storeeze

“The great question is: How can we win America's peace?”—Richard Nixon, Address to the Nation on the War (November 3, 1969) J. R. and I hopped on the world stage when we walked down the steps of a Flying Tiger 707 at Cam Ranh Bay, a humongous seaside base, 180 miles NE of Saigon. No flowers or open arms, just “You are now in the Republic of Viet Nam.” Commies weren't coming for us, we were coming for them. Neither poets nor conquerors, we were gonna make a statement, even a bad one. Funny people, strange smells in a strange land, nothing I could have invented. The weather was nice. A jeep drove us to a two-story barracks with a distinct lack of hominess. We shared a room with fifty other guys, picked out beds from scattered empties, and lived out of duffel bags. Each morning after chow, the guys in the barracks lined up outside in roll call formation. A bitch box (bullhorn) called out names. Done for the day, if yours didn't come up. Night-time, we climbed a fifty-foot towe...

In a warm-lit St. Louis night You drew me into a flame. Monday at BB's Your loose-knit top Stares me in the face: White-velvet In a black-silk cage. I call for Monk and a tango, Catherine D. Snow Comes up fast— You're hot, girlie! On an afternoon of morning, The dark is rising. Here is your card, Do you feel it? The Second Child. He is the reason . Y ou’re tired. They’re here, It won’t be long.

The first stanza is really nice and a very solid image. In the second stanza, the images move quickly and become more personal. On the third stanza, the details about Arlene seem to center the poem and where it the poet is at his most confident. Some symbolism is presented to the reader, and life and death seem to be the likely code to decipher. It seems to parallel with the ‘The second Child/He's the reason’. Whatever the case, I feel a balance is trying to be played, between a personal observation and deeper philosophical insight. To thread these concepts together can be difficult I give credit to the poet for trying his hand at such a difficult endeavor.  —Kent Walker, my writing coach a. R ichard upon hearing of her death, suggested that Arlene was ‘a flame of exuberance’. A rlene’s voice struck some listeners as ‘unattractive’ or ‘pushy'.  So full of life, s he would burst out of her  skin. A force of nature, she had a joy in her, a love of life with the confiden...

My life as a company clerk may not have been sexy, but it was the most sought after job in Vietnam. (Killer wanted it bad, but never got his chance.) Besides the full-time job of taking care of company business, I was mother confessor and personal vending machine. “Can you get me a Swiss knife?” “How about a Rolex?” “Any rings?” “Camera?” “A pipe?” If it wasn’t one thing, it was another. “I’ll give you a gook ear for an SKS.” “A TV?” “Chocolate covered cherries?” I’d been running in a thousand different directions when I put away the typewriter and hit the sheets. Sometime later, I had that dream again: It was morning. My wife offered a ride in our Impala. I said, “I’ve been expecting you,” and got in. Her hair was mussed. She was wearing clothes she wore the day I left for Vietnam. We drove on and smoked cigarettes. Someone was in the back sleeping. My wife stopped outside our apartment and grabbed my wrist. I tried to pull away. She tightened her ice-cold grip and sobbed, “Borgo!” ...

After two hours of fear and fangs at the Mayan exhibit, I met a stream of white twenty’s with torn, bloody shirts moaning and groaning, staggering down the Delmar strip. Could a zombie apocalypse actually be happening? I reached out, “Go back to Pittsburgh!”   “We belong dead! Ha ha ha ha ha!”   A bald black guy in his 40s startled me. ‘Stacy’ wanted to sing like a troubadour. I left him and crossed the street to a two-piece combo playing on the sidewalk. He followed, close on my heels. I ventured, “What’s the plan?”   “What kind of music do you dig?”   “Jazz, blues, classical.”   “You look like Mozart, brother.”   “More like Einstein.”   “I can see that. There's better music on the corner. I know the band.” He leaned in. “What you want is a black girl.”   “You’re married, I can tell,” he added.   “No, actually I’m not.”   The look in his eyes was disbelief. “Wait’ll we get inside. You’re gonna love the music.”   The zombies were at...

The sun drives the seasons and the days between Legion ball and football practice. These were the best of times—running with Richie and his brother Larry, living on unemployment and sponging off the old man—more interested in getting laid than getting paid. Traffic tickets, pecker tracks in the back seat, a police escort home after midnight. Mom wringing her hands like Lady Macbeth, crying out loud, “Where did I go wrong?” On one of those dog day Friday afternoons, I turned my Harley onto Diagonal Boulevard. A mile from home, the bubble machine lit up on a cop car parked at a side street. I grabbed a handful of throttle—my risk insurance had expired—no license! The Harley roar and the siren alerted mom as I swung past the house, wind in my face, the fuzz on my ass. I looped on 74th Street and flew past Marlys Pederson's, my fantasy until I saw Phoebe Crouch on the first day of seventh grade. At Portland, a busy thoroughfare, I said a prayer, goosed it and blew across without lookin...

CONTENT WARNING:  READER DISCRETION ADVISED “Whilst Man, however well-behaved, At best is but a monkey shaved.” —W. S. Gilbert (1884) What I remember is a  bitter January morning wrangling a junkyard transmission into a ‘53 Packard,  jacked up on blocks. Richie and I should have been trudging through the snow to classes at the U instead of o ur backs jammed against a freezing curb,  lining up an Ultramatic, biggest I’d ever seen.  Two cars rolled up.  ( Alan would come upon you anywhere, anytime, and frequently intoxicated.)  “Charlie?”   “Yeah, what?” “Beautiful day, huh?” “What are you doing here?” The transmission teetered. “We got two women and Bunny's pad.” Alan peered under the car. “Back-to-back racks. Whaddya want?” “Hold it there, Richie. It’s Alan.” “Not Alan. Fuck no!” grunting disgustedly. “W hat do they look like? ”  I asked,  “Check 'em out,” said Alan.  I edged out for a look. I couldn't place either one. ...