BLAH, BLAH, BLAH.... it was the new year and I had diarrhea. The Indians were turning on the music full blast. I was taking the loss of my Tibetan Family very hard. I was stuck with Rosie and Nanina, a French student of Bero's and a German dharma groupie. "It's getting worse and worse, Michael," lamented Rosie. "Ten years ago there was nothing here. Now the Indians are destroying this place," she sighed. But Rosie got me to a doctor. I was saved in the nick of time. Nanina was also sick and spent most of her time lying nude in her room. She asked me if I wanted to fuc k her. I said no. But it was Bero's appearance during his difficult time that inspired me. He was an ox of a man, beefy and huge. My head would swell and shoot sparks whenever he passed me. I followed him to the stupa and sat with him inside the giant monolith's guts; we faced a huge glowing Buddha figure. It seemed to sit in suspended anima tion.
All Buddhist statues pierced you with their weird trance. I began to feel light and free. I heard the Buddha speak: CHANGE YOUR LIFESTYLE. My rib-cage was smarting. I could feel Summer's subtle body. It was denser than mine. She had a lot of witchcraft behind her. "Don't get lost in a dream world with her," the Buddha warned. "Balance your energies CORRECTLY and CONSISTENTLY, RELEASE MORE!" I could hear the New Year crowds heaving and barging outside. It sounded like empty bottles rolling and clanking away. But in a strange muffled sort of way. I gazed ruefully at the floor. Memories of Bero's frescoes flooded my mind. I saw strange half-clad figures; they tied knots in their heads and had deep nasty stares; these were the wrathful Maha-siddahs, the crazy adepts Jim had so admired. I started to cry. I was disgusted with Jim and at the same time missed him terribly. Jim's weird legacy still haunted me. Summer was on my mind, too. Was she also a new sacrificial victim? Was she also a victim or just another perpetrator of the black arts? Did she abuse her powers and skid off into an illness spiral? My head began to tingle. Bero was getting up. A strange humming entered my ears. Bero was blessing me, I could feel it. Now was the time to plunge into the unknown.
I took a bus to Gaya, a miserable and ugly town, dark, intense, menacing. A medical student who had befriended me at the stupa showed me off to his roomies. These young Indians were obsessed with the dazzling mammon of the west. My Olympus camera and worn-out Walkman were minutely inspected, and I was hosted to a dinner prepared on the premises and served steaming hot. My hosts wanted visas for the promised land. I was noncommittal.
I was on my way to Calcutta. My train arrived on time in Gaya. I was in desperate straits. I was running out of money in a foreign land at the very start of a brand new year. My hosts were from Uttar Pradesh and were looking for a hustle. They guided me to my cabin and left me in a Bengali world. The screech of the train pulled me back from my self-imposed trance. I was frightened and now had to face KALI. The black Madonna of India, licking the world's sins with her lethal tongue, making my movements absolutely mad. No words, no words .... inside KALI'S mouth. I began hearing her haunting refrain .... CHAI, CHAI, CHAI, KOFFEE, KOFFEE .... CHAI, CHAI, CHAI, KOFFEE, KOFFEE. I looked outside my window and saw a wall of thick haze and tropical vegetation. I could see industrial infrastructure everywhere. If Delhi was like Beijing, than Calcutta was like Shanghai. The train crawled into Howrah station.
Howrah was a monster. All kinds of noise and squalor, videos and beggars, huge lines and crowds, touts too. I was in shock. I could not afford a taxi and didn't know which bus to take, so I walked across Howrah bridge. It was mesmerizing, zillions of people and moving objects swarmed over the bridge in both directions. The smog was astonishing, like a vision from hell. The Hooghly river was barely visible. Calcutta was madness.
I was inside KALI's belly and a monster was now shaking up and down, first sideways, quick walking, sitting, then crossing its legs, then uncrossing them, then getting up and rubbing its hands, now rubbing its fly, hitching its pants, then slitting its eyes to see everything, then grabbing me by the ribs, and screaming, screaming. This was KALI'S song. There was no money waiting for me at the bank. I had given my stepmother the wrong wiring instructions. I had to contact her and start from scratch. money was running out and I was in a hot spot. I found lodgings at a Theravadan temple, just in time. I plunged back into the maelstrom and sent two telegrams.
Then I went to visit KALI for she was the queen of Calcutta. Her face was everywhere. I found relief from the heat and noise in the unfinished subway system and zoomed down to Kaligut. Here KALI'S blood lust was satisfied. Priest touts showed me the sacrifice altar where goats were killed every morning. I poured water and flowers over a shiva lingam, a kind of stone penis , and said prayers for the family. I swished around some incense and got slammed for a donation. There was red paste on my forehead. The cry of ravens was everywhere. Beggars roamed in every corner smelling of strange purification. I thought about Brown Eyes. KALI knew how to work with the elements, with blood and water. Here I was exactly one year to the day since my final puja at the Burmese place. I could taste Summer's honey suck le breath. The world was in turmoil. The hard-liners were gaining ground all over the world. Exotic nickknacks and fast food absorbed my attention as I walked back at night. Men piss ed right on the street. Smoke was everywhere. I had survived my first day in Calcutta. KALI was laughing and taunting me, then making love to me, she was now my consort for this nightmare part of my journey. I was really protected
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I hopped off the train at Ostrava, a dismal and ugly border town. I spent the rest of the night listening to wretched drunks puke and yell in the passenger waiting room. I made repeated dashes into the filthy toilets. I stared at a faded picture of Havel resting on a flea-bitten wall. The Velvet Revolution seemed like a distant fantasy to me now. I had watched it unfold on CNN in San Diego, four years earlier, as my father disintegrated in San Diego, after I had lost all my money. Summer was only fourteen at the time. I wondered if she had even bothered to watch all this exhilarating craziness on the tube. My mind was on dull overload. "Proseem!" shouted the old lady at the counter. The food was awful. "Diki," I muttered. I hated Ostrava. The train for Katowice lumbered in late in the afternoon. The minute we crossed the Polish border, the energy changed dramatically. Poland was another Universe. The sleepy garbanzo-bean looking Czechs were now replaced by creatures bursting with life and energy. The Poles knew what life was about. The Poles projected real confidence and strength. Their square jagged faces were meaty faces of survivors. Mother Poland herself was a maelstrom survivor.
Beautiful autumn colors filtered into my train compartment from the outside. I could see farmers harvesting their crops. A tough, but friendly Polish businessman gave me directions on how to transfer to Krakow. "We may be heading for trouble," my beefy friend sighed. "The last Russian troops will be out of Germany by late next summer, then the next war will start." These were my first memories of Poland.
In Krakow, it took what seemed like hours to make a connection with Jerzy, my Polish contact, on the creaking Polish telephone lines. The loud din of the train mobs made it hard to hear him, but Jerzy eventually showed up in a dinky matchbox car. We loaded up all my tedious cargo and took off to his apartment. It was the beginning of a new adventure.
Jerzy had not really been expecting me. He was building a little retreat center for himself. Jerzy was muscular and compact in his appearance. I liked the vibes of his place immediately. Jerzy was a serious practitioner. He translated spiritual books into Polish and made his living in Norway. Polish money was worthless and inflation made it more worthless day by day. I had found a cozy new refuge for a few days. I went to bed with thoughts of Summer on my mind. I felt very close to her. A strange joker energy filled the air. Jerzy's protectors had accepted my offerings; and I was buzzing with wild and sweaty thoughts. Poland was gonna be all right. Krakow was bustling and beautiful. It beat out Berlin and Prague in my book; and I walked around enjoying the friendly crowds and vibrant air. I could feel an ancient resonance here. Krakow had like Prague, its own Hrad, its own Stare Mesto, and of course its own Josefov. The Poles also seemed to be far ahead of their Czech and former East German neighbors in the dirty race for entrepreneurial savviness. New little businesses were mushrooming up in all kinds of strange little corners and the Poles instinctively knew that SERVICE was important. The Red Stress was fading, even with the new old Commies back in power. The large football-sized town square of Krakow was where all the action was. The Rynek hummed with life at all hours of the day and no cars disturbed the holy scene. Old churches and fountains made an excellent backdrop for guitar-toting poets and barefoot Polish girls.
The old Alma Mater of Copernicus was close by. I rushed to pay homage to the man who put the sun at the center of our solar system. It was brilliant insights like these that transformed our weird and narrow human horizons. The Polish astronomer's statue was hidden in a corner somewhere, somewhat lost in all the jazzy hubbub. I found it and stared at it for quite awhile. Back at Jerzy's a tarot spread confirmed that my long-term relationship with Summer was OK and secure, but that the short-run, whatever that could possibly be, was filled with obstacles. I sighed and accepted this sad and exciting state of affairs. I was on the road now and going progressively eastward. Summer was now my little wish-fulfilling gem and like all good-luck tokens had to be kept very close to one's heart. Jerzy asked me whose side I was on in the brat war. I told him I supported the kid in Tibet. So did he. We were both relieved about this.
Half the Krakow sangah had abandoned the Grand Wizard and Jerzy was at the head of the line. Jerzy was also itching to start his retreat and dumped me on the other camp's doorstep. I wasn't bullish about this new development. The new place I found myself in was dirty and overcrowded. The air also felt somewhat confusing. Jerzy was extremely embarrassed and quickly vanished into the night. My new hosts found me a place on the floor of "The Guest-room" and I quickly surrendered to the guides somewhere inside my dreams. Poland was full of surprises. The Jewish quarter in Krakow had an air of a lost world. Like Prague it was haunted by ghosts, but they were sweeter and warmer. I could feel my grandmother here. The grave of the great Zaddik, Rabbi Rhemu called out to me. An old Polish Jew begging for dollars skillfully guided me to the great saint's "final" resting place. I placed rocks on it for Summer and myself, for my family and for all sentient beings under stress. I knew my offerings were instantly accepted. Jewish bodhisattvahs had love for all Goys. I felt great light and protection. The black demons had failed to destroy IT. Poland had survived, despite the hideous black stress, and was now the spiritual center of Europe. I was amazed at the friendliness of the Poles. I found a helping hand wherever I went. The karma was good.
I took a bus outside the city to a Camaldolese monastery. The autumn gave the day a terrific sound and light show: wind and leaves danced furiously in front of a rainbow just for me. I was in a strange kind of heaven here. I visited the crypts. I got into an argument with a monk in Spanish. "You empty the pail to receive God," Brother Benito exclaimed. "No! You empty the pail and then throw it away." I countered. This tennis match lasted an hour and I was rewarded with a dinner of red cabbage mixed with potatoes and a ride back into town.
Krakow was wet with rain, but nothing seemed to matter. I WAS HOME! I was feeling Summer's heart and the world's. I had rejected a material paradise and sent blessings, even to the brown and red demons that had tormented this magical and friendly land. Krakow was suffused with an unnatural glow that was like gold. The karmic bouncing was no longer unpleasant. I was on a graceful and billowy trip as if over a blue sea, and there were no doubts in my mind at the moment.
It was time to go to Auschwitz. I boarded a bus and gazed at the onion domes and horse carts on the road. Birch trees and autumn colored leaves flashed by my window. If this was the road to hell it was well camouflaged. I got off with a drunk twenty-something a mile from "The Museum" as the locals called it. My companion was a young and confused mongrel like myself: half of this, and half of that. German and Portuguese in this case; and sadly rejected by both cultures. I told Marush to leave his beer bottle outside the gate. He meekly complied.
The cars were roaring along the freeway to San Rafael. America was leading the civilized world in a titanic struggle against unknown terror. She was steam-boating in the Utah desert. The Feds were furiously reorganizing with a high-ball in their face in order to improve collapsing domestic security; and a new cabinet position was being created now second only to the DOD that would simply handle all this BS with a steamy baritone kind of voice.
A young woman was precariously cradling the cell-phone to her ear with one hand, as her other hand was furiously dancing with the steering wheel. " I dunno. I'm just really speechless, you know. He was really this misleading ass. I mean, couldn't he have just come up with something really more tactful? " The voice on the other line was inaudible.
Drooling fools everywhere were parading in the evening. The speeding cars were getting lost in kitchen vineyards. " Couldn't he have just had the guts to call me. You know, and tell me how he really feels about me? It's pathetic. He was just pretending. I mean…."when these giant stars start exploding they just show these irregular blasts that create these gnarly globs of space; and these kinds of supernovas can then unleash energies that can briefly outshine any galaxy.
The driver at the wheel was starting finally to tear. "I mean, I'm not picky, and I'm open to meeting new people. You know, I'm not desperate and I'm fun, and I'm really cute. I like singing in the shower, and hanging out with all kinds of cool friends, I like hiking, running, and trying out new things. I mean gosh, why did he behave like such a jerk. I mean I could have taken him and shown him some monkeys and watermelon juice and you know, I'm just sexy as hell! "
Video conferencing was now really booming since nine-eleven. One hundred and thirty million cell phones were discarded every year in America. About 65,000 tons! They were also shrinking in size and weighing only three ounces. They also contained toxic elements like arsenic, lead and zinc. " I mean did he just want a blow-job right away or what? " She was crying. The freeway was getting dark. The buddahs were also just waking up. Serious issues were being discussed now like transport and border security, also something obliquely called emergency preparedness and also serious counter-measures for biological, chemical, and nuclear attack. Hemingway and Salinger were also really laughing. " I mean I'm a nice girl. " She pleaded. " aren't I ? "
It was a complete farce and he knew it. The suicide bombers were trembling on the world screen. They were going into the LA vineyards and disrupting his concentration. It was just another secret conspiracy. Or was it more than one. They were possibly clashing on principle. Hitting the right buttons and and just making a bloody mess of things. Stupid things real bugged out and stumbling. Itching for a shower and shave.
Then the knock on the door.
" Can I talk to you? I need to talk to you. " It was a distant voice. It sounded possibly like Billie Holiday falling off the Twin Towers. It was so smooth and steamy like Chardonney. He had heard this voice before on the silver screen. Just a few blocks away. He loved it. It was addictive. It was rickety and...
" You're not washing the tin cans. We' re recycling them you know. You're not paying for the soap. You're not pulling back the shower curtains. Geez, I can't walk naked in the house because of you. I can't... "
He looked into the thick steamy screen with its lamp-light of arguements. The filthy currency markets were going crazy. The Yen had gone up 250 pips in two hours. Then suddenly 150 pips down in just ten minutes. These were certainly the kind of moves that could make serious money even for fools. The world was on fire. It was looking for cactus plants and saying " hands up. " It was breathing in the purple air. Where were those suicide bombers now? Were they in Calcutta, Montreal, maybe Haifa?
The voice continued its litany. "You never clean the sink. You never pull the living room curtains in at night. It's not ecologically efficient. You can only use the shower for ten minutes. Also you can't take baths. You can't... "
He had loved that voice on the silver screen. Even if it was commiting adultery.The editors and translators were screaming for their getaway money. It was suicide time for the snuffed-out planet. There were these large gas shells exploding everywhere. In Chinatown and then in California. So where were the aliens? Why hadn't they arrived? They were overdue.
How could one explain in fifteen languages the nature of the problem? It was everywhere in the air. Under the sea and up in the Himalayas. He had just loved her so much on the silver screen. He turned off the computer and just missed the last bus to Mississippi.
She began screaming:
" I DON'T UNDERSTAND YOU. " She walked away.
This was CNN on a good evening. It roared in the mysterious night and he just loved it.
I can feel her soft breath now, she is so close, trapped in the sand, in the waves, that crash with foam like yoga, stretched on the floor, both legs raised and extended, lightly touching the vast plains strewn with the craters, the pelvis, elbows, lifting up, inhaling the rigid and wrinkled seas, whose lips kiss me with a tongue--not lacking in spiritual truth, which curls forward to support me, grasping both knees and clasping the sea.
You were beyond the deadest traffic noise with these pretty things that you made, your long dark brown wavy hair, your fairest skin, the Irish thing--which was expressed with a
moral vigor, with light blue eyes, that loved interesting people, that were more comfortable in a pair of low hung jeans and a chloe blouse, which according to some interpretations
can be nectar rendering, especially in a broom closet at a boring party, your serious look takes you to distant galaxies--that blow snow from sweeping gusts near the bizzare silent
sun, it's all in the sad braids of your hair, also your harmless baseball cap, and your long neck, so strong and lean that it quickly jumps down towards your long, white legs and big
feet, listen--the scenic views from the billowing hills hint that Saturn is nearby with its dirty hands, contemplating, perhaps impatiently, which excessive fingers will signify how
serious our new relationship will be, when the mysteries are completely revealed, but the murkiness continues to hold its place, like patches of ice which are pock-marked and
spotted with all kinds of fungus and moss, spilled harmlessly onto your palms which sweat and which hold me with accurate mischief--when we swim into the pitch black
ocean--and discover that soon we are slowly in orbit--around loose, wooden floor boards, that have yet, to burn down.
The tremendous brightness of your light came as a surprise to me, your bright red hair floated out and strictly speaking this temptation was not allowed,
nor your blue eyes which put this far away stress on me, I was gripped by an agonizing posture, by your zen flash jeans that drooped down towards your black shoes,
and that circled your waist below your redeeming breasts hidden by a black shirt, I entered your deepest shadow, I then shuddered in the middle of your deepest art-works,
I held your hand and did not monopolize your time, your lucid radiances were lost in the silence of our breaths which reminded me of Christmas ornaments hanging in the doomed blackness of space.
I moved closer to your face and touched your swinging lips with my lucky fingers, the laws of physics told me, you were the finest of space-crafts which suddenly made
your divine orbits around the strange planet that was me, something that clicked simply, like a master utensil which could never be diminished in scope, this was the cosmic
jewlery that you wore always in honor of the world, I gentley blew the flickering flames and entered your golden door.
I have always thought it curious that on the releasing moon all the rushing green leaves furiously circulated around you, except for the blowing wind which was always ancient
still, I was born on top of a long and crooked branch with trickling creek sounds that perfectly touched you and were rather cool in these dead, disintegrating shades, I
enjoyed the fact on one side of this little fallen log, millions of mosses didn't mind that you were quickly communicating with me with your regular out-breathes, breathing so
normally on the way back to earth, you were immensely black--and practised this total unity with an effortless experience of stillness, it seemed to me that we spent most of
our time discussing, immeasurably what color the moon could be possibly, I watched as the size of the limitless earth was possibly compared to your stretching breasts which
were pressing and pushing your ribs, across our ocean of fragile air, which suddenly I saw as a sad curved line of blue light, a thin and fragile atmosphere which looked like the
mighty Pacific ocean as I was quickly traveling within you at a speedy four miles a second, it took me just twenty-five minutes to cross you and I knew finally that you were big.
I heard the word ignition, as the tree dust blew outside my window, I was leaving the planet now, the white noise, its plastic pollens living on the edge of town, I thus went further into those dark moments, unbuckled myself, as nothing remained underneath me, like a weightless cactus, I floated and uttered the verbal spells of white twisted clouds with shades of blue radio chatter, that disappeared into those substatic regions too deep for dispassionate shadows to probe fitfully, During my first unfulfilled view, close to these green leaves of ocean, silently rimmed by the earth's missing spectacle of snow, red flowers hanging triumphant, dwelling deeply, with a dreamless sleep, that petered into a slow crab-like meaning, instructing the planet, as if through a bull-horn that brilliantly existed in New Zealand,
I heard the word ignition, as the blackness of space began sprinkling outside my window, I welcomed the home planet, as I was pounding my fists like a familiar siren, blowing off these transcendent blessings of the sun, its space-suit touching the floating hatches of the planet's muttering orbits, which touched me in such unknown ways, vast and deep, allowing me soon to hear my own body,
my heart beating a unique fear, my blood vessels pulsing this over-lapping kindness, so wild in its rustling, with muscles as vast as these pinkish stars, hidden by blue lights, so violently defended like holy relics, that burned with a silent pressure, that flinged itself as if inhaling a velocity so outward, that only I could successfully set it ablaze, as I heard the word ignition, for the first time like a divine lightning, pouring forth earth's glowing organ pipes....
If you and I were like rivers my Darling, tributaries….flowing, everywhere converging gurgling like a silence, scary and quietly turning.
Inside long and velvet sheening, more like branches, mannequins, whose vulnerable elbows would land like a bumpy mist….
I see you, my Darling, as a spider weaving her web, around me and whose long and wintry fingers are longing for these tributaries, that are so sticky and thin. I have found that these fingers, are easily bruised, that their skeletal stutter is breakable and easily burned.
Your love also is easily pulled, and easily raised, so easily lifting is your love into me, its spreading moss is a greeting of something, so tightly pink and pressed like a guest.
I can see my Darling, your neck’s anxious sighings, inviting me quickly like these dripping drips, I can see these drops exposed because they are so near, like drip drops from a leaking roof.
Your dark eyes hear these plops, whose plopping sings, of your yearning for me, whose plippity plops are searching so knowingly and plippingly, in a plopping sort of sadness, in this distance.
There is a silence, somewhere here in these trees which mirrors your measure endlessly, whose everywhere is here in these fingers that see me, speedingly, spreading us outwardly….
And than like butterflies, flittering my Dear, your lips bring in a darkness, whose here is a when on your face, and therefore inquiring if these mountains could hear and be us.
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