Death On The Forrestal (Prelude To Darkness)

Kooney bird had the key
There is power in the key
Power on a ship with 5,000 men
Can't be overstated
Nor underestimated
I was glad to be friends with Kooney
As well as Bobby Mac Walker
But I can't remember all the names
So we will have dudes
Dudes with numbers
1 through 5,000
We were all numbers anyway
Trapped in a prison of our own making
Did I tell this story before?
Does anybody care?
This is written for MySpace,
But this is a story about our space
A time of glory
A time of youth's unbounded search
Searching for life
Within the confines of death
Running from the shadows
And the ghosts
Few will read
It will be too long
No trip of this magnitude
Can be done on a page
Like a good mind fuck film
We shall have flashbacks within flashbacks
And images will converge upon themselves
And by time we are through
You will be nearly as lost as I was
Shall we begin…or have we already

Was it you that said,
How long, how long
How long to the Point of Know Return
~Kansas~

Conflagration
Learned it in boot camp
During fire fighting week
It is used in the movie
The real deal, not made in Hollywood
Shot on location
The flight deck of the U.S.S. Forrestal
In the Gulf of Tonkin
Mr. McCain was there
I just saw the movie
Slightly ahead of getting my orders
The movie gets your attention
The movie puts in all in perspective
The movie is a total mind fuck
Just like the Navy
Mr. Neal was right
Oh so right
Bend over boys, here it comes
Did I tell you Bobby Mac was a drug dealer?
They caught him and gave him a choice…
Jail or join the Navy
There was a lot of that going on…
I was an altar boy
A boy scout
A suburban street punk
A member of the ROTC and drill team
I was anything anyone wanted me to be
I was gung ho and selected for OCS
But I choice my own path
And got rewarded accordingly

Dream on…dream until your dream comes true…
~Aerosmith~

I read a book once about The Beatles
It was "The Five Year Long Cocktail Party"
Or something to that effect
I always wanted a piece of that
And it was my time
And Kooney had the key
But it was dude 1 and dude 2
That Bobby Mac moved into the house on the beach with
Dude 1 was street smart…Detroit City
Bobby Mac was laid back Dallas cool
Dude 2 was New York smart
And Kooney Bird was Philly tough
I was small town suburbia
Southern rebel without a clue
But a sponge waiting to soak up the knowledge
Not all education comes from books
I read another book once "Snowblind"
The coming eight months were like those books
Only without Yoko or the money
I didn't live in the house…just partied there
Among other places
Somewhere along the way
I went from puppet to puppet master
From hayseed to a dealer of schedule A drugs
I was the man who knew Sid
And a whole bunch of other dudes
But first I was the boy who had never bonged before
Never read R. Crumb
Or High Times
Dudes 3 through 7 hung out there from time to time
Dudes 8 through 10 lived up the beach
And 11 and 12 lived up the road
Fuck the numbers
No one is going to read this anyway
Did I mention we were in Ocean City
A poor man's beach
Down the way from Virginia Beach
Quite a ways from The Portsmouth Naval Shipyard
And its concrete prison
I met a dude on a detail
He was a member of one of the gangs
Yes there were gangs
They say he fell overboard
But I know he was pushed
It was payback for the one he killed
Lay down your sword
Or be ready to die by it
8 was a freak over the band Kansas
Played them loud and constantly
And hung on every word
After 5 hits of very good acid
Anything can sound profound
Acid and beer go together well
Weed goes with anything but Angel Dust
Mad Dog is for when everything dries up
You can go awol without going anywhere
You can go back to the streets of Detroit
And hide forever
You can drop so much acid
That you just fade away
You can get strung out on heroin
And lose it all
You can climb on top of a train
And smoke under the stars
You can climb up near the top of the mast
And fly so high
You can forget that the ocean will eat you
You can run with the big dogs
But you can't hide
I knew some cats…ok, dudes
That lived in Virginia Beach
High class
Dude worked in one of the bars
And thought he could hide in plain sight
Deep fried brain cells
Sizzle, sizzle
Mark Roberts went awol and they never knew it
His name was lost off of the duty roster
So he just quit coming

Sounds of laughter shades of life
are ringing through my open ears
exciting and inviting me
Limitless undying love which
shines around me like a million suns
It calls me on and on across the universe

Jai guru deva om
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Jai guru deva
Jai guru deva
~John Lennon~

Did I mention the asbestos?
Tons of it…that's why we were there
The yardbirds had refused to touch it
But we had little choice
I later joined a group that was trying to unionize the military
A gesture as futile and empty and doomed to failure
As NORML…whose pen I wore on my uniform
I knew a dude who subscribed to a Soviet magazine
Just to piss them off
I know the ends and outs of how to paint steel
How to lay tile when you are flying on reds
How to climb a fifty foot ladder after smoking Angel Dust
Privacy is hard to come by on an aircraft carrier
But Kooney had the key to the music room
In it was everything you needed for a rock band
I played drums, Kooney and another dude played guitar
We sounded like shit, but no one heard
We were in our space
And we were stoned
We ruled and we rocked our space
Kooney had another key
The key to outer space
He got me 50 hits of acid
I was on my way
But damn I loved the merchandise

I met a girl who sang the blues and asked her for some happy news…but she just smiled and turned away.

~Don McLain~

Then there was that whole virgin thing
I think they were more freaked out about it than I was
I just knew that there was something else out there I was missing
The girls hung out at the house
Not because we were studly
It was the drugs
But deals can always be worked out
She was 16 and I was eighteen
And we were both from Knoxville
But I still believed
In what I was sold
Love is the answer
Yes I said love
I chose not to deal in transient love
So I carried the burden a little further down the road
And ignored the snide remarks
Down the road…always down the road
There was that day Bobby Mac crossed the yellow line
Down the road…
That changed everything
Facing death in the pursuit of life and happiness
Makes everything crystal clear
What were we after and where does it end?
We were speeding towards oblivion
And didn't really care
That's the line you cross
Without even knowing it
And the road back is so very long

No stop signs
Speed limit
Nobody's gonna slow me down
Like a wheel
Gonna spin it
Nobody's gonna mess me 'round
Hey Satan
Payin' my dues
Playin' in a rockin' band
Hey momma
Look at me
I'm on my way to the Promised Land, woh

I'm on the highway to hell
Highway to hell
I'm on the highway to hell
Highway to hell
~AC/DC~

McDonald's is a dangerous place after 5 hits of acid
That damn clown and his colors
The ocean is a dangerous place after 5 hits of acid
A window in Chicago is a dangerous place to be
While coming down off of 40 hits of speed
Coming down is never safe
We tried it as little as possible
When the doors open wide
It is a beautiful thing
Until they slam shut
There’s no way to tell it all, is there
You got to live it and hope you don't die it
Or not really care one way or the other
I was just along for the ride
It was now or never
And the time was right
And now gone forever

'Cause I've had my share of broken dreams
And more than a couple of falls
And in chasin' what I thought were moonbeams
I have run into a couple of walls
But in looking back at the faces I've been
I would sure be the first one to say
When I look at myself today
Wouldn'ta done it any other way
~Jim Croce~

Mike Carson
7-26-2008