by Rick Young | May 30, 2018 | Uncategorized
A Frank Blair (1915) hologram
bleakly announces the death of Sun Ra (’93).
So opens the new Howard Hawks (1896) film,
a bizarre new take on the murder of Joan of Arc in 1431,
starring Keir Dullea (1936) and Michael J. Pollard (1936)
as a conjoined-twins version of the heroine, voiced by Mel Blanc (1908),
whose last vision is of Jimi Hendrix at Berkeley (1970),
the great lefty axeman portrayed by Stepin Fetchit (1892)
in a marvel of editing. An uncredited walk on by Clint Walker (1927)
as Turk Lown (1924) relieves tension and leads to the final gasp
as Gayle Sayers (1943) and Lydell Mitchell (1949) arise from the pyre
as Joan’s conjoined souls and are transplanted into the bodies of
Mike Sadek (1946) and Mike LaCoss (1956) as life’s eternal battery.
Somewhere in the mix, Max Carey dies (’76).
He is played, with lifelike precision, by John Felske (1942).
Joan’s song vocals by Idina Menzel (1971).
“Hymn To Sun Ra” by Ceelo Green (1974).
The movie is dedicated to the memory of Claude Pepper (d. ’89).
by Rick Young | May 30, 2018 | Poem, Posthumous Additions
A Frank Blair (1915) hologram
bleakly announces the death of Sun Ra (’93).
So opens the new Howard Hawks (1896) film,
a bizarre new take on the murder of Joan of Arc in 1431,
starring Keir Dullea (1936) and Michael J. Pollard (1936)
as a conjoined-twins version of the heroine, voiced by Mel Blanc (1908),
whose last vision is of Jimi Hendrix at Berkeley (1970),
the great lefty axeman portrayed by Stepin Fetchit (1892)
in a marvel of editing. An uncredited walk on by Clint Walker (1927)
as Turk Lown (1924) relieves tension and leads to the final gasp
as Gayle Sayers (1943) and Lydell Mitchell (1949) arise from the pyre
as Joan’s conjoined souls and are transplanted into the bodies of
Mike Sadek (1946) and Mike LaCoss (1956) as life’s eternal battery.
Somewhere in the mix, Max Carey dies (’76).
He is played, with lifelike precision, by John Felske (1942).
Joan’s song vocals by Idina Menzel (1971).
“Hymn To Sun Ra” by Ceelo Green (1974).
The movie is dedicated to the memory of Claude Pepper (d. ’89).
by Rick Young | May 23, 2018 | Uncategorized
Thoughts and prayers go out to bears whom hunters can now stalk inside their den.
That’s not the only rub: they now can shoot the cub. O, what it takes to create manly men!
And caribou can now be shot from boats. A reindeer can be threatening when it floats.
We’ll turn back every rule and reach new heights in cruel.
Our wildlife will survive just as footnotes. But we’ll all look so smart in our fur coats.
by Rick Young | May 17, 2018 | Poem
Willow rite. Weeping wrong.
Another palliative platter
of poached persuasions
for the putative pluribus.
Magic gooning gone wild.
The free state falling.
Puppets and drones
tracking phones, pheromones,
flames fanned by versed robots,
ice caps drooling down Broadway.
The great white way is closed.
“For Repairs,” says a sign
your system cannot understand.
by Rick Young | May 8, 2018 | Poem
Reasonable dialog, dead as a hot dog,
has been packed away with the rats.
Freedom of thinking, burnt out and stinking,
is now criticized as ersatz.
In the land of money, the currency is lies.
The golden rule’s the stuff of fools.
Forget the things you learned in schools,
The new frontier, it seems, is where truth dies.
There is no benefit for honesty.
It’s painted now as last resort of rubes.
Misinformation has a ministry,
while truth and trust slide quickly down the tubes.
