Hotrod
Verse I

Wrenches clanging, knuckles banging
A drop of blood the young man spilt
A new part here, and old part… there
A hotrod had been built!
A patchwork, mechanical, quilt

Feeling good.  Head under a raised hood, hands occupied, the job nearing completion.  Sometimes the good feelings would dissipate though, as quickly as they came, as he cursed himself for stripping a bolt, or cursed someone else for selling him the wrong part, or the engineer whose design goals obviously did not consider “remove and replace”.
He cursed the “gorilla” that never heard of a torque-wrench, the glowing particle of **** that popped on to the top of his head as he welded, the metal chip he flushed from his eye, and even himself for the burn he received by impatiently touching something too soon after grinding. 
 He, and his type, cursed a lot, but mostly to their selves as they battled-on with things oily, hot, bolted, welded, and rusty – in cramped spaces. One day it was choice words for an “easy-out” that broke off next to a broken drill bit that had broken off in a broken bolt, that was being drilled for an easy-out. 
  Despite the swearing, the good and special feelings would always return, generally of a magnitude that exceeded the physical pain and mental frustration of the day, by a large margin.  
Certifiably obsessive, the young man continued to toil dutifully, soulfully, occasionally gleefully, sometimes even expertly, in his most loved and familiar place, his sanctuary, laboratory… the family garage.

And tomorrow would be the day.
With hard learned, hard earned expertise and confidence - in this special small place, a supremely happy and excited young man commanded his creation to life.

Threw a toggle, pressed a switch
Woke up the neighbors with that *******

The heart of his machine was a stroked Chevy engine that everyone had just grown sick hearing about.  Even the local machine shop to which the boy nervously entrusted his most prized possession had had enough.  “Sir, I don’t want to seem disrespectful, but from what I’ve read in Hot Rod Magazine, you might be suggesting a clearance too tight for forged pistons…” then it would be something else the next day.  
One must always speak politely to the machinist, and even though he always had, the usual allotment of contradictions and arguments afforded to each customer had long run out – and although the shop owner took a special liking to the boy because, as he liked to say, “he reminds me of me”, well, that man was done too.  But in the end, the mill was dead-on.  Of course from the start, the shop knew it would be; that’s almost always the case; it’s how they stay in business - simply doing good work.  Bad shops fall out quickly, but this place had the look of times gone by.  Good times. 
 Old porcelain signs, here and there were to be found, all original to the shop and revered by the older workers in honored nostalgia.  The younger workers get it too; they can tell from the co-workers they respect and learn from, there is something special about this past.  One sign advertises Carter Carburetors and the artwork depicts “three deuces”, model 97’s, sitting proudly atop a flathead engine, all speeding along in a red, open roadster.  Its occupants, a blond haired boy with slight freckles (driver), and a brunette girl passenger, bright white blouse, full and buttoned low. They are in the wind-blown cool, their excited expressions proclaim… "we have escaped and are free!" (and all you need is a Carter, or three).  How uniquely American.

The seasoned old engine block the boy entrusted to the shop cost him $120-even from the boneyard.  Not a bad deal for a good high-nickel content block that had never had its first 0.030”overbore.  In the shop, it was cleaned, checked for cracks by "magnafluxing", measured and re-measured, inspected and re-inspected.  It was shaped and cut in a special way that would allow the stroker crankshaft, that was to be the special part of this build, to have all the clearance it would need.  The engine block was fitted with temporary stress plates that mimic the presence of cylinder heads,  then the cylinders were bored to “first oversize”,  providing fresh metal for new piston rings to work against.  New bearings were installed everywhere bearings are required.  Parts were smoothed here and there.  Some surfaces were roughened just so, to allow new parts to “work-into each other” when things are finally brought together.  All of this was done with a level of precision and attention far, far greater than the old “4- bolt” had ever received at the factory on its way to a life of labor in the ¾ ton work van from which it came, and for which it had served so dutifully.  They called this painstaking dedication to precision measurement and fit, to hitting all specifications on the mark, “blueprinting”, and it would continue throughout the entire build of this engine.  The boy remained worried, but the shop had done it a million times.

After machining, the block was filled with new and strong parts that cost the young man everything he had.   Parts selected with the greatest of effort, decision, and debate.   You can compromise on paint and live with some rust,  he would say, wait for good tires, but never scrimp on the engine.  Right on.  Someone taught the boy right, regardless of whether or not he fully understood the importance of the words he parroted.  His accurate proclamation  also provided ample excuse for the rough, unfinished, underfunded look of the rest of his machine.  But it was just a look, his car was, in fact, “right”.   And its power plant?  Well the machine shop had talked their customer into letting them do the final engine assembly - even cut their price to do it.  To make that go down easy, they asked to have two of their shop decals affixed to the rod on race-days.  The young man thought that was a fair deal, but the shop was really just looking out for the boy, with their herring of sorts.  
The mill in its final form was the proper balance of performance and durability; and with its camshaft so carefully selected, the engine's “personality” was perfectly matched to the work at hand.   It would produce adequate torque in the low RPM range to get whole rig moving quickly, yet deliver enough horsepower near and at red-line to pile on the MPH, fast.  No longer a polite-natured workhorse, this engine, this engine is impatient now.  High compression, a rapid, choppy idle - it seems to be biting at the bit to be released.  On command, it gulps its mixture and screams angrily, and often those standing around have a reflexive jump - the louder, the better - the more angry, the better.  If it hurts your ears, that’s a good feeling.  If its bark startles, that’s a good startle.  A cacophony?  No, the “music” of controlled explosions, capable of thrusting everything and everyone attached, forward, impolitely, on a rapid run to the freedom so well depicted in the ad.  

This is the addictive sound and feel that has appealed to a certain type of person since engines replaced horses, and why?  A surrogate voice for those who are otherwise quiet?  A visceral celebration of accomplishment?    Who cares.  Shift once, then again - speed quickly makes its appearance.  It appears as a loud, rushing wind and a visually striking, unnatural view of the surrounding scenery.  At some point, in the sane, it triggers a natural response - better slow down.    

He uncorked the headers, bought gasoline, dropped her in gear, tore off to the scene
Camaros and Mustangs, an old ‘55
Obediently lined-up, to get skinned alive!

Verse II (1st person)

I drove past the banner that said “Welcome race fans” took a new route, behind the grandstands
And through my chipped window, I thought I could see
Some of the racers were laughing at me

I guess rust and primer are not to their taste
But I put my bucks mister in the right place

I chugged/popped past cars that dealers had sold
Swung into a spot, next to something old

Emerging with interest from under his hood
My neighbor said two words, he said, “sounds good”

The Nova I parked next to was “classic rodding” in its outward appearance.  The much overused “primer paint job”.  The hood and front fenders a fiberglass clamshell, pinned affair.  Dice hanging from the mirror paid homage to days its driver never knew, but wished he had.  He removed them before he drove, always.

If you know how to peel the onion, secrets are revealed.  Wilwood brake calipers can be a dead giveaway. Someone needs serious stopping power - maybe.  Generally, owners who have sprung the bucks for this type gear let the calipers show off in bright red, to make a statement, and sometimes, these days, it’s just a fashion statement.  Expensive calipers, as eye candy, seem to be all the rage.  What is true, however, is very few guys spend big money on brakes only to render them inglorious and seemingly common with a shot of silver paint from a rattle can - and the owner of this half fiberglass racer that poses as a street car had done just that.  I'll glean two things from this observation. One, he needs those heavy brakes because he’s fast, and two, hiding them fits his style.  
Really, the message to be found in the silver paint, so cleverly applied to make your eyes simply slide across on their way to more interesting things, was “sleeper”.   And sleeper really means, he’s one of those guys with a score to settle - with everyone perhaps.   The list of “real parts” grew, if you knew where to look.  Looking was something I had unofficial permission to do since my rod was undergoing a similar scrutiny.  
“Stroked?”, I asked.  That’s something you can’t see from the outside. “ No”, my racer friend replied.  
“Hundred shot?”  (If engines have their language, so do the people who love them).   Despite the owner’s great efforts to conceal braided fuel and nitrous lines, electrical solenoids and switches, I spied his system.  The chunks of aluminum posing as ordinary spacers under his two Holly's were anything but.   “No”, was his one-word reply to my 100- shot question.  I tried again; “Your nitrous system is cleanly installed, how much are you spraying?”  “Two hundred fifty” in two stages, he said.  That’s more like it, I thought, and I then figured, he too had budgeted well for the machine shop – if not, he was gambling in a game that if lost, would soon fly parts in all directions.   Based on the overall neat work on display, I believed his build was up to the punishment planned. 
  I knew exactly what this tight-lipped guy was about, seeing someone very familiar in him as it were, and that made the “sounds good” complement I received upon my arrival all the more valuable.  I liked my neighbor.  And I liked the fact of our scratch-built rods having found each other - and I looked forward to us both dusting off the factory jobs.  It was going to be a good day.

The voice on the loudspeaker tells us we’re up.

Pre-staged, staged, then given the green
The line becomes blurred between man and machine

Bones become linkage
Muscle, spring
Fear, excitement

Time distorts ….
Color disappears …
Vision narrows…
Noise ---  becomes music
Speed, satisfaction

End

Go on, and pass it along
To your workhorse

Go on, tell me I am wrong
I am your resource

Please blame me
Please shame me
Please work me to the bone
Please frame me
Please proclaim me
Make me one of your own

Get out, but please don't shout
At your workhorse

Get out, you're too devout
To your workhorse

Please blame me
Please shame me
Please work me to the bone
Please frame me
Please proclaim me
Make me one of your own

A bicycle is the most efficient transportation machine.  A little input and I’m gliding, moving a useful measurable distance but more than that. I like going fast enough so the wind in my ears is louder than my thoughts.  On a tough day I like riding until I can be grateful again; sometimes that takes a couple hours but every ride is a good ride.

My youth’s independence was a banana seat Huffy pulled from an under-appreciated pile of rust in the back of St. Vincent’s Thrift Shop.  No school bus meant riding to school, the first 45 minutes of every day in all weather. Afternoons were exploring detours; summers were expeditions to the city limits, sometimes beyond.  I needed an upgrade for high school; I found a spotless antique 3 speed Raleigh, the cultural English workhorse collecting dust in an unlikely garage for $50.

I kept it through two foster homes. The first one kept me busy with farm chores, but the second was back in town. There, I had the bike back, and as an aside, they had a phenomenally sophisticated wall sized sound system: reel-to-reel and amazing headphones. I would forget myself in records: Sgt. Peppers, Genesis, Yes, etc, and another favorite. Just a guitar and piano instrumental album with a simple melody called Bricklayer’s Beautiful Daughter. Something about that one song in particular I heard faint glimmerings of contentment that was denied to me.  I would replay it to cling to this hint of a simple happiness I didn’t understand; that if it was in the song, it was somewhere deep in me.
Without a car for 10 years, one used 10-speed or another got me to various eccentric jobs.  

Fast forward to the life-changer, after a divorce. Needing to reconnect with myself, I searched for a decent bike. I found it hanging dusty in the back of a cluttered boutique shop smelling of tire rubber, quiet with racers’ confidence. They had a Lemond thoroughbred on consignment, assembled custom 5 years earlier to race. It was slightly outdated, but a dent on the top tube put it out to pasture. It was steel though, so rideable enough for me.  My entire $300 savings and it was mine. Then I discovered the special pedals needed special shoes, so another month saving for those.  I wasn’t going to wear those silly spiderman outfits, until I started to ride more than 10 miles and my **** demanded it.  And those pockets in the back of the shirt were handy.  I met a friend who taught me how to draft: my skinny wheel a few inches behind the bike in front at 20 mph, to save precious energy in the slipstream. Truly dangerous, vulnerable, and effectively blinded; but he pointed at the ground with various hand signals to warn of upcoming road hazards. I was touched by this wordless language of trust and camaraderie. This innate concern is essential to the sport, even among competitors, so it seems to attract quality people I liked.  My new life expanded with friends.

I discovered biking exercise could stabilize the life-long effects of brain injury, lost some weight, grew stronger, and started setting goals.  First longer group rides, then a century (100 miles in one ride), then mountain biking: epic fun in nature, unadulterated happiness.  Then novice racing, then the next category up with a team, then a triathlon.  It became an admitted obsession but I won a pair of socks or bike parts every now and then.  Eventually tattooed two bike chains around my ankle, one twisted and the other broken.  I loved the lifestyle, and had truly reinvented and rediscovered myself.

A 500 mile ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles with fellow wounded veterans helped dissipate the old shame from the military.  I had joined the ride to raise money for a good cause.  I respected the program and knew personally that cycling had changed my life.  They turned out to be inspiring, helping me more than I could have helped them.  Some had only just started riding a bike for only a few weeks, some were amputees fit with special-made adapters on regular bikes, some had no legs using hand cycles.  They all joined on to the task of riding 500 miles. No one whined, and helping each other finish the day was the only goal.  While riding with them, I began to open up about my experience.  I found a few others who also had TBI, and we could laugh about similar mishaps.  The other veterans didn’t judge me about anything, like when I was injured, the nature of my disability, how much I did or didn’t accomplish. I had signed up just like them, had to recover back to a functioning life just like them.  It was the first time in my life that whole chapter in my life was accepted; I wasn't odd, and they helped close the shame on that old chapter.  (Thank you, R2R.)  The next year I took a 1500 mile self-supported bike trip through western mountain ranges with my husband and soulmate, whom I had met mt. biking.

There was one late Spring day, finally warm after a long winter, when I just wanted to ride for a few hours by myself.  No speedometer or training intervals, just enjoy the park road winding under the trees. I had downloaded some new music on the IPod, a sampler from the library.  I felt happy.  Life is Good.  Rounding a bend by the river, coasting through sunbeams sparkling the park’s peaceful road, my earphones unexpectedly played Bricklayer’s Beautiful Daughter.  I hadn’t heard that simple guitar tune in three decades.  My God, time suddenly disappeared.  I was right back in the forgotten foster home, listening for the faint silver threads of the contentment I was feeling at this very moment on the bike.  The full force of this sudden connection, the wholeness of the life and unity of myself in one epiphany, brought me to tears. I found myself pouring my heart into praying hang in there, girl, hang in there, you’ll find it and I felt my younger self hearing echoes of birds singing in new green leaves.

I WAS born on the prairie and the milk of its wheat, the red of its clover, the eyes of its women, gave me a song and a slogan.

Here the water went down, the icebergs slid with gravel, the gaps and the valleys hissed, and the black loam came, and the yellow sandy loam.
Here between the sheds of the Rocky Mountains and the Appalachians, here now a morning star fixes a fire sign over the timber claims and cow pastures, the corn belt, the cotton belt, the cattle ranches.
Here the gray geese go five hundred miles and back with a wind under their wings honking the cry for a new home.
Here I know I will hanker after nothing so much as one more sunrise or a sky moon of fire doubled to a river moon of water.

The prairie sings to me in the forenoon and I know in the night I rest easy in the prairie arms, on the prairie heart..    .    .
        After the sunburn of the day
        handling a pitchfork at a hayrack,
        after the eggs and biscuit and coffee,
        the pearl-gray haystacks
        in the gloaming
        are cool prayers
        to the harvest hands.

In the city among the walls the overland passenger train is choked and the pistons hiss and the wheels curse.
On the prairie the overland flits on phantom wheels and the sky and the soil between them muffle the pistons and cheer the wheels..    .    .
I am here when the cities are gone.
I am here before the cities come.
I nourished the lonely men on horses.
I will keep the laughing men who ride iron.
I am dust of men.

The running water babbled to the deer, the cottontail, the gopher.
You came in wagons, making streets and schools,
Kin of the ax and rifle, kin of the plow and horse,
Singing Yankee Doodle, Old Dan Tucker, Turkey in the Straw,
You in the coonskin cap at a log house door hearing a lone wolf howl,
You at a sod house door reading the blizzards and chinooks let loose from Medicine Hat,
I am dust of your dust, as I am brother and mother
To the copper faces, the worker in flint and clay,
The singing women and their sons a thousand years ago
Marching single file the timber and the plain.

I hold the dust of these amid changing stars.
I last while old wars are fought, while peace broods mother-like,
While new wars arise and the fresh killings of young men.
I fed the boys who went to France in great dark days.
Appomattox is a beautiful word to me and so is Valley Forge and the Marne and Verdun,
I who have seen the red births and the red deaths
Of sons and daughters, I take peace or war, I say nothing and wait.

Have you seen a red sunset drip over one of my cornfields, the shore of night stars, the wave lines of dawn up a wheat valley?
Have you heard my threshing crews yelling in the chaff of a strawpile and the running wheat of the wagonboards, my cornhuskers, my harvest hands hauling crops, singing dreams of women, worlds, horizons?.    .    .
        Rivers cut a path on flat lands.
        The mountains stand up.
        The salt oceans press in
        And push on the coast lines.
        The sun, the wind, bring rain
        And I know what the rainbow writes across the east or west in a half-circle:
        A love-letter pledge to come again..    .    .
      Towns on the Soo Line,
      Towns on the Big Muddy,
      Laugh at each other for cubs
      And tease as children.

Omaha and Kansas City, Minneapolis and St. Paul, sisters in a house together, throwing slang, growing up.
Towns in the Ozarks, Dakota wheat towns, Wichita, Peoria, Buffalo, sisters throwing slang, growing up..    .    .
Out of prairie-brown grass crossed with a streamer of wigwam smoke-out of a smoke pillar, a blue promise-out of wild ducks woven in greens and purples-
Here I saw a city rise and say to the peoples round world: Listen, I am strong, I know what I want.
Out of log houses and stumps-canoes stripped from tree-sides-flatboats coaxed with an ax from the timber claims-in the years when the red and the white men met-the houses and streets rose.

A thousand red men cried and went away to new places for corn and women: a million white men came and put up skyscrapers, threw out rails and wires, feelers to the salt sea: now the smokestacks bite the skyline with stub teeth.

In an early year the call of a wild duck woven in greens and purples: now the riveter's chatter, the police patrol, the song-whistle of the steamboat.

To a man across a thousand years I offer a handshake.
I say to him: Brother, make the story short, for the stretch of a thousand years is short..    .    .
What brothers these in the dark?
What eaves of skyscrapers against a smoke moon?
These chimneys shaking on the lumber shanties
When the coal boats plow by on the river-
The hunched shoulders of the grain elevators-
The flame sprockets of the sheet steel mills
And the men in the rolling mills with their shirts off
Playing their flesh arms against the twisting wrists of steel:
        what brothers these
        in the dark
        of a thousand years?.    .    .
A headlight searches a snowstorm.
A funnel of white light shoots from over the pilot of the Pioneer Limited crossing Wisconsin.

In the morning hours, in the dawn,
The sun puts out the stars of the sky
And the headlight of the Limited train.

The fireman waves his hand to a country school teacher on a bobsled.
A boy, yellow hair, red scarf and mittens, on the bobsled, in his lunch box a pork chop sandwich and a V of gooseberry pie.

The horses fathom a snow to their knees.
Snow hats are on the rolling prairie hills.
The Mississippi bluffs wear snow hats..    .    .
Keep your hogs on changing corn and mashes of grain,
    O farmerman.
    Cram their insides till they waddle on short legs
    Under the drums of bellies, hams of fat.
    **** your hogs with a knife slit under the ear.
    Hack them with cleavers.
    Hang them with hooks in the hind legs..    .    .
A wagonload of radishes on a summer morning.
Sprinkles of dew on the crimson-purple *****.
The farmer on the seat dangles the reins on the rumps of dapple-gray horses.
The farmer's daughter with a basket of eggs dreams of a new hat to wear to the county fair..    .    .
On the left-and right-hand side of the road,
        Marching corn-
I saw it knee high weeks ago-now it is head high-tassels of red silk creep at the ends of the ears..    .    .
I am the prairie, mother of men, waiting.
They are mine, the threshing crews eating beefsteak, the farmboys driving steers to the railroad cattle pens.
They are mine, the crowds of people at a Fourth of July basket picnic, listening to a lawyer read the Declaration of Independence, watching the pinwheels and Roman candles at night, the young men and women two by two hunting the bypaths and kissing bridges.
They are mine, the horses looking over a fence in the frost of late October saying good-morning to the horses hauling wagons of rutabaga to market.
They are mine, the old zigzag rail fences, the new barb wire..    .    .
The cornhuskers wear leather on their hands.
There is no let-up to the wind.
Blue bandannas are knotted at the ruddy chins.

Falltime and winter apples take on the smolder of the five-o'clock November sunset: falltime, leaves, bonfires, stubble, the old things go, and the earth is grizzled.
The land and the people hold memories, even among the anthills and the angleworms, among the toads and woodroaches-among gravestone writings rubbed out by the rain-they keep old things that never grow old.

The frost loosens corn husks.
The Sun, the rain, the wind
        loosen corn husks.
The men and women are helpers.
They are all cornhuskers together.
I see them late in the western evening
        in a smoke-red dust..    .    .
The phantom of a yellow rooster flaunting a scarlet comb, on top of a dung pile crying hallelujah to the streaks of daylight,
The phantom of an old hunting dog nosing in the underbrush for muskrats, barking at a **** in a treetop at midnight, chewing a bone, chasing his tail round a corncrib,
The phantom of an old workhorse taking the steel point of a plow across a forty-acre field in spring, hitched to a harrow in summer, hitched to a wagon among cornshocks in fall,
These phantoms come into the talk and wonder of people on the front porch of a farmhouse late summer nights.
"The shapes that are gone are here," said an old man with a cob pipe in his teeth one night in Kansas with a hot wind on the alfalfa..    .    .
Look at six eggs
In a mockingbird's nest.

Listen to six mockingbirds
Flinging follies of O-be-joyful
Over the marshes and uplands.

Look at songs
Hidden in eggs..    .    .
When the morning sun is on the trumpet-vine blossoms, sing at the kitchen pans: Shout All Over God's Heaven.
When the rain slants on the potato hills and the sun plays a silver shaft on the last shower, sing to the bush at the backyard fence: Mighty Lak a Rose.
When the icy sleet pounds on the storm windows and the house lifts to a great breath, sing for the outside hills: The Ole Sheep Done Know the Road, the Young Lambs Must Find the Way..    .    .
Spring slips back with a girl face calling always: "Any new songs for me? Any new songs?"

O prairie girl, be lonely, singing, dreaming, waiting-your lover comes-your child comes-the years creep with toes of April rain on new-turned sod.
O prairie girl, whoever leaves you only crimson poppies to talk with, whoever puts a good-by kiss on your lips and never comes back-
There is a song deep as the falltime redhaws, long as the layer of black loam we go to, the shine of the morning star over the corn belt, the wave line of dawn up a wheat valley..    .    .
O prairie mother, I am one of your boys.
I have loved the prairie as a man with a heart shot full of pain over love.
Here I know I will hanker after nothing so much as one more sunrise or a sky moon of fire doubled to a river moon of water..    .    .
I speak of new cities and new people.
I tell you the past is a bucket of ashes.
I tell you yesterday is a wind gone down,
  a sun dropped in the west.
I tell you there is nothing in the world
  only an ocean of to-morrows,
  a sky of to-morrows.

I am a brother of the cornhuskers who say
  at sundown:
        To-morrow is a day.

These are the hard times,
the long stretch of coal-shed days,
the corrugated nights of the antinomian.

I retch at the old doubts and the panoply
of dustbins clattering bright,
their watchers simian in the morning ****.

I dress as though dredging up greys,
monotone deep in the GB tradition:
now sandpit tea with oil stain floats
silt dreads the mass of a seven year clay.

Four weeks of shadows drown wind in a storm.

And dreams of my cottage
in days of such calm and late summer happiness
as brought cut corn and strawbs
and horse manure in hugs

until like Zulu tribesmen the birds appeared.
Hunched with expectation
Spears smiling like baddies they rushed me.

I woke pouring sweat like a workhorse
the weakest of defences laid up
my face pulling cellophane over French windows.

§
Battle of New Britain

Lieutenant Jim G Paulos led elements
of G Company in a savage counterattack
that ousted the intruders supported
by Lieutenant James R Mallon’s improvised
platoon of H/11, which remained
to help man casualty-depleted line.

Improvise (OED):
One: to compose on spur
of the moment; to utter
or perform extempore

two: to bring about or get up
on the spur of the moment;
to provide for the occasion

Three: […] hence to do anything
On the spur of the moment

Improvised platoon
Df James R Mallon:

When most of your platoon
lies dead in the pumice sands
of the South Pacific-Japanese
bushido bullets tear flesh and spirit
out of the corporeal—husks of limp
limbs you fought to defend and they you
Japanese mortar fire, machine and small-gun fire
fifteen yards in advance of the wire
how do you bring about or get up
the courage to grab whoever—
the nearest marine
talk through ears drums burst by mortar succeeding shockwaves
forget for the time the men
you spent months training
sipping beers in Australia
laughing over bar stool drunken jokes
men you shared your dreams about after
away from the mosquitoes
away from the constant moisture
rain rain rain day and night
soaking through fatigues through skin through bone
never enough sun to dry out
air already saturated
sweat or seawater—it is all the same
now you must find new men—men you have seen,
but do not know the same as your own platoon
their life and yours in each others hands
alone in a group of stranger-brothers
always faithful
keep composure in the face
your buddy’s entrails pouring into the pumice sand
hence to do anything
on the spur kicked into your side
to block what no man should ever be asked to see
and do what you can in the moment
to save your division from enemy fire.

§
Cyclops Black Eyes

One summer e’ening drunk to hell
He stood there nearly lifeless
A gal sat in the corner
And it’s how are ye ma’am and what’s yer name
And would ye like a drink?
She looked at him, he at her
All she could do was accept one

And rovin’ a rovin’ a rovin’ she’ll go
Through his pair of blue eyes

She knew not the pumice beaches and streams
Sometimes walking sometime crawling
amongst blood and death ‘neath a screaming sky
Where Cyclops black eyes waited for him
Was it birds whistling in the trees?
Always the Cyclops black eyes waiting for them
So they give the wind a talkin’

And a rovin’ a rovin’ a rovin’ he’ll go
Away from those Cyclops black eyes

And the arms and legs of other men
Were scattered all around
Some cursed, some prayed, some prayed then cursed
Then prayed and bled some more
All he could see were Cyclops black eyes looking at him

No Cyclops black eyes waiting for her
And a rovin’ a rovin’ a rovin’ she’ll go
And never know what saw his pair of blue eyes

Could she forsee in that pair of blue eyes
Decades he’d spend drunk to hell?
Sometimes walking sometime crawling
Rovin’ and rovin’ away from those Cyclops black eyes

§
Colt 1911**

I was nineteen when I learned
my Dad his father’s Colt 1911 pistol

when Dad was young he
and his brother found
the gun—hidden in the rafters
of the cinderblock basement
their father built; magazine bullets and pistol
on one rafter—separate, except
the bullets lived in the magazine

my dad and uncle, like any
young boy, were fascinated
by the pistol; though too young
to feel and know the power
and danger in the cold blue metal

when their father and mother were
away—home alone they snuck
to the hand-laid basement
reached around the rafters
through years of dust and darkness
feeling for the colt and mag
scrape-click-pop—ca-chick
round in the chamber—“freeze!”

so played boyhood fantasies
cowboys & Indians
cops & robbers
with a lethal toy


so my dad kept it a secret
locked in a tarnished steel box
locked through the trigger guard
magazine separate
four silver, dimpled, bullets rolled round between
their queue and releaser

I was struck by the weight—heavier than I expected—I felt the years of use polished into the wood grips—thick hand grease sweat blood humidity sand saltwater gun oil mud tears life saved and taken.
At the bottom of the wood grips ticked notches deep in the grain—both sides—different numbers; “What are these?” I asked running my finger across the nocth-ticks feeling their depths their absence consciously carved with his next best tool—kabar: workhorse that can baton through five inch diameter logs, machete through two-finger branches, dig a hole to burrow while machinegun fire mows down jungle; easy to sharpen, keeps an edge; full tang to hammer temples or tent posts

“I don’t know; the only thing we have is the lore.”

fI counted seven
the number the magazine carries
eight total, if you have one in the chamber

You have to commit to fire
a 1911, the cliché: don’t pull
the trigger—squeeze
is how the 1911 fires—a button
fits the crotch of the thumb and index finger
opposite the trigger on the handle;
to unleash the hammer then
lead, squeeze the two—firm
tight at the target; no shot fired
by accident—no Marvins with the 1911.

Busting my back
Breaking my bones
Helping the pack
Holding their stones.

Workhorse will try
Workhorse won't budge
It's time's gone by
I'll be the judge

If I had last words they would be…
Well… I mean… I see in those streams of invectives
I see especially people who drink, eat, sleep,
who make all human functions
Which are quite rather ******
And I shall say that they’re heavy
It never stopped being heavy
I noticed
I’ve read so many verses and particularly
verses from the 17th century
Verses, so-called courteous verses
I found 3 or 4 good ones in thousands of them
There’s little lightness in man
He’s heavy... isn’t he
And nowadays he’s extraordinary in heaviness
Since automobiles, alcohol, ambition, politics make him heavy
Even heavier
It’s mostly like that, he’s extremely heavy
Maybe one day shall we see a mind rebellion against the weight
But it isn’t for tomorrow
For now... we’re heavy
So I’d say indeed
If I had to die
I’d say
Man is heavy
That’s all
Oh! They were mean but...
Because they were heavy
They were heavy
They were heavy… jealous of a certain lightness
Jealous... jealous like a woman who wears a clothing burlap
instead of another who wears lace
Like someone who owns a workhorse
instead of a thoroughbred
Jealous...
Jealous of being heavy... that’s all
Crippled...
They weigh... they're crippled
Heaviness makes them *******
Therefore we can beware of them
They’re ready to do anything
Oh sure
They’re ready to do anything
And to activate heaviness
They drink, aren’t they
So when they drink, they turn into sledgehammers
It’s frightening, isn’t it
Sledgehammers without control
Yes, they’re especially like this
They activate... increase their weight
Instead of making themselves lighter
Oh! They’re not in Ariel’s side
They’re more like Caliban
More and more

Paddy's faithful workhorse
It broke down by the gate
And he had forty acres
To plough and cultivate

Paddy lived all alone
Now that was a fact
So he wrote an advert
Somewhat lacking tact

WIFE REQUIRED URGENTLY
A MOST IMPORTANT FACTOR
IS THAT THE APPLICANT
SHOULD POSSESS A TRACTOR
AGE UNIMPORTANT, COLOUR DOESN'T MATTER
PLEASE ENCLOSE WITH REPLY PHOTO
OF SAID TRACTOR

a minor amnesia - nonetheless it happens,
there's another word for it...
skleroza: spontaneous forgetfulness...
this fickle creature that's memory...
thankfully i have a stash of about 5 major memories
that i like to revisit...
play them over and over in my head...
since... i'm not on the crux of death...
well... since i'm not...
i have become more prone to exercise
the freedom of memory than i might want
to watch a movie...
trouble comes when i'm not my own d.j.,
in a car... heading toward... ******* IKEA...
in Enfield... where the phlegmatic crew of
dodo are this close | | to learning the arithmetic
of time...
a song on the radio... Belinda Carlisle...
circle in the sand...
in between talking with my father...
                  nothing metaphorical about that...
- so you know how old bob marley was
when he died? 36...
- you think he would still be touring?
well... he wouldn't need the money...
**** jagger does it for the joy...
          
i can't write narratives...
it's not like we're estranged...
but... it's complicated...
i think this is one area of my life i will keep
off-limits when writing...
i can be as honest about ******
as i can be about horses...
the narrative never took place...
believe me...
we talked about a range of things...
morgage

then when we came home an hour
later than expected...
she (dearest mother)
was probably drinking alone...
throwing little tantrums of me and father
alone time...
well... not to mention he was absent
from the most crucial years of my life...
from 4 till 8...
how does the ugly side of immigration
look like? brain-drain...
we: the diaspora members...
away from the motherland...
for the "better life"...
i too am playing catch-up...
how did ol' Leo frame it?
every happy family is the same...
but every sad family is sad uniquely:
in it's own unique way...

   get Wittgenstein to sort this
tautology... i'm not going to bother...
come to think of it... it's not even
a tautology... a tautology would be more
focused on thesaurus rex...

we had a conversation about football
and music... re-mortgaging...
even Bowie remained true to music...
he probably didn't tour...
but still made new content...
singing about mortality and ****...
i think i'm having this playback moment
in my head...

but then this song came on the radio...
magic fm... belinda carlisle...
circle in the sand...
all of a sudden i had this urge to listen
to a song, that song reminded me off...
oh hell... exactly: what was it?
the search began with: 'the message'...
mc-****-fartery...
      round and round...
jokes aside... i had to listen to belinda's
song on earphones once more
before the "revelation"...

  it seems obvious... "now"...

nik ******* kershaw - the riddle...

exactly... how did i get "the message" wrong?
two strong arms... blessings of Babylon...
blah blah: toe-tying-riddle...
almost like good luck is expected...

come to "think" of it...
a revelation... even though there's that monotheistic
focus on the patriarch...
puppet... strings...
missing *******...
i'm having a hard time not thinking
that ha-shem... the nameless father of hey-zeus
and the ha-ha-mighty blah-lah-al
are not... primarily... feminine gods...
well... conjured up from a ****
rather than a working 'ed...

they're irrational... and can be reduced down
to... the three heads of Cerberus...
they are never really depicted...
worded sleuth pulp fiction harlequin traps...
most artists?
oh **** me... even the ****'ites would agree...
get your eyes to focus on something...
that's how much i dare to admire Islam...
from the ****'ite perspective...

what ******* topic is this?
i was about to pour myself another drink
and this thought like a blitzkrieg came
flushed from a ******* in the universe
where all the gods and nothings
congregate from indigestion and
constipation...
a ******* miracle: a diarrhoea moment...
of sorts...
the monotheistic veneer... of "patriarchy"...

what?! she wants a ring of gold
and my ******* too?
how about a tent's worth of a kippah
on my ******* tonsure?
a man would require a screwdriver...
a hammer... nails... screws...
it would make sense to have many
involved... than this pressure of solipsism...
vampire... succubus... leech...
a ****** hail mary...

**** speak...
                    so great... the technological advances...
atheistic secularism...
but there's a ******* grid-lock to mind too...
no a ****** dam...
a rich cognitive custard...
it's just that: a cognitive custard...
like Moses rekindling a belonging concept
along the lines of being lied to:

monotheism hardly serves man...
i can find appeals to the illusion it presents...
but... hardly...
looks like the "plenty of fish in the sea"
metaphor is drying up the concept
of a "catch"...

the conversation with my father are
off-limits in my purpose of writing in the first
place... unlike a Knausgaard...
i'm the drinker... he's the teetotaller...
he's the workhorse i'm the... chicken-scratcher:
if i had ink...
but i'm also probably ten beaks pecking
resounding at this... grand... oh my god...
******* piano of QWERTY...

genius idea... what?
qwerty... because the orthodox memory erosion
of the alphabet is of any use?
suddenly everything has to **** me off...
it has to be dipped in still water...
it has to be believable...
monotheism is concretely a religion
designated for the preservation of women...
why my *******?
oh... because if you don't have it...
i can... ******* at a leisurely pace?

that a woman can ******* without inhibitions...
while i have to be shamed?
*******, *******...
i don't even have enough slander to express
what my heart reacts to these days...
i don't have "hurt" feels...
i have... agitated feelings...
thank you for waking me up from my numb...
apathy...
but what do i hear? "hurt feels"...
****'s sake... those people don't even recognise
what feeling is supposed to feel like!
they're all french footballers... "hurt" all of a sudden...
wow! so...
"hurt" is translated into the parameters of:
feeling per se?
imagine my shock finding out that
apathy has dulled "i.q." to so little that...
you must be hurt to feel...
you can't be spontaneously agitated...
you must be hurt...

bring out the hot horseshoes...
let's have some fun branding these *******-waggling-
***** aside...

just wait for the breeders to wake up
to having children that turn into freely-arranged
agents of will...
i'm passing through a decade where there's
boasting...
but sooner rather than later...
there will be some hidden mention
of those... pickled-cabbage:
why do the 'indus find pickled cabbage
"funny"?
not eating beef sounds pretty funny...
or like that "proverb" from Morocco:
there's no water, in the desert...
then... what... the... ****... are... you...
"doing" in this, here... land of replenished
roots?!

******* camel jockeys...
what do "they" call them, proper?
sand-*******...
it would take a Bengladesi to get
smart notes on the caste "system"....
Aryan has no origin in Europe...
it probably originated in Indian when
they first came across Persians...
who are... oddly... "pale"...
but have not bartablondine aspects
of their ****** expressions...

ivory skinned like an Iranian or a ***-
without a suntan?
"you" wanted trenches...
here's my designated plot...
"you" wanted ******* to overshadow
real.. culprit-esque concerns...
the jealousy of a woman
knows not bounds...
most especially when a father-son
privacy is engaged with...

   if i ever encountered male jealousy...
it was always rare...
almost never...
         but female jealousy? anything...
everything to belittle the opposing "authority"...
ha-shem... the jealous deity of women...
blah-lah-al of...kept secrets stashed in the niqab...
allure of the ******* eyes...
come on...

****** ******* mary:
that matriarch of sold foetuses and
walking abortions...
at least there was something adventerous
in conceiving the existence of Loki...
of Thor...
there's nothing... original about the point
of monotheistic gods...
that there are three...
is Islam the truest of religions?!
they had a Sunni ****'ite schism... didn't they?
once again:
i want to believe in something:
to give me momentum...
give be a willing acceptance to excuse...
an overarching stressor of incredulity...
and a... "what life"?

well... existence is...
out of every instance: a persistence to:
instance... a persistence...
that's... existence... ex-
out of...
and stance...
dis-ease... a negation of ease...

there will be plenty more of those car
journey listening to magic fm...

an "original": whether mind, or thinker...
that mythology of evil that the Nazis provided...
******* Armani suits and boots...
or whoever designed them... Hugo Boss...
what are we left with,
to mind matters of collectivism?
the evil of censorship instigated by...
halfwits and ******* haemophiliacs?

a myth of evil that could be...
galvanised... momentum and emblem...
what's on offer... currently?
grey-suits and...
expectations: that it's the "21st century"
something magical is about to happen...
what's the difference between the 20th century
and the 18th century?
the 19th century...
so what's the difference between
a pebble, a cliff edge and a mountain?
don't know... a river? a lake?

that same **** different cover excuse
like some wonderful was going to happen
in the 21st century...
like there was a promise...
where is this **** coming from?!
oh yeah... but it's the 21st century...
i was hoping for gravity to ******* and turn all:
short-circuit awry...

i can pretend... for a while...
but after that while passes... i turn into a real mystery
of a door **** gone berserker...
are there these societal expectations
to simply **** **** the next...
blow the next... ******* origami of OXFAM
purple-fest whimpering "dead-doughnut":
although i'd cry... if it was a stray dog
from the streets of Seville...
******* camel-jockeys...

  it's not even a inhibited play on pronouns:
there's no: "they"...
i thought the trans-lobbyist covered the plug-hole
of cognitive-****...
there is not "us" or "them":
gender neutral is me...
armed with a strap-on ***** on my ******* forehead...
a bit like... that hebrew practice of...

so i had me a "friend: a fwend...
maybe that's cornish for something in velsh...
you know how word salad sounds?
on a persistence?
sure... a son of divorce...
what am i? his ******* uncle?
his mother undermined the concept
of al dente spaghetti...
we're talking fractions of people...

people eat ****... leave the universal utility
of pork aside...
mind you: not water in the desert...
and not piggy too...
the leather shoe... the belt...
it's not exactly kosher... is it?
i have this backlog of a peoples...
at least a priest only attracts confessions...
i'm not at knife point
easy... for this triad to work?

if my fwend mentioned cognitive custard...
but the concensus of word salad
is socially broke on the norm...
so blah blah boo'yah assortment...
enriched strawberries...
juicing much later...
i can understand cognitive custard... pie...
but a word salad?
that's.... what doesn't deviate from
solipsism... this solo "project"
of "you and i"...

                       psychiatry is persisting to be
deemed a branch of
the Hippocratic oath....
but it's not...it's pseudo-"medicinal"...
it's hyped-up... idon't remember
that junction in a life...
hardly worth lived... just lived...
of my 20s... what mea culpa stressor of
those psychopaths?
currents under the broken wheel of...
attempts at supressing..
momentum? this whole ******* "flake"
of barrage?

by word salad you're implying i
have, speak... low i.q....
    non-hieroglyphic suede...
non-answerable... past replica...
woe wow salad...
but how i understand it...
a cognitive custard...
well... thinking is messy:
you ******* dim-wits!
        ought-i: thought...
i don't like being ridiculed...
or expected to her a less i.q. than what's...
nuanced at a ****** favouritism... Balkan-esque...
seriously... *******: before i ****** someone...
ugh attached to that: wind... now there's a purpose...

yeah... so what's what?
this is the least of my "concern"?
well... as they say in the west...
as long as the brain-drain happens...
we can forget about keeping the native 9 to 5ams...
sort of... but hardly... justifiably...
less than expectedly...
capitalistically boast: not exhausted...
sort of...

i can understand cognitive custard...
meddle some more...
word salad?
your ******* ****- nig-
of sorts is speaking your language better than me?
******* sour crass of a native's ***!
*******...  and you deserve it.

Our road trip memories align
as we pass a Farmall tractor,
fire engine red and rooted
roadside in a field of alfalfa,
a relic washed by cloudburst,
a workhorse dried in sunshine,
arrested air stack,
rusted crank case,
supple spider webs
in chaste wheel wells—
immutable old machine
somehow extinguishing
in the reflected acreage
of the rear view mirror.

Shortened by your own expectations
to a son, whose a workhorse.
who's under the shade of others,
ill and hidden under the rocks.

Under dog they say
does not brag any stellar milestone he's been in,
giving all the drastic efforts
but still gray and merely unseen.

Questioned himself
when he learned the term "black sheep"
Child in the heart, strong,
operates at his own risks.

of epic proportions and stars
he sees but only to himself,
hidden angst and questions to his own blood,
kept in the inner skirts of his chest.

A son, whose emerging,
underrated with his dreams.
a follower of the art
waiting until dawn, forever it seems.