tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32622558714929664782024-02-19T03:59:53.800-05:00The Eye of the Needle: Fourth of July Special 2010 EditionThe Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.comBlogger39125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-24183109676901653552010-07-03T23:00:00.001-04:002010-06-14T22:57:29.900-04:00<div style="margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvbwoTI_Pzgp0cHuPLVZSQOTk5hImPPpCU-wsL6i329nZXHO-sh0d8YxTZc-hiTXahFUh4FlPrkZhGfYp6DLmZxXtJ5VHgJVoiKoRJ7_u7QMWgY7sJyIYdnKjki8L_n22xsvvqp8cHhv_I/s1600/firework-night-8x%5B1%5D.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvbwoTI_Pzgp0cHuPLVZSQOTk5hImPPpCU-wsL6i329nZXHO-sh0d8YxTZc-hiTXahFUh4FlPrkZhGfYp6DLmZxXtJ5VHgJVoiKoRJ7_u7QMWgY7sJyIYdnKjki8L_n22xsvvqp8cHhv_I/s400/firework-night-8x%5B1%5D.jpg" /></a> </div>
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<span style="font-size: 85%;">Bigfoto.com</span></div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-60551144726245193792010-07-03T22:30:00.000-04:002010-06-14T22:54:25.166-04:00<div align="center">
<span style="font-size: 130%;"><span style="font-size: 180%;">Night Chant</span> </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 130%;">(Navajo)</span></div>
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<br />
House made of dawn.<br />
House made of evening light.<br />
House made of the dark cloud.<br />
House made of male rain.<br />
House made of dark mist.<br />
House made of female rain.<br />
House made of pollen.<br />
House made of grasshoppers.</div>
<div align="center">
<br />
Dark cloud is at the door.</div>
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The trail out of it is dark cloud.</div>
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The zigzag lightning stands high upon it.</div>
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An offering I make.</div>
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Restore my feet for me.</div>
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Restore my legs for me.</div>
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Restore my body for me.</div>
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Restore my mind for me.</div>
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Restore my voice for me.</div>
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This very day take out your spell for me.</div>
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<br />
Happily I recover.</div>
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Happily my interior becomes cool.</div>
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Happily I go forth.</div>
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My interior feeling cool, may I walk.</div>
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No longer sore, may I walk.</div>
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Impervious to pain, may I walk.</div>
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With lively feelings may I walk.</div>
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As it used to be long ago, may I walk. </div>
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<br />
Happily may I walk.</div>
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Happily, with abundant dark clouds, may I walk.</div>
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Happily, with abundant showers, may I walk.</div>
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Happily, with abundant plants, may I walk.</div>
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Happily on a trail of pollen, may I walk.</div>
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Happily may I walk.</div>
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Being as it used to be long ago, may I walk. </div>
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<br />
May it be beautiful before me.</div>
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May it be beautiful behind me.</div>
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May it be beautiful below me.</div>
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May it be beautiful above me.</div>
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May it be beautiful all around me.</div>
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In beauty it is finished.</div>
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In beauty it is finished.</div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-8877156961374003812010-07-03T22:00:00.000-04:002010-06-14T22:54:59.825-04:00<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZaArDrtx2x81aGqHErVW7quWYvoz0DeBhBDQO6t6Iww1g0C0fXMttoEGUTtd4otptO4sxmX_R49Ib3cxHH8PX9JOuEsbIDkGbcKLI0hYFMTCAiqiJJReTZl_PNm3n2gyTEfXBwniy16w6/s1600/Flag_Cherokee-Peace%2520flag.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZaArDrtx2x81aGqHErVW7quWYvoz0DeBhBDQO6t6Iww1g0C0fXMttoEGUTtd4otptO4sxmX_R49Ib3cxHH8PX9JOuEsbIDkGbcKLI0hYFMTCAiqiJJReTZl_PNm3n2gyTEfXBwniy16w6/s320/Flag_Cherokee-Peace%2520flag.jpg" style="clear: both; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;" /></a><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"> </span><span style="font-size: small;">Cherokee Peace</span></div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-14332404302641891862010-07-03T21:30:00.000-04:002010-06-14T22:55:52.016-04:00Take Me Out to the Ball Gameby Jack Norworth (1879-1959)<br />
<br />
Katie Casey was base ball mad.<br />
Had the fever and had it bad;<br />
Just to root for the home town crew,<br />
Ev'ry sou Katie blew.<br />
On a Saturday, her young beau<br />
Called to see if she'd like to go,<br />
To see a show but Miss Kate said,<br />
"No, I'll tell you what you can do."<br />
<br />
"Take me out to the ball game,<br />
Take me out with the crowd.<br />
Buy me some peanuts and cracker jack,<br />
I don't care if I never get back,<br />
Let me root, root, root for the home team,<br />
If they don't win it's a shame.<br />
For it's one, two, three strikes, you're out,<br />
At the old ball game."<br />
<br />
Katie Casey saw all the games,<br />
Knew the players by their first names;<br />
Told the umpire he was wrong,<br />
All along good and strong.<br />
When the score was just two to two,<br />
Katie Casey knew what to do,<br />
Just to cheer up the boys she knew,<br />
She made the gang sing this song:<br />
<br />
"Take me out to the ball game,<br />
Take me out with the crowd.<br />
Buy me some peanuts and cracker jack,<br />
I don't care if I never get back,<br />
Let me root, root, root for the home team,<br />
If they don't win it's a shame.<br />
For it's one, two, three strikes, you're out,<br />
At the old ball game."The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-76683933834296810192010-07-03T21:20:00.000-04:002010-06-22T06:28:03.220-04:00Charley Plays a Tuneby Michael Lee Johnson<br />
<br />
Crippled, in Chicago,<br />
with arthritis<br />
and Alzheimer's,<br />
in a dark rented room,<br />
Charley plays<br />
melancholic melodies<br />
on a dust-filled<br />
harmonica he<br />
found abandoned<br />
on a playground of sand<br />
years ago by a handful of children<br />
playing on monkey bars.<br />
He hears bedlam when he buys fish at the local market<br />
and the skeleton bones of the fish show through.<br />
He lies on his back, riddled with pain,<br />
pine cones fill his pillows and mattress;<br />
praying to Jesus and rubbing his rosary beads<br />
Charley blows tunes out his<br />
celestial instrument<br />
notes float through the open window<br />
touch the nose of summer clouds.<br />
Charley overtakes himself with grief<br />
and is ecstatically alone.<br />
Charley plays a solo tune.The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-56444654827142270312010-07-03T21:00:00.000-04:002010-06-14T22:56:36.911-04:00<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFyhT19EbpAzoxCXyVn-J2XBV72oyvy6WYxncSu-7ejPEBoJLHf4FzEv2C_AFOuAJPJTlefFA3T0ie6imJneG90qmvId5MlQgQhgpFhL5P62pOZmoe-p49P_zSFTqPUcE_MjwUYIWUZwaV/s1600/Flag_BetsyRoss.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFyhT19EbpAzoxCXyVn-J2XBV72oyvy6WYxncSu-7ejPEBoJLHf4FzEv2C_AFOuAJPJTlefFA3T0ie6imJneG90qmvId5MlQgQhgpFhL5P62pOZmoe-p49P_zSFTqPUcE_MjwUYIWUZwaV/s320/Flag_BetsyRoss.jpg" style="clear: both; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;" /></a> <br />
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<span style="font-size: 85%;">Flagpictures</span></div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-82016184309123023022010-07-03T20:00:00.001-04:002010-06-14T23:09:42.486-04:00Approbations 456 (after Ravi Coltrane’s Away)by Felino Soriano<br />
<pre><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Found off
near
flocks of focal designations, imaginational
constructs
clung
to
the
reinstated
versions of myopic segregations, whole in circular conjoining, alive.
Views dissipate
those of
varied physical amalgamations
akin
to influenced synopsis
creating raw of multiple
syncopation
collaborating amid bodies whose visceral
understandings
ratify slants of equaling
unintended beauty.</span> </pre>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-21420716474982889722010-07-03T19:55:00.002-04:002010-06-29T18:33:30.384-04:00Batless Vermontby Rebecca Anne Renner
<pre><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">They hang from the rock face, tiny-
boned as pine needles: in September
—then in March, the cave is shellacked with carcasses.
Hanging from the ceiling, little mummies--
the spores have filled the air,
their white noses in the hibernacum, a dust
choked infection, leaving Vermont
batless for the spring.
Back nests are highly dangerous, sub-humous
or in the ceiling, scampering like mice to leave
their fungal shells behind.
The El Dorado Motor Inn
has jacuzzis in its rooms;
and cash for gold
brings homeless in
to barter teeth and spoons.
But in the batless, Vermont-fresh caves,
I'm crying out to you.
We leave by light, the cave mouth too
"could never be too soon."
The relics in the alley way, fallen from the attic,
were built of gold and meant to stay but traded in a panic,
growing roots and bricks and feelers
echolocate to the past--
this is Vermont in Autumn time,
too soft and fast
to cost or catch or be caught or captured--
batless Vermont is suffering cold,
lucifugus enraptured. </span></pre>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-48463139976415066462010-07-03T19:30:00.000-04:002010-06-14T23:11:30.020-04:00<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi59GvlG88sMlmUy23PrV4ObGnPKoTtXneYhX1BAfYN802U9QWQddJS7jf64XrtPgg4Pd3pytbkA0ba9O3Gm35LVte2mogO90GE9LWF0Wl36iF_hp4WChIXCzW5QJEhbHzClbXQS9wb_6-G/s1600/Spirit_of_'76_by_AM_Willard.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi59GvlG88sMlmUy23PrV4ObGnPKoTtXneYhX1BAfYN802U9QWQddJS7jf64XrtPgg4Pd3pytbkA0ba9O3Gm35LVte2mogO90GE9LWF0Wl36iF_hp4WChIXCzW5QJEhbHzClbXQS9wb_6-G/s400/Spirit_of_'76_by_AM_Willard.jpg" style="clear: both; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;" /></a> <br />
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<span style="font-size: 85%;"><em>The Spirit of '76</em> by A. M. Willard</span></div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-65608669615767824062010-07-03T19:00:00.000-04:002010-06-14T23:12:37.916-04:00Nihilistic Realityby Catfish McDaris<br />
<br />
the united??? states of america<br />
democrats & capitalism & republicans<br />
aristocracy & oligarchy<br />
at its finest<br />
a melting pot<br />
becoming a pressure cooker<br />
niggers fighting honkies<br />
gringos fighting spics<br />
cowboys fighting indians<br />
chinks,dagos,jews,polacks,nazis<br />
wood niggers, prairie niggers<br />
wiggers & oreos all in the soup<br />
the rich stirring the mixture<br />
red necks shooting cans<br />
africans, puerto ricans, mexicans<br />
let's change the motto on mr. $$$<br />
from in god we trust to<br />
let me get mine & fuck everyone else<br />
rich doing the poor with<br />
pork barrel kickbacks<br />
nafta,gatt,wall street,savings & loan<br />
health care, insurance<br />
bussing children a polluting experiment<br />
homo versus hetero<br />
right to life, it's my body<br />
atheists versus believers<br />
gay versus sad<br />
with liberty & justice<br />
for all, but<br />
don't tread on me.The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-14558402192524073572010-07-03T18:30:00.000-04:002010-06-14T23:13:14.308-04:00<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGdnqint_KqTSDUSj75ks8ZbeZS9nMbroLeXQVTH3nYNbbetlh8t1QeuZsVpGIdn1Uo7mmhfmCVTuKTNfIIRt6lJo74WIYoU1f1EX235TKW_EqomYqyMdJVuSGQu1OZwacaOyLADK7Cugr/s1600/forest-trees-4sp%5B1%5D.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGdnqint_KqTSDUSj75ks8ZbeZS9nMbroLeXQVTH3nYNbbetlh8t1QeuZsVpGIdn1Uo7mmhfmCVTuKTNfIIRt6lJo74WIYoU1f1EX235TKW_EqomYqyMdJVuSGQu1OZwacaOyLADK7Cugr/s400/forest-trees-4sp%5B1%5D.jpg" style="clear: both; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;" /></a> <br />
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<span style="font-size: 85%;">Bigfoto.com</span></div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-57374336147324318402010-07-03T18:00:00.000-04:002010-06-14T23:14:02.366-04:00Guided Tourby Steve Prusky<br />
<br />
Near this part of lower Michigan, outside of Grayling, one un-cut stand of defiant, yet delicate, pedigree White Pine remains. We’re coming up on the park surrounding it now. Most of the virgin timber is between 300 and 375 years old. Some trees tower up to 160 feet tall. The Potawatomi Tribe, who originally inhabited this area before its value supplanted its beauty, called these trees the Whispering Pines after the high needles that lightly whistled music in the wind. Their reddish-brown furrowed bark distinguishes them from the younger gray-green smooth second growth thriving around them.<br />
<br />
Dawn is the best time to drive the dew soaked interstate that penetrates this side chapel of virginity. A verdant mass of cloud high trees flank the black top then. The highway meanders, like a simplified maze equipped with signage assisting you past every deceptive “S” curve or tricky side road nowhere. Mid-morning sun hovers here on clear summer days, drying the asphalt dense black, kissing the high needle tips pure jade green.<br />
<br />
Forty-nine virgin acres are all that stand today. The rest of Michigan’s wealth was destroyed by fire, storms, mankind. Of course, the tall pines you see now were planted by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), in the 1930’s on “cutover land” as one of President Roosevelt’s pump priming projects during the Great Depression. Only walking tours are allowed through the virgin stand. No smoking is allowed.<br />
<br />
Some guess over 160 million White Pines were cut and milled in lower Michigan between 1834 and 1897. This harvest provided the material for the Transcontinental Railroad, commissioned by the Lincoln administration, across the Midwest between 1863 and 1869. Omaha, Des Moines, Kansas City, Topeka, Wichita are all indebted to Michigan for its contribution to their growth along that railed path. Michigan White Pine also rebuilt Chicago after Mrs. O’Leary’s cow tipped the lantern over in 1871 and burned the city to the ground. Tragically, the Great Michigan Fires of 1871 burned a large part of Michigan’s natural wealth beginning just south-east of here from Port Huron to Tawas City on the shores of Lake Huron. Had the fire not occurred, 60 million more trees would have fallen, or maybe been saved. This lost treasure is now nothing more than fuzzy tin-type pictures placed on museum walls.<br />
<br />
Should you speed through here some day, focused on more common, less delicate destinations, with no notice this forest passed, by mistake you may spot the pines shrink smaller in your rear view mirror, ignoring your anxious impatience to pass the hay farmer ahead, his overloaded, careening flat bed truck slow walking you with no regard for your haste. Then, later, peek back as the pines verdant tips appear like corks capping timber message bottles bobbing about on an earthen ocean’s horizon, each tree proffering a centuries old invitation for you to slow down next time through, stop, gaze a bit, but don’t step out and touch.<br />
<br />
Now we go to the Leelanau Peninsula where Lakes Michigan and Huron mate.The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-3531432784777748622010-07-03T17:35:00.000-04:002010-06-30T20:31:38.029-04:00Place of the Wild Apricot Vineby John Swain <br />
<br />
Mountainside like the shoulder<br />
of a warrior<br />
whose wound was<br />
draped in mosses and ferneries.<br />
In an opening of stone<br />
I looked for wild apricot vines<br />
beside the place<br />
where three streams met and fell<br />
into an opal pool.<br />
My horse lowered <br />
his muscled neck to drink water,<br />
I felt rejuvenation<br />
astride this wild throne.<br />
In the distance<br />
blue summits carry<br />
the names of all who passed here.The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-81076435539404220582010-07-03T17:30:00.000-04:002010-06-14T23:14:49.399-04:00<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyrSXaWhNoRevpzpluDAKur-FwS6VsKEjeqtl8_RmNlk28NSV2_-5iutil7vM_zvZ4vx-_hYQ5_f0fmlLgSdnoJpCUWHkwJOS5eQsrVoqT2N7nHa4ZRRikTt9TQlN7V06iGwwYC_d3Qlyp/s1600/firework-b7g3%5B1%5D.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" height="267" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyrSXaWhNoRevpzpluDAKur-FwS6VsKEjeqtl8_RmNlk28NSV2_-5iutil7vM_zvZ4vx-_hYQ5_f0fmlLgSdnoJpCUWHkwJOS5eQsrVoqT2N7nHa4ZRRikTt9TQlN7V06iGwwYC_d3Qlyp/s400/firework-b7g3%5B1%5D.jpg" style="clear: both; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;" width="400" /></a> <br />
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<span style="font-size: 85%;">Bigfoto.com</span></div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-70178513154193001472010-07-03T17:00:00.000-04:002010-06-14T23:15:24.887-04:00Strainby Shannon Peil<br />
<br />
I didn’t agree with why he went<br />
or that he was going back<br />
but I could appreciate his stories<br />
what he had gone through<br />
the look in his eye that acknowledged he’d seen war<br />
<br />
at times I empathized with all of it<br />
and the closeness of death<br />
but others I wanted to scream at him<br />
tell him if no one agreed to go, none of this would have happened<br />
so what came first, the soldier or the war?<br />
what came before that<br />
the patriotism or the fear?<br />
<br />
and his friends that died<br />
was it their fault they went<br />
or mine that I didn’t?<br />
<br />
we never mention any of this<br />
but I have a feeling he knows I’m not necessarily afraid of death<br />
I’m just terrified of dying for the wrong reasons<br />
and for the sake of friendship we talk of anything else we can think of.<br />
<br />
<em><span style="font-size: 85%;">Strain was originally published by The Panulaan Review</span></em>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-72255752884380211542010-07-03T16:50:00.000-04:002010-06-20T18:24:31.815-04:00five year planby Steve Calamars<br /><br />i'm thirty years<br />old today<br /><br />ten years from now<br />kafka was dead<br /><br />coughing up blood<br />like sudafed-red <br />paint-balls<br /><br />tuberculosis depleted<br />his lung-tanks and filled<br />them full of death <br />like helium<br /><br />but i don't have<br />the patience to<br />wait on tb or ms or<br />any other disease <br />or natural cause<br /><br />i have to much<br />ambition for my<br />own good<br /><br />while others are<br />busy engineering<br />careers and constructing<br />small fortunes<br /><br />i am hard at work on my<br />own five year plan<br /><br />assembling stories and<br />poems as fast as my brain<br />can manufacture them<br /><br />hurling words like<br />hand-grenades that explode<br />across the page like<br />gooey black insect-sobs<br /><br />and when i have spilled<br />enough ink and constructed<br />my own meager fortune from<br />the meaningless materials of<br />throw-away jobs and <br />minimum wage<br /><br />i'll empty my accounts and<br />invest in smith-&-wesson<br /><br />with no need for a 401k<br />i'll go with a 357<br /><br />i'll demonstrate my savvy and<br />opt for hollow-point slugs to<br />guarantee my success<br /><br />i'm not delusional enough<br />to believe i'll ever escape the<br />shadow of kafka's<br />giant menacing words<br /><br />but i have taught myself<br />to see in the dark<br /><br />and after i have exploited<br />what little talent i do have<br />and my five year plan has<br />run it's course like any<br />other fatal disease<br /><br />i'll know i did something<br />that not even kafka<br />could bring himself<br />to achieve<br /><br />as the bullet fires<br />from the barrel like<br />a baseball<br />into my skull<br />tough as a<br />catcher's mittThe Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-8826409803624132042010-07-03T16:30:00.001-04:002010-06-14T23:23:26.372-04:00<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-NpKZZk_B75ss3oTAZd0sh2-JMIE2BnSs9afNTFK0ROXUlZjCtRPtRa_htJlRXx_WPf9jRdBlVg3SrmUQukf2lrUGVkvsfQA5VzP5bVoNivt5vF648NX3apAG4t6TFA_tdgW86CBlTOz-/s1600/statue_liberty-x3x%5B1%5D%5B1%5D.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-NpKZZk_B75ss3oTAZd0sh2-JMIE2BnSs9afNTFK0ROXUlZjCtRPtRa_htJlRXx_WPf9jRdBlVg3SrmUQukf2lrUGVkvsfQA5VzP5bVoNivt5vF648NX3apAG4t6TFA_tdgW86CBlTOz-/s400/statue_liberty-x3x%5B1%5D%5B1%5D.jpg" style="clear: both; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;" width="260" /></a><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Bigfoto.com</span><a href="http://picasa.google.com/blogger/" target="ext"></a></div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-6804318802044950852010-07-03T16:05:00.001-04:002010-06-29T18:32:39.779-04:00Just a Pennyby Katherine Mercurio Gotthardt
<pre><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">You know that trouble what ironed me
last year? I went to that place you told me--
there’s this red carpet like I’m some kinda King
o’ somethin'. There’s some posh chair
in the waitin' room, clay pot o' red flowers,
silk, I think, smellin' up the space
with that fakeness. I see the man, that lawyer,
he says to me real serious like,
“How much justice can you afford?”
I can’t afford nothin'.
I got somethin' like a penny
slid under the railroad, all flattened
out by that train gone south, that nasty screech
runnin' the poor thing over, that little money
pitched off the track to the woods,
chippin' off the grass,
driven into dirt,
sinkin' rotten copper back to Earth.
That’s you ‘n me.</span> </pre>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-3037762304526352712010-07-03T16:00:00.000-04:002010-06-14T23:18:05.127-04:00Rome Burnsby Mike Meraz<br />
<br />
Rome burns,<br />
America burns,<br />
I burn...<br />
<br />
I think<br />
if we all just<br />
reserved ourselves<br />
for that special calling<br />
we were meant to do<br />
that unique voice<br />
that burns inside<br />
every one of us<br />
we would all be better off,<br />
rather than prostituting ourselves<br />
to every whim and person<br />
who calls our name.<br />
<br />
mira,<br />
this poems for you.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 85%;"><em>Rome Burns was originally published by Chiron Review</em></span>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-855393362393923022010-07-03T15:45:00.001-04:002010-06-30T12:10:33.030-04:00<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidp51ciWhSfTOBCXAFQY5bTk9vbhVzhGoZRWcSnjzK2h-YbZvB1J-18fyvH4XRFc6mSiFfhki-UOVxU4Ey2tTgU8FRu2CZ-gz9tj0d3digLC3qMFKScqL7av4Bfmq3V__nX2lxbCfSzlXN/s1600/Falls.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidp51ciWhSfTOBCXAFQY5bTk9vbhVzhGoZRWcSnjzK2h-YbZvB1J-18fyvH4XRFc6mSiFfhki-UOVxU4Ey2tTgU8FRu2CZ-gz9tj0d3digLC3qMFKScqL7av4Bfmq3V__nX2lxbCfSzlXN/s400/Falls.JPG" style="clear: both; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;" width="400" /></a><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Amicalola Falls, Georgia, by Dave Posluszny</span></div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-71778795561982136232010-07-03T15:30:00.000-04:002010-06-30T20:32:50.881-04:00Superman Wore an Armani Suit and Spoke with a Thick Sicilian Accent<dev>by Ryan Quinn Flanagan <br />
<br />
They used to come by in their expensive suits <br />
and everyone looked up to them;<br />
feared them,<br />
respected them.<br />
They gave us kids money<br />
for no reason at all<br />
and handed out turkeys at Thanksgiving time.<br />
They helped old ladies across the street <br />
and didn't take shit from nobody.<br />
Even the cops stopped coming around <br />
because they got their envelopes <br />
at the end of every month.<br />
We used to call them wise guys <br />
but I don't know what they called<br />
themselves.<br />
They took care of the neighbourhood <br />
and no one complained.<br />
<br />
One time, they came to collect <br />
as I was buying candy<br />
and they put the shopkeeper=s head through a plate glass window.<br />
They also broke three ribs and cracked a few more<br />
with a tire iron <br />
in anger<br />
because the shopkeeper had forced them to wrinkle <br />
their suits.<br />
<br />
When they were done,<br />
they gave me money and a loaf of bread<br />
and told me to go home.<br />
<br />
These wise guys from the neighbourhood <br />
were my superheroes<br />
growing up.<br />
<br />
They were not sold as action figures<br />
and never appeared in comics<br />
but they should have.The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-3039905382309516022010-07-03T15:05:00.000-04:002010-06-30T19:22:54.619-04:00Starscream for Bumblebee<div>
by Ray Succre<br />
<br />
People moved about those nooks of residence with an excellent speed,<br />
though most were rare to stop, to talk or trade or haunt the place.<br />
Each new location to me was for new people soon out of sight,<br />
led into nonexistence when I’d leave.<br />
<br />
There was always the presence of boxes, packed, and a parent<br />
looking over a map for the next place.<br />
There was always the one way of leaving, no matter how you arrived.<br />
<br />
My first childhood friend:<br />
“Hey you, black kid,” I called across the parking lot.<br />
“Fuck you,” he said.<br />
“You have any Transformers?”<br />
“Yeah.”<br />
“Wanna trade?”<br />
“Maybe. What do you have?”<br />
About a dozen. In a toybox. My room of the month.<br />
We went in with an excellent speed.<br />
I knew him ten minutes and was cured of being racist.<br />
He traded Starscream for Bumblebee.<br />
It was just one place. One more kid. One month in a dozen,<br />
over the barter of myth and plastic. </div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-30438741124627610082010-07-03T15:00:00.000-04:002010-06-14T23:26:16.325-04:00<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge_yM6eEspI5lC-EFTVtWnM-ede56lvRFu3u9y8qrfDV_uTjDhWjZ5ArFHaXZ800i0DVlFt1Yc65Oto-oFT4XuBCtMoqeBY0IJqf26YilCPqrF_YDRr8GBfGWArmblXjvAOYfO8HDTdfJ8/s1600/Flag_Sault_Ste_-Marie.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge_yM6eEspI5lC-EFTVtWnM-ede56lvRFu3u9y8qrfDV_uTjDhWjZ5ArFHaXZ800i0DVlFt1Yc65Oto-oFT4XuBCtMoqeBY0IJqf26YilCPqrF_YDRr8GBfGWArmblXjvAOYfO8HDTdfJ8/s320/Flag_Sault_Ste_-Marie.jpg" style="clear: both; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;" /></a><br />
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Sault Tribe</div>The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-32521584728608950122010-07-03T14:30:00.000-04:002010-06-14T23:20:07.409-04:00American Dinerby Len Kuntz<br />
<br />
Beneath the skin<br />
she is so many stars blinking and pulsing.<br />
Shadows from her waitress cap<br />
cast bold stripes across her cheek and chin,<br />
glowing blue in the mirror.<br />
<br />
Mornings she still smells of pan smoke and salty bacon.<br />
Even after a bath or<br />
bad dream<br />
her fingers feel sticky<br />
with syrup.<br />
<br />
She kisses the boy at her mother’s,<br />
his face so similar, the long jaw and dimpled grin<br />
that twists something sharp inside her<br />
when he salutes and says, “Happy Fourth.”<br />
<br />
At the diner<br />
the manager has left her rolls of red and blue streamers<br />
which are gauzy like bandages.<br />
She ties bows along the wainscoting, the juke box, a row of stools.<br />
She recalls the day he left, him looking like another man in that uniform,<br />
old yet not,<br />
brave but scared.<br />
Two hundred twenty-three days from yesterday.<br />
<br />
The first couple through the door<br />
shake off rain and tell her<br />
the weather is a bitch.<br />
The little girl orders pumpkin pie but<br />
her Mom says it has to be apple,<br />
pumpkin is Thanksgiving.<br />
The girl beats the vinyl seat,<br />
beats it like a war drum,<br />
her little fists pounding to be noticed.The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3262255871492966478.post-83605635691854334862010-07-03T14:20:00.001-04:002010-06-30T19:24:18.406-04:00Maid Riteby Jeffrey Miller<br />
<br />
Just down the street from Adrian’s Skelley Station<br />
the ancient diner, its weathered clapboard sides<br />
a peeled and faded reminder of better days<br />
is opened for lunch with regulars already in place.<br />
<br />
Seated elbow to elbow around the scarred stained<br />
Formica top counter, on wobbly stools that have<br />
long since stopped swiveling, it’s the usual lunch chatter<br />
about the weather, politics, and the economy.<br />
<br />
Outside a line stretches halfway down the block.<br />
It’s a simple menu Maid Rite sandwich—<br />
finely ground beef cooked and piled on a bun, <br />
served with mustard, pickles or chopped onions.<br />
A bag of chips and a Coke on the side.<br />
<br />
“I’ve been coming here for 30 years,” says one patron<br />
to another. “Best darn sandwiches in McDonough County.”<br />
The waitress behind the counter nods, takes another order.<br />
What’s tradition and history got to do with it, she thinks, <br />
when she’s making three dollars an hour plus tips?<br />
<br />
It’s only a sandwich for crying out loud.The Camel Saloonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17466326145539153263noreply@blogger.com0