled rag,

hitting his head.

"You couldn't have put it better," she hissed.

She was obviously pissed.

He was a skinny man with a thin wisp of chin hair,

very Arab skin, with brilliant chocolate eyes, scholarly, and

the nickname of Flash Gordon.  He tried to be fast!

She was a heavily built, powerful woman with hair on her face

which ran in her family from the Kingdom of Jordan.

She tried to be slow!

"Ah, I see!", she calmly spat,

"I should write your name on toilet paper and toss it away!"

"Of course," he rapidly said,

while re-lighting his cigarette and blowing smoke in her face, adding,

"You live in a world of dreams."

And that much was true, as most who knew her would say:

former marriages, divorces,  old lovers, new lovers, 

ball-and-chain relationships, and sudden infatuations mixed with

the current heresay, but she stayed true to herself.

"At least I'm not lost," she remarked in reply,

"And you're still here, and I can only guess why!"

He tugged at his wisp of chin hair, smiling,

but said nothing.

I and my many Selves

I called myself on the phone:

it was an i phone,

full of apples, mostly, to keep the medical profession

at bay.

and like a leaf in the storm, like a tempest in a teapot,

 I heard myself answer

"to whom do you wish to speak?

it was the assertive me,

but the shy me didn't answer.

for he was in a bedroom, applying lipstick,

while humming a song from 1963.

between songs, like a school tease, 

I grabbed one of several membership cards

and began to whack away at my infidelities:

Whitman, again, in my head but off in a far corner,

and his multitudes yelling,

'Ship Ahoy!'

my wheel was spinning, like a mammoth spider web, it spun and spun.

I yelled, too, with a chorus of voices,

each a different sound.

but now I finally have control until I lose it,

I'm in the fog, I know, but the sky is clear blue and

the winds calm yellow, like that solitary flag in Philadelphia,

high atop a stone building in the middle of William Penn's city.

dreaming, cowering under my bed, I hold onto my blankie and soft monkey toy.

the monkey looks like me when I am being my silly Self,

so I don't take it personally, 

but I do take it with me when I march off wearing combat boots.

my literary Self is nervous about acting childlike

in a war zone, where I think of John Wayne and the tough guys

who spit chewing tobacco juice on the floor without apologizing.

the cleaning lady is watching with her clean white towels.

she could be me or I could be her, as we both push the cart without apologizing.

I am often GI Joe but shop like GI Jayne, looking for bargains in the bins.

and when thinking deeply, I am shallow like a shim of milk over day-old cereal.

acting bravely, I hide like a furry caterpillar inside my newly-spun cocoon.

when I am kicked, I see an angry mule and get angry at those floppy ears.

when I kick in return, I see my anger like a flash of despair over a fragile childhood

spent in puzzled hurt, and

I do wonder if that hurt has completely gone away,

while knowing that it hasn't.

my vulnerabilities can be dunked like a basketball.

I acknowledge the ball rolling across the court of my life,

foul or fair,

as I sit in the second row of the bleachers,

where I am yet a player, but

just wait until I tell mother, I hear my younger sister say.

just wait.

I wait, holding my phone.  the seconds pass and a lifetime, too.

a voice finally answers, and I speak normally,

asking how is the weather where you are?

I age and yet am not old,  so weather is what it is!

I discuss and listen but sometimes don't really hear.

I entreat and hold my hand to be held, while holding my breath,

hoping to be loved,

seeing the flowers among the weeds.

I love, too, and love and love, and more than love,

I and many Selves:

we steer the ships, and man the sails, and tackle the seas,

plotting our charts, 

diagramming our diagrams,

with no particular place to go:

I am the parent and the child,

standing on the shoulders of others who have guided me.

two new best friends

the two new best friends

went marching near the band.

a man holding his rifle watched

as they blew kisses,

fondling the air left hanging between their lips.

a salute without a glass,

yet the glass was half-full somewhere out of sight.

they two were from different countries

but they shared a border and a common enemy,

so it was assumed.

the assumption followed them to the conference table

eventually, to a grand meal:

they digested points of view

they drank in strategies and weapon systems

they regurgitated ideas for world hegemony

they ate lemon meringue pie

they listened to translators

translating

over a fine dinner

with Chinese teacups!

Toasts!!

the hot bravado

was wearing nothing but a bare white chest:

the world listened

ears were bent

sounds fell to the ground quietly

where a damp puddle smothered their good vibrations

and then the dust settled once again.

first day of school

on the first day of school

bits of limestone and raw clay
took my normal shyness away

and i became the baker with his bread
using time and patience and my head

to knead you.

rising from a heated kiln

one piece off the top shelf had cooled
and i was initially fooled

into thinking i could never learn to fire
or to apply thin glazes with a wire

to pot you.

then, even the fresco on the teacher's wall
became damp and started to fall, 

but i watched it take another form
when dried and reapplied warm.

and i was very happy to see 
the complete unity
of my final piece.

Israeli settlers on my porch

Outside on the porch,

overlooking a slow-moving creek,

i see an abundance of spring green,

dotted with large blooms of purple Rhododendron,

and attractive red Azalea.

a busy squirrel is nosing the ground,

soon joined by another,

and they begin wrestling.

i am sipping my hot morning coffee,

while also watching a nearby robin sitting on her nest.

i know the robin is resting on warm, small blue eggs.

her eye are glossy, bright brown, shining with life:

she is alert to every movement and sound!

according to a book i referenced the evening before,

the eggs are due to hatch sometime soon.

the robin must know this, too.

but what she didn't know was that a mob of Israeli settlers

had just blocked a food convoy!

i read this news report between warm sips of my coffee.

it was unsettling, this latest news, but still i had the creek and the green

and the flowers.

the squirrels, too, and the robin with her eggs.

yet my thoughts slipped to a bad place i once visited:

Dachau, near Munich, Germany.

Then, away to the stories of the Warsaw ghetto,

of people being accosted on public streets, beaten.

smashed store front windows.  Raised sticks.  nighttime flames!

And images of skeletal bodies and, of course, those awful eyes,

shrunken, dark and despairing.  Railroad cars.

but the convoy was simply transporting flour and rice and other

needed essentials to a hungry people,

people who were of a different religion from the Israeli settlers.

people who were, according to reports, starving just the same.

this news told of piles of rice and flour that were thrown onto the dirt street,

to the accompaniment of loud cheers and other noises of celebration.

Yes, no food from this particular convoy would be delivered to the hungry mouths,

those waiting with hope just a few miles away.

so i looked again at the robin on her nest.

she was constantly alert!

soon, after hatching, her little babies would bob and weave,

stretching their weak necks skyward,

and their mouths would open cavernously, hugely for so small

a body below, expecting food.

sadly, i sat wondering if an Israeli settler group would block

the mother robin from feeding her babies.

and then my drink turned cold.

The Burial of the Dead

Ford Madox Ford.
Ted Hughes!
his old lady
and her oven shoes
writing in their London flat
where she poetically sat
listening to the news
with Ezra Pound
and Dorothy,
who slipped underground:
he to Venice
stressing clarity
& musical words
absent disparity.
Robert Lowell.
Robert Frost!
at St. Elizabeths
at any cost
at any hour
giving the inmate
a special flower.
James Joyce
had no choice:
he always wore glasses
to see
language and brilliant infinity,
while Marianne Moore,
went quietly approaching her door,
but no one was there.
and it didn't seem fair
that Edna St. Vincent Millay,
who kissed all lips,
had the softest fingertips
to write sonnets
which the modernists hated
and constantly berated.
they loved Eliot, though,
especially the flow
of The Waste Land:
Pound for Pound
despair
and
The Burial of the Dead is there
stirring the air.

a Copper moon

i slept in the Victoria Hotel

down in old Mexico
where i walked on handmade tiles
colored in deep indigo.

Eliot wasn't on my floor
nor was he in the bar
listening to the young gringo
strumming on an old guitar.

i heard he was still swimming
in a pool without a sound
with a handful of wasteland dust
i remembered he had found.

he was wearing a huge sombrero
pulled tightly against his cheek,
with a slip knot fully made
and still showing the receipt.

my margarita had no salt
but i drank it all the same
to not offend the bartender
who called me by my name.

a Spanish lady with the melons
she was proposing to sell
approached the nervous tourist
ringing the front desk bell.

i came to walk the canyon
so deep it smelled of death,
where spirits wear an empty mask
and take away your breath.

a train would leave the station
soon maybe the next day
and though tempted by those melons,
i knew i shouldn't stay.

my coach was full of writers
down on their luck & drunk
on mescal which they all consumed
until their voices shrunk.

i stopped above the canyon walls
and began the long decent
into darkness at highest noon
i wondered what it meant?

i heard the hidden waterfall
down in these depths of doom,
and supped on endless poetry
beneath a Copper moon.

Bibi, will it be you or me?

Bibi,

will it be you or me?

the man who spilled his own beer on a narrow street,

who couldn't keep his feet,

I called to you and what did you do?

you brought in a few toughies,

mostly the religious roughies,

who began to bluster and boast.

they helped you butter your toast!

meanwhile, a young boy who lived near the coast

faded away since he had nothing to eat;

he, also, couldn't keep his feet.

but unlike you, sir,

he wasn't a self-indulgent minister

with body guards for every sip and bite.

he simply wanted the peaceful life that wasn't in sight.

you wanted to be exonerated for any possible crime,

and didn't want to do jail time.

he only wanted to have a happy meal,

hoping to heal.

Bibi, will it be you or me?

the man who gave it all away to rule for just another day:

you gather many incredulous looks

and will certainly go down in the history books.

the fat lady sing

i drove into the oldest part of my old town
and saw, sitting on an empty window sill,

the woman
with a fancy cigarette hanging from her hand
and inside her mouth a psychedelic pill.

she was the only girl on the entire block
with two legs kicking instead of twenty four,
a wind blowing papers which she wouldn't read
hard up against the bottom of her front door.

some cats played music in the middle of the street,
humming a southern spirituality tune.

one stray dog slept until he was done,
then began howling at the shadow of the moon;
his eyes red and two ears hanging way down low;
he started licking himself where he felt it hurt

and had no where better to go.

another mangy dog, stretching, went looking for his next meal

when a saloon exploded like a house of cards,

scattering Wanted: Dead or Alive Posters into the adjacent yards.

favorite loaded pistols were shooting at whisky bottles wobbling on the bar!

thru it all, nonchalantly sat the woman on an empty window sill,
waiting for me to get out of my damn car.

she was watching an elephant and a brown bear with balls
juggling coins in a game of pure chance.

while far down the old road marched a traveling band,
playing a sweet song of  adolescence romance.

young kids in blue jeans, tattered and with holes in the knees,

sang along without knowing the words,

several boys dangerously swaying from the few nearby trees.

behind the patched circus tent in an alley full of loose string,
a striking fat lady danced her weight inside the big top ring:

a crowd of local drifters were sitting around 

acting spellbound:

they had come to hear the fat lady sing.

no one saw Hemingway

 no one saw Hemingway shit into his green slop bucket 

so fuck it 

he's long dead now 

but i walked on a tour to his former studio 

and people in the know 

think it's cool he was an expat who came from money 

Hadley was his first special honey 

he wrote in a sharp narrative style making himself famous 

winning awards from the House of Lords on a hill near Paris 

i didn't give a damn that he grew depressed 

who could have guessed 

he'd loudly kill himself?

he still quietly lives on many a library shelf: 

the old street is narrow where he walked, drank, talked 

the Paris traffic passed by in its' familiar hurry: 

it did not appear aimless as it sped over ancient cobbles with edges smoothed by dreams 

which have often bled with age.

he couldn't sail

my great granddad was on the late train

he delivered the US mail

right out of college he needed a job

and he knew he couldn't sail

he held important letters inside a leather sack

i watched him shuffle on down the freight line 

but never knew if he was coming back

white smoke and black noise filled the air

while my great granddad sat on his lonely chair

on the last car leaving at night

sorting his letters by candlelight

no woman to keep him company

he had an important job to do

whatever he might have been thinking

he knew the mail had to go thru

each day could be slow or amazingly fast

each day could be his last

but he had a smile as he counted sacks

rolling down the railroad tracks:

my great granddad was on the late train

he delivered the US mail

right out of college he needed a job

and he knew he couldn't sail.

 

Le Coeur a gaz (1923, Tristan Tzara)

the play was three short acts, &

the last spectacle on the program was a

complete Dada farce,

with a trumpet blaring inanely, mangling the Marseillaise

in front of an infuriated audience.

this time around, there were no professional actors

to storm out singing about the utter pointlessness

of pretending to be body parts while wearing cubist costumes

made of stiff tubing,

which reduced their walking to a geriatric shuffle on stage.

outside on the street, the police heard the angry voices and stormed inside,

where fist fights between Dadaists and the future Surrealists

had begun in earnest,

with several already badly beaten and in no mood to be mollified.

shouts for order bounced off walls, hitting no one.

but damage to the small theater was considerable:

seats were smashed and faces bloodied.

Louis Aragon tried to rescue Eluard while the police arrested

the entire audience!

but later,

they concluded it was all a big misunderstanding.

Sir Elvis Presley

in the state of Tennessee

i left the freeway

to climb an old oak tree

once owned by Sir Elvis Presley

before he hit the sack of an apparent heart attack.

he had an iconic pink Cadillac,

a 1965 which he'd drive

all the way from Tupelo.

the Blue Moon Boys put on their famous jail house show

after the high speed drive, you know,

before Elvis gyrated his hips out of joint

trying to make an innocent black and white point

at the lonely Heartbreak Hotel.

the backyard wishing well

was filled with dozens of blue suede shoes

which made it easy for him to choose

which pair to wear.

in the state of Tennessee

i found the Rockabilly Boys

playing Chuck Berry songs with all their musical toys

heading down to Nashville.

there, they'd eat to get their fill

of rhythm and blues and an old hound dog

because 

in the state of Tennessee

they don't eat much frog.

it's an unforgivable

it's an unforgivable

and too often repeated

CRIME

against humanity

white mob intimidation

and RULE

beyond cruel

vicious and violent

heartless torment

causing death

bleeding and painful

SHAMEFUL

hardly an indictment

levied

even when the FBI pokes a nose

into the affair

it isn't merely UNFAIR

it's an unforgivable.

under Southern heat

i heard Merl sing
after lunch time
on the prison floor
for a red hot dime

he sang real hard
meant what he wrote
about a hanging judge
with a midnight rope

and a dark man
on a wild horse
underneath the tree
being held by force

long time ago
white as a sheet
in a rural land
under Southern heat

laughing at love
smiling at pain
trying to be bad
swinging in the rain

i heard Merl sing
outside his cell
just like Johnny Cash
in a wishing well

he sang real hard
meant what he said
that an outlaws' life
was better than dead

long time ago
white as a sheet
in a rural land
under Southern heat

a nuclear Iran

the grilled chicken salad was a perfect meal

and you were the perfect guest,
as i watched you easily eat your plate clean
with a fork and a knife:

what an appetite for life!

it appeared to me that you enjoyed
our time together:

my iced root beer wasn't able to
provide any profound statements,
although i sipped with eagerness.

the grilled hamburger i ate resulted in an
onion burp far removed from our table
but i covered my mouth and apologized
to no one in particular.

it's true, as we discussed, that a nuclear Iran would pose
regional balance-of-power issues!

what is not certain is if the Israeli
Air Force will send 100 (+/-) fighter jets
on a preemptive attack against these nuclear
facilities, creating awful uncertainty.

but it seems certain that Muslim terrorism is 
a growing worry worldwide.

Hamas and Hezbollah, hear me!

October 7, & a redux, perhaps?

climbing over the rubble?

what is not understood is how to address this
extremism!

there are historical facts about Islamic
expansionism that we can know with certitude,

but IS this truly expansionism when the land in question has always been lived on,

cared for, kissed and loved?

i have not read the Koran or The Satanic Verses,

but perhaps in uneasy dreams, i, too, could become a suicide bomber, 
wearing an explosive vest or belt,

anxious to express my outrage and defiance!

the Middle East is on the knife edge, and all blades are historically sharp.

we also have sharp eyes to see what is necessary,

and eyes to cry, as well as to see suffering.

but who will publish the guide book?

and i trust you didn't have too much trouble
digesting our meal together,

assuming you saw it clearly.