Singing in the car
For Adrienne Thomas
Cruising down 101 S., long smooth continuum of freeway, on and off ramps
steering wheel hands, left foot on the accelerator
white clouds adrift over the Peninsula
fine hairs shining on my forearm
This is another nowhere like suburban shopping centers
stacks of bottled water outside supermarkets
multistorey office blocks whose sheen is empty sky
discarded territories under freeways
places where the spirit flutters like a crimson butterfly and finds no place to land.
It’s time to sing.
Yes it’s time to sing.
Low notes. Deep rich man sounds.
Here it comes… guts full of breath and it’s AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
yes that’s a good note more please AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH
Sing it sing it sing it from the liver yes liver in there open up now
sing it from the unkempt toenails yes all 10 of you
seeing it from the buttocks and the bollocks oh yes there’s a sound
sing it from forgotten chakras and hollow reverberating bones and all the blood the going out of it the coming back AAAAAAEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEUUUUUUUUUU
Sing it from the brain the brain miraculous inside the skull
And yes another note EEEEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOO and another AAAAAAAAAAAIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEE and yet another and another
Here’s a tune, a solemn pattern, ancient chorus, aboriginal maybe or Russian
wish you were here could hear it
melody always sounding
sounding out from deep within the onwarding of everything
so big it sounds from all my being
all except the steady auto pilot checking speed and watching out for cops
AAAAAA AAAAAAAAA AAAAAAA EEEEEEE EEEEEE AAAAAA
It’s changing my goodness yes I love it!
And now yes I am singing for the world, no for humanity
for we who seem intent on digging an enormous grave we can all jump into
yes this is for us for all of us, a big theme singing from my deep big bass
oh God it feels good!
This is for everybody driving south on 101 today
the lady in the Lexus, the man in the Mercedes, the Asian family in the SUV
and for everyone who isn’t
and I’m thinking as I sing I’m wishing you were singing too
yes you and you and you and all of you
singing as you drive down 101 south,
singing from your toenails and your unseen fluids
singing from the life that lives inside you
everyone on all the freeways in America, singing for the world.
Emmanuel Williams
RANT
You who reap without sowing
you who are possessed by the need to possess
who are controlled by the need to control
you for whom compassion is a character defect
for whom moderation is an unknown town
30,000 feet below you
you who despise those who obey you
and destroy those who defy you
you who are obsessed by endless power games
you who gamble with tribes and eco-systems
you who jump the cosmic line .
Listen!
Ours is the planet you are pillaging
Ours are the leaders you buy or bypass.
Fat as lava, you boom behind the bulletins you own
behind the darkened windows and the guarded portals
of your parasitic universe
impose the brute momentum of your insatiable appetites
bleed the wetback in your toxic fields
and slam the factory gates on anyone who cries
THIS IS NOT HUMAN!
Blind as cancer
loyal as a psychopath.
your system swells and spreads
draining Gaia with its huge prehensile gob
You who think you own it
you are owned.
You who think you are its master
are its servant.
You are a victim
as we will never be.
Beyond the hum of Lears and cyber-cash
Eve and Adam sniff the wind
And scream for all their children
And their dreams.
Listen!
Emmanuel Williams
These poems were first posted in Subud Creative