There was duct tape
on his automatic weapon,
his eyes fidgeted,
no smiles
& his finger
nervously
stroked the trigger.
No joke,
all of sixteen,
he was,
it made me realize,
I wasn't in Kansas
anymore.

On a Pan American traverse,
we skirted across the Altiplano
somewhere near Titicaca,
worked our way
through the chicken bus line
up to the lone road stop.
A mere shack
with government thugs
hiding inside,
suits wearing ray bans
& checking tourist-bags,
as if they were
making a difference
with the war on drugs.

Cheap plastic
smelly rubber
dead batteries
turn me on honey
I ain't no fake

I wonder what it must have been like
for romantic lovers
when they sang songs
about Love Potion No. 9's,
not knowing much about geography,
Earth Angels and Do Wah Diddy's.

It must have sounded
like unchained melodies,
real stardust &
genuine innocence,
not these plastic hearts,
seemingly molded by technology,
a certain type of synthetic love.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIuYd0GzMjs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFDmst7ULGI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rXhXLsNJL8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiiyq2xrSI0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNO72aCnVr0

Minutes turn into hours
when I contemplate,
recalling
vivid memories
swirling out of the past,
what some label
the good old days.
But, what about the nights.

They were never truly
meant to last,
proving-grounds,
stored banks of the good times
& the bad.
Such tough realizations
dissipate into the melancholy.

And, if we could go back,
would we really change a thing?
For, we can never recreate the wheel,
it's already been done
& it's perfect.

In fact,
we're all perfect,
molded from clay,
washed with grit.
******,
pattern recognition
never felt so good.

Most of the machines don't know
they're broken.
They hum circadian.
I am in a patch-process.
I'm rewiring my hard drive
with the only chips I know.
I hope You like
my feeble,
yet desperate attempts,
to reconstruct my mainframe,
my big iron.
Pray for Me.

I saw the damage once.
The entry wound
split his mouth.
The exit wound
shattered his skull,
taking half of it.
Red, white, and gray
brains were splattered
on the wall behind him,
where he sat crumbled.
I ask.
Would you ever
be the same
again
after witnessing
crazy **** like that?
Pray tell.

I grew up
in a parallel universe,
somewhere
beyond the constellations,
where I sit
in the same smoky room,
listening to the blues,
the melodic bass.
Only this place
has sweethearts
with yellow neon hair
and plastic skin.

I walked in a sea of zombies,
circled a million roundabouts,
wandered
the streets in the reverse.
Nobody noticed me
with my two-week stubble,
my body odor emanated
as I cruised through the rubble,
waiting for twilight.

Dried baby llamas grimaced
while children played jacks
& men sold coca,
green bag mountains of it
stacked high like the cordillera
with chicken bones
lying around,
configured
in all directions,
it smelt magical.

And when
the sun finally fell,
I witnessed
the poverty stricken elite,
totally lost on their own
two feet.
I wanted to relate,
to feel human,
so I joined the winos
on a dark unknown corner,
sniffed the cool air
& could finally relate
to a time in space.

O you,
you enlightened rogue,
scratching & scribbling,
clawing
at your meager existence.
You insist,
you insist it's love
you squeeze,
drain from
your tortured soul.
But alas,
I feel it's something deeper,
something so close to your darkened core,
something begging for release,
a ******* radiant light,
pooling off your tongue.

Two inches of aluminum separated me
from one ton of jagged-tooth man-eating fish.
I looked into its lifeless black eye,
and in an instant,
realized how insignificant I was.
FYI, when you **** in a wet suit,
it's a warm comfortable feeling
& a great way to relieve anxiety.

Early this morning,
the chariot swung low
for Thomas,
before the sun rose.
It was time for
my good friend to pass,
but still too soon.
Nobody knows,
can truly understand
the reasoning,
the ways
of the sacred.

And he left us
with a  wonderful legacy,
touched our hearts
with his humor,
gave us a great example
with his quiet,
confident,
good-natured demeanor.

Yet sadly, he
will not give up
his beautiful daughter's
hand in marriage nor
see his son graduate
the Naval Academy.

Lord willing,
we
might just
see those things
and remember him even more.

Rest in peace my good friend Thomas.

When you engage
in close quarters combat,
it ain't pretty,
it ain't nothing like Hollywood.
The blood looks more real,
the screams sound more anguished,
the smoke smells diesel.
Things move rapidly
in slow motion,
hand signals lead the way.
If you have to use your bayonet,
it ain't like slicing up a watermelon,
there's real bone in there.
And if you waste a second
staring into their lifeless eyes,
the haunting memory
will last you a lifetime.

They're gone now,
our wild reveries
are now replaced by others.
No one will remember
the cannonballs
we exploded there,
blaring AC DC's givin' the dog a bone,
the licorice in our mouths,
or the grain spiked tangelos.

Surely her red bandana
was the attractant,
but it was the way
she wiggled her hips
that truly drew me in.
Her musk slayed me,
it was so ****** delightful
connecting her
beads of perspiration
with my quivering finger,
her breath quickened
between the dots
of her meaty thighs.
I will forget her
some night, but
I am content now,
just remembering
her innocent smile
and the way
she dialed me into
her broken heart.

I layed there
courageous
inside our wetness
and watched her
doe-eyes break in waves,
against the shores
of her high cheekbones,
it shattered my dreams.

And I am really sorry,
feel a sadness beyond belief
I couldn't make it better
for her or that
I never got the chance
to apologize
over the phone.

She's long gone...
I heard she's in Virginia.

Spicy aromas
Cobbled streets and loud barkers
Mysterious people

Flowering beauties
Ochaya’s on Gion Streets
Soothing sweet maikos

Witches and llamas
dark cobble ****** streets winding
blank vacant eyes stare

Glitz and glamour
Subterranean armed bandits
Streetwalker zombies

Zona Rosa bliss
Tequila kisses frolicking
Headaches in the morn

Strudel and homebrew
Lying on the Banks of the Rhine
Learning bauchnabel

Lifesize chess pieces
We camped along the river
I kissed your navel

I remember watching the explosions
on the pitched-horizon,
night after night,
we felt the ground tremble
thirty miles away
& I remember us thinking,
we're glad it's their foxhole,
not ours.

Tony Lama nights
Lone stars and ***** tonk bars
Don't you mess with her

I lay here sometimes
in the early morning darkness
& watch the sunrise
alone
through the blinds.

I imagine where you,
where you used to lie
& I kiss your likeness
remembering the way,
the way you used
to kiss me back.

I remember the hot springs near Zunil,
it was in the middle of nowhere
in the cloud forest
just below the saddle.
It was one of those places
you could stay forever.
Immersed in sulphur-thermals
with the ferns & hanging vines
& two sweet Aussies
surrounding me.
There was a 4.4 on the Richter
that night & nobody died,
not a single fight either,
only love.

The anejo-liquid
changed my dynamics,
& I threw caution to the wind,
embraced sin & anything
else that came my way.

I was a renegade in paradise,
had come there to play
& flirt with danger.
A euphoria crept over me,
it traveled throughout
my bloodstream,
& I became
another,
dreamt of being happier
& swallowed worms.

I squirmed for her,
the smiling *****,
the pretty stranger
who spoke Francaise
with the wrinkled smile,
while flashing icy-blue eyes,
she cried wolf.

As if on cue,
I became a locomotive,
she the caboose
& we snaked our way
out into the cool night
on fire.

We spoke the same language,
the one without words,
burnt candles in a semicircle
under the net,
relished each other madly.

Sadly, it had to end,
but I bet
she still thinks about it,
'cause I know I do.

Constantly it seems,
I squeeze luscious fruit,
kiss hardened-tips
& find myself
in compromising positions
with your penetrating pretty-eyes.

I'm sure I must
be sweet-dreaming,
'cause I wake up
empty in the morning,
mind & my body,
spent & smiling.

There us no Earthly way
to recapture,
to recapture the splendor
of times past.
So I'll play here,
play here on the astralplane.
And wish,
wish I could wake up,
wake up beside you.
So here,
here I am,
have come full circle,
I'm back to start,
repeating myself
again &
you disappear
one more time.

Come komodo,
unleash your ancient ways,
teach me lightning moves,
let me feel the sting of your bite
& the pain of your claws,
make me your disciple,
come komodo.

Born to be Wild
just blasted out
on the radio.
It perked me up,
reminded me of
the road warrior days.
We lived it hard.........
preached the holy gospel,
the real one that
included free love,
strong drink,
a puff or two.

Now, I'm digging up old numbers.
I'm going to resurrect the apostles,
we walked on water,
it would cool to see
who was saved.

You think we have all the time in the world.
Think again.

It was another retrieval-order,
he’d been missing forty-eight hours,
tracker beams calculated his
last known whereabouts
in the Tharsis quadrangle.

I didn’t relish this mission,
red dust had been swirling for days
& the winds were picking up speed,
measured at 100 m.p.h.
It was crazy for Snyder
to have gone out in the first place.
I remembered his friendly face,
his jovial demeanor & gracious smile.
I felt sad knowing I’d never seen him again.
He was one of the hardest workers.

All the company could ever talk about
were profits, profits & even more profits.
We all knew the risks,
it went with the territory.
Out here on the perimeter,
on the edge of tomorrow,
we lived our lives three-dimensionally,
another day, another dollar, another ***** shirt.
It was the same **** here
as those days we had
back on good ‘ole planet Earth,
working for greed.

Dry cisterns hovering in space,
a neediness beyond the MACS0647-JD,
if we knew about those other galaxies,
we'd be gone in flash.

I was soothed,
dipped in Styx
for immortality,
the reality of my weakness
makes me vulnerable to broken hearts,
usually my own.

I'm feeling more grounded
these days,
seem to be getting
my old self
back again.

Last night,
I watched a falling star
travel the Heavens
at supersonic speeds,
only to sputter out
somewhere
miles above.

I love myself
and that,
that is where it begins,
this journey,
this journey
back
out of this
self made abyss.

Stigmitized
by my genetic nature,
there is no blame.

I am more than an animal,
a plain simple man,
more than a ****.

My sickness is
just gentle kindness,
and for that,
my heart lies broken.

This I know,
it's nobody's fault
but mine.

Good but sometimes bad
You know deep inside your heart
How to tell them apart

Theodore said it about right
& now,
the opposite is true.
You got me there.
Squeeze.
Squeeze.
Rock me baby.
Get higher.
Come on up.
Squeeze harder.
Get tighter.
Make me fight.
Let me love you
the way you should be
loved.
Ready....

We rode on endless ribbons,
driving through rain-soaked jungle,
low clouds enveloped the countryside,
steam painted the glass.

It was a million degrees
on the inside & not a single
window was open.
Body odors wafted
throughout the cab,
while pigs & chickens
made the usual noises,
babies cried & the locals
murmured in hushed tones.

I was the only ******
lost in the seated crowd
without a cell phone.

There was no way I could make a fuss,
for I did not speak the language
& they'd never understand
a single word anyway.

She told me
I was a bad boy
for breaking
her precious heart
& I said, "Well baby,
I'm so very sorry
to make you so very sad,
but I'm so glad, so merry,
'cause now I'm very free!"

And with that
she retorted,
"Right on bad boy,
me too!"

Seems like
she loved freedom
just as much as me,
who knew?

Swirling head and heels
Gravity forces pull you down
Struggling hard to breathe

Imaginary love
Rhythm daydream so hypnotic
Drive hips rainbow arc

I smell the coffee brewing.
Soon, I'll down a cup
with real sweetener & heavy cream,
then ride like a banshee
listening to rage against the machine
& dreaming about
the way she once loved me.

Baking in the sun
A creature met the maker
Buddha rolled over sad

There are times when it hits you,
those raw ******* feelings
that get your motor running,
memories of the hottest person on earth
come popping up,
explode into your mind.

It's really bad
when you're driving
down the highway
& you have to keep you
hands on the wheel
& eyes on the road
with a heavy load.

I miss her travelling
with me on
those long road trips.
If she only knew...
if she only knew.

Robert's mark
left an indelible impression,
etch on my tortured mind.
His scorpion-tat crawled
up his right calf
in shades of deady crimson.
During PT, it instilled
a certain amount of fear
on those who gazed upon it.
But lying in the desert sun,
without the rest of his body,
it was not nearly as terrifying.
I'll never forget the crying
of those surrounding his leg
& boot,
still attached.

I watched
a preening robin
on my windowsill
today.

Looking around,
it watch itself from
every angle
scratching at feathers.
It did not flinch
at me behind the glass &
I felt there was some
sort of a connection
of some sorts.

Never once
did I consider
this beautiful creature
a narcissus,
it was only
taking
care if itself.

Third Sunday of the month,
*******
& a mutual ******.

Third Sunday of the month,
*******
& a mutual ******.

Third Sunday of the month,
*******
& a mutual ******.

Third Sunday of the month,
*******
& a mutual ******.

Third Sunday of the month,
*******
& a mutual ******.

Second Sunday of the month,
69 & a mutual ******.

Third Sunday of the month,
*******
& a mutual ******.

Third Sunday of the month,
*******
& a mutual ******.

Third Sunday of the month,
*******
& a mutual ******.

Third Sunday of the month,
*******
& a mutual ******.

Third Sunday of the month,
*******
& a mutual ******.

Third Sunday of the month
*******
& a mutual ******.

You chunky girl,
a bit pinkish
you are
around
your hardened
edges

I love
inhaling you,
just to feel
the instant rush
of your smoky nature.

And I get crushed
when
you
leave
my aching body.

Another session greets
me for another
beautiful day.

I flow effortlessly,
from one
position
into another,
breathing prana,
in and out,
my hips reach
toward the heavens
into a nirvana-state,
rock hard & perspiring,
I am connected
to the sacredness
of other kindred spirits
engaged in similar activities,
a million miles away,
in their own sacred places,
exploding.