Your bedroom is a carefully preserved time capsule,
a tribute to a fondly remembered time long past.
Though I have visited this small square room less than
feels right since our once tight-knit group dissolved, it is
kept as pristine as a display about a foregone era in a dark
and cluttered museum.  The walls still stand wearily in that
same stubborn shade between periwinkle and robin's egg,
the only difference is one unfamiliar poster-the rest have
hung steadfast in the same positions since you moved into this
bedroom from the one next door many years prior.  In the
corner across from your bed, rests the desk you have
used to hold some of your most valued items for as long as
we have traversed the undulating cycle between friendship
and acquaintanceship, including the now-empty terrarium that
bravely contained a wooly tarantula.  Your closet, still noticeably
bare, informs me, through a smattering of neon yellow t-shirts,
that you are still employed for the same landscaper. As we pass a
meticulously re-rolled cigar between us, two old and distant
friends, my vision drifts towards the dresser under the plain
windows, which overlook your claustrophobic backyard.  It is,
surely, an Ikea affair, for though it has the coloring of mahogany,
the wood has the unmistakable sheen of faux; but what compels me
to gaze at this dresser is not its questionable quality but the years
of graffiti scrawled across its drawers and walls in the sort of thick
black marker that might give one lightheadedness if uncapped for
too long.  I realize, suddenly, that this dresser is our monolith.

I express to you my incredulity that you have kept this dresser,
of all things, for so long, as a wry grin splits my mouth in halves.
Too many memories, you say, a melancholy tone suddenly echoing
through the small bedroom.  My grin fades, and I look closely,
recalling in a bright flash a multitude of intoxicant-fueled evenings-
you were always in that black pleather computer chair, while
always I sat on the bed, squished between or beside the
on-again-off-again couple.  The exact words inscribed upon this
Ikea monolith, I realize, are no longer of importance, for they
are largely insensitive, pejorative, and crude.  These words are
the spirit of a fading adolescence wasted in suburban bedrooms
and backyards, or in city basements and roofs, spawned by
countless cases of the cheapest beers available, by handles of
off-brand *****, by bags of substances in every shape and
size imaginable.  I am staring at a proclamation of a girl's
promiscuity on this very monolith when you exclaim that you
would give anything to have a time machine, to go back to those
days, that they were the happiest days of your life.  Though
outwardly I smile and offer a noncommittal expression of
sentimentality, inwardly I frown, struck by a wave of pity.  

Halfway between twenty and thirty, I am no longer the shy,
hasty, or withdrawn teenager who spent hours cooped up in
a stagnant bedroom, ****** and bored. I can suddenly perceive
exactly how little you, my old friend, have changed, and I am
ashamed of my inability to say so.  But that couple imploded
years ago in a neon display, temporarily destroying all that
surrounded them; all of the satellites that orbited our group
have moved out of our gravitational field, some going off
to college, some getting good jobs, some moving to big
cities, some starting bands.  Graduations or birthdays
might bring us together for a few hours of drunken
reminiscence, we all know, somewhere, that we have
grown apart, while you hide in this bedroom,
a lonely hermit.

This room is not a time capsule;
it is a tomb, and the Ikea monolith might as well be your
headstone.

I’ve sat on a bare-damp chair.
out on the North deck
where the moss blurs the lines
between itself and algae and lichen
and me.  Me, who wouldn’t know such a line
if it were less blurred...I’m not so sharp as all that.


I set my glasses down on a stone table.
Beside the cold-soon tea.
I watch the wind coming, first through the reeds.
And then shifting the banana leaves.
And soon the birch curtain crowding out my
writing place.  My righting place.

The labyrinth is hosting some flowers.  A dragonfly alights on an altar of crystal
and stone and birch branch.  And offerings.  
The dragonflies seems to (me to) re-write spider lines
or maybe ley lines.  A frog just leaped from a tree past my feet.
I’ve lost my word lines, my throughline.
This frog is now in the leaves by the ivy under the bees.
Looking so green.  Leaf droppings dropping on its head.
It’s green head.  Like an emerald in a mountain’s side.

Now a rustle.  Just beyond.  But not that far.  Like feet away.  But beyond.
Another distance.  Another limit.  Another world.  A bank-robbery escape-mode
Squirrel is making off with what it made off with from the free-to-all and undefended
(and legal, too) pear tree in the far yard.  It leaped upon the birch trunk and then, startled to find me unstartlingly well...just here.  And unstartled.  Paused to set its claws in bark.
It teeth gripping as fifth grip the rind of an unripe pear, its size, if I might compare,
the size of its head without the ears, without the hair.  This unrepentant squirrel leaped                  from
     here
to
     there
all of which was over there but just there so basically here.  (Just not here here, more there.)  It found its place to contemplate me.  To observe.  It made no offer.  But of itself.  Which, really, is all that we can do.  It chuffed a few times but it seemed to me that this was more to do with why-not-give-this-a-try-but-I-don’t-know-why.  It’s belly flush to gray birch bark.  It’s tail extended, and caught by a breeze that the leaves were not informed of.  A deceiving breeze.
Soon - which wasn’t soon, it was minutes - the squirrel scrambled up the birch and branch-to-branched its way to overhead and then out of sight.  I may have smelled of peanuts as I’d just emptied a jar.  I may have been the deceiver.  I may be the lone believer that I might know at all.

The frog hasn’t yet moved.


Something is buzz-whistling.  In the grass?  The trees?  The soil?  The sound rises and the tone
shifts.  The pitch lifts.  I cannot say if it is insect.  I cannot say if it is amphibian.  I cannot say if it is electric and thus man and thus unwelcome.  Cicada?  Frogs?  A hummingbird just fooled me into thinking I knew something about speed.  Something about color.  Something about birds.
Something about Nature.  Something about need.  Something about life.  Something about something about my self.  A partial-second lesson.  The teacher came and went.  The teachings stayed behind in mind.  I have so much work to do.

The far birch, placed in the yard for a long-ago dog
seems to offer up a peach harvest this year.
(At least when my glasses are off.)
The landscaper says that all the birches are yellowing this summer
this year this near to the midsummer and this far from the far flung
and far colder cold slumber of December and November and October.

The blue spruce has a still-for-the-first-time-this-season small flock
of oriole.  Or sunset-breasted, warbler wren throated tipped somethings.
I count seven.  Or six.  No, eight.  Wait.  Nine.  Uh, now eight.
Oh, there’s one!  Oh, no matter.  There’s some.
Too flighty and flittery each blur-glance I’ve had all year.  And I've tried each time
to secure them (sharply) in my lens.

The ducks converse as they arrive at the pond’s far edge.  About to traverse the
turtle-hiding waters, the en-flowered pond’s surface, the distance between heard and seen.
I reach for my glasses.  The birch leaves in yellow have fallen and lied.  Belied to believed.
There are no birds in the tree.  That I can see.  That I care to see.  Autumn come early.

A hawk glides past my edge-of-can’t-quite-see.  It’s loping-like arc its own pleasure...to me.
And, I imagine, it.  The meadow is blushing in purple, ironweed.  The jewelweed, too is a star-field of twinkling orange.  A constellation by day.  A bowl by the winter-blooming something (jasmine?) is concentrically coming awake as drip drip drippings are drop drop dropping.  A yellow-spiked caterpillar treks through the detritus of the unkempt bits of the beside-the-garden which isn’t so much a garden as a place I once planted and once planned.  A spider fast-ropes down to investigate and, as it happens, to pester.  The caterpillar twists and tumbles.  Righting itself, it plods on in its stretch-curl way as the spider ascends to the invisible upper home in its way.  The frog hasn’t moved but I notice and note its **** has two bumps.  Like its bulbous eyes in its front which, as I notice and note is spear-shaped as is its hind.  I wonder at defenses.  It is still.  It still is still.  It’s stillness is still stilling.  Until...I move on.  My fastest is not footed but mindful.  Not mindful but of mind.  I am of a mind to move the mind along.  The caterpillar closes the distance.  What a distance to it it must be.  It’s face is black as an undersea shadow.  It has spikier spikes of black here and there.  Likely in some pattern but my mind has moved and so, here and there it will be.  My story.  My pattern.  My refusal to change.

The mushrooms where the spider met the yellow fellow, though.  Sesame-seeded.  Decorated.  Pimpled.  Bejeweled.  A tawny cup beside a stone behind the frog.  Soft mustard-dotted.  But now!  A new frog where the old new frog had been.  This one a leopard toad.  I think.  (I shouldn’t think.)  Browns upon browns with stripes and blots and dots.  Tans and browns.  At the end of the birch twig is now the first frog.  The green-headed bumpy-butted one.  The leopard in tiger lily patches watches the caterpillar (a different one?) clamber though the unswept unkempt.  

The frog, beside me in ceramic keeps time for the timeless.  The throat bellowing.  As though feeding a fire somewhere where Earth is turned to plow.  We all make our own ends, don’t we?

I remember when I use to have sunflowers instead of hair and butterflies were always landing on my head as if I was their own mobile home.
I never went to the barber but our landscaper would take his shears out whenever he came over and prune me, and I would sell the sunflowers at the end of our driveway out of a cardboard box stand. One buck a bunch.
Instead of shampoo I used fertilizer mixed in with the water I would sprinkle on my head each night from the tin watering can I kept under the sink.
In the summer I would lay in the sun to photosynthesize,
And I would leave home with a crown jungle of green stem and yellow peddle,
My personalized jungle.
In the winter I went bald,
Except maybe some brown droopy stems with wilting flowers that would shed their peddles whenever I got flustered, or laughed too hard, or cried.
When I was 14 I got tired of boys pulling out my hair to ask a girl to prom.
So one night I plucked out each blossom, one by one,
Until my arms were full and my head was bare.
I sat down and picked out each peddle, one by  one,
“He loves me” “He loves me not.”
The sunflowers never grew back after that,
Whatever part of me made them grow was gone,
I no longer have the seeds.
And now I sometimes sit in gardens,
And wonder if the bees recognize me.

Your love is hard
like rocks
in my belly
in the morning;
like starting the countdown
to a three-day drunk
a week later,
at every turning point,
every shadow
of an angle,
I am taking roads
I have never
crossed,
I am watching
water run
in crystalline rivers
toward alleys
I've never known.

When they ask me
for money
or Marlboros,
I say yes,
please,
I would like those too.

I would like to eat
bagels
in the sun
with crinkly paper in my teeth
and sour cream cheese
sweetening in the liquor.

My landscaper's shoulders
and granite deltoids
are now green with lime
and lichens.

Girls like to run
their
hands over them;
but they are hungry
for your hands
and the lavishing footsteps
of your fingernails.

When I wake up
I put enough water in the
coffee-maker
for about
twenty cups,
and enough
***** in those
twenty cups
for a three-day drunk.

Your love is hard like ice-cold *****
and boiling coffee
that
mutilates tastebuds
and
makes my belly feel real good.

But not talking to you for awhile;
it's easier to warm up in the morning
so I can cool down at night,
and by the pink dawn
of darkness
I could get back to working my belly
with *****, rocks, and
Marlboros.

I, the poet wears many hats to adorn self at any given time.

Musician, orchestrating with instrument of pen, expressive words upon page.

Artist, painting with beautiful colorful jargon, to open eyes and hearts inside grace.

Gardener, planting seeds of thoughts for them to bloom inside readers mind.

Chief, dishing out many a line, filled with delicious words to tantalize reader.

Landscaper, constructing scenery as beautiful as a mountain, or deep as an ocean.

Sculptor, molding craft of words sometimes soft and light, other times sharp as steel.

Teacher, enlightening one with information to open their consciousness if they choose.

Sailor, guiding ship-like eyes across a sea of words to move into calm waters for peace.

Laborer, picking just the right phase, to get a fresh new perspective inside a poem.

Singer, using one's rhythmic voice to echo inside vibrations of a sonnet that goes viral.

Doctor,  becoming a wordologist aiding the reader to receive insight to help them heal.

Secretary, to self who writes and transcribes many an ode so reader and poet has peace.

I, poet has a wardrobe quite extensive to pull from, on a creative journey of sharing.

StarBG © 2017

Unlocked, loaded, let your words flame papercandle-flame

set arson to thought-control, combust news.

Pyro-dissident: touch fire to their views

Reveal new topographies, mind-shaper.

Spark a candle – a single thin taper.

Subvert what worldlings dare not refuse.

The herd will always revile or accuse;

but contours alter for you, landscaper –

so chastise darkness. Proclaim what is right.

(When their stable burns down due to your light

or smoldering, implodes, it’s not your fault.)

If the status quo will not acquiesce

then muster another frontal assault.

There’s no shame in a flame; just incandesce…

To you the reader
Join me in my reflections
I can't be the only one who used to wonder
I would look and see touch and feel
but I had to ask is this real?
Yes I was 5 years old but do you think you've out grown these childish contemplations?
Because you are now in college you figured the question need not be asked
you enter the workforce and no one cares to know
so to you it seems impractical
your pragmatic lifestyle sets aside no time for the 5 year old me
but how bout it
entertain me
though to you it may be a simple play thing
what if? Just what if it is all a dream can you explain to 5 year old me so impractical a thing?
Yes of course you can
you take a breath and you sit back you read what I write and you laugh
“this is absurd” you think yourself “perhaps this paper would have been better left on the shelf”
a waste of time
you could have been banging another girl
making some more money
sitting back and watch the game
listening to music or going to the movies
but instead here you are if you have made it this far
and why? Why have you chosen to read on?
Have you never wonder the answers to this song?
why so much consistency in life in nature
why don't the clouds fall with the rain
why does the rain fall at all
is rain reality or imaginary
behind a smile and a chuckle
you don't like the words I place on your mind
put the paper down
burn it throw it away
you can hide behind a smile
a life style of glittering prizes
a day dream of something better
in your lovers mansion in your movie star car
behind the door of a shack
the reflection of technology
your computer screen
your cell phone or the T.V
you can jump through the hoops of the corporate ladder
you can flip burgers severe burgers or eat them
you can paint cars
fly air planes
get your PHD and teach at Harvard
you may be a full time student
a part time stripper
you could be the best crack dealer or the worst hotel manager
you may have never read a book
perhaps you've read most all
you could be an engineer
a landscaper
a cake baker
a clothes designer
a truck driver
a construction worker
a framer
a carpenter
a plumber
a foremen
an electrician
a fruit picker
an insurance consultant
a medical doctor
a lawyer
a taxi driver
a stay at home mom
a computer designer
a movie director
an actor
an actress
a behind the sense extra
a singer
a dancer
a musician
an athlete
a family man
a single man
a good man
a bad man
a sad man
a mad man
or a glad man
So I know to you this question means nothing
but for 5 year old me could you answer it please?

Unlocked, loaded, let your words flame paper
set arson to thought-control, combust news.
Pyro-dissident: touch fire to their views
Reveal new topographies, mind-shaper.
Spark a candle—a single thin taper.
Subvert what the worldlings dare not refuse.
The herd will always revile or accuse;
but contours alter for you, landscaper—
so chastise darkness. Proclaim what is right.
(When their stable burns down due to your light
or smoldering, implodes, it's not your fault.)
If the status quo will not acquiesce
then muster another frontal assault.
There's no shame in a flame; just incandesce...

I'm 23 as of today
It was suppose to be special
Because the father I never knew
Was suppose to come today
He said he wouldn't miss it for the world
And come to find out
He traded me in for a six pack
Some 26 year old *****
Out for only the money he stockpiles
In every pocket he can find

I lived a poor life
With my mom working two jobs
Barely able to pay the bills
Me quitting school
Even though she hated the idea
Me getting a job as a landscaper
At the age of only 13
Here I am working plants now
Crying because he promised

I had to raise my three siblings
Watch my baby brother die
Because his little heart wasn't strong enough
5 years old and he faded
Disappeared like our father
He says he left for that reason
But he was out the door
4 years before we even knew

How am I suppose to be the man
Of this already vacant house
When there was never a man to teach me
That being a man was sticking it out
Through thick and thin
No crutches and no lies
Just a god we pray to on Sundays
And a lie we live through the week
I can never say I'm strong
I still break down and cry
When I see my brothers footprints
Tattooed on my mothers chest
When I see his name on my arm

They say lessons are learned
Through the mistakes we make
Yet I'm learning more from everybody else's
Rather than stumbling and catching myself
I've watched my younger sister
Sell herself for $50
My younger brother go off to high school
My baby sister crying because nobody can help her
I'm lost and beaten down
I've tried protecting her
Yet I'm too weak to protect myself

My mom says she named me angel
Because I was her gift from god
Yet I know I'm the spawn of Satan
Always working
Always being the role model
I'm the most damaged one
On every possible edge known to man
Only centimeters from the cliffs
When does enough become enough
When do I get to rest
And engulf myself in throw away girls
You know the ones who you ****
Then watch walk out the next morning
Kind of like my younger sister
But she has her own life
Her own special "medication"
Her ritual to relieve her pain
While I'm stuck working 12 hour days
6 days a ******* week
Where church comes first on the 7th day
I want to disappear
But how would my mother feel
My brother my little sister
All those depending on me
Maybe this is the feeling of a man
The feeling a father gets
When things get too rough
Backs in the corner
No left hooks or right jabs to escape
Just alcohol and the flight plan
Where nothing else matters when you go
Leave everything at the door

I haven't had a girlfriend
Yet I've had *** twice
I don't know how I managed that
I've pulled my mother out of debt
Saved us from getting evicted
Even started a fund for my brother to go to college
I'm just hoping I can be as good as a father
As I am a brother and a son
I just wish I could tell every one
Through all the struggles
All the abandonment and self hate
I can still smile for those I love
Their what matter the most
Even when we get mad at each other

Kyrie Eleison*

Father, my Father, Glory unto Thee, creator and sustainer of our Earth, hear my prayer. I found a single strand of hair in my car, long and reddish brown, and I wept.

I wept not for myself, or for something that I had lost, but for an idea which that represented, a yearning for something greater than myself, for a finale end to this loneliness I have run from for uncounted years.

Yet I understood that we, your children, are more than abstractions, more than symbols, more than mere variations on a theme.

We are the landscaper who left a single bunch of flowers unmowed in an open field, we are the children attending a theater in Palestine dedicated to self expression and non-violence, we are the penitent kneeling at the pillar of St. Simon in Syria, we are the bus driver giving free rides in Queens, we are the random person who pulled a needle out of my friend's arm one night, we are humanity, and our journey is a long one.

Many of us feel abandoned by You, many don't believe in You at all, and many, such as myself, are merely lost and wondering, searching for signs You have left along the way, managing as best we can to get back to that place where You live.

I thank You though, thank You for the beauty that is all around us, but more than that, I thank You for helping me to see it, to see the World, not as I am, but as You are. I am trying, and perhaps one day I shall succeed.

"careful son", plucking stems from leaves
no hands threw him onto a stump, broke his arm
so a doctor went to work, a landscaper rolled his sleeves
years later, the yard changed and looked less
like the farm

On cold days,
I envy the landscaper
for his freedom.

It came from an accident.

From two people who met, loved, and sputtered out.

It came from adoption. From a family in the suburbs around Philadelphia.

And it came from Nowhere, as my brain put out feelers around her
and learned she was real.

It came from Fantasia-- from classical dinosaurs, and from Mickey Mouse with little dancing brooms, and from a line that vibrated with the music.

It came from Love, a word I learned.

It came from feeling like the weird kid in school.

It came from chorus, learning trumpet, and Boy Scouts.

From losing young friends and Sugar We're Going down coming on mtv2.

It came from nooks and crannies and trinkets from my life I am sweeping by and not mentioning.

It came from confusing therapy appointments and being told to take medication.

It came from my first guitar at age thirteen.

From losing control and breaking everything in my house and going to a mental health clinic. From cutting myself because I don't know, other people did it and I'm sad.

It came from puppy love with this cute girl who was pretty averse to me at first. And from sneaking over her house when no one was home.

And it came from identifying myself as a poet, songwriter, a kawaii emo kid who could hang with anyone (but maybe not some of the popular kids).

It came from being arrested for trespassing on accident, not believed, and then put on probation. It came from sleeping in past the bus and then being sent to juvenile hall for truancy. It came from a burning hatred for authority that hurt my life for no reason.

It came from feeling mishandled by my parents but also whiny and unable to stop whining.

It came from Latin class and AP English and Music Theory classes, and my high school sweetheart who is forever my personal Goddess of Music. But I don't think about her much anymore.

It came from feeling self-conscious about being a slow reader.

It came from seeing myself as an intellectual, and from being watched all the time by the government.

It came from starting to realize my brain gets depressed, grandiose, understands the world through fixations, and is sort of a lopsided brain.

It came from high school antics, starting to smoke ****, and becoming interested in the truth about drugs.

It came from starting to realize I was way too invested in these girls, and wow I really let myself become a **** sometimes.

It came from going away to college in the middle of Pennsylvania.

It came from an interest in psychedelics and probably overdoing it a bit and an incident where I hit my head that really had me spinning for a while.

It came from dropping out of Bloomsburg.

It came from starting to feel like I should know what I'm doing by now and for the first time, feeling like an adult lost in the world.

It came from going back to school and meeting a cute older girl who was Scandinavian and new and exciting.

It came from living like a rock star in a college town, delivering food and going where the **** I wanted when I wanted.

It came from my last time losing my **** over this girl. From realizing I am in control of how I react, and finally developing a callus.

It came from a very bipolar drive to Miami and back to Pennsylvania without looking into any new places like I planned.

It came from having to live back home with my bad memories. From an uncharacteristic DUI and banging my head in the cop car until it bled.

It came from getting another DUI for **** because my headlight was out and I got pulled over, but I was driving perfectly.

It came from having to be involved with the law again, and being depressed about that girl, cutting myself and admitting myself to the mental clinic.

It came from my parents really getting on my nerves, and it's not just me.

It came from losing my temper and breaking the TV and my dad's windshield with a baseball bat.

It came from not being allowed back home after admitting myself to the mental clinic again, from being set up with a room in the next town only to have it be destroyed by strangers and kicked out.

It came from living with a new friend, partying all the time, selling **** for money, and living in hotels.

It came from having to get away from all that and working hard as a landscaper. From patching things up and moving back home.

It came from losing probably my tenth job because I didn't show up, and getting depressed again.

It came from throwing that shoe at the wall. From my dad coming downstairs and me yelling at him to shut the ******* door. From my brother being rightfully angry at me because I'd been a **** and throwing his iHome at the ground.

It came from my parents calling the police on me when I was on probation.

It came from de-escalating, talking to the cops, and then using my coping skills and riding my bike after that, but it came from finding my tires slashed and failing myself, storming off and busting things up (only insured things) with rocks.

It came from the police surrounding my house and taking me off to jail, from that being the last time I'd ever see grandpop alive. We caught you on surveillance.

It came from five hard months in the county jail feeling very scared and not treated with justice at all. Except I thought maybe God is treating me with justice.

It came from re-assessing myself and taking some time to breathe.

It came from being locked up again two months after that for smoking ****, for a month and a half long sentence.

It came from behavioral health court, which promised to lower my charge from a felony if I passed this very strict program for a year.

It came from only being able to let it go about 50% of the time and from deep resentment for my parents built up over the years.

It came from being accused of doing opiates when I didn't, and from being reprimanded for not trying hard enough when in truth I was. It came from my psychiatrist is on vacation, and that's why she isn't answering. It came from I know myself, and I don't need medication.

It came from even deeper anger at the system but now I'm an adult. And it seriously helps some of these people, and they really do care I guess.

It came from not being sure if I'm trying my hardest but I'm going to apply here and work on something today.

It came from feeling like a complicated mess no one wants to listen to.

It came from getting up early every day to see if I have a drug test and biking through the freezing cold to make the bus if I do.

It came from love, that's a word I learned.

The after life part 7



Cronus is having a busy times bringing people back to life and he had 33 year old Brian Buchanan who was a hard worker, he works as a landscaper during the day, helping people get their gardens sorted out and he worked every dinner time at the roadhouse, which is a homeless shelter where he helps out at and after that on Tuesday and Wednesday he does performing arts at the community centre and on Thursday he plays tenpin bowling where he has won many trophies and in summer he volunteered at the cricket and basketball by standing at the gate letting and not letting people in and at winter he does the bbq for the Southport sharks neafl team in Aussie rules where he occasionally gets free footy tickets for Brisbane lions and also works at the masters games where he has met so many great olympians and doing all this made him feel good about himself but he was all burnt out doing all this, he collapsed on the road and passed away and Cronus said, Brian Buchanan what or who do you want to be in your next life and Brian said I want to play little league baseball for whoever they choose for me and I want a family who respects the decisions I make and if you think it is a good idea, I want to bring afl football to Jupiter, I have a team name called the goofy gorillas which is cool enough don’t you think and Cronus said yes that would be good, as long as you don’t burn yourself out
And Brian said no I won’t burn myself out and Cronus sent him to Buddha for a reincarnation talk and then to Athena for a soul check and after that Brian went to Jupiter to work on creating the afl team, the goofy gorillas and after that Cronus had another soul named Harry symes who died by getting hit by a car on his way to work by a drunk driver and Cronus said it was horrible how you passed away, so who or what do you want to be in your next life and Harry said I want to be good enough to be a trainee policemen and I want my spirit to make me a good policeman and Cronus said there is no such thing as a good policeman but I could give you to a family who is ready to learn how to not break the law, so it will be your fault if you make mistakes and Harry said ok, but I don’t want to make mistakes though, I just want to lock away people like the driver that killed me and Cronus said policemen get killed, I hope you know and Harry said yes I know but it is an important job so Cronus sent him to Buddha for a spirit check and then to Athena for a soul check and then Harry went to Saturn to have a methane smoothie before he comes to a world where methane is deadly and then Cronus asked Yvonne Simmons who died on the operating table after collapsing at work, who or what do you want to be in your next life and Yvonne said Just send me anywhere, I want to play sport and do concerts at school and outside school and do a few other cool stuff, please I want to be normal and not stupid and Cronus said you ain’t stupid you could do anything you want to do, and I could see you are a live in the moment kind of person so just relax as I send you to Buddha to talk about the best parents for you and then a soul check with Athena and after that Yvonne went to mercury to meet her deceased boyfriend and they had a good conversation about future lives and Yvonne went back to Buddha to ask if she could be in the same family as her boyfriends next life and Buddha said fine but you might have to just be a cousin and Yvonne said that is fine with me, thanks and Cronus sent her to be her boyfriends cousin and in 9 months she will be back to earth