Graceful Dissonance (A Collab with Roarke)

Leaving Vegas infrared

dark dark night, power off, black strip, sunset silhouettes

large birds washed in water and moth wings

rain on the glass, rain on the windshield, wet black leather....rain.

lonely streetwalkers, wire-hanger-children in someone else's cocktail dress, red painted nails, shivering shoulders, walking, walking

old neon lights, SANDS, TROPICANA, DUNES

Can't see clear from the sidecar, too much vibration under the scuffed helmet

Diamonds and cleavage, pink-blue-green peacock tails

2 a.m. lightness of fog, crosses on hubcaps,

the Greeks understand what I've seen,

talk with me for a moment, motorcycle spin, carousel twin, I dig your perspective.

digging up Charlie in Huntsburg at Halloween, Christ running with your face in this windshield, I'm more aware of the digging, in the basement, cracked and rattles loose.

Saw her adjust her bracelet, waif, wraith.

In Rothburg you got shaky.

I do wander�" polished edges, corners and doors.

Strum sacred chords to the rhythm of passing rock formations; concrete alto of man harmonized with nature’s bass line; rocky ghost notes abound. At the long, limo tinted troughs, sad eyes lap musical mind milk like a caramel kiss from beyond. Grey demons with white moustaches tumbleweed through blue notes; rumble through ghost towns and dirty diamond-studded cities. Riding in an armored tomb; a farmed tune, from Sin City to Podunk Piss-pot. Sandy beige forevers morph into red clay remains. Slither and slather the beer-bars, pool halls & strip malls seeking dewdrops of agape high-fives and the red meat manna of casual coital thrusts. Yeehaw or bust: bingo halls to banjo balls that jingle-jangle-jingle like the taste of stale Pringles and the smell of aged road-sweat. Wet & ready for the rock steady hay-down: sliding northwest on your dial, through hick sneers and farm girl smiles, with more miles in our back pockets than earth, yet, left to till. Turning our hard times into good rhymes, and our monotonous pains into rain-washed ragtime roars. Close that door! It’s cold out in the real world.

Miles of churning road-scab roll on and on and under.

There is no more scent to the rushing air but cinder and wet char. The last sound, the last feeling a thud, thudding of a stone heart in a hollow cave wrapped in cracked leather.

The blasting shotgun muzzle deals the cards, it's saw-snubbed barrel and amputated stock fit the calloused, blistered, splintered hands that strangle-grip it.

Remnants, shrapnel, shreds of anger, red-blind-rage

Barbarous Pict battle eyes, the Romans knew the fear.

Hot, pump-ejected shells spilled like good-and-plenty on the sticky movie house floor, slanted and oozing bodily syrup toward the basalt bowels blackened with death all the way to the river styx and the ears ring boom, boom, BOOM, BOOMBOOMBOOMBOOM.

Through all the backwater roadhouses, we think we’ll get there from here. Reading the trail of pack wolves, snow and branch winter rusts the air, close, narrowing the stalled pickup’s dying cab light. Young, cream smooth legs, �"loins covered by a grease soiled quilt�" twist in the throws of birthing. The wind howls. The wolves howl. The girl screams, tears streaming, hands griped white and freezing on the seat. It's now.

Dense grey pterodactyl wings beat and float above the stalled truck. Prehistoric Predators spy the innocent offering with red-eye glow. His hands are drenched in new born blood. Cries of relief and life sob through the night beaconing, calling, luring the heavy grey beat of death closer. Pregnant, pipe-grey clouds hide the pointed wings, massive beak and honed claws as they move behind the blizzard, but they come.

There's anger when it's over. A pyre stench.

Sweat and tears choke the passage and seal the way back.

Anger spills like scalding oil over a besieged parapet

anvil forged heart beats

sight breeched in blind flood

It demands more until there's nothing left

hands clench and unclench invisible air

The Harley chuds to a standstill, empty fifths of Jack are gauntlet-thrown to the frozen pavement.

The chest heaves empty, a broken bellows

Consciousness destroyed, subconscious maniacally released, bellowing a laugh before Ragnarok.

Oh redneck Ragnarok! Shifting stones of a confused fortune roll like soothsayer bones. And, how the Earth trembles beneath the mighty roar of raging pulse and human howl! Steel-toed talons bite down on the naked stage. Before the raised altar, rivers of sweaty heads full of drunken sex phantasms and overdue car payments and lust writhe and groan. Lust! Lust! Lust for an unscarred moment of streetwise Zen. Woody fingers clawing and searching for a taste of the totem head; a whiff of that opiate mountaintop mist. Adoration and fleshy hungers seep from every pore. We are just the offered sacrifice to an unnamed god. But, as the spirit flows from fiery fingers and tongues, we touch that coveted high. Lightning enters through the head, and flows through all parts of the burning whole. Amplified, glorified, sanctified with each sweet note. We have crossed that barren desert, and are, now, wallowing in the milk & honey of these heathen angels. Transcending all things physical! Just a whirlwind of ghostly noise that tickles every nerve ending still functioning.

Their bloody, wet teeth don’t quench the thirst; they only fertilize the ravenous want.

Electrical lights flash a rainbow mushroom cloud around my bone frame. I am Dionysus; full of wine and song; oozing lust and rage; trickling the ambrosian tones of heavenly origin onto the outstretched mortal tongues of phoenix/vulture crossbreeds. Like a river of pleasure and pain; music and fire; Heaven and Hell on a hardwood platter! Eat up! Sop up that polytonal red roux with your heart biscuit, baby! Live with me in the flashbulb slides that flicker this timeless night. Collide and combine, collide and combine! Until we are all at one, reeling in the unpredictable throes of a neon midnight.

Dante led the way further south. Level under hellish level. The snows abate, withering in the pan-head’s wake. Nothing remembered, debauched amnesia, a fools errand taken by warrior knights occult bound to sacred battle.

The unfocused mind reels back to music on a hot summer day lying on a beach towel in the park, his head resting on folded arms, a small transistor radio tuned to an AM jazz station. A hip relaxed combo backs up Dakota Smith, a nine-piece swings Anita O'Day, over some tube static Dinah Washington sings “Damn your eyes” as he drowsily whiles away the afternoon, lost in that private closed-eyed world. It’s still hot, sweating.

A jazz ensemble was blowin’the roof off the roadhouse. Searing changes blast a fist full of squares who try to dance instead of just listen. The tenor man was rabid, his cigarette burned down to his knuckles. The trumpet player was in a heroine itch to talk back. It was a vicious cutting battle. Few were hip.

She stood near-breathless ecstasy on the edge of the dance floor. Hourglass, stiletto-heeled goddess. At the bar a leather arm swiped across stubble ringed lips, his ears all tuned in until demon lust was aroused by....green eyes.

A screaming high note erupted opening the trumpet’s chorus. Her garnet-red lips parted and teeth gnashed. Her silken red blouse clung to her ample pride and theosophical carnal fantasies. The rhythm section tried to keep up, the trumpet man was a mixolydian addict. The tenor player nodded reefer-ascension with his eyes closed.

The two musician’s began trading eights then fours, then it was an all out street fight. The music triggered flashbacks of Mephistophelean orgies in his road weary mind.

A hysterical laugh rode on top of the cutting session. Blended with the music, like a flame to nitro. Her Onyx mane flipped as she legged a path toward her convertible exit. Ripping her bodice open, she redlined the tach and washed the curbed Harley and sidecar in a contrail of burnt rubber.

It starts with a sneer, twists into a snarl and ends in a drooling, lunatic laugh. The bass player was carving out a crazy blues walk, head bent, elbows up and thick fingers digging the wires of his varnished mistress. Another amber shot was slammed. A mind race to the bike; the valet shouted her name�" Absinthe.

The chase, the grail quest is eternal, it bends minds as completely as it bends light, as cruelly as tenor man bent his notes. The jazz never gives up, the convertible Circe knew it, the road warriors just grooved to echoes of the riff breaks as the chase resolved back to the head.

When music is worn like a winter coat, and Gabriel’s trumpet blast wears a devil mask, there are no boundaries. He is adrift in space. Going home seems a step backwards; rolling onward into the night-cloaked fray seems too ambitious. So, he lights a smoke, and watches the dance floor writhe with sex, lets the jazz baptize the dust from the dream. Intoxicated, liberated, invigorated, he stumbles through another mysterious door, and glides into the night as smooth as a jungle cat.

Up and down the magical avenue, serpentine women slither their suited up ogres. Lights twist in smoke like paint drops in alcohol. The world blooms around him, and the sky whispers his name in a husky bedroom voice. He remembers the stage burning beneath him, the faces suckling at his sacred source. He contemplates the stale air of his s****y apartment. The monotone advisory drones of pseudo-friends and armor-plated family members. He sniffs at the trail sweet Absinthe has left behind. The wolf climbs from his woolen tomb, and unleashes a rabid love song into existence. Everything is different. He is quite lost, and quite happy to be so.

Las Vegas will still be a desert full of bones whenever he reaches home again. Until then, he will live. And, Life will embrace him in a dreamer’s kiss, and wrap him in the tribal fold of her beloved street children. And, the glorious music! The music never stops.

Author's Note

I know it's long. But, it's worth the read. Roarke is one of my favorites; and, not just on WC. He's one of my favorite writers anywhere, anyhow. (or favourite if you're into that sort of thing) READ THIS!

Reviews

[Larry Dyson]

Amazing...I kept underlining and copying the parts I liked best and then would change my mind...too damn good of a story...within several more stories...I have to say I really liked this part..."A jazz ensemble was blowin’the roof off the roadhouse. Searing changes blast a fist full of squares who try to dance instead of just listen. The tenor man was rabid, his cigarette burned down to his knuckles. The trumpet player was in a heroine itch to talk back. It was a vicious cutting battle. Few were hip. "...

[freelancejouster]

it feel like i'm in a storm of sorts, being assaulted by wind, rain, sights, sounds, everything. the effect is amazing. wonderfully done.

[Ruth]

I would say this is one of the best collabs I have ever read! I was thinking half way down before I got to it...that this is like Dante meets Kerouac! Expanding and exhilirating beyond words...long...yes...but so worth the read, I am left feeling quenched but needing more! This could be a novel in the works! Amazing! xoxo

[Kenneth The Poet]

F**k yes! This has smattering of my favorites...Chuck Palahniuk, Tool, The Doors, R.G., even some Sartre and Nietzsche I think.

All across the map awesome.

Like a road trip through literary modernity. Must read more Roarke now.

[Emily B]

you two work well together!

[Seshat Nidaba]

A very excitingly strange poem, though it seemed like the collaboration of about 9 poets :P Mostly lovers of jewellry, jazz and the radio!

[Robin]

Im going to read this probably 4 or 5 times more , because every time I do I find another jewel that sparkles in my memory chest . fantastic - no - real writing my friends ...

[Lilly Negoi]

you two actually managed to go all the way to and back from hell...and that "sweet absinthe trail" can still be felt in the air behind you...this is one splendidly done work of art! bravo!

[roarke]

I've never read this WHOLE thing before...... is it cricket to review your own piece?
Whatever it is, it's ten tons of fun man.
That's all I can say.