Where are the Kerouacs?
The Ginsbergs?
The Cassadys?

Drunk on
wine
and life

Riding the highways and railroads to dreams unseen, even by them.

Clashes of ideas, like bright lights in the dim daybreak of an all-nighters.
Fueled by cigarettes and philosophy.

Now everyone wants the same thing.
A boring spouse.
A boring job.
A boring house.

What happened to the generation of lost souls that once searched the open plains and the cramped alleyways?

For nothing more than a beautiful moment.

I had a dream the other night
That I had found a window
And that window revealed to me the entire world
I could see everything there is to see
I could see the sun set in one land
As it rose in another
Nothing could hide from the windows gaze

I could see kids in public parks
Late at night
Staring at the dark, foreboding trees
Hallucinating the majesty
Of the way the branches moved in the wind
And upon reflection
Were called into the forest
By the sinister shadows inside themselves

On the West Coast I saw a girl
Separated from her Midwestern friends
And her Midwestern love
(Whom I have not met)
I see as her mind is split
Cross country style
And her thoughts fall
Like the raindrops on her window

I see a single match being lit
In the basement of an East Coast hospital
A young boy has traveled many miles
(Hitchhiked across the country
In a time where the Cassadys and Kerouacs
The great heroes of the road
Have all died out
And the road is home to the carcasses of a million dear
A thousand raccoons and a hundred skunks)
The boy lights a second match
And with the match lights a candle
Then he pulls out an old dusty guitar
And begins to play

The boy,
Born too late,
Journeyed to this hospital
The hospital here his hero stayed
While his hero’s mind decayed
But now there is no one around
The hospital is long empty
So he plays a tune to himself
The guitars’ celestial strings sing
Echo through the Empty
But with the window I see the boy is not alone
The spirit of the boy’s hero
Smiles down upon the boy from Heaven
And with God & Saints
Bless the boy
The song
The guitar

Miles away
Out west on a lonesome prairie
In the cover of night
I see a man sit at the bar of a diner
The warm glow does not penetrate far into the solid darkness
The man is alone
A fry cook stands in the kitchen
But is not in the man’s view
The hostess is out back
Smoking in silence
The man is left with his thoughts
Along with his rancher’s jacket
And ***** ball cap
This man wears an air of sadness
I can’t hear what he is thinking
But in his silence I can feel the weight of that sadness
I can almost know all his troubles
The man finishes his coffee
Puts money on the counter
And leaves without saying a word

As the dream ends
And I can feel myself begin to wake
I can see all those faces staring back at me
Each look through their own windows
I see the man stare through his car window
And the window of hope
I see the West Coast girl
Stare out the window of a plane
And the window of longing
I see the boy stare through the window of time
And finally I see the children in the parks
Staring through the window of Nature
And the window of the soul