Vendimia al Mar

Eric, 5 March 2003

“My beloved, I have neglected you these months. I beg your forgiveness. The focus has been unceasingly upon the Path. I have not attended to your delicate and sensitive needs, but sometimes it is necessary. Please know that I never forgot you, that I have longed to dance with you, to hold you, to be with you, and now, at last, we do stake our claim, upon this our night. To touch and to be tender and to love one another.

“You are the devil,” purred she from behind her intoxicating, beguiling smile.

“The devil has only as much power as you give him my dear.”

“Then I give you mine,” she giggled, knowing that she really gave nothing, and for that would receive everything. “But why have you stayed away from me for so long? Where have you been?”

“I have been in that exquisite place where our reincarnate brothers and sisters have chosen to return because they know how truly sweet it is.”

“Heaven?” she gasped.

“Yes,” he answered with a gleam in his eye.

“But how did you get there?”

“It was a decision. I see why those souls return over and over to play in this space.”

“Tell me more,” she begged. “What did you do there?”

“Most recently I healed from ancient wounds, the very wounds that were cripple to my physical vessel as well as others that have restrained me from giving myself to you all these years.”

Tears filled her eyes and she broke into sob. She had longed for this event since her first moment by his side and now he was telling her that it had happened. This meant the obstructions were gone, those greedy whores and malignant bitches, those ravenous vampires of lifeforce and twisted viral sorceresses that she’d never been able to defeat. She had tried everything she could learn or harness to cast down the demonic lot of them and she had grown exhausted, though never ceasing her attack. She had been true to the faith, calling it forth most especially in times of doubt, knowing that she would eventually crack her enemies and then destroy them, and now he was telling her he'd done it for them both. Her sobbing grew to mad storm at sea, her whole being crashing from their swollen crests, her every and all growing in power and intensity, tossing him at will amidst her destructive presence. She cried in painful ecstatic release. The candles in the dark room began revealing their essence as their flesh melted away, flowing down their slender forms. And they dribbled and grew short, purifying the air about them with their demise. The quivering, swaying, huddled shadow of their embrace flickered upon the walls as the candles wept with the mass of trembling entwined lovers who had transcended so much more than human love. The dam had been engineered over so many lifetimes and its reservoir had filled to the brim, even spilling over during distant seasons. But it’s time had come. Nothing is permanent, nothing lasts. The damn burst and its flood would rage for hours. She let it out. The primitive screaming energy of her emotion pounded him on the rocks as the torrent surged and he gripped her with all the might he called his own. She raged as he struggled to keep his head above it all, to keep his self from drowning, to avoid the swallow and batter of all that was surely breaking loose within her, but the stronger his grip, the more the rushing force pushed him under, the more he drown. His King was checkmate. Drown in pain or drown in bliss. He let go, once and for all, and was taken on a ride so exhilarating and forceful that it turned him inside out and outside in, rhythmically with her swells. Every cell in his being was crushed under full contraction and ripped to shreds during full expansion, and with each immortal wave parts of his self were smashed, released, surrendered back into the hands of their rightful keeper. They had never been his to posses, and yet he had held them for so long. He drowned into her raging rushing current, and died, and at each death, she breathed life back into him, only to drown him once more, to permit his passage through the rocky swollen gates into the beyond once more, so that she might place her perfect supple lips upon his and save him with her fine preserving breath. She made love to him in this way for hours until he was no longer he, but He, the one she fell in love with when first her essence touched his so long ago. She laid his limp being to rest and caressed him as he slept. He was hers now and always would be. The candles were long since extinguished by the storm and the dark humble room hinged upon the rhythm of her breath. Her gaze floated beyond the window into the starry sea of dreams above the Pacific and she winked to the heavens and purred and giggled with delight.

When he woke she placed cold refreshing fruits upon his tongue and he swallowed them with the appreciation of a man who has dragged himself across the desert for days under the scorching heat of high suns, through the skin removing abrasion of eternal sands, flesh cracking and burned and bleeding, throat parched closed, broken, and arriving three breaths from merging with the eternal sands about him, reaches an oasis and sips his holy water, every drop of wetness upon his lips a prayer unto its own.

“Will you leave me again?” she asked, with the excitement of a child playing guessing games with its parent, and the calmness of the parent who knows the answer.

“My love,” said he, with all the tenderness of a mother cat bathing her kittens, “yes, I will leave you again, but never more need you fear that I shall not always return. I realize now that I am forever on my way home. The journey has turned and the return voyage has begun. I am coming home to you now for always and ever and I yearn for you now more than ever before. I know not the duration of this return voyage, neither temporally nor spatially. Who knows what tempests await just around the cape to throw us off course? Who knows what scoundrels lurk in the shadows of the swarthy adventurous harbors in which we will drop anchor? Who knows what contraband we will run for those who would make our return voyage all the more profitable and worthy? Only the oracles of distant lands can foresee these destinies my love, but what I do know is that I am coming for you, forever and always. I realize now that there is no course I could chart that could carry me away from you because you are my devotion and all possible courses, all directions, all the stars that guide me now, will lead me to you.”

His head rose upon the swelling life of her bosom as she breathed deep with a knowing and contented smile.

She drew him a hot bath with oils where he faded into oblivion, waking to find that she had slipped into the bath with him, where they kissed and touched and stared into each other until the candles extinguished themselves out of modesty and respect for true love.

The following morning after moving among the postures of body and the currents of mind, they prepared a meal thanks to their amigo above, Jaime, purveyor of all things organic and good and unadulterated that once permeated all of the chlorophyll light-eaters of the planet upon which they depend for life, but which are now tragically in short supply. His vessel hadn't been so pleased by his diet since he’d set out on the voyage so many moons ago and it demanded answers from him now.

“Why isn’t this kind of living convenient in your world?” demanded his vessel. “Why is it that everything convenient seems designed to destroy me?” it pleaded. “How can it be so difficult for you to secure my most basic of needs in that world of yours? Why is it that an endless array of poisons is the default provision selected for convenience in your world? How did you let it get this way? Why can’t you bring back my chlorophyll brethren and exalt them for all they would give us if you would only allow them some pure water and earth free of poisons? Why can you not put them on every street corner and make them convenient to the vessels of my brothers and sisters? Why Captain? Answer me this please, I beg you.”

“I’m sorry friend. I do not have the answers. Perhaps those who trade in poisons serve different masters. Perhaps those who suppress themselves with the poisons know not what they do. Perhaps it is easier to ingest the poisons made convenient than to create what is rightfully ours. Sorry bud, I just don’t know. But I’ll look into it when I get some time.”

“Thanks Captain.”

She returned to the table soaked in morning light and sipped from her lemon water.

"Who were you talking to?" she asked.

"Oh, no one."

“So…,” she said, “…are you going to tell me what you're glowing about? Come on, out with it.”

He chuckled, hesitant to tell her for fear of...for fear of what? He chuckled again when he found the answer to that one.

“What the hell,” he said. “Yes my love, you have caught me, it is so that my memory has returned me to the moment at sea when the vessel and myself and all aboard, passed through some inexplicable warp in time-space, some kind of…well, there’s really no way to describe it my love. Angels descended upon us. All earthly laws were cast aside. The navigational instruments ceased to operate and the vessel and crew seemed to follow orders from someone other than myself their Captain. Magic and the supernatural were daily occurrences during that bizarre and wonder-filled time, until they became commonplace and expected. As common as they became, they never failed to amaze me my love. The angels were abuzz, coming and going, loading the ship with tools and provisions, retraining the crew in specific areas, providing new maps and long lost navigational information, suggesting all manner of return routes that had never before occurred to me, and introducing captains of other vessels who also were at the mercy of this strange energy field.”

“If I didn’t love you I’d say you lost out there sweetheart.”

“As would I my love, had I not been there then, and sitting here telling you now,” he offered to her with all humility.

“Well, what else?”

“Let’s see,” he began. “We did have a few crises involving the crew which almost left the entire ship adrift. And then there was the time – "

“Wait a minute! What about the crises? What happened?”

“Oh, well, nothing really. I was at a loss for awhile until I remembered some old instruments I'd discovered along the way that were collecting dust. So I disappeared to my cabin to rekindle acquaintance with the forgotten tools. Once I cleaned the dust and removed the rust, they were better than new and they performed impeccably, quelling both crises with minimal upset to the voyage. I will tell you my love, that I did learn something from those affairs. I learned that service is to give the best I have to offer to the crew I serve first, and to give to myself only from what remains. Generally speaking my love, I prefer the best of all things for me and mine which is strong incentive to make what remains every bit equal in quality as the best I have offered the crew. It's a slight shift in priority, but so far it's been a good one.”

“How noble dear. So why don’t you get your butt in the kitchen and make me another cup of mate?”

“Yes dear. Do you want honey with that?”

“Sipo mi amor,” she purred.

He left the room to attend to his duties while she stretched her smooth supple body across the couch, basking in the warm sunlight pouring through the window.

He returned from the kitchen with her honey laden mate.

“Here boss,” and he handed her the steaming mug.

“Thanks Cap’n,” she said and sipped from the bombilla, flirting with him like a kitten as she stirred it slowly around the rim. His heart pounded a little harder. He couldn’t believe how in love he was with her.

“You know something,” he began, “there were many times out there when the seas and the winds did all the work. All I had to do was stay ruttered to the course. It makes captaining a ship almost without effort. It was almost like a dance where I was required to lead and follow simultaneously.”

“Yeah well, I hope your rhythm is better dancing with the seas and the winds than it is with me!”

They stepped out into the day, Pacific smiling at them from below, caught a colectivo to the plaza and stepped out. Adolescent males breakdanced in the plaza as doting teenage admirers looked on. Clowns twisted balloon crowns for young princesses and balloon swords for their gallant knights. Comedians plied their trade, blocking the paseo with crowds of laughter. One-man bands danced and jumped about, banging out their score. Free spirits gathered together on benches to weave the vibrations of gut string with bongo.

They strolled to the beach, indulging in sinful manjar treats along the way. Stretched out their blankets in the sand amidst lovers and families and teenagers fresh from school, soaked in the warm rays and crashing surf and just generally thanked this place for existing.

That night they made love in ways that transcend and identify all that is primal within humans. She floated in ecstasy the entire evening, as did he. When they finally came down they laid together without saying a word for the longest of moments. And then he spoke.

“We dropped anchor once in a jungle port,” he whispered softly. “The crew was operating with extreme efficiency in those days. We'd been trading with some of the Indian tribes, gold for herb, spirits for furs, and such and sundry transactions. The chief of one of the Indian trading groups from a village deep within the jungle was interested in me due to a certain fascination I held for a carving hanging from his neck. He insisted that I travel with him to meet the tribe’s holy man, the man who had carved the neckpiece and given it to him. So I agreed to journey to this village six days into the jungle on foot, leaving First Mate in charge of the Hammerhead. To make a long story short my love, the tribe's holy man led me further into the jungle, a day’s travel from the village, to locate a jaguar that he’d befriended, the inspiration for his carving. It was incredible really. That man and that cat had a relationship that I'd only glimpsed once before and never had I witnessed it firsthand, some rarely observed bond between man and beast. After gazing into each other's eyes for countless breaths, the holy man directed the jaguar’s gaze into my own and it held me there, locked in the ray of immensity beaming from its yellow eyes for countless breaths more. Never have I witnessed at that range such unbreakable focus, the focus of the jaguar stalking it prey through endless jungle, immersed totally and completely in its prey and yet aware totally and completely of its every surrounding, stalking in the sublime perfection of the flow of its being. Living a life of zero effort directed toward anything but the moment of the hunt itself. I will never forget what I saw in those eyes my love.”

He turned his head to see if she was sleeping. Her eyes pierced his just as those of the jaguar and his heart panicked for several beats before returning to calm.

“Uh…yeah,” he said and turned his face back to the ceiling. “Later when I returned to the ship, I told First Mate about the experience. He commented that jaguars spend their entire lives in solitude except when they mate. Efficient beings those jaguars.”

“So is this what I am to expect from you now? Solitude until you are ready to mate?” she purred at him with those eyes, from behind that smile.

“No babe, I’m just saying…you know what I’m saying. Right?”

She arched her back and the spasms of releasing feminine feline muscle rippled through her exquisite form.

A tugboat blasted its warning from the black distant harbor of Valpo.

The next day they rose early as they had become accustomed to doing.

“Come on babe. Let’s get crackin’. We’ve got a ton to do to day.”

“But I want to make posture and sit for awhile. I know I’ll feel better if I do and the day will be better for it. I know we have many tasks to attend to today, but those tasks can wait if necessary. There are some things that cannot wait because you only get one shot at them. You can never make love to me on any day but today. You can never love yourself on any day but today. All the tasks on your list need your attention, I know. Believe me honey, I know they need your attention. But if you don’t get to them today, they will be there tomorrow. Priorities sweetheart. Now come make love to me in posture and then sit with me, and then, I promise, we will get to your list and make a productive day of this day yet, I promise.”

They strolled down Calle Valparaíso past the painted mimes and the stilt walkers in sparkling splendid costume. Past the folklorico musicians playing for the small peopled plaza outside the supermercado. Past the street performer surrounded by throngs of adoring fans as he danced with his sultry puppet to “Total Eclipse of the Heart” -- he'd developed a strong following in just those few short weeks. They passed traffic intersections where kids juggled spheres and heavy pins for drivers waiting on the light to turn, in hopes that monedas would rain from the windows.

Down a side street they heard the ancient gentlemen blowing his signature call on a high-pitched whistle, announcing his arrival to the shopkeepers so they could bring him their blades and he could remake the edges on his hand-powered bicycle grinding stone.

At their favorite café just off the plaza they sat outside in the fair air and warm sun and sipped cortados from glasses cradled by stainless steel handles, indulged their taste buds with all things manjar, and watched the fluid tapestry of Viña flow by.

“Amigo,” he said to the older fellow in his maroon jacket, “un poquito más soda por favor,” requesting more of the seltzer water always accompanying cortados here. Nice detail, one of many nice touches in this fine land.

Youths barely old enough to shave, uniformed in the sailing traditions of their nations’ navies from Europe and the Orient, strolled past along the Calle soaking it all in while their ships held anchor in the port of adjacent Valparaíso. Pairs of police officials patrolled the Calle in dark green uniforms, seemingly felt, appointed with the class of brown leather holsters and belt.

They finished their cortados and paid la cuenta por favor. As they walked hand in hand down Calle Valparaíso he remembered making posture with her earlier that morning, watching her be, watching her shed the self-imposed limits that invariably creep in when she isn’t vigilant. He remembered the flashes of clarity that had visited him during his morning time with her. He never could figure out where these flashes came from, just that they did not originate with him, and so he always took them as gifts from beyond and paid them due respect. On that particular morning they'd visited and woven the following melody into his mind:

If we bring everything into our lives through our thoughts, words and deeds, including people, then everything and everyone must have a purpose. This includes family and friends. We choose our family just as we choose our friends. What is their purpose on the Path? Should we be honest, loyal, cheerful, good-humored, dependable, reliable, fun, loving, giving, and so on because they are our friends or family? We should be these things for them because they are results of our consciousness, quite literally our children, children of our consciousness. They are our guests to whom we owe the duty of host, host of the most impeccable and highest caliber order, for you see, we have invited them.

He'd then returned his attention to her perfect form, and again, another visit from beyond:

The things you have committed to fully are the things you have enjoyed most in life and the things at which you have excelled.

When they'd completed making their postures and sitting with each other they showered together.

He held her close as steaming water found its downward path through their flesh pressed so tight and said to her, “I am totally committed to you my love.”

She looked far into his eyes and purred, “Well it’s about time,” and pressed her intoxicating kiss deep into his mouth.

Over breakfast that morning he read the paper while she marveled at the birds building a nest above the patio.

“I don’t like it when you read the paper dear. It agitates you. The fictions those pulp writers are allowed to get away with just rots your mind honey. Please put it away.”

“Looks like we’re going to make war again” he said matter-of-factly. "The entire world seems to be blaming this one guy. I wonder why we'd give him so much power by giving him so much blame? And what's even funnier is that he's blaming some other guy! Like children on a merry-go-round!"

“Come on honey, this is the same garbage they've been stuffing in those rags for as long as I can remember. It's boring. Read me some poetry by Pablo Neruda, or better yet, come over here and make poetry to me yourself. The plot in those rags never changes. They throw different black villain costumes over the same villains and different white hero costumes over the same worse villains, change the scene up a little, have some mindless pop star regurgitate a mindless soundtrack, and expect me to buy it. Well I don't, it's boring.” she replied calmly.

"Yeah my love, but many of us do and for the life of me I can't figure out why. Maybe human wars seem important or significant enough for us to give them our hearts and minds. One long glance into the night sky should correct that, but we never seem to look up. Maybe it's just too difficult to pull ourselves away from the television long enough to step outside, get lost in the heavens, and realize just how significant our wars truly are. It really doesn't matter if we wage war, whether they be one of the perpetually ongoing "justified police actions," small "conflicts," large "world" wars, or the "One" that ends us forever. Human wars are less than singular notes upon the sheet music of The Grand Eternal Opera, the masterpiece that everyone knows doesn't end until the fat lady sings, and the fat lady is still in her dressing room on the other side of the cosmos."

"Mmmm!," she purred, "opera, I like the sound of that. Put some on the stereo for me."

“Ha! Look at this,” he laughed. “We’re turning to some fictionalized entity to solve the problem for us. To make the war go away we are turning away from our selves! But don’t we know that turning away from our duty will not bring about our desired reality? We can’t ask this fictionalized entity to do what is ours alone to do. Wars do not exist except so far as they exist in the minds of humans. If only we would erase it from our minds. If only we would turn off our damned televisions! If only we would accept our responsibility to end the war within ourselves, and then extend into our spheres of loved ones, friends, co-workers, acquaintances, and strangers and end the wars being raged on those battlefields. If only we would bow to the one true God who can end war, Kevin Bacon. If only we would pivot from Him to realize that we truly are connected to every being in this vast Universe of holiness, and that we are not connected by "leaders" sitting atop their own self-proclaimed pyramids, but by the One leader sitting atop the largest pyramid of them all. If only we would stretch to those six degrees of separation that would deliver us to the humans on “the other side,” to spread our love and peace and to ask those other humans, “Do you guys want to make war with us because none of us really want to come over there and kill you?” We would surely find that in fact no one on “the other side” wants to make war with us. And then both sides would realize that we are being played as fools by even bigger fools, as is always the case with war. And then it would be simple. We wouldn’t need to protest or petition. To whom could we possibly protest and petition? A fictionalized entity run by the most bloated egos on the planet? Is that who?”

“I don’t know honey. Sit down and quit pacing. You’re upsetting the birds.”

“We want to end war so we give our power to the very people who wage it!? What kind of madness is this!? All we need to do is turn off the television, chuck the "news" rags, call our children being sent into harm’s way this very day using every means of communication available and ask them collectively to lay down their arms, to come home, that we don’t want them to die, that we don’t want them to kill. The most focused email campaign in the embryonic flash history of the internet, the campaign by the people for the people, the campaign to end all wars forevermore, a focused barrage of love to everyone touching the war machine on "both sides" and every other side, starting with those in military service, begging them, imploring them, to lay down their arms and come home, assuring them that choosing peace is the most heroic Act they can choose, assuring them that they will be loved and fed and housed until all the energy being lost to unnecessary conflict-generated friction, all the energy wasted in support of the world's war machines, is redirected to support ascension of the human race, at which time there will be more jobs than ever in the history of the world. Because human wars cannot exist without humans to fight them. The power to end war resides not with the "leaders," but with those whose fingers are on the triggers, the soldiers and the manufacturers and the homemakers and the scientists and the flight attendants and the movie producers and every other "non-military" person who by their daily actions either makes war possible or makes love possible. These are the people with the power to end wars forevermore, not the "leaders" sitting atop their fictional power structures which only exist because human beings allow them to. If we want a warless world, then we must act. If we want to end the firestorm, we must not throw more gas on its flames. Conflict only breeds more conflict, in whatever form. Omission is an Act, perhaps the highest of all Acts, and one that is always available to us. Walk away from the war machine. Refuse to serve it. Don’t sell even one copy machine to its bureaucratic offices. Don't draft one loan document for the development of more weapons. Don’t prepare food for its cafeterias. Don't attach one rivet to a device designed for destruction of humanity. Refuse to apply the creative mind of science to anything but ascension. Not out of hate and anger, but out of compassion for those who would otherwise spend their lives waging war and destruction instead of love, and spend the rest of their eternities slaving off those debts. Don’t we know that we have the power to just turn off the war because it only exists if we let it? Don’t we know that when we turn away from our selves, to sources external and existing in the great sea of chaos, that we give our power to that chaos? Why do we insist on shirking our duty by turning to external sources for solutions to our problems? This only validates that it is "they" who hold the cards, that it is "they" who decide whether our race will suffer war or ascension. We do not need "their" sanction to live in a world of peace. Don’t we know that we give away our power every time we talk about what “they should do about it!?!” Human wars cannot be waged by politicians, generals, shareholders, and banks, no matter how much their rabid mouths might foam for it, but only by human beings! All the power in the reality of humanity exists in that one place, human beings. Not in fictionalized thoughtforms of governments or councils or armies or protestors or votes. All of those fictions move when the human beings within them move. What if the human beings comprising the "bottom" fifty percent of those organizations refused to move their fictional beasts into waging war? What if the janitors and cooks and guards and secretaries and farmers and cobblers and machinists and barbers and software programmers and salespeople and executives and scientists and leaders simply laid down their tools of employ whenever their leaders began to pound the drums of war? What if we refused to budge an inch on this matter? What if we treated these egomaniacal "leaders" as mandated by their behavior, that of kindergarteners? What if we just took away their toys and grounded them every time they threw a temper tantrum? What would happen? I’ll tell you what would not happen. War. That’s what would not happen, because who would be there to fight it? The elite few at the top who have probably never even thrown a punch in their lives? Hell no!! And by the way, since when did war become subject to a vote!? I've never heard of such lunacy! The bullies that used to slug me in the stomach during grade school recess never took a vote on it, they just delivered two or three good ones right to the gut! Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure they never asked for anyone's permission. If we're going to wage war then by god let's wage it and wage it with all destructive capacity that we as humans posses. Let's wipe ourselves off the planet if that is our Path, but please, for the sake gastrointestinal stability, let's end this WWF soap opera which has nothing to do whatsoever with a lust for war and everything to do with the largest grand scale larceny of the collective human mind in the history of modern human civilization!!!"

“Calm down honey.”

“I’m not calm dammit! I am so bored with all this mindlessness that I'm inclined to puke! We're just giving ourselves over to ignorance by thinking that some fictionalized entity, or anyone other than ourselves, can make our world a better place. We cannot create a desired reality by negating a negative, because that only seeks to hold status quo, which by its nature is static, but the static status quo is a fiction. It does not exist because all must change, all must pass and evolve. Don’t we know that we can only bring about our desired reality by initiating positive actions and that those positive actions must be eternally initiated? We must act. There is no "them" that we could turn to even if it were absolutely necessary because "they" exist within us. It is not enough for us to say, "Yeah, but what can I do? I’m just a this or I’m just a that or I don’t have any power." What every one of us are is human being, and that is all the power and status we need. In fact, it is for the armed psychic robbery of this very power and status that all wars are waged, never for gold or land or oil, because those things have no value to humanity without human beings to value them. We posses all the answers and powers within us if we’d only just realize it. Just let the fear go, and love, everyone, love every one and every whole. No matter how many bloated egos wish to wage war on our world, it is impossible if human beings refuse to give their minds away, refuse to build weapons, join armies and support war machines in whatever fashion. Dammit man! When are we humans going to change the course of our ascension? How many times must we hammer ourselves with the same lessons, over and over and over? Why can’t we pass third grade and start learning some new stuff, if only just for a change of pace?”

“I don’t know honey. Calm down and eat your breakfast.”

He took a deep breath, immediately returned to calm and sat as suggested.

“Do you think we will ever get it my love?”

“I don’t know dear. So many people are averse to change, and we've been having wars for as long as we can collectively recall. People probably think that it can never change, that it's how we are, that we have no power to guide our collective destiny into any aspect of the infinite we so choose, including peace. We’ll just have to wait until we want it badly enough I suppose...if we don't destroy ourselves first. Honey, I've already wasted enough of my precious time in this short sweet life this morning by giving my energy and focus to the twisted reality of these ego-driven children. Their warped views for the world will never be mine, so what's the point in spending any of my time watching them make their sausage," she said with a wink to the Nomad. "It's simple dear. You are going to immediately cease filling your heart and mind with that garbage and focus all of your energy on loving me. Now put on some opera and let's get back to living our lives.”

They finished breakfast and hopped a colectivo into town for the day. He learned more of the native tongue in those intimate transports than anywhere else in his voyage and for that they would forever hold a special place in his heart. They strolled the Calle as they so often did, it being so peaceful and full of endless wonder and smiling faces. Playful melodies of music boxes drifted through the side streets. Music boxes of wooden pipes, iron crank, green parrot mascot, balloons, and bubbles, and when lucky, live monkeys.

As always, the fresh-baked wafting hand of pastelerías tugged at them to enter and buy just one treat, one with manjar of course. They’d already purchased fresh whole wheat bread for dinner and so gave into the call, “It costs 150 and you know you want it, it tastes so good.” Yes, they gave in to the call and felt delightfully guilty for doing so.

The young, heavy set blind woman who sings for money was at her post that day, singing with all that she was. People walked past as though she didn't exist, but her music was a love call from amidst the honking, engines, commercial pop music from stores, and general hustle and bustle of the town center. Her melody floated there just behind the noise, available to all who would stop and listen, available to all who would enrich their day, if only a little.

“It’s sad that someone so beautiful is resigned to such an existence isn’t it my love?” he said.

“Forget what she’s living,” she purred, “look at how gracefully she’s living it! God, she’s beautiful. Go put some money in her cup sweetheart.”

“Yes my love.”

They strolled into the plaza lined with palms and lovers and those taking siesta in the green grass.

“Let’s take a ride in the horse carriage,” she said, which meant they would be taking a ride in the horse carriage.

The carriage twisted through the Pacific paradise to the romantic rhythm of clackety-clack shoed hooves upon the pavement. They rounded the glistening white casino and the Pacific surf pounded the beach below.

“Tell me another story about when you were a fearless Captain,” she pleaded.

He smiled and swelled with pride, that rascal, and began.

“OK babe, anything for you. Let me think. Ahh…yes. Here we have the tale of my certain demise, and yet here I do sit to tell the tale.”

She snuggled closer to him in the carriage.

He loved when she did that.

“We'd been sailing along a deserted desert coast for weeks spanning incredible latitudes, and the crew was exhausted. First Mate informed me that morale was good but the crew needed rest. Second Mate warned that discipline was becoming a problem. The shore along that stretch of coast was little more than an endless series of rock cliffs, secret caves, treacherous reefs and jagged hidden coves. We decided to search for a sheltered cove where we could drop anchor and give the crew some much needed R & R. We found that cove almost immediately. It was idyllic and secluded, the white sands of its tiny beach lined with palms, and protected from the pounding surf by a rock outcropping towering above its southern mouth and a reef protecting its waters to the north.”

“Boson, fetch me the spyglass,” I ordered.

“The blurry glass eye revealed a beach crawling with the bronze sumptuous forms of indigenous sprites and temptresses.”

“Drop anchor!” I ordered. “The crew will rest and relax here for the season. They will like it here.”

“As the crew prepared Hammerhead for a season of anchor we were boarded by one of the nastier pirates we encountered during the entire voyage, Bum’stache Belly Scratch was his name. His henchman was a henchwoman and she was even nastier, Emphysema the Hacking they called her. We were slow to act and unwise when we did so, and soon Bum’stache Belly Scratch had looted what little bullion remained in our stores.”

“I made small talk with ole Bum’stache Belly Scratch while giving the secret signal to First Mate. We’d used this strategy many times in varying manner, always to profitable end. First Mate, in turn, gave secret signals to his men and in a matter of minutes our crack team had slipped into the water, swam to Bum’stache’s sloop, raised themselves by the riggings, entered the cabin of ole Bum’stache himself and made take of enough doubloons to make us whole, returning to Hammerhead unnoticed. Now, my love, the Hammerhead does not engage in the Sweet Trade of high seas. We are not pirates, but explorers and enablers. But this dirty situation fell squarely within the Letters of Marque, surely preserving our status as honorable privateer. Unfortunately, as I would later learn, Letters of Marque are rarely honored.”

“How many times have I told you my dear,” she purred, “that two wrongs never make a right. Never.”

“Yes my love. You are correct. You are always correct.”

“Anyways, Ole Bum’stache was none the wiser, being blinded to our treachery by his own. Not for a full moon cycle anyways. Then on an overcast morn, after weeks of frolic by the crew and charting by the Captain and First Mate, the alarm rang out.”

“Sail ho!” cried from the crow’s nest.

“I was roused from entering the ship’s log in my cabin and headed for the quarter deck.”

“You, lookout, what spy you through that glass?” I hollered to the sky.

“A sloop me Cap’n, flying the Jolly Roger! Starboard aft. Methinks it be the sloop of Bum’stache Belly Scratch!”

“Boson, fetch me the spyglass,” I ordered.

“Aye Cap’n!"

“I strained to see the sails coming over the horizon.”

“The spyglass for you Cap’n!”

“Argg boson, make clean this fuzzy eye!”

“Aye Cap’n.”

“What spy you?” asked First Mate.

“Bum’stache it be, me matey. The Jolly Roger flies high. His chase guns are fore and manned.”

“Sink us!” exclaimed First Mate. “Aye, methinks the wind sufficient to outrun 'em Cap’n. Shall that I weigh anchor and ready the crew and sails?”

“No me matey, that shan’t be necessary. We sail under Letters of Marque. Order all hands to their positions, at full alert but relaxed. We will face this scoundrel and do our damnedest not to bilge the Hammerhead by her own anchor. Fetch me the Navigator.”

“Ole Bum’stache Belly Scratch pulled along our starboard, tossed his grapple onto Hammerhead's deck and across stepped Emphysema the Hacking and her minions.”

“Ahoy! How do you do my dear sweet and lovely Emphysema the Hacking?” I asked.

“Cut the sweet tongue ye wet bilge rat, 'twil do ye no good now. Bum’stache Belly Scratch…cough…has put the Black Spot to ye…wheeze. He…hack… demands that ye…cough, wheeze…strike your colors and return his doubloons,” rasped Emphysema the Hacking. “Comply and…hack, hack…hack…ye will be given quarter…hack…and a severe flogging by the cat. Vicious, and nine wicked tails has she. Refuse and ye will be…wheeze, wheeze…hack…cough…given quarter ney, but flogged, mast tied, keelhauled, …hack… mast tied for measure, and sent to the locker of Davy…hack…Jones bound in chains stripped from yer…cough, cough, cough…own beloved Hammerhead.”

“Emphysema my dear, what is this you say? Surely Bum’stache Belly Scratch has mistaken me for one of the many captains of the high seas who would seek their revenge upon him for his dealings in the Sweet Trade. I know not of what you speak, but please that you and your captain understand that these colors will not be stricken.”

“Argg,” she licked her lips, “me wishes the pleasure of flogging ye m'self!” Smoke spilled from her nostrils and she quivered with wicked lust.

“If it comes to that my dear Emphysema, I would accept it from none other. Now please hurry along back to your captain and deliver this message: ‘No colors will be stricken on this day and we will not go quietly into the night. Please if you will Bum’stache, note the guns on our lower decks. Be wise as you chart your course with the Hammerhead.’ Now run along lass.”

“Emphysema and her minions returned to their sloop.”

“First Mate, fetch me the Navigator!”

“He can’t be found Cap’n.”

“Blimey! Find him! Put all hands on it! Argg!”

“The Navigator was finally located and arrived on deck."

"Your pardon, Captain. I was using the head."

"I explained to him the situation.”

“What say you Navigator? What course do you recommend we chart?”

“Captain, this is not a good situation. Your rival Bum’smack the Stomach Pump holds all the cards in this game with more up his greasy hairy sleeves. He has a flotilla of subordinates within day’s sail. It would require weeks or months to navigate through their gauntlet without injury, and – "

“Boson! Fetch me the Letters of Marque!”

“Aye Cap’n!” the boson disappeared below deck.

“Navigator, what of these Letters? Do they serve us not at all?”

“Captain, it is true that you are graced by the letter of those Letters, but we are on high seas far from home with no allies in tow. The Letters of Marque will not serve you here.”

The boson scrambled back on deck. “The Letters of Marque me Cap’n.”

“Argg! Boson! Take those letters to my head and I will put them to their proper use yet! Argg!”

"Aye Cap’n!"

“Captain,” resumed the Navigator, “I have been studying the charts and maps and grid positions of our foes. I have calculated the winds and tides and seasons in order to achieve your desired course. The winds will shift soon and the season will turn harsh, making travel into the realms you desire impossible until the season lifts many moons from this. You can battle this no good Butt’head the Gut Rot if you so please, and no doubt you will emerge victor, but it will be a bloody battle, will exhaust the crew and provisions and will keep you from the much larger engagements that await you around the Cape.”

“Arrg! We have the firepower. The crew is strong and skilled. We would surely claim victory. But I am called by the siren song of my beloved and must make way to her. You are correct good Navigator. The seasons will change soon and we will be stranded here if we stay too long. Arrg! Boson! Fetch the doubloons to First Mate.”

“Aye Cap’n!”

“You are a wise friend dear Navigator and I am crusty and stubborn. Thank you for your clear head and dispassionate advice. We have wasted enough time here and will be on our way. First Mate! All hands to battle posts! Ready all guns! Emphysema the Hacking and her minions return!”

"Emphysema the Hacking and her minions stepped onto the deck of the Hammerhead."

“Bum’stache…hack…Belly Scratch has heard yer…cough, cough, wheeze…message and he licks his chops…cough…, and melicks mine as well,” hacked Emphysema the Hacking.

“Her minions surrounded me placing their swords to my throat.”

“Bring him…hack…aboard so that the…cough, cough, cough…floggings may begin,” she commanded with wicked relish.

“Before I step to your captain's ship my dear Emphysema, please that you take note of the siege guns on our lower decks aimed into your hull, manned, loaded and packed. If you force me onto the ship of Bum’stache by these sabers at my throat, I assure you that you will not have time to touch even once your cat’o’nine to my flesh before your good captain’s ship is taking on more seas than it can displace. Do you still wish that I come aboard?”

“Argg! Hack…cough…wheeze. Blasted…hack…wet bilge rat! Argg!”

“Our First Mate has here the doubloons which we have taken from your captain,” I told Emphysema.

“Give them to me…hack…and be gone ye wet bilge rat!”

“First Mate, you heard the dear, hand over the precious doubloons. They print more every day,” I said, with a wink to the blonde mermaid.

“It had been a tense situation with unforeseeable outcome until the final moment, but we had won our pardon by the graces of the seas, and one very cagy Navigator. That night the crew was frazzled and I needed to splice the mainbrace.”

“Boson! Move it lad to that hogshead and fetch me grog, and keep them coming!”

"Aye Cap'n!"

“First Mate gave me a grin and we toasted, knowing we had kept the Hammerhead on course.”

“Good enough my dear,” she said. “As long you know that you didn’t swashbuckle yourself out of the situation without help from others.”

“This I know dear, this I know.”

The weeks lapped by like the surf upon the sands. They spent their weekends on the beaches amidst excellent trance DJs and oiled tan perfection, traveled the local lands, returned to peak physical condition and rolled through adventure after adventure.

One morning while meditating in a lofty perch high above the beaches they watched a whale swim along just past the breakers, surfacing for air every few minutes. The throngs of people playing on the beaches didn’t seem to notice, or perhaps they couldn’t see the whale surfacing beyond the break.

He thought about his time spent with her here in this healing environ. There was something powerful for him about living on the Pacific, on that vast reservoir of raw untapped energy. Whatever the mood of the day, he had only to hold it in his gaze, to draw from its energy, to wash in it all negative thinking, and focus would soon follow, every time without fail; an omnipotent god holding all the power and beauty of life and cradling him while he healed. It would be a sad farewell.

“Must you leave?” she pleaded.

“Yes my love. Our cargo is valuable human stock, people traveling to distant places, and we must return to our duty and see to it that they arrive to their destinations. There is no vacation from the Path my love, only the briefest of respites before the inevitable return to eternal service and duty.”

She sniffled and wiped her eyes.

“Come now my devotion, and remember what I have already told you. The return voyage has begun and it is eternal and there no longer exists a route or course or path that can ever again take me away from you. I am coming to you forever and always.”

He embraced her and kissed deeply of all that she is.

“I love you.”

With those his parting words, he stepped from the dock onto the Hammerhead and ordered the weigh anchor.

“First Mate,” he said.

“Aye Cap’n.”

“Hoist the sails.”

Return to PunchDragon