to the young privateer.
the captain kidd & his bought n’ taut gang of holy bluffs.
they bribe and imbibe and swoon on the dock-way looking for a quest or two or three
to dream and bury their doubloons in island guts like little mysteries. little sundowns
over a rixdollar indian ocean.
let them take a turn.
destined to mutate from private to pirate, the kidd, like blackened rotten wood.
******* frigates.

the ship:
with her bob and sway. she is, the adventure.
& her song is calling out for a rapturous few,
for men ready to die on the highwater mark by glory or fire or dead glorious sun.
so they put her brass and bough to seafaring days,
the sweet galleon, barely wet, yet
completely riffed to voyage.
she is
from the shores of london. built. designed to kick 14 knots under a full sail blast.
& she will bite.

she’s in calm waters.
the kidd savvy toothed and butterscotched, he awaits the big show,
engorged to set forth the play like wily ocean dervish &
they do.
they do proceed with benefactors coined and crunched on postulations of pirate death &
pirate gold. reclaimed honor as they say. the hunt for pirate teeth.

& with official pass and parchment, high-throne approved,
king ***** III stamp & sealed,
this voyage is.
this voyage is and forever was, hereby charted, to recover said stolen goods.
to reclaim thy warrior vanity &/or vengeance.
to noble this **** with pinched loaf, like now.
set sail. now.
1696.

“**** them navy yachts at greenwich, the thames be ours, boys.”
slap *** and flick thumb toward those armada sons,
& as tribute
smoke balsam herbs on the starboard side for the mother she and the father be.
but for this slight,
this dishonorable silly ****,
one third of adventure’s men are pressed into service of the crown.

[continue.]

the adventuresome few, petty crew and crows.
steal the heart and mother-meat of a french ship. steal everything onboard.
steal the ship itself.
& on her way to new york, new boon, pure and entered into the new world.  
there are new men bought in the american port,
good men and odd men of long criminal legacy.
a small black vicious quartermaster. he’ll do.
a murderous preacher gripped by stars and celestial patterns. he speaks spanish. he’ll do.
another type of holy man and a wild drinker too, embattled by demons on the port side. sure.
plus the dock-boys destined to **** for fruits of exploration.
this is the way of the son of a gun.

the boatmen jockeyed. she is
the adventure
prancing the vertebrae of atlantic and beyond. cape of good hope, she
breathes easy out here on the wide tide and float.
out here on the vast blue this. she
evolves
out here. loves out here.

pirates.
the hunt for pirates or the lack thereof. she leaks.
she rasps into the years on. and on.
the kaleidoscope hallucinations of sun and moon, sun and moon, and moon and sun
forever.
the strait of bab-el-mandeb.
& there
she plunges into darkness, into the stars seen from and through a periscope formed
by ancient hominid lineage.
seen but untouched,
in dreams. the kidd, reluctantly lime, admits to his madness.
madagascar.

malaria and cholera and hell break the boat by the throat.
& thrash.
to be organic is to be ruled by a shadow, or entropy.
the mouth of a red sea.
one third of the men will die here.
simply as insects crushed and brushed off deck and into to her great spate of agua,
the mother gush.
her earth.
body.
father,
hear his whispers in the mirage.
the ancient mariner, the ancient holy ghost riming down there.

in destitution.
in a rough and soggy life squeezed and making men weird or violent or both be ******.
the kidd goes cold to hot sweating noxious.
turns pirate himself
out of sheer hunger.
out of sheer need to eat.
sets the boys like dogs upon a frigate of east india company men,
or french *****. either/or/or/either/or.
he & the boys are in a madness swirl of sun and heavy guts.
cuts to spill blood
or gold. this tender bit.
lip bit
& tested.

captain kidd fractures the skull of a deckhand named moore,
for bad attitude and giggles. moore gets death.
chisel on the deck.
& to think we are all troubled by some primal trauma.
some dumb thing called death, that is.
men starving, men dying, men falling in the vast black that is that eternal void.
dream of women and riches in the meantime.
fortunes.
1698.

savage kidd, cool kidd, cool spit
off the edge. to think of the once soulful idea of these paradise days
& trip.
savage to cool.
the two divine modes of a survived man.
a ghoul man, or aging man.
& to keep control of his crew kidd sets them upon the quedagh merchant;
a 400 ton armenian hulk chalk full of gold, silver, satins, and muslin. ‘tis *****.
renames her: the adventure prize.

madness quenched for now.
charmed for now
& on the horizon are fragrant times. blissful distance.
but robert culliford,
with his mocha frigate. this man, this suave pirate lord, his vengeance act.
he had stolen kidd’s ship years back, &
the captain opts to cut his throat.
take the mocha.
keep calm & carry on.
to paradise.
to dream of her cool warm beaches and fruit forever, peacefully thinking.
so that night they two drink together in good health, and in the morning
most of the men defect to this other man, this other ship, culliford.
other dream,
other captain of true buccaneer effect.
act 3:

13 remain in the galley firm.
this is the house adventure.
& she is burnt alive three days later for rot and ill repair.
but she was fun,
& a *****.
a stitch of old woodwork given-in
& crackling with the eyes of her crew seen in fire.

kidd steps the pond to caribbean times with the adventure prize, toad toxins
& high on the jungled shore.
he trades that colossus, flips her for a sloop and seven little chests of gold.
little bellies.
the island-gut doubloons to bury.
dream, remember?

but the men-of-war are after him now. the privateers & hunters & devil’s dogs.
the men he once was.
men of marked death.
& he is now some pirate, some forthright bandit
settled to **** or be killed.
some sad kid.

first: buries that treasure up the coast of america.
oak island rig.
cherry rocks of the maine bank and *****-trapped pit.
the hunted.
they catch him on an inlet ****, and sail back
to london to be tried for crimes against the crown.
the high court of admirality.
1701.

they hoist and gibbet his body with worn chains above the river.
not for piracy, but for ******.
the ****** of that strange deckhand moore and his giggle.
kidd’s bones
suspended there for three or more years at the mouth of the thames,
as warning
to the perverse travails of a criminal lifestyle on the highwater pond.

Jumping in the blue
water lilies reflection
in the pond up in the sky.
Lo, the punter sun peeps into
the rose dew down on earth.
Floating just on a navel-high!

The broad daylight pictures
the heavenly blue smile
painting on its highwater mark.
Million and one primula flower
kissing this elfin column.
Not up in the wild blue yonder
nor down on the ground.
Just on a navel high!

A tiny army
armed with tiny knives
slowly cut away at me
They cut away my skin
leaving behind wrinkles
they cut away memories
and tastebuds,
hair, color, and sensations
Every day steady chip, chipping
away on me.
The bravest move I make
is to get up every morning
The hot water of the shower
hitting my spine is the jolt
I need, to keep the army away
Steady now, hold together,
here they come again.

Adam touches down
in heaven upon the high.
But his highwater mark
wasn’t solely one way.

He could hear the jingle
upon the high resonates
beneath the ground!

He could see the cloud
forms on the top
and rains down to the ground.

Bow down on the earth
and rise high.
Lo, the golden spiral too,
curves downward
before spiking high up.

the history and indoctrination of infantry

infant re
cruits

de rim u derimu, I count (old high irish)

gityeirishup, er shut yer leprechaun trap,

clap three times, spit wit the wind.

reason countable

you are trained to focus, aim,

miss, aim, miss, aim miss, come let's
cipher this thang out,
raison d'etre,
and all...
aims,
though misses all
count for nothing,
valenced by
one heartfelt hit t' knock the lie right.

old man re
crew recurrent reason to let this be re
al, always, already re
pulsing
pulsing
pulsing

aim, loose... spit wit'thwind...

---- war seen from after his jet died--
---- vicarious warriors can't match
---- the missing memories.

Prisoners enobled warriors endurent
indoctrined to prevail

"did I train well enough to do my job?"

Win the war. Right, that was your job,
all along.

What?...

no will to win a war without a reason
not willing to question
reason

authority doctrines in undated
rulebooks only lawyers
can read, that's a rule.

sacrifice and suffering un
common valor *** common
virtue

how do you win?

-- my guess, really

love my enemies. As good a way to die
as any I've tried.

-----
war stories on youtube. imagine that and
sure as hellen highwater was easy

I gotta call armchair-back o' the arm
bullshistory,
as I wipe a smeared memory

bullsss'it... RTOs don't walk point,
not back when you had
the radio, or said y'did,
nor did ye rereguard, when you
have the radio, Pr'ck 25
(like a cell phone
weighing 25 pounds, with a 5 mile range,
and no data. One to a team, as we

squellch squellch out) Nah, the guy's

lying, but it will hurt his kid's feelings,
if I say so,

or
he could believe his own hero myth,

I do.

---- nah, war stories are all we remember
ever after, happy as helen highwater was
to find you after fifty years
on facebook.
***
FTA, it don't mean nuthin'

it was so
silly, this is not the way it's supposed
to be, we

were the redcoats.
We were hanging Johnny Tremain Ngyuen,

wasting the last crawling,

man,

the first starlight scope flash
bright green white

FNG popped a flare.

--- when do we call ******* ---

For the price of a baseball cap, a fool
can claim honor other fools died for.

Silly little war. Eighteen thousand
eleven bravos of aver
age age
Twenty-two.

Ooh ooh, like Pappa Doc 22 voodoo
doopy doo doopy doo
Duvalier, Ton Ton M'coo

hey. okeh

we got you. You thought crazy,
now you can stop.

--- there was a war and nobody won.
--- safe. passed madness has passed on.
--- see what good you may imagine done.
--- work that out, without making enemies.

April Fool. Why has this day always been about me?
Ask yourself. There exist

degrees of foolishness, none fashionable beyond
twenty-two.

footnote: https://www.uswings.com/about-us-wings/vietnam-war-facts/
Who has a guess why facebook would refuse a link to this page. ***** about it.

Census Stats and “I Served in Vietnam” Wanabees
1,713,823 of those who served in Vietnam were still alive as of August, 1995 (census figures).
During that same Census count, the number of Americans falsely claiming to have served was: 9,492,958.
As of the current Census taken during August, 2000, the surviving U.S. Vietnam Veteran population estimate is: 1,002,511. This is hard to believe, losing nearly 711,000 between ’95 and ’00. That’s 390 per day. During this Census count, the number of Americans falsely claiming to have served in-country is: 13,853,027. By this census, FOUR OUT OF FIVE WHO CLAIM TO BE VIETNAM VETS ARE NOT. This makes calculations of those alive, even in 2017, difficult to maintain.

when you wanna go home, where do you wanna go?

the worst thing about growing up is learning
that you can always leave home but you can’t always go back.
the thing about roots is that unless you want to die,
you can't ever pull them out completely.
we are always going to be from somewhere.
we are always going to be from here.

when you move out of your childhood home,
will your mother clean out all your **** and make it
into the home office that she always wanted
or will she keep it like a time-capsule, so preserved that 20 years from now
you will come to the same posters staring down at you?
what dream is she still holding on to?
does she remember, did she give it up for you?

sometimes i think i am the last five things i gave up on,
a mausoleum to my mistakes.
i am bad asking forgiveness.
i don’t really believe in god, but for some reason or another
i write a lot about it him.
maybe it’s always easier to blame someone else.
because if god exists, i think he’s on autopilot.
see, god is good at letting go of things.
i know this because what else could it mean
when his disciples told me to find someone new to pray to?

all i remember of my baptism is white dresses and pinched shoes
and my cries echoed off stuccoed walls of the church.
my father has a rosary hanging on his bedside table,
he always likes to say that you’ve got to
believe in something.

and i know i don’t always make myself easy to love.
i keep saying “i’m sorry” so what does it mean anymore?
if you say something too many times, the meaning starts disappearing.
i guess that’s why i never told you that i love you,
but that feels like an excuse, too.
love called in sick again, i keep telling you that you’ve gotta get better friends.
they only love you when everything’s going wrong.
you can’t love somebody just because they love you.

love is mumbling you feel so good into the side of her neck.
love is promises. love wants to believe you.
she is beautiful like sunday, not friday. she is holy.
she is beautiful like sunday and tuesday and all the days in between,
like three weekends and six day work weeks
like ***** and soda pop
like sleeping in every sunday and staying up every saturday.
she is alternately the wild fire and the burnt shell of the forest,
the calm and the storm, the curse and the cure.
the hell and the highwater.
you want to learn to swim and learn to drown in her.
love is love is love is in love with you
but she wishes she wasn’t.
love is an unfinished symphony,
all the lullabies you’d sing for me, the clank of car keys.
there is no silence in leaving, there is no silence in believing.
there is nothing that feels better than never coming back.
there is nothing that feels worse than never coming back.

i’ve been too many people to call you home.

The old man hunched over, slow to move,
Decided that this day, a honest day's labor,
Was just the ticket in order to have a day,
Productive and so lasting as the day was long.

He stretched and felt every muscle and bone,
Cry out to him in momentary pain and hurt,
But struggled, still, to dress himself alone,
In order to have a breakfast of eggs and toast.

The dinted coffee *** rattled on the stove,
The blinds were open to let in the light,
He put his breakfast on his plate of tin,
And commenced to eat in solitary fashion.

"Today's the day we build the wall,"
"You know, the one to keep the neighbor out,"
Because the neighbor was a persistant pest,
With constant hellos and meddling talk.

The old man bathed himself in silence,
Preferred to keep his thoughts secretly hidden,
Did not care for the company of idle fools,
Who didn't know what honest labor could do.

So, off to the work shed for his tools to begin,
The wall between the neighbor and him,
Walked to the place where walls are built,
Between the pastures of a neighboring farm.

The cold air felt like needles on his face,
The snow crunched repeatedly beneath his boots,
Wind hurtling gushs of shivering air,
With numbness in his toes he forged along.

Perhaps, a wall is something that builds itself,
Or maybe takes a long, long time to construct,
But determined in his quest for total privacy,
He must have felt a mission was his daily call.

"I'll build this wall, come hell and highwater,"
Despite the time of year being such a challenge,
Yet, when he knelt to gather his thoughts to begin,
He told himself tomorrow would be just as good.

Then, back he tredged to the house he had,
Where the fireplace roared and comfort awaited,
So, he could sip his tea and eat his evening meal,
While planning for tomorrow's daily labor.

Highwater Risin'
Of this there is no doubt
We never really understand
What this brief life is about

I think of you, Posterity
I remember Jonathan Swift
I remember ugh! the vertigo
Thank you kindly for the lift

The man at the Book of Kells
He said: meant to be
Please keep her calm
Please protect our 3

        South China Sea

Bring me forth
          from that nightflow
magnet for I
    have heard the calls
of my guardians
they have beckoned
                 me into a visionary stupor
pulled my head from the
           quicksand's mulch
my daily chores whirling
                         from my hands
             they are spinning me around
like a an electric charged
                   whirlpool of light
all objects caught up in
its path
             be they leaves
                              or rocks
or household appliances
and I am casting to hell
and highwater
            all of those warnings
as sacred adorations
nick into my solitude
I fling my demons to the skies
          release them to their
                              own salvation
I do not wish them before
                            my eyes
as I work my own deliverance
of beatitudes
   my own song of songs
spun into the glowing
Let them sputter and trip
over their words
           My inner hearing closes
upon their petty phrases as
they mouth them out of sync
             The path opens up before me
               as riverflow
                       in one graceful arc
Here I fight in my own
               siege of Orléans
No point in stopping me
because the vestige of
flickering truth is turning
into the solid molecules
                    of freedom's spark
right before
             your very eyes

asleep in the afternoon
    home far from Stockholm
                  Europa Report!