Spirits of St. Augustine
by mike marcellino
Clouds the size of
galleon sails
dance in ocean pools
burnt by the falling sun
charred black grey,
red of campfires
miles an’ miles
a footprints
on flat cream sand
spirits of St. Augustine.
Costal clouds like
perimeter flares
hang
without motion
held up with
parachute suspenders.
Headlights in the dusk
head this way
scenes from Doctor No
miles an’ miles
a footprints
on flat cream sands,
spirits of St. Augustine.
Riding sweet Betsy to E
a woman an’ girl
hand an’ hand
out of the surf
with ankle length halter top dresses
pants of cotton on.
Do you always do this,
Hold hands?
No, I imagine you hold hands a lot.
Do you always wear dresses in the ocean?
They are modest. They cover our skin.
Yesterday’s crescent moon
tonight’s near a half.
Ships light the east horizon.
Seas darken
lure bulls an’ black tips
near 14 foot long.
Parties retreat to
houses in silhouette.
Scrub brush wrestle
in southeast breezes
on tales of Spanish saints
miles an’ miles
a footprints
on flat cream sand,
spirits of St. Augustine.
The writer in the night
rides by the trail,
daring not to cut though rabbit
rattle snake dunes.
The writer sees
lights
of the beachcomber,
visions
of the island of broken shells,
a fair Dutch girl
Nicole,
and brown skin Albina,
from Albania,
down to Augustine
to get their fortunes read
by the daughter of
a Rumanian celluloid queen.
Albina picks up
a tear drop
gun metal stone
cut with pin hole
from the sand of St. Augustine,
a trimast ship etched on. Nicole,
her flower dress gently flowing
gazes out to sea, wistfully
thinking of a short board
surfer
in her day dream.
Visions of
Anastasia,
in the night
miles an’ miles
a footprints
on flat cream sand,
spirits of St. Augustine.
Spirits of St. Augustine by Mike Marcellino copyright 2009
Notebook Writer: poetry, music, photography and writing of Mike Marcellino
Friday, September 25, 2009
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Amelia Earhart, soft silver wings
Amelia Earhart, soft silver wings
by mike marcellino
"Courage is the price that Life exacts for granting peace. The soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things." - Amelia Earhart, 1927
amelia earhart,
Love your picture
in flight.
Love your goggles,
love your lips.
Love how you circled the world,
single handed.
amelia
amelia
amelia.
Like that leather
air cap.
You’re a goddess, a woman,
soft white,
ahead of your time,
such afterglow
night
in shinning armor.
Meet me on a northern coast,
not far from the equator,
above the island
where they made King Kong.
Your Atlantis, risen
in my South China Sea.
amelia
amelia
amelia.
Oh, your last flight.
Oh your last flight.
What a night.
Looking at your picture
in my book,
soft silver
soft silver
wings.
Your lips, painted colors
light, pretty pink.
Those eyes,
imagine,
sigh.
Your nails, natural,
fingertips.
Taking you with me.
amelia
amelia
amelia.
Soft silver
soft silver
wings.
Courage
Courage is the price that Life extracts for granting peace.
The soul that knows it not, knows no release.
From little things.
Knows not the livid loneliness of fear.
Not mountain heights where bitter joy can hear
The sound of wings.
How can life grant us boon of living, compensate
For dull grey ugliness and pregnant hate
Unless we dare
The soul’s dominion? Each time we make a choice, we pay
With courage to behold the restless day,
And count it fair. - Amelia Earhart, 1927
You made the crossing
not alone.
Meet you over the Atlantic.
amelia
amelia
amelia.
Soft silver,
soft silver,
wings.
copyright Mike Marcellino amelia earhart 2009
by mike marcellino
"Courage is the price that Life exacts for granting peace. The soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things." - Amelia Earhart, 1927
amelia earhart,
Love your picture
in flight.
Love your goggles,
love your lips.
Love how you circled the world,
single handed.
amelia
amelia
amelia.
Like that leather
air cap.
You’re a goddess, a woman,
soft white,
ahead of your time,
such afterglow
night
in shinning armor.
Meet me on a northern coast,
not far from the equator,
above the island
where they made King Kong.
Your Atlantis, risen
in my South China Sea.
amelia
amelia
amelia.
Oh, your last flight.
Oh your last flight.
What a night.
Looking at your picture
in my book,
soft silver
soft silver
wings.
Your lips, painted colors
light, pretty pink.
Those eyes,
imagine,
sigh.
Your nails, natural,
fingertips.
Taking you with me.
amelia
amelia
amelia.
Soft silver
soft silver
wings.
Courage
Courage is the price that Life extracts for granting peace.
The soul that knows it not, knows no release.
From little things.
Knows not the livid loneliness of fear.
Not mountain heights where bitter joy can hear
The sound of wings.
How can life grant us boon of living, compensate
For dull grey ugliness and pregnant hate
Unless we dare
The soul’s dominion? Each time we make a choice, we pay
With courage to behold the restless day,
And count it fair. - Amelia Earhart, 1927
You made the crossing
not alone.
Meet you over the Atlantic.
amelia
amelia
amelia.
Soft silver,
soft silver,
wings.
copyright Mike Marcellino amelia earhart 2009
Monday, September 14, 2009
Flatbush, a new poem
Flatbush
by mike marcellino
Flew into New York
on wings of Peter Pan.
Flew into New York
on wings of Babylon.
Perfect trip, eleven minutes late.
Coastal Jersey the same,
belchin’ chemicals and oil -
industrial desolation
in the boot of this deep down.
Flew into New York
on wings of Peter Pan.
Flew into New York
on wings of Babylon.
On the heels of Jupiter,
not a bad act to follow
on the right a
Santa Anna’s banner,
lighter green an' red, white
tricolor
blazoned to the fire escape
of a third floor dirty red brick
tenement, a place the West Indians
call Flat Bush,
perfect spot for Jimmy Cliff.
Mariachi music filled the air
all Saturday.
Flew into New York
on wings of Peter Pan.
Flew into New York
on wings of Babylon.
Soft good mornings in English,
more likely Patois
darkened skins
standin' outside temples
ol' ladies an' gentlemen
takin’ numbers for dinner
in a church
outside
a
redemption,
after
a
revolution
into
a
resurrection.
Flew into New York
on the wings of Peter Pan.
Flew into New York
on the wings of Babylon.
Walkin on graves a stone
17th Century soldiers'
worn blank
in this once 'Vlacke bos'
Dutchland flat plain.
Flew into New York
on the wings of Peter Pan.
Flew into New York
on the wings of Babylon.
Jupiter on the right now
not as bright,
on this clear
an’ quiet night.
Wings of Babylon copyright by mike marcellino 2009
by mike marcellino
Flew into New York
on wings of Peter Pan.
Flew into New York
on wings of Babylon.
Perfect trip, eleven minutes late.
Coastal Jersey the same,
belchin’ chemicals and oil -
industrial desolation
in the boot of this deep down.
Flew into New York
on wings of Peter Pan.
Flew into New York
on wings of Babylon.
On the heels of Jupiter,
not a bad act to follow
on the right a
Santa Anna’s banner,
lighter green an' red, white
tricolor
blazoned to the fire escape
of a third floor dirty red brick
tenement, a place the West Indians
call Flat Bush,
perfect spot for Jimmy Cliff.
Mariachi music filled the air
all Saturday.
Flew into New York
on wings of Peter Pan.
Flew into New York
on wings of Babylon.
Soft good mornings in English,
more likely Patois
darkened skins
standin' outside temples
ol' ladies an' gentlemen
takin’ numbers for dinner
in a church
outside
a
redemption,
after
a
revolution
into
a
resurrection.
Flew into New York
on the wings of Peter Pan.
Flew into New York
on the wings of Babylon.
Walkin on graves a stone
17th Century soldiers'
worn blank
in this once 'Vlacke bos'
Dutchland flat plain.
Flew into New York
on the wings of Peter Pan.
Flew into New York
on the wings of Babylon.
Jupiter on the right now
not as bright,
on this clear
an’ quiet night.
Wings of Babylon copyright by mike marcellino 2009
Saturday, September 5, 2009
The James Brown
by mike marcellino
Can man can,
only 80,
strong arms guide a bike,
his headlight of cans
arms of V-8 juice.
Can man can,
his Sears bike, an Elgin
then J.C. Higgins
thirty four model,
rusted over an over
runs straight ahead anyway
on tubes and tires.
Can man can,
aluminum down to 40 cents
from 71, in this depression.
His heart's still strong,
operated on.
His Elgin still runs true
along the yellowing brick roads
like a West Virginia
company coal town,
wood box houses
homes of steel workers
in the middles
of the then.
Can man can.
James Brown
ride on to Marietta,
down to the river
makin’ his way to Somerset,
Kentucky.
Can man can by mike marcellino copyright 2009
by mike marcellino
Can man can,
only 80,
strong arms guide a bike,
his headlight of cans
arms of V-8 juice.
Can man can,
his Sears bike, an Elgin
then J.C. Higgins
thirty four model,
rusted over an over
runs straight ahead anyway
on tubes and tires.
Can man can,
aluminum down to 40 cents
from 71, in this depression.
His heart's still strong,
operated on.
His Elgin still runs true
along the yellowing brick roads
like a West Virginia
company coal town,
wood box houses
homes of steel workers
in the middles
of the then.
Can man can.
James Brown
ride on to Marietta,
down to the river
makin’ his way to Somerset,
Kentucky.
Can man can by mike marcellino copyright 2009
Long distance love
Love long distance
by mike marcellino
Long distance love.
Love, long distance,
far as the brightest moon,
fulfilling
empty blue black skies,
the star next door, Jupiter,
afterglow
afterthought
light in the wilderness.
Long distance love.
Love long distance.
Copyright by mike marcellino Long distance love 2009
by mike marcellino
Long distance love.
Love, long distance,
far as the brightest moon,
fulfilling
empty blue black skies,
the star next door, Jupiter,
afterglow
afterthought
light in the wilderness.
Long distance love.
Love long distance.
Copyright by mike marcellino Long distance love 2009
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Legacies in another harbor, a new poem
Legacies in another harbor
by mike marcellino
An American salute -
hope she’s right.
Her flag born
over a fort, guarding
Fell’s Point.
Legacies in another harbor,
Then Baltimore.
Lanterns on the road, headlights down the highway.
An American salute -
Centuries after
The Revolution,
almost forgot.
Still, leftover in real ages,
finding
virtually reality
picturing
her waving, flapping
flying over Key’s song spot.
An American salute -
born
in the blood of our brothers,
sweat,
tears, fears
years an’ years.
Soldiers fighting
to get back home,
suddenly unfriendly, unfamiliar.
Kiss their sweethearts.
Salute Old Glory,
the nation they knew -
The one they lived for
loved for, died for.
An American salute -
Across rivers, time
worn, forgot.
near frozen
worker army
almost forgot
across the Delaware
River,
with a founding father at the helm.
An American salute -
To a plain, anguished
man in rough spun cover.
Saving a union in chaos, carnage.
Freeing the slaves.
Remember Abe,
a great paperback writer
picked folks out of oppression
from a culture,
Southern.
States not possessed.
An American salute -
Not her uniforms.
Not our flag.
Our Revolution,
almost forgot.
Our Constitution.
almost forgot.
Our bills of rights
almost forgot
intended not just for men,
but for women, even children.
Our bills of rights
drawn by rich
land an’ property owners.
The poor,
almost forgot.
An American salute -
On wings of dreams.
On freedom’s rings.
On,
Remember
The Revolution
almost forgot.
Remember
The Revolutionary men
Their dust
Lying
in graves unknown.
Martyrs born in
The Revolution
All
but forgotten.
Abe, Martin, Bobby and John,
An American salute -
Legacies in another harbor,
Now Boston.
Lanterns on the road, headlights down the highway.
An American salute - Legacies in another harbor by mike marcellino copyright 2009
by mike marcellino
An American salute -
hope she’s right.
Her flag born
over a fort, guarding
Fell’s Point.
Legacies in another harbor,
Then Baltimore.
Lanterns on the road, headlights down the highway.
An American salute -
Centuries after
The Revolution,
almost forgot.
Still, leftover in real ages,
finding
virtually reality
picturing
her waving, flapping
flying over Key’s song spot.
An American salute -
born
in the blood of our brothers,
sweat,
tears, fears
years an’ years.
Soldiers fighting
to get back home,
suddenly unfriendly, unfamiliar.
Kiss their sweethearts.
Salute Old Glory,
the nation they knew -
The one they lived for
loved for, died for.
An American salute -
Across rivers, time
worn, forgot.
near frozen
worker army
almost forgot
across the Delaware
River,
with a founding father at the helm.
An American salute -
To a plain, anguished
man in rough spun cover.
Saving a union in chaos, carnage.
Freeing the slaves.
Remember Abe,
a great paperback writer
picked folks out of oppression
from a culture,
Southern.
States not possessed.
An American salute -
Not her uniforms.
Not our flag.
Our Revolution,
almost forgot.
Our Constitution.
almost forgot.
Our bills of rights
almost forgot
intended not just for men,
but for women, even children.
Our bills of rights
drawn by rich
land an’ property owners.
The poor,
almost forgot.
An American salute -
On wings of dreams.
On freedom’s rings.
On,
Remember
The Revolution
almost forgot.
Remember
The Revolutionary men
Their dust
Lying
in graves unknown.
Martyrs born in
The Revolution
All
but forgotten.
Abe, Martin, Bobby and John,
An American salute -
Legacies in another harbor,
Now Boston.
Lanterns on the road, headlights down the highway.
An American salute - Legacies in another harbor by mike marcellino copyright 2009
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Bring me a rainbow
Photo credit : (cc-by-nc-nd) Bruno Monginoux / http://www.landscape-photo.net
Bring me a rainbow
by mike marcellino
Rainbow me a rainbow,
on my wall
now two,
oranges, reds
greens, yellows,
blues,
down southwest of the cracks.
Bring me a rainbow,
painting
rolling farms on the wall
in a bed, living room.
Terraces rise up
to nearby hills,
far mountains,
giving chills,
Thoughts of Van Gogh,
countryside’s in the south of France,
the Pyrenees.
Bring me a rainbow,
next to an old burnt
red brick wall,
ladders leading
nowhere.
Rainbows on the wall,
appear, disappear, lost in temptations.
Bring me a rainbow,
bite into Ohio
sour apple,
painting those rainbow colors,
ones from the wall.
Bring me an apple
right
from the heights of Berlin
Farmers unpack them fresh, sour apples
out of the box
right
off the trees
outside a century market,
on Cleveland’s West Side.
Bring me a rainbow,
sour apples too,
gone
eaten
by gods of the sky,
gone,
eaten
by a man’s
way of surviving,
wondering
how rainbows are,
come to be
projections on the wall.
Bring me a rainbow
again
sometime, i pray,
wish,
for an apple
sour, colors true
trucked by farmers
from the heights
above Berlin.
Bring me a rainbow,
open windows,
unscreened,
to tree leaves
inches, fields away,
blown by the wind.
Bring me a rainbow,
i pray, again,
on my pale papered
green wall
of printed flowers,
prehistoric.
Bring me a rainbow,
again,
i pray,
wondering why
apples, sour,
brown once bitten,
touched by man.
Bring me a rainbow by mike marcellino 2009
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Back to Woodstock, a poem
Back to Woodstock
by mike marcellino
Reaching out
to touch you,
sun’s rising.
Reaching out
to touch you,
sun’s rising.
Reaching out
to touch you
shampoo in my eyes, burning
cloudy.
Reaching out
to touch you.
Morning
in Ohio.
Requesting
Richie Havens
‘Freedom’
Forty years
back to Woodstock.
Forty years
back to Woodstock.
First call
a girl from Arkansas.
Old wounds
break open
releasing
a streak of blood
down to my toes.
Reaching out
to touch you,
sun’s rising
back to Woodstock.
Reaching out
to touch you,
sun’s rising.
back to Woodstock.
Back to Woodstock, copyright mike marcellino 2009
by mike marcellino
Reaching out
to touch you,
sun’s rising.
Reaching out
to touch you,
sun’s rising.
Reaching out
to touch you
shampoo in my eyes, burning
cloudy.
Reaching out
to touch you.
Morning
in Ohio.
Requesting
Richie Havens
‘Freedom’
Forty years
back to Woodstock.
Forty years
back to Woodstock.
First call
a girl from Arkansas.
Old wounds
break open
releasing
a streak of blood
down to my toes.
Reaching out
to touch you,
sun’s rising
back to Woodstock.
Reaching out
to touch you,
sun’s rising.
back to Woodstock.
Back to Woodstock, copyright mike marcellino 2009
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Bit of brown paper, a poem
Bit of brown paper
by mike marcellino
Trois chanson d'amour de partie
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Bit of brown paper.
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Bit of brown paper.
Prisoners,
that won’t be confined,
defined.
Prisoners,
that won’t be confined,
defined.
Prisoners,
that won’t be contained
by love,
life,
war,
death.
Ready
to break
loose
at a moment’s notice.
Prisoners,
that won’t be contained
by love,
life,
war,
death.
Ready
to break
loose
at a moment’s notice.
Prisoners,
that don’t say
‘That’s ok, never mind.’
Prisoners,
that don’t say
‘That’s ok, never mind.’
Prisoners,
as Lincoln at Gettysburg -
‘As the sculptor
must dream the statue
prisoned
in the marble,”
Prisoners,
‘As the musician dreams a song.
so he who writes
must have a vision
of his finished work
before he touches to begin it,
a medium more elastic.
more vivid,
more powerful than any other,’
she writes, Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews,
in her “Perfect Tribute”
to the man with ‘the deep-lined face
bent over Seward’s bit of brown paper.’
Prisoners,
wearing
four hats at a time,
not a long time,
not a long time.
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Bit of brown paper.
Bit of brown paper copyright mike marcellino 2009
by mike marcellino
Trois chanson d'amour de partie
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Bit of brown paper.
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Bit of brown paper.
Prisoners,
that won’t be confined,
defined.
Prisoners,
that won’t be confined,
defined.
Prisoners,
that won’t be contained
by love,
life,
war,
death.
Ready
to break
loose
at a moment’s notice.
Prisoners,
that won’t be contained
by love,
life,
war,
death.
Ready
to break
loose
at a moment’s notice.
Prisoners,
that don’t say
‘That’s ok, never mind.’
Prisoners,
that don’t say
‘That’s ok, never mind.’
Prisoners,
as Lincoln at Gettysburg -
‘As the sculptor
must dream the statue
prisoned
in the marble,”
Prisoners,
‘As the musician dreams a song.
so he who writes
must have a vision
of his finished work
before he touches to begin it,
a medium more elastic.
more vivid,
more powerful than any other,’
she writes, Mary Raymond Shipman Andrews,
in her “Perfect Tribute”
to the man with ‘the deep-lined face
bent over Seward’s bit of brown paper.’
Prisoners,
wearing
four hats at a time,
not a long time,
not a long time.
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Prisoners,
not a long time.
Bit of brown paper.
Bit of brown paper copyright mike marcellino 2009
Against the wall
by mike marcellino
by mike marcellino
Trois chanson d'amour de partie
On the futon
back against the wall
all hung up.
back against the wall
all hung up.
Restin’ on a pillow
back against the wall
all hung up.
back against the wall
all hung up.
Do you love me?
Do you love me?
back against the wall
all hung up.
back against the wall
all hung up.
Do you love me?
Do you love me?
Do ya?
Do ya?
Do.
Back against the wall
all hung up
all hung up
all hung up.
Do you love me?
Do you love me?
all hung up
all hung up
all hung up.
Do you love me?
Do you love me?
Do ya?
Do ya?
Do ya?
Do.
Back against the wall
all hung up
all hung up
all hung up.
Against the wall, copyright mike marcellino 2009
all hung up
all hung up
all hung up.
Against the wall, copyright mike marcellino 2009
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Alphabet coffeehouse, a poem
Alphabet coffeehouse
by mike marcellino
Alphabet Coffeehouse,
“Where can it be?”
Wandering streets,
A to Z
the East Side,
New York City
aimlessly,
late afternoon, after a show.
Red, white and blue
chipped, cracked lettered
no name circle concrete park,
bed of violet flowers
in the middle,
back lit
crimson eyed Susan’s
no name circle concrete park.
Alphabet Coffeehouse,
“Where can it be?”
sundown of existence,
A to Z
the East Side,
New York City,
10th and C.
Only a clue,
whisper,
unknown friend, fellow traveler
searchin’ for the
Alphabet Coffeehouse
9th and C,
‘round the corner from Banjo Jim’s.
“It’s nothing,” the young man replied,
aimlessly.
“Everything is nothing here,” he said again,
“nothing” about
Alphabet Coffeehouse
“Where can it be?”
A to Z,
red, white and blue
no name circle concrete park,
flag pole,
no colors up.
“Everything is nothing here,”
echoed across
the East Side,
New York City’s
middle a projects
brick, white window sills
houses of thirteen stories.
Jump rope,
rapping voices,
rollerblades,
bikes
black and brown
German Sheppard
walkin'
over a freeway
crooked overpass -
bottom of 10th,
East River Park.
Softball diamonds,
a dog like Sally with her master,
cars speeding, either way.
Banjo Jim’s open.
“Listen,”
the LA country girl sings,
Rebecca Turner,
no cover.
Alphabet Coffeehouse, copyright by mike marcellino 2009
by mike marcellino
Alphabet Coffeehouse,
“Where can it be?”
Wandering streets,
A to Z
the East Side,
New York City
aimlessly,
late afternoon, after a show.
Red, white and blue
chipped, cracked lettered
no name circle concrete park,
bed of violet flowers
in the middle,
back lit
crimson eyed Susan’s
no name circle concrete park.
Alphabet Coffeehouse,
“Where can it be?”
sundown of existence,
A to Z
the East Side,
New York City,
10th and C.
Only a clue,
whisper,
unknown friend, fellow traveler
searchin’ for the
Alphabet Coffeehouse
9th and C,
‘round the corner from Banjo Jim’s.
“It’s nothing,” the young man replied,
aimlessly.
“Everything is nothing here,” he said again,
“nothing” about
Alphabet Coffeehouse
“Where can it be?”
A to Z,
red, white and blue
no name circle concrete park,
flag pole,
no colors up.
“Everything is nothing here,”
echoed across
the East Side,
New York City’s
middle a projects
brick, white window sills
houses of thirteen stories.
Jump rope,
rapping voices,
rollerblades,
bikes
black and brown
German Sheppard
walkin'
over a freeway
crooked overpass -
bottom of 10th,
East River Park.
Softball diamonds,
a dog like Sally with her master,
cars speeding, either way.
Banjo Jim’s open.
“Listen,”
the LA country girl sings,
Rebecca Turner,
no cover.
Alphabet Coffeehouse, copyright by mike marcellino 2009
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Watching over a lone rider, a poem
Watching over a lone rider
by mike marcellino
A postcard half moon,
stamped on a dark envelope
in the empty night sky.
A postcard half moon,
rested in her fuzzy white nest,
tattered cloud of sorts.
Postcard half moon,
cradled thoughts,
wishes,
distant dreams,
desires
beyond his reach,
lost.
Postcard half moon
looked upon a world,
black and white,
traveled on seas,
time and space
watching over a lone rider.
Copyright by mike marcellino 2009
by mike marcellino
A postcard half moon,
stamped on a dark envelope
in the empty night sky.
A postcard half moon,
rested in her fuzzy white nest,
tattered cloud of sorts.
Postcard half moon,
cradled thoughts,
wishes,
distant dreams,
desires
beyond his reach,
lost.
Postcard half moon
looked upon a world,
black and white,
traveled on seas,
time and space
watching over a lone rider.
Copyright by mike marcellino 2009
Thursday, July 23, 2009
President Obama rallies for health care reform
President Barack Obama
Town Hall Meeting On Health Care Reform
Shaker Heights High School
Shaker Heights, Ohio
by Mike Marcellino
Challenges Facing Americans
Being a relatively kind journalist, in my travels over the past two days, I’ve tried to “set the stage” for President Obama’s Town Hall Meeting on Health Care Reform at Shaker Heights High School. My two sons and stepdaughter all went to school there.
Ari, my youngest just graduated from Ohio State University. Sean went out to LA to be a rock star after singing in Jesus Crisis Super Star and every other musical at Shaker High. He went to the School for the Recording Arts in Hollywood, still has a band, opened for Deep Purple before 5000 people outside and lives and works as a sound engineer in Germany. Rachael, got her LPN from Cuyahoga Community College and has made a career as a concierge in Las Vegas after working as a nurse in a doctor’s office for a year.
Shaker Heights High School is touted as one of the best public high schools in the country and some students do win a lot of academic honors.
I know one thing for sure – the Red Raiders hockey team - against all odds - won the Ohio state championship in 2001 and Ari, played right wing. He had a sweet left handed shot, finesse and pin point passes. His team members were swell. No one expected the Raiders to win anything that year. I blogged a story about that magical season on the Shaker Youth Hockey website. His journey began at 8, but most kids started at 3 or 4. It was our family’s life, and the life of many families, a good life and lots of fun traveling to Pennsylvania, St. Louis, New York, Michigan and Canada, getting creamed in the latter two.
While I was a long time newspaper reporter, winning a couple of national awards for investigative and community journalism, I decided to cover President Obama’s meeting with the public as myself - a veteran of the United States Army who barely survived a year as a combat correspondent and photojournalist covering every kind of mission under the boiling sun and monsoon rains.
I wrote for years about the health, personal and family costs of combat stress as far back as the 1970s. That’s when Dr. John Wilson, a Cleveland State University psychologist and professor, helped coin the phrase, “Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.” This continues to help millions of people, not just veterans, around the world suffering from traumatic stress. He interviewed 600 Vietnam combat veterans from across our nation and published “The Forgotten Warrior Project.”
Years later, in a meeting room at the United States Department of Veterans Affairs Louis Stokes Medical Center in Brecksville, I looked up at chalk board filled with the symptoms that I and a half dozen combat veterans identified ourselves.
I said to myself, “Man, Mike, you got some of all of these, a classic case.”
Actually, I have post VA hospital stress disorder, as the system, though a leader in what I call “bionic prosthetics” is just about as screwed up as the private system. The VA system is still rated one of the best hospital systems in the country. I know a lot of people in the Cleveland hospital. For the most part the staff is dedicated, hard working and they respect veterans. The VA has improved to be sure since the 1970s and 1980s when I wrote about it or attended weekly investigative meetings as an aide to former Congressman Stokes. Well, the body count is lower now and most veterans still don’t complain.
I don’t look forward to going to the VA. I go often, oh, for prostate surgery, or hernia surgery and a four month long prostate related bacterial urinary tract infection, and for a while PTSD. I think about having prostate cancer, or some other cancer picked up from all the Agent Orange we sprayed from planes to defoliate South Vietnam. Actually, some days at the VA go well – good, friendly doctors who actually entertain and answer questions and listen, and cute, funny nurses. I do like seeing and sometimes talking with my fellow veterans, including those from Iraq and Afghanistan.
If I had prostate cancer, I’d get disability compensation. Not a pleasant thought though.
Got up before six this morning, made coffee, French roast, downed a couple cups, smoked a Bugler roll your own cigarettes and got to work. Just after 8 I got an email confirming that I get in the door at Shaker High to cover President Obama’s Town Hall Meeting on Health Care Reform. That’s a mouthful. Actually the health care mess is more than a mouthful, it’s a monster.
Getting through Tower City on my bike, a Japanese model, to avoid a hill, I asked a young woman of color on the elevator, “Did you know Obama’s coming to Cleveland tomorrow?”
“Yes,” she replied without hesitation.
“What do you think about his health care reform?”
“We’ll see what happens,” she said smiling. I smiled too.
At the tiny specialized office supply in the Standard Building, the only place I can get reporters’ notebooks, I asked the thin, mild mannered, friendly clerk, “Did you know Obama’s going to be in town tomorrow?”
“Yes,” he answered.
“What do you think of Obama’s health care reform?” I asked him.
“Nutrition.” His one word answer. He went on to point out that there could be a lot less grossly overweight and obese people if they paid any attention to nutrition.
Since I felt these interviews were pretty revealing and comprehensive I gave myself a coffee break at Phoenix on West 9th Street in the yuppie Warehouse District. I got a European blend, like Dutch or something, medium roast. But I was preoccupied trying to “set the stage” for President Obama’s Town Hall Meeting on Health Care Reform and my series of blogs I would start posting tomorrow.
A man of color on a bench outside the cafe, just behind me, bummed a Bugler and rolled it.
“Did you know President Obama is coming to Shaker Heights tomorrow?” I asked him, really nailing the question at this point.
“They’re trying to derail him,” he said flatly, meaning his detractors and enemies in Congress are using President Obama’s shot at providing health care to everyone to stop the popular president with a Hollywood glow in his tracks. He says these people don’t care about health care one way or the other.
He told me President Obama is right about health care reform. He agrees that everyone should have health care.
But, he added, “There’s a lot of racism still left in America. He told me he had come from in a little town in Mississippi, near Memphis. The man, in his fifties I guess, said he blew his lips out playing the trumpet, touching them with his hand. He took off running for the trolley to find a friend.
To cap off my “setting the stage” for President Obama’s town hall meeting, I called a few people that I trust and have some sense left. I told them I was covering Obama’s town hall meeting at Shaker Heights High School tomorrow and asked them what do they think about health care in America and President Obama’s reform package.
Boy did I get an ear full. Now I know for sure the health care crisis in my country is a total disaster, a monster, and it must be fixed or America will go under a sea of red ink. Here’s just some of what ”my team of experts" had to say. Be prepared, it’s frightening.
“While you read this stuff I’m taking my antibiotic. I have to stop forgetting,” I said to myself.
Here’s the scoop –
America doesn’t compete very well in health care with the rest of the developed nations in the world. These other countries provide access to health care for everyone but taxes are higher than ours, at least in most cases.
Since we don’t compete in health care, we don’t compete very well in everything else, i.e., jobs, the economy.
That stuff comes from my brother. He used to be a newspaper reporter too and then did corporate PR for a major power company.
But, my brother’s final point I liked best.
“We need a department of coordination.” he said sleepily. I could hear his pain from bad disks, surgery, procedures and pills. He says every time we try to fix a big problem we screw something else up while we’re at it.
My economic guru, a former sports reporter and CPA, really had the shocker.
“Anchor babies. Ask Obama what he’d do about anchor babies.” he said. I could tell over the phone he was smiling somewhat as I was as to just how preposterous this was.
My friend says that illegal immigrants each year give birth to 500,000 “anchor babies.”
“How many illegal immigrants are there,” I asked him. He said about 20 million. And more and more and coming to take advantage of our health care system and working in laboring jobs, driving wages down.
He pointed out that by making our health care better we are actually inviting more illegal immigrants to cross the border and take advantage of our stuff. He said Congress should get rid of the law granting citizenship to children of illegal immigrants.
But, my chief economic advisor wasn’t finished. He claims, excuse the expression, that insurance companies charge people without insurance two to three times what they charge people with insurance.
“Man, that’s sounds backwards to me,” I reacted.
Oh, he also points out that in his humble opinion insurance companies are a total rip off.
“They try to get you to pay as much money as they can get for your policy and try not to pay claims, and are very good at it, making tons of money.”
A Palestinian friend can’t figure out how President Obama is going to get the drug and insurance companies to go along with his health care reform when they are making so much money right now doing what they do best, making money. Now, the President did say in his news conference tonight that the drug companies are pledging $80 billion dollars to health care reform. Somehow these days that doesn’t seem like very much.
A small businessman and artist, he thinks the only way to pay for health care is cutting military spending. Even President Obama admits that Medicare and Medicaid alone, left alone, will “break” out country. “See why I find this scary?” My friend also thinks the way to heal our economy is by supporting growth of small business, kind of like starting all over in America. He adds that Congress is kind of in the sleep mode.
My chief economic advisor winds up my effort to “set the stage” for President Obama’s Town Hall Meeting on Health Care Reform.
He read that colleges are closing nursing schools to tighten their belts because they are too expensive, lab equipment and all. Yet, there is a real shortage of nurses.
“See, this gets right back to my brother’s point which my chief economic advisor agrees with.
“We desperately need a department of coordination.” I thought.
Finally, my chief economic advisor says without a shudder, “Forty percent of our health care costs are for patients in the last six months of their lives.”
He told me there are hospitals in Florida with nothing but patients on ventilators. Yea, I know, you say, “Boy, he’s all heart,” but he says he has no problem if someone wants to keep their loved one alive in a comma or vegetating, if they pay for it out of their own pocket.
My Palestinian friend, kind of my secretary for peace, wonders why the United States has 40,000 troops in England, and thousands in Germany and a few odd places I can’t remember, maybe the Philippines. He says the only way to find money to pay for health care reform, saving lives, is to close down some of these bases. He says there are something like 60 of them or more. He figures no one in America is going to readily give up their guns so to speak and actually cut weapons of low to mass destruction.
My friend also reported to me that the drug companies had recently won the favor of many congressmen and senators in recent days. They donate a lot of money to them.
Oh, I almost forgot. A 20 something girl with a nose ring serving coffee said she didn’t know President Obama was coming to Cleveland tomorrow.
“What do you think of Obama and health care reform,” I asked politely.
“I have 8000 words,” about that, she replied, looking up slightly and then facing me. But she had “no comment.”
“Are we going in the right direction?” I asked.
“The wrong direction,” she replied without explanation.
“I guess that explains why some of my young friends are anarchists,” I thought.
Last word for “setting the stage” goes to my very tired, at this point in the phone call, chief economic advisor.
“No matter what is in the bill that goes to conference from the Senate, very few Congressmen will read it,” he says, his temperature rising. “The bill may run 300 pages, maybe a lot more, and they will get it one day and pass it the next.”
“This is ludicrous,” I gasped.
Well, finally, I have my say in “setting the stage” for President Obama’s Town Hall Meeting on Health Care Reform at Shaker Heights High School where my kids went.
One thing I know for sure –
Vietnam combat veterans outnumber all combat veterans of all other wars combined and they are flocking to the Veterans Affairs medial centers all over the country with all kinds of ailments and conditions.
And sadly, when the many many Vietnam War veterans are finally coming home they’re finding not enough room at the inn.
See tonight’s Notebookwriter Blog for the second in the series of street journalist Mike Marcellino’s coverage President Obama’s visit to Cleveland and his Town Hall Meeting on Health Care Reform at Shaker Heights High School where my kids went to school.
I switched to Gambler roll um up cigarette tobacco for a change. This morning I heard on National Public Radio the 188th British soldier was killed in Afghanistan and wondered how many of my American brothers and sisters have died.
Copyright 2009 by Mike Marcellino
Friday, July 17, 2009
That Amish cup, a poem
That Amish cup
by mike marcellino
On a late night train, one time, not on time.
"God," i pleaded, give me
a cup of coffee,
with caffeine."
Down a few rows, upfront in the car
of the Lincoln country train
headed for the corn fields of Ioway,
an Amish man, his son and daughter
stood out. Bearded with the straw hat 'n' blue jean overalls.
'Have you seen Witness," i asked sheepishly
smiling, remembering.
"Man that was the greatest
love scene i've ever seen."
"You know, slow dancing in an old barn garage,
next ta that baby blue dream machine."
'Course, dancin, film, ain’t the Amish scene,
But, we do all dream.
"Man, could i go for a cup......"
Before i got the word "coffee" out,
his father had poured me one.
Yes, we do all dream,
witness scenes, played by different actors.
That Amish cup,
love -
richest gift i coulda got.
copyright mike marcellino That Amish cup 2009
by mike marcellino
On a late night train, one time, not on time.
"God," i pleaded, give me
a cup of coffee,
with caffeine."
Down a few rows, upfront in the car
of the Lincoln country train
headed for the corn fields of Ioway,
an Amish man, his son and daughter
stood out. Bearded with the straw hat 'n' blue jean overalls.
'Have you seen Witness," i asked sheepishly
smiling, remembering.
"Man that was the greatest
love scene i've ever seen."
"You know, slow dancing in an old barn garage,
next ta that baby blue dream machine."
'Course, dancin, film, ain’t the Amish scene,
But, we do all dream.
"Man, could i go for a cup......"
Before i got the word "coffee" out,
his father had poured me one.
Yes, we do all dream,
witness scenes, played by different actors.
That Amish cup,
love -
richest gift i coulda got.
copyright mike marcellino That Amish cup 2009
Monday, July 6, 2009
Amelia Earhart, soft silver wings
Amelia Earhart, soft silver wings
by mike marcellino
"Courage is the price that Life exacts for granting peace. The soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things." Amelia Earhart, 1927
amelia earhart,
Love your picture
in flight.
Love your goggles,
love your lips.
Love how you circled the world,
single handed.
amelia earhart
amelia earhart
amelia.
Like that leather
air cap.
You’re a goddess, a woman,
soft white,
ahead of your time,
such afterglow
night
in shinning armor.
hip, hop
stop,
go
all the way.
Meet me on a northern coast,
not far from the equator,
above the island
where they made King Kong.
Your Atlantis, risen
in my South China Sea.
amelia earhart
amelia earhart
amelia.
Oh, your last flight.
Oh your last flight.
What a night.
Looking at your picture
in my book,
soft silver
soft silver
wings.
Check your suit
put on your black dress.
Your lips, painted colors
light, pretty pink.
Those eyes,
imagine,
sigh.
Your nails, natural,
fingertips.
Taking you with me
the upper part of my mind.
amelia earhart
amelia earhart
amelia.
Soft silver
soft silver
wings.
Courage
Courage is the price that Life extracts for granting peace.
The soul that knows it not, knows no release.
From little things.
Knows not the livid loneliness of fear.
Not mountain heights where bitter joy can hear
The sound of wings.
How can life grant us boon of living, compensate
For dull grey ugliness and pregnant hate
Unless we dare
The soul’s dominion? Each time we make a choice, we pay
With courage to behold the restless day,
And count it fair.
- Amelia Earhart, 1927
You made the crossing
not alone.
Meet you over the Atlantic.
amelia earhart
amelia earhart
amelia.
Soft silver,
soft silver,
wings.
copyright Mike Marcellino amelia earhart 2009
by mike marcellino
"Courage is the price that Life exacts for granting peace. The soul that knows it not, knows no release from little things." Amelia Earhart, 1927
amelia earhart,
Love your picture
in flight.
Love your goggles,
love your lips.
Love how you circled the world,
single handed.
amelia earhart
amelia earhart
amelia.
Like that leather
air cap.
You’re a goddess, a woman,
soft white,
ahead of your time,
such afterglow
night
in shinning armor.
hip, hop
stop,
go
all the way.
Meet me on a northern coast,
not far from the equator,
above the island
where they made King Kong.
Your Atlantis, risen
in my South China Sea.
amelia earhart
amelia earhart
amelia.
Oh, your last flight.
Oh your last flight.
What a night.
Looking at your picture
in my book,
soft silver
soft silver
wings.
Check your suit
put on your black dress.
Your lips, painted colors
light, pretty pink.
Those eyes,
imagine,
sigh.
Your nails, natural,
fingertips.
Taking you with me
the upper part of my mind.
amelia earhart
amelia earhart
amelia.
Soft silver
soft silver
wings.
Courage
Courage is the price that Life extracts for granting peace.
The soul that knows it not, knows no release.
From little things.
Knows not the livid loneliness of fear.
Not mountain heights where bitter joy can hear
The sound of wings.
How can life grant us boon of living, compensate
For dull grey ugliness and pregnant hate
Unless we dare
The soul’s dominion? Each time we make a choice, we pay
With courage to behold the restless day,
And count it fair.
- Amelia Earhart, 1927
You made the crossing
not alone.
Meet you over the Atlantic.
amelia earhart
amelia earhart
amelia.
Soft silver,
soft silver,
wings.
copyright Mike Marcellino amelia earhart 2009
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Love and war poems
Symptoms of love
Almost the Fourth of July
a two part piece with symptoms overflowing into fourth of july
copyright mike marcellino 2009
Part I: Symptoms of love
by mike marcellino
Symptoms of love
You remember Robin
your first girl
Tomboy.
Eating hot peppers
on a dare
from three cute
California girls
giving kisses.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You remember rolling in sand
dunes
with an Armenian girl
you called Margaret
saying goodbye
in a New York City
hotel room,
a picture of a four poster bed.
It it still possible?
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You think there may not be an end. Like the Blue Hole in western Ohio
You rediscover discover,
happy. again,
over little things. nothing
special.
You feel, slowly.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You clean out the ice box.
Find Carolina ham
dated your son’s birthday.
How long does it this last, you wonder?
You want to call California
Have the Ohio apple left. Miss her.
Your appetite’s back. It left.
You remember roller coasters.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
Love songs on every station.
Eat like a bird.
Upside down. Spin.
Catch constellations.
Drink Costa Rican,
Shiner bock
across Texas again.
You think, “It’s possible.”
Head for cover,
bleached out
Transatlantic.
Sheets of clouds,
blue, white
pink sun glasses.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You bought a back dress. Put it
carefully on a hanger.
Think about phone sex.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.You keep losing things.The things you haven't lost, you can't find.You watch a light
searching night clouds.
Part II: almost the fourth of july
by mike marcellino
almost the fourth of july
find yourself
shaken to the core, this day
that day
fill up from the tank of your soul.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You made it.
Run to the other side,
wonder how to survive
in a world going mad.
No check today,
bills arrive.
On point,
alone out there
nothing but a forty-five.
Fighting your way
ever so carefully
guarded,
go your way
through these fields of fire
terrible storms
hit any time.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Outside, the battle rages.
You skirt by The Monument
to soldiers of America’s civil
war, the union side, but you’re
from below the mason dixon
riots in Baltimore
You're on both sides.
Find yourself at 36-9 palms
still alive,
hell to pay, hell to pay.
Shaken to the core.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
Every soldier’s afraid
deep inside
determined to survive.
In thy light shall we see the light
Thirty six nine
A few clicks away
wars rage.
You’re not dead, alive,
only wounded,
a bit broken.
shaken to the core
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Roll a gambler cigarette,
brothers cover you.
“Make the call. You could win ten thousand,”
the cashier tells you.
“Fuck that,” you say,
think about yourself,
then Buddy,
listen to Bruce Springsteen
land of rock and roll,
capital
center of what makes the world go round.
Listen to the music,
the music,
the music.
Bitter disappointments
rush at you, tearing at you inside.
Pack it up right,
live
to fight another day.
Change the station.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Get back on the trail
to Van Gogh,
Morrison,
Gandhi
instrumental classic.
“Who is John Galt”
You wrote on the steel pot
you never wore.
Take the pain
Keep faith.
It’s not to lose or gain.
Peddle power, peddle power,
peddle power.
A boy of six aims the cannon
to sea.
Keep ahead of the storms
that surround you. They keep coming. They keep coming.
Take the glider
from the lakefront strip, watch napalm cascades.
Stop in sight
of shelter. This time
Cleveland public power,
whales paint the water, not killers.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july,
Follow Zapata,
Tom Johnson, King
Bobby,
his brother’s soldier.
Manry did,
Lindberg, Amelia.
Head for the northern coast.
Drop into the Ashau Valley
rounds fly
zing, skip
zing. Sing; never hear the round that kills you.
Rockets burst,
mortars
thump,
thump,
thump
around you.
You’re still alive, lucky fucker
no flack jacket,
no steel
pot.
Returned the borrowed 45,
Rusty.
You’re close,
almost there. Almost home.
“Do you want to go there?”
she asks, sincerely.
Symptoms of love symptoms of love symptoms of love
Try to make 15 clicks an hour.
Peddle power, peddle power,
peddle power.
You’re there,
hell to pay, hell to pay.
“Indestructible?”
Ok, pretend, anyway.
“How did you get out
in or near Cambodia?”
Night across the border.
Do you really want to go there?
Words and thoughts the same.
Chose life.
Live to fight
another day.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Ahimsa -
Stop, the sign read.
Lock and load, tap your clip
slip it on full automatic.
Spell check, man
Ahimsa
You’re in the X age.
Hell to pay, hell to pay.
Drink water,
keep trained
minefield roads,
trails of tears.
Dance with wolves, English patient
Chose life,
chose life,
music of Bob Marley,
Dylan, Arlo, or Woody Guthrie, Cash & The Clash.
“You’ve got a message.”
Head above waters
of the Johnston Flood,
Katrina,
San Francisco earthquake.
almost the fourth of july.
You’re not dead,
only wounded.
symptoms of love and almost the fourth of july copyright mike marcellino 2009
Almost the Fourth of July
a two part piece with symptoms overflowing into fourth of july
copyright mike marcellino 2009
Part I: Symptoms of love
by mike marcellino
Symptoms of love
You remember Robin
your first girl
Tomboy.
Eating hot peppers
on a dare
from three cute
California girls
giving kisses.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You remember rolling in sand
dunes
with an Armenian girl
you called Margaret
saying goodbye
in a New York City
hotel room,
a picture of a four poster bed.
It it still possible?
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You think there may not be an end. Like the Blue Hole in western Ohio
You rediscover discover,
happy. again,
over little things. nothing
special.
You feel, slowly.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You clean out the ice box.
Find Carolina ham
dated your son’s birthday.
How long does it this last, you wonder?
You want to call California
Have the Ohio apple left. Miss her.
Your appetite’s back. It left.
You remember roller coasters.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
Love songs on every station.
Eat like a bird.
Upside down. Spin.
Catch constellations.
Drink Costa Rican,
Shiner bock
across Texas again.
You think, “It’s possible.”
Head for cover,
bleached out
Transatlantic.
Sheets of clouds,
blue, white
pink sun glasses.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You bought a back dress. Put it
carefully on a hanger.
Think about phone sex.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.You keep losing things.The things you haven't lost, you can't find.You watch a light
searching night clouds.
Part II: almost the fourth of july
by mike marcellino
almost the fourth of july
find yourself
shaken to the core, this day
that day
fill up from the tank of your soul.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You made it.
Run to the other side,
wonder how to survive
in a world going mad.
No check today,
bills arrive.
On point,
alone out there
nothing but a forty-five.
Fighting your way
ever so carefully
guarded,
go your way
through these fields of fire
terrible storms
hit any time.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Outside, the battle rages.
You skirt by The Monument
to soldiers of America’s civil
war, the union side, but you’re
from below the mason dixon
riots in Baltimore
You're on both sides.
Find yourself at 36-9 palms
still alive,
hell to pay, hell to pay.
Shaken to the core.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
Every soldier’s afraid
deep inside
determined to survive.
In thy light shall we see the light
Thirty six nine
A few clicks away
wars rage.
You’re not dead, alive,
only wounded,
a bit broken.
shaken to the core
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Roll a gambler cigarette,
brothers cover you.
“Make the call. You could win ten thousand,”
the cashier tells you.
“Fuck that,” you say,
think about yourself,
then Buddy,
listen to Bruce Springsteen
land of rock and roll,
capital
center of what makes the world go round.
Listen to the music,
the music,
the music.
Bitter disappointments
rush at you, tearing at you inside.
Pack it up right,
live
to fight another day.
Change the station.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Get back on the trail
to Van Gogh,
Morrison,
Gandhi
instrumental classic.
“Who is John Galt”
You wrote on the steel pot
you never wore.
Take the pain
Keep faith.
It’s not to lose or gain.
Peddle power, peddle power,
peddle power.
A boy of six aims the cannon
to sea.
Keep ahead of the storms
that surround you. They keep coming. They keep coming.
Take the glider
from the lakefront strip, watch napalm cascades.
Stop in sight
of shelter. This time
Cleveland public power,
whales paint the water, not killers.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july,
Follow Zapata,
Tom Johnson, King
Bobby,
his brother’s soldier.
Manry did,
Lindberg, Amelia.
Head for the northern coast.
Drop into the Ashau Valley
rounds fly
zing, skip
zing. Sing; never hear the round that kills you.
Rockets burst,
mortars
thump,
thump,
thump
around you.
You’re still alive, lucky fucker
no flack jacket,
no steel
pot.
Returned the borrowed 45,
Rusty.
You’re close,
almost there. Almost home.
“Do you want to go there?”
she asks, sincerely.
Symptoms of love symptoms of love symptoms of love
Try to make 15 clicks an hour.
Peddle power, peddle power,
peddle power.
You’re there,
hell to pay, hell to pay.
“Indestructible?”
Ok, pretend, anyway.
“How did you get out
in or near Cambodia?”
Night across the border.
Do you really want to go there?
Words and thoughts the same.
Chose life.
Live to fight
another day.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Ahimsa -
Stop, the sign read.
Lock and load, tap your clip
slip it on full automatic.
Spell check, man
Ahimsa
You’re in the X age.
Hell to pay, hell to pay.
Drink water,
keep trained
minefield roads,
trails of tears.
Dance with wolves, English patient
Chose life,
chose life,
music of Bob Marley,
Dylan, Arlo, or Woody Guthrie, Cash & The Clash.
“You’ve got a message.”
Head above waters
of the Johnston Flood,
Katrina,
San Francisco earthquake.
almost the fourth of july.
You’re not dead,
only wounded.
symptoms of love and almost the fourth of july copyright mike marcellino 2009
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Almost the Fourth of July, a poem
Almost the Fourth of July
by mike marcellino
almost the fourth of july
find yourself
shaken to the core, this day
that day
fill up from the tank of your soul.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You made it.
Run to the other side,
wonder how to survive
in a world going mad.
No check today,
bills arrive.
On point,
alone out there
nothing but a forty-five.
Fighting your way
ever so carefully
guarded,
go your way
through these fields of fire
terrible storms
hit any time.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Outside, the battle rages.
You skirt by The Monument
to soldiers of America’s civil
war, the union side, but you’re
from below the mason dixon,
from riots in Baltimore.
You're on both sides.
Find yourself at 36-9 palms
still alive,
hell to pay, hell to pay.
Shaken to the core.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
Every soldier’s afraid
deep inside
determined to survive.
In thy light shall we see the light
Thirty six nine
A few clicks away
wars rage.
You’re not dead, but alive
only wounded,
a bit broken.
shaken to the core
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Roll a gambler cigarette,
brothers cover you.
“Make the call. You could win ten thousand,”
the cashier tells you.
“Fuck that,” you say,
think about yourself,
then Buddy,
listen to Bruce Springsteen
land of rock and roll,
capital
center of what makes the world go round.
Listen to the music,
the music,
the music.
Bitter disappointments
rush at you, tearing at you inside.
Pack it up right,
live
to fight another day.
Change the station.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Get back on the trail
to Van Gogh,
Morrison,
Gandhi
instrumental classic.
“Who is John Galt”
You wrote on the steel pot
you never wore.
Take the pain
Keep faith.
It’s not to lose or gain.
Peddle power, peddle power,
peddle power.
A boy of six aims the cannon
to sea.
Keep ahead of the storms
that surround you. They keep coming. They keep coming.
Take the glider
from the lakefront strip, watch napalm cascades.
Stop in sight
of shelter. This time
Cleveland public power,
whales paint the water, not killers.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Follow Zapata,
Tom Johnson, King
Bobby,
his brother’s soldier.
Manry did,
Lindberg, Amelia.
Head for the northern coast.
Drop into the Ashau Valley
rounds fly
zing, skip
zing. Sing; never hear the round that kills you.
Rockets burst,
mortars
thump,
thump,
thump
around you.
You’re still alive, lucky fucker
no flack jacket,
no steel
pot.
Returned the borrowed 45,
Rusty.
You’re close,
almost there. Almost home.
“Do you really want to go there?”
she asks, sincerely.
Symptoms of love symptoms of love symptoms of love
Try to make 15 clicks an hour.
Peddle power, peddle power,
peddle power.
You’re there,
hell to pay, hell to pay.
“Indestructible?”
Ok, pretend, anyway.
“How did you get out
in or near Cambodia?”
Night across the border.
Do you really want to go there?
Words and thoughts the same.
Chose life.
Live to fight
another day.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Ahimsa -
Stop sign read.
Lock and load, tap your clip
slip it on full automatic.
Spell check, man
Ahimsa
You’re in the X age.
Hell to pay, hell to pay.
Drink water,
keep trained
minefield roads,
trails of tears.
Dance with wolves, English patient
Chose life,
chose life,
music, Bob Marley.
“You’ve got a message.”
Head above waters
of the Johnston Flood,
Katrina,
San Francisco earthquake.
almost the fourth of july.
You’re not dead,
only wounded.
almost the fourth of july copyright mike marcellino 2009
by mike marcellino
almost the fourth of july
find yourself
shaken to the core, this day
that day
fill up from the tank of your soul.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You made it.
Run to the other side,
wonder how to survive
in a world going mad.
No check today,
bills arrive.
On point,
alone out there
nothing but a forty-five.
Fighting your way
ever so carefully
guarded,
go your way
through these fields of fire
terrible storms
hit any time.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Outside, the battle rages.
You skirt by The Monument
to soldiers of America’s civil
war, the union side, but you’re
from below the mason dixon,
from riots in Baltimore.
You're on both sides.
Find yourself at 36-9 palms
still alive,
hell to pay, hell to pay.
Shaken to the core.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
Every soldier’s afraid
deep inside
determined to survive.
In thy light shall we see the light
Thirty six nine
A few clicks away
wars rage.
You’re not dead, but alive
only wounded,
a bit broken.
shaken to the core
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Roll a gambler cigarette,
brothers cover you.
“Make the call. You could win ten thousand,”
the cashier tells you.
“Fuck that,” you say,
think about yourself,
then Buddy,
listen to Bruce Springsteen
land of rock and roll,
capital
center of what makes the world go round.
Listen to the music,
the music,
the music.
Bitter disappointments
rush at you, tearing at you inside.
Pack it up right,
live
to fight another day.
Change the station.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Get back on the trail
to Van Gogh,
Morrison,
Gandhi
instrumental classic.
“Who is John Galt”
You wrote on the steel pot
you never wore.
Take the pain
Keep faith.
It’s not to lose or gain.
Peddle power, peddle power,
peddle power.
A boy of six aims the cannon
to sea.
Keep ahead of the storms
that surround you. They keep coming. They keep coming.
Take the glider
from the lakefront strip, watch napalm cascades.
Stop in sight
of shelter. This time
Cleveland public power,
whales paint the water, not killers.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Follow Zapata,
Tom Johnson, King
Bobby,
his brother’s soldier.
Manry did,
Lindberg, Amelia.
Head for the northern coast.
Drop into the Ashau Valley
rounds fly
zing, skip
zing. Sing; never hear the round that kills you.
Rockets burst,
mortars
thump,
thump,
thump
around you.
You’re still alive, lucky fucker
no flack jacket,
no steel
pot.
Returned the borrowed 45,
Rusty.
You’re close,
almost there. Almost home.
“Do you really want to go there?”
she asks, sincerely.
Symptoms of love symptoms of love symptoms of love
Try to make 15 clicks an hour.
Peddle power, peddle power,
peddle power.
You’re there,
hell to pay, hell to pay.
“Indestructible?”
Ok, pretend, anyway.
“How did you get out
in or near Cambodia?”
Night across the border.
Do you really want to go there?
Words and thoughts the same.
Chose life.
Live to fight
another day.
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july
almost the fourth of july.
Ahimsa -
Stop sign read.
Lock and load, tap your clip
slip it on full automatic.
Spell check, man
Ahimsa
You’re in the X age.
Hell to pay, hell to pay.
Drink water,
keep trained
minefield roads,
trails of tears.
Dance with wolves, English patient
Chose life,
chose life,
music, Bob Marley.
“You’ve got a message.”
Head above waters
of the Johnston Flood,
Katrina,
San Francisco earthquake.
almost the fourth of july.
You’re not dead,
only wounded.
almost the fourth of july copyright mike marcellino 2009
Monday, June 29, 2009
Symptoms of love, a poem
Symptoms of love
by mike marcellino
Symptoms of love
You remember ..Robin..,
your first girl
Tomboy.
Eating hot peppers
on a dare
from three cute
....California.... girls
giving kisses.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You remember rolling in sand
dunes
with an Armenian girl
you called ..Margaret..
saying goodbye
in a ....New York City....
hotel room,
a picture of a four poster bed.
It it still possible?
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You think there may not be an end. Like the Blue Hole in western Ohio.
You rediscover discover,
happy. again,
over little things. nothing
special.
You feel, slowly.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You clean out the ice box.
Find ....Carolina.... ham
dated your son’s birthday.
How long does it this last, you wonder?
You want to call ....California.....
Have the ....Ohio.... apple left. Miss her.
Your appetite’s back. It left.
You remember roller coasters.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
Love songs on every station.
Eat like a bird.
Upside down. Spin.
Catch constellations.
Drink Costa Rican,
Shiner bock
across ....Texas.... again.
You think, “It’s possible.”
Head for cover,
bleached out
Transatlantic.
Sheets of clouds,
blue, white
pink sun glasses.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You bought a back dress. Put it
carefully on a hanger.
Think about phone sex.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.You keep losing things.The things you haven't lost, you can't find.You watch a light
searching night clouds.
Symptoms of love copyright by Mike Marcellino 2009
by mike marcellino
Symptoms of love
You remember ..Robin..,
your first girl
Tomboy.
Eating hot peppers
on a dare
from three cute
....California.... girls
giving kisses.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You remember rolling in sand
dunes
with an Armenian girl
you called ..Margaret..
saying goodbye
in a ....New York City....
hotel room,
a picture of a four poster bed.
It it still possible?
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You think there may not be an end. Like the Blue Hole in western Ohio.
You rediscover discover,
happy. again,
over little things. nothing
special.
You feel, slowly.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You clean out the ice box.
Find ....Carolina.... ham
dated your son’s birthday.
How long does it this last, you wonder?
You want to call ....California.....
Have the ....Ohio.... apple left. Miss her.
Your appetite’s back. It left.
You remember roller coasters.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
Love songs on every station.
Eat like a bird.
Upside down. Spin.
Catch constellations.
Drink Costa Rican,
Shiner bock
across ....Texas.... again.
You think, “It’s possible.”
Head for cover,
bleached out
Transatlantic.
Sheets of clouds,
blue, white
pink sun glasses.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.
You bought a back dress. Put it
carefully on a hanger.
Think about phone sex.
symptoms of love
symptoms of love
symptoms of love.You keep losing things.The things you haven't lost, you can't find.You watch a light
searching night clouds.
Symptoms of love copyright by Mike Marcellino 2009
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
His invention, a short story
His invention
by Mike Marcellino
Another chapter, Life stories series
Many days had come and gone in the writer’s life. Today, he sat down by the river to write, not sure what it would be about but had some ideas.
Sound.
He had thought about writing about sound, or soundless to be exact. Life without sound. What that would be about. Frightening, at first thought. Fortunately the writer had an answer to that dilemma – invent it. Invent sound, like the light bulb or electricity, like Edison or Franklin.
After all, it was, or is his birthday. “You’re forty-four,” said Harry already working on his first bike, wearing a Mexican bandana, but the bike shop owner was Jewish, at least he used to be with some Jewish cult, but I always forget the name. “I was Acidic,” he announces every few days. I thought, “Whatever that means.”
“Mathematics, music and the brain. What a threesome,” the writer thought.
He’d invent sound in his mind.
Things are better this morning on the Cuyahoga. Just one plastic bottle floated by. “Find the owner,” he ordered. The OD bridge is open to bikes, but not cars. “How perfect.” he said to himself.
He listened to the clanging bell. A boat, maybe. Yes, a boat. A loud whistle followed but nothing ever came round the bend. Slowly the draw bridge rose. Workmen were fixing it.
In his mind, he missed the boat, a thing he feared, missing jump off time. That’s a mission of no return.
But, the writer remembered – he had not missed a thing. It’s his birthday. He invented sound on his birthday.
He watched a train on a distant hillside, glad he wasn’t on it. He watched a little basketball float by.
“You may be asked for security information,” the recorded cell phone company voice stated as the writer waited for a human being.
“Shit,” he thought, “what does that mean?” Well, they couldn’t read his mind, could they?
At that instant he was disconnected.
“This call may be monitored or recorded,” the recorded person said. “How reassuring,” the writer thought.
With that he rode as fast as he could to the War Memorial, on Mall B, two blocks from the lake. In books they call it War Memorial Fountain Plaza, but the writer had never heard anyone call it that. He called it the Veterans Memorial.
But he decided to stop across the plaza to the statue of Lincoln beside the board of education.
“Lincoln” she said in a sweet Texas accent, Carolyn told about her song, “Captain, My Captain,” at Town Hall in New York City. The writer wasn’t at the concert but he still has the album and listens to it.
Lincoln walked forth, toward the War Memorial. His expression uncertain, a declaration in his left hand, his right palm opens for deliverance.
No speeches, not a sound. Lincoln walks forth to war over the rights of man, people to be correct. Now presidents, soldiers made of stone, metal, granite, weathered, discolored, and covered with the soot of man.
Lincoln looked straight at the tall statue, a hundred feet or more, high, of the naked warier reaching for eternal peace.
The writer never remembers the verse from Palms, exactly. It’s about seeing the light, something like that. The monument made of nickels, Jefferson, from kids in Cleveland, spearheaded by press, shaped by Marshal Frederick, surrounded by a bronze plated wall – named of the dead, World War II and Korea. Vietnam left on the Internet, wishing the fountain of eternal life would burst, rise again, and touch the sky.
The writer grew tried. His mind drifted, remembering early morning of his birthday. He turned the switch on his hand tuned radio. In an instant, he got a clear, strong signal – the Raccoon Festival and Allison standing there in the mid day heat, champion of the fiddle at 16, and the cutest, nicest girl he’d met. He forgot his marriage, wanted nothing but bluegrass, wondering if she’s 18. He settled for classical Canada CBC. The old signal evaporated the way it came.
It was music to his hears, but nothing like the sound he created in his mind. That’s still his invention.
His invention copyright by Mike Marcellino 2009
by Mike Marcellino
Another chapter, Life stories series
Many days had come and gone in the writer’s life. Today, he sat down by the river to write, not sure what it would be about but had some ideas.
Sound.
He had thought about writing about sound, or soundless to be exact. Life without sound. What that would be about. Frightening, at first thought. Fortunately the writer had an answer to that dilemma – invent it. Invent sound, like the light bulb or electricity, like Edison or Franklin.
After all, it was, or is his birthday. “You’re forty-four,” said Harry already working on his first bike, wearing a Mexican bandana, but the bike shop owner was Jewish, at least he used to be with some Jewish cult, but I always forget the name. “I was Acidic,” he announces every few days. I thought, “Whatever that means.”
“Mathematics, music and the brain. What a threesome,” the writer thought.
He’d invent sound in his mind.
Things are better this morning on the Cuyahoga. Just one plastic bottle floated by. “Find the owner,” he ordered. The OD bridge is open to bikes, but not cars. “How perfect.” he said to himself.
He listened to the clanging bell. A boat, maybe. Yes, a boat. A loud whistle followed but nothing ever came round the bend. Slowly the draw bridge rose. Workmen were fixing it.
In his mind, he missed the boat, a thing he feared, missing jump off time. That’s a mission of no return.
But, the writer remembered – he had not missed a thing. It’s his birthday. He invented sound on his birthday.
He watched a train on a distant hillside, glad he wasn’t on it. He watched a little basketball float by.
“You may be asked for security information,” the recorded cell phone company voice stated as the writer waited for a human being.
“Shit,” he thought, “what does that mean?” Well, they couldn’t read his mind, could they?
At that instant he was disconnected.
“This call may be monitored or recorded,” the recorded person said. “How reassuring,” the writer thought.
With that he rode as fast as he could to the War Memorial, on Mall B, two blocks from the lake. In books they call it War Memorial Fountain Plaza, but the writer had never heard anyone call it that. He called it the Veterans Memorial.
But he decided to stop across the plaza to the statue of Lincoln beside the board of education.
“Lincoln” she said in a sweet Texas accent, Carolyn told about her song, “Captain, My Captain,” at Town Hall in New York City. The writer wasn’t at the concert but he still has the album and listens to it.
Lincoln walked forth, toward the War Memorial. His expression uncertain, a declaration in his left hand, his right palm opens for deliverance.
No speeches, not a sound. Lincoln walks forth to war over the rights of man, people to be correct. Now presidents, soldiers made of stone, metal, granite, weathered, discolored, and covered with the soot of man.
Lincoln looked straight at the tall statue, a hundred feet or more, high, of the naked warier reaching for eternal peace.
The writer never remembers the verse from Palms, exactly. It’s about seeing the light, something like that. The monument made of nickels, Jefferson, from kids in Cleveland, spearheaded by press, shaped by Marshal Frederick, surrounded by a bronze plated wall – named of the dead, World War II and Korea. Vietnam left on the Internet, wishing the fountain of eternal life would burst, rise again, and touch the sky.
The writer grew tried. His mind drifted, remembering early morning of his birthday. He turned the switch on his hand tuned radio. In an instant, he got a clear, strong signal – the Raccoon Festival and Allison standing there in the mid day heat, champion of the fiddle at 16, and the cutest, nicest girl he’d met. He forgot his marriage, wanted nothing but bluegrass, wondering if she’s 18. He settled for classical Canada CBC. The old signal evaporated the way it came.
It was music to his hears, but nothing like the sound he created in his mind. That’s still his invention.
His invention copyright by Mike Marcellino 2009
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Life stories series: Saratoga r&r
Saratoga r&r
by Mike Marcellino
Day No. 7 of a series, ‘Life stories’
He loved the smell of the track, his first whiff as he neared on his bike. The writer’s first thought was uncle Buddy, lying there dead in the Jamaica cemetery, blocks away from the track where he rode winners without a whip. Now Lavelle 'Buddy' Ensor lives in a touch screen video inside the National Horse Racing Hall of Fame, a kind a new red brick building, across from Saratoga, one of the oldest and pretties tracks in America. Buddy rode thoroughbreds like Exterminator. He won millions of dollars in the years before and during the Great Depression. He died without a penny, but he threw great parties after a big stake's win and invited all of Baltimore.
Inside the gate he swung his bike over to the rusting silver chain link fence that kept him off the dirt. The track, fittingly across the street from a barren shopping mall dotted with higher weeds, had seen it’s better days but jockeys still put on their silks and roses walked along alone tied up to a training wheel. He would have taken that lone mare for a ride if he thought he could get away from it.
He could have been a jockey, still could if he could sweat and starve his way to lose 10 pounds to get down to 114, the top weight. One of the jockeys at the cheap Ohio track, 10 miles southeast of Lake Erie in a town called Northfield, namesake of the deserted mall, told the writer there’s no age limit.
He daydreamed, made up headlines in the Times -
Michael Ensor navigates Crapshootin $5000 Charles Town claimer win
Buddy’s great grand guides Easy Does It's maiden special weight romp by six
“What If?" "Great name for a horse." he figured.
Strange things happened, especially lately.
He knew he could do it, with practice. He felt like a bird when he lifted himself off the seat of his bike, and guided, glided easily. Feet on the peddles, it could be a dawn morning work.
Next month, the writer would find out if he is his father’s son and his great uncles nephew or not. An ex-paratrooper, Gary, picked out a horse for him to ride at his Texas ranch next month.
His daydreams reminded him of the night before, or the night before that, when white birds called to him, raced across the night sky, crossing just under a near full moon that looked like the sun. The next day he swore those birds had turned brown, but not black.
“I was born at the race track,” the writer leaned down and told the girl jockey in her silks and cap, waiting for her next mount.
“Well, at least I must’ve been conceived at the track.’ he clarified. She was the prettiest jockey he’d ever seen, always wearing baby blue and white.
The dirt of the track gave him chills. The infield gave him peace.
He was at home at race tracks - Santa Anita, Gulfstream, Saratoga, Pimlico, Sunland, outside El Paso, it didn’t matter where.
Saratoga R & R, copyright by Mike Marcellino, Life stories, seven in a series 2009
by Mike Marcellino
Day No. 7 of a series, ‘Life stories’
He loved the smell of the track, his first whiff as he neared on his bike. The writer’s first thought was uncle Buddy, lying there dead in the Jamaica cemetery, blocks away from the track where he rode winners without a whip. Now Lavelle 'Buddy' Ensor lives in a touch screen video inside the National Horse Racing Hall of Fame, a kind a new red brick building, across from Saratoga, one of the oldest and pretties tracks in America. Buddy rode thoroughbreds like Exterminator. He won millions of dollars in the years before and during the Great Depression. He died without a penny, but he threw great parties after a big stake's win and invited all of Baltimore.
Inside the gate he swung his bike over to the rusting silver chain link fence that kept him off the dirt. The track, fittingly across the street from a barren shopping mall dotted with higher weeds, had seen it’s better days but jockeys still put on their silks and roses walked along alone tied up to a training wheel. He would have taken that lone mare for a ride if he thought he could get away from it.
He could have been a jockey, still could if he could sweat and starve his way to lose 10 pounds to get down to 114, the top weight. One of the jockeys at the cheap Ohio track, 10 miles southeast of Lake Erie in a town called Northfield, namesake of the deserted mall, told the writer there’s no age limit.
He daydreamed, made up headlines in the Times -
Michael Ensor navigates Crapshootin $5000 Charles Town claimer win
Buddy’s great grand guides Easy Does It's maiden special weight romp by six
“What If?" "Great name for a horse." he figured.
Strange things happened, especially lately.
He knew he could do it, with practice. He felt like a bird when he lifted himself off the seat of his bike, and guided, glided easily. Feet on the peddles, it could be a dawn morning work.
Next month, the writer would find out if he is his father’s son and his great uncles nephew or not. An ex-paratrooper, Gary, picked out a horse for him to ride at his Texas ranch next month.
His daydreams reminded him of the night before, or the night before that, when white birds called to him, raced across the night sky, crossing just under a near full moon that looked like the sun. The next day he swore those birds had turned brown, but not black.
“I was born at the race track,” the writer leaned down and told the girl jockey in her silks and cap, waiting for her next mount.
“Well, at least I must’ve been conceived at the track.’ he clarified. She was the prettiest jockey he’d ever seen, always wearing baby blue and white.
The dirt of the track gave him chills. The infield gave him peace.
He was at home at race tracks - Santa Anita, Gulfstream, Saratoga, Pimlico, Sunland, outside El Paso, it didn’t matter where.
Saratoga R & R, copyright by Mike Marcellino, Life stories, seven in a series 2009
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Once and for all, a soldier's song
'My girls' photo by Mike Marcellino, South Vietnam, 1967-68
'Search and destroy' photo by Mike Marcellino, 1967-68
We should ask ourselves -
'Why do we not bring an end to all this unnecessary slaughter and suffering in America and our world?'
Once and for all
a soldier's song
by mike marcellino
No more ‘thank you’s,
No more memorial days,
No more salutes,
No more parades,
No more, if you please,
Unless and until,
America gets it right,
soldiers' rights.
Our nation’s third century
of GIs fighting, dying,
sticking their necks out for us,
our way of life,
taking a hit, covering lethal charges,
save a brother’s life.
Too many body bag houses,
soldiers' homes for that the ones never coming back.
Too many wounds, terrible prices.
Too many in prison, and somehow locked up.
Too many in body, not spirit. Once 'n for all, get it right.
Stop starting wars for no reason,
by bad intent or the gravest mistake.
Man, like don't tell us to ‘take the hill’ when its suicide, same bloody ground we took the other day.
Starters, deciders, you go fight.
Never again, send soldiers into battle, to fight,
lie wounded, coming home in disbelief, with wounds no eye can see.
Why mister presidents, congresspeople did you authorize benefits, a GI Bill, to 9 million Vietnam veterans with an expiration date?
Once 'n for all,
America, do your duty.
Copyright Mike Marcellino, 2009, Once and for all, a soldier's song. Mike served in the United States Army as a combat correspondent and photojournalist in the Vietnam War.
If you would like to listen to his recorded songs go to Split Pea/ce, www.myspace.com/splitpeace. More of his writing can be found on his Blog, Notebookwriter on Myspace as well as his Networked Blog, www.notebookwriter.blotspot.com
Mike served as a combat correspondent and photojournalist in the United States Army with II Field Force in the Vietnam War.
Memorial Days are rememered each day in the lives of those who lost loved ones, as well as for those whose loved ones were maimed or wounded, physically, emotionally or mentally, in that terrible war, both Americans, Vietnamese and people from other nations.
The Vietnam War remains the nation's longest, from 1963 to 1973, though it goes beyond that. It appears that the various wars in the Middle East, somewhat different, but all related, have already broken that record.
The Vietnam War left in its wake, more than 58,000 American troops dead, hundreds of thousands wounded, hundreds of thousands imprisioned, hundreds of thousands still homelesss. Countless millions of people were killed and wounded in the Vietnam War, thousands left missing, not counting the killing fields of Cambodia and the undeclared war in Laos.
We should ask ourselves -
'When will we bring an end to all this unnecessary slaughter and suffering in America and our world?'
Writings and photos copyright by mke marcellino 2009
To listen to mike's lyrical Americana pop poetry song recordings -
www.myspace.com/splitpeace
Question for mike try mike marcellino on Facebook
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
dylan and baez poems
i think that was dylan
by Mike Marcellino
i think that was dylan
i think that was dylan,
walkin down 42nd street
girl in his arm
right in the middle of the slushy road,
right pretty too,
comin right at me,
so i ducked
down into the
alley
found sally
and wrote this piece
"i didn't see you there,"
- went something like that
i think that was dylan
walkin down 42nd street
trouble was the cold,
blinded me,
so i parked my car,
a cutlass i believe,
recklessly
at the first illegal spot i could find
went up to the bar
"Irish whiskey,"
i said that,
it must ta been in '65
i think that was dylan
walkin down 42nd street,
go ask Sally.
i think that was dylan copyright by Mike Marcellino 2009
i knew Joan Baez
i knew joan baez
joan baez.
i knew she would
pick
this
one,
her little sister.
joan baez
i knew she would
pick
this one.
she had a choice -
barbwire
or
bobbing 155 mm shell casing
on the Oriental River,
no number
rung sat zone
south, southeast of Saigon
the delta hell on earth,
special forces
say.
i knew joan baez
joan baez,
i knew she would pick this one,
like her little sister -
joan baez,
i knew joan baez.
i knew she would pick this one
Copyright by Mike Marcellino 2007
i think that was dylan & i knew joan baez copyright by Mike Marcellino 2007, 2008 & 2009
by Mike Marcellino
i think that was dylan
i think that was dylan,
walkin down 42nd street
girl in his arm
right in the middle of the slushy road,
right pretty too,
comin right at me,
so i ducked
down into the
alley
found sally
and wrote this piece
"i didn't see you there,"
- went something like that
i think that was dylan
walkin down 42nd street
trouble was the cold,
blinded me,
so i parked my car,
a cutlass i believe,
recklessly
at the first illegal spot i could find
went up to the bar
"Irish whiskey,"
i said that,
it must ta been in '65
i think that was dylan
walkin down 42nd street,
go ask Sally.
i think that was dylan copyright by Mike Marcellino 2009
i knew Joan Baez
i knew joan baez
joan baez.
i knew she would
pick
this
one,
her little sister.
joan baez
i knew she would
pick
this one.
she had a choice -
barbwire
or
bobbing 155 mm shell casing
on the Oriental River,
no number
rung sat zone
south, southeast of Saigon
the delta hell on earth,
special forces
say.
i knew joan baez
joan baez,
i knew she would pick this one,
like her little sister -
joan baez,
i knew joan baez.
i knew she would pick this one
Copyright by Mike Marcellino 2007
i think that was dylan & i knew joan baez copyright by Mike Marcellino 2007, 2008 & 2009
Life stories series: A scotter named lucky
A scooter named lucky
By Mike Marcellino
The prose daily volume 1
Life stories Days 3, 4 and 5 June 2009
The writer had lost track of the days. He just knew he had passed through days 3, 4 and 5.
He had a record.
Monday night he took off on his classic Japanese model to the drug store. Well, they really aren’t drug stores anymore. No new one he’d ever seen had a soda fountain.
He went to the drug store for Snickers, his favorite candy bar. Hoped they were on sale. The drug store was only a short distance, but he still had to ask for directions. His post traumatic delayed directional disorder was worse at night.
The Snickers bar was 89 cents. Out the door, he unlocked his classic Japanese model built like a tank. As he waited for the light to change, a fire truck came screaming by, red and white neon bubble flashing. The hook and ladder pulled into the other new drug store across the street.
“A drug store on every corner, a chicken in every pot,” he thought. “Why is that?”
He swung his leg over the cross bar, peddled slowly across the intersection. He had a green light. On his back he carried an Indian army surplus pack and in his left hand held a plastic thrift store bag containing a new pair of kaki shorts he got for six bucks and an army green shirt, Indian too, less than two bucks from the thrift store, a non-profit the black woman clerk said was owned by Jews.
Almost midway inside the cross walk, a pickup truck whizzed by, a near miss. Then suddenly out of nowhere he heard the winding motor of a scooter looking him straight in the eyes.
Smack, he got hit head on, the writer, the classic Japanese, another white guy and scooter all went sprawling onto the pavement.
Cars sped by. As the writer got up, the scooter guy, shaken, asked, “Are you ok? Are you ok?”
Then a black guy driving by sticks his head out the window, “I’m gonna waste you.”
The writer wondered, “Which driver is he talking about?” He did have a green light. .
His left thumb tingled a bit, that was it.
The writer punched in the hack’s name and phone number and rode off.
His bike came through without a scratch, leaving its mark on the front fender of a coffee cream scooter named “Lucky.”
(To be continued.}
A scooter named lucky, Life stories, Days 3, 4 & 5, Copyright by Mike Marcellino & Mike Marcellino Communications, 2009
By Mike Marcellino
The prose daily volume 1
Life stories Days 3, 4 and 5 June 2009
The writer had lost track of the days. He just knew he had passed through days 3, 4 and 5.
He had a record.
Monday night he took off on his classic Japanese model to the drug store. Well, they really aren’t drug stores anymore. No new one he’d ever seen had a soda fountain.
He went to the drug store for Snickers, his favorite candy bar. Hoped they were on sale. The drug store was only a short distance, but he still had to ask for directions. His post traumatic delayed directional disorder was worse at night.
The Snickers bar was 89 cents. Out the door, he unlocked his classic Japanese model built like a tank. As he waited for the light to change, a fire truck came screaming by, red and white neon bubble flashing. The hook and ladder pulled into the other new drug store across the street.
“A drug store on every corner, a chicken in every pot,” he thought. “Why is that?”
He swung his leg over the cross bar, peddled slowly across the intersection. He had a green light. On his back he carried an Indian army surplus pack and in his left hand held a plastic thrift store bag containing a new pair of kaki shorts he got for six bucks and an army green shirt, Indian too, less than two bucks from the thrift store, a non-profit the black woman clerk said was owned by Jews.
Almost midway inside the cross walk, a pickup truck whizzed by, a near miss. Then suddenly out of nowhere he heard the winding motor of a scooter looking him straight in the eyes.
Smack, he got hit head on, the writer, the classic Japanese, another white guy and scooter all went sprawling onto the pavement.
Cars sped by. As the writer got up, the scooter guy, shaken, asked, “Are you ok? Are you ok?”
Then a black guy driving by sticks his head out the window, “I’m gonna waste you.”
The writer wondered, “Which driver is he talking about?” He did have a green light. .
His left thumb tingled a bit, that was it.
The writer punched in the hack’s name and phone number and rode off.
His bike came through without a scratch, leaving its mark on the front fender of a coffee cream scooter named “Lucky.”
(To be continued.}
A scooter named lucky, Life stories, Days 3, 4 & 5, Copyright by Mike Marcellino & Mike Marcellino Communications, 2009
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Life stories series: Chased clouds, empty sky
Chased clouds, empty sky
By Mike Marcellino
The Daily Prose, Volume 1, Issue 2, May 29, 2009
Two of a series
“Where to begin start? “he wondered.
“Start with radio, NPR,” as he had a portable, hand operated Shack radio. He began listening to public radio, riding his classic Japanese model bike to downtown Cleveland.
The writer was overwhelmed again. It was only the day after yesterday, the day before today. He forgot allergy pills, had stupidly got two plastic containers of conditioner at the dollar store, no shampoo. Yes, the conditioners were each a dollar.
His ability to scan labels - gone bad to worse, with or without glasses. No matter, 88 cent dime store specks, or the VA specials. He had some incurable eye condition he could have inherited from his real father, the assistant starter.
“The good news, the VA said, “double cornea transplants.”
A few years later, a really nice guy riding the Detroit bus asked the writer,” Are you on the transplant list?”
“That’s a really good question,” the writer thought to himself,”
“No. I’m not,” he answered.
“My first pair of VA glasses, gunmetal frames, high fashion,” he explained. “The top right rim split clean. “They must have been pretty thin,” he reasoned.
“Second pair, lightweights, rimless bottoms, fell apart right away, looked like silly putty,
Now that’s pretty funny if you need glasses just for show,” the writer said, wondering how he was going to write without eyesight.
“Blind people figured a way,” he knew that.
At the veterans’ medical center the writer handed the two broken glasses to the young man in the office. He asked him for a card but he didn’t have them. He said he was a “patient representative.” The writer, ex- orderly, in six months learned about health care. He was the only male on a surgical ward in Lakewood Hospital.
“These glasses are defective, contractors are ripping me and the VA off,” the writer said in consternation. “Investigate these glasses and get back to me, ok?” Without a word, he quietly put them away in a desk drawer.
Weeks later, the writer returned to the VA for another reason. He walked into the office of the patient representative and asked, “Did you look into my glasses?”
“No,” he responded, quietly and looking straight at me without another word, handed over two pair of broken glasses wrapped up in white paper and a red rubber band.
On the road, the writer rode toward the breaks in the puffy sky. He stopped on the near side bank of the river, at a drawbridge over the flats and tracks.
Junk floated on the Cuyahoga, dozens, on the layers of muck, discarded, mostly plastic bottles, all sizes, Styrofoam cups, faint, yellow striped off white rubber ball and a wooden desk drawer. Gradually, the mess on the water drifted, skating upstream.
“Fowl birds have more sense than to light on this water,” he thought. Then a goofy goose honked by.
The Cuyahoga, “crooked river,” as natives called it, was very celebrated. In the 1970s, the river’s ‘water’ caught fire. Another time, ex-mayor Ralph Perk’s set his hair on fire with a blowtorch. He aim narrowly missed the ceremonial steel ribbon. Both made world news.
The sun warmed the writer’s right shoulder. He felt it through an old green army shirt, probably Cuban. He’d done chores already – GI, no, err, rock star shower, brushed his teeth, tossed out pieces of his paper collection.
“Yikes,” he said to himself. “A call in public radio show about bikes – ageless, timeless commentators talking about ageless, timeless peddle power transportation. Right away he called the only station number on his cell phone. Turned out to be the wrong FM station but someone answered and he told him what he had to say about bikes anyway.
“We’re light years away from being ‘bike friendly,’” he told the guy at the WRONG station. “I know without doubt, this revelation won’t ever come to the earth’s most powerful nation. After all,” his thinking continued, “People in most of America’s towns, big and small, these days exist without a bus or train, intra or inner city and a third of our workers get to work carless.”
The writer remembered when he was in Saigon, it was 1968, a now and then Chinese sedan and a few motor scooters, were hopelessly outnumbered, surrounded by bikes and tricycles, aka rickshaws.
A commentator told about an LA doctor prescribing biking for a patient. “It must be a joke,” she chuckled nervously.
“Wait, don’t you know the cost of treating overweight Americans run in the trillions, and millions are dying needlessly.” he wanted to ask her.
“Where to begin,” he wondered again.
“Bikes as a means of transportation are ethic. It’s the economy stupid, if not for pleasure, adventure.
It’s a good thing for us and our planet,” he cried, into a northwest headwind.
“Is anybody listening? They still don’t get it. Isn’t that politically correct?”
“How much money does the government have for bicycles?” a caller asked.
“We have no specific sum,” a planner responded.
Then a downtown commuter called, asking about showers.
“You should live in Tulsa,” the writer could a told him.
Luckily, the writer was saved by the day. The sun chased the clouds, emptied the blue sky.
“Another day at the office,” the writer relented, landing safely again in Phoenix.
He took his usual break before starting work, reached for a wad of Gambler tobacco. A black and white portrait of a smoking cowboy stamped on the pouch, half his face in shadow, he noticed.
The writer thought, “In God we trust” for some reason.
Back in the executives’ wash room, he looked in the mirror. His hair was out of control, without shampoo for days. Reminded him of this couple he knew won a Toronto twist contest, last standing on the cream & black checkered dance floor.
“Call on John Travolta. File a class action,” he suggested.
Chased clouds, empty sky, copyright by Mike Marcellino 2009
By Mike Marcellino
The Daily Prose, Volume 1, Issue 2, May 29, 2009
Two of a series
“Where to begin start? “he wondered.
“Start with radio, NPR,” as he had a portable, hand operated Shack radio. He began listening to public radio, riding his classic Japanese model bike to downtown Cleveland.
The writer was overwhelmed again. It was only the day after yesterday, the day before today. He forgot allergy pills, had stupidly got two plastic containers of conditioner at the dollar store, no shampoo. Yes, the conditioners were each a dollar.
His ability to scan labels - gone bad to worse, with or without glasses. No matter, 88 cent dime store specks, or the VA specials. He had some incurable eye condition he could have inherited from his real father, the assistant starter.
“The good news, the VA said, “double cornea transplants.”
A few years later, a really nice guy riding the Detroit bus asked the writer,” Are you on the transplant list?”
“That’s a really good question,” the writer thought to himself,”
“No. I’m not,” he answered.
“My first pair of VA glasses, gunmetal frames, high fashion,” he explained. “The top right rim split clean. “They must have been pretty thin,” he reasoned.
“Second pair, lightweights, rimless bottoms, fell apart right away, looked like silly putty,
Now that’s pretty funny if you need glasses just for show,” the writer said, wondering how he was going to write without eyesight.
“Blind people figured a way,” he knew that.
At the veterans’ medical center the writer handed the two broken glasses to the young man in the office. He asked him for a card but he didn’t have them. He said he was a “patient representative.” The writer, ex- orderly, in six months learned about health care. He was the only male on a surgical ward in Lakewood Hospital.
“These glasses are defective, contractors are ripping me and the VA off,” the writer said in consternation. “Investigate these glasses and get back to me, ok?” Without a word, he quietly put them away in a desk drawer.
Weeks later, the writer returned to the VA for another reason. He walked into the office of the patient representative and asked, “Did you look into my glasses?”
“No,” he responded, quietly and looking straight at me without another word, handed over two pair of broken glasses wrapped up in white paper and a red rubber band.
On the road, the writer rode toward the breaks in the puffy sky. He stopped on the near side bank of the river, at a drawbridge over the flats and tracks.
Junk floated on the Cuyahoga, dozens, on the layers of muck, discarded, mostly plastic bottles, all sizes, Styrofoam cups, faint, yellow striped off white rubber ball and a wooden desk drawer. Gradually, the mess on the water drifted, skating upstream.
“Fowl birds have more sense than to light on this water,” he thought. Then a goofy goose honked by.
The Cuyahoga, “crooked river,” as natives called it, was very celebrated. In the 1970s, the river’s ‘water’ caught fire. Another time, ex-mayor Ralph Perk’s set his hair on fire with a blowtorch. He aim narrowly missed the ceremonial steel ribbon. Both made world news.
The sun warmed the writer’s right shoulder. He felt it through an old green army shirt, probably Cuban. He’d done chores already – GI, no, err, rock star shower, brushed his teeth, tossed out pieces of his paper collection.
“Yikes,” he said to himself. “A call in public radio show about bikes – ageless, timeless commentators talking about ageless, timeless peddle power transportation. Right away he called the only station number on his cell phone. Turned out to be the wrong FM station but someone answered and he told him what he had to say about bikes anyway.
“We’re light years away from being ‘bike friendly,’” he told the guy at the WRONG station. “I know without doubt, this revelation won’t ever come to the earth’s most powerful nation. After all,” his thinking continued, “People in most of America’s towns, big and small, these days exist without a bus or train, intra or inner city and a third of our workers get to work carless.”
The writer remembered when he was in Saigon, it was 1968, a now and then Chinese sedan and a few motor scooters, were hopelessly outnumbered, surrounded by bikes and tricycles, aka rickshaws.
A commentator told about an LA doctor prescribing biking for a patient. “It must be a joke,” she chuckled nervously.
“Wait, don’t you know the cost of treating overweight Americans run in the trillions, and millions are dying needlessly.” he wanted to ask her.
“Where to begin,” he wondered again.
“Bikes as a means of transportation are ethic. It’s the economy stupid, if not for pleasure, adventure.
It’s a good thing for us and our planet,” he cried, into a northwest headwind.
“Is anybody listening? They still don’t get it. Isn’t that politically correct?”
“How much money does the government have for bicycles?” a caller asked.
“We have no specific sum,” a planner responded.
Then a downtown commuter called, asking about showers.
“You should live in Tulsa,” the writer could a told him.
Luckily, the writer was saved by the day. The sun chased the clouds, emptied the blue sky.
“Another day at the office,” the writer relented, landing safely again in Phoenix.
He took his usual break before starting work, reached for a wad of Gambler tobacco. A black and white portrait of a smoking cowboy stamped on the pouch, half his face in shadow, he noticed.
The writer thought, “In God we trust” for some reason.
Back in the executives’ wash room, he looked in the mirror. His hair was out of control, without shampoo for days. Reminded him of this couple he knew won a Toronto twist contest, last standing on the cream & black checkered dance floor.
“Call on John Travolta. File a class action,” he suggested.
Chased clouds, empty sky, copyright by Mike Marcellino 2009
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