wiltshire blvd

where golden images still exist
of a sunny, sandy, seaside precipice
as some things do not fade
like the Macy’s parade or the JFK cavalcade

some new arrivals are attracted by glitter
some seek redress from birth in the wrong litter
the tide of invention is a test for newcomers
intolerant of a new life with unfamiliar drummers

from the south, an exodus from despair
seeking a place at the table, in a generation or two
from the east, bored Americans everywhere
hoping to become someone new

illegals, aliens and wetbacks
man woman and child
it is impossible to follow all their tracks
or see the future until votes are compiled

here everyone marks their border
quickly learning the foresight of a hoarder
thankful for every day that they are closer
to a dream career or food from a grocer

when night falls or power fails
the haves of Beverly hills stop to alleviate themselves
their reality held firmly as the day’s sales
like santa with a factory of elves
except the toys here are destined for shelves

at the shore, the road greets the pacific
a beach graveyard with 2,455 crosses mark this day
while family fun belies any wiff of horrific
their duty unclear while being treated like a stray

the road ends where it begins
at the intersection of awe and suspicion
no weight given to media spins or cheshire grins
or a legacy which demands too much transition


each day measured by what is, no more or less
not by what once was or even what could be
finding strength in spiritual success
and redemption in a big fee or the marquee

yet each visitor seeks directions from the other
remaining separate, except to embrace
each son or daughter, mother or brother
and the trampled seeds of a new human race

pornographic virtue

Kiss, Kiss

Undress, Undress. Undress

Mount, He on She

Undress, Undress



Non-medicated desires for

Longings of life pulse my blood

With wonderlust

With willing wantoness



Lick, He on She

Panting, Faster and Louder

Foot on Balls,

Hand on Head, She wants him



Horny hormones

Command constant caresses

Impervious to aging or pleasure

When coupled with pornographic virtues



Moan, Hisses, Hisses

He spits into her vagina

And pushes two fingers deep

And his eyes flicker with passion



He dominates with his demands

She accepts with her desire

Contractual banality

In the obscenity of sex



Lick, Lick, Lick

Umm, Umm, Ummmm, Aah, Aah, Aaaah

Foot Stroking, Lips Lipting,

Panting the labour of love



It is not enough to have war, violence and greed

We must silent stand

While new generations are shaped

By the values that make our world less habitable



Music tells the lovers move

He stands erect the pushes her there

The butterfly tattoo in prominent view

As her ass is no longer featureless



Not to speak badly against all man or even all men

It is to state the hormone-free obvious

To those that have seen true pornography

The rape and pillage of animals, the pollution of our world



The fireplace embraces the music

As we see a close up of her smile

With his hand guiding her to his cock

And her destiny of desire



Against the background of the inhumanity

We must also smile when confronted

With something that we must kneel to worship

Because size matters, especially to supersized Americans



As the music no longer fits the demands of passion

Moaning takes up the rhythm

His heated hand demands her sycophancy

Allowing us to imagine loveless sex as natural



And to find our role

In sex and love and life

And in matters of world importance

Yet fail to see what is given and what is taken



mmmmMMMM, mmmmMMMM, mmmmMMMMMMMMMM

Lick, Lick, Lick, StrokeStroke, CockinMouth,Cock,Cock

Words, Heated, Fast. Oh, Yeah, Come on, Give it To Me

Cum, Succumb, music off, story on. Cycle cycles. ComeOn.



Kiss, Kiss, He leans back

Like a lead dog

After it has eaten and

And his sperm has seeded



The pornography of our age

Is swallowed by all that submit

To an unkind hand or a loveless embrace

As we comply to the larger lie



Yet between youth and desire

What matters more than size

In the life we bequeath

With a wink and a smile

NoClock

In the 'middle of nowhere' Nevada
Where the world extends to the horizon
There is an unspoken beauty
That nobody has yet marketed

The secret value is not shared
With those that fail to value anything
That they can not exploit
Or carry away

In this inhospitable garden
The delights, although remarkable
Are only available to those searching
For no reward

If there are distractions
That remind you of
Another life, another time
Then looking further means looking away

Nothing much happens here except
a rush of people going somewhere else
Not much has changed here except
Man has lost touch with its beauty

Casinos and whore houses
Now lure gold diggers
As Borros claim the wilderness
Abandoned by miners and prospectors

Here there is no outside news to fear
There is nothing to do that can't wait
Here the rhythms of each day
Shower an indifferent land

Here time is not measured
By the clock or by appointments
A refreshing prospective, like the first time
I held my tongue out to catch snow

For some it is the rebirth of thinking
About your life outside the rhythm of your life
For others it is the rebirth of wonder
About the timeless cycles of life and death

For me, no clock can erase
The memory of these moments
Time has witnessed this land for too long
To allow my life significance

The brief moments that I feel connected
To a world beyond my reach
Are these times that I connect to the ticking
That keeps time of eternity

Deathcamps

A trailer hookup
With conveniences
Brought the illusion of comfort

But being on the road
Destroyed the warmth of escape
And the joy of being somewhere else

We set out on our journey thinking
That our life was important
And that we were important too

After a lifetime of following the beaten path
To the waiting rooms of Arizona

When you reach a certain image
You begin to understand
That death is the next big thing in your life
Then it hits you, like an diseased lover

A waiting room is the place you spend the time
That you have left before you die

No more Doctors anymore
Death camps for 'snow birds'
Where Still Life is acclaimed as Life still

Every year the regiment becomes routine
A game of cards with the boys
Or some gossip with the girls
And a trip to Wal-Mart to break the monotony

Keeping track of time is deceptively easy
Friday night is the dance (until 10pm)
And Monday is the Blood Pressure Clinic

Everything else is free time
Paid for by a lifetime
Of sacrifice and servitude

The 'hot tub' rules are clearly posted
Rubber pants are encouraged

No one under 18 is allowed
No one with diapers
No one with open sores or infections

Uniformity without uniforms
Is the casual order of the day
One day bleeds into another
With one season and not much reason

Each rig in a tiny spot
Crowded by Neighbours on all sides
Surrounded by brick walls
And a 24 hour sentry at the gate

No lawns or green space
Mostly concrete parking spaces
The size of cemetery plots

Fear is a great time filler
Fear of everything on the news
And fear of everything different
Becomes the conversation of the day

The men always talk about their rig
Or about the sunny warm weather
And how cold it is back home

The women always talk about pets and children
or about the sunny warm weather
and how cold it is back home

A lingering smile is sometimes an invitation
And sometimes a judgment
Of a sterile life without effort or result

It doesn’t tell the lies
A life has taken to escape
Or to be rooted in a home with wheels

When hope was a possibility
And death didn’t have a lineup

Sultry winds

I fell in love with strangers
now they sleep within me

As I walk alone
with the shifting balance of time
falling to one side

Yet today I lie beside you
with confidence in tommorrow
As turning metal chafes the wind
into a sirens call

I sense a moment
that stetches beyond reach
into the despair
of dreamy comforters

This is one of those pure days
too hot to fight, or play
as the sultry winds rise,
like elapsed loves

carressing the still depths
of my aching bones.
And the love I feel
for my lover

Everything is taken
but not for granted

nature rules

Sitting on the floor of Death Valley,

An oasis in an america that seldom sanctions silence

Reminds me of the first time I visited Sable Island

An oasis in the North Atlantic that still silently serves

where the harsh winter equals the harsh summer here



life can’t escape time and nature

and death isn’t hidden or sanitized

the remnants of the harsh seasons and past generations

lie about like scattered treasure

and humble reminders of impermanence and vanity



The salamander, snake and scorpion here and the wild horse and seal there

live and die by nature’s rules

in a land unfrequented by people and exacting in it’s harshness

where each plant and animal can survive better than man

but only man can survive the rigors of both



As marram grass anchor the sands

the snake outgrows his skin

and man returns to dirt

the insatiable soil and sea stands silent

set for the next unsuspecting visitor


man has always viewed each natural wonder for richness and resource

the path of one thing often leading to the destruction of another

when only remnants of man remain, it will be plain

That places like these should serve no person

and remain silent testaments to the art of the great spirit

work will set you free

As my son and I walked through the gates of the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp I noticed the sign ‘work will set you free’. It was a cruel joke for the millions that suffered great indignities and impossible working conditions only to die a horrible death.

I’m married to a German who is deeply affected by the inhumanity of her countrymen. She was born in 1961 but feels the guilt of being a German. The truth will never set her free.

Americans and Canadians believe that they are free but they are controlled and manipulated from their birth to their death. The de-mystification of advertisements is a way to gain insight into the process that is used corporations to make individuals into predictable consumers and workers.

The advertising industry is working hard to sell and it doesn’t matter to them what they sell. It could be war or a refrigerator. Slogans like "Just do it", "You deserve a break today", "Breakfast of champions” and “Where's the beef?” sell ideals that also sell products. The slogans used by the military also sell ideals; “Were looking for a few good men!” “The few the proud!” “Get an edge on life!” and “Army of One”.

The really dark side of this manipulation is that it creates a standing army of ‘freedom fighters’ ready to defend the propaganda and lies. Freedom is the battle cry used to rally the troops regardless of the circumstance. It is a cowardly simplification that tries to convince others of the need to fight for a principle when the truth is often less of a motivation.

The American public is controlled through jingoisms that tell them how to feel, think and act as part of a proud community. It is not ‘work will set you free’ but something equally as cruel. It could be “Give me liberty or give me death’ or ‘Home of the Brave, Land of the Free or "Operation Iraqi Freedom".

In Canada, we are a bit more circumspect but equally as vulnerable. The slogan, "Aboriginal Pride", is used to recruit native people into the military. It plays on the fact that most Aboriginals are proud but that they also are struggling to find the dignity that was taken from them by the same government now promising to return it.

The sign was also a cruel joke for their captors who once believed their own propaganda and became a superpower that mindlessly followed their leader into hell. They were blinded by power and greed and inhumanity. They were mostly ordinary people that were afraid to think or act differently than the oppressors in their life.

It is not hard to imagine how German people were manipulated but it is, therefore, difficult to understand why today we allow manipulation and propaganda and lies from our political leaders.

The United States allows industry, especially the powerful oil and gas industry, to protect its special interests even if it is against the well being of it’s citizens. The War in Iraq is the obvious example but their self interest has also hindered the scientific evidence validating the threat of global warming.

The fact that Germany used it’s military prowess with such dire consequences should make us all more aware of the threat of super power. This concentration camp is a stark reminder of a highly effective indoctrination and propaganda campaign.

This American corporate self interest and power of manipulation has created ‘a perfect storm’ for the country with more military strength than any country in history. It is a time for truth to set us free. If we can learn to think and act without slogans or signs in time to stop another catastophe, then this will be a fitting epitaph to those that have died here.

ArtificialReality

It is a stormy day on the californian coast and while we are prepared to break camp at dawn, our neighbour is video taping a fire in an outdoor pit.

The fire is taunted by the swirling winds as the cameraman locks his frame and watches his creation unfold. Later, I learn that he has a successful business selling video to nature-loving trendsetters in lala land that want to experience nature in the comfort of their living room.

It reminds me of New York stores that use (or once used) homey smells, like fresh bread, to put customers in a good mood as they entered the store. It is probably the same idea behind the ubiquitous elevator music.

Although a faint smell is more subliminal, like the early days of movies when they used to insert a few frames of suggestive images to prompt the audience into believing they just had an urge to buy whatever was being suggested.

We are easily manipulated because we are so predictable. A little suggestion here or there is all we need. Most of us extract memories from associations with our life experience yet don’t see the bigger picture hidden by our actual reality.

My childhood smells and sights and sounds are probably the same as other kids in my childhood neighbourhood. We all remember the nice smells or the nice images of idealized family, especially in greeting-card season. Some of us, however, also remember the abuse of childhood through similar cues.

The fire is being blown by high winds now. The fire has lost the coziness associated with a gentle flame. I look to the fire starter in alarm but realized that he takes the matter too seriously to be distracted.

As an adult you will never get permission from the childhood imprinted memories of parental authority. You must take it.
It is the most demanding aspect of growing up and the thing that hold us closest to the bosom. The emotional outrage that challenges your childhood source of security, food, shelter and love.

We are all abused as children as the nature of child rearing is abusive. This doesn’t mean that your parents were mean, just ignorant of their own abuse.

The society that profits from this fact condemns the child to repeat the sins of the parents. The exploitation of this repressed individual continues the abuse, through extending the inability of the victim to see the pattern of their life in a rehabilitative manner.

The video taping is over. The fire has died. His excited, quick movements reveals that he knows he has something useful, something valuable. He understands the needs of his clients and the power of comfort and rage.

The artificially of our lives is that we cannot grow up until we see our selves clearly and fully. We can not see the present struggle within us until we recognize our selves as victims.

It is difficult for the child of abuse to know any other way to express love that what the adult offers. It is also difficult for us to see a world beyond what our authoritarian leaders offer. This is why we are all victims, even the victimizers.

We all know that there are rules to life and each person must follow the artificial guidelines or face rejection by society. We also know that life without reality is meaningless. It is the nature of all terrorist acts that they come from pain and sorrow, as well as defiance.

It Just Happened

It wasn’t something that I had planned. It just happened. After 16 years of marriage I had lost my way, again. This time I was too afraid to leave the stability of my ‘successful’ life so I lied and cheated on my family, as well as myself.

I had become a prisoner that had build his own prison. I knew that I had a lot to be grateful for – a rewarding career, five beautiful children from two marriages, a nice home in a nice neighbourhood and a wife who provided a six figure income – but I felt alone and and taken for granted.

I had difficulty expressing myself and I would try to please others at the expense of my own needs. It was the second time that I felt I was wasting my life living someone elses life. This recognition that this was pattern woke me up. I realized that I was sleep-walking through my own life.

My crisis led to self reflection and an admission that my outwardly successful life didn’t provide me with fulfillment or happiness. My children were my true joy but even they couldn’t make me whole.

At first, my fight to ignore my wake-up call led me to a dis-connected life. I pretented to be happy but I had given up on my search for my authentic self and was miserable.

Then I met an angel, Corinna, who gave me the courage of my convictions. I knew that it was now or never and, so, within three months we started a new life together.

We discovered each other late in life and with her support and love I’ve spent the last 5 years recovering from my ego-driven, priviledged life. She was the only one who heard my screams and understood that I needed time to discover my self.

In March of 2006, my wife and I went to an Iraq War Protest in New York during the last week of our 7 month trip through america in an airstream trailer.

I went to the protest because I believed that the social and economic cost of the Iraq war will impact the quality my life and turn our society into a totalitarian state. I had hoped that the NY protest would be a powerful anti-war message that it would capture the despair and hopelessness that we had experienced in our travels. Instead, I found that the peace movement is asleep and our press is silent.

The protest was a fun carnaval-like family event. There were some memorable signs and slogans, festive costumes and theatrical skits, music, food and sunshine.

The main stream media didn’t cover the event even though with 350,000 protesters, it was the largest Iraq War protest to date.

The festive atmosphere almost felt the same as when I last protested US foreign policy in New York. It was over twenty years ago on a sunny day in June, with a million others.

But it didn’t because many things have changed in twenty years, especially in this city.

The world has also changed, in a predictably self-destructive way that has created both a problem and a denial of the problem. I have also changed. I see the reality as a mature adult, not a wide-eyed young man.

I had all the answers when I was 20 but forgot the questions my the time I was 30. Now, in my mid-fifties, it could see some perspective.

The message of the March protest felt controlled to my seasoned cynicism. ‘Peace and justice’ stopped abruptly at the police barricates and video cameras.

The mainstream media was not interested in the event – one picture with a short tag line covered the event for the NY Times. Some of the other papers, like the Post, had bigger pictures but not much more insight into the event.

New Yorkers were annoyed by the inconvenience and the unnecessary reminder that NY is on the front lines of a new war with no front lines.

I also felt that the organizers had to be creative to get such a large turnout and that they made a deal with unions to get a high membership turnout.

It was discouraging to see a protest with so much energy and hopefulness yet with so little impact.

It was dishearting to see that the participants and the organizers still couldn’t reach beyond the already converted masses at a time when we are sleepwalking.

We have no control over our lives because we lack the maturity to confront our enslaved selves .

The peace movement fails to convince others of the importance of Eisenhower’s words and find a way to challenge today’s wisdom and tommorow’s prognosis.

It is like going to a funeral while the soon-to-be deceased is still alive and slowly moving towards their death in equal strides of enthusiasm and righteousness. It is an entralling image but the real metaphoric bouquet lies bury in the fact that we are all attending the funeral as paying customers, not mourners.

It was this image that struck the despair deeply embedded within my consciousness.

Although we had attended other protests and interviewed many disillusioned patriots, this was the first time during our travels that I realized how invested we all have become in the dreams of others and how much my past hasn’t reflected my dreams.

LostLagoonFound

My first visit to her next new city, now a country apart
Only today do we have enough time to waste
On a serendipitious expedition to find the lost lagoon
Although I secretely wonder how anything lost could be on a map

Florentine crepes and chocolate strawberries apetize our path
Through the week’s first sunshine on savory robson street
Flooding our senses with sensible senselessness
And renegotiating reminders of all matters, now trivial

I self-suprisingly suggest roller skating
prompting my youthful relative to exaggerate my relative decrepitness
my dexterity long forgotten, like the distance once between us
we engage in a playful dance of the ages, the aged and the ageless

Until we find ourselves Enroute to nowheres
in a quest for Sunday memories
Embracing each upright encountered,
we gleefully wobbled like newborn foals

Then recovered enough bravado to not turn back or back down
Our stroll becomes a 12km test that finishes on uneven sidewalks
Although our newfound courage is clouded by disapproval and laughter
we are too consumed by our accomplishment to let others invade

like all seditious travels the return is as foreign as the start
freedom that we never knew existed when we were unharnessed
somehow connected another memory of separation, not abandonment
the lost lagoon of our love found not wanting

Even though I secretly wonder how anything lost can be found
Her life now evolves Less around my fatherhood,
As my life evolves less around her childhood
It is only normal I reason to myself

On the map of my statistically anespectic uncle role
As we continue to walk with renewed respect for each other
And the comfort and safetly of shoes
That have been walked in for a long time

With total disregard to their mission or purpose
Other than to be there when needed
Whenever called upon for a quick stroll
Or a journey across the country

After veggie dogs and some photography at a war protest
we retrace our steps, soon joined by evacuees from still life
At the crowded turnstill, my daughter infiltrated the front
Knowing when the gates open that the race for dignity ended

A prime seat saved for one, promised for another
Became the line crossed by each father
I wanted my child’s offering
He wanted to offer his child

Words hurriedly measured frality and committment
While battering the seemingly uncaring passengers
As our daughters stood as somber sentinels
Witnessing male rage and their future modeled

My peaceful self saw his true nature
And understood the protection-level male primate
His anger transparent and ridiculous
Yet released with abandon in an unstoppable procession

My coolness inflamed his anger
His crudeness offended my sense of scale and theatre
Each position dismissed by righteousness
I watched his daughters illusions evaporate

As stolen stares absorbed the exchange
Searching for signs of flosum
For some as yet unplanned dinner party
My daughter quickly, intelligently offer her seat

As our sea bus paused waiting for strays
My passive/aggressive humour met his colourful assault
The primal scream held all captive
When a challenge to step outside was ridiculed

As we competed for false pride and dignity
Long after the seat was given up
the cry for justice, as in all wars, was unjust
To those securely on safe shores of childhood

What is right when it must be taken my might
What is fright if it brings no delight
It began with rage and indignation
And ended with an apology

But no understanding or reflection
Just the futility of making a smiling man angry
Unable to dissolve habitual patterns
Or provide any path to peace

An adult view of a childhood fear of an adult view
Resigned to the familiar
With the suspected truths of youth
Another memory not wired for civil realization

I secretely wonder if the lagoon can be found on foot
My fatherly self swells with painful wisdom
With lifes design beyond by reach
I accept that I am without the words to teach

InsideOut

The outside world enters
even after much abuse
It still turns me inside out

She reaches out to me
in a "I don't want to be hurt" manner
that easily reads as insincere

Like a fishermen trawling
prepared to throw away everything
but the exact fish they seek

Am I the one
that got away
or the prize?

Now, after years of separation
she wants to reconcile
our differences

She is more her Mother
now than ever
I am more me

We’ve grown accustomed
to not trying
how can we find trust again

Or is my age
and her rage
that keeps us apart

beach blanket burial

above, seductive sounds insulate the hastened steps
below, childhood rainbows reek of old lovers
here nature lures the unsuspecting and the ill gotten
as all the important things are remembered for a day


nearly imperceptible processions takes form
a cacophony emerges from the unnatural inundation
as all claim their turf and begin to circle
like a zamboni before the big game


a festive day after a mindless week of toil
mostly suspicious and poor
not yet tempted to kill for the privileged life
anxiously waiting the stolen promises


a fleeting cenotaph sprinkles the shifting sands
of flag-draped caskets and white crosses
each mourner carries their own terrorist thoughts
desperate to make sense of patriotism


the palpable smog and pollution idles
while the righteous hang onto hope
in order to breathe fresh air another sunny day
fearful that the escape is futile

hollywood disneyfies californian beaches
with freshness and freedom for all
nature and youth are taken for granted
now they are measured by those pornographic images


many seek understanding for their plight
more simply want to forget
in a land dying for democracy
a day of rest is fought on many shores


the kingdom has reached it’s pinnacle
yet nobody noticed yet
like the body, ignoring the early signs
long enough for the brain to announce death