Lisping the Lucid Light

The Forbidden Story Book 4 The Post Avant Epic

The Forbidden Story – Book 4 – The Post Avant Epic

The following poem is an extract from Book 4 of “The Forbidden Story.” I completed this poem some four years ago and, of course, it is based on “Paradise Lost.” So far this poem has NOT been reviewed in Jacket Magazine or featured on the blog of my BOHO Langpo other half, Ron.

Why? Because it is funny.

Please just imagine that I, like the Napolean Dynamite fellow who created The Five Pointed Star one of those poems praised by Ron which have no conceivable value to many but which possess all that is worth living for for our post avant brethren, have here set down a mysterious introduction with canny allusions to Jack Spicer, William of Orange and Li Po. It begins, of course, in media res since all sorts of res comes before since it is, after all, Book 4. If it merely seems like witty prose to you, you are mistaken. It is actually a shitty poem.

Thank you. I couldn’t have done it by the way unless I had once imagined taking a seminar on “Landscape in Poetry.”



"And now let me introduce Blue Coal's distinguished heating expert John Barclay. Thank you Ken Roberts and good evening friends. Don't let a few days of mild weather fool you. You'll need a fire for a while -- six to eight weeks most likely. So folks in order to continue efficient firing right down to the last day give your furnace a cleaning now. And here's what I mean. Get the fly ash off the heating surfaces where it's been accumulating all season. That's the main thing. You know, fly ash gradually coats the heating surfaces and acts as an insulator -- even better than asbestos. So get rid of all fly ash. It's the simplest thing in the world to do. Don't disturb the fire. Just open the clean out door. With a wire brush or scraper give the heating surfaces a light going over. Make sure you brush or scrape off all the fly ash that's accumulated …that's all you have to do. Cleaning your furnace is a small job but it pays off big because with a clean furnace you'll get more heat from less coal for the rest of the season. I thank you.

The weed of crime bears bitter fruit…

Keep the home fires burning with Blue Coal!"

Radio off.

I tried to get back to sleep. A ruddy light was already flooding the cabin.

"I'm hungry." It was Randy.
Damn it.

He looked hungry.

"Was that the Shadow?" he asked.

I picked him up and put him in the bowling bag.

"Nope, you just had a weird dream."

"Thank God," he sighed. "Gosh, I've been having a lot of those weird dreams lately.. Say, could you check on something for me?"

"What?"

"Am I…ok?"

"Yes."

"Oh, good."

"Lets go eat."

The ruddy light was growing brighter. Here comes the sun I thought.

No. I looked out the window. Oh, it was Elijah's Chariot of Fire.

I screamed, Randy wept.

Into the dangerous world I leapt!

Now I saw that it was actually a fiery chariot suspended from a Zeppelin. A kind of Floating Ad. Fiery letters writhed on the side of the great vehicle."Blake's Satanic Mills. Visit us at out new Factory Outlet! Mr. Blake begs leave to inform the public that two products of his manufacture will be available to the Ladies and Gentlemen for the first time at low, low prices: THE LINEMENT OF GRATIFIED DESIRE! Sovereign remedy whose superior excellence and utility is attested by all Major Poets. ETERNITY, the perfume in love with the productions of time! Mr. Blake's establishment also stocks many other items of his manufacture too numerous to attempt a description of -- all at low, low prices. Also -- see the Tygers of Wrath that are Wiser than the Horses of Instruction! On display here for the first time and seen very recently by HER MAJESTY THE FAERIE QUEEN. Randy looked up with a wild surmise. I was as silent as if I were upon a peak in Darien."I wonder if we have time to get to Blake's" he wondered.The door snicked open. Captain Spaulding strode in.'Ah, there you are. Drinks in the Upper Lounge! And a surprise. Why aren't you dressed?He wiggled his cigar."Ha Ha! The games afoot! The Shadow is joining our little party!" Scampered down the hallway."He'll have the Sloe Gin Fizz," I thought. Doffed the PJs. Donned doublet, hose, sword, pointy boots and blade. Hat with white feather.I love the Puerto Rican look.

Of course, it wasn't just "drinks in the lounge." It was the gathering of the 12 I had hoped for. Long and long had I said to myself -- Jesus H. Christ when will we all get going? I was willing to wait until we got to London but… didn't have to! Bond and M were already in the rather fabulous first class lounge of the Freedonian owned but German flagged Zeppelin the "Arthur Schopenhauer." Both Will and Idea were expressed in the furnishings. A Zinc bar, overhead various Teutonic maidens (carvings, of course) in various stages of undress. Nice idea. All in various states of yearning expressing the embodiment of the Will.

Before the bar a round table of the proper old sort manufactured exclusively in the Black Forest. Great chairs for each one of the 12. Above, a dais, obviously hastily rigged for the occasion, and on the dais three thrones in the Cretan style. And, suspended above it all. a flat screen of Atlantean manufacture. Suitable for showing 70 mm movies (and, in fact, a showing of "Lawrence of Arabia" was advertised for that afternoon).

But first -- before I saw all this -- I had to enroll and pick up my handouts and so on. Get my badge. "Hello, I'm LON" A rather irritated looking elf maiden was handing them out. And no wonder. Just a brief look around told me that more than a few of the great villains were there and grumpy as hell. Professor Moriarity looks very irritated as he conversed with the insidious Doctor Fu Manchu who looked haughty and bored as Moriarity complained that he really didn't have the time for this since he was in the midst of assassinating the crowned heads of Europe.

"Of Europe only?" the Insidious Doctor hissed.

Darth Vader laughed at this. Mr. Mxyztplk (pronounced mix-yez-pit-el-ick) (isn't this worth the price of admission?) floated by and nodded at me briefly. The last time I saw him was in 1959 in a Superman comic but he remembered. I hurried in and scanned the room.

There was a seat at the Round Table with a place card that read "World Historical Individual Whose Task It is the World's to Understand" I was flattered and sat right down. I had quite forgotten I was carrying Randy. Maybe I should have gotten him a name card? Anyway I'd leave him under the table and bely up to the bar with the rest of them for a Martini… Randy seemed to be sleeping.

An officious looking elf tapped me on the shoulder.

"Pray, reverend sir, your seat is yonder" And he gestured to the oaken seat next to the Shadow's --who was primping: adjusting his ascot around his thin little mouse face.

"I laughed. Are you certain? I am LON."

He nodded somberly in the depressed way elf guys have (sex once every ten thousand years, harp lessons each day -- you'd be depressed too) so I moved and eyed the room moodily.

Th elf bent down and placed Randy in the "World Historical Individual Whose Task It is the World's to Understand" seat. Careless asshole. Oh, well, I wasn't moving him.

The Shadow and I were the only two of the twelve to be seated (if you don't count Randy and I don't) but I saw some of the others. Posthumous and Samson were at the bar, of course. The Crow was on a bust of Pallas where some Japanese villains were taking his picture. Bill Gates was there of course. I was surprised to see the Chevalier but not surprised that he was holding a flagon of absinthe and drearily (I'm certain) chatting to a goddess. Greek I think. Perhaps Diana. Golden bow -- but two breasts. Very puzzling. Her Tyrian gown of the color called Panelume gave it away though: Atlantis. Yes. I noticed that she wore a necklace of blue topaz. She saw me looking at her and gave a little wave.

Good God. It was Riotboo.

Damn it. The Chevalier was now showing her my ruby slippers. I started to get up but liike everyone else froze in abject horror as flames engulfed the middle of the three thrones, the room filled somehow with the howling of lost souls, (one recalled watching the musical "Cats" ) and a flaming eye of a sudden occupied the space above the throne.

"Oh, shit!" Posthumous cried from right behind me -- dropping his drink -- "It's Sharon!"

An ex wife, no doubt.

But it was only Sauron of Mordor.

Oh, I had forgotten P was the ringbearer.

Sauron's eye turned towards the trembling adventurer.

Then, from a space above the throne to the left Death stepped out from his sable coach.

I made my way to the bar. I couldn't stop for Death.

But I did stop when the third of the evil trio appeared next to me and bowed.

It was the person from Porlock.

I haven't often been in the grip of theological terror but this is exactly what I felt when I saw the little man in the checkered suit and bowler hat. "Fuck you," I snarled. I AM going to finish…" And I knew that all was in vain -- until I realized that he wasn't bowing at me but at the Lonliest Ranger who shimmered forth right in front of me.

Lonliest grinned at the Person from Porlock and, I could be wrong, the little man quailed. Lonliest's golden front tooth caught the light and for an instant I felt that everything was ok.

But again just for an instant -- for the Eye of Mordor flamed with an, of course, Satanic light and his voice -- a voice that recalled unheard of suffering -- as if somewhere there was still a production of "Cats" and people were going to it -- filled the First Class Lounge.

"GIVE ME MY FUCKING RING."

We all screeched and Posthumous sank to his knees.

"I can't…I…it's in…"

I pulled my sword ready in that instant to kill my old friend so that mankind could live. Except it appears I had left my sword back in the cabin.

Celestial light! How else can I describe it? I felt as a sparrow pillowed on the pavement of heaven snoozing away sweetly and -- in an instant of suspended time (a curious phrase but what the fuck…) blue rays shot forth from the chair where Randy's head had been and a million butterflies seemed to swarm and form a face of such beauty that I am occasionally distracted even now when I have seen the face of…I'll get to that later.

A god no doubt for his head was golden and his beard golden and his eyes serene as the Middle Sea after you have escaped from the Cyclops and are having a smoke knowing that that dumb asshole will think your name is No Man ahahahahah…

The God laughed.

"Oh, fuck off, you twit."

Sauron seemed aghast. How do I know since he is a flaming eye? A mystery it seems.

"BALDY?"

The God smiled.

Death spoke.

"Let's get started. Im a busy man."

In an instant the God was gone and I made my way back to the table. There was only Randy. Still sleeping.

Sauron muttered something but that was all and everyone was seated as the Interpreter for the Deaf mounted the dais.

There seemed to be a small tree in the chair next to mine. He was smoking a cigarette.

"Why the hell do we need a deaf and dumb interpreter?" he remarked.

What an insensitive bastard. I'd bring it up in the team building session that was sure to follow. You'd think a talking tree would understand diversity.

Death, Sauron and the Person from Porlock were on their thrones. I quickly glanced around to see just who the 12 were. Fuck, there weren't 12 yet. Me, Samson, a trembling Posthumous, the Goddess Riotboo, the Head of Randy, the damn crow, the tree, and a person wearing jeans and a Princeton teeshirt. A young fellow -- early 21st century it seemed to me and clutching a sheaf of paper.

Death spoke.

"We will begin with a reading from one of the 12." He looked at his notes.

"J. M. Pearson from Princeton will read selections from his blank verse epic: "The Austiniad:" a poem of thousands of lines in the manner of John Milton on the subject of Professional Wrestling."

This was the second time I was frozen in theological terror.

The young fellow made his way to the front of the room. Cleared his throat and in a sing song voice began to intone his poem.

"Of consecrated smackdown and that pin
which whoop-ass thwarts a screw job, I propose…"

"Thank you, Mr Pearson, Death interrupted. He stopped for Death and slunk back to his seat. I averted my gaze.

"That was evil," I remarked to the tree.

"Yes," he replied. A good beginning. Perhaps there is some hope after all."

I had no doubt that the person from Princeton was secretly smirking. I knew the type. Very useful in certain situations but I couldn't help but feel that someone from Harvard would be a bit more…

But the great screen above the evil trio was flickering with a goblin light and the room lights were slowly dimming. I can't help it -- a 20th century man -- I was, at once quiet and attentive. The show is about to begin? Sauron's eye was still flickering. Someone should do something about that Will there be a cartoon? The image of the Freedonian flag appeared on the screen. Death spoke.

"Ladies and Gentlemen will everyone rise for the National Anthem?"

Really -- it was a rather stirring moment. One that recalls the singing of the Marseilles in "Casablanca." I admit that I was a bit choked up. The tree was openly weeping I saw. The tune is different but the words are different, of course. Death, I noticed, had a fine baritone and Sauron tried to match him but missed the really low notes.

"Hail, hail, Freedonia.....
Mightiest of mighty nations!
Hail, hail, Freedonia!
Land of the brave and free!"

Of course we sang it again as is required and ended with everybody with outstretched hands turned toward the main door that connects the reception hall with the outer hall.

" Hail, hail, Freedonia.....
Mightiest of mighty nations!
Hail, hail, Freedonia!
Land of the brave and free!"


Of course the leader did not appear again and once more we sang:

"Hail, hail, Freedonia.....
Mightiest of mighty nations!
Hail, hail, Freedonia!
Land of the brave and free!"

Sauron had been chosen to read the final lines:

" I assure you there is nothing to worry about. Father is probably taking extra care in getting into his robes of state. I'll call him."

He rushed the reading I thought.

And then a spotlight followed (who was it?) as he went over to a corner of the room and pulled a tapestried bell cord. This rings a fire bell in Hell, of course. No-one comes but we all sang:

"The bells of hell go ting-a-ling-a-ling For you but not for me: And the little devils how they sing-a-ling-a-ling For you but not for me. O death, where is thy sting-a-ling-a-ling, O Grave, thy victor-ee? The bells of hell go ting-a-ling-a-ling, For you but not for me. "

Sheer bravado, of course, but that is how every meeting of the Great Villains of the Multiverses has begun for like forever.

We all sat down. Now there was an image on the screen. A black and white still it looked like.

And death spoke holding his two hands against his forehead like a carnival mind reader.

"Quiet, please. Will everyone concentrate on the image above. The spirits tell me that there is one person here who knows what it shown. Please. Please. Will everyone concentrate?"

The image was dim. An interior illuminated by moonlight. Oh.. a little fellow -- rather homely I thought is sleeping in that little bed with the Red Ryder bedspread. Yes.. a bureau and above it oh…I knew that painting…Dogs Playing Poker… and something gleaming in the moonlight on the bureau…silver moonly gleam…

Death spoke....rather gently, I thought.

"Yes, LON, that young fellow is you and on the bureau…"

"My silver dollar. The one that my Dad gave me!" I shouted this. Good dear sweet God that was my old bedroom!.

"Tell us more."

"It was (the image didn't change all was till except for the breathing on the angelic looking young lad under the rich bedcovers) the silver dollar my Dad gave me the day Stalin died!

"I remember it well," Death remarked. "His death was announced 7 March, 1953. He went with me a bit sooner than that though. On March 5th. Dead behind the armored doors of his Dacha. Thinking that would keep me out! Poisoned by Beria, of course…"

I interrupted Death.

"I was reading the comics and my Dad came in. The headlines of the paper said "Stalin Dead!"
I asked my Dad "Who was Stalin, Dad?"

"He was a bad man, son" he said and smiled and put his hand in his pocket and flipped a silver dollar that I caught!"

"And then…?" Death asked.

This was hard for me. "When I woke up in the morning the dollar was gone. I guess my Dad took it back to buy booze. I asked him and he…"

"Go on…"

I choked up a bit.

"He told me Stalin had stolen it. I believed him…the bastard…"

"Now, watch…." That was Death.

I could see the door to my room open and a figure creep into the room. I had to watch my Father steal from me. The figure slowly crept to the bureau. Damn you damn you, Dad…

And then a ray of moonlight illumined the face!

"Yes," Death thundered. "Your father didn't lie to you. That is Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili known as Stalin, Father of All Nations! Or, rather, his ghost. Stealing your father's gift! Sneaking into the bedroom of an innocent young boy and doing so!"

We were all thunderstruck. A universal gasp from the assembled villains.

I howled.

"The fucking commie bastard. He's going to pay!"

I sank to my seat racked with great sobs.

Me, not the seat.

Stalin would pay. Let there be no mistake about it.

Oh, how often have we wronged out fathers! All my life I had been so bitter and I recalled again

My father.

Born in the beginning of the 20th century -- that century of universal disaster. Born in the USA to a family of neurotic vaudevillians: Jews who disguised their Jewishness and pretended to be an Argentinian family of tango dancers.

A Jew dancing the tango: the one dance that, above all, speaks of fatality, of destinies engulfed in pain. It is the dance of sorrow.

Then take this Jew (my poor Papa) and arrange it so that he falls in love in Berlin months before Hitler takes over … falls in love with that fatal woman: Ilsa. The rest of the family flees while my Papa -- the fake gaucho -- is drawn inexorably into the darkest of the dark underworlds that existed in Berlin: the Nosferatau: the secret society of decadents with their Vampire balls and Grand Guigonal orgies and my father and Ilsa dancing El tango de la muerte there while Europe descended into madness and my father danced -- danced to the dark music of the bandoneon and the violin: a long stillness as the watchers waited in the dark and my father and Ilsa waited frozen on the stage and then the quick motion that begins the tango, stillness… and then the sudden violence -- the dynamic of a frozen world suddenly shattered, the apotheosis of the twentieth century.

And then -- escape -- the only one of his family to survive he said -- escape to a Steel Mill Town in Pennsylvania -- a shattered man -- where he met my mothers and had to convert to Catholicism to marry her… how horrible it must have been for my father to pretend he was a Catholic! This explained his strange melancholy during my first holy communion and, as I remembered more of the story he told me I thought back to those times when, my mother gone to Novena, he would look himself into a room and all we could would hear was "Hernando's Hideaway" on the old record player and the sounds of my father shuffling about, breathing heavily…

And I had wrong this man. And it was Stalin's fault.

"What kind of silver dollar was it?" The man from Princeton inquiring.

I felt for self control.

"Damn it. It was a 1929 Peace Silver dollar."

"Ah, the Anthony De Francisci Art Deco Liberty Head with a crown of rays on the obverse and a bold majestic eagle at rest on a high mountain top, clutching the laurel wreath of Peace in his talons, on the reverse?"

"Exactly." Fucking Know It All.

"None were minted in 1929…"

I fell that I would have punched him out had I not been distracted by "The William Tell Overture."

There, on the screen, Stalin turned clutching my silver dollar and chuckling evilly. The Overture and then the little figure of the Lone Ranger I kept on my bureau shimmered and glowed and suddenly the Lonliest Ranger leaped from his mighty steed's back from a space near the picture of the Poker Playing Dogs onto the back of the arch murderer and sneak thief. The room burst into applause as Stalin and the Lonliest Ranger struggled silently in my childhood bedroom!

And then -- the picture went out. The room lights went up to reveal the figure of that noble masked rider of the plains standing next to Death. He wiped a tear from his eye.

"He got away." He lowered his head into his hands.

"I failed."

Death put his arm around the weeping Ranger. Everyone was silent listening to the blubbering of that Great Man. It seemed to go on forever.

The rear door burst open. The figure of Steve Shafely strode into the room -- the dapper fellow with his pencil thin moustache..the hero before the Gates of Wrigley.

All eyes turned to him.

"The Jim Jim's have broken through." he announced.

Then -- in an even grimmer tone.

'Sylvania has declared war on Freedonia. This meeting is over."

He strode to our table.

"The Legion of the Doomed must come with me at once."

We all looked around.

Oh, he meant us.

Everything -- as it tends to do in these tales -- happened at once. Captain Spaulding screamed. "Pinky, the Ringbearer!" and the mysterious figure that had pulled the tapestried bell cord that rang the Fire Bell in Hell burst through the crowd with incredible speed and jumped behind a confused Posthumous and seized him around the neck pressing a topaz studded dirk against his carotid artery (if that's the one on the neck). Posthumous -- the same Posthumous who, laughing had skewered the Guardian of the Temple of Smaug in Far Rockaway collapsed utterly trembling managing only a simply inquiry:

"Harpo?"

In the same instant a portal opened behind the Hero Before Wrigley -- a portal opening to (a quick glance confirmed this) to the old Cleveland airport -- to be more precise to the rather shabby first class lounge.

Steve screamed: "Legion of the Doomed -- into the Portal!" and drew a photon cannon of antique design and waved it wildly about at the same time the Eye of Mordor flamed and screamed "Give me the Fucking Ring" and Captain Spaulding jumped to the dais and cold cocked the Lonliest Ranger and, laughing jumped at Death landing a savate kick against the skull of the Dark Visitor who moaned and collapsed to the floor.

Riotboo reacted before anyone and her golden bow was in her hands and an arrow impaled the Eye of Mordor who screamed even as a portal opened behind him and the unholy spawn of the Netherworld began pouring out from its smoking abyss.

"LON -- the Shadow -- he's one of them" Steve screamed -- almost too late for me as the Shadow rushed towards me pulling a marlin spike from beneath the folds of his cloak. I would have been a goner had not the Crow flapped screeching against the Shadows face and the Head of Randy somehow launched himself from his bowling bag and rolled between us causing the frail minion of evil to stumble into the tree who put out a cigarette in his eye screaming "As long as I live Poland will ever be free!"

The Shadow screamed as the Tree danced away and with one branch seized Randy's head and the other the bowling bag and ran for the Portal.

Samson was at my side grinning

"No fucking chandeliers again. We fall here!" and, laughing, jumped in front of me to engage the traitorous Chevalier D'Arq who was advancing on him laughing with a blade in each hand. He had on the Ruby slippers! Stumbled. Kicked them off and I dived for them falling to the floor tumbling and then …I had them!

"Good show!"

It was Bond. James Bond… and he helped me up even as he suddenly gasped -- as we all did. For there standing over what seemed to be the bloody smoking ruin of the Eye of Mordor were two figures.

We knew who they were.

Adolph Hitler.

Joseph Stalin.

Spaulding fell back - appalled. Pinky groaned and stood away from Posthumous who fell into a heap.

"Oh, shit." I muttered.

And I jumped through the portal!

It is always awful when one ends up in Cleveland -- and even more awful when one is stuck in the airport but it is very awful when one has fled there running from the wraiths (for I suppose that’s what they were) of Hitler and Stalin and one is one of the Legion of Doomed who are fleeing or have fled through the portal in various stages of panic and ontological nausea. How fucking long will I be stuck here is the first question one asks and when one looks at the unbearably suffering faces of persons already in the airport there is understandable longing for Death.

posted by & @ 1:31 PM