guns | THE CIRCUS . . . . . . . . . AND THE ZOO

HEY I WAS ALRIGHT, THEN CAME THE REVOLUTION

How did we inherit this? I thought we were trying to make it better. Now here we are struggling along the old beaten path, only to find out things are worse. In the early days, gangs meant the Boy Scouts, or the kids living on Sycamore Lane against the chumps on Oak Drive. We would plan the encounter for days, only for it to wind up turning into a ballgame. It doesn’t work that way now, dude. It’s more like hack ’em up permanently.

At night we would drive around. Some of us might have a beer, we would yell at girls or paper the grumpy neighbors house. Man, we didn’t machine gun ’em in a pile of blood.

The cartoons were kinda’ rough. Maybe that’s where all this started. Popeye would get a little ugly with Brutus. Now you see eyeballs and arms and brains all over the place. It’s just not cool! We waited a long time for these years, just to have them screwed up by some punks in the wrong direction, or the greedy money hungry old fools making good on their adolescent shortcomings. Go home with it.

Hey, I’m hip. It’s America and I am an immigrant living better than any previous generation. I am not going to put up with this ‘tomorrow isn’t getting any better’ bullshit. If it doesn’t get any better tomorrow then it never will.

I think there are still real people out there in America. They work hard, they are honest, and they are just trying to stay ahead. But they get screwed bad everyday, by the politician, the white collar crook, the blue collar crook, by their employers, the judges and all the rest. This shit just won’t go. If the kid wants to be a ‘man’ and play with a gun maybe he should be living with the adults. Let them start paying us back just like their friends behind the costly steel bars. We need more road signs and other things that don’t compete with private enterprise.

When I was growing up we thought ‘wow, man, bad news’, Vietnam and hell were one and the same. We thought our generation would live and die at war. But a couple of wild hairs, a few cowards and a few more even worse worked to change it. Then everyone was spiked with a heavy dose of freedom. But they forgot the main ingredient. It is the core of what we did it for.

Somewhere is this good hard working pioneer value. It is so frail. And there are so many bad pioneer losers. Their voices are louder. They get all the publicity.

Get naked and find a life. You attach your organism to whatever you like, but give the kids an even break. A clean break. Don’t push it. Face it, there isn’t much difference between what you buy at the drugstore and what they sell on the streets. It all depends on what you have and what you don’t. The dudes pushing the stuff are richy, rich, rich. What a burn.

No man, we didn’t plan this shit. Just like we didn’t plan Aids. We thought we were a little smarter than the Beatniks and the Hippies, if we could just get a grip. If we could just tighten up and lighten up. It didn’t happen dude, now we are just bitching. Where in the hell did the good shit go? And where did they stash all those good ideas? I’m gonna’ keep looking pal. And every time I see a cow bend over backwards I’m gonna’ kick it in the ass. I owe it to them. Clean it up, get capitalistically environmental, almost like organized religion. I hate that phrase. You know I always kinda’ figured it was too late for us, but I’m still thinking ahead.

THE STORY OF X

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MUSINGS, PHILOSOPHY, PHOTOS, POLITICS, SOCIETY, THE STORY OF X

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ONE IN THE BUSH IS WORTH TWO IN THE DESERT

Originally published in ‘Stories of X’ (1979)

Deep in the Orient the smoking bowl fumes. The natives of the southern mountains chew their leaves for life. The natives of the Southwest eat their buttons religiously, picking dark fungus.

George had his own patch, and the peace pipe kept many soothing moments calm. From the hills came the factories and the stills. When the swinging strayed, the singing stopped.

An old American favorite at the fountain brought a brief relief from menstrual pain. Along came a minor confrontation gone sour. Young pincushions flourished deep in the jungle. The boys back home invented undreamed of chemicals, and everywhere the scent of burning flowers.

The boys came home undernourished from depleting inventories. Spoiled by the frank availability overseas. They were trained in war to move undetected, to fly. To trust to a limit and respect their superiors. They had to get back to work. They had to make money. To feed tortured, tattered families.

The power brokers and politicians ran out of easy armory contracts. They had to find new toys to play the game on the trading field. To feed the undernourished. Harvest the Oriental fields, develop the long forgotten rope trade. Teach the mountain villages the importance of chemical laboratories. Worst of all, it was all in line with the plans of the adversaries, like walking up to a smoking gun. On the record: ‘we are against’, ‘we will fight’. From the highest echelons of business, political and diplomatic circles: ‘buy the product’. Put the boys to fly and move undetected, to sell! Feed the undernourished.

The profits began to add up. They began to shakedown a simple and straightforward economy. They created international tidal waves.

A new plan of action had to be drawn in response to a new subculture of unemployed, homeless, high dollar battered street vendors and ten year old carpetbagging dictators. A new class was formed. Easy money, high stakes, finagling wealthy criminals with an expensive taste for the churches of the night.

Start a war. Bleed the taxpaying dollar and feed it to fight the roots of mega multi-national profits.

He was my lieutenant in Nam, we did a few together. He is on a D. C. staff now, pays well. I guess one in the bush is worth two in the desert.

The banker politician and celebrity justice shake hands at the gala event. The multimillion dollar shipment has arrived in time for their re-election campaign. Down the street the minority crack dealer trying to feed his wife and kids, hears a shot. His buyer hits the street in blood. He feels the cold steel cuffs tighten on his wrists. The cop gets an extra hit, the judge laughs, and the banker pours another shot.

An answer? More money for planes to stop them. More contracts. More congressional profits. Your money. And more money to run them. More ways and more places and more of it. Your money.

All the money to give them jobs, give them homes and give them food. More money to give them nice cars, give them mansions and give them banquets. No money. Give them drugs.

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