The day is nice, excerpt from Sal Manders by pd lyons (adult themes)

in 1974 I started work on a biographical/fiction. ( originally titled salamanders) incorporating bits of journal, drugs sex and drama from the point of view of a 18 – 20 something male living in an old factory town New England as he discovers drinks weed cocaine love sex marriage divorce fatherhood etc. it began by the river it hasn’t ended yet. here’s another excerpt – for what its worth. still ruff n ready I suppose

The day is nice,

today is a light cool mist over everything after weeks of ninety degrees. The coffee is good and strong. I’m sprawled out on the kitchen table with pen and paraphernalia. When I was first married my wife always made sure where ever we lived there was a room for my desk. It was great; a room, a desk, a typewriter and all my books. But as time went on and she and I got farther apart the desk seemed to get lost along the way as we moved and the place got smaller and smaller my room became less and less of a priority no longer, like myself, a necessity. However I did find a substitute for my desk, a most convenient and logical solution – a place to sprawl out and be close to the coffee pot a place generally as far as possible from sleeping children and angry women and even today when I have no typewriter, no home, no wife, I still have a little quiet and solitude here at this long inspiration of kitchen table.

It’s nice and cool but I would like some sunlight, sunshine like yesterday, the girl dancing and laughing and I rubbed her sore muscles putting her to sleep in the ragged summer grass there by the stream you can still drink from. Maureen, the way your hair shines golden, the way you wore that yellow tied at the waist shirt – I want to buy you a gold medallion of the sun, pretty girl I want to lay you out in ninety degrees of heat and fuck you till we melt. Maureen in the sun quiet, cynical, tired, your legs are strong I thought you were nervous but you fell asleep as I worked the tight muscles of your legs yielding up the cheeks of you ass, a long sleek back up around sore shoulders the white ivory neck kissed between the space of blonde laying in the grass my hands unable to stop…

Then there is Maureen in evening laughter,

Restless martial arts forms against the stars

Stoned as shit on some hashish she bought

To see her now, happy, care free, no self put downs,

Golden lady I like to be here…

Maureen your skin is magic,

The night has been beautiful for us

The moonless stars are animals I want to travel among

While your desire is to keep both feet on firm earth

Dancing in the dark I hate to leave you –

All night my fingers shake in their sleep as if I had ten penises each dreaming of your cunt all at once.

 

Bella-rose & Shirley by pd Lyons now on Amazon. sample pages. References to war violence, strong language, assault

BELLA-ROSE & SHIRLEY: a love story Paperback – 28 Jun. 2023

by PD Lyons (Author)

Kindle Edition LOVE, JUSTICE, SALVATION, FUTURE, CAN THESE BE FOUND AMIDST THE SAVAGERY OF MORDERN CIVIL WAR

 

English Publication date 28 Jun. 2023

 

 

15.24 x 0.2 x 22.86 cm

ISBN-13979-8397062190

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/BELLA-ROSE-SHIRLEY-story-PD-Lyons/dp/B0C9SGWTWN/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

newest from PD Pd Lyons contains descriptions of war violence. a hy-bred prose novel

It Was Tilkon from the Lady Camp
It was Tilkon and the others from the lady camp. They were still alive. Moving milling around me. Our women. Our people. The ground gives way. Their voices drift farther and farther away. Feel them support me. Feel them remove my weapons, my gear. Let myself be carried. they were alive. They were our women. My women. Alive. They bring me to one of the tents. into one of the beds. and there are sheets. sun dried stiff sheets. so white I must close my eyes. So, clean I must turn my face into their scent and weep no more.

Split Seconds
I see the horrible red rose bloom upon her chest. heard the splatter the rifle crack. our eyes meet. she whispers Bella, managing to grab my arm pulls me down. Split second before the next a harmless ricochet. I scramble. Shelter among the rubble. she had taught me well. no point in trying to spot the shooter. only thing now – survive. Hands, knees, flat on my belly, safety among the ruins. Once again, I am alone. Once again, I have lost. She who had taught me well. She who had armed me well. She who one last time from her blood-stained mouth named me. As once she would whisper with each kiss. So, she whispered with her death. That name she gave me, Bella. And once more gave me life.

So, I Became the Lady of the Rose.
From then on, I duplicated that red rose wound. Put between the legs of every man deserved it. When possible, the death wound. If not, then I would make the dead bloom. No one would know the difference; the message would read the same. Eventually people would talk of it, give me the name. Another one I never spoke. Never meant to give myself. Either way not Bella. No, not Bella ever again. Silent as that blood-filled mouth once named me so. Now renamed by strangers. Lady of the blood red rose.

Pig Whore Fucking Pig.
“Pig, whore. Fucking, whores….” Maybe if he cried, begged on his mother’s life, even just shut up, but no he stands there. arms and legs secure to the kitchen post. Pants down around his ankles while the woman he had beaten senseless moans on the floor. I push. How easy it goes in. Amazing the strength left in him to twist like that. Amazing how loud a man’s screams can be. So clear. I notice small things. Stains on his shirt, a rough shape of a bird in flight? A bird born of sweat or blood? His own or his victims? How clear every small thing, His teeth have a colour, his smell… Thrashing hard against the rope I snap to. His contortions set him free! But no. Still bound. But now its whispers. Now its pleas. Now he prays to me… “Pick it up!” Shirley yells “you missed. You fucking missed!” Then seriously quiet says, “Do what I taught you. Remember. Observe, relax, act.” So, I pick up the knife. Observe its weight, the room, the light, clearly again every small thing, his shaking hairless knees, his bleeding stomach. Breathe. Relax. Slowly, steadily, search, until peaceful a soft pop sound dwindles from his never to be heard from again mouth.
Do We Have the Right?
“Do we have the right?” I ask. She sits beside me on the bed takes my hand forces it hard between my legs, She stiffens, holds firm against my resistance. Brings her face close to mine, eye to eye. Calls me softly for the first time, “Bella. Close your eyes. Trust me. Close your eyes. Now observe. Whatever your thoughts. Whatever you feel, no matter what.” I stop. we both relax. All at once something drains. And in that filthy bed, into her arms I weep. Cling like I don’t know what, to her. Finally, when I can look up, she asks again, “So do we?” “Yes,” I hush, “yes, we do.” And I let her bring her mouth to mine. Breathe in her breath as once more she names me. “Bella…” And as she draws away, I pull her back again and again. Until we both fall into a luxury of dreamless sleep.

from Salamanders by pd lyons

Slow

 

Slow as a screw cap wine morning dark faded into rain blocked sunrise. Chug of the coffee making scents of redemption and awareness fills my kitchen. Unlike the rest of the world. Friday is the hardest one too many days dragged wake-ups not really awake when you’ve not slept. Now among the shadows forgotten aspects of our truth. Hamlet the shadow of Summer’s dream.  The eighteen year old girl sentenced to life for murder of a nine year old girl when she was fifteen. Tried as an adult. No blood ever found on her or her clothes. No murder weapon recovered. Her sixteen year old boyfriend, interviewed six times by thy FBI, failed polygraph, none of that allowed to the jury. Fifteen year old in jail for three years before convicted, denied application to continue education, innocent until proven guilty. Eighteen year old Tibetan girl Buddhist nun under Chinese occupation. Practitioner of compassion for all beings. Sits down outside the abbey in a pool of gasoline – lights the match in protest, light upon atrocities, atrocious act among atrocious acts. She and all who immolate are terrorists, seek only to disrupt the lawful Chinese government and it’s people. This is the morning shadow of the night before. Coffee the shadow of the cheap screw cap bitchy white wine slowing me down into crow sound shapes emerged from darkness into grey dawn.

 

Saturday, February 18, 2012

The Girl in the Silver Mercedes by pd lyons

come back

I want to know

what’s it like

all your dreams come true

your hair longer now than when we were teenagers

leaned against high school halls

100 years old then

gone now

gone

the one word, one thing

applies, can be applied,

utterly applicable to every person,

place, thing, concept, category –

what else is new?

                                                                                 2.2.12

~

 

paris by pd lyons

from Salamanders by pd lyons 1981

Djanet Tozeur

 

Wanted to come up with a new name to use on the poetry ‘scripts. Thought if I used a foreign androgynous sounding name it would help change the bad luck you know I picked two towns from Liberia or Syria can’t remember which, from a 1940’s globe. It was a good name I thought. Practised saying it out loud and signing it. There had been a few others I liked even better but couldn’t get ’em right as a signature. Finally found the one that worked but now can’t remember it and have since thrown out the globe, but I think there might be some practise signatures around. I don’t know.

I feel like Laurie Anderson “always used to wonder who I’d bring to a desert island.”

   So going to get a cigarette and smoke the bloody thing and when I’m done go back into the room clear away the table and type out the fucking Negative Space story that I started three bleeding years ago. Meanwhile I scribble like a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters eventually bound to come up with something…if I write enough – maybe. It’s no fucking fun. I wish I could be like Stephen King – looks like he has fun or at least it’s painless for him to write and write and write. That’s how you get rich finding a way, so the work is painless effortless producing consistently, comfortable, confident, according to formula, just a few basics filled in over and over and it’s successful.

Like this twenty-four-year-old woman who sailed around the world in a little sail boat all alone. She was on this late-night talk show the host must have figured it for a good dramatic interview interspersed with his lame teasing and joking which his audience would find fantastic. So, he asks “How did you prepare for doing such a thing?”

“I sailed along the West coast for about a year.”

“One year? Was that all? No long ocean voyages?”

“No”

“…Well, you must have been pretty nervous.”

“No. It’s all pretty easy once you get the basics down.”

And that was about it. She sailed like King writes. Like I can’t. Writing for me is a pain that must be exorcised. On my long ocean voyage alone,  the basics are ever changing – more like rock climbing once committed you have no choice except to push on knowing that eventually you will gain the relief of it being over. That’s what you preserver for, the sense of relief once it’s done, the great feeling that it’s over but as for the actual climbing? I’d rather be shopping.

   Like this writing, now that I’m winding down, now that its “done” I feel release from the tension from the pain, relieved regardless of what is written. Grateful for the release, to be done with it. You know thinking about writing and typing and finishing the story is exciting but to actually sit there and have to sit there is a pain in the ass. I think I’ll go put the Beethoven on have a brandy and go to bed – it’s too late now to even go shopping.

 

The Great God Pan Is Dead by pd lyons

photographer unknown

 

Within the pages of illusion,

Before the glass of no reflection,

The sensuous form of her adoration,

(White on blonde)

Rises to the occasion of the

Mysterious relation between,

The pale worship of a

Vanishing god and the blue

Whispers of her blood.

As fevered as silk in cedar,

Fanatical as dew dipped spider webs;

She’s come and gone.

Her absence heavy in the spicy

Dust of death, where her foot steps

Spell out the haunting word

Amen

1987

a mandala of dinosaurs, a message of lovers

 

 

A mandala of dinosaurs. A pestilence of motorcyclists. A red sky of warnings. A coyote of marzipan. A zygote of intelligence. Crystal of elan-ists. Soda of psychopaths. Preponderance of dictators. Herald of crows. Kansas of superpowers. An eclipse of educators. Blessing of coffees. An autumn of smudges, a winter of geese, a summer of topiaries, a spring of dreams. Empire of penises. A squander of vaginas. A catapult of efforts. A plethora of crows. An envy of ravens. A parcel of pachyderms. A coagulant of desires. A mercury of fish. Kick-start of starlings. meandering of serpents. Bucket of worms. Sack of cats. A giggle of girls. Shyness of boys. A Saladin of wisdoms. A crisis of faiths. A plague of religions. Carpet of bred crumbs. Sanctity of prisoners. A rats-ass of carers. Trombone of sexes. Conglomerate of crows. A pudding of infants. A declaration of sea shells. A tumble of puppies, a cartoon of kites. Meander of mysteries. A half league of words. A complaint of crows. A severance of hopes. An ignorance of drivers. A Shenandoah of daughters. A crux of sons. A crossing of souls. A delightful of crows. A smatter of kisses. A moonbeam of tongues. A secretion of secrets. A message of lovers.

 

Today’s answers are not the ones I had back then. by PD Lyon

Thank you for saving my life

 

I’m sorry I never told you. But that night I came home terrified it was you who really saved my life. I lay in bed your cool hands on my for head on my arms. Talking softly all I could say was that someone must have slipped something in my beer. When actually what it was, was I had bought these little white pills after being told they were mild like Valium. Turned out they were white lightening acid. I had taken a about four or five and handed the rest out like candy to everyone else at the party. Up at the golf course by the reservoir hot summer clear sky night.  And so eventually  I spent a few hours trying to figure out what was happening alone in the woods coming up with answers like I was dead, or I was god or if I didn’t want to be dead I had to become god. Usual seventies acid stuff which at the time even with my experience I couldn’t tell it was acid and so i got terrified. Well, anyway. I didn’t need to do any of those things, I just had to make it back to you. Where then it all came clear, and you were my mother, and I was your kid and I slept for most of a day, and it was ok.

 Sorry too that we never really talked about your sickness. Maybe I didn’t want to know? Or I was too afraid to know that I would be loosing you. Loosing my mommy. I was feeling I couldn’t do anything any way. Well, what could I do?

Today’s answers are not the ones I had back then.

 Helpless when all I could do was hold you – and didn’t even do that much,

 Today’s answer – one of them, I hold you now and always in my heart. I see you in my beautiful son and daughter, for that always I am grateful.

 

Thank you for saving my life and for giving it to us.

The First Time I Went to A Funeral by pd lyons Triger Warning: Suicide, Gunshot

The first time I went to a funeral was for the wife of one of my then sister in laws friends. She had shot herself in the head. She wasn’t anyone I knew well but I’d met here now and then. She seemed so very happy. Like they were a good match, and their little boy was doted on. I’d heard how when her husband came home for lunch he found her. I could only imagine so I did. Her lovely blonde hair, blood clots, brain and bone.  Her face? Her sweet girl face… She used a rifle or a shot gun. Pistols were hard to get in those days. Fortunately, her child was  at  school. Maybe she planned it because she didn’t want him to see. Any way she was 24 or 5 only a few years older than myself.

I left not really wanting to stay long. But not before the little fellow tried to get the coffin open so he could be with mommy.

 

It might be because of this my heart has always been open to those who choose to end their lives and those who survive that choice. You know the families friends loved ones. While I can understand all their emotional and reactions I never get how other folk make it their business to get angry and demonstrative about it. At times even ridiculing the dead person. I guess since anger always comes from fear they must be afraid of what they can’t control and feel threatened in some way by a person’s choice even though it has nothing to do with them.

 

But family and loved ones, I think that they must be accepted and respected and allowed their expressions.

 Sometimes the best we can do is stand beside the grieving, keep our silence as respect and encouragement.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

We had come to that place

sometimes a river, a chasm, an ocean, a darkness

Where we, unlike you could go no further.

Loretta’s Piece a poem by pd lyons

(photographer unknown)

Loretta’s Piece
(12.09.73.)

Rose was first thought
remembering was coming
but put back almost worn out.

Now – when roses bloom
not trying for anything.

Now when I am and am not
then or pretty soon.

Now when words burn meaningless
giving warmth
to bodies
already left behind
the thoughts are all,
growing weeds
coiling snakes
blooming
gaping
the flesh we cared for
the planet we cared for
the stars we strived for.

a version of this was published by Thunder Clap 2010/2011

at this time I was a student at Crosby High School in Waterbury Connecticut. I had been a poet for about 5-6 years since having decided  at the age of 12 to be one. Loretta was a class mate/friend/muse. We’d spend many an afternoon class sitting in the back talking and writing. its been a lifetime since I’ve seen her. She still lives in Connecticut and she is still I believe very very cool.