On the Road with Davey Boy, also Known as Cassady

I was 23. This was my Kerouac On the Road adventure with Davey boy, my sidekick Cassady and partner in living life to the limit, until you just burst and break on through, torn down, built up, but never stopping, flying faster and faster as you surf life's wave in all its love and glory

***

 

Drove 17 hours strait

Indiana PA to New Orleans

Late-night driving through South

Davey Boy at the wheel

Dodge Sunbird with California license plates

Grateful Dead dancing bears bumper sticker

We are a good target in the South

Alabama 3 AM

Miles Davis coming on strong

A lonely stretch of highway

Trucker – 16 wheeler decides to play games

Spotlight shining in our eyes

Truck weaving back and forth

Slithering snake trying to send us home

Davey makes the pass after 5th try

I’m convinced we are about to die

Trucker coming on strong from behind

90 miles an hour

We lose him at the exit

Trucker honks going on by

***

Early morning dawn, we’re in  Mississippi

Old man at a gas station

Hat says, “Life is not a cabaret; it’s a circus.”

Stretch my legs – Balmy air

Buy pre-packaged pickled pig lips

We are close to the destination

City of decadence

America’s Amsterdam

New Orleans

The mouth of the Mississippi River

French corner voodoo

African Rhythms in the street

Spirits and souls abound here

We are destined to meet

***

Early morning campground

Outside the city, we encounter

By chance, Swedes, English, and a Welsh woman from IUP

And a Dane – who I had seen

In vision nights before

The stage is set

***

Muddy brown river flowing

We look West than East

Steam Boats plow waters

We make our way to Jackson Square

We have not slept

Partake of the Mushrooms

Peanut Butter sandwiches

On back in the park

Sunshine – Breeze from the river

“You gotta eat crawfish.”

African Anerican man befriends us

He would like a bottle of Jack Daniels 

Watch him eat the crawfish

We consider eating crawfish

Instead with give him money

It is time to leave

Things are getting way strange

Mushroom state taking hold

***

We go to the highest place in the city

Watching the Mississippi river flow

Buy beer from Nun in front of the church

Live music in the streets

Black boy tap dancing

Washboard  woman scraping

Band Jamboree breaking loose

Wander streets to find

Ourselves in an open bar

Goldie in a cheap outfit running the bar

It looks like she has done too much coke

Her mom owns the bar

This is a family affair

You know she can be had

For a price – Goldie or her mom that is

She talks of Medical School

We drink and watch

We do not do those kinds of things

Bubble blower on the sidewalk

He sends his bubbles at passing cars

Some smile – Some wave

Some stare stone-faced ahead

Hands tight on the wheel

Davey Boy and I float with

Each bubble

One bubble pops on my forehead

Everything flowing like that river

I am feeling bad for Goldie

It is obvious she is not happy

There is a woman who has not moved for four hours

Her cigarette has burned

Down to her fingers

Davey Boy and I have had our

Share of lonely patrons

We head of to the sound of a marching band

The best music in America

Comes from the African Anerican culture

We soak it all in

Happy to be alive

We buy another beer from a nun

Why don't nuns sell beer up North?

***

We hit

A guys real drunk getting drunker

Talking Davey boy up in the bathroom

Talking about Blacks and the Final solution

We head off into the night

***

We take some more mushrooms

From car garage payphone

Call our parents

Davey Boy’s mom found a postcard

Me pretending I am queer

David getting off

As mother quizzes him

***

It is time to flee this city

Drive straight to Tampa and St. Petersburg

Stay with our grandparents and pretend we are normal

Soon we leave and cross the Skyline Bridge

Into the Everglades, we journey

Onto the grand finale Key West

Erin working at some crazy bar called the Pirates Den

Her best friend is named “Bear” and pole dances

As the music plays on and on, I want to break free

We have an adventure on a boat at sea

In Erin’s house, she is always naked

The ending is a grand birthday party for Erin’s Dog

Who sits in the front seat as I drive around town

Davey boy and Erin tripping on Acid in the back

Me strait sitting next to a barking dog in front

Driving up and down the streets of Key West

***

Our pilgrimage into the heart of America is complete

We set out on our 20-hour drive to Indiana PA

More crazy drivers playing games with us in Georgia

We drive and drive

It all blurs together

Then somehow, we make it home

Collapsing into a dream-filled sleep

Of crawfish, pickled pig lips

The flowing Mississippi River

Taking us home

Our Grandparents twilight years

Erin, in all her glory

In the place, my Birth Mother was born

Where Hemmingway lived whose cat’s we visited

Young, awake, and alive

Breathing the sea breeze

Of lifelong friendship