JAN KEROUAC

In the previous post, I was shocked and saddened to learn she had died. I stumbled across her work back in 2001, after coming back from Nebraska, spending a lot of time in the library, having little else to do. Read Baby Driver and then Trainsong, and fell in love. So honest and raw, just like her dad, and so sad.
She only met him twice. Once when she was nine and her mother had filed a paternity suit, he denied that he was her father. The blood tests showed he was and paid $52 a week in child support. The second was when she was 15 and running to Mexico, at his parents in New Hampshire, where he spent his time watching TV with a 5th of whiskey. His parents got nervous and asked her to leave, which was the beginning of Baby Driver. He died a couple of years later in 1969.
Later on, after she had been published, the likes of Ginsburg and Kesey, solicited her to speak and write about her father. She definitely inherited his talent and wanderlust and also his pain.
She died in 1996 of kidney failure, a footnote. I hadn't heard but was involved in my own rehab at the time.
I'm just so thankful that, despite my own failings, I still have my daughter as my friend and my hope. So when you marvel at the Scroll and praise him for the icon he was, remember he was also a bastard.

CONFLUENCE

Jack Kerouak Scroll on display. Don't need to tell you about the writing or the story. I was born at the same time, Spring 1951. Struck more by the sudden knowledge of Jan, born 1952. Baby Driver and Trainsong.

LAST TIME BLUES

Eight Ball Blues(S. Goodman)
Well I wish I had some memories
That I'd keep inside my trunk
I wish I had a nickel
for every beer I've drunk
And I wish I had me a sailing ship
That'd take me over the sea.
I wish I could talk you in to coming home with me
Is this the part where I came in
I've heard this song before
Had a couple too many
but I think I can find the door
And I do not know your name my friend
But I've seen that face before
Well I saw it in the Jail House
and I saw it in the War
and I saw it in my mirror
Well just a couple of times before
I wish I was the Candyman
sweet as I could be
In every town the ladies hang 'round
Just to get a taste of me
I wish I was an opry star
Or had me a Ph. D.
I wish I had the common sense
to be satisfied with me
Is this the part where I came in
I've heard this song before
Had a couple too many
but I think I can find the door
And I do not know your name my friend
But I've seen that face before
Well I saw it in the Jail House
and I saw it in the War
Well I saw it in my mirror
Well just a couple of times before
I wish I had a magic pocket,
That'd keep all my money in
I wish I knew a good excuse
for all of my mortal sins
Well they say 'to know the best in life,
you gotta know the worst
I wish that I had been the clown,
who thought up that one first
Is this the part where I came in
I've heard this song before
Had a couple too many
But I think I can find the door
And I do not know your name my friend
But I've seen that face before
Hey, I saw it in the Jail House
and I saw it in the War
Well I saw it in the mirror
A couple of times before

SPACE AND TIME

Relative

Intricately woven; intimately coiled

Cannot occupy the same; limited by light

Faith and art; spirit and flesh

Untimely spaces of silence

SHELTER FROM THE STORM

'Twas in another lifetime, one of toil and blood

When blackness was a virtue and the road was full of mud

I came in from the wilderness, a creature void of form.

"Come in," she said,"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

And if I pass this way again, you can rest assured

I'll always do my best for her, on that I give my word

In a world of steel-eyed death,

and men who are fighting to be warm.

"Come in," she said,"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

Not a word was spoke between us, there was little risk involved

Everything up to that point had been left unresolved.

Try imagining a place where it's always safe and warm.

"Come in," she said,"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

I was burned out from exhaustion, buried in the hail,

Poisoned in the bushes an' blown out on the trail,

Hunted like a crocodile, ravaged in the corn.

"Come in," she said,"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

Suddenly I turned around and she was standin' there

With silver bracelets on her wrists and flowers in her hair.

She walked up to me so gracefully and took my crown of thorns.

"Come in," she said,"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

Now there's a wall between us, somethin' there's been lost

I took too much for granted, got my signals crossed.

Just to think that it all began on a long-forgotten morn.

"Come in," she said,"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

Well, the deputy walks on hard nails and the preacher rides a mount

But nothing really matters much, it's doom alone that counts

And the one-eyed undertaker, he blows a futile horn.

"Come in," she said,"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

I've heard newborn babies wailin' like a mournin' dove

And old men with broken teeth stranded without love.

Do I understand your question, man, is it hopeless and forlorn?

"Come in," she said,"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

In a little hilltop village, they gambled for my clothes

I bargained for salvation an' they gave me a lethal dose.

I offered up my innocence and got repaid with scorn.

"Come in," she said,"I'll give you shelter from the storm."

Well, I'm livin' in a foreign country but I'm bound to cross the line

Beauty walks a razor's edge, someday I'll make it mine.

If I could only turn back the clock to when God and her were born.

"Come in," she said,"I'll give you shelter from the storm."
Copyright © 1974 Ram's Horn Music

DYING FLOWERS

After supper we'd run out to play
In the cinder alley behind our house
In the endless summer dusk
Till the last gasp of light would give way
To the evening star
And our mothers voice
Calling from the back fence
We'd hobble home
Black as the coal dust
Immediately immersed in waters of love
Helluva bathtub ring

JUNE 5,1968

Forty years ago today, Robert Kennedy was shot after addressing supporters in California, having just won their primary and veritably clinching the Democratice nomination. "Now its on to Chicago and let's win there." I was watching, at 17, graduation looming and VietNam. The train, just five years before, and MLK 2 months, when Bobby was here that night.

Ironic that Sen. Obama clinched this week. Limited hope, the best I can do, after so much.

But I will use this space to shake my head. The OWW's (old white women). Get over it.
It wasn't stolen, she lost. Sexist remarks? I remind you of a true 'iron lady', Golda Meir.
David Ben-Gurion once said of her, "the only man in the government".

The Clintons, plural. Maybe now she can break away. Obama needs her in the Senate. Nothing is going through without her, especially now that Ted might be gone.

Well, I move on with my life.