Week Thirty-Nine: Audio.
Track for Week Thirty-Nine is available for listening, thus concluding the third cycle of The Year of the Buffalo.
The Four Trumps of the Dakotas
(Maccabeus & the Man with the Axe)
In which we learn the nature of the bet that led to the death of the Diamond Maid, and further understand the guilt of Ray Lahoon thereby.
Part the Second
Summer
To spring
In my hands:
Time again
A Freeman
Maccabeus
Guerilla
Warrior
Judas Maccabee
The other Jude
A bug in my hair
Wields swords
Axes, sharp
And all that’s left
Is purest thought of
an Israel
We’ve never visited
Nevertheless
We’re always
Ever there
Release us
Release me
From the memory
Of the bloodstained
Bullet
Ridden by devils
a-cackle a-cackling
We want
Freedom
From ourselves
So badly
And Canada’s
So damned
Close
As summer
Turns to spring
Whirls to spring
The everlasting
Turning
Undone
By a bullet
On a wing
Till my mind’s eye
presents another dream!
A queen’s head
On a stump
A girl running
Through a closed door
And stops
Drummed down
Ready to be axed
Maccabeus
The Man of the Clubs
Is the Man with the Axe
Caesar’s dizzy twin
And all things
Bleed into one
Rome and
Israel
All
To me
The same
To me
All stories!
But stories
Reveal
Plans
And plans
Become
realities
You see
A bet was made
by a drunken
sorcerer
Bet you can’t hit an apple
Off the head of your wife
With this gun
A bet was lost
A bet was won
And visitors
Always go first
I missed my wife
and hit the girl
and for the first time
on this long road
I remember
The smell
And the sound
Of it
Choking iron
Sulfurous smell
Hell boiling up
Dante would be proud,
That Chuckler
And oh the blood
of
William Burroughs’
Brotherhood
Concealed
By damned words
By a fantasy
And a want
For purification
By smoke
By wind
By fire
Native
And I want it
Now
And so I go
And as I go
She dies
Every minute
Again and again
Her blood spit out
Over the stonehard
Skull
Of a collector’s
Buffalo
And God
gods
“God”
I want her
Back
And it’s right
That I must kill
To make it so
The sword’s
A thought
Now
And bullets
Are all real
Rebellious
Thickjaw
Brethren mine
Old brother me
Boney Rebel
Waits
Over the fire
And hearth
Of my grandpa’s
Home
Where took place
That described before
So hangs
That Rebel
Bone
Bloodstained
Skull
Surely
As was left
Hidden
MY
Holy
Evidence
For he
shot the girl
Not
I
The Four Trumps of the Dakotas
(The Glorious Edge of Nowhere)
In which we again change narrators
becoming the pure consciousness
of Ray Lahoon: the diamond in the skull,
and discover the long stretch of highway
that is I-94
Part the First
Minnesota
Never was
And there was never
Anything
Before
But trees
And dead
Chattering smiles
Some dream
A comic book
History
Before this here
Highway
Here Lahoon
Is nothing
But a diamond
In the skull
Somewhere
They would call it
Consciousness
And sell it to you
In a Hare Hare
pamphlet
Here we just call it
The road
Here now!
I am a basketcase
Kid
Delivering
Papers
Pumping gas
In Fargo
Chasing
Races
I blink and
I am a basketball
Girl
Chucking balls
At nothing
And wondering
How the hell
To get out
Of this town
Down the road
down
I am Bismarck
And I am Mandan
And I am
Everything
In between
Missouri
Becomes Mississippi
And both consist
Of
I’s
And I am’s
I am and
I hear the choking
Escape
Of bloodclogged
Drains
And shotgun
Weddings
With bullets
Not bells
And bridestains
Not brides
Eternal
Recurring
Like has been said
I am the First
Of Four
Trumps
immutable
I am pinochle
Second dates
And Indian
Summers
I am the heart
On the sleeve
And the card
Up the same
I am all of it
And more again
I am the axe
In your back
And all
the Indian
Givers
On trial
As their victims
Swing in the summer wind
I am the beast
On the ground
The grain
Milled up
And spit out
To drink you
Beerdrunk
On the prairie
A beer Mass
Last supper
Summer wind
I am German
And Ukrainian
And Irish
Diaspora
And the language death
the culture
death
maggot culture
reborn from the carcass
of eastern European
western European
pain and fear
the maggot smiling
in the summer heat
the wind blows and
This America
Devours
Itself
And giant waffle
Breakfasts
2 for 1
On the side of the highway
Between Fargo
And Jamestown
Here
I am still dying
Forever
At war
With the east
At war
With the west
And the north and south
To come
Four kings
Four trumps
And at the center
Two princes
Made of one
Blood
Now summed
What a card
Battleground in the Soul Wars
or
A poem, part of an even longer poem, in which our “hero” crosses the great Mississippi river between Saint Paul and Minneapolis in early September, 2008 after some days’ driving nonstop from New York and, while ruminating on the horrors of American driving culture, experiences an epic hallucination of America’s god(s) at war in this our weird, modern era. The hallucination reaches down, touches him, and levitates his vehicle over Prospect Park, past the University of Minnesota, above the IDS Tower (barely not crashing into it), and past even the deathskull Metrodome, to finally place him fifteen miles northwest on I-94 on the way to North Dakota. This takes place at 808PM in a quartz sunset.
None of this is noticed by anyone attending the Republican National Convention at that time.
Ahem.
You think that
These many hours
on the roads of sensual America
Would give you a sense
of the grandeur
of it all
Yet for me
Bleeding me
Tired me
Me me me
It’s been nonstop
Malls banks and church steeples
Pre-fab fantasies
And the holy light of gas
Station
Upon
Station
Upon
Station
Oh
And the flags
Some thousands
Each rammed
Into the Earth
in measure
Against the dark
Truth
Were I
To salute them all
My arm would
Fall off
And I would
Crash
Into a schoolbus
Full of Rockwell
Schoolboys
Boy scouts
On their way back
From camp
Winnamuckaruck
Fubar
Doodle Dandy
Flag after flag
Highway side
Jammed huge
And booming
From pancake
Homes
That kill us
Slowly
With sweet sauces
And so much butter
Or they’re
redwhitenblue
stuck
on bumpers
on dangerously driven cars
that the banks
still mostly own
And it’s the same
For you too
When you’re
Driving on
These
American roads
If you’ve been
So cursed
So privileged
So doomed
But let’s not
Let me be
Too cynical
Here
The highways are
After all
A military
installation
naturally
Jesus Fish
Cuts me
Off!!!
I spare
The finger
And breathe
Deep
We cannot know
Someone until
we see how they
behave
in traffic
And it has been said
Know Thyself
I’m the kind of man
Who breathes
Before shooting
I exit
And prepare
To cross
The river
From Saint Paul
To Minneapolis
But I digress
Yes
I was talking
About Highways
And America’s
god(s)
Behind that stupendous
Highway America
Is
Another America
Is
And behind that
Mall America
Is
Another America
and she’s still
not through
with me
You can keep
Highway America
I’m almost
Done with her
But not yet
Oh Lord
Glass bottle
King
Wellstone
Bumper sticker
Cuts me off!!!
Planet Earth
Is planet earth
And the Universe
A cold one
We got lucky
Well
I’m almost
To where
That bridge fell
Last summer
And must
detour
I am tired
So very tired
Of driving
I calculate
If I’d rented
This car
I would owe
A jillion dollars
In use – mileage
Look at the gas
Guzzling creeps
They’re all on phones
All on phones
Some of them
Read behind the wheel
But nowhere else
Strange
$710 dollars a week!
To rent
A death machine
From Hertz
hurts
No thanks
My car’s not
That
Erotic
Mine’s
Just
Getting
The
Job
Done
The clock reads
808
PM
Minneapolis
Here I come
Sun setting
The sky is a quartz
Crystal
Like unto
The one
They planted
In my skull
Lahoon
My boon
My bride
My groom
My daughter
My doom
Sinisteria
Wisteria
Sky
Lahoon
Is my
Inner
I
Driving
The clouds
Collapse
Into skulls
And bones
Quivering
Dancing bones
Of white
Gone purple
Gone white
Ivory
And violet
Do battle
Fight fight fight!
The American god(s)
At war
With themselves
With itself
With me
Truth and lies
Right and left
Death and life
Youth and death
Fight fight fight!
Football wet dreams
Quarterbacks in flux
Hot dog stands
Figurines, glass dolls
Children in adult bodies
With bank accounts
Some would kill for
Running amok
Sad old men
With nothing better to do
Than to police
A park
Or play
Some golf
Children raised
By the state
Children raised
By religious fanatics
Children raised
By patriotic millionaires
Children raised
By the Just Don’t Cares
One arm in the Sky
Two arms in the Sky
No beard
No smile
No God
Just god(s)
and the Sorcerer
has finally
re-arrived
The river
Below
A snake
Flowing toward
New Orleans
Everybody
On the take
The sky
Collapses
My orison
is a beat up
Volkswagen
Floating now
In the sky
The thing
In my skull
Begins
To glow
And I
Am transported
Over
Above
And beyond
And these words come:
“Light is fragile now in this place
Flickers pale beneath the sun’s
Descending grace
Till unabashed the Sorcerer King stands
And holds me
To him.
And takes me
Into his
craggy face.”
Westward
He throws me
With a flick
Of his bonewhite wrist.
And lets me see from high above,
for the first time
in my long days,
This god(s) War
For what it is:
“A dream
But no less dangerous
For being that
For dreams
Move men
However
Unreal
However
Obscene.
Dreams kill kings
And dreams kill queens.”
Dreams drive
the real.
He stares
He nods
He grins
And leaves me
On the road
again
Ahem.
Amen
Of Westward Paranoia
This feeling now
as I exit the bus
as I rent a car
as I rent a home
This feeling now
Woodward
Toward a cabin
And a memory
To find
A smokepit
With smoke still rising
Blowing westward
Westward blown
I stare at the smoke,
And I say
With upright
Honesty
And a homecomers
Groan
This:
I have felt the
Red hot poker
Of fear
Jab into my
Left breast
With such persistence
I believed
I would
Die
I have soaked
Swimming in my own
Mania
Hearing
Bombs outside
The living room door
Just beyond the
Office
Just beyond
the wall
unholiness
dark, winter light
tear gas miseries
of which I know
little
but feel
plenty
I have been
Christ crucified
On electric rails
and great squadrons
of free-thinking
nobodies
surrounded me
with payments
for services
I did not render
Romans
Christians
Americans
gods eating gods
and stones crumbling
infrastructure nothingness
drab men
drab stones
drab gods
From these
I have fled
To my
International automobile
Gone suddenly Freudian
And I have breathed
Breathed breathed
And I will do this
again
And again
And again
until the
war
is over
until I win
my war
this home
of smoke was
once mine
not the Bones
it’s time
I hunt
Him down
And westward
Slowly go
William Tell
The conqueror
A Daughter
A dream
A stone
And bones
Piled
Upon bones
The Black Maria
In a Polaroid
And the bones
Piled
Upon bones
Call me
Westward
home
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