Democrat, Illinois - The ElectroLounge

64 !
I was months, weeks, days, hours, from tonight’s concluding ride, dozens then a few
pages away, tis a warm night, comely nocturnal hour, more lights flash past, I watch & do
not know, but swift pen still moves, hopeful toward a high buzz & a small nest of clear
moments—
A year ago I came back here ready for a new effort at making the West my home, I
was in love again, even further along than I’d been—
Sigh.
One gets back nothing, & yet, truly, one carries along the pollen of lost hours, potent or
dead,
I told the dude:
KILL YOUR DEMONS OR
THEY WILL KILL YOU
Many pages along, is “Why?” the question
or the topic?
Benny Big Dreams shoots up too like the dude I met at the trinket stall, but I don’t
know if junk or medicine. I don’t know.
Pounds the steering wheel & hits the gas.
Raise a howl & believe a thousand things at once blah blah
“Everything’s fine!” insisted the mushroom again!
The mind leaves traces where it pass along & is awled by matter—
What explains toothaches, lightning, & peppermint candy? Still no answer?
In a lifetime we pass countless cemeteries, closed factories, secret houses of deep
violence, we see a thousand & more skies above, new skies, new patches of skies, sometimes
great clouds about the wings, & who was standing on that hilly street corner the other night
ragged & lost, looking for some or maybe any face, I wondered how he got so lost & if he
stood there wondering too, I was accelerating with bags of food for my beloved but
something in me remained there, & I thought of the ragged & those walking low, give it all a
name but what? concoct some sharper word from burbling blood & long enduring bones—
TripTown suddenly comes on the TV at Luna T’s Cafe & stays on for a stretch of
hours, the hero dies & returns as a tree, a coyote, a bluish wind—there are moments when
some at the bar are watching it while others see the Red Sox game—
Dr. Arnold T. Knickerbocker hobbles fraily into the bar & settles at his seat—says
nothing but watches this show intently—
Mr. Bob the barman fixes him a hot cup of tea & settles across the bar from him.
“Welcome back.”
“I stayed away to discover if our lord might call me if I did, if I prayed alone in my dwelling” says
softly.
“Anything?”
“Images of decay & brutality. Waste & guilt. Loneliness. Desolation. Endless unmoving hours.”
“Welcome back.”
“Our final hours do not arrive at our bidding, nor can we summon their shining
triumph nor dismal gloom” his voice begins to rise but he stops.
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