Like a psychotic docent in the wilderness,
I will not speak in perfect Ciceronian cadences.
I draw my voice from a much deeper cistern,
Preferring the jittery synaptic archive,
So sublimely unfiltered, random and profane.
And though I am sequestered now,
Confined within the walls of a gated, golf-coursed,
Over-55 lunatic asylum (for Active Seniors I am told),
I remain oddly puerile,
Remarkably refreshed and unfettered.  
My institutionalization self-imposed,
Purposed for my own serenity, and also the safety of others.
Yet I abide, surprisingly emancipated and frisky.
I may not have found the peace I seek,
But the quiet has mercifully come at last.

The nexus of inner and outer space is context for my story.
I was born either in Brooklyn, New York or Shungopavi, Arizona,
More of intervention divine than census data.
Shungopavi: a designated place for tribal statistical purposes.
Shungopavi: an ovine abbatoir and shaman’s cloister.
The Hopi: my mother’s people, a state of mind and grace,
Deftly landlocked, so cunningly circumscribed,
By both interior and outer Navajo boundaries.
The Navajo: a coyote trickster people; a nation of sheep thieves,
Hornswoggled and landlocked themselves,
Subsumed within three of the so-called Four Corners:
A 3/4ths compromise and covenant,
Pickled in firewater, swaddled in fine print,
A veritable swindle concocted back when the USA
Had Manifest Destiny & mayhem on its mind.

The United States: once a pubescent synthesis of blood and thunder,
A bold caboodle of trooper spit and polish, unwashed brawlers, Scouts and      
Pathfinders, mountain men, numb-nut ne'er-do-wells,
Buffalo Bills & big-balled individualists, infected, insane with greed.
According to the Gospel of His Holiness Saint Zinn,
A People’s’ History of the United States: essentially state-sponsored terrorism,
A LAND RUSH grabocracy, orchestrated, blessed and anointed,
By a succession of Potomac sharks, Great White Fascist Fathers,
Far-Away-on-the Bay, the Bay we call The Chesapeake.
All demented national patriarchs craving lebensraum for God and country.
The USA: a 50-state Leviathan today, a nation jury-rigged,
Out of railroad ties, steel rails and baling wire,
Forged by a litany of lies, rapaciousness and ******,
And jaw-torn chunks of terra firma,
Bites both large and small out of our well-****** Native American ***.

Or culo, as in va’a fare in culo (literally "go do it in the ***")
Which Italian Americans pronounce as fongool.
The language center of my brain,
My sub-cortical Broca’s region,
So fraught with such semantic misfires,
And autonomic linguistic seizures,
Compel acknowledgement of a father’s contribution,
To both the gene pool and the genocide.
Columbus Day:  a conspicuously absent holiday out here in Indian Country.
No festivals or Fifth Avenue parades.
No excuse for ethnic hoopla. No guinea feast. No cannoli. No tarantella.
No excuse to not get drunk and not **** your sister-in-law.
Emphatically a day for prayer and contemplation,
A day of infamy like Pearl Harbor and 9/11,
October 12, 1492: not a discovery; an invasion.

Growing up in Brooklyn, things were always different for me,
Different in some sort of redskin/****/****--
Choose Your Favorite Ethnic Slur-sort of way.
The American Way: dehumanization for fun and profit.
Melting *** anonymity and denial of complicity with evil.
But this is no time to bring up America’s sordid past,
Or, a personal pet peeve: Indian Sovereignty.
For Uncle Sam and his minions, an ever-widening, conveniently flexible concept,
Not a commandment or law,
Not really a treaty or a compact,
Or even a business deal.  Let’s get real:
It was not even much in the way of a guideline.
Just some kind of an advisory, a bulletin or newsletter,
Could it merely have been a free-floating suggestion?
Yes, that’s it exactly: a suggestion.

Over and under halcyon American skies,
Over and around those majestic purple mountain peaks,
Those trapped in poetic amber waves of wheat and oats,
Corn and barley, wheat shredded and puffed,
Corn flaked and milled, Wheat Chex and Wheaties, oats that are little Os;
Kix and Trix, Fiber One, and Kashi-Go-Lean, Lucky Charms and matso *****,
Kreplach and kishka,
Polenta and risotto.
Our cantaloupe and squash patch,
Our fruited prairie plain, our delicate ecological Eden,
In balance and harmony with nature, as Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce instructs:
“These white devils are not going to,
Stop ****** and killing, cheating and eating us,
Until they have the whole ******* enchilada.
I’m talking about ‘from sea to shining sea.’”

“I fight no more forever,” Babaloo.
So I must steer this clunky keelboat of discovery,
Back to the main channel of my sad and starry demented river.
My warpath is personal but not historical.
It is my brain’s own convoluted cognitive process I cannot saavy.
Whatever biochemical or—as I suspect more each day—
Whatever bio-mechanical protocols govern my identity,
My weltanschauung: my world-view, as sprechen by proto-Nazis;
Putz philosophers of the 17th, 18th & 19th century.
The German intelligentsia: what a cavalcade of maniacal *******!
Why is this Jew unsurprised these Zarathustra-fueled Übermenschen . . .
Be it the Kaiser--Caesar in Deutsch--Bismarck, ******, or,
Even that Euro-*****,  Angela Merkel . . . Why am I not surprised these Huns,
Get global grab-*** on the sauerbraten cabeza every few generations?
To be, or not to be the ***** bullgoose loony: GOTT.

Biomechanical protocols govern my identity and are implanted while I sleep.
My brain--my weak and weary CPU--is replenished, my discs defragmented.
A suite of magnetic and optical white rooms, cleansed free of contaminants,
Gun mounts & lifeboat stations manned and ready,
Standing at attention and saluting British snap-style,
Snap-to and heel click, ramrod straight and cheerful: “Ready for duty, Sir.”
My mind is ravenous, lusting for something, anything to process.
Any memory or image, lyric or construct,
Be they short-term dailies or deeply imprinted.
Fixations archived one and all in deep storage time and space.
Memories, some subconscious, most vaporous;
Others--the scary ones—eidetic: frighteningly detailed and extraordinarily vivid.
Precise cognitive transcripts; recollected so richly rife and fresh.
Visual, auditory, tactile, gustatory, and olfactory reloads:
Queued up and increasingly re-experienced.

The bio-data of six decades: it’s all there.
People, countless, places and things cataloged.
Every event, joy and trauma enveloped from within or,
Accessed externally from biomechanical storage devices.
The random access memory of a lifetime,
Read and recollected from cerebral repositories and vaults,
All the while the entire greedy process overseen,
Over-driven by that all-subservient British bat-man,
Rummaging through the data in batches small and large,
Internal and external drives working in seamless syncopation,
Self-referential, at times paradoxical or infinitely looped.
“Cogito ergo sum."
Descartes stripped it down to the basics but there’s more to the story:
Thinking about thinking.
A curse and minefield for the cerebral:  metacognition.

No, it is not the fact that thought exists,
Or even the thoughts themselves.
But the information technology of thought that baffles me,
As adaptive and profound as any evolution posited by Darwin,
Beyond the wetware in my skull, an entirely new operating system.
My mental and cultural landscape are becoming one.
Machines are connecting the two.
It’s what I am and what I am becoming.
Once more for emphasis:
It is the information technology of who I am.
It is the operating system of my mental and cultural landscape.
It is the machinery connecting the two.
This is the central point of this narrative:
Metacognition--your superego’s yenta Cassandra,
Screaming, screaming in your psychic ear, your good ear:

“LISTEN:  The machines are taking over, taking you over.
Your identity and train of thought are repeatedly hijacked,
Switched off the main line onto spurs and tangents,
Only marginally connected or not at all.
(Incoming TEXT from my editor: “Lighten Up, Giuseppi!”)
Reminding me again that most in my audience,
Rarely get past the comic page. All righty then: think Calvin & Hobbes.
John Calvin, a precocious and adventurous six-year old boy,
Subject to flights of 16th Century French theological fancy.
Thomas Hobbes, a sardonic anthropomorphic tiger from 17th Century England,
Mumbling about life being “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.”
Taken together--their antics and shenanigans--their relationship to each other,
Remind us of our dual nature; explore for us broad issues like public education;
The economy, environmentalism & the Global ****** Thermometer;
Not to mention the numerous flaws of opinion polls.



And again my editor TEXTS me, reminds me again: “LIGHTEN UP!”
Consoling me:  “Even Shakespeare had to play to the groundlings.”
The groundlings, AKA: The Rabble.
Yes. Even the ******* Bard, even Willie the Shake,
Had to contend with a decidedly lowbrow copse of carrion.
Oh yes, the groundlings, a carrion herd, a flying flock of carrion seagulls,
Carrion crow, carrion-feeders one and all,
And let’s throw Sheryl Crow into the mix while we’re at it:
“Hit it! This ain't no disco. And it ain't no country club either, this is L.A.”  

                  Send "All I Wanna Do" Ringtone to your Cell              

Once more, I digress.
The Rabble:  an amorphous, gelatinous Jabba the Hutt of commonality.
The Rabble: drunk, debauched & lawless.
Too *****-delicious to stop Bill & Hilary from thinking about tomorrow;
Too Paul McCartney My Love Does it Good to think twice.

The Roman Saturnalia: a weeklong **** fest.
The Saturnalia: originally a pagan kink-fest in honor of the deity Saturn.
Dovetailing nicely with the advent of the Christian era,
With a project started by Il Capo di Tutti Capi,
One of the early popes, co-opting the Roman calendar between 17 and 25 December,
Putting the finishing touches on the Jesus myth.
For Brooklyn Hopi-***-Jew baby boomers like me,
Saturnalia manifested itself as Disco Fever,
Unpleasant years of electrolysis, scrunched ***** in tight polyester
For Roman plebeians, for the great unwashed citizenry of Rome,
Saturnalia was just a great big Italian wedding:
A true family blowout and once-in-a-lifetime ego-trip for Dad,
The father of the bride, Vito Corleone, Don for A Day:
“Some think the world is made for fun and frolic,
And so do I! Funicula, Funiculi!”

America: love it or leave it; my country right or wrong.
Sure, we were citizens of Rome,
But any Joe Josephus spending the night under a Tiber bridge,
Or sleeping off a three day drunk some afternoon,
Up in the Coliseum bleachers, the cheap seats, out beyond the monuments,
The original three monuments in the old stadium,
Standing out in fair territory out in center field,
Those three stone slabs honoring Gehrig, Huggins, and Babe.
Yes, in the house that Ruth built--Home of the Bronx Bombers--***?
Any Joe Josephus knows:  Roman citizenship doesn’t do too much for you,
Except get you paxed, taxed & drafted into the Legion.
For us the Roman lifestyle was HIND-*** humble.
We plebeians drew our grandeur by association with Empire.
Very few Romans and certainly only those of the patrician class lived high,
High on the hog, enjoying a worldly extravaganza, like—whom do we both know?

Okay, let’s say Laurence Olivier as Crassus in Spartacus.
Come on, you saw Spartacus fifteen ******* times.
Remember Crassus?
Crassus: that ***** twisted **** trying to get his freak on with,
Tony Curtis in a sunken marble tub?
We plebes led lives of quiet *****-scratching desperation,
A bunch of would-be legionnaires, diseased half the time,
Paid in salt tablets or baccala, salted codfish soaked yellow in olive oil.
Stiffs we used to call them on New Year’s Eve in Brooklyn.
Let’s face it: we were hyenas eating someone else’s ****,
Stage-door jackals, Juvenal-come-late-lies, a mob of moronic mook boneheads
Bought off with bread & circuses and Reality TV.
Each night, dished up a wide variety of lowbrow Elizabethan-era entertainments.  
We contemplate an evening on the town, downtown—
(cue Petula Clark/Send "Downtown" Ringtone to your Cell)

On any given London night, to wit:  mummers, jugglers, bear & bull baiters.
How about dog & **** fighters, quoits & skittles, alehouses & brothels?
In short, somewhere, anywhere else,
Anywhere other than down along the Thames,
At Bankside in Southwark, down in the Globe Theater mosh pit,
Slugging it out with the groundlings whose only interest,
In the performance is the choreography of swordplay and stale ****** puns.
Meanwhile, Hugh Fennyman--probably a fellow Jew,
An English Renaissance Bugsy Siegel or Mickey Cohen—
Meanwhile Fennyman, the local mob boss is getting his ya-yas,
Roasting the feet of my text-messaging editor, Philip Henslowe.
Poor and pathetic Henslowe, works on commission, always scrounging,
But a true patron of my craft, a gentleman of infinite jest and patience,
Spiritual subsistence, and every now and then a good meal at some,
Sawdust joint with oyster shells, and a Prufrockian silk purse of T.S. Eliot gold.

Poor, pathetic Henslowe, trussed up by Fennyman,
His editorial feet in what looks like a Japanese hibachi.
Henslowe’s feet to the fire--feet to the fire—get it?
A catchy phrase whose derivation conjures up,
A grotesque yet vivid image of torture,
An exquisite insight into how such phrases ingress the idiom,
Not to mention a scene once witnessed at a secret Romanian CIA prison,
I’d been ordered to Bucharest not long after 9/11,
Handling the rendition and torture of Habib Ghazzawy,

An entirely innocent falafel maker from Steinway Street, Astoria, Queens.
Shock the Monkey: it’s what we do. GOTO:
Peter Gabriel - Shock the Monkey/
(HQ music video) - YouTube//
www.youtube.com/
Poor, pathetic, ******-on Henslowe.


Fennyman :  (his avarice is whet by something Philly screams out about a new script)  "A play takes time. Find actors; Rehearsals. Let's say open in three weeks. That's--what--five hundred groundlings at tuppence each, in addition four hundred groundlings tuppence each, in addition four hundred backsides at three pence--a penny extra for a cushion, call it two hundred cushions, say two performances for safety how much is that Mr. Frees?"
Jacobean Tweet, John (1580-1684) Webster:  “I saw him kissing her bubbies.”

It’s Geoffrey Rush, channeling Henslowe again,
My editor, a singed smoking madman now,
Feet in an ice bucket, instructing me once more:
“Lighten things up, you know . . .
Comedy, love and a bit with a dog.”
I digress again and return to Hopi Land, back to my shaman-monastic abattoir,
That Zen Center in downtown Shungopavi.
At the Tribal Enrolment Office I make my case for a Certificate of Indian Blood,
Called a CIB by the Natives and the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs.
The BIA:  representing gold & uranium miners, cattle and sheep ranchers,
Sodbusters & homesteaders; railroaders and dam builders since 1824.
Just in time for Andrew Jackson, another false friend of Native America,
Just before Old Hickory, one of many Democratic Party hypocrites and scoundrels,
Gives the FONGOOL, up the CULO go ahead.
Hey Andy, I’ve got your Jacksonian democracy: Hanging!
The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) mission is to:   "… enhance the quality of life, to promote economic opportunity, and to carry out the responsibility to protect and improve the trust assets of American Indians, Indian tribes, and Alaska Natives. What’s that in the fine print?  Uncle Sammy holds “the trust assets of American Indians.”

Here’s a ******* tip, Geronimo: if he trusted you,
It would ALL belong to you.
To you and The People.
But it’s all fork-tongued white *******.
If true, Indian sovereignty would cease to be a sick one-liner,
Cease to be a blunt force punch line, more of,
King Leopold’s 19th Century stand-up comedy schtick,
Leo Presents: The **** of the Congo.
La Belgique mission civilisatrice—
That’s what French speakers called Uncle Leo’s imperial public policy,
Bringing the gift of civilization to central Africa.
Like Manifest Destiny in America, it had a nice colonial ring to it.
“Our manifest destiny [is] to overspread the continent,
Allotted by Providence for the free development,
Of our yearly multiplying millions.”  John L. O'Sullivan, 1845

Our civilizing mission or manifest destiny:
Either/or, a catchy turn of phrase;
Not unlike another ironic euphemism and semantic subterfuge:
The Pacification of the West; Pacification?
Hardly: decidedly not too peaceful for Cochise & Tonto.
Meanwhile, Madonna is cash rich but disrespected Evita poor,
To wit: A ****** on the Rocks (throwing in a byte or 2 of Da Vinci Code).
Meanwhile, Miss Ciccone denied her golden totem *****.
They snubbed that little guinea ****, didn’t they?
Snubbed her, robbed her rotten.
Evita, her magnum opus, right up there with . . .
Her SNL Wayne’s World skit:
“Get a load of the unit on that guy.”
Or, that infamous MTV Music Video Awards stunt,
That classic ***** Lip-Lock with Britney Spears.

How could I not see that Oscar snubola as prime evidence?
It was just another stunning case of American anti-Italian racial animus.
Anyone familiar with Noam Chomsky would see it,
Must view it in the same context as the Sacco & Vanzetti case,
Or, that arbitrary lynching of 9 Italian-Americans in New Orleans in 1891,
To cite just two instances of anti-Italian judicial reach & mob violence,
Much like what happened to my cousin Dominic,
Gang-***** by the Harlem Globetrotters, in their locker room during halftime,
While he working for Abe Saperstein back in 1952.
Dom was doing advance for Abe, supporting creation of The Washington Generals:
A permanent stable of hoop dream patsies and foils,
Named for the ever freewheeling, glad-handing, backslapping,
Supreme Commander Allied Expeditionary Force (SCAEF), himself,
Namely General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the man they liked,
And called IKE: quite possibly a crypto Jew from Abilene.

Of course, Harry Truman was my first Great White Fascist Father,
Back in 1946, when I first opened my eyes, hung up there,
High above, looking down from the adobe wall.
Surveying the entire circular kiva,
I had the best seat in the house.
Don’t let it be said my Spider Grandmother or Hopi Corn Mother,
Did not want me looking around at things,
Discovering what made me special.
Didn’t divine intervention play a significant part of my creation?
Knowing Mamma Mia and Nonna were Deities,
Gave me an edge later on the streets of Brooklyn.
The Cradleboard: was there ever a more divinely inspired gift to human curiosity? The Cradleboard: a perfect vantage point, an infant’s early grasp,
Of life harmonious, suspended between Mother Earth and Father Sky.
Simply put: the Hopi should be running our ******* public schools.

But it was IKE with whom I first associated,
Associated with the concept 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
I liked IKE. Who didn’t?
What was not to like?
He won the ******* war, didn’t he?
And he wasn’t one of those crazy **** John Birchers,
Way out there, on the far right lunatic Republican fringe,
Was he? (It seems odd and nearly impossible to believe in 2013,
That there was once a time in our Boomer lives,
When the extreme right wing of the Republican Party
Was viewed by the FBI as an actual threat to American democracy.)
Understand: it was at a time when The FBI,
Had little ideological baggage,
But a great appetite for secrets,
The insuppressible Jay Edgar doing his thang.

IKE: of whom we grew so, oh-so Fifties fond.
Good old reliable, Nathan Shaking IKE:
He’d been fixed, hadn’t he? Had had the psychic snip.
Snipped as a West Point cadet & parade ground martinet.
Which made IKE a good man to have in a pinch,
Especially when crucial policy direction was way above his pay grade.
Cousin Dom was Saperstein’s bagman, bribing out the opposition,
Which came mainly from religious and patriotic organizations,
Viewing the bogus white sports franchise as obscene.
The Washington Generals, Saperstein’s new team would have but one opponent,
And one sole mission: to serve as the **** of endless jokes and sight gags for—
Negroes.  To play the chronic fools of--
Negroes.  To be chronically humiliated and insulted by—
Negroes.  To run up and down the boards all night, being outran by—
Negroes.  Not to mention having to wear baggy silk shorts.



Meadowlark Lemon:  “Yeah, Charlie, we ***** that grease-ball Dominic; we shagged his guinea mouth and culo rotten.”  

(interviewed in his Scottsdale, AZ winter residence in 2003 by former ESPN commentator Charlie Steiner, Malverne High School, Class of ’67.)
                                                        
  ­                                                                 ­                 
IKE, briefed on the issue by higher-ups, quickly got behind the idea.
The Harlem Globetrotters were to exist, and continue to exist,
Are sustained financially by Illuminati sponsors,
For one reason and one reason only:
To serve elite interests that the ***** be kept down and subservient,
That the minstrel show be perpetuated,
A policy surviving the elaborate window dressing of the civil rights movement, Affirmative action, and our first Uncle Tom president.
Case in point:  Charles Barkley, Dennis Rodman & Metta World Peace Artest.
Cha-cha-cha changing again:  I am Robert Allen Zimmermann,
A whiny, skinny Jew, ****** and rolling in from Minnesota,
Arrested, obviously a vagrant, caught strolling around his tony Jersey enclave,
Having moved on up the list, the A-list, a special invitation-only,
Yom Kippur Passover Seder:  Next Year in Jerusalem, Babaloo!

I take ownership of all my autonomic and conditioned reflexes;
Each personal neural arc and pathway,
All shenanigans & shellackings,
Or blunt force cognitive traumas.
It’s all percolating nicely now, thank you,
In kitchen counter earthen crockery:
Random access memory: a slow-cook crockpot,
Bubbling through my psychic sieve.
My memories seem only remotely familiar,
Distant and vague, at times unreal:
An alien hybrid databank accessed accidently on purpose;
Flaky science sustains and monitors my nervous system.
And leads us to an overwhelming question:
Is it true that John Dillinger’s ******* is in the Smithsonian Museum?
Enquiring minds want to know, Kemosabe!

“Any last words, *******?” TWEETS Adam Smith.
Postmortem cyber-graffiti, an epitaph carved in space;
Last words, so singular and simple,
Across the universal great divide,
Frisbee-d, like a Pleistocene Kubrick bone,
Tossed randomly into space,
Morphing into a gyroscopic space station.
Mr. Smith, a calypso capitalist, and me,
Me, the Poet Laureate of the United States and Adam;
Who, I didn’t know from Adam.
But we tripped the light fantastic,
We boogied the Protestant Work Ethic,
To the tune of that old Scotch-Presbyterian favorite,
Variations of a 5-point Calvinist theme: Total Depravity; Election; Particular Redemption; Irresistible Grace; & Perseverance of the Saints.

Mr. Smith, the author of An Inquiry into the Nature
& Causes of the Wealth of Nations (1776),
One of the best-known, intellectual rationales for:
Free trade, capitalism, and libertarianism,
The latter term a euphemism for Social Darwinism.
Prior to 1764, Calvinists in France were called Huguenots,
A persecuted religious majority . . . is that possible?
A persecuted majority of Edict of Nantes repute.
Adam Smith, likely of French Huguenot Jewish ancestry himself,
Reminds me that it is my principal plus interest giving me my daily gluten.
And don’t think the irony escapes me now,
A realization that it has taken me nearly all my life to see again,
What I once saw so vividly as a child, way back when.
Before I put away childish things, including the following sentiment:
“All I need is the air that I breathe.”

  Send "The Air That I Breathe" Ringtone to your Cell  

The Hippies were right, of course.
The Hollies had it all figured out.
With the answer, as usual, right there in the lyrics.
But you were lucky if you were listening.
There was a time before I embraced,
The other “legendary” economists:
The inexorable Marx,
The savage society of Veblen,
The heresies we know so well of Keynes.
I was a child.
And when I was a child, I spake as a child—
Grazie mille, King James—
I understood as a child; I thought as a child.
But when I became a man I jumped on the bus with the band,
Hopped on the irresistible bandwagon of Adam Smith.

Smith:  “Any last words, *******?”
Okay, you were right: man is rationally self-interested.
Grazie tanto, Scotch Enlightenment,
An intellectual movement driven by,
An alliance of Calvinists and Illuminati,
Freemasons and Johnny Walker Black.
Talk about an irresistible bandwagon:
Smith, the gloomy Malthus, and David Ricardo,
Another Jew boy born in London, England,
Third of 17 children of a Sephardic family of Portuguese origin,
Who had recently relocated from the Dutch Republic.
******* Jews!
Like everything shrewd, sane and practical in this world,
WE also invented the concept:  FOLLOW THE MONEY.

The lyrics: if you were really listening, you’d get it:
Respiration keeps one sufficiently busy,
Just breathing free can be a full-time job,
Especially when--borrowing a phrase from British cricketers—,
One contemplates the sorry state of the wicket.
Now that I am gainfully superannuated,
Pensioned off the employment radar screen.
Oft I go there into the wild ebon yonder,
Wandering the brain cloud at will.
My journey indulges curiosity, creativity and deceit.
I free range the sticky wicket,
I have no particular place to go.
Snagging some random fact or factoid,
A stop & go rural postal route,
Jumping on and off the brain cloud.

Just sampling really,
But every now and then, gorging myself,
At some information super smorgasbord,
At a Good Samaritan Rest Stop,
I ponder my own frazzled neurology,
When I was a child—
Before I learned the grim economic facts of life and Judaism,
Before I learned Hebrew,
Before my laissez-faire Bar Mitzvah lessons,
Under the rabbinical tutelage of Rebbe Kahane--
I knew what every clever child knows about life:
The surfing itself is the destination.
Accessing RAM--random access memory—
On a strictly need to know basis.
RAM:  a pretty good name for consciousness these days.

If I were an Asimov or Sir Arthur (Sri Lankabhimanya) Clarke,
I’d get freaky now, riffing on Terminators, Time Travel and Cyborgs.
But this is truth not science fiction.
Nevertheless, someone had better,
Come up with another name for cyborg.
Some other name for a critter,
Composed of both biological and artificial parts?
Parts-is-parts--be they electronic, mechanical or robotic.
But after a lifetime of science fiction media,
After a steady media diet, rife with dystopian technology nightmares,
Is anyone likely to admit to being a cyborg?
Since I always give credit where credit is due,
I acknowledge that cyborg was a term coined in 1960,
By Manfred Clynes & Nathan S. Kline and,
Used to identify a self-regulating human-machine system in outer space.

Five years later D. S. Halacy's: Cyborg: Evolution of the Superman,
Featured an introduction, which spoke of:  “… a new frontier, that was not,
Merely space, but more profoundly, the relationship between inner space,
And outer space; a bridge, i.e., between mind and matter.”
So, by definition, a cyborg defined is an organism with,
Technology-enhanced abilities: an antenna array,
Replacing what was once sentient and human.
My glands, once in control of metabolism and emotions,
Have been replaced by several servomechanisms.
I am biomechanical and gluttonous.
Soaking up and breathing out the atmosphere,
My Baby Boom experience of six decades,
Homogenized and homespun, feedback looped,
Endlessly networked through predigested mass media,
Culture as demographically targeted content.

This must have something to do with my own metamorphosis.
I think of Gregor Samsa, a Kafkaesque character if there ever was one.
And though we share common traits,
My evolutionary progress surpasses and transcends his.
Samsa--Phylum and Class--was, after all, an insect.
Nonetheless, I remain a changeling.
Have I not seen many stages of growth?
Each a painful metamorphic cycle,
From exquisite first egg,
Through caterpillar’s appetite & squirm.
To phlegmatic bliss and pupa quietude,
I unfold my wings in a rush of Van Gogh palette,
Color, texture, movement and grace, lift off, flapping in flight.
My eyes have witnessed wondrous transformations,
My experience, nouveau riche and distinctly self-referential;
For the most part unspecific & longitudinally pedestrian.

Yes, something has happened to me along the way.
I am no longer certain of my identity as a human being.
Time and technology has altered my basic wiring diagram.
I suspect the sophisticated gadgets and tools,
I’ve been using to shape & make sense of my environment,
Have reared up and turned around on me.
My tools have reshaped my brain & central nervous system.
Remaking me as something simultaneously more and less human.
The electronic toys and tools I once so lovingly embraced,
Have turned unpredictable and rabid,
Their bite penetrating my skin and septic now, a cluster of implanted sensors,
Content: currency made increasingly more valuable as time passes,
Served up by and serving the interests of a pervasively predatory 1%.
And the rest of us: the so-called 99%?
No longer human; simply put by both Howards--Beale & Zinn--

Humanoid.

"A leisurely breakfast" their mother would admonish, "aids digestion and builds strong bones..." so what with the imposed inactivity every morning, boredom broken only by Sockeye the family Spaniel, whose want of table manners coincided very conveniently with mealtimes... as he paced restlessly under the table, slobbering indiscriminately in his daily scramble to devour every dangling morsel before supply and demand shut up shop for the night and went home, far tastier... he gobbled down the latest offering of egg white, than the remnants of his own dietary allowance, they just had to get the timing right that was all, or risk loosing a finger, or gaining one depending upon who was doing the dangling, or who was doing the gobbling... he gave an indignant sneeze, not so much a hint but more of a... 'what's with the pepper malarky...'  So that it was only with a good deal of snappy hand coordination, lengthy digestion and sturdy bone building that Rocky was finally able to extricate himself from the table and make the most of what little time remained until lunchtime, meagre time indeed for the Rocky's of this world to hang around with their dogs, leaving their little sisters to help mums do, whatever it was that girls usually did when they should have scooted out of the kitchen faster, when it would have been all so much simpler just to grab a handful of biscuits instead...  Meanwhile, laying in wait in the room above, flat out upon the bedroom counterpane, having recently had their insides stuffed to bursting with a full English breakfast's worth of beach and holiday apparal... and that was just the luggage.    

     The contents of which, up until a week last washday had been snoozing fitfully behind 'Do Not Disturb' signs, cautiously peeping out from the gloomier, more remote recesses of the bedroom dresser, or carefully concealed in cupboards and closets... and being in every other respect by no means readily accessible to public scrutiny of any kind... had been left to their own devices some twelve months earlier with a clear understanding to skip bath nights from that moment on and henceforth immerse themselves in the heady, camphorated pungency of mothball, vowing once and for all never to darken portmanteau lids again... but now, after many hours of arduous laundering and de-fumigation... were now being squeezed and unceremoniously shoe-horned into what had recently become nothing short of an overcrowded sanctuary for the dispossessed.  
              
     Meanwhile, all the luggage asked from life other than be detained under section four of the Mental Health Act, 1983 and be found cosy padded accommodation elsewhere... was to have their interiors vacated, their tranquility reinstated... and with a questionable wink from a dodgy Customs official, have their travel permits invalidated... irrevocably, for despite throwing a double six for a spot of well earned convalescence back on top of the wardrobe some twelve months ago, basking in the shade of a warm Summer Sun, striking up the occasional conversation with the floral decor, third bloom from the left currently answering to the name of Petunia, the still over extended luggage, seemingly with little hope of R & R this side of the letter Q, faced the perennial disquiet of vacational therapy, of being knelt on, sat and bounced upon and be specifically manhandled in ways that matching sets of co-ordinated luggage should not...
                                        
     Tina could be heard quite distinctly in the next street concerning her husbands lack of competence, whilst Red it appeared had become just as outspoken as his wife in that particular direction... as the local self appointed busybody, who lived well within earshot of the address in question would bear witness to as she put feverish pen to paper, writing to what had become a regular... and some would say hot bed of intrigue in the local tabloid concerning how vociferous the once tranquil neighbourhood had become of recent and how certain undesirable elements within the community were to be heard carrying on alarmingly at all hours, day and night... and as she diligently weighed her civic duty against simple household economics as to whether to send this latest block busting eye opener by first or second class post, their parents could now be heard broadcasting, if anything to a wider listening audience than the previous newsflash, some of the more sensational episodes of the previous twenty-four hours as to who was pulling whose suitcase zipper now... although in which direction it should be pulled, they both agreed, wasn't for public disclosure at that time... vowing to draw blood well before the day was out, as three lacerated fingers would later testify and that it was only because of the children that they were going at all... but God willing, they would be setting off very shortly with rosy smiles on their faces for the sole benefit of the neighbours, even if it killed them. 

     Spurred to fever pitch  by this latest 'stop-the-press' newsflash, the same public spirited busybody now threw herself wholeheartedly into further award winning journalism and for the second time that morning took to pen and paper, only now directed to the gossip column in the local Parish Gazette, followed by grievous lamentations of impending bloodshed to the incumbent Chief Constable as to how they'd all be murdered in their beds ere long before nightfall.

     By devouring his water bowl, thereby dispensing with the need for it to be washed and by its abrupt and mysterious absence, disposing of all further incriminating evidence as to where the abundant supply of liquid, now surging copiously across the kitchen floor had sprung from... the flash-flood was hastily making its own getaway beneath the kitchen units, leaving Sockeye to his own devices to carry the can on his own, ankle deep in what up until earlier that morning had been sloshing around quite contentedly in Eccup reservoir.

      Having inadvertently released the handbrake in a boyish gesture of bravado, thereby placing himself in sole charge of a runaway vehicle, Sockeye it appeared was not the only member of the Salmon family to have dropped himself right in it that day as Rocky, having unwittingly placed the following ten years pocket money well out of reach and back into the pockets of his parents dwindling resources, had to a far greater extent nominated himself for the same Earth moving experience as the one his mum would shortly be giving Sockeye...

      Having just been granted licence to do whatsoever it pleased, the vehicle began its leisurely rearwards perambulation down the long garden driveway and by way of small thanks for its new found independence took Rocky along for the ride where due to a certain lack of stature on Rocky's part, at no point had he ever been in the slightest position to influence the Holiday threatening train of events which now engulfed him, never thinking to reapply the handbrake... that would be too easy, he perched on the edge of the seat clutching the steering wheel and stretched out his sturdy little legs in an heroic, but futile attempt to reach the pedals as the family car, which up until any second now had been his fathers pride and joy, pitched backwards at what seemed to Rocky, breakneck speed and directly into a very severe and unforgiving brick wall.

     Almost missing this latest round of entertainment above that of her parents most recent exchange, River accompanied by Sockeye scampered outdoors and slap into what could only be described as the most fun she'd had all year as an unsuspecting "what was that noise" muscled its way through the open bedroom window and fell flat on its face in the garden below and which, if that morning to date was anything to go by, then the neighbourhood would soon be tuning in to the latest Salmon family's 'hot-off-the-press' breaking news bulletin.

     Opening her mouth River hesitated as she fine-tuned the speech centres of her young and delicate synapse into full vocal alignment, then adjusting shutter speed from f8 to automatic she closed her mouth... then opened it once again and informed her brother that if the tip of dads size 9 was an Olympic gold, then Rocky would be sure to take first in the 110 metre hurdling event with 'team GB...' and could she have his autograph... with those words of solid encouragement rattling around his ears like the last biscuit in an otherwise empty tin box, River went skipping back into the house to announce the latest newsflash of her parents next financial happening... which she felt certain would prompt further rounds of thought provoking front page journalism.

     A steady two hours drive away, over on the east coast, the inhabitants of a sleepy fishing community were gainfully employed, pretty much as any other, going about their daily business, one such denizen... a baby crustacean, currently marooned by the tide had taken up temporary accommodation in a beachfront rock-pool property of certain distinction, was as yet unaware of a completely different and obscure set of circumstances that would shortly be rearing his slobbering jowls and bring all four paws, the size of dinner plates, crashing down upon the unsuspecting seashore fauna... was determined while she waited to catch the next high tide home, that until such time that the right wave rolled along, would potter about in the little rock-pool, perhaps indulge herself in a leisurely bathe... and catch up on a spot of therapeutic knitting.

     So, placing the days events since breakfast into perspective...  [i]  the vehicle indemnity provider, henceforth to be named 'the party of the first part', who currently weren't cognisant of an impending claim to date, would shortly be laying eggs attempting to squirm out of all liability, due to  [ii]  the automobile, driven by a minor, fortunately for Salmon senior on private land and henceforth, the aforementioned to be called 'the third party, to the party of the second part...' which urgently needed rigorous cosmetic attention to the rear tail light cluster and surrounding bodywork so as to maintain a favourable resale mark-up price.  [iii]  Having been dragged kicking and screaming from the top of the wardrobe, the luggage had rapidly developed cold feet and cried sudden illness in the family, but were being taken to the Wake anyway.  [iv]  Wrapped around the hot water cylinder since the previous Summer, the various sundry items of holiday apparel stood united, resolute as a Union Picket line not be seen dead looking as though they'd never so much as seen the bottom of a flat-iron.  [v]  Both Red and his wife, Tina, despite wearing the same anaemic smile as the one show to the neighbours as they departed, travelling counter clockwise along the crescent so as not to unduly advertise their recent misadventure with the garage wall, were only going for the sake of the children, whilst  [vi]  River and her errant brother didn't want to go anyway dismayed at leaving the television set behind, were already missing their favourite programs, which only really left  [vii]  'mans-best-friend' who, when he wasn't actually hanging over the front seat giving dad big sloppy licks as though... 'are we nearly there yet' or perhaps... 'I need to stop and spend a penny... or you'll all know about it if you don't,' was more than content to be taking up the majority of the rear seating arrangements and with a delinquent wag of his tail, was deliriously happy to be wherever his family were.**

                                                        ­                             ...   ...   ...

a work in progress.                                                        ­                                                                 ­  1862

How we start is only part of what we eventually do.

Physically that's easy to see. Being human, adamkind,
we see weak starts often in life.
Colts or pups born a week too soon can be loved to lives as pampered pets,
Siring toys for the enjoyment of those who can afford to fuel them,
For generations, with never a single care,
Past that initial trauma and subsequent subjugation to the will of man.

I don't tell horse stories, dog stories or war stories, if I can keep from it.

But when you want to demonstrate the purest of payback,
revenge getting the bad guy in the end,
having a horse be the hero makes behaving like an animal
more noble to the mind of vengeful man.
It's not true, revenge being noble.
That's a very old lie.

Law is to prevent error by disallowing failure. Law.

Relative to the rest of God's creatures, we, adamkind, seem dependent, weak and vulnerable next to bears being weak
a way-less long time
Than we.
We come into this world weak as a baby anything and we stay that way longer
Than any living creature.

I am an American, by birth.
I was not born to a political party or a family with political roots,
"I ain't no Senator's son."
Still,
I was reared drinking mythic cherry wine
sprung from George's failure to lie
Regarding his woodman's knack with a hatchet.

Sitting on the fence rail Abe split,
town fathers where I lived
were said to have decided the most harmonious of towns
have only gainfully employed darker folks,
while white
trash was allowed to loll around because they was
some employer's kin by marriage.

It all seemed pretty normal, as a child.
The loller-arounders let kids listen when they told
Their friends, who could not read, what the newspapers said.

One block from my house there was a vet's and hobo's flop-house clad in corrugated tin, rusted-round the nail-holes all the way to the ground and the rust had spread, so at sunset,...
I only recall the single story shed having one door.
There were always old white men sittin' on the southside of the shed. At sunset, those old men's whispy white hair

appeared as white flowing mare's tale clouds under
a scab-red wall held up by old men with sunset shining faces...

It was a big shed, a low barn, a bunkhouse,
eight or ten 4-foot tin-sheets long on the north and south
Windowless walls.
The one door was on the south side.
Once I saw an old man selling red paper buddy poppies.
He was missing both legs about half-way up his thighs.
The poppy seller rode a square board that had what I think were
Roller-skates, the key-kind, with metal wheels about a 1/2 inch wide.
Nailed to it's bottom. He had handles made from a carpenter's saw
Without it's blade. He pushed himself with those handles.

That looked fun, to a four-year old.
It looks different now-a-days. Knowing
Those red poppies symbolized
The after math automatics of the war to end war.

Who knows the poppy-sellers son? He would be old.
Does he know how his father lost his legs, but lived?
Does he bear the curse of the curse that lost his father's legs?
Does he honor his father's cause or weep at the thought?

Enough is enough.
My family tree branched in America, but only one great grand-parent,
Three generations back from me, was rooted in this land.
My gran'ma's ma, a Choctaw squaw,
That rhymed fine,
But it's not true. My grandma did not know her parents. She was born an orphan,
And her father and mother were likely strangers.

1910 in southwest Arkansas or southeast Oklahoma or northeast Texas or northwest Louisiana
And the color of her skin is all that proved my American heritage.

My grandma was born poor as poor can be,
she never told me how she survived

To survive a 1925 or so car wreck
in eastern Arizona's white mountains.
I never asked what my grandmother knew,
nor how she came to know.

This is my point.
After you and I have gone into forever more,
Our great grand children may wonder
what we did or did not, since we
Are no longer around to give our account.

These days we can leave our story to our great grand children.
Our own children
And our grand children follow us on facebook back to before they were born.
Shall they judge us idlers wielding idle words for laughs,
or  think us knowers of all we found while seeking first the Kingdom of Heaven
In the place Jesus says it is. You know where Jesus said the Kingdom of our kind lies?

The double minded man is unstable in all his ways,
hence Eve and her broader bandwidth corpus colostrum
Come back later, there is a breath system upgrade evolving.

Such changes to the courage of the mind rolls out more slowly
to the root ideas, labouring to find sustenance,
it is a struggle being a radical idea,
we agree, but we have our part,
as do the flowers
and the spore.
Leaven the whole lump, like it or lump it.

The now we live in grew from far deeper roots than
the roots claimed by the
Self-identified nation through it's cartoons/representations of national desires to rally 'round the flag as if it were the fire,
those desires to herd beneath any shelter from the storm,
Your country, your incorporated allegiance
to the inventor and creator and counter of the money under
the protection of the sword and crown representative
of the flame that burns,
The namers of patriot, the rankeers of ideas
who, by their existence,
naturally, over rule you.
Such powers are granted by the individual, not the mob.
You get that?

The desires of the nation over rule the desires of the individuals who
Com-prize the nation.
Whose side are you on, dear reader?

Is the idea we believed believable?
Ex Nihilo, I don't think so because
I can't imagine how now could be
Accidental-ly.

When my hero wore spurs as he went from the jail office to
Miss Kitty's place, (Gunsmoke on A.M. radio)

What did Miss Kitty do?
I had no clue.
In my hero's world people never
Did the wrong thing
While Marshal Dillon was in Dodge.

So did you think Miss Kitty's place was anything other
than a culturally acceptable
reference to professional social ******* workers
under a strong, smart female CEO
with top-level links to the local cops?

All these are rhetorical questions, this being
Rhetorical if you are hearing me say this.
That means, don't nod or raise your hand or shout Amen, kin!

I see your answer my answer and
I know my answer, so you know my answer.

Step-back, 1961, USA Snapshot
Unitas, Benny Kid Perett, Mantlenmarris, the Guns of Navarone.

Why I recall those things, I know not.
Why I did not say I do not know, I do not know.

Though, pausing to think,
knowing contains the doing of it within it, you know.
What's to do?

Outlaws were more my heroes than cowboys, and marshals, and such
Especially the ones that had been forced out by law.

I grew up in a 1950's junkyard with no fence, one mile north of route 66
On the Al-Can highway to Las Vegas, 103 miles away.
My Grandpa was a blacksmith's son,
who rode a horse he broke and his pa had shod
From Texas to Arizona in 1917, at the age of 18.

by the time I knew him,
He was fifty, settled down, nearly, from the war.
Momma had to work, so, daytime, Granddaddy raised me.

Horses weren't, wrecked cars were,
the toys of my childhood.

Grandpa built a junkyard from cars left steam blown
on the old stage road, from before
the railroad.
The Abo Highway hain't been Route 66 for some time yet…
Hoping…


Hoping sometime to polish this bit of this book, I left myself re-minders
Hoping memory of mental realms might rewind or unwind sequentially
When trigger
Neighed.
That worked, Roy Autry and Gene Rogers were names Sue Snow's
Mormon Bishop granddaddy called me,
back when I first recall My Grandpa Caleb,
a baptist by confession,
who was,
as I recall a *****-drinkin' jolly drunk.
While Grandma made beds in some motel,
granddaddy built boats and horse trailers
and hot rod 34 Chevies,
and he fixed this one red Indian, I could read the word on the gas tank, I knew the word Indian
and this motor cycle was proud to wear the name. I was 4.

A stout-strong man, no fat near any working muscle system,
he could and would
repair any broken thing,
for anybody. People called him Pop.
Pop and Mr. Levi-next-door at the Loma Vista Motel, shared a listing in the Green Book,
so broke down ******* knew where help could be found
after dark in that town.
There was a warnin'ag'in
let'n sunset there
on darker than grandma's skin.

My Gran'daddy's shop had two gas pumps
that were reset to begin pumping with the turn of a crank.
As soon as I could turn that crank,
I could pump gas.
I could fill up that red Indian
Motorcycle.
But "m'spokes was too short
to kick the starter."
I told my eleven year old uncle
and he told
how he would always remember learning
that saddles have no linkage
to horse brakes.
"Not knowing what you cain't do
kin *** ye kilt."

He grew up in the junk yard, too.
My first outlaw hero.

Likely, I am alive today, because
On the day I discovered I could pump gas as good as any man,
I also discovered that real motorcycles were not built for little boys.

One morning safe in barracks while sitting on the loo,
Our Colonel, who'd put duty first, was wondering what to do.
Now, he'd sounded out the adjutant and the R.S. M.
He'd asked that pair what did they think would occupy the men.
They had answered 'drill, sir. Men love parade ground stuff'.
But the Colonel, after consultation, thought they'd had enough.
Their morale it should be lifted, satisfaction thus enjoyed.
'We must not have the men abused, but gainfully employed'.

Thus, next morning doing block jobs, the diggers were astonished
When told by sergeant of platoon that toilets must be polished.
''Tis for honour and the Company's pride' he'd said to busy soldier
'And pleased it is you'll be my boy before you're too much older.
That instead of stamping feet on square or theory of the gun,
Or concealment from an enemy, or stalking (which is fun),
You will spend your time with elbow grease each morning here with me,
Polishing taps and porcelain and cleaning lavatory'.

So that every week when CO. comes to look at WC.,
Accompanied by the Major and all the powers that be,
And they poke round toilet ledges, check louvred slats for dust,
These expert, fighting officers smelling drains because they must
Ensure their Colonels wish, and we to quench our Major's thirst,
So that of Battalion's toilets it's his that comes in first.
And young, fit, soldier volunteers, now feeling ****** annoyed,
Are to be denied all training to be gainfully employed.

But enough of silly moralising, holier than thee.
Who finally beat up all the rest for champion company?
Well, that was Sergeant Kusba, who were a devious swine.
He'd doctored water closets so they smelled like table wine.
Well, 'twer lemon essence really, after which one could not flush.
And a secret guard on toilet bowls to ward off morning rush.
Which was borne by me and Sergeant Glen 'til trickery did we smell,
After which we cornered Kusba in the Mess and gave him Hell.

So we as well began to use the lemon essence trick.
We all professed to satisfy but thought our Colonel thick,
As he stood at water closet breathing deeply, satisfied,
The diggers standing by their beds all laughed until they cried.
And the CSM., cognisant, fed up as much as we,
Served the Colonel and his minions a scrumptious morning tea.
Whilst they stood relaxed and at their ease upon our polished floor,
Between ***** trough on one side, on the other, closet door.

Sympathetic comfort, peace -a harmony of perishable Liberty! Such dying love, was never my leitmotif; and I will not foolishly go about haunting the town -seeking from thee, that deplorable Pity, of which you deem me • as tho renowned • fond of once -as unsightly Greed is to debts! as heavy-laden gluttons add another pound and ounce • on the go • are to Gluttony!


And oh! Ye fiendish dunce • I am here now, (how soon she forgets.)  And I stand above -above the hunts. So many once fetched, lest yet I deem no more necessity. But rather I mourn, mourn now • an Ode to Death, (owed to Death.)  And also I grieve the loss by severed head, my mighty steed -and I wept. Oh! how I wept.

And I lay flowers upon this, his departed spirit.  Of which I had foreseen to naught offend thee • the dead • who'd grin & bear it: but due for his long service to me, I offer him • the weary •  solace from your offence. I shudder to mention it • even now •  I swear it! And do send you a suffered lyric -to confound your pretty head.

A Baby-Boomer walks so freely through the town
he pays no mind to those suffering around
“Why don’t poor people just get jobs,”
he asks himself,
“And stop bellyaching?
And women need to shut their mouths and stop complaining
the wage gap is a fallacy
they invented to work less.
trust me I am a man who would understand the oppressed,
a man who has always been gainfully employed,
in fact if you ask me I am simply annoyed
that others dare to call me privileged
just because I can afford more than they do
(well that and the fact that because of my face
I can be sure that I will not be chased
by the police unrightfully
or a strange man most frighteningly).”
He walks alone in the darks of night
and yet his bones do not creak with fright
for he knows the world respects his white skin,
his wife, and the money he keeps only for him.
On his wall hangs a college degree
he got from a school in 1983
“I don’t understand why the millennials are such whiners
pull yourself up by your bootstraps while you’re still minors,
yes we ruined the economy, but it’s not that hard
if you just stop focussing on being so avant-garde
and get a job, who do you think you are?
Just kids trying their best to be what they are?
Disgusting excuse,
sell your soul to businesses,
it’s what Reagan would do.”
As he puts his money to bed at night
in the house he bought when the market was still alright
he wonders why kids these days
seem so tired and hungry for praise.

The fire burned in the hearth upon a summer's day, in the land of  blazing abnormality.
The wire haired dog laid silently in his basket, without reaction.
Two other friendly dogs attended, but still he laid.
A silent half giraffe was stroked, he or she, was also still.
Herring gull swung in a cage, motionless and the peacock perched in reticence,  as he was strutted on the cabinet no more.
Half a seal poked its head out from the wall, while the antelope looked on.
And still they sat and chatted, not an eyelid was batted, as they sat and supped their ale, while the air took on the stale scent of musty beings.
The atmosphere in the place was tranquil.
Death, so obvious within this amazing place
Ghastliness of death, was somehow so respectful.
As they gainfully employed the taxidermist, who did a magic job!
(c) Livvi

Lured by the bait of a golden trap
Got down on the road for one quick snap
Season’s harvest lay the gleaming yield
Pains of seeding sprouted fulfilled!

May I take a shot of this wondrous show
Of homing the crop in its brightest glow
Would you mind if take a photo or two
To carry with me this freshest hue!

A hint of a smile broke her lipline
She said please don’t take any of mine
For the harvest can take as many you need
Of the pastures stretching far across the mead!

But as one you know bred in the city
Smart and scheming gainfully witty
I said the soil you must have perfectly tilled
To have reaped now this abundant yield!

Won’t hide my wish to you won’t lie
Some I would take home if you let me buy
To remind me of the glory of your toil
Spent on the farmland rewarded by the soil!

On her lips now broke a girl’s rippling laugh
Why sir I would give you of what we have enough
To give you some as gift would be a pleasure nice
Can’t stoop so low as to charge you a price!

She put in my bag some of her bumper yield
Her heart’s gift to a stranger his wishes fulfilled
As I drove away from her leaving her on her land
Through the window I saw love’s waving hand!

“many who are first will be last, and the last first.” Mark 10:29

the mixed drink of finance terminology
my stock and trade, or,
used to be anyway, when I was gainfully employed,
intersects with a place I don’t habitually frequent,
seeing as I am an Old Testament kinda guy

dollars to doughnuts,
this errant thought makes me smile,
the devil and me (a/k/a the devil in me)
have a warm milk with KAHLÚA,
in the dead of night, across the kitchen table,
doing repartee and bad poetree
and biblical textual emendation
on the verse in question

having been present, the devil likes it just the way it is,
but the old nitpicking me always thinking,
a little editing makes the ‘milk’ go down easier,
suggests a reversal of emphasis:

the last shall be first,
for many who are first, will be last

less threatening and the point better made

lead with your right, taught my boxing master,
and the last shall be first is
very right

you see, many call me,
the lender of last resort
which is true enough,
but my preference is best
when addressed as

lender of the first resort

follow the night through to day
wait in the usual way
wanting to say something wonderful to you
while lying in wait for the words
tears brimming up in my eyes
holding your hand as you sleep
I wanted to say something wonderful
sweetly, just something that offers some peace

something that sums up your life
the things that we all need to hear
the purpose you have and your ways, how you live
how you face everything without fear
Waiting on wonderful words
something nice...means a lot to me now
I've spent all my life simply trying to speak
and I must get the words out somehow

sitting beside you I pray
though my prayers are eclipsed by my need
to tell you right now just how wonderful words
are when spoken, seem outdone by deed

and whatever we meant can't come out
Well I laugh then I cry and I shout
you're
terribly
       painfully
                   beautifully
                          gainfully
                                 miss you already
                                          you're wonderfully made fully
               powerfully
                                   lov­able
                                         covered by kisses      
and nobody misses
you more

well we could enjoy a cold beer
and I know how you love that stuff too
I'm sorry and sad my heart's feeling bad
but you're hugged just as hard till you're blue.
and  I know that you know what I mean
just as sure as you called to the birds
I could borrow a line from a card
make it rhyme
while I'm waiting on wonderful words
.
oh, you're
terribly
       painfully
                   beautifully
                          gainfully
                                 miss you already
                                          you're wonderfully made fully
               powerful
                                   lovable
                                         covered by kisses
and misty salt roses      
and nobody misses
you more

Beautiful downtown Atlanta
Sunny, blue, cloudless sky
Tall, wide, massive buildings
Window glass glistening in the sun
Beautiful, well-dressed people
Gainfully employed people
Taking care of business people
Running essential errands
Contributing to the community
Pursuing positive, purposeful lives.

I take in the sights, sounds, smells
Sounds of people walking, talking
Engines revving and car horns
Smells of restaurants and fast food vendors
Engine exhaust and overheated brakes
The feel of the sidewalk
Under my expensive dress shoes
The heat of the sun on my face and neck
The exciting hustle and bustle
Of a thriving metropolis.

A faint “Please, sir. . .” reaches my ears
And a homeless man appears
*****, disheveled, hirsute
“Please, sir. Could you. . .”
His weak speech trails off
As I divert my eyes, quicken my pace
Ignoring his petty pleas
As he disappears in my wake
Bothersome soul, good riddance
Why doesn’t the city do something?

Days later the encounter haunts me
I was so proud of the way I handled myself
How easy it was to dismiss a soul in need
Months later the encounter haunts me
Instead of the clever human
I had become cruel, inhuman
Unfeeling, unkind, uncaring
Years later the encounter still haunts me
Never will it ever happen again
Never. . . ever.

They call it flooding
sensory overloading and psyche attack
persisting harping on negatives acts created
this to a spineless snowflake would drive insane
they see it as gnawing at a scar re opening wounds for pain
or the torturing style of keeping a prisoner awake while music runs
playing unappreciated sounds over and over and over and over again
he sadist ****** buzzes believing we are doing his head cracking it

I see emotional intelligence
this is psychotic obsession by an inferior bully
imagine the damage inherent in minds such as these
imagine how useless inadequate unfulfilled and pained to do this
I feel sorry for them then I find it funny they put in time and effort
then even funnier  that there is no bases in reality or truth to it at all
perhaps sadly I also see there are loads of unhinged people around
then gainfully it all reinforces my confidence and self assurance
and in all modesty the difference between good education an *******

But there is something I do not comprehend
why ingrates have not considered that if their acts impacted
I have choice to leave site and not read their delusion therapies
do they imagine I am masochistic or numb as they erroneously say
I think not its simply narcissists are arrogant and lack introspection
which brings me to a salient assertion which again I state humbly
If I'm going to be driven mad it would not be by a bunch of asinine nutcases and semi illiterate spineless cowards and certified toe-rags

I rest my Lords......

An evening set in metered rhyme,
of pinecones, gainfully bracted
in the manner of spiralling time.

No perfect measure yields a woody cone
although conifer strobilus gilded ratio makes.
The standard mesh of numbers alone

symbolise a hope that a glorious God
assembled in a perfect factory line,
this defiant change to perfectly flawed.

Chisel your memory
To my plates.
Mind falling emery
Such is fate’s.

Mindlessly picturing
As by age.
Beauty quivering
Turning page.

Knuckles so painfully
Bending out
Tears fall gainfully
Hope’s sparse sprout.

Image so tenderly
Filling thought.
Eyesight so slenderly
Catching aught.

Breathing intake shallow
Lung fill work.
Every moment hallow
Even murk.

Approaching end rapid
Time so scant.
Experience vapid,
So much can’t.

But you are there,
In the echoes.
You are there.
Lovely,
Goodbye.

From the lofty snowcapped peaks
of Kilimanjaro
The morning mist envelopes its verdant foothills in a tight embrace,
No need to hurry, this is not a race,
Beads of sunlight dancing across the glistening dew.

As the plains of Amboseli reveal their golden hue,
There's movement spied where none existed moments prior,
A herd of Zebra lounging in their elegant attire,
The lush grasslands beckoning them for yet another day.

The few Wildebeest amongst them if only they could talk they'd say,
We're happy to be safe in this weird and motley crowd,
Despite the fact these Zebras are so boisterous and loud,
What's a little banter when the promise is of grazing in contented peace.

Double is their luck as the pert Egyptian geese
Act as wary Sentinels, their honks resounding loud,
Alerted by the pride of crouching lions, their countenance so proud,
Scouting for that meal for their young to feed.

A Wildebeest or two would fill those hunger pangs indeed,
Were it not for those Hyenas prowling on their scent,
To steal their hard-fought prize definitely hell bent,
Neither party cowered, neither will give
ground.

But what's a little tiff when prey does so abound,
A fragile land of bounty, God's country that's for sure,
Where every single creature finds ways to gainfully endure,
Africa in all its glory, nature’s living work of art.

You make life.
You light it up with sunshine.
You make love happy.
You make people realize, what they are missing.
In other words, you make Sunday.
Then again, you do that with everyday of the week.

You that angel without a halo.
One that makes others realize the reason lover's glow.
Don't matter, what season's of the weather.

Love, you make Sunday.
What I once was?
I'm no longer that way.
What kept me from profiting?
Has gainfully improve my life.

All days of the week is worthy.
Except, you make Sunday the day for me.

If
Youth is wasted on the young
Beauty is wasted on the beautiful
Agedness is wasted on the aged

and everyone goes on and along
with a gleeful acceptance that's life
so flip over the hourglass of time
and be so really glad, you the aged
ones are keeping the buoyages,
plus 15 doctors and nurses so
gainfully employed!

Raised on absence and responsibility
we've moved from one catastrophe
to the next with no moment to pause
and take a collective breath.
We are a generation growing old
adrift on a raft in these choppy
oceans of neglect.
We are atuned to a universe
that doesn't care if we live or die
shoveled into our mouths were promises
of better lives if we got degrees
if we gave up our needs and forsake
or learned a trade or worked long
long hours and never took a break.
But here in the future we're broke
gainfully employed with no hope to retire
no pension party planned
one day, we're expected, to arrive at
the work site and simply die.
No paychecks left to send
no gods left to ask why.
We're a turn of the century generation
watching old mistakes repeat themselves
but being asked to wait our turn
if we wanna complain,
there are two or so generations ahead
of us who still have the floor
and one nipping at our heals
demanding so much more.
I think the world will forget us
and our arbitrary, necessary pain.
I think they move on to Z and Y
and treat them just the same.
Stiff upper lip, chums. It pays to be silent
in fact your silence is brave.
The generation that killed tradition
walks toward the same traditional grave.

Although gainfully unemployed
(fate now finds me receiving
social security disability –
for approximately
the last baker's dozen years -
the yeast divine intercession
rose to the occasion),
I can still vividly visualize
utter despair during
early and emerging adulthood.

The following synopsis
wrought, impressed, crafted...
within mine temple mount
when yours truly
long overstayed his welcome
at 324 Level Road
(formerly Rural Delivery 2 -
before expanse of hundred acre wood
constituting Glen Elm tract
became vinyl city),
and lacked courage -
analogous to cowardly lion
epitomized in The Wizard of Oz
to test mettle and live independently –
abandoned said challenge  
rather remained domiciled
with birth parents.

Indelible, permanent
and unfading abysmal
damaging domestic dynamics
got indelibly etched in deep purple
upon the memory banks
of this erstwhile individual.

The general gist in the form
of quick broad brush strokes
of psychologically
traumatizing recollection now follows.

I can attest to malevolent
mean-spirited objections
by my then father stayin' alive
(Normandy Farms retirement community
in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania)
at date of forthwith
original poetical draft
(still mourning of his wife,
i.e. mine late mother),
whose passing did nothing
to ameliorate severe emotional trauma  
in regard to mine
unkempt appearance
grossly unacceptable attire,
deportment, grossly jaded mien
and erratic work ethic
to figuratively rattle
(and hum) abridged list.

Back in those inglorious bourne days,
I poorly wore the mantle and staff
of supposed maturity.

Lack of compliance
and obeisance with regulations
and rules of the Harris household
brewed, festered and lied dormant
during prepubescence.

The pressure and tension
between maternal and paternal adult
would rank as dysfunctional
way before such ****** babble
(barely audible above the babel
between me mother and father)
became je nais se quois in vogue.

Such venomous barrage
and fusillade spewed forth
from off parental tongues
at an exponential rate
and on a par to feeling
the stinging cudgel of a horsewhip.

Out of fear and timidity,
I consequently and silently
absorbed cruel treatment.

Neither the eldest nor youngest sibling
bore witness against the
tender spirit of their only brother.

A façade as of statue conveniently adopted.

This embodiment ill served
to fend off onslaught of incessant anger.

Such a defense mechanism
offered miniscule protection
as I mentally (dumbly and mutely)
dodged andforded
lobbed and rammed insults
and affected defiance
of endless threats
and hollow ultimatums.

No matter these bitter pills
of blaring character assassination,
denunciation, fulmination, incrimination,
and countless vociferous vocalizations,
I feigned to be stone
(temple pilot) deaf.

Such self-repression
of emotional maelstroms
only caused seething internal ire
to invite intense anxiety
and unpredictable
debilitating panic attacks,

They (mom and dad,
neither parent still alive)
became further angered
and inflamed per my total oblivious stance.

This reaction added insult to injury.

Deliverance per tough love lessons
amplified to the tune
of additional feats
at becoming excoriated, ranted
and raved against personal habits
and what appeared as mine
nonchalant indifference to pursue work.

Those involuntary, unrehearsed
and vicious family chats happened
to be replete with heavily exploding
verbal wrath and uncorked anger.

Dad, the nominal spokesperson
for unpleasant chest donned thumping
trumpeting exclamations emphatically swore
all manner of vulgarity and demanded
from this insolent appearing
male offspring, whose passive demeanor
intimated immediate compliance.

Defiance and fatigue offered him
that predictable and usual blank stare
upon hearing the kind
and lenient sentence
to pack bags and GET OUT!

With the dreaded approach
of dire and sealed fate,
I anxiously experienced
a dramatic increase in apocalyptic suspense.

Deadlines came and went without incident.

What caused especial ire and wrath
to fester pertaining
to apparent ambivalence,
indifference and nonchalance
for me to take any job -
even shoveling horse manure!

My maternal grandfather
supposedly never paid much heed
to regular and steady employment
despite his skill as a tailor.

Hence my mother and three siblings
lived in destitution and poverty.

Behavior of yours truly triggered
her flashbacks scores of years earlier,
when she lived in squalor,
and felt forced to seek either
part or full time income,
where household members
lacked camaraderie and integration
as a healthy family unit.

The wraith of those
ghastly imprecations
still hound with infrequent
unwanted ghostly visitations
from thy dead mother.

Anxiety and once
immobilizing panic attacks
the battle scars afflict
my psyche and interfere
with the ability to enjoy life,
liberty and pursuit  of happiness
to the utmost despite reliance
on following prescription medications:

BUSPIRONE TAB 20 MG
CLOMIPRAMINE CAP 50 MG
CLONAZEPAM TAB 0.5 MG
FLUOXETINE CAP 20 MG
GLYCOPYRROLATE TAB 2 MG
PRAZOSIN HCL CAP 1 MG
PRAZOSIN HCL CAP 5 MG
RISPERIDONE TAB 1 MG
ROPINIROLE HCL 0.5 MG

Ghosts cannot be hugged because they are inter-dimensional entities. Keith Richards and run-of-the mill lepers have gnarled phalanges. Indeed, loneliness MUST be communal as demonstrated by demonstrators employed gainfully. Why plunge free hair-clogs dissoluble in lye? ****-blame recipients need everything. The opposite of pro-life is pro-death.

Hands down the most dramatic change ever needed to make the most profound impact awoke from helping beget the first offspring. An internal paradigm shift reshuffled priorities such that the helpless newborn necessitated immediate attention.
     Whatever task held my attention at a given time, the cry of said progeny triggered and quickly trained an obligation to become a first responder of sorts.
     Yes, I readily admit that at first blush selflessness grudgingly accepted, but quickly an avid enthusiasm became manifest.
    Matter of fact (and much to the surprise to this chap who never served as caretaker for infants, nor young children), an instinctual natural protection arose concomitantly with attention, affection, and adoration as the ensuing years tending (to thine eldest daughter and approximately twenty six plus months later another heiress begat), this role of fatherhood entranced, galvanized, and inspired me toward increased selflessness.
     The overpowering raw emotional of first time fatherhood emotional, financial, and spiritual impact shook my entire corporeal being to experience supreme tenderness, which set me to step up affinity to write (poetry seemed a natural modus operandi de jure, which sample seems apropos to share at this juncture.    
     Though thee empty nest syndrome long since elapsed, I happened upon thee following verse while scrolling along memory lane recording incipient onset of parenthood, when the missus underwent routine planned parenthood in College approximately two score and eight earth orbitz ago late March/early April ninety ninty six.

December 22nd 1996 bundle of edenic joy

Twenty seven years plus ago
faux cap’n Matthew Scott
twittered n burst with ahoy
on account of thine first borne –
unbeknownst to us then if a girl or boy
so an unusual assortment
of gender appropriate names –
(some brazen others coy
others an utter embarassment
verbal remonstration our offspring

especially when older, would deploy)
filled pages of our journals, viz
newly minted parent’s endless employ
though of Semitic ancestry choices
per namesake reflected more ova goy
which genealogy less significant
than precious progeny healthily fused
vis a vis via being masterfully charged
two sets regarding
twenty three pairs of chromosomes
that did miraculously alloy

into a healthy genetically whipped miracle –
crème of the crop
that only imaginary dragons
reigning over a vampire weeknd
with fiery red hot
chili peppered lyrics could drop,
whereby flute tour ring notes
induced crowdsource to hip hop
calisthenics that emulated
swishing brush strokes of a mop

which if attempted by myself,
would witness one culled sic pop
so, he sticks with ranks, viz his literate
*** spur ray shun to confess
those thermostatic and
temperature controlled emotions more or less
extolling occasions that held poignancy,
though as a first time father
my state of managing a newborn
felt chaotic and a sorry mess

though words resonated less
gifted with beautiful daughter,
she most likely happened
to be oblivious asper YES
mine hand felt hogtied,
yet over ensuing years –
the integration characterizing  
Rites of (aiding) spring  
our suite firebird
did indelibly impress

an invaluable psychic ring,
whereby initial awkward role
no longer on par
to foster teaching child
autonomy for her existence,
(albeit demanding at times –
synonymous with any other
infantile pang), thine essence
acquired an acute attentiveness
to her basic needs and wants

likened and linkedin to pay obeisance
per a special offering,
whose absence and permanent separation
as a responsible grown woman
makes mine heart didst grow fond
(and psyche doth twinge
with nostalgia) asper
those long day's journey
into night, when I could attest
she declared  and constituted

daddy's girl, yet mandatory
to let go of this biological offshoot
part of me (within human league
to the  babyhood, childhood,
and emerging adulthood
attended, mollycoddled, pampered
she extruded, and had me
wrapped around her little finger
cuz, now perhaps happiness sprung
from within herself

she sought guiding light
as days of our live sped by at lightspeed
now, a mixed bag of emotions wrestle and roil
inside mine corporeal being,
I praised and prized accomplishments
(rarely admonished)
spurred by natural borne desires
for potential Atalanta,
(who loved running until an injury
brought said passion to screeching halt),

nevertheless she became independent
rather than shutter herself up
as exemplified by das papa,
who still writhes, seethes, and orates
many forfeited explorations
of natural self discovery thwarted
renting my psyche asunder
with lightning mailer daemons
still on the prowl
and trawling like bot size internet trolls

within the windmills of my mind
essentially futilely explaining
mein kampf and hard times
impressionable years of emotional,
financial, interpersonal and social toil
repercussions forever unfairly induced
upon the darling lass
pronounced upon this star student,
who suffered sheer agony
when asked – by classmates -  
the vocations of me “Herr father

or Frau mother,” neither gainfully employed,
which vicarious taboo
(county assistance still evokes stigma,
particularly for outliers like us
living social along MainLine)
zapped, tortured, inflicted
crisis nearly destroyed yours truly,
cuz of utter embarrassment, misery,
writhing really vociferously
within genetic blend, whose love
not asked for nor sought unequivocally.

Ever since mine boyhood
I experienced abhorrence
toward yours truly,
an extremely introverted kid,
whose parents nor siblings
(one younger and older sister) could
not arouse him out of his emotional torpor
akin being on par with
Peter Peter pumpkin eater...
whereby he (meaning
author who wrote this poem)
kept himself isolated, quarantined, and xed out
within self made shell.

Me mum mollycoddled her only son
bathed him in maternal love
omnipotent motherliness
figuratively guillotined
(unwittingly) healthy maturation,
thus development sabotaged
courtesy figurative apron strings.

No matter his filial relationship woeful
(to thee woman who birthed him),
he registered sentimental value
regarding keepsakes bequeathed,
he still keeps cherished mementoes
redolent when she lived.

Call him a mama's happy go lucky boy
whose later ambivalent feelings
tarnished, undermined and vitiated
short lived tender loving care,
which brief vouchsafed cocooned wellbeing
regarding idyllic rapport between parents,
got staind, suppurated, sundered, sullied...
in later years by incrimination
against being gainfully unemployed.

February twenty eighth ninety sixty eight
marked a tectonic seismic shift as moving vans
transported our household freight
to (at that time) R(ural) D(elivery) 2,
Level Road Collegeville, Pennsylvania 19426,
a ramshackle (summer) mansion named Glen Elm
plus whittled down fraction
of original Hundred Acre plus wood.

Relocation with Lower Providence School District,
approximately half dozen mile distance
between former and latter home(s),
nevertheless psyche of mine
property of extremely introverted kid
severely hi-jacked.

Invisible to the naked eye
traumatization (courtesy
chastising and reproaching -
by fellow classmates
and later in life
birth parents and inlaws
dealt hefty figurative jab)
tremendously impacted yours truly
analogous to him moving bajillion miles away
compounded by his withdrawn demeanor

diagnosed when he reached middle adulthood
as schizoid personality disorder,
thus exhibiting obvious developmental delay
bullied courtesy nasty brutes,
who scapegoated and rejoiced
with hip hip hurray,
meanwhile I experienced
terrible psychological melee
escaping to safe confines of bedroom,
where I wanted to stay
for mine remaining years of life.

Retrospective review
now approaching my doddering old age
constituted more'n one cruel (cheap) trick
played on super tramping urchin,
who traipes across virtual global stage
ensnared within whorled webbed wide
spending his hard earned itty bitty wage
spinning one strand after another.

Whereby I confessed being guilty
impossible mission to escape accusation
of prurient transgressions
wrought transformation and self condemnation
additionally begat demonstrable emasculation
against accepting, kindling,
urging temptation toward verboten fruit,
clearly communicated, albeit clumsily
courtesy non verbal gesticulation
labeling mine promiscuous, lascivious,
horrendous... behaviour reviling.

Yours truly shirked fidelity
regarding faithful vows
bequeathed courtesy angel of mercy,
who pledged her troth
July twenty fifth nineteen ninety six
five months (not quite to the day) before
"star student" birthed
on December twenty second,
(now gainfully employed
at Certified B-Corporation
headquartered in San Francisco, California).

The missus likened to Rose Madder
than a raging (red) bull
visa vis upon discovering mine absence
(cuz I slept in the basement cull
hooding with Casanova
while at 724 Railroad Avenue
keeping company with mice elf),
methought then how wretched and dull
being married and celibate,
hence yours truly sought full
fill mint outside the marriage,

yet unbeknownst to this husband
an automatic, fatalistic,
and opportunistic hull
king, quaking, and vociferating wife
gave me a thrashing tongue lashing harangue
verbal dressing down,
cuz I betrayed lifelong commitment
until death do we part
me uttering sacrosanct words witnessed courtesy
immediate family members

plus justice of the peace
honorable Judge: Henry Schireson
925 Montgomery Avenue, Suite 100
Narberth, Pennsylvania 19072-1913
pledged allegiance, compliance,
exuberance,  obeisance lull
and sacred marital concord
yours truly did not honestly mull
kickstarting promising unswerving monogamy
deserved hypocrite label
coveting, facilitating, indulging,

loving, offering pent housed
****** relief with another woman
nearly did render null
and void marriage pact
flaunted sacred pact
and will (as good as) hang,
which ****** imbroglio,
albeit (nocturnal escapade) did boomerang
in earshot of both
our then young daughters ****** ears,
thus a sudden pang

to exit the scene arose up inside me
courtesy wishful trapdoor to appear suddenly,
(whereby regarding floorboards)
from out mine overactive imagination sprang
open to usher, and/or time travel back
to earlier that fateful night rather than lang
whooshing amidst livid rage
self serving deserved fiery emasculation,
the noose hence I did stage,
experiencing withering, twittering,
snapchatting, kickstarting blistering
expletive laced epithets think
ready to burst pressure cooker
evincing dangerously hot level gauge

driving figurative wedge
between me family
courtesy foaming at the mouth spouse
(of course deux progeny affected)
renting asunder and rendering hollow
thee justice of the peace
gordian tied, uttered,
vouchsafed worded oath I did pledge.

Divorce prematurely *******,
yet instantaneously dismissed
no more pleasant alternative spewed versus
contracting cankerous cyst
analogous to toxic mother
of our two offspring hissed
disparaging me directly linkedin
with promiscuous tryst
besotting me with blackened barbs
me honestly, lamely, meekly
justifying philandering gist,

cuz gal methought
(good idea mister casanova wannabe),
which came as soliloquizing aside
to exchange as bartered bride
thine scorned wife,
who would relentlessly chide
(even long after the day I died)
heard thru tomb harrows coffin

abominable behavior, I do readily admit
figuratively found me electrified
what with raging testosterone nsync with
hormonal secretion my guide
****** gamboling, I chose not to hide
never back once black traipsing inside
double entendre meant
viz yule eyes joyride.