Bag-drop. Check-in.
Hyphenated. Two syllables.
Security. A fat Scottish man,
A gentle caress of the inner thigh.
I retch violently.
Boarding, disembarking.
All I want in life is the back door.

I am a traveler commuting on life's rails,
going station to station.
Disembarking at different destinations,
each time spent differently.
The car can be claustrophobic with passengers,
suffocating me in anxiety.
Other times, just a few of familiar faces,
friends, families, locals, daily riders.
Some talking, of life, nonsense, all or nothing,
each making their way.
There are times of light, above ground and of sun,
the rest tunneled, falsely lit, dark.
The sights of open land, buildings, and of the day,
the faces of love, hurt, hurried and grind.
Day in Day out this cycle goes on,
different,yet the same.
I am part of this mass exodus to get somewhere,
yet my commute is my own.
At times I arrive with many at the platform
bustling towards their tasks.
Trains for life come and go, expresses to locals,
roaring with noise, movements, purpose.
However, there are times i am the only one there,
Occasional train, in silence, alone.
Those are the days that my commute seems fruitless,
leaving me to wonder,
Have I just been passing it all by?

© J.L.Gonzalez75 09/2016
* this is a rough edit... am not a poet, but just write.

This is on a bus back from camp. I’m thirteen and so are you. Before I left for camp I imagined it would be me and three or four other dudes I hadn’t met yet, running around all summer, getting into trouble. It turned out it would be me and just one girl. That’s you. And we’re still at camp as long as we’re on the bus and not at the pickup point where our parents would be waiting for us. We’re still wearing our orange camp t-shirts. We still smell like pineneedles. I like you and you like me and I more-than-like you, but I don’t know if you do or don’t more-than-like me. You’ve never said, so I haven’t been saying anything all summer, content to enjoy the small miracle of a girl choosing to talk to me and choosing to do so again the next day and so on. A girl who’s smart and funny and who, if I say something dumb for a laugh, is willing to say something two or three times as dumb to make me laugh, but who also gets weird and wise sometimes in a way I could never be. A girl who reads books that no one’s assigned to her, whose curly brown hair has a line running through it from where she put a tie to hold it up while it was still wet.
Back in the real world we don’t go to the same school, and unless one of our families moves to a dramatically different neighborhood, we won’t go to the same high school. So, this is kind of it for us. Unless I say something. And it might especially be it for us if I actually do say something. The sun’s gone down and the bus is quiet. A lot of kids are asleep. We’re talking in whispers about a tree we saw at a rest stop that looks like a kid we know. And then I’m like, “Can I tell you something?” And all of a sudden I’m telling you. And I keep telling you and it all comes out of me and it keeps coming and your face is there and gone and there and gone as we pass underneath the orange lamps that line the sides of the highway. And there’s no expression on it. And I think just after a point I’m just talking to lengthen the time where we live in a world where you haven’t said “yes” or “no” yet. And regrettably I end up using the word “destiny.” I don’t remember in what context. Doesn’t really matter. Before long I’m out of stuff to say and you smile and say, “okay.” I don’t know exactly what you mean by it, but it seems vaguely positive and I would leave in order not to spoil the moment, but there’s nowhere to go because we’re are on a bus. So I pretend like I’m asleep and before long, I really am.

I wake up, the bus isn’t moving anymore. The domed lights that line the center aisle are all on. I turn and you’re not there. Then again a lot of kids aren’t in their seats anymore. We’re parked at the pick-up point, which is in the parking lot of a Methodist church. The bus is half empty. You might be in your dad’s car by now, your bags and things piled high in the trunk. The girls in the back of the bus are shrieking and laughing and taking their sweet time disembarking as I swing my legs out into the aisle to get up off the bus, just as one of them reaches my row. It used to be our row, on our way off. It’s Michelle, a girl who got suspended from third grade for a week after throwing rocks at my head. Adolescence is doing her a ton of favors body-wise. She stops and looks down at me. And her head is blasted from behind by the dome light, so I can’t really see her face, but I can see her smile. And she says one word: “destiny.” Then her and the girls clogging the aisles behind her all laugh and then she turns and leads them off the bus. I didn’t know you were friends with them.
I find my dad in the parking lot. He drives me back to our house and camp is over. So is summer, even though there’s two weeks until school starts. This isn’t a story about how girls are evil or how love is bad, this is a story about how I learned something and I’m not saying this thing is true or not, I’m just saying it’s what I learned. I told you something. It was just for you and you told everybody. So I learned cut out the middle man, make it all for everybody, always. Everybody can’t turn around and tell everybody, everybody already knows, I told them. But this means there isn’t a place in my life for you or someone like you. Is it sad? Sure. But it’s a sadness I chose. I wish I could say this was a story about how I got on the bus a boy and got off a man more cynical, hardened, and mature and ****. But that’s not true. The truth is I got on the bus a boy. And I never got off the bus.


I still haven't.

Spiral of fate foreseen
A Vegas winning sure thing
A journey to realms beyond
Where those already gone
Traveled before I
With letters sent home
still left unseen
Wait, I'm not ready!
Is there another?
This train came too soon!
Excuse me,
I'll wait for the slow train!
Can I exchange my ticket?
For a later departure?
Perhaps tomorrow?
Of course tomorrow,  
Can never be!  
Round trip ticket please!
I wish to not be gone long!
I must return, otherwise,
who will care for the wee ones!  
Wait, I still must pack!
All my silver and gold
Can I bring?  
Is First Class an option?
A sleeper car?
Bring any friends?
My loved ones
should meet me
after reaching the end!
Must I board,
This train?
An evil angel at the controls
in the locomotive's cab
steam billowing all around
conductor in a ghastly robe
bearing the cutting scythe
leaning out the door
shouting out
to the platform crowd
"All aboard!"
"All aboard!"
this train
always runs on time
and no one ever
gets left behind
except perhaps a few
entering heaven alive
first stop is Sh'eol
all disembarking to wait
then chugging on to the
station with pearly gates  
those remaining aboard
catching a glimpse
then fast downhill all the way
to the end of the line
the last stop of Abaddon

©  2017 Jim Davis

Lydia's father said
she could go with you
to Waterloo railway station
mind the roads though

he said(in his
sober moments
he could be quite
considerate)

and not too near
the edge
of the platform
can't have you

falling in front
of a train
so you took a bus
to Waterloo station

both sitting at the rear
of the bus
on the side seats
having paid

the conductor the fare
and sitting there
watching
the passing views

she in her pale
blue dress
her dark straight hair
pale features

thin arms and legs
you thinking
of the steam engines
the power

and the puff of smoke
grey white
and she thinking
of her big sister

coming home
in the early hours
puking in the bog
her mother giving one

hell of a loud scream
of abuse
and her father saying
O give the girl a chance

and Lydia turning over
in the double bed
dreading her sister's
arrival stinking of sick

hanging off
the side of the bed
with a bucket beside
throwing up

what was once inside
the bus arrived
and you got off
and you said

hang on to my hand
we'll cross together
and so she held
your hand

her thin bony fingers
wrapped about yours
her hand cold
thin nails chewed

got to keep an eye
on you
your old man said
you said

and you crossed
running to avoid
the rushing traffic
and once across

she said
that man next to me
on the bus
put his hand

on my thigh quickly
but then we got off
and I didn't know
what to say

she added
you should have told me
you said
she looked anxious

and bit her lip
no matter now
too late
but if you see him again

tell me
and we'll get
the ******
you said

she nodded
and so you walked
into the station
past crowds of people

and porters
pushing trolleys
of luggage or mail
by the tall copper  

with hands behind
his back
and on to the platform
and took a seat together

to watch trains
and hear the sounds
and smell the acrid
smoke and engines

come and leave
sense the overpowering
sounds of released steam
and whistles blown

and flags waved
and passengers
boardings
and disembarking

and you taking
a side view of her
sitting there
anxiety

in the features
of her face
her hair straight
and well brushed

she unaware
you gazed
and took it all in  
and she thinking

of her sister's moans
and occasional vomiting
and she hardly sleeping
and now here

watching trains
you beside her
in your short
sleeved jumper

and cowboy shirt
and jeans
and sniffing in
the smell of smoke

and steam
and listening
to the engines
start up

and sense
the thrill of power
in the huff and puff
and she for once

happy just being there
far from her sister's snores
and her brother's tease
here to be

with you and be
as she please.

you made quite an impression on me
old man. Something about the dichotomy
of your mangled mechanical motion
and the cobble stone streets of Portland
-and every other city constructed with a bipedal complex-
made about as much sense to me as a lilac shooting
upwards through the parched desert earth. From the other
side of the street I saw your ***** calloused
hands grasping the wheels of your entrapment.
Hands for horses crooked legs for reigns,
your mind harbors the immutable knowledge that your
wheeled prison can't be escaped. But then, for a moment, it happens:
With a desire for movement unparalleled by even the most
diligent of wayfarers you break free from
the confines of immobility.
you are a great steamboat disembarking
from a familiar port, traversing the
***** rivers of black tar and cement,
fires stoked by the thoughts of what was and is no more,
drifting along to the tempo of a softly beating heart and
the feel of a woman's touch....
it pounds and you listen
and you and her are wrapped
tightly under sheets of linen again,
legs intertwined, arms embracing
the undulating curvatures
of a supple young body
and she says she loves you
and you say its requited
and she says we can make it
and you begin to run your
clean youthful fingers through her hair
and then boom,
your ship runs aground
and you once again become enslaved
to your affliction. Upon the curb
you sit old man, stagnant,
face in your ***** hands
thinking of where
you've been
and where you will never go.

Disembodied;
Flesh gains solidity.
Concrete pours into my pose.
Disembarking the ecdysiast
Seething eyes,
Insight projected.
Traveling through tunnel vision.

When over the rail bridge
on the sky autumn blue
clouds floated in cotton pieces

I longed for home.

The port light tower
and the masts of anchored ships
made me keen to reach home
like a sailor long on the sea
disembarking with dreamy eyes
thinking if at all is one home
a tender lip awaiting his sunburned cheek
or if he would retrace to the waves
and someone waiting was only in his head.

I was at Remount Road an old station
with home not really that far
and disproportionately small to my yearning.

I was making a brisk walk
and when at the door
fell into a reverie of
rail bridge
anchored ships on the port
white on the autumn blue
and the small station
Remount Road.

On the train, the "Caretaker of ******* Masses"
Taking classes on fascist *****,
hiding my eyes behind rose-colored glasses
I am in transit:
On the rails between Wayne and the Western Passes
the shellgrasses on the plains
on either side of the train surpasses
the wane of the forest in the distance.
A florist in the aisle peddles her wares
The poorest seated triple-file give her longing glares
"Will you buy some roses today?"
She holds no roses, only hay

Fingers on the arm of the chair
wafting in the smell of her hair-
You there?
Come, my dear, if you dare
quietly, how will you fare
if you hear the words I have for your ears?

She passes, another transaction
supersedes this attraction:
No reaction? No pause.
Even in asking my question withdraws
to the rear compartment.

This line is miles through benign black pines
and white cliffs, stained by time
Every hour she hovers near, marked by the whine
of passersby lamenting their confines-
Every hour fails to entwine us,
so I sit alone with wine and swine.

The conductor tells me we've arrived
but I consider it survived
I've died and revived by the short hand
in anything but repose.
Disembarking, she brushes my sleeve,
then through the crowd on the platform leaves.
Never to receive my rose.

I am disembarking from here,
I have moored my boat here for too long,
I have made to many friends,
I have made more enemies than not,
I have destroyed the place of where I live,
I have wiped it clean of its tolerance,
I burned it to the ground not by my own cause but by talking to each side.

Confused seems to be the new grade.
i've brought it home on my report cards
for years and yet
never allowed it to dampen until now.

It would appear to many that i have
lifted a new blank page from the books
and flailed around senselessly, finally
resorting to casually disembarking the
book on an outward passage through
the plate glass window of the 19th
floor apartment.
It doesn't scream on the way down,
primarily due to the complex fact that
it knew in some way or form that
this day would come eventually.

(Across the street, an old man sat
on a park bench, feeding popcorn
and alka-seltzer to the flocks of
pigeons he attracted.  He watched
the book's swan dive and unapologetically
smiled inside: also so disenchanted that
he too gave himself coal in his
stocking labeled "Dreams.")

i don't smile anymore for them;
makes me sad inside, i guess,
because one day we will be old,
carry our canes arthritically and
look for and reminisce about each,
but who knows if together.

A cemetery with a name only known as “Lost Soul”
Sue who no one really knew
Assumptions but nothing really thought through
Sue was often considered to be a Witch
It was spells enchanted into a wave of hands like a switch
Evil that was always on Sue’s mind
Darkness with no lighted moon in having people think in being blind
But within their own subconscious being sublime
It was in the Old Craven’s house
There was nothing moving, but some lonely mouse
This was the house where Sue dwelled
But as the hour glass turns, it was her wizardry being the tell
Sue was in no way related to previous owners of the house
But some considered her to be a spouse
Spouse or not but mysterious indeed
But please allow me to continue to proceed
Sue lived in the Craven’s house all alone
Why she did in the house wasn’t really known
It wasn’t until a fierce stormy night where spirits were seen disembarking from the Craven’s house
The lightening provided the video screen, and the thunder of evil in what it all could mean
Loud moans and a witch’s ***
Eerie emotions that would be definitely hitting the spot
Sue was pursuing she was a witch
But having no music not needing any pitch
Spells that would tell forgetfulness like a drift of a well
A night of breathless life
Mythical or fiction
The fact remains this was a condition
The unspoken word that was never ever told
Her powers were like a curse from hell
To many doubters, it was a thought of oh well
It was Sue’s forces combatting the evil from within
It was a moment of revenge
But it was no tricks being treats
It was becoming a night that won’t be entirely complete
Heaven holding the answer and hell being the firer ashes
Sue raised her hands to fight the Heavenly skies
But her fate that wasn’t really thinking wise
A lightening bolt having full charge
Sue was struck and died instantly
She was later placed in a grave only known as Sue
The evil was finally over
But did it really come to an end
Hidden spirits vow to come back on the hour of when
Sue’s grave reads, “ Hell has become my home, but I will return to once again roam”
Hell opened her gates, and sue became the fate
But the hour had come, but was it too late
Sue’s last name having no word
You now know and have heard
Utterance having a patient silence
Light guided by the moon, and darkness remembered as only a forever gloom.

It was late the train to oblivion
it screamed into the station of the dead
stopped on a penny farthing
then let off steam in anger

It was the time to say goodbye
time to let sleeping dogs lie
it was time to now deploy
that perfect moment of pure joy

The platform was packed with the hopeful
and in between those cringed the lost
so many relying of springs hope
yet winter did dwell forever here

Embarking and disembarking
braking the chains of servitude
the cost was the written word  
that was strewn all over the tracks

Come my dears to heaven said the driver
yet all the tickets were to hell
and the smoke emanating from the engines
was only sulphur you could smell


By Christos Andreas Kourtis aka NeonSolaris

The highway thru bus to love, and as the curtain has arisen, so is the story.  It’s a hot day in the midst of summer when two musicians are about to find each other, and the analysis of Chemistry 101. The story takes place in Downtown Pittsburgh at the Pittsburgh Transportation Center on Greyhound for a journey to New York City. You see, Judy Smith, an accomplished Pianist is about to venture at Carnegie Hall for a concert. Because Judy hit all the right notes of melody, it was University of Pittsburgh in their amateur night sponsored by the Music department under the guidance of Professor Geoffrey Tuner. Now John Minichiello, an accomplished Violist from the Pittsburgh music arrangement society sponsored by the creator, John Carey. Back in his day, he was an extraordinary Orchestra Leader. Joseph was also going to play at Carnegie Hall.

Before the bus even arrives in New York City, there will be a music harmony of its own having a love tone and tranquility in a relationship in the making while at a Rest Stop. At Gate 18, a Greyhound Prevost with the destination in bold letters, NEW YORK, NY was ready for boarding for a 10:00 am departure. It the trip would take 7 hours. The Greyhound Driver was busy exchanging passenger Tickets at the gate, and the Baggage Handler was loading the bus. Judy Smith was in front of Joseph Minichiello, which he accidentally bumped into Judy Smith, which Joseph apologized, and Judy stated no problem. One begins to wonder, was the bump really an accident or a way of getting Judy Smith’s attention. The bus was backing out of the departure gate on time precisely at 10:00 am. The bus was going through the downtown streets of Pittsburgh heading for the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

Finally, the bus was moving swiftly on the turnpike passing cars and trucks. At about 2:00 pm, a rest stop was made at Breezewood, PA. The Greyhound Driver announced that the rest stop would be for 30 minutes. Oh good, here’s my chance too stretch my legs stated Joseph Minichiello. As all the passengers had gotten off, Joseph Minichiello and Judy Smith seemed too settle for another area of the rest stop, where Judy Smith was reading her music that she was going to play at the concert. Mind you now, none of them knew each other, but that is about to change. Judy looked over her shoulder, and asked Joseph, “What instrument do you play?” and Joseph replied, “The Violin”. Judy responded that she is a Pianist heading for Carnegie Hall. What a coincidence Joseph responded, he told Judy he was heading to Carnegie Hall as well to perform. They talked and talked, and almost missed the bus at the rest stop. They boarded the bus and proceeded onward to New York City. The bus was now on the New Jersey Turnpike. In the distance looking close was too far was New York City. It is now 5:00 pm, and the bus has entered rush hour traffic going into the Lincoln Tunnel. Finally, the Hound bus enters the Lincoln Tunnel heading for the final destination of New York City within the Port Authority Bus Terminal. The bus pulls into Gate 64, which the arrivals are Gates 62 through 66. When everyone is disembarking, Judy Smith asks where Joseph Minichiello is staying, and he said, “He will check into a hotel, but Judy suggested, why don’t you stay with me at the Carnegie Hall Tower complex as her University supplied everything, and Joseph said yes, why not.

It was a subway ride to West 57th Street on the R train. Up they went in the elevator to their room, which had a panoramic view of numerous New York City Skyscrapers, which the Big Apple is known for. Joseph stated he wanted to take a shower. So he showered then later came out of the bathroom in just a towel wrapped around his body. It was wrecking Judy’s senses of curiosity as to what size was under that towel. The ripped abs didn’t help either. Out of the blue, Joseph began to kiss Judy, and she became weak under his spell, and wanted more. Joseph then picked her up, and escorted her to the bedroom for unstoppable loving action, which added the tones of sequence with the playing of her ivories of melody.

The concert is tonight, and the music accompaniment is about to begin. Judy smith on the Piano with soothing sounds of peace and comfort, and on the Violin was Joseph Minichiello call of the wild and embracing the soul into taming the beast from within. Then the entire orchestra joined in for a musical night that for the entire audience that they would never forget. Loud applause and standing ovations rang out. This was a night Judy Smith and Joseph Minichiello will always remember. They played musical notes of their own, but not for the audience. They kissed behind the curtain, and it was music of the skies that brought them together, and the intermittent Hound bus for bringing people together.

I saw you on the plane.
The small crook of your neck turned
outward and resting along the
shoulder-line of another man.
How many lives will it take to shake
your phantoms from my spine?

We made eye contact disembarking and,
awash with turbulent shadows of
an old unyielding guilt, I said nothing.
There is a regret that exists,
deeper and more exacting within the shells
of lives we shake off and carry behind us—
tin cans attached to the wedding car
we will never drive.

On a whim one day we took the car
And drove for miles and miles, quite far
To visit a place, a sanctuary
For cats and dogs and all things hairy

All three of us without a plan
Had never been best friend as man only can
We had no clue when disembarking of all the curs
Alone there skulking and marking

The couple who had come on holiday
Decided to stay when confronted by strays
And in their house they were inundated
With bowls and beds and little bodies mutilated

In one cage a ball of fur hid and retreated
Into the shadows and disappeared
I failed to notice this little hound
Instead shed tears for all around

With anxious steps from Helena and Remy  
We were led to a cage much bigger and roomy
Where inside seemed to hide a huge Bear
Who smiled and sniggered and appeared not to care

This one we took out for a walk
But before that we asked who could not talk
And from the cage the most pitiful thing
With one broken leg and fear heartbreaking

We bundled them both out that day
And bathed and fed and loved them forever
And still today

Disembarking on the shores
                   of roadside curbs,
I look at the distance
of my eloping footsteps.

          Emigrating from that place
now in wishful forgetfulness.
But my anchor fell,  
                 and for now I have arrived.

North of Watford Gap is grim
and even the reaper needs a minder
to go about his business.

Can't say that I agree,
its been tough but fair
to me.

We'll soon be docking,
disembarking at
the quayside of 'new year'
which was named the year that it was new,
it's not new anymore,

seems like everything's like that
South of Watford Gap.

Disembarking like
                         wet snowflakes,
they submerge within me,
laying a blanket of  
                 regrets.
Melting within my physicality,
a stream of motions joining estuaries
of consciousness.
        
And I slumber, woven dreams of
                                    nothingness
                                              encompass me,
swimming in a blizzard of closed senses,
I'm drowning in slower beats, like the
rumbling of thunder slowly fading away
with each rumbling of consciousness.

As the last breath of existence  
                                               falls,
a singular snow flake shatters
                                       within me,
I'm buried in the frailties of my decisions.

I love to sleep with both eyes wide open,

So I can catch my dreams in the real world.

Maybe I just made all this up in my head.

I have written the truest story never told.

I dared to laugh at a joke nobody spoke.

Disembarking the coattails of a trail of smoke.

Where's my car?

I forgot where I parked.

I am lost,

In this labyrinth of thought.

But it is okay.

Maybe this is where I am meant to be,

A place made by me.

title: scandal tilt
body: porous: per & marie 2019:
simultaneously: preserved...

wow!

on my way back from a shift at Craven Cottage... walked through the park with great haste, sweat like a pig prior to slaughter when sitting down on the District Line from Putney Bridge to Victoria... still wearing my jacket... upon disembarking the train, took the jacket off... breathed... allowed my sweaty back to breathe, took off my clip-on tie, undid about three button from the collar down... well... i've been told before that i'm as hairy as a monkey... hairy face, hairy chest, hairy stomach... a Turkish ******* would never mind... we only travelled two stops from Victoria through to Oxford Circus... i have to write the following word in katakana... what... a *******... スカ - SUKA... *****... a female-dog... what's the ideogram of that katakana? no... it's not that simple... SUKA... thank god i was wearing my sunglasses... the Thames bore these two holes for my eyes with the glimmer of the sun being reflected come sunset... i asked my co-worker: Putney Bridge is not the last bridge of... the first bridge of London? he mentioned: isn't there one at Hammersmith? isn't there one at Richmond: i replied? favourite bridge? oh... you that film: from the 1990s... Sliding Doors... the Battersea Bridge? no no... not the Battersea Bridge... that white one, with all those Christmas Lights... it's the Albert Bridge... sure... we know the last Bridge of London is the Tower Bridge... but what bridges are there after Putney?! oh... we're not going into Oxfordshire or... Kingston-upon-Thames... **** that... London, proper... **** me... the map on google reads like some Arabic text: right to left... weird... what comes after Putney... see... when i was living in Edinburgh... at least i knew my bearings... there it was... the shining emblem of the compass... the Firth of Forth... down in London? it's a ******* Bermuda triangle! the ****** just spins and spins... people come from all other i'm like: yeah... "that"... that's not supposed to be there but... "there"...  clueless... sure as ****... after Putney Bridge you get the Hammersmith Bridge... then the Chiswick Bridge... then the Kew Bridge... then the Twickenham Bridge... that's the last proper bridge on the map... London will forever be too disorientating... at least Edinburgh is facing north... London isn't facing any direction on the compass... it just... spins out of control... so i got on the Victoria line at Victoria... two *******... one looking somewhat tame... the other... ooh... what a treat... we were only going as far as Oxford Circus... red hair... some of her's some fake... tattoos on her hands and fingers... she looked like she had piercing in her cheeks in the past... just my type: crazy... unhinged... daddy issues: whatever... and i''m standing there, tired... dead-beat... i just want to get home and drink some whiskey and scribble... about my triumph while helping a few boys sell cookies and brownies for charity by changing around their stall arrangement... because i wasn't put into the stadium to shove a lot of lard around... i'm peering through my sunglasses... oh... wait... she's digging me... oh right... she's one of those girls into the Scandinavian look? oh god, one of these ones... only hours prior i was talking to this Finnish grandfather about sports in general... i'm giving off these whiffs of Viking "beauty"... **** me: and i know what i'm goign to say next: that sort of physiognomy always attracts the happy-tattooed-hands and fingers red hair types of *******... right? where they **** is my ******* Mohawk then?! where the **** are my tattoos... i mean... i've seen dogs with eyes like these... eagerly brown and blooming with joy... any other scenario... we got off at Oxford Circus... i waited a little... she just about ****** off down the North Bakerloo route... i spotted her... obviously... she tried to give a shy glance back: would i follow her... ask her for her number... she had the most amazing: inquisitive eyes... i know... she wanted me to approach her... one of those... magical movie scenes... two strangers on the tube... blah blah... if work didn't **** me off... if i didn't have to make up for it on my own crowds from something within like: self-initiative... just my-******-up-type... no... i went down the Central Line route... travelled to Stratford... got the train to Goodmayes... bought a bottle of 200cl of brandy... some pepsi... some cigarettes... and walked past Chadwell Heath... thinking... about absolutely nothing... well... the "one that god away"... sure... it's not even whether i have the patience... i obviously have the charm... but i know how the conversation would have started and ended... so... you still don't live alone? you don't have a place for me to crash... bring all my belongings to? guess... what... what she said with her eyes... perfect! what she would later say with her tongue? no, i don't want to hear it... beccause i'd be her stereotypical loser... so... why... ******* bother? with those eyes of hers i also received: twice-more with the eyes of the boys i helped to collect more money from selling charity cookies in the park... oh **** me: more! because it was selfless! there was no ******-friction involved!  sure, i could try to rekindle my self (in the reflective, not the reflexive: myself... sense... no... that's long gone... i've aged, i've learned some pretty good lessons of reserve) with a teenage boy i used to be, who would fall asleep listening to Roxette... fading like a flower, watercolours in the rain, blah blah... but this... what's that film? Happiness of a Spotless Mind? Jim Carrey... crazy free spirited girl with red or purple or blue hair... sure... and if, myself, didn't go mad aged 21... entering a church... hearing a choir and then hear a great wind disperse the singing... sure... right now... aged 35... i'd be a proper career-boy... not caring about the lesser people in me... status-orientated... i would easily pick-up these wacko girls left right and centre... and give them a month's worth of... living out the Pretty Woman fantasy... no.. instead i have a personal library in my ivory tower of a bedroom in my parent's house filled with Heidegger's black notebooks... oh man... but this one... she had prettier eyes than an Alsatian's... she gave off whiffs of surprise... could she love me, like i am? torn? perhaps... i forgot to make a reality-check-cheque in my head... better this fleeting interaction... she... infatuated: me indifferent... at least in the moment... obviously now i think about it... sure... some, "alternative" universe... where... we might live an affordable living in... the ******* Shetland Islands caretaking a lighthouse! but my life hasn't been all that predictable to find more unpredictability all of a sudden... some exercise in a vitality for / of life... i just need little pockets of being acknowledged by the other as being recipient of existence... that usually comes along with children and handicapped people... or animals... these three categories always spot me... if i were ******* rising in the hierarchy of the truly insane-sane folk... i'd have to be as mad as a poodle-or-a-toddler's-worth-of-Mozart! ****'s sake... no no no... i'm not buying that trip! **** that... i'm going my own way... to a place where the moon is a skull in the coldness of the night, and come April... there is a whiff of a Magnolia scent in the air! i call it trans-temporal pairing to some cue to a clue to this puzzle... but this one... my god... eyes like a properly bred Alsatian... so endearingly brown... she looked like a teenage girl for a second's worth of flash of time... she just looked so ****** up... like a puzzle box... and with all that make-up she slapped up... Madam Tussauds' replicas saw less... what's the retrospect? i? i'm scared of reality? last time i heard: i've been the one most detached from it... why would i be afraid of reattaching myself to it? the only reality i find comforting is... when i'm surrounded by children, retards or animals... i consider plants as inanimate objects, so no... other thoughts... mother's arthritis... a father coming to the conclusion of this career... nearing retirement... their mortality... my mortality... cinema movie love stories are sort of gone... reality doubles-down... no one was truly with me when i needed help... ergo? i helped myself the best i could... and... i don't need loved-up pretend hitch-hickers... how authentic it might seem... at least when i visit a brothel... no ******* is going to say: oh... another loser... how are losers treated in those Japanese love-hotels because of over-crowding, no-house-building "claustrophobia"?

on my way back from a shift at Craven Cottage...
tired... left the house at quarter to 9am...
came back.. at 8:30pm...
and did what? only a 6 hour shift... got paid...
hmm... good idea... i don't even know...
capitalism... whoever defends it ought to know
that there are rogue companies out there...
the current company i'm working for...
i'm supposedly an employee...
   but... they have... since November of last year...
yet to issue me with a statement to clarify
how many hours i've worked and what i'm to be paid...
they just... transfer money into my bank account:
without any: black on white clarification...
i've already heard stories about the owner and co-owner...
how they profited from the pandemic...
little pawn me... a year... i just need a year...
to get those references... even today i started talking
to this guy about joining another company...
at least that company has an online rubric in place:
where you can book in electronically
rather than rely on some bogus whatsapp messaging...
******* cowboys... meat-heads... the whole lot
of them... no logistical sensibility...
but i've done it since November... i'll wait...
i'm patience... i'll play nice... but today...
oh today was coming... they're behaving like it's
a ******* schoolyard... i'm being punished for having
mentioned already having a university education:
oh god! and a degree in chemistry!
some are studying pretend-law... or whatever *******...
or they have known each other for a bit longer...
or that i'm not talkative: professional... while they
stab each other in the back... or...
i fancy this one girl who started work...
rumours spread that a supervisor is ******* her...
but i approach her with flowers on Valentine's day...
she gets fired... i get sidelined...
          oh i know my place... it's a place that's
called the waiting game...
         but today i was *******... less capable people
were put into positions within the stadium...
me? again: to the ******* park with you...
some might say: oh... he's ben given the easy shift...
yeah... the ****** shift...
   i made due counters... i had to...
by the end of the game a ginger colt that was
ejected during the game... drunk... had nothing better
to do than to sleep in the park... i tended to him...
woke him up... waited with him for his friends to rejoin
him... so half-asleep... i comforted him with:
you team (Coventry) beat Fulham 3 - 1... happy?
he replied... why do all the best games happen when
i'm asleep? well... this must have been the first
in a park in London... you're lucky it was a gorgeous day...
but my pinnacle came when i helped these boys
who were selling homemade bakes for charity...
NSPCC... £1 a pop... but they weren't selling them...
because they position their stall right behind a tree...
so i walked up to them... listen...
you're not going to sell them... you're hiding behind
a tree... here... let's move this stall of yours...
away from the tree... and closer to the route of leaving
fans... and let's also twist the table a little so...
your BAKED-GOODS for CHARITY is facing
the people walking out of the stadium...
    i finished my shift... would you know it...
             from about 30 unsold pieces of dough...
the boys had only 2 left...
           and how they thanked me...
   fine... FINE... if this steward contra SIA hierarchy
is in place... ******* wanks...
i'll do a better job elsewhere... pacifying people...
after all... all those with those SIA badges... licenses...
oh... they know **** all of judo...
they just rush overpower: art of ****...
   first comes the art of reason...
much much later comes any physical interference...
but i'm working with half-wits...
  just because some are bulging... have a voiced-prowess...
gorilla-mating-call-warfare i call it...
they think they have a license to: attend to doors
they build up this superiority-complex...
which is great... i might therefore ask:
not that i have a PhD... but... if you're going to belittle me...
do you have a degree in chemistry?
just today... i picked up a high-viz. orange...
later it was changed to black... i picked up one with
the word: supervisor on it... because it fitted me:
2XL... oh no no... one of the other pawns inquired...
you can't wear that... but it's black...
i was told to change from orange to black...
but this one has the word: SUPERVISOR written on
it... my god... how people have learned to overvalue
themselves... or rather: how have become become
undervalued that they have to have these little battles...
the war is already lost...
whatever ******* Einstein figured this one out...
so at the end of the shift we're about to stand down...
me and my "mate" are park 3... we're looking for park 2...
right... and we're all wearing black vests... black trousers...
black coats... the crowd that's leaving?
well... you know how the English dress...
hardly in the United Colours of Benetton...
or the old way that GAP used to attire people: colourfully...
so... i'm looking for a black moth
among a cloud of dark grey moths... great!
******* genius! like i said:
i'm working with ******* meat-heads...
i'd like to say retards but they are too bulky and too angry
and too ready to stance themselves as BIG
rather than arm themselves with cunning...
o.k. o.k. work... but i got the upper hand...
i helped those boys sell those cookies... cakes... whatever...
out of their stash... we just moved the table away
from the tree... shifted it so the sign was more apparent
and... hey presto! NSPCC got its fair share...
and... my reward? the sweetest thank you any man
can receive... the outstanding look on a young boys face
that a stranger is capable of helping (him)...
that's ******* priceless... i'm writing about all those
petty squabble prior... but... that thank you:
that look of longing for hope in the future...
that's mine... i own that... or that tenderness of
the drunk boy who was sleeping in the park
waiting for the game to finish... while i gentle touched
his leg to wake him up... that too...
i don't need physical confrontation when i can:
appease... comfort... all those adrenaline junkies...
those... amphetamine-anabolic-steroid: former prison
guard types... whatever...
i know one decent move that could floor anyone...
you make a cross with your thumbs... while pretending
to pray... with these hands... you grip someone
by the knuckles... pressing the thumbs into the hand...
and twist... i forgot martial art i learned that from...
i left the classes after i was kicked in the *****...
and curled into a foetal position: after i refused to:
shout HA-YA! when pretending to punch and throwing
kicks while marching forward...
****** lessons in martial arts... getting kicked in the *****...
but... i write this... like...
like i will never go to the gym and pump weights...
just give me 2 hours on a bicycle...
doing some press-ups...
and once the shift it gone... having being paired
with this "mate" of mine:
he'll reply: it was nice working with you...
and you sort of know it's almost...
when he tries to sell you an alternative
job to the current you're working at...
because... it's "CAPITALISM":
   i too heard... didn't you hear?
if you have the right sort of a microphone...
and you put it up to a dog's *******
when the dog's running...
you can... hear... ******* the tune of:
jingle-bells!
didn't you know?!
   esp. that version from Lethal Weapon...
      one ****, count one two...
two's a ****'s worth... three and four and by five:
grr... what's not to love about
life and all the arguments for the status quo
of all those people that always go ahead
and gear up the tide of: away away we go:
leaving the rest of the idiots behind...
           tear-jerking psychologists with an audience
of soft-cookie:
those types that ought to be hard-on
digestives... instead... they get dunked into tea...
i burp... what... a cushion my crap and crab
on the inside out...
rather than harden it with the exoskeleton
of the outside in...
            little ******* London adventure of... perhaps
Romance... but... most probably:
probably not.

i mean: you know how the joke goes?
when you diagnose someone as having lost touch
with reality?
and then... too many people have lost touch with reality?
the supposed loss of reality of the individual...
transpires like a phantom: clout...
why were people supposing that, "i" became detached
from reality?! huh?! why are these people
wearing pseudo-niqab nappies on their faces
when almost pretending to be: trainspotting?!
huh?!
           i'm schizophrenic... what about all these...
covert... hidden... undiagnosed hyperchondriacs?
i thought i was just a bilingual...
oh... right... the mono-lingual normies of England...
sure... "we" can follow-up with that...
"you" try to destroy "me"...
"we'll" come after "you":
gender neutral? one's a ROYAL:
one and we...
                anything to: bypass the ******* rap!
investment from years... years ago...
always invest in children...
you never know when they'll come around to
protect you against the elders
or... more importantly...
your contemporaries...
                always invest in children...
         their presence is a future forward:
kinder:
      immer invertieren im kinder...
   ihr(e) gegenwart ist ein zukunft: ein fließen!
i'm guessing...
unlike in Deutsche...
a(n) apple... savvy?

           i truly wish... i truly... want to believe
beyond the told ties of the heart to:
all the discomforts of reality checks...
that i could possibly come to the splendours of
illusion on a whim:
and keep such whims within the confines
of illusion... without having to have to reality
check them back with...
items of "reciprocated" gratitude...
for the "good life"... oh what a sweet little whisper...
and... if i were a painter...
what a Francis Bacon horror i would possibly
conjure with the aid of cubism...
such trivial times are beyond us...
dog have eyes and the levelled certainty as such...
women just have the spontaneity...
there's no Bonaparte behind them...
no suicide quest for Moscow... no... chains and harship...
believe whatever psychologists you want...
pop, piquant... whatever... piquant: i.e. niche...
whatever... no one helped me through my 20s...
now in my mid 30s...
i've finally reached a pinnacle of being attractive...
during transit... but i know it's all a veneer...
behind my visage there ought to be some
******* miraculous story where...
i'd probably invite her back to my flat...
where i live alone... blah blah...
                i own too many books...
   i prefer the safety net of prostitutes...
at least they love me for the way i **** them...
with the intensity of the moment...
i posit: carpe diem... and make an hour last
a certainty... i don't need this *******'s worth
of timid courtship... no thank you...
i waited long enough... i waited too long...
no more...
              i'm done... i'm going to brush my "Greek" nose
up a little more... with arrogance and say...
when i needed you? you weren't there...
now... that you might, perhaps want me?
no... i don't need you...
           you know what i really need?
strangers! i need to interact with as many people
as possible! i can't be bothered with living a life
for some... exclusive relationship!
i need... the most inclusive: selfless relationship!
a... motto akin to:
liebe für das volk!
               if not in Deutsche... then in Latin?

AMOR ENIM POPULUS!

who else? who else can one love?
if one has been denied the excusive rights to love a woman
in one's youth?
as one ages... being denied such a right?
one can only grow to abound in loving:
the people! how else is one to survive?
   what? the same old: "missing"... "mythological":
"exclusive": female?
learn from Adolf ******! LIEBE DAS VOLK!
                  you haven't been given exclusive rights
to counterpart individual...
and... to be honest... inclusivity is stressed by both
status of wife / bus-driver in terms of how
universality is to be expressed on the ground:
all are to be treated equally...
alles ar zu sein behandelt gleichermaßen,
id est: gott! mit! uns!

             i have no one to love... i truly do, not,
so why... keep myself deluded in some...
waiting game of exclusivity?!
   why not freely pass into a medium of selfless
inclusivity?! why... not love: as freely...
and as painfully... as a sparrow might...
the dawn of spring... and the midnight or some:
forgotten hour(s): to come...
    i'm too old to find exclusive love...
to pair-bond... i'm too old... i know the frosty bite
of reality... but at least i can love inclusively...
like a Jesus Christ... like an Adolf ******...
what?! they're... that ******* far apart?! i don't...
*******... ****-ing... think so...
       i'm more comfortable with inclusive love-affairs
where i can be forever pillar... cold...
less-spoken that could be expected...
    my 20s... i never had them...
                    my 30s just about returned...
and now i'm interacting with people in their 40s
and 50s... and all i have in my mind is...
a cat... in musketeer type of boots...
kicking a rat into a sewer... why?
because... that's seems... just about... GERECHT!

To lonely, bent Charon, it seemed
As though beneath the sunless sky
The waveless River somehow gleamed
With light unseen. A long, soft sigh

Breathed like wind over the dead fields
As there approached One who, sunlike,
Crested the fort that never yields;
Pale Death o’ercome by One unlike

Any that yet had passed these shores.
Strange sight! A naked king, each hand
And foot marked deep with cruel red sores,
Addresses the ageless Styx and

Meets the ferryman’s soulless gaze
With eyes whose irises of gold
Seem to encompass endless days.
Before Eternity the Old

One flinches; his strength cannot bear
To match for long seconds the weight
Of the Stranger’s undying stare.
A trembling seizes him - a great

Terror swallows the ferryman.
“What hast Thou to do with us? Thou
Who opens the door, and none can
Close?” The Visitor waits. “And how

“Can I grant Thee passage, and see
Such light made food for my fell lord?”
Then lo, having finished his plea,
Charon resolves to keep his word

And carry out his solemn task.
But still, as he takes up his oar
He glances up, as though to ask
His charge for some sign, some word, or

Anything that might give him peace.
The Sojourner answers: “I will
That your master’s reign should now cease;
So go, then, that we may fulfill

“All righteousness.” Thus He boarded
The morbid ark, and a low wail
Creaked from boards which ‘neath the sordid
Weight of lost souls were used to sail.

Thus the ferryman sets out, he
Navigates rivers men have wept,
Plying across the morbid sea;
Meanwhile, the Guest lay down and slept.

Before an hour in Death’s domain
Had passed upon the waters, all
Ears were pricked by a cry of pain;
The Styx let out a plaintive call

And shuddered while the shuddering
O’ercame the ferryman as well
For ne’er was dread Styx known to sing
And ne’er before did whimper Hell.

Then, falling at the Master’s knee
Charon woke the Sleeper and cried
Aloud: “O Lord! Depart from me,
A poor wretch!” The Passenger sighed,

Looked up, and with a quiet, bold
Command He rebuked the River
And all fell silent. Blood ran cold
In the guide’s black veins, a shiver

Gripped him as they approached the shore
Where on the nearing beach there stood
A company of phantoms, for
Their dry bones ached for Him who would

With beautiful feet step onto
The sepulchral sands to declare
That doleful ghosts shall be made new,
Allowed to breathe the Heav’nly air.

**! Life’s Author disembarking!
Thund’rous Life into Satan’s hall!
Death, shattered, kneels before the King!
His Heart oped, Hades proves too small!

The vault of Hell’s bleak sky does shake
And burst, for the Word has spoken
With grave finality: “Awake
Now, arise! The Dawn has broken!”

Summer rites
Reinvented pastimes
Happy days of yellow
Fringed with sea-foam green

Mountains of tomorrow
Holding fast at sundown
Burgeoning beginnings
Awakening each day

Reflections in a shadow
Of mist forever rising
As dawn predicts a new day
With lazy afternoons

Forgetting stress of winter
Seasonal sensations
Dow Jones disembarking
To quieter retreats

The mantra of the summer
Mixed in pure reflection
Of happy ever after
Perfecting summer rites

6/28/19

www.brucelevine.com
https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B07485W4Q1

Who didst unknowingly, unquestionably,
and unwittingly script vitality
and the prologue to Thanksgiving,
(which theme poem initially written)
about three hundred and ninety seven years,
and nine months after February third 1621,
yet genesis of American November tradition
pronouncing Meleagris gallopavo domestico
sacrificial bird spurred them to revolt enmasse.

Wise no adulation, dedication and gratification
not emphasized the other three hundred
and sixty four days a year
question their role as consumed
end product of taxidermist,
gnome hatter clucks fie against industry where
when thanksgiving gobbledygook brouhaha
glib lets deified whereat
a countless range of turkeys sacrificed veer

rill lee with commendable,
gratuitous and laudatory plaudits
bequeathed to the cook,
who held as the grand umpire
calling bastes time to bring in the pitcher -
though such an action tends
tubby viewed as fowl, with tail feathers there
be fluttering in sync with shutterfly flapping
at least one angry bird

sent to the slaughterhouse -
whose peck within four square
foot locker enclosure
breeds base sill wrath bone,
which Birdseye view dispensed,
though tis grim fate
doth behoove turkeys to rear
up and protest their predestination
forbidding grim intuition

via special Turkish communication
from axe of cruelty,
the butcher will not deem queer
yet questions pop up why
this singular twenty four hour
Fitbit of time fosters the people
to summon beneficence,
and when whatsapp did appear
rent lee clinched this American custom

squawks back hundreds of years
sans "The First Thanksgiving,"
a spontaneous oscillometer
ocular venerated, feted,
and celebrated requisitioned,
when Governor William Bradford
organized a three-day long feast near
the tip of Cape Cod,
which was too far north
of intended destination.

One month later,
they made maximum headway
to Massachusetts Bay
celebrated Native Americans friends,
the year 1621 feasted
between Pilgrims and Wampanoag
at Plymouth Colony a green day
(know your enemy unsung)
arbitrarily chose spread of turkey,
waterfowl, venison, fish, lobster,

clams, berries, fruit, pumpkin,
and squash mebbe fish fillet
Thanksgiving, currently celebrated
on the fourth Thursday
in November by federal legislation
in 1941 recalling hooray,
or more particularly regaling
the maiden voyage 1620
viz a ship called the Mayflower

ambitiously disembarking stalked
by death and injury
from Plymouth, England
for the New World
after a difficult battle at sea
that lasted 66 days;
the 102 passengers roped a deejay,
which essentially doubled up as conductor,
and struck up psalm songs

for a guiding buoyant gull
they named Oak Kay
of the Mayflower landed near
and the Pilgrims began
to build a new home at Plymouth,
whence an annual tradition hay
begat by founding fathers and Mother Nature
incorporating some marketing spin,
thence United States

by presidential proclamation and fiat Gerry
rigged obeisance (essentially honoring
those brave hearts
that dared traverse
the Atlantic Ocean
without life jackets nor a whit,
they didst courageously ferry
themselves in a rickety craft
(where many perished at sea)

since 1863, and state legislation
since Founding Fathers donned gray
powdered wigs (served
to trumpet political stance)
forging fledgling colonies
slated crude establishments and primitive bidet
wrought forth from deep
within the bowels
of fecund fields broke ranks with Britain,
and pioneered United States array.

Throw away forever
In favor of eternal
Lay to rest
The mortal soul
In deathless pages
Of this journal
Join me now
In disembarking
From compassion’s hesitance
Your empathy is not a weakness
But a conduit to this
Commiseration
Correlation
Know you feel me
Just afraid
To ever deign
To stand before me
And confess you feel the same

wenn du lange in einen abgrund blickst, blickt der abgrund auch in dich hinein

I
as a child you painted the sun
shining with your burning smile

you sang in school halls,
sailor laced pubs and broken bottle bars

in button-up paisley shirts
and alligator boots your moves shocked electric

skull composed rock n roll rhythms mixed,
blending with blues to fret board machine gun shots

reaching beyond the realm of ocean and sand
standing on the shoulders of giants

drinking and bathing in the ancient fruit
your mind hypnotized, floating through the cosmos

supernova sensations exploding, shining
into looping black hole visions of the afterlife

walking in the darkness of a steel moon
a shadow illuminated over hades from bare balconies

II
school was a prison
blurred by dimming medication,
your prism mind
strapped in a straitjacket

mechanical marching orders
fell on deaf ears
a broken cacophony
sparking flames in the rain
where weeds grew with flowers
dancing in the breeze
setting Eden alight

III
riding on the smoke train
from green stations
and university radio studios
until the tracks turned white
disembarking the disenchantment highway

facing the music
saving face
one less grave with your name

IV
you gave your jacket to grey bearded vagrant
naked, hysterical, freezing on the streets

waves of disease blew across oceans
hitting you homeless and clothesless, drowning

war tore through towns, crippling the lost
while your inner tug of war, ripped the seams

ink reflections swim on those pages
revealing the cost of eternal darkness

phoenix rise from cigarette ash ******* heaps
get back on your feet before you fall deeper

the monsters you face aim to take your place
from a mirror to the underworld, dragging you beneath

shine once again
shine one last time before the end
shine on
everlong.

                  jeder, der mit monstern kämpft, sollte sicherstellen, dass sie selbst kein monster werden

Boarded the same train
Striking out at different stations
Disembarking on their destinations
These are Saints famous quotations

Guard waves the flag
Whistle blows and train moves
Wheels rolling on the tracks pulling carriages one by one

Waiting for none
Father mother son
Safely till terminus
Source or end not its business

This is the Anectode
Told as an antidote
Paradigm of reality
Remain balanced emotionally

Harsh in its execution
To its duty alone devotion
Needles move to declare
Time to leave fair and square

Loosing loved ones
Easily said than done
Unless heart made of stone
Rest of an living life live  alone

Missing the ones
Not left as bygones
Core of any philosophy
The message it carries

Permanence in temporary
Reality in reality
Realising the reality
Temporal is temporary

Real and unreal
Permanent and temporary
Dream and reality
Rebirth and Salvation

Clueless at arrival
Clueless in queue
Clueless as traveller
Clueless in departure

How does it matter
Near and dear exit earlier
Everyone is exciting for sure
No exception no answer

Pulling the chain
Trains holy grail
Hangs as temptation
No points for engaging in that action

Be the driver
Engaging in his endevour
Uniform and recruited as soldier
He too exits but till then deliver