I live in Moshi,Tanzania,
As a child,one day I got lost,
A maasai took me to his home.
He lived at the foothills of the majestic Mt.Kilimanjaro,
His home was a kraal (hut)
made of  stone,sticks and cow dung.
I cried for my parents,
So he fed me milk and blood from a cow,
He pierced a hole in the cow's neck,
He put a bamboo and told me to drink the blood,
It was warm but I vomited,
Gradually, I got used to it.
The maasai's  way of life is communilism,
Hunting,gathering and raiding neighbours cattle.
Theirs is an age set system for men,
The children look after the herd,
I joined them having fun,
No  school, no lessons or homework.
Then,there were the Morans,the youths,
They wore black **** cloths,
Carried a spear in one hand,
Their faces were painted with white ochre.
They protected the clan and the cattle,
From predators and other tribes.
They lived in a circle of huts called manyatta.
After being circumcised the Morans were taught the art of warfare
The bravest warrior got to wear the feathers of an ostrich.
The senior morans could marry and settle down,
The Moran who jumped the highest got the best girl.
The Laigewenanis trained the morans to be warriors,
My maasai was a laigwenani,
Like all maasais, he was tall and lean,
He wore a bright red shuka cloth with black stripes,
A red tartan blanket was slung on his shoulder,
He always held a long bladed stabbing spear,
His long hair was tightly braided,
He had ochre painted on his body,
He had no children and treated me like his son,
He would take me to teach the morans about warfare.
But,he had to take the permission of the chief, the Laibon.
The Laibons were the chief religious leaders,
They settled disputes,
They decided when and on whom to attack.
Luckily,after two months my maasai and I had gone to a game reserve for hunting,
A game warden found me.
He alerted the police and I was taken home safely.
But,I missed my maasai and their pastoral way of life.

.
Robins spike the lawns,
Pulling from moist earth,
Bobbing and rigging oil
Skinned worms topside
And butterflies hovering,
Round eddies over flowers
On a windless day, sailing
In search of colourful spots
On which to land, sparrows
Are nesting above the fray,
Winging with fresh supplies
Building bases about twigs,
Tufts and twine, canvassing
The nailed on house shelters
Left for them, finches, yellow
Headed come in, cheerfully
Raiding the red apple buds
Before trees are even laden
And flowers are out in force
As the rapacious humming
Birds thrusting their rapiers,
Lash all the hearts blooming.

“They’re killing my art”, I enounced, once more.
I cannot remember how long it has been,
since I’ve taken reason to account me the pleasure of truth.

Too long since I’ve allowed
the eloquence of ambiguity to persuade me
like a drunken, sunken, driven violin
that by its arduous harmony
knows not love
but the expression entangled
between deception and madness.


What a lovely step,
each and every step
of every pronounced pitch; rhyme - never to be heard, once more,
and never again;
should these feelings fade,
should I know any more.

I know not less than written
formalities and informalities,
messages, designs, rules;
they’re teaching me how to think,
how to drool over so-called precious,
unblemished restrictions,
while the only thing I can procure is
“they’re killing my art”.

They are killing me,
with every step;
every step of a pronounced pitch
that only grows louder as I grow older; weaker.

They are attempting to make me a follower,
attempting to rid of all
mesmerizingly morbid sensations
engraved in my sphere - even me, even you.

I could not recall the last moment
I tried to picture your smile,
still now,
I deny myself the ruthless pleasure.
I do remember, it was cold,
I felt a rigid tangent of merciful memories raiding;
all I could bestow of tendered hope,
then I remember dissolution.

“They’re killing my art”,
they dare deny it.
They dare to outstand me
and enforce me to exhibit myself as a self-evoked,
developed work of admiration
only so that they could indulge of a sense of liberty
while they are chained to an unsustainable
glimpse of stability they dare defy as happiness.

Much unlike myself,
much more like you.
It was a fault,
you’ve only ever wanted to be loved, accepted.
The moment in which they took
the blossoming of your efforts
with calid gestures and tinted words,
pitifully glanced upon your seldom eyes
with a misunderstood applause,
you felt at home.


But I could not stand it,
for I am no more than you,
and no less than myself.
I apprehended that while they exalted our blossoms,
they knew not our roots.

They cared not for our feelings,
for the treasures we buried
beneath every step of every word,
in every line.

they only admired what they were taught to,
and diminished what they loved
but soon were taught to forget.

For we are us,
“not them”,
how many times could I have repeated
these words before you stubbornly gave in?

Sometimes I still listen to you,
after all,
you are me, and I am you,
but I chose to evade you
in a sad and solid place,
where I, too, exhibit my sorrows,
and the brief explanations
which one brought me
to become a beautiful being
but are no longer relevant,
driven.

Sometimes I still listen to you,
when I am lost,
and I find not an excuse to better,
fearing I have become like them, while I wonder,
“why not? is it so wrong to belong?
Is it so wrong to **** a part of myself?”
For I have done so with you,
and shall never regret it.

While every time I listen to you,
I am comforted,
blindly submerged, yet alive;
reminded that no matter
how cold and frighting
a lonely path may guide me,
it shall never be as empty
as a world without art,
for that, is me.

It’s Thursday morning, usually no one’s favorite, but this one seems sugary new, as if beamed in from a different, better universe. The clouds look fluffy and freshly washed.

Even the freshmen, who’re everywhere, multiplied, as if they’d been cloned overnight, seem less dramatic with their endless droning-on about insignificant political points.

Could this explosive sunniness be because midterms were stupidly easy and spring break is one day away? Hmm, maybe, but it’s not the whole story. Peter (my bf) will be here tomorrow night and for 18 romantic days (and nights) we’re going nowhere except New Haven night spots and my dorm room. I’m so happy, in a pure pop euphoria way, I almost feel guilty about it.

It’s 45°, the high will be 52°. New Haven’s warming up, I think we have winter on the run, next stop:spring, baby. Sunny, Lisa, Leong and I are breakfasting together before we scatter, like Confetti, for our day.

We’d picked a table by the windows, because it looked relatively clean. We dumped our stuff and began raiding the breakfast bar. All of the choices look depressingly healthy—does anyone else miss grease for breakfast—you know, bacon? Anyone? Oh, well, at least there’s ‘specialty coffee’.

After we’d all settled in, we were quiet. Most were visualizing their day, I supposed. I wasn’t. I was thinking about last night. Last night, Leong was making Chinese soup—she’s a gourmand—and teaching us how to make it. It’s elaborate, and as she worked she married the instructions with details from her life growing up in China.

Like how, back in Macau, they lived in this great house with many servants (her dad is an industrialist) but her grandmother insisted on raising chickens and growing a garden—and somewhere in the mix she added, with heart-on-her-sleeve vulnerability, “My dad doesn’t know how to show his love.”

And we were like, “Oh, wow, Ok, that got real - quickly.” It seemed sudden and off-kilter, at first, but as we talked it out, I decided that there was something kind of poetic about using food to talk about the emotional barriers you’re facing with your Chinese father.

“I need some high energy, smashing,” Sunny confided, after her first few sips of coffee.
“It’s 8:23am,” Leong moaned, closing her eyes as if to say, “It’s too early to start.”
“Who says femininity is shy and retiring?” Lisa asked, rhetorically.
I made a face. The pastry I’d gotten was stale. I dropped it, but I didn’t spit out my first bite. “It’s the non-stop of disappointing little things that **** our joy,” I stated sagely, around the stale mush.
“Epicureanism?” Sunny asked no one in particular. But no one entered the debate.
.
.
Songs for this:
You Can Have It All by Yo La Tengo
Cry! by Caroline Rose

Robins spike morning lawns,
Pulling from the moist earth,
Bobbing and rigging new oil
Skinned worms took topside
And butterflies dart hovering,
Swirling eddies over flowers
On this windless day, sailing
In search of colourful spots
On which to land, sparrows
Are nesting above the frays,
Winging with fresh supplies
Building bases about twigs,
Tufts and twine, canvassing
The nailed on house shelters
Left for them, finches, yellow
Headed come in, cheerfully
Raiding the red apple buds
Before trees are even laden
And flowers are out in force
As the rapacious humming
Birds thrusting their rapiers,
Lash all the hearts blooming.

Barbarians, and archers, and goblins oh my !
Restless in army camps for the raiding is nigh.
The builders are busy setting up my next plot,
Deciding where the mortar can pull off the best shot.

A chop and a cut, and voila ! More land to use,
Setting up decorations, all cast as a ruse.
I look to my shield, and the icon says “none”,
If I don’t request troops soon I’ll surely be done!
I prepare to attack, but don’t like what I see,
So “next” I press, and hope for a camp that’s easy !
Aha! I exclaim as I find a weak prey,
Gold walls or not, I’ll be claiming victory this day !

Giants come rumbling, to cause some destruction,
Followed by wall breakers to remove all obstruction.
With holes now aplenty, in come the rest of the crew,
To pilfer and plunder and do what they do.
100% !!! And 3 stars the finale,
Plus 35 more trophies to add to my tally.
Mission completed, I set back to my camp,
A smile on my face feeling like a real champ !

The day’s at an end so off goes the phone,
In the middle of the night I hear a familiar tone.
I reach for my ipad and what do I see,
****** ! I’ve been raided by PãRāß@pk !!!
With shields now up for the next 16 hours,
My resources are safe and I can upgrade my towers !
And thus ends the day’s tale of cast spells and flighted arrow,
Don’t worry Clash of clans, I’ll be back tomorrow !!!

Robins spike morning lawns,
Pulling from the moist earth,
Bobbing and rigging new oil
Skinned worms took topside
And butterflies dart hovering,
Swirling eddies over flowers
On this windless day, sailing
In search of colourful spots
On which to land, sparrows
Are nesting above the frays,
Winging with fresh supplies
Building bases about twigs,
Tufts and twine, canvassing
The nailed on house shelters
Left for them, finches, yellow
Headed come in, cheerfully
Raiding the red apple buds
Before trees are even laden
And flowers are out in force
As the rapacious humming
Birds thrusting their rapiers,
Lash all the hearts blooming.

The feminine voice finds many ways to my ear
It conceals its muffled words in droplets of water
Brushes against me while in tow of unknowing winds
Shrieking whispers invade my solitude
Masters of disguises invisible to young eyes.

I can never fall asleep as gently as I once could
Drifting into the safe havens has become a rough journey
Dreams have become a great escape rather than a warm embrace
Through battle they have my eyes hostage
By their command they unwillingly disallow rest.

As butterflies caught in a storm, my eyes flutter manically in their cage
In closed lids they pry and scratch in search of escape.
Never ceasing to stop looking they trap me in this limbo
Almost treacherously aiding the sexless voiced general
In his raiding my humanity for feelings to satisfy his troops hunger.

But they are disappointed more often than not
Self ruining feelings are all this soulless ghost army craves
A delicacy they tasted in me and fed on in greed
I am sorry, dear enemy, your momentary pleasure is over
This storage is running low from frequent raids of provoked panic and emotion.

This war has been long, and no longer appears a battle
More a dance well practiced, predictable every night
You have eaten all of what you desired, but fear not I have something left
Without catch nor trickery I give to you a message of kindness and savior-
It reads Your hunger will bring starvation
So let me sleep, or continue your attacks to your downfall.

I know why the little girl cries
Because there were so many planes, it blocked out the skies
The bombing and raiding of the island side
Where the planes and the boats and the people collide
A place and time where so many died
I know why the little girl cried

I know why the little girl cries
Running away from it all with a disguise
All of her friends and family, packed up and gone
Taken to a camp, never seeing the morning dawn
A place and time where so many died
I know why the little girl cried

I know why the little girl cries
Because the bomb was dropped with no denies
Two cities fell and not a soul survives
All to the purpose, that so the nation thrives
A place and time where so many died
I know why the little girl cried

I know why the little girl cries
Because the troops marched so hard that the ground subsides
Through the blood and the sweat and the tears they all fought
Destroying everything in their path with the entire world caught
A place and time where so many died
I know why the little girl cried

I know why the little girl cries
To escape all the pain and the struggle and lies
She cried so hard that the little girl died
And now the whole world knows why, the little girl cried

Old story
New trust
What you've seen of me
Was just the crust
Wipe away the grime
Of my old life
The icky part when I went through the motions
Silently, like a mime
But now I feel the need to
Scream and shout
I want to express,
To let it all pour out
I'm like a bomb
Just waiting to explode
Say the wrong thing
Might send me into irrational mode
In my faith I will stand
Firm like a lighthouse on the ocean
Knock me down, scrape me up
And I'll bleed pure emotion
I'm in an invisible army
With me, myself, and I
Tonight we're raiding imagination land
So don't bother to stop by
Sticks and stones will break my bones
But words will hurt me more
They say it's nothing, don't worry about it
But I feel it in my core
All these things, these words
Describe how I exist
Never normal, always a maddening mess
My rant is over, with that you are dismissed

Before air became gas
And water waste;
Before light became lasers
And fireworks cannons;
Before cars got wings
And trucks got tracks;
Before rafts were raiding ships
And we breathed underwater;
Before sticks were arrows and spears
And we exalted ourselves;
Before Empires rose and fell
And rose and fell,
A femur crushed Cro magnon's skull.
It's a marvel
How any of us
Are here
At all.

the hard up politicians down under
have given themselves a wage increase
and the taxpayer would be far happier
if this kind of thing did cease

our members of parliament
are fattening up their pay packets
we taxpayers are onto their
most unwarranted rackets

they tell us we must show some restraint
in all our pay rise requests
as the nation's cannot be held down
by these outlandish behests

yet they so love having the extra quids
put into their pay pots
while us taxpayers never get single dollar
placed into our meager plots

the politicians are great at lining
their pockets with our hard earned cash
they have no conscience
when it comes to raiding the taxpayer's stash

next year the greedy politicians
will be crying poor mouth again
and us put upon taxpayers
shall be feeling their wage rise pain

FIRST DAY

1.
Who wanted me
to go to Chicago
on January 6th?
I did!

The night before,
20 below zero
Fahrenheit
with the wind chill;
as the blizzard of 99
lay in mountains
of blackening snow.

I packed two coats,
two suits,
three sweaters,
multiple sets of long johns
and heavy white socks
for a two-day stay.

I left from Newark.
**** the denseness,
it confounds!

The 2nd City to whom?
2nd ain’t bad.
It’s pretty good.
If you consider
Peking and Prague,
Tokyo and Togo,
Manchester and Moscow,
Port Au Prince and Paris,
Athens and Amsterdam,
Buenos Aries and Johannesburg;
that’s pretty good.

What’s going on here today?
It’s friggin frozen.
To the bone!

But Chi Town is still cool.
Buddy Guy’s is open.
Bartenders mixing drinks,
cabbies jamming on their breaks,
honey dew waitresses serving sugar,
buildings swerving,
fire tongued preachers are preaching
and the farmers are measuring the moon.

The lake,
unlike Ontario
is in the midst of freezing.
Bones of ice
threaten to gel
into a solid mass
over the expanse
of the Michigan Lake.
If this keeps up,
you can walk
clear to Toronto
on a silver carpet.

Along the shore
the ice is permanent.
It’s the first big frost
of winter
after a long
Indian Summer.

Thank God
I caught a cab.
Outside I hear
The Hawk
nippin hard.
It’ll get your ear,
finger or toe.
Bite you on the nose too
if you ain’t careful.

Thank God,
I’m not walking
the Wabash tonight;
but if you do cover up,
wear layers.

Chicago,
could this be
Sandburg’s City?

I’m overwhelmed
and this is my tenth time here.

It’s almost better,
sometimes it is better,
a lot of times it is better
and denser then New York.

Ask any Bull’s fan.
I’m a Knickerbocker.
Yes Nueva York,
a city that has placed last
in the standings
for many years.
Except the last two.
Yanks are # 1!

But Chicago
is a dynasty,
as big as
Sammy Sosa’s heart,
rich and wide
as Michael Jordan’s grin.

Middle of a country,
center of a continent,
smack dab in the mean
of a hemisphere,
vortex to a world,
Chicago!

Kansas City,
Nashville,
St. Louis,
Detroit,
Cleveland,
Pittsburgh,
Denver,
New Orleans,
Dallas,
Cairo,
Singapore,
Auckland,
Baghdad,
Mexico City
and Montreal
salute her.



2.
Cities,
A collection of vanities?
Engineered complex utilitarianism?
The need for community a social necessity?
Ego one with the mass?
Civilization’s latest *******?
Chicago is more then that.

Jefferson’s yeoman farmer
is long gone
but this capitol
of the Great Plains
is still democratic.

The citizen’s of this city
would vote daily,
if they could.

Chicago,
Sandburg’s Chicago,
Could it be?

The namesake river
segments the city,
canals of commerce,
all perpendicular,
is rife throughout,
still guiding barges
to the Mississippi
and St. Laurence.

Now also
tourist attractions
for a cafe society.

Chicago is really jazzy,
swanky clubs,
big steaks,
juices and drinks.

You get the best
coffee from Seattle
and the finest teas
from China.

Great restaurants
serve liquid jazz
al la carte.

Jazz Jazz Jazz
All they serve is Jazz
Rock me steady
Keep the beat
Keep it flowin
Feel the heat!

Jazz Jazz Jazz
All they is, is Jazz
Fast cars will take ya
To the show
Round bout midnight
Where’d the time go?

Flows into the Mississippi,
the mother of America’s rivers,
an empires aorta.

Great Lakes wonder of water.
Niagara Falls
still her heart gushes forth.

Buffalo connected to this holy heart.
Finger Lakes and Adirondacks
are part of this watershed,
all the way down to the
Delaware and Chesapeake.

Sandburg’s Chicago?
Oh my my,
the wonder of him.
Who captured the imagination
of the wonders of rivers.

Down stream other holy cities
from the Mississippi delta
all mapped by him.

Its mouth our Dixie Trumpet
guarded by righteous Cajun brethren.

Midwest?
Midwest from where?
It’s north of Caracas and Los Angeles,
east of Fairbanks,
west of Dublin
and south of not much.

Him,
who spoke of honest men
and loving women.
Working men and mothers
bearing citizens to build a nation.
The New World’s
precocious adolescent
caught in a stream
of endless and exciting change,
much pain and sacrifice,
dedication and loss,
pride and tribulations.

From him we know
all the people’s faces.
All their stories are told.
Never defeating the
idea of Chicago.

Sandburg had the courage to say
what was in the heart of the people, who:

Defeated the Indians,
Mapped the terrain,
Aided slavers,
Fought a terrible civil war,
Hoisted the barges,
Grew the food,
Whacked the wheat,
Sang the songs,
Fought many wars of conquest,
Cleared the land,
Erected the bridges,
Trapped the game,
Netted the fish,
Mined the coal,
Forged the steel,
Laid the tracks,
Fired the tenders,
Cut the stone,
Mixed the mortar,
Plumbed the line,
And laid the bricks
Of this nation of cities!

Pardon the Marlboro Man shtick.
It’s a poor expostulation of
crass commercial symbolism.

Like I said, I’m a
Devil Fan from Jersey
and Madison Avenue
has done its work on me.

It’s a strange alchemy
that changes
a proud Nation of Blackhawks
into a merchandising bonanza
of hometown hockey shirts,
making the native seem alien,
and the interloper at home chillin out,
warming his feet atop a block of ice,
guzzling Old Style
with clicker in hand.

Give him his beer
and other diversions.
If he bowls with his buddy’s
on Tuesday night
I hope he bowls
a perfect game.

He’s earned it.
He works hard.
Hard work and faith
built this city.

And it’s not just the faith
that fills the cities
thousand churches,
temples and
mosques on the Sabbath.

3.
There is faith in everything in Chicago!

An alcoholic broker named Bill
lives the Twelve Steps
to banish fear and loathing
for one more day.
Bill believes in sobriety.

A tug captain named Moe
waits for the spring thaw
so he can get the barges up to Duluth.
Moe believes in the seasons.

A farmer named Tom
hopes he has reaped the last
of many bitter harvests.
Tom believes in a new start.

A homeless man named Earl
wills himself a cot and a hot
at the local shelter.
Earl believes in deliverance.

A Pullman porter
named George
works overtime
to get his first born
through medical school.
George believes in opportunity.

A folk singer named Woody
sings about his
countrymen inheritance
and implores them to take it.
Woody believes in people.

A Wobbly named Joe
organizes fellow steelworkers
to fight for a workers paradise
here on earth.
Joe believes in ideals.

A bookkeeper named Edith
is certain she’ll see the Cubs
win the World Series
in her lifetime.
Edith believes in miracles.

An electrician named ****
saves money
to bring his family over from Gdansk.
**** believes in America.

A banker named Leah
knows Ditka will return
and lead the Bears
to another Super Bowl.
Leah believes in nostalgia.

A cantor named Samuel
prays for another 20 years
so he can properly train
his Temple’s replacement.

Samuel believes in tradition.
A high school girl named Sally
refuses to get an abortion.
She knows she carries
something special within her.
Sally believes in life.

A city worker named Mazie
ceaselessly prays
for her incarcerated son
doing 10 years at Cook.
Mazie believes in redemption.

A jazzer named Bix
helps to invent a new art form
out of the mist.
Bix believes in creativity.

An architect named Frank
restores the Rookery.
Frank believes in space.

A soldier named Ike
fights wars for democracy.
Ike believes in peace.

A Rabbi named Jesse
sermonizes on Moses.
Jesse believes in liberation.

Somewhere in Chicago
a kid still believes in Shoeless Joe.
The kid believes in
the integrity of the game.

An Imam named Louis
is busy building a nation
within a nation.
Louis believes in
self-determination.

A teacher named Heidi
gives all she has to her students.
She has great expectations for them all.
Heidi believes in the future.

4.
Does Chicago have a future?

This city,
full of cowboys
and wildcatters
is predicated
on a future!

Bang, bang
Shoot em up
Stake the claim
It’s your terrain
Drill the hole
Strike it rich
Top it off
You’re the boss
Take a chance
Watch it wane
Try again
Heavenly gains

Chicago
city of futures
is a Holy Mecca
to all day traders.

Their skin is gray,
hair disheveled,
loud ties and
funny coats,
thumb through
slips of paper
held by nail
chewed hands.
Selling promises
with no derivative value
for out of the money calls
and in the money puts.
Strike is not a labor action
in this city of unionists,
but a speculators mark,
a capitalist wish,
a hedgers bet,
a public debt
and a farmers
fair return.

Indexes for everything.
Quantitative models
that could burst a kazoo.

You know the measure
of everything in Chicago.
But is it truly objective?
Have mathematics banished
subjective intentions,
routing it in fair practice
of market efficiencies,
a kind of scientific absolution?

I heard that there
is a dispute brewing
over the amount of snowfall
that fell on the 1st.

The mayor’s office,
using the official city ruler
measured 22”
of snow on the ground.

The National Weather Service
says it cannot detect more
then 17” of snow.

The mayor thinks
he’ll catch less heat
for the trains that don’t run
the buses that don’t arrive
and the schools that stand empty
with the addition of 5”.

The analysts say
it’s all about capturing liquidity.

Liquidity,
can you place a great lake
into an eyedropper?

Its 20 below
and all liquid things
are solid masses
or a gooey viscosity at best.

Water is frozen everywhere.
But Chi town is still liquid,
flowing faster
then the digital blips
flashing on the walls
of the CBOT.

Dreams
are never frozen in Chicago.
The exchanges trade
without missing a beat.

Trading wet dreams,
the crystallized vapor
of an IPO
pledging a billion points
of Internet access
or raiding the public treasuries
of a central bank’s
huge stores of gold
with currency swaps.

Using the tools
of butterfly spreads
and candlesticks
to achieve the goal.

Short the Russell
or buy the Dow,
go long the
CAC and DAX.
Are you trading in euro’s?
You better be
or soon will.
I know
you’re Chicago,
you’ll trade anything.
WEBS,
Spiders,
and Leaps
are traded here,
along with sweet crude,
North Sea Brent,
plywood and T-Bill futures;
and most importantly
the commodities,
the loam
that formed this city
of broad shoulders.

What about our wheat?
Still whacking and
breadbasket to the world.

Oil,
an important fossil fuel
denominated in
good ole greenbacks.

Porkbellies,
not just hogwash
on the Wabash,
but bacon, eggs
and flapjacks
are on the menu
of every diner in Jersey
as the “All American.”

Cotton,
our contribution
to the Golden Triangle,
once the global currency
used to enrich a
gentlemen class
of cultured
southern slavers,
now Tommy Hilfiger’s
preferred fabric.

I think he sends it
to Bangkok where
child slaves
spin it into
gold lame'.

Sorghum,
I think its hardy.

Soybeans,
the new age substitute
for hamburger
goes great with tofu lasagna.

Corn,
ADM creates ethanol,
they want us to drive cleaner cars.

Cattle,
once driven into this city’s
bloodhouses for slaughter,
now ground into
a billion Big Macs
every year.

When does a seed
become a commodity?
When does a commodity
become a future?
When does a future expire?

You can find the answers
to these questions in Chicago
and find a fortune in a hole in the floor.

Look down into the pits.
Hear the screams of anguish
and profitable delights.

Frenzied men
swarming like a mass
of epileptic ants
atop the worlds largest sugar cube
auger the worlds free markets.

The scene is
more chaotic then
100 Haymarket Square Riots
multiplied by 100
1968 Democratic Conventions.

Amidst inverted anthills,
they scurry forth and to
in distinguished
black and red coats.

Fighting each other
as counterparties
to a life and death transaction.

This is an efficient market
that crosses the globe.

Oil from the Sultan of Brunei,
Yen from the land of Hitachi,
Long Bonds from the Fed,
nickel from Quebec,
platinum and palladium
from Siberia,
FTSE’s from London
and crewel cane from Havana
circle these pits.

Tijuana,
Shanghai
and Istanbul's
best traders
are only half as good
as the average trader in Chicago.

Chicago,
this hog butcher to the world,
specializes in packaging and distribution.

Men in blood soaked smocks,
still count the heads
entering the gates of the city.

Their handiwork
is sent out on barges
and rail lines as frozen packages
of futures
waiting for delivery
to an anonymous counterparty
half a world away.

This nation’s hub
has grown into the
premier purveyor
to the world;
along all the rivers,
highways,
railways
and estuaries
it’s tentacles reach.

5.
Sandburg’s Chicago,
is a city of the world’s people.

Many striver rows compose
its many neighborhoods.

Nordic stoicism,
Eastern European orthodoxy
and Afro-American
calypso vibrations
are three of many cords
strumming the strings
of Chicago.

Sandburg’s Chicago,
if you wrote forever
you would only scratch its surface.

People wait for trains
to enter the city from O’Hare.
Frozen tears
lock their eyes
onto distant skyscrapers,
solid chunks
of snot blocks their nose
and green icicles of slime
crust mustaches.
They fight to breathe.

Sandburg’s Chicago
is The Land of Lincoln,
Savior of the Union,
protector of the Republic.
Sent armies
of sons and daughters,
barges, boxcars,
gunboats, foodstuffs,
cannon and shot
to raze the south
and stamp out succession.

Old Abe’s biography
are still unknown volumes to me.
I must see and read the great words.
You can never learn enough;
but I’ve been to Washington
and seen the man’s memorial.
The Free World’s 8th wonder,
guarded by General Grant,
who still keeps an eye on Richmond
and a hand on his sword.

Through this American winter
Abe ponders.
The vista he surveys is dire and tragic.

Our sitting President
impeached
for lying about a *******.

Party partisans
in the senate are sworn and seated.
Our Chief Justice,
adorned with golden bars
will adjudicate the proceedings.
It is the perfect counterpoint
to an ageless Abe thinking
with malice toward none
and charity towards all,
will heal the wounds
of the nation.

Abe our granite angel,
Chicago goes on,
The Union is strong!


SECOND DAY

1.
Out my window
the sun has risen.

According to
the local forecast
its minus 9
going up to
6 today.

The lake,
a golden pillow of clouds
is frozen in time.

I marvel
at the ancients ones
resourcefulness
and how
they mastered
these extreme elements.

Past, present and future
has no meaning
in the Citadel
of the Prairie today.

I set my watch
to Central Standard Time.

Stepping into
the hotel lobby
the concierge
with oil smooth hair,
perfect tie
and English lilt
impeccably asks,
“Do you know where you are going Sir?
Can I give you a map?”

He hands me one of Chicago.
I see he recently had his nails done.
He paints a green line
along Whacker Drive and says,
“turn on Jackson, LaSalle, Wabash or Madison
and you’ll get to where you want to go.”
A walk of 14 or 15 blocks from Streeterville-
(I start at The Chicago White House.
They call it that because Hillary Rodham
stays here when she’s in town.
Its’ also alleged that Stedman
eats his breakfast here
but Opra
has never been seen
on the premises.
I wonder how I gained entry
into this place of elite’s?)
-down into the center of The Loop.

Stepping out of the hotel,
The Doorman
sporting the epaulets of a colonel
on his corporate winter coat
and furry Cossack hat
swaddling his round black face
accosts me.

The skin of his face
is flaking from
the subzero windburn.

He asks me
with a gapped toothy grin,
“Can I get you a cab?”
“No I think I’ll walk,” I answer.
“Good woolen hat,
thick gloves you should be alright.”
He winks and lets me pass.

I step outside.
The Windy City
flings stabbing cold spears
flying on wings of 30-mph gusts.
My outside hardens.
I can feel the freeze
deepen
into my internalness.
I can’t be sure
but inside
my heart still feels warm.
For how long
I cannot say.

I commence
my walk
among the spires
of this great city,
the vertical leaps
that anchor the great lake,
holding its place
against the historic
frigid assault.

The buildings’ sway,
modulating to the blows
of natures wicked blasts.

It’s a hard imposition
on a city and its people.

The gloves,
skullcap,
long underwear,
sweater,
jacket
and overcoat
not enough
to keep the cold
from penetrating
the person.

Like discerning
the layers of this city,
even many layers,
still not enough
to understand
the depth of meaning
of the heart
of this heartland city.

Sandburg knew the city well.
Set amidst groves of suburbs
that extend outward in every direction.
Concentric circles
surround the city.
After the burbs come farms,
Great Plains, and mountains.
Appalachians and Rockies
are but mere molehills
in the city’s back yard.
It’s terra firma
stops only at the sea.
Pt. Barrow to the Horn,
many capes extended.

On the periphery
its appendages,
its extremities,
its outward extremes.
All connected by the idea,
blown by the incessant wind
of this great nation.
The Windy City’s message
is sent to the world’s four corners.
It is a message of power.
English the worlds
common language
is spoken here,
along with Ebonics,
Espanol,
Mandarin,
Czech,
Russian,
Korean,
Arabic,
Hindi­,
German,
French,
electronics,
steel,
cars,
cartoons,
rap,
sports­,
movies,
capital,
wheat
and more.

Always more.
Much much more
in Chicago.

2.
Sandburg
spoke all the dialects.

He heard them all,
he understood
with great precision
to the finest tolerances
of a lathe workers micrometer.

Sandburg understood
what it meant to laugh
and be happy.

He understood
the working mans day,
the learned treatises
of university chairs,
the endless tomes
of the city’s
great libraries,
the lost languages
of the ancient ones,
the secret codes
of abstract art,
the impact of architecture,
the street dialects and idioms
of everymans expression of life.

All fighting for life,
trying to build a life,
a new life
in this modern world.

Walking across
the Michigan Avenue Bridge
I see the Wrigley Building
is neatly carved,
catty cornered on the plaza.

I wonder if Old Man Wrigley
watched his barges
loaded with spearmint
and double-mint
move out onto the lake
from one of those Gothic windows
perched high above the street.

Would he open a window
and shout to the men below
to quit slaking and work harder
or would he
between the snapping sound
he made with his mouth
full of his chewing gum
offer them tickets
to a ballgame at Wrigley Field
that afternoon?

Would the men below
be able to understand
the man communing
from such a great height?

I listen to a man
and woman conversing.
They are one step behind me
as we meander along Wacker Drive.

"You are in Chicago now.”
The man states with profundity.
“If I let you go
you will soon find your level
in this city.
Do you know what I mean?”

No I don’t.
I think to myself.
What level are you I wonder?
Are you perched atop
the transmission spire
of the Hancock Tower?

I wouldn’t think so
or your ears would melt
from the windburn.

I’m thinking.
Is she a kept woman?
She is majestically clothed
in fur hat and coat.
In animal pelts
not trapped like her,
but slaughtered
from farms
I’m sure.

What level
is he speaking of?

Many levels
are evident in this city;
many layers of cobbled stone,
Pennsylvania iron,
Hoosier Granite
and vertical drops.

I wonder
if I detect
condensation
in his voice?

What is
his intention?
Is it a warning
of a broken affair?
A pending pink slip?
Advise to an addict
refusing to adhere
to a recovery regimen?

What is his level anyway?
Is he so high and mighty,
Higher and mightier
then this great city
which we are all a part of,
which we all helped to build,
which we all need
in order to keep this nation
the thriving democratic
empire it is?

This seditious talk!

3.
The Loop’s El
still courses through
the main thoroughfares of the city.

People are transported
above the din of the street,
looking down
on the common pedestrians
like me.

Super CEO’s
populating the upper floors
of Romanesque,
Greek Revivalist,
New Bauhaus,
Art Deco
and Post Nouveau
Neo-Modern
Avant-Garde towers
are too far up
to see me
shivering on the street.

The cars, busses,
trains and trucks
are all covered
with the film
of rock salt.

Salt covers
my bootless feet
and smudges
my cloths as well.

The salt,
the primal element
of the earth
covers everything
in Chicago.

It is the true level
of this city.

The layer
beneath
all layers,
on which
everything
rests,
is built,
grows,
thrives
then dies.
To be
returned again
to the lower
layers
where it can
take root
again
and grow
out onto
the great plains.

Splashing
the nation,
anointing
its people
with its
blessing.

A blessing,
Chicago?

All rivers
come here.

All things
found its way here
through the canals
and back bays
of the world’s
greatest lakes.

All roads,
rails and
air routes
begin and
end here.

Mrs. O’Leary’s cow
got a *** rap.
It did not start the fire,
we did.

We lit the torch
that flamed
the city to cinders.
From a pile of ash
Chicago rose again.

Forever Chicago!
Forever the lamp
that burns bright
on a Great Lake’s
western shore!

Chicago
the beacon
sends the
message to the world
with its windy blasts,
on chugging barges,
clapping trains,
flying tandems,
T1 circuits
and roaring jets.

Sandburg knew
a Chicago
I will never know.

He knew
the rhythm of life
the people walked to.
The tools they used,
the dreams they dreamed
the songs they sang,
the things they built,
the things they loved,
the pains that hurt,
the motives that grew,
the actions that destroyed
the prayers they prayed,
the food they ate
their moments of death.

Sandburg knew
the layers of the city
to the depths
and windy heights
I cannot fathom.

The Blues
came to this city,
on the wing
of a chirping bird,
on the taps
of a rickety train,
on the blast
of an angry sax
rushing on the wind,
on the Westend blitz
of Pop's brash coronet,
on the tink of
a twinkling piano
on a paddle-wheel boat
and on the strings
of a lonely man’s guitar.

Walk into the clubs,
tenements,
row houses,
speakeasies
and you’ll hear the Blues
whispered like
a quiet prayer.

Tidewater Blues
from Virginia,
Delta Blues
from the lower
Mississippi,
Boogie Woogie
from Appalachia,
Texas Blues
from some Lone Star,
Big Band Blues
from Kansas City,
Blues from
Beal Street,
Jelly Roll’s Blues
from the Latin Quarter.

Hell even Chicago
got its own brand
of Blues.

Its all here.
It ended up here
and was sent away
on the winds of westerly blows
to the ear of an eager world
on strong jet streams
of simple melodies
and hard truths.

A broad
shouldered woman,
a single mother stands
on the street
with three crying babes.
Their cloths
are covered
in salt.
She pleads
for a break,
praying
for a new start.
Poor and
under-clothed
against the torrent
of frigid weather
she begs for help.
Her blond hair
and ****** features
suggests her
Scandinavian heritage.
I wonder if
she is related to Sandburg
as I walk past
her on the street.
Her feet
are bleeding
through her
canvass sneakers.
Her babes mouths
are zipped shut
with frozen drivel
and mucous.

The Blues live
on in Chicago.

The Blues
will forever live in her.
As I turn the corner
to walk the Miracle Mile
I see her engulfed
in a funnel cloud of salt,
snow and bits
of white paper,
swirling around her
and her children
in an angry
unforgiving
maelstrom.

The family
begins to
dissolve
like a snail
sprinkled with salt;
and a mother
and her children
just disappear
into the pavement
at the corner
of Dearborn,
in Chicago.

Music:

Robert Johnson
Sweet Home Chicago


jbm
Chicago
1/7/99

We stalked hawthorn hedgerows,
Backyards our battlefields,
Wielding wooden swords,
Dustbin-lids, for our shields.

We scouted railway cuttings,
Long abandoned and disused,
Where friendship’s blended alloys,
Were cast, forged and fused.

We patrolled village streets,
Marched along muddied lanes,
Proudly defending ‘our land’,
From raiding, heathen, Danes’.

We boldly challenged Vikings’,
Beneath a Sixties-summer-sun,
Bonding loyalty, faith and trust,
That will never, come undone.

Those days will not return,
Memories-mismatched-truth,
Recalling the fallen heroes,
Fighting follies of our youth.

Protecting imagined Kingdoms,
Lost in time, for evermore,
Boy soldiers standing guard,
In Castles built from straw.

I do not know what it feels like to live in someone else’s dream.
Outside the house, the moon, like a mistress, slits its throat
and bleeds white. The nature of all things around me has its way
of heaving out the wrongness, as if a drunkard staggering for words,
floundering in a curt reply after being asked where’s the nearest station
towards nowhere. I remember in 4th grade, they asked me what I
wanted to do with my life. All I ever wanted was the same clichéd response,
without knowing the appropriate punishment the desire coming with it.
I am not culpable. I wanted to be a bird stirring in a plainsong: free.
Whatever that meant. In a room where cross-sections of you tender me
margins I cannot cross. When I was young, whenever my mother would
leave me for the marketplace, she told me to always lock the doors
and never let anybody inside. The sound of the gears resembled your hand
in mine when we held hands, securing each finger into place the way
the night tucked us to sleep. It is still something the unforgettable, with
its feigned urgency, its ersatz summer days indoors spent on nothing but
gibberish and luxuriously lounging at nothing, looking at blank spaces
as though they were naked women the first time and the last. In a place like
this that selfishly spires with thoughtless hum, it’s conversations with the smallest
details that cover such distance, revealing weight I cannot solder.
Freedom to me is as bizarre as any other feeling that pushes one person
over to the next one. I have its wobbling sense scattered all around like a crushed
scent of bougainvillea. What we have to give in exchange for it, and what we
are to acquire after trying to weave out denotations that would make us swill
over like muck over the city that we selfishly breathe in, and our almost
ridiculous misunderstanding of the word riddled with unsparing details.
  I had myself mull over it, passing your decrepit house. Freedom,
the wind, or a bird, or anything unloosened like a waning volume from a stereo,
a readying tip of fire awakened ready to catch the corners of your fingers,
a basket of fruits in the morning from a remote bazaar, the peeled off and pared skin
  of an orange, some November night that burnt auburn, anything that may take place
     anytime in our hands – something that does not break in it, but holds still, waiting
to take place, forming names, sliding away from fingers. Freedom, to have a shadow
engraved on an architrave and a cornice, and to have your name in my heart
  like a frieze ornamenting some entablature, or that long dream of striding past
the Metropolitan, knowing how erroneous it was to feel so immense at that cosmic moment
of sizable smallness: the perpetual dialogue between a host and a barfly,
  mellifluously woven striking in sense, a farce raiding meaning all afternoon, like the close
eye of the Sun inspecting furniture, or your nosy neighbor taking time to stop watering the
  plants and watch you dance from your window, to a music that he has no knowledge of,
               but I do. I do. If it wasn’t plainsong, then I was wrong, writhing and alive
still, leaning in the air of a dream – free, wandering,
                      *wind,   passing of figures, clenched fingers, nothing.

Ulysses now left the haven, and took the rough track up through
the wooded country and over the crest of the mountain till he
reached the place where Minerva had said that he would find the
swineherd, who was the most thrifty servant he had. He found him
sitting in front of his hut, which was by the yards that he had
built on a site which could be seen from far. He had made them
spacious and fair to see, with a free ran for the pigs all round them;
he had built them during his master’s absence, of stones which he
had gathered out of the ground, without saying anything to Penelope or
Laertes, and he had fenced them on top with thorn bushes. Outside
the yard he had run a strong fence of oaken posts, split, and set
pretty close together, while inside lie had built twelve sties near
one another for the sows to lie in. There were fifty pigs wallowing in
each sty, all of them breeding sows; but the boars slept outside and
were much fewer in number, for the suitors kept on eating them, and
die swineherd had to send them the best he had continually. There were
three hundred and sixty boar pigs, and the herdsman’s four hounds,
which were as fierce as wolves, slept always with them. The
swineherd was at that moment cutting out a pair of sandals from a good
stout ox hide. Three of his men were out herding the pigs in one place
or another, and he had sent the fourth to town with a boar that he had
been forced to send the suitors that they might sacrifice it and
have their fill of meat.
  When the hounds saw Ulysses they set up a furious barking and flew
at him, but Ulysses was cunning enough to sit down and loose his
hold of the stick that he had in his hand: still, he would have been
torn by them in his own homestead had not the swineherd dropped his ox
hide, rushed full speed through the gate of the yard and driven the
dogs off by shouting and throwing stones at them. Then he said to
Ulysses, “Old man, the dogs were likely to have made short work of
you, and then you would have got me into trouble. The gods have
given me quite enough worries without that, for I have lost the best
of masters, and am in continual grief on his account. I have to attend
swine for other people to eat, while he, if he yet lives to see the
light of day, is starving in some distant land. But come inside, and
when you have had your fill of bread and wine, tell me where you
come from, and all about your misfortunes.”
  On this the swineherd led the way into the hut and bade him sit
down. He strewed a good thick bed of rushes upon the floor, and on the
top of this he threw the shaggy chamois skin—a great thick one—on
which he used to sleep by night. Ulysses was pleased at being made
thus welcome, and said “May Jove, sir, and the rest of the gods
grant you your heart’s desire in return for the kind way in which
you have received me.”
  To this you answered, O swineherd Eumaeus, “Stranger, though a still
poorer man should come here, it would not be right for me to insult
him, for all strangers and beggars are from Jove. You must take what
you can get and be thankful, for servants live in fear when they
have young lords for their masters; and this is my misfortune now, for
heaven has hindered the return of him who would have been always
good to me and given me something of my own—a house, a piece of land,
a good looking wife, and all else that a liberal master allows a
servant who has worked hard for him, and whose labour the gods have
prospered as they have mine in the situation which I hold. If my
master had grown old here he would have done great things by me, but
he is gone, and I wish that Helen’s whole race were utterly destroyed,
for she has been the death of many a good man. It was this matter that
took my master to Ilius, the land of noble steeds, to fight the
Trojans in the cause of kin Agamemnon.”
  As he spoke he bound his girdle round him and went to the sties
where the young ******* pigs were penned. He picked out two which he
brought back with him and sacrificed. He singed them, cut them up, and
spitted on them; when the meat was cooked he brought it all in and set
it before Ulysses, hot and still on the spit, whereon Ulysses
sprinkled it over with white barley meal. The swineherd then mixed
wine in a bowl of ivy-wood, and taking a seat opposite Ulysses told
him to begin.
  “Fall to, stranger,” said he, “on a dish of servant’s pork. The
fat pigs have to go to the suitors, who eat them up without shame or
scruple; but the blessed gods love not such shameful doings, and
respect those who do what is lawful and right. Even the fierce
free-booters who go raiding on other people’s land, and Jove gives
them their spoil—even they, when they have filled their ships and got
home again live conscience-stricken, and look fearfully for judgement;
but some god seems to have told these people that Ulysses is dead
and gone; they will not, therefore, go back to their own homes and
make their offers of marriage in the usual way, but waste his estate
by force, without fear or stint. Not a day or night comes out of
heaven, but they sacrifice not one victim nor two only, and they
take the run of his wine, for he was exceedingly rich. No other
great man either in Ithaca or on the mainland is as rich as he was; he
had as much as twenty men put together. I will tell you what he had.
There are twelve herds of cattle upon the mainland, and as many flocks
of sheep, there are also twelve droves of pigs, while his own men
and hired strangers feed him twelve widely spreading herds of goats.
Here in Ithaca he runs even large flocks of goats on the far end of
the island, and they are in the charge of excellent goatherds. Each
one of these sends the suitors the best goat in the flock every day.
As for myself, I am in charge of the pigs that you see here, and I
have to keep picking out the best I have and sending it to them.”
  This was his story, but Ulysses went on eating and drinking
ravenously without a word, brooding his revenge. When he had eaten
enough and was satisfied, the swineherd took the bowl from which he
usually drank, filled it with wine, and gave it to Ulysses, who was
pleased, and said as he took it in his hands, “My friend, who was this
master of yours that bought you and paid for you, so rich and so
powerful as you tell me? You say he perished in the cause of King
Agamemnon; tell me who he was, in case I may have met with such a
person. Jove and the other gods know, but I may be able to give you
news of him, for I have travelled much.”
  Eumaeus answered, “Old man, no traveller who comes here with news
will get Ulysses’ wife and son to believe his story. Nevertheless,
tramps in want of a lodging keep coming with their mouths full of
lies, and not a word of truth; every one who finds his way to Ithaca
goes to my mistress and tells her falsehoods, whereon she takes them
in, makes much of them, and asks them all manner of questions,
crying all the time as women will when they have lost their
husbands. And you too, old man, for a shirt and a cloak would
doubtless make up a very pretty story. But the wolves and birds of
prey have long since torn Ulysses to pieces, or the fishes of the
sea have eaten him, and his bones are lying buried deep in sand upon
some foreign shore; he is dead and gone, and a bad business it is
for all his friends—for me especially; go where I may I shall never
find so good a master, not even if I were to go home to my mother
and father where I was bred and born. I do not so much care,
however, about my parents now, though I should dearly like to see them
again in my own country; it is the loss of Ulysses that grieves me
most; I cannot speak of him without reverence though he is here no
longer, for he was very fond of me, and took such care of me that
whereever he may be I shall always honour his memory.”
  “My friend,” replied Ulysses, “you are very positive, and very
hard of belief about your master’s coming home again, nevertheless I
will not merely say, but will swear, that he is coming. Do not give me
anything for my news till he has actually come, you may then give me a
shirt and cloak of good wear if you will. I am in great want, but I
will not take anything at all till then, for I hate a man, even as I
hate hell fire, who lets his poverty tempt him into lying. I swear
by king Jove, by the rites of hospitality, and by that hearth of
Ulysses to which I have now come, that all will surely happen as I
have said it will. Ulysses will return in this self same year; with
the end of this moon and the beginning of the next he will be here
to do vengeance on all those who are ill treating his wife and son.”
  To this you answered, O swineherd Eumaeus, “Old man, you will
neither get paid for bringing good news, nor will Ulysses ever come
home; drink you wine in peace, and let us talk about something else.
Do not keep on reminding me of all this; it always pains me when any
one speaks about my honoured master. As for your oath we will let it
alone, but I only wish he may come, as do Penelope, his old father
Laertes, and his son Telemachus. I am terribly unhappy too about
this same boy of his; he was running up fast into manhood, and bade
fare to be no worse man, face and figure, than his father, but some
one, either god or man, has been unsettling his mind, so he has gone
off to Pylos to try and get news of his father, and the suitors are
lying in wait for him as he is coming home, in the hope of leaving the
house of Arceisius without a name in Ithaca. But let us say no more
about him, and leave him to be taken, or else to escape if the son
of Saturn holds his hand over him to protect him. And now, old man,
tell me your own story; tell me also, for I want to know, who you
are and where you come from. Tell me of your town and parents, what
manner of ship you came in, how crew brought you to Ithaca, and from
what country they professed to come—for you cannot have come by
land.”
  And Ulysses answered, “I will tell you all about it. If there were
meat and wine enough, and we could stay here in the hut with nothing
to do but to eat and drink while the others go to their work, I
could easily talk on for a whole twelve months without ever
finishing the story of the sorrows with which it has pleased heaven to
visit me.
  “I am by birth a Cretan; my father was a well-to-do man, who had
many sons born in marriage, whereas I was the son of a slave whom he
had purchased for a concubine; nevertheless, my father Castor son of
Hylax (whose lineage I claim, and who was held in the highest honour
among the Cretans for his wealth, prosperity, and the valour of his
sons) put me on the same level with my brothers who had been born in
wedlock. When, however, death took him to the house of Hades, his sons
divided his estate and cast lots for their shares, but to me they gave
a holding and little else; nevertheless, my valour enabled me to marry
into a rich family, for I was not given to bragging, or shirking on
the field of battle. It is all over now; still, if you look at the
straw you can see what the ear was, for I have had trouble enough
and to spare. Mars and Minerva made me doughty in war; when I had
picked my men to surprise the enemy with an ambuscade I never gave
death so much as a thought, but was the first to leap forward and
spear all whom I could overtake. Such was I in battle, but I did not
care about farm work, nor the frugal home life of those who would
bring up children. My delight was in ships, fighting, javelins, and
arrows—things that most men shudder to think of; but one man likes
one thing and another another, and this was what I was most
naturally inclined to. Before the Achaeans went to Troy, nine times
was I in command of men and ships on foreign service, and I amassed
much wealth. I had my pick of the spoil in the first instance, and
much more was allotted to me later on.
  “My house grew apace and I became a great man among the Cretans, but
when Jove counselled that terrible expedition, in which so many
perished, the people required me and Idomeneus to lead their ships
to Troy, and there was no way out of it, for they insisted on our
doing so. There we fought for nine whole years, but in the tenth we
sacked the city of Priam and sailed home again as heaven dispersed us.
Then it was that Jove devised evil against me. I spent but one month
happily with my children, wife, and property, and then I conceived the
idea of making a descent on Egypt, so I fitted out a fine fleet and
manned it. I had nine ships, and the people flocked to fill them.
For six days I and my men made feast, and I found them many victims
both for sacrifice to the gods and for themselves, but on the
seventh day we went on board and set sail from Crete with a fair North
wind behind us though we were going down a river. Nothing went ill
with any of our ships, and we had no sickness on board, but sat
where we were and let the ships go as the wind and steersmen took
them. On the fifth day we reached the river Aegyptus; there I
stationed my ships in the river, bidding my men stay by them and
keep guard over them while I sent out scouts to reconnoitre from every
point of vantage.
  “But the men disobeyed my orders, took to their own devices, and
ravaged the land of the Egyptians, killing the men, and taking their
wives and children captive. The alarm was soon carried to the city,
and when they heard the war cry, the people came out at daybreak
till the plain was filled with horsemen and foot soldiers and with the
gleam of armour. Then Jove spread panic among my men, and they would
no longer face the enemy, for they found themselves surrounded. The
Egyptians killed many of us, and took the rest alive to do forced
labour for them. Jove, however, put it in my mind to do thus—and I
wish I had died then and there in Egypt instead, for there was much
sorrow in store for me—I took off my helmet and shield and dropped my
spear from my hand; then I went straight up to the king’s chariot,
clasped his knees and kissed them, whereon he spared my life, bade
me get into his chariot, and took me weeping to his own home. Many
made at me with their ashen spears and tried to kil me in their
fury, but the king protected me, for he feared the wrath of Jove the
protector of strangers, who punishes those who do evil.
  “I stayed there for seven years and got together much money among
the Egyptians, for they all gave me something; but when it was now
going on for eight years there came a certain Phoenician, a cunning
rascal, who had already committed all sorts of villainy, and this
man talked me over into going with him to Phoenicia, where his house
and his possessions lay. I stayed there for a whole twelve months, but
at the end of that time when months and days had gone by till the same
season had come round again, he set me on board a ship bound for
Libya, on a pretence that I was to take a cargo along with him to that
place, but really that he might sell me as a slave and take the
money I fetched. I suspected his intention, but went on board with
him, for I could not help it.
  “The ship ran before a fresh North wind till we had reached the
sea that lies between Crete and Libya; there, however, Jove counselled
their destruction, for as soon as we were well out from Crete and
could see nothing but sea and sky, he raised a black cloud over our
ship and the sea grew dark beneath it. Then Jove let fly with his
thunderbolts and the ship went round and round and was filled with
fire and brimstone as the lightning struck it. The men fell all into
the sea; they were carried about in the water round the ship looking
like so many sea-gulls, but the god presently deprived them of all
chance of getting home again. I was all dismayed; Jove, however,
sent the ship’s mast within my reach, which saved my life, for I clung
to it, and drifted before the fury of the gale. Nine days did I
drift but in the darkness of the tenth night a great wave bore me on
to the Thesprotian coast. There Pheidon king of the Thesprotians
entertained me hospitably without charging me anything at all for
his son found me when I was nearly dead with cold and fatigue, whereon
he raised me by the hand, took me to his father’s house and gave

i see them, your little fingerprints
like footsteps in the snow
   wherever i look, wherever i go,
         there they are, your constant reminders
of a world i no longer know
         whether i'm thinking of my favourite book
looking at my keyboard keys
                      leafing through my school pages
  or raiding a shelf of dvd's
                       my midnight snacks of icecream
                         nolonger warm the world
only serving to open the void
                               with rememberances spilt from your quill
             little flickers here and there
the way we sat, our favourite film, you trying to type with me
every break and lunch time together, climbing hills, falling asleep

i breathe you in and suffocate
                  see your finger prints every where
                       reminding me of the desert void under a burning cold sky
                                                             ­   that endlessly rests there.
                                           there,
           hanging in time
frozen between you and me
as i follow your finger print footsteps
                            and make my own with droplets of me
a tidal wave of memories overflowing and blocking my drain
                    each little piece of me staining
                              the finger prints left in our name

I kept my
blood shot eyes
securely hidden behind
my day killing shades
as I took long careful steps
over the flatend headstones.

I looked to the shadowed
areas of the hillside
graveyard,
soon found refuge beneath
a sorrow slumped eucalyptus.
I pulled the pint from
my pocket and took a pull,
then planted myself
down along side the dead.

The whirling Santa Anas brought
forth the aroma of the
marigolds,and dandelions that
had been left for the departed.

I concentrated on the pint,
I thought hard about my
decision to stop
chasing the dream and devote
it all to chasing the Dragon.

It hurt at first when I awoke
to the fact that my dreams
were not my own.
And this life and all it includes
was as false as the Gods we pray to.

I was surrounded by the dead
but the dead paid me no mind.
The dead were too busy being dead
to do anything else but lay there
within the earth in silence.

A memory invaded my thoughts
like a raiding army hungry for
wine and flesh.
The times before all of this,
the times when I felt the need
to be seen with the crowds.
The times when I followed
the flow of the fools and applauded
with them all,
bought gifts with them all
and celebrated a false celebration,
all in time and step  
with the fools.

That memory of me
when I was less then I am now,
following the fools ,
just as blind as they remain on this
very day.
As part of the crowd
I made no impact on it all.
I stood not
apart but Within.
Engulfed and smothered with lies.
I became too much like the
other guy and his best friend.
The smiling head on the television,
and the digitized voice on the radio.
I thought not on my own but
as one with the machine.

All of that person is gone now,
dead and hopefully buried
just as these fading bones
who now surrounded me.
These silenced spirits who
are the only crowd I wish to join.

Its a lonely travel that I've turned
to,it didn't take much to walk away
from it all once I awoke to this.
I left my shadow behind,
and threw their goals away
as I took on the
task of casting flames
upon the serpent.

I never knew how wrong I was
until that veil of television and
radio,material wealth and
religion was pulled sternly from
my mind.
I found my comfort
among the dead whose silent
cheers applaud me.

They know now as they lay
deep and dead
that all of it was a lie.
Their lives were never lived,
their decisions not their own.

I went at the bottle
and played host to death.
And I wondered
were they the winners,
the lucky ones who had found
a way out of this place
where death looms over head
and the struggle to go
on living is a war fought everyday.
This place where good men are
falsely accused and artist are brushed aside,
where sports are king and the lies
are told as truths.

I find my days are clearer
living on this side of the coin,
but easier they'll never be.

I have awoke to this.
To this and all of the lies
that have come from this.

Once you have awoke to this
theres  no going back to sleep.

In Ulzana's Raid,
the Native- and European-American concepts of property
      ownership and rights
are incompatible and irresolvable. McIntosh
had no illusions about that. He said hating Apaches for killing
      whites
is like hating the desert for having no water.
I suspect the movie's not a good source of anthropological
      data
and overlooks the commonalities among human communities
to focus on just a few bold characters
as all art must.

I consider McIntosh fortunate
to have died commensurate with the way he lived his life,
rolling a final cigarette, nothing between him and the desert,
and no gravediggers waiting, jesting, defecating. Also,
he is lucky to have had one last, dispassionate friend
to whom there is nothing left to say, the Chiracahua tracher
Kah-ti-nay.

Last night's performance of Beauty and the Beast
may have been the most victorious, ecstatic, cohesive
moment in our little school's history. Emily was Beauty, a
      filament of energy
who doesn't like to be touched and has been known to punch
boys hard. She had memorized her lines until she was hardly
Emily but only Beauty in a blue dress unselfconsciously
hiking up her tights between the Beast's advances.
Is this done in every American town and the world
over so there's no need to feel lost or lonely
ever?

There is no context for a man
outside the platoon or raiding party, home or shop.
When violence comes to the neighborhood,
the hierarchy of communicants will hold or fold
it is then the peace work proves relevant. I noticed McIntosh,
grizzled as he was, accepted the given hierarchy, a raw
      lieutenant's orders,
as he did the desert and Apaches, with a shrug and
      foreknowledge
of the outcome. If there's anywhere with no Emily or Beauty
we should bring them such blessings at the point of a
gun. But there is no place without Emily, not
the least-known prison in deepest space as long
as we do not hate or hurt or shun
the Beast.

the politicians down under
have just given themselves a wage increase
and the taxpayer would be far happier
if this kind of thing did cease

our members of parliament
are fattening up their pay packets
we the taxpayers are onto their
most unwarranted rackets

they tell us we must show restraint
in all of our pay rise requests
as the nation's finances cannot be held down
by these outlandish behests

yet they so love having the extra quids
put into their pay pots
while us taxpayers never get a single dollar
placed into our meager plots

the politicians are great at lining
their pockets with our hard earned cash
they have no conscience
when it comes to raiding the taxpayer's stash

next year those greedy politicians
will be crying poor mouth again  
and us put upon taxpayer's
shall be feeling their wage rise pain

A mass ******, of killings.
It truly is, a wicked thing.
You'll never see us, surrendering.
Not until the war is over.

Thousands of soldiers, marching along.
What they don't know is, they'll soon be gone.

I've seen many men, go to war.
And I can't take it, anymore.
I'm not an adversary, to war.
Only when necessary.

Thousands of soldiers, marching along.
What they don't know is, they'll soon be gone.
Hope keeps them marching, fearless and strong.
But, they don't know that, they'll soon be gone.

Silence falls, over the battlefield.
The time has come, your fate is sealed.
We have to fight, we cannot run.
The time has come, the war has begun.

Thousands of soldiers, marching along.
What they don't know is, they'll soon be gone.
Hope keeps them marching, fearless and strong.
But, they don't know that, they'll soon be gone.

Thousands of soldiers, marching along.
Raiding small towns, during the early dawn.
Hate keeps them killing, fearless and wrong.
The government controls them, they are its pawns.

Brood of the journey,
Offspring of adventure;
Cradled in a crib
Of boat rides and bus drives,
Rocked in time with teenage nursery rhymes,
A million miles per hundred hour,
Marking dashed lines
Across the Philippine map
From Region IV-A
To Region V,
For four summer daysprings
And five summer nightfalls.
My umbilical cord recoiled in loops,
Through the roller coaster road,
Under the waterfall expressways,
Bumper-to-bumper with the hills,
Baby on board;
Pulled in my diesel pushcart,
Back to the womb of my motherland
And into the water that once broke
To give me my own air.
But I haven't breathed better until
Now that I swim again in her salty seasac.
How I have long starved my feet
Of her creamy sand
Which the skin between my toes
Suckle like breastmilk.
How short it has taken
For her colors to change
From seagreen in the dawn,
To aquamarine by ripe daylight,
To turquoise in the afternoon,
And to teal blue by dusk,
Upon having me in her arms.
I was as happy as a clam
When a welcome party was thrown
By the fish residence
And I was reunited
With my crustacean playmates
And their echinoderm pals.
During my stay,
I had the whistles of the sea breeze
As my morning wake-up call,
And by night
The sky is my ceiling,
Decorated with star glitters
And one would fall everytime
To turn off my night light
While the waves would splash
A cool blanket on me.
I would go on treasure hunts
To find the lost seashells;
Raiding coast-to-coast of the boundary,
Declaring tug-of-war,
Jumping in with both feet
And holding my breath,
Fighting the careless Captain Current
And his crew of buccaneers
Attacking in foams and spumes,
And I was unwavering,
Unflagging,
Yanking the *****
To victory.
With Merleau-Ponty,
To be free is to be situated;
But with these marlins,
It is dancing on the ocean floor.
Take it from the jellyfishes
Who just go with the flow
And follow the tide
Whether if it meant
Being washed ashore
Or sinking in the deep,
As long as their tentacles
Are free.
One day I visited
The underwater kingdoms;
Parts of Atlantis
Dispersed into an archipelago.
The Coral Cave,
Land of the soft and stony;
There lives the family
Of jelly-prickled corals
Who are all slimes and tickles,
Among their relatives,
The rose reefs,
Who are red as petals
But rough as thorns.
The Boulder Territory,
A colossal chamber castle
Filled with all the bathroom stones
To scrub your feet with,
But which upon being rushed in
By the cavalry of billows,
One would bruise themself
On the cliff floors
For fear of the enemy,
The barracuda;
Patroling the dark areas
Of the vicinity,
Lying in wait
For its next victim.
In the neighboring island
Just beyond the shoreline,
Is the Seaweed Seabed;
The base plantation
Of the seagrapes,
Natively Philippine Caviar,
Which are saltwater explosives
In the mouth
That come in bunches
Of crunchy, jelly green beads.
Last but not the least,
The Pebble Desert;
A torrid terrain
Of dunes and dunes of pebbles
Pink, peach, and pearl,
Cool in the eyes
As pastel *****
But hot in the feet
As burning coals.
Sometimes we create
The most beautiful things
To be mirrors of ourselves
Modeled from our brokenness
To cast back
A better image of us
In one piece
And be looked at
As something worth loving
If not something perfect,
And God must have been
Truly in smithereens
As to put together
A whole world of a looking glass
Reflecting His divine entirety
For us, His fallible caretakers
To see Him as someone
Worthy of our love,
Aside from perfect.
And I know that
He knows me too well
To know that
What I really mean to say
Is 'I love you'
When I would rather
Simplicity speak for beauty
And let majesty be mystic,
Than bother forcing
Some not-quite words
To fit His creation.
Sadly,
Even the starfish,
The child of the ocean
And the sky,
A blending of two worlds,
Yet still goes out on a limb
To be a part of a third one,
Can't stay too long
Where it doesn't belong,
And we all have to
Go back at some point
To the place
We just couldn't call home
Because we're always looking
For somewhere else.
But I have come to find
That home is not really where,
But who you're with.
So I shall never have to worry
For the Earth is three-fourths water
And the body is fifty percent of it;
The ocean and I
Will always share
The same whole.

The Harbour quakes as we break your Boom,
The Nemesis Sails-Harbinger of doom,
A New Chapter - the Sly Celt Raptor,
Bain **** proceed us-Scream in rapture
As The Bodhran shakes your eardrums shatter,
Lightning rakes- your defences Scatter,

It's raiding season!-Take your Oars!,
Boats filled to the brim with Ores and ******
our targets-fat Merchants waddle,
Crimson seas as the Forces Battle

The Morrigan Swaddles our mind with the caul (call)
no Mercy asked(None Given!) SLAY ALL
Widows scream as they're dragged to the Ship
Towns burn to ash in our wake as we rip,  
A Blood red Swathe Through the Dawn in the east,
As the Nemesis Sails,The Harbinger Feasts...

Granny.took a switch to me.

But I insisted on raiding the big mango tree.

The big rainbow  ones hung kinda low.

The sweet yelllow ones were close to the limb.
They would sometimes come down In a huge carribean gust.
And splatter.

The young unripe green ones. Were my favorite. Treat.
With crushed habaneros mixed in with some salt.



Or mango. Sweet mango ice cream.
Oh. Yeah let me dream.

High above dear Maple Street
There looms a cold iron curtain of fear
That dares to drop and let all the monsters
Unleash their dreaded promise of chaos
As in Europe despots gift a new World War
Trembling parlors hug the radio

Hallows Eve: the radio
Begins to sing throughout dear Maple Street
The Seventh Trumpet declares all out war
And that heavy iron curtain of fear
Eclipses the sun and invites chaos
In vacant hearts of men into monsters

Halloween Night: the monsters
Now dance to the tune of the radio
Raiding the stores, jumping bridges, chaos
Entombing the stretch of this blood strewn street
Parlors gorging on endless waves of fear
Riding hysteria, imminent war

O great catalyst of war
Twisting the minds of men into monsters
Diving your hands in that great pit of fear
Now throbbing with screams from the radio
No fences nor faces can save Maple Street
Now plunged in the throes of sweet sultry Chaos

And we call it Chaos
This boiling of minds all stewing with war
Once masked with humanity on this street
Now reveals good neighbors make great monsters
Skies of martians (n)or men, the radio
Hissing, twists the knobs and tunes in to fear

And when that curtain of fear
Draws, and shadeless light casts on the chaos
And the broadcast fades on the radio
And mere fiction rescinds the throne of war
What will we make of all of these monsters
Scattered about in a daze through the street

Where there are minds of fear and war,
Chaos reigns and calls to the sleeping monsters;
Tune in to Welles’s radio on Sterling’s street.

Train spotted on ancient rail tracks
Mucks and grants on submerged pasts
Copper and ***** metal poles point
Upwards in heaven above the panelled tops
Price all  the intentional conditioning
A paradise of self sufficiency
A dew of ranting , the metal raiding
Price the substitutional compressions
A timber frame of tunnels
The heightened temperature
Price and tag her beautiful mind
An attachment of glorified plinth
The punch of the chaotic medals
Pride and rearrange her plentiful plight
Show all her cast frame in crimson and greys

Blister packs  and Auld Lang Syne,
the rain-dance in the rain-forests
where no one keeps time;
the maypole, the bar stool,
the sunstroke pilgrimage;
the Superbowl commercial,
the secret raiding of the fridge-
all conforming to some routine
of half-comfortable bliss;
we stumble blindly through
our blueprint futures-
we borrow our happiness.

The truth is out there
if you look within:
the circadian rhythm,
the central nervous system;
the clamour of your mind
in the face of chronic stress.
The Lenders are out
in the crowds now,
with their placards of high-interest
amongst the indifference
of the street-meat vendors,
the numbered tables at the bar;
we spoil ourselves in the reach
of the so near's;
that we forsake all of the so far's.