Hypocrites and Mirrors: The Search for Mr. Cassady and a Guy Named Raul

By Caleb Masaji Yamanaka

Kyle Lynch believes in true love. The summer of 1997 and everything has turned to shit. School is over and every person Kyle knows is going out into the new world. Like a group of Columbus searching for their own new definition. One in which truth, justice, and love all co-exists amongst that which is modern American society.

Its 221 years of propaganda, 70 years since the lost generation, 35 years since the beats, and everything else in between. One can only figure it out for himself. So Kyle sets out first to find himself and then to find something to live for.

The search for Mr. Cassady and guy named Raul.

An idealist with no actual intellect but a genuine heart Kyle travels from L.A., to home, back to L.A., and then upon a road trip that leads nowhere except into the very depths of his own mind.

Kyle:

When you sit down and take a look back at yourself sometimes the initial image is quite appealing. Filled with ideals, convictions, beliefs, and a knack for excitement. You or in the case of myself you lament the good times past. That hot red head in San Diego that could suck a dick like it had been her pacifier all her life. Its all glitz and glamour. Looking back you feel old and haggard. Tired and unfulfilled so you lunge harder into your new life that cant by any means live up to the life youve already lived. Its always the search. Life has to be lived, and level, by level we search to grow. Following the rutted path makes no sense when only the exploration means anything. So we embark with no map, and no star to guide us through our travails. No understanding of love. No understanding of right. No wrong. Just life. Left or right... no middle?

And so it begins...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Aug 27, 2001
• ISBN: 9781465318831

Caleb Masaji Yamanaka

Caleb Yamanaka was born in Hilo, Hawaii in 1974. Then some time later I wrote this book. In between I did things and went places. “It’s all very interesting” I would say.

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Copyright © 2000 by Caleb Masaji Yamanaka.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any

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from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

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Contents

DEDICATION

INTRODUCTION

BOOK I

BOOK II

DEDICATION

thank you mom and dad

BLAH, BLAH, BLAH . . . EVERYBODY ELSE TOO

INTRODUCTION

When you sit down and take a look back at yourself sometimes the initial image is quite appealing. Filled with ideals, convictions, beliefs and a knack for excitement. You—or in the case of myself—lament the good times past. That hot red-head in San Diego who could suck a dick like it had been her pacifier all her life. It’s all glitz and glamour. Looking back you feel old and haggard. Tired and unfulfilled. So you lunge harder into your new life that can’t by any means live up to the life you’ve already lived. It’s always the search. Life has to be lived, and level by level we search to grow. Following the rutted path makes no sense when it’s only the exploration that means anything. So we embark with no map, and no star to guide us through our travails. No understanding of love. No understanding of right. No wrong. Just life. Left or right . . . no middle?

BOOK I

The last night in LA, and I’m sitting in a duplex in central-west Los Angeles where all the poor forgottens who don’t live in South Central are just that . . . forgotten. LA’s White Ghetto. The last night in LA, and I am talking with an innocent three-year-old who always walks up to me and proudly holds out three fingers.

‘How old’er ya?’

‘Free.’

‘What’s that?’

‘Free’. Other hand. Two fingers in the mouth. Cutest boy with little brown freckles, deep blue eyes, light brown hair. Hopefully he won’t be the addict his mom is. That’s all I think to myself.

My last night in my mom’s armpit of America. The boy. Cedric. His mom’s in the kitchen around the corner cooking the ice, and I’m just waiting for my baggy so I can go spend the rest of the time with folks of a bit more consistent character. The fly-by-night addict is just so much more dependable then those old-timers, but then the one-timers never got the goods.

There’s only seven hours till I leave. Till I am on the way. On the Road where it’s only my wits. Me, me, me . . .

Shari is the girl I live with. She’s sitting on the couch next to me. I like the way that she holds onto me whenever we’re out of the house. I never let go of her when we’re at home . . . I can’t. I might go mad.

Rah! Rah! Rah! Speed metal like the old MegaDeath and I can do anything but think.

Shari’s talking.

‘So what are you gonna do when you get home?’

‘Eat a lot.’

I think.

‘Sleep a lot . . . dream a lot.’

Rah! Rah! Rah! fuck you slut metal, metal, metal!

Sid’s not a bad guy . . . he’s actually a pillar when it’s in his best interest, but I mean. What? He tries. Sid knows the woman. I want to take her child. I want to take Cedric and make him my own. He can call me Pops. And I’ll teach him about baseball and surfing. Tell him all the things about the trees and the ocean. How everything is at peace with you, if you’re at peace with yourself. Everything the opposite of the environment that is his life. I don’t like to think about where he’s gonna be in eight years when half his friends are inhaling the best primer Home Depot has to offer.

‘Sid, I’m gonna go get a drink.’

‘I’ll get a ride home.’

‘ Alright. ‘

Shari’s got a car so we walk out the door. Cedric gives me five, on the side, up high, down low . . . man I’m always too slow.

There’s an old-time saloon across the street from Sid’s house in the Chest. It’s by the airport. A nice place to be so I don’t got to worry about missing the plane. God forbid I gotta stay another night here. I already served my time. I’ll be back soon enough.

Shari’s driving; she doesn’t say much ever, but I know what’s in her head, or at least I make it all up to make me feel better about myself. She’s thinking about the last hours, cause she knows we’re never gonna see each other again. She’s thinking about how I never or hardly ever said I loved her. Or how all we really do is have sex, and since it’s not even good sex (because of me) it won’t really matter that I’m gone. She’s rationalizing it all out. I hope it makes sense to her, cause I got a lot of time to think about it, and I’ve had a lot of time to rationalize, and it all don’t make sense to me. This is the Last Summer. School’s out. You’re supposed to get a job. You’re supposed to start living. You’re supposed to make a living. No more of those drunken nights and crazy cavortings with coeds.

‘I haven’t cavorted for a while.’

‘Cavorting’s always fun.’

‘You never cavorted.’

‘I like to watch though.’

She does like to watch. I learned to watch life from her. Who ever said you can’t learn nothing from a woman? It might have been me talking to Justice, but whose gonna remember?

‘What are you gonna remember about me?’ She’s really thinking out loud.

‘The sex.’

We don’t say anything till the bar, but after a drink I’m already playing pool with old Sailor; I don’t know his name, but he just calls me hippie anyway. I think I would like to fly like a crow, and soar. I get drunk. I fall over. Shari helps me to the car. She doesn’t drink. ‘And I got a designated driver to boot.’ What the fuck am I thinking? Leaving! Hah!

Old drunken LA streets, and the trash blows in the wind howling, screaming the crazy screams of pained children, and migrant-working back-breaking laborers. Where do all the Mexican kids go? I want to play baseball and be rich like Fernando. Cesar Chavez had a family, and he worked harder than shit . . . take that too all you latch-keys in Hollywood with your crazy nannies that beat their kids who kick and scream with reckless spoilings. I ran over a fifteen-year-old kid with a ten-thousand-dollar sound system in a brand new mercedes yugo and he didn’t even know the car pool was for two on state roads, but three for the feds.

Sid’s not home, but the door’s unlocked. It’s always unlocked. Sid’s naive like that. I like him for that at this moment.

‘Sid should be the son of an old Hawaiian man.’

‘He doesn’t like the sun.’

‘He’s a good pretender.’

‘Yes he is.’

‘Can you help me with my pants?’

‘Sure baby.’

I make love to her in the little bathroom five foot by five foot with the lights off. Only a shower two by two on my left. She fits perfectly on the sink. I think I hear Sid. It’s only a single so the fun might be over, but I’m hearing things again. I love her, but I’ll never tell her that. She might think I’m nuts.

‘I’ve been better since I got back on the speed.’

‘It’s nice baby, but...’ ‘What?’

‘This is it.’

‘ Yep.’

‘Then it’s pretty nice.’

I like how she worries like a good mother. I need the mom. I need the one who wants to take care. I have no delusions of crazy party girls with big busts, and crazy leather straps. I just want the girl who doesn’t drink and doesn’t care that I’m gonna be . . . one . . . Lovely ladies with full figures and pleasant demeanor who let the crap slide off them. Slickered fish women in yellow suits who feed this world, and let the crazies keep it just enough in control. I can’t help the women that’re just like me. They’re gonna need Shari’s male equivalent or at least be happy with the entire lesbian experience.

Its all the ins and outs and sweat falling from our scalps, down our cheeks, mixing with tongue and lip, saliva and salty sweat of lip to tongue. She moans and purrs with tongue twist and laugh. Playing with the bite, first lightly upon my tongue, and then harder upon my lower lip. Later that night I would feel the one hole her incisor left right below my lip. ‘So you’re gonna have fun on your trip, aren’t you?’ So unaccustomed to care or actual verbal expressions are we? Our relationship is dysfunction that functions to perfection in bed. But that’s all laid out for you later so I’ll just stay with general conversation.

‘Yeah’ . . . pause. ‘That’s great.’

‘Yep . . . I’m gonna miss you.’

‘You ‘re probably gonna forget my name when you get home.’ (Pause) ‘nah.’

‘Sure you will, but that’s OK cause I enjoy your company.’

‘Cool.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Yeah’ she smiles big and reaches for a hug. We do our talking better with touch, whispers, breathing, and oneness within the silence. Language proving to only push us further and further apart. But we are both grown children living lives of selfish fantasy and right now I feel that she couldn’t stay with me much longer for I’m holding her back. But I love her, and that’s what I scream to non-listening walls within myself. Fuck it and shuck it. I’m tired of explanations and realizations. I lose myself in her and kiss.

It’s my last night in LA. I’m in bed with my love. We’re alone. I’m not gonna let her go till Sid gets back with speed.

How would you speak voiceless?—Dream

How do I speak my mind? Voiceless thoughts should be counted with the utmost hearing-impairedness of visitors to my planet. Toothless, tongueless voiced approved synthesisors will not require bedlam of my should. Unfruitful is jibberish heard in trances of states of being. Gone is the will to be a consultant to the Vice-President’s second-in-command of Highway supervision and trash thank-you cards. Gone is the kid of lively persuasion, and boyish attributes all working together in unison fighting all for the same cause commandeered by Admiral Penis. Voiceless souls chant to prepare the journey through sand dunes, shipwrecks, life, death, mountains, cold, heat, never-ending walks taking care of your own, helping, squeezing, hurting and all along suffering theirs. Visionaries sell our future in hell, fire, crinkling, curdling, suffocating masses of heathens. Lusting, loving, drugging, living.

Taking lead, a young, long but not short hair-cut, clumsy-looking, almost childish. Hazed, and dazed, and confused he puts his cane to earth thus starting a journey of soulless voice search. Every third step, and fourth step back traveling, trippy, head on-journeys outside the wall that hell-fired damnation lies. With brick-red bony skyscrapers clinging to air in hopes of escaping charred block ass-phalt grinding, masochistic with clockwork rodents scurrying through the intricate maze constructed for the people by the people. The curly-haired envisions a predecessor of bus-driving clowns of stories seeping musically in one ear, and out the other while he drives along bouncing, and giggling in a Yogatic mantra trance to transform self into car form. Acid letters litter the forefront of the bus as if to say the cartoonish smile that the bus has frozen upon its face could only be a becoming of happiness.

Children play in the streets of Hell Fire with bookish young adults passing pamphlets of death and dismemberment. Heat brings sweat and long thick streams flow riverish down the throats of pagans, and those most opposite. All the while salesmen laugh and kid as another of the endangered corn men dies for slaving and saving the Hell Fire’s righteous. Juxtaposed positions and lines are drawn using bones of those who’ve been systematically shelved for musing too many thoughts at one time.

Heard from beneath a little whimper of respect is the call of the Heathen Free Soul with his cane/walking stick. Lost too Hell Fire’s damnation and not caring for its wrath he has lost himself amongst the throngs of Flesheaters who socialize to call themselves human. Heathen Free Soul clings daily to cattle calls and even abusive language unheard of amongst the Flesheaters, whose generational facade runs so deep that any break from created reality means automatic expulsion. Free Soul clings to the bosom of life every day newborn, wanting to learn the language of nature’s life-giving ability. Every day un-understanding the confusion of creatures most like him.

The feeding frenzy begins at a point when the great light appears in the east never ending for six cycles until the Flesheaters return home to their caves, repenting their Flesheater ways. Heathen Free Soul has become accustom to their pursuits yet as if to be the curly-haired bus he dreams of finding the carnal force behind flesheating and its many customs. With Hell Fire, damnation, flesheating and time biting heel, the long, skinny one takes fire from water, and trots backwards to search the mystical oasis of flesh truth. Mystical truths and voice and voicelessness scream in silence for the truth seeking one who unknown to mere society creates genius with every second of life. The Genius of legend of folk tales told to a new generation of Free Souls who search for theirs. Picked and reincarnated for every generation as only the Dalai Lama himself can understand. The Genius, the source of light who has found his voice, understands voicelessness, and the possessor of the mystical that is the truth.

‘Whom do you seek?’

Heathen Free Soul speaks to his dream, practicing for the moment his vision takes mortal form. Lulling himself to sleep in Hell Fire using raw forms of meditation Heathen Free Soul saves himself from insanity with thoughts of the Genius. Possessor of great powers and truths, Heathen Free Soul understands that genius will be found in the depths of Hell Fire. Working next to all the Flesheaters secretly disrupting the normality of their benign existence.

The pamphlet puppets with their extreme beliefs forcibly recruit the genius only to be turned toward another light that their needy hearts will now believe in. Genius the jester makes Hindu, Muslim, and Christian, Buddhist. Always a Flesheater the people fail too recognize the Genius. Genius the outcast, because his light is not the mask they wear. While Heathen Free Soul is not one with Flesh society. The Genius is one neither with or without. Moving unknown as a life living, life understanding, life loving, pre-destined entity. Genius the Heathen, Genius the Flesheater, Genius the life.

Thunder claps! God pisses vehemently to wake the Heathen.

‘It’s time to continue!’

Sleeping cardboard boxes sagging in torrents of rain Heathen leaves the space folding neatly for future use; he tucks it under his right arm, and enters out the ‘Black Alley’ into Hell Fire domain, no longer under poverty’s protective blanket Heathen enters Main street searching, asking the questions, hoping for the answer. One man slicked with black hair neatly manicured stops mid-ignored stride to acknowledge a question.

‘Come’ere boy.’

‘Who, me?’ says the expression.

‘That’s right I know the Genius. Luckily for you he’s a close friend o’mine, and you look like you need the help.’ Heathen sensing the urgency chases, following after the pin-striped Flesheater knowing full well that the Genius will know all. Will help all. Will give all.

‘The Genius has got to be the real Genius cause in his Genius ways he’s got a Flesheater friend who don’t even realize how much he needs the Genius.’ Idle thought from an open mind.

Into a funny noiseless cave dwelling-building the Flesheater leads the young Heathen. Excitement builds as the goal nears. Truth for once to be told by knower to seeker. The Flesheater constantly speaks of mind, and truth, of karma, and work of meaningless entities that interest Heathen the least. To a back room decorated in circles and polkadot colors. Heathen is led to a man meditating very industriously. Man introduced as the Genius. The Flesheater bows before the Genius who has been named ‘The Great One’ by his flock. Not understanding such humility Heathen decides to stand.

‘Do you not bow to whom you seek?’ The Great One speaks downwardly in Heathen’s direction.

‘Should I understand humility for the Genius? Or should the Genius understand humility in front of a Heathen?’

‘You the Heathen search for truth. For the Way, but will not humble to I The Great One?’ Searching for words Heathen is frozen in a trance hoping to understand The Great One’s disposition.

‘Humble I am, and humble myself as you wish, but then may I ask how humble humility will take its toll on peoples of said equal creation, and generosity in the eyes of our maker?’

Circles swirl, and The Great One said Genius rants as if to bring the stucco walls down upon all inside. Flesheaters cower in the presence of their master, begging Heathen to acknowledge the righteousness of The Great One’s words.

Heathen speaks. ‘The Genius I search for knows all, shows all, enlightens all, respects all.’ Flesheaters point in all directions; somehow voiceless their devotion must be understood to be enough to assure one of The Great One’s powers.

‘If I follow, will I not learn to only understand misguided visions of one who aspires for want and greatness?’ No answers. Only questions.

‘For sixty dollars a month you will know all in my ultimate visions of truth and enlightenment.’ Smiling jester smiling Great One.

‘I’m sorry for my Genius seeks only to enlighten all, to teach the understanding of their own vision. NOT worship!’

Twinkling stares melt, and the room ceases to exist. Great laughing mingles with cries of the believers. Fear shivers down the spine of Heathen Free Soul, filling him with the need to move on. On the main street he is allowed to breathe once more, and life’s food fills his soul.

Disenchanted no longer Heathen sees the evil of Hell Fire, and its minions. False prophets preaching false light, truth for flesh, and a genius is no more. Within the swirling circle, and light, Heathen’s clarity returned, and all understanding is known.

The Great One once a Heathen had also searched for genius. Corrupted by flesh, and an overriding addiction to society brought the man to his knees. If genius is truth then society is false. Society and its many arms, hands, feet, and brains led a young Heathen much like Heathen Free Soul into the depths of one’s self. Indefensible to treachery. As the young Heathen learned of genius thus did society control what knowledge was handed down. Until the day came when the virginal, flower-soft-pedaled Heathen claimed genius for himself, backed by Flesheaters and clouded by falseness, the Heathen was lost.

Ego the Flesheater’s a mass destructive, atomic-bombish soul-destroyer. Heathen Free Soul cried a tear for the fallen, and set out with knowledge that Ego was chasing him. Beautiful dreams become nightmares of a soul constantly swirling downward passing faces of smiling pamphleteers wielding computer notes in one hand, and boned daggers in the other. Fluffy purple dinosaurs selling crack at the neighborhood playground, money wanters with squeaky clean smiles. Swirling images of societal destruction, global upheaval, fire, horseman, volcanic uprisings, spontaneous combustions, and all along the society thrives growing stronger. Villages crumble as towers reach for the sky searching for their god in the only way shown. Death. Families die as individuals forget their brothers. Greed, hate, fear runs rampant as Ego’s stranglehold grows. Feeding the haves to the starving have-nots. Vicious circles of societal life and death. Scenes foreign to Heathen character, but not to Heathen self. In his nightmare Heathen is overwhelmed, and eaten by the spiral. Sucked whole and dry like the Great One. A mindless shell pursuing a mindless life.

As day breaks, and night falls, Heathen Free Soul travels the limits of Hell Fire, asking the questions, and haunting the answers. Still unfound, but still as the newborn suckling a life giving bosom. Answers from the false haves brought Heathen amongst many Flesheaters known to him as the acquaintance of the other acquainted. Still Ego persist, wanting to entice, to entrap his soul. Finding shelter in his thoughts Heathen muses thoughts of Ego, self and the Genius. Always the prize Genius strives to reach Heathen a true heart, but always, Ego enters blades drawn with minions. Believers are the Ego’s centurions, those willing to possess that which Heathen Free Soul has, that which is Heathen’s guiding light.

Again with raw meditation Heathen closes his eyes only to be awoken by that which has become known as genius. In the form of a man with long, but not short hair, skinny and clumsy. The genius peers into the eyes through the soul of Heathen. No speech needed the genius flows through Heathen’s body. Every extremity lights up on fire, but unburning. Soothing warmth takes hold, caressing every being of that which is Heathen Free Soul. The Genius found the seeker. The giver and the wanter in the base of all human form. For a short period of uncountable Flesheater time Heathen understands the genius. As only human form understands genius. Then as quickly as a shooting star, peace and understanding of the truth has been replaced by the understanding of what it is to be genius. Thus the beginning of the search. Again.

Genius uncontrollable, and only briefly attainable. Answering all life’s questions without an ability to fully comprehend. Heathen mystified and satisfied knows the truth of Genius the jester. The Genius that is all entity. The Genius that is all Flesheater. The Genius deep, dwelling, insecurities of self only veiled by no need of search. Genius hidden, but open. Genius the one. Genius for all.

Home

‘Mr Lynch . . . Mr Lynch . . . ‘ Piercing screech of a voice. How does one such as her become the flight specialist that renders all the service for flight crews and passengers alike? My eyes are open, but my mind’s asleep. It’s going on some day and then some since I’ve had the real shut eye. I sleep, eyes wide awake. ‘Mr Lynch’, she screeches, but she’s only whispering. My mind’s still asleep. She’s not so becoming with her sad wrinkled face and clothes a size too tight. Oh if you were that younger version, unworn and oh so tight you would fit the costume.

‘What?’

‘The plane’s empty.’ I look around. By God she’s right. The sticky, heavy dew-rain, eighty-degree balm of the islands lies on my shoulders. Another forty-five and I’ll be home in sweet sweet Hilo. I’ll be ready for a good sleep once I’m in my bed. The speed in all its brevity pours through the pores and my skin’s flooding the shirt I wear. Everything’s brighter in Hawaii. Hawaiian women greet you as you exit in the funky seventies hula uniforms that are actually Tahitian, but the Haoles think it’s Hawaiian. ‘So you gives the customuz what they want. So as they keep coming back to the islands. Tourists. Gotta lov ‘em.’ God bless Hilo and all its attractive rain. Two hundred inches a year. That’s the pre-droughting period.

Pale skin and pale faces have been replaced by the ethnic soup. LA’s so-called melting pot. Beautiful tanned Asian women, blacker than the black man with blue eyes, and ehu hair (light golden brown that can only be the ehu of my dreams). So many with wishful painless contented eyes. Nobody is angry and over-anxious in Hawaii. ‘Everybody just gotta kick back, drink some be-as and smoke a joint. Brah relax! ‘

Shari doesn’t like the sun. How can such a perfect woman not like the sun? Wasn’t she meant to take care of me. I’m an island boy, even though everybody just figures the born-again Haole is never going move back home. ‘We’ll see . . . we’ll see.’ Half-Japanese . . . half-Haole . . . some Norwegian, Irish, German, sputnik, crustacean, elkeseltzer . . . I moved to LA.

‘Hey bro, you from Hawaii?

‘Yeah.’

‘Man, all them Japs are just buying up the place.’ I heard this in ‘92 in LA, when them Japs still had the cash to spend.

‘Yeah . . . eh I’m Japanese.’

‘Good thing you don’t look it’ . . . pah, booom, bah . . . and I can’t even fight. Over and out, see yah bruddah.

I catch the early flight cause there’s a flight to Hilo every hour on the hour. Call Mom. Have her pick me up. It’s only another forty-five but I’m gonna be tired when I get there. It’s sleep time. I’ll talk to the family tomorrow.

Justice, time and squirrels

Justice Counter isn’t called Just by anybody but only one person that being me, but Just’s cool about that. Nobody knows but he’s busy like crazy unlearning everything. Justice just graduated this past summer. His parents would say: ‘In the year of our Lord 1997, in the month of May on the day of Saturday the ninth, our son Justice Counter finished a degree, was awarded a bachelor of science in the unlearned sciences’.

Just’s crazy unlearning right now, and he’s frantic cause he knows he’s got a busy summer ahead of him. All kinds of plans, and routes, treks, rides, running crazy, and first he needs to forget everything that has ever been institutionalized in his mind. (I tried unlearning once and it worked for two years I kept forgetting how old I was until the day came when I really, truly, to your honest Lord I had to think about that age that I was. It hasn’t been the same since I remembered. There’s something in that thar unlearning.) I don’t think his parents think it’s fair that he’s forgetting everything that they paid for him to learn, on the other hand they paid all that money for him to learn that you need to know nothing to really survive in this world.

‘Tell me what you find Mr Squirrel.’

Chase, chase, chase—run after what’s got to be found. Just is busy chasing, chasing squirrels around the woods of Tahoe. I lost Just to the winds. He takes the ‘shrooms and begins walking deeper into the woods.

‘Don’t leave the site!’ His parent scream—mind-set.

‘I’m tripping.’

J walks into the woods—’here Mr Squirrel, where are you?’ He walks for hours until he’s tired and dehydrated lying for rest. Nap time. Don’t sleep. Shutter. Flutter. Just wakes and the rodent is standing log’s end away and is peering—What are you doing lying down on such a beauty of a day? And lie like that sleeping dog cause it’s all about the now and time is only but a glimpse at a watch away.

He chases the squirrel off his perch. Running faster and faster. Bonk. Thud. You have to watch for low-lying branches. But Just’s busy unlearning so all that’s gonna do is help. He comes home with visions of children drawing and painting subjects blowing away families who don’t understand the importance of innocence. Just is busy wanting while all of us are still busy lying. ‘Who’s right?’

Kerouac talks about the living and the dying, the importance of life and the wishing for death, but he’s beat by his own omission. Just is busy unlearning. He mimics poems of his favorite author’s. ‘Who’s right?’

-America, Jack, William and Allen are dead-America, where have all the hippies gone? (Talks about adventures with Just to come later cause his adventure ain’t over.)

AMERICA REVISITED

America, all the poets have died

-all we have are hangers-on.

America, you silenced the innovators

You made Dr Leary a narc.

Where are all the spirits and the liquor?

America, I don’t know vocab.

-Slackers have complaint,

America, I work fifty hours a day

-I only make minimum, cut me some slack.

I can’t express myself anymore, my tongue and will have left.

-I dream of when I had a tongue and will,

America?

America, you love your conservatives.

-Where is the adventure?

You said affirmative action doesn’t work.

America, I like them stinkin’ Japs

-should I be interned? (I’m biased)

America, I want to grow corn and raise my crops

-I want free land and a wife with pickets

America, your cities are killing urban youth Nobody cares about anything anymore-I don’t care. Thank you, America . . .

Just is still busy chasing squirrels and I don’t know if he’s gonna be home for dinner. He’s in Tahoe finding the way defining life and nobody’s gonna notice. He’s talking crazy talk that only he understands and the Rangers are gonna shoot on sight. Maniac!

As I’ve been told:

‘Kyle when you’re asleep the shadows come and dance, playing around the sights only to let the other levels fall through the cracks. I’m out in the trees and that Mr Squirrel he’s talking to me, he’s saying—’hey if you catch me you can have all the secrets’—and I’m digging the fact that all squirrels do is gather nuts, eat, sleep and play. Brah! (with emphasis) Brah! Squirrels know how to play. You ever see squirrels—they fuck with each other and they play’.

‘I ain’t ever seen that’, I remark (glib).

‘Did you know form is worthless?’

‘No.’

‘So I’m after him and he’s leading me through pines and reds, I notice oak and elderwoods. I’m not even sure what elderwoods are, but it’s all there. I’m jumping from boulder to boulder over pine needles, leaping and skipping the entire time, smiles on my face—’I’m gonna get you little man’—he’s running and skipping and all I can do is imitate cause the only way to skip through the forest is squirrel-style—they know how it’s done. Further and further I’m getting far from the camp now, but I gotta keep going cause I gotta know. I just gotta know. ‘You furry bastard skedaddle all you want cause I’m on the case like Dragnet, I ain’t giving up till it’s done’. He hears me, I can tell, but then he climbs a tree and I’m lost. That’s the trick I’m lost and in the middle of the wood half the things I’m seeing ain’t even real and now I gotta find my way home.

This is where I just nod when I hear the story cause I understand the squirrel, he was real although Just’s having second thoughts. It’s all about who’s in the right place, and who’s outta place? That’s nature.

Tying knots in the cord will make your escape easier

It’s a week later till I get my bearings and all is well in Hilo. Meanwhile my mom is feeding me and telling me—’my, you’re skinny . . . you look sick’—’thanks, Mom’. So Mom’s feeding me and Dad’s out golfing. loving life. Hilo Boy. I gotta tell you about the Hilo boy cause it’s like old country boy legend. If you’re in the city, or if you’re in today’s ‘country’ either way the good ol’ Hilo Boy is what you gotta understand is life at its purest. Country all the way. It’s for some, and not for all. You gotta be tough and you gotta be a man, otherwise it’s gonna be miserable.

HILO BOY—bruddahs who can only live in one place (Hilo, Hawaii). Home. When home is about going fishing. When home is about Keaukaha, Honolii, Papaikou, Pepekio, Uka Falls, Boiling Pots, Kole Kole parties, Hakalau to sleep it off, Cane field hook-ups, Civic Beefs, Side Salads, Wong Stadium, Mullet runs, Papio, Ulua, Bay Front, Pines, Wainaku Mill, 4-miles, Gentry Homes, Panaewa, Da Boys, Da Chicks, Front Street, and Downtown. When this is life then you are definitely a Hilo Boy. Throw in a Kapoho run or a Hapuna run and it’s all about Hilo. You can’t live there if you ain’t born there. Sometimes you can’t even be the Hilo Boy no matter how much you wanna be . . . Hilo?

My days consist of waking at eight to the old child hood rants—up an at ‘em, Reading, Riting, Rithmatic, if you don’t get up you don’t get smart. ‘Garrett, if you ain’t up when I get back you’re getting the water’—don’t mess with Moms and the water cause she’ll dump the entire glass on ya if you don’t get up, get dressed, and go to school. Everybody is out of the house by eight-thirty and I have the place to myself. A stumble down the hall to get that first cup of coffee, and out to the patio to watch the seniors putt about the golf course. I sit as they walk by. Smoke cigarettes, smoke a joint, drink coffee, eat, lowly Japanese men who hang down low because of the years of the farm and honorable labor in the cane. They walk gently, wishing that they’d taken the game up sooner. Little men who hold their heads up in pride when you ask them about work, about the Luna, about life on the plantation. Tradewinds blow the sweet scent of Ginger and Plumaria through the air you sit hallucinating, translucent, stoned on the poor man’s speed ball (Thanks to Wip from Mexico).

The day moves on, my brother Art comes over and picks me up with some of the boys, old Hilo Boys who like the weed, the drink and the fight. All the woman love them in their own sincere sort of awkwardness. I don’t understand it, and for that the woman pay me no attention. Tony Miyamoto, and Michael Stone. Tony I only know as Art’s friend who can hunt and has a cherry Mustang that is sweet for the loving little girls. Tony played baseball and now works somewhere with the resorts on the Kona side of the island. He’s got the crip and don’t let anybody tell you anything different. Cool guy always thinking about what he’s saying, and always joking with whatever it was that he said. Hilo Boy!

Michael Stone is my old boy, I got stories about him that will have to wait for another time, but he and I got into it later on, but this is a story about now, and that was after. So if you are now thoroughly confused Michael’s Brother Alan is my best friend in the whole wide world. Who got my back when the world was gonna crash down on it, who had the balls to break up all my fights by beating up the guys who wanted to have the fights with me (to tell the truth only once I ever wanted to fight—other than that I was too much of a pussy to even raise my fists for fear of severe beating).

Michael is the sweetest most lost boy in the world, and if I could get half the women he can I would probably be married by now. He is sincerity. He is Just’s lost brother, cause he has already unlearned by not bothering to listen when they told him it was right, and you better listen to it now before it’s never said again. He can say the dumbest shit in the world, but sincerity is ripe with irony, and Michael without fear of sounding absurd is the purest of all that is irony. Contradiction upon contradiction. Yet. He is right. (Don’t tell him).

‘Kyle’ . . . Michael talking . . . ‘Kyle, I don’t like fighting . . . I hit somebody, he drops , or he drops me, then what? One of us is dropped and the other is out, and who won? I can’t even remember why anymore.’

‘Brah.’ That’s me. ‘Brah, fighting is for those who can’t understand the law of time and karma . . . Bachi . . . you kick my ass . . . you break your leg . . . Bachi!’

‘Yeah, brah, it’s wrong . . . wrong.’

‘Eh, that guy is looking at you.’

‘Where? ‘

‘Nah . . . I kuddish.’ he’s still looking.

‘Where?’ Mike, getting antsy and turning beet red, which is his way. Weather,drinking heavily or just adrenaline rush . . . beef, beef, beef. Red, red, red . . .

‘D’ere.’

‘What! Nah, fuck it.’ Mike turns, the guy is still looking—he wants the beef, and he’ll get it . . . he’s a Hilo Boy, no irony. ‘Brah! What!?! It’s all beefs and brawls, and the last man standing gets the girl. Welcome to Hilo . . . we don’t shoot nobody.

Art picks me up—I’m stoned, but it’s gonna be a nice day with lots of fun and craziness. No artsy crap. No Haole shit. KYLE.

V-dub bus all the windows down Alpha Blondy singing sweet sweet . . . it’s all Pakalolo. Croon for love, and hope, African, uh Hawaiian. Love songs, and ballad. Hope. The Marines are in the bay and when the queen signs the signature it’s gonna be wheat fields, baseball and apple pie for everyone. Joe Blow Americans talking about how the locals are so unfriendly—’I don’t like-what’s this Haole? Eh Haole what chu doing? Da kine where you from?’

‘Don’t call me Haole.’

‘Don’t call me Jap.’ Or don’t call me spic, nigger, chinc, pake, moke, honky, redneck, wop, mick, spade, coon, charley, slant eye, fag, queer. A man by any name is still a man.

That’s what Romeo was saying. We all call you what you are cause you’re the white that said it’s right.—I ain’t mean nothing by it boss! . . . Honest.

Sweet essence and smoke cigarettes of ganga pass, puff, here, to the back, and a puff puff. Light and shades, swirls of color, calm and peace. Michael’s talking about how all those damn soldiers in Vietnam got what was coming cause they didn’t even belong there. Last time he talked like this I had to do all I could just to keep a vet from breaking his legs in half, and feeding them to him with some egg noodle hell hole mud muck soup. P.O.W . . . that was his uncle to boot.

‘Ask Kyle. If I was drafted for dat fucken was it woulda been straight up your ass to Canada and whole bunch of them big Canuck bears fathering all my children cause it ain’t even about fighting no other person’s war.’

Nobody’s really listening, just agreeing to the music, stoned and happy. The sun’s bright, all the myna birds won’t stop the chattering. The Keaukaha stretch. Five miles of coast, beaches on a two-lane road, old fishing, old Hawaiians on the side living Hemingway dreams of peace and Spain. If I’m ever again in Hemingway’s Spain I’ll know that Keaukaha is the only thing next too it Too much ohana and old Hawaiian culture. Passing big Banyan trees, coconuts, young girls in bikinis walking from the old shave ice store by Hukilau and its koi ponds. Past Break Wall, and Front Streets with all the tents, and poi, where’s the lomi lomi, old Hawaiian style with cable. Honekahakaha, Yacht Club with its private tennis court, pools, expensive food, private . . . private . . . private . . . four miles across from Seaside and its acres of mullet farms. Pass all the coast and nooks, little swimming holes, and places where only the locals know to have fun. Behind Seaside on the old back road you can get ‘shrooms from the pastures. Where I lost my mind and that only continued till I found it on old Highway 50 (but that’s gonna be some time later). Sun’s shining, all the girls are out to play. Continue to Richardson’s across from Alan’s old house, which would also make it Michael’s old house. Where I learned to surf, and where I met the great Jonas who could surf better than anybody I ever met, but time takes its toll on youth, and life leaves its mark, and now I think he just stopped. There’s sadness in dem d’ ere paradises.

Past Richardson’s where the road ends is King’s Landing. Old Hawaii. Old Fishing. Deep King’s Landing