Retrospective Of A Boomer (part 2 of 4)

For nine months of 1969, I was drunk most of the time, 

self-medicating, hoping to silence a vicious demon.

At the university,* I studied walkers, runners, 

rock climbing, landscapes (with houses and without);

sidewalks, clouds, bones, music, rocks, sonic booms, 

searing desert sunlight, and once a day I recited Desiderata.

I loved being the random university student. 

I had good friends and was active in several clubs.

But the sixties and early seventies were full of rampage,

riots, kidnapings, fire bombings, and Vietnam.

It was as if the times were conspiring to destroy

what little was left of everyone’s innocence.

I ran naked at Gate’s Pass and at Mt. Lemmon.

On a dare, I streaked on the university campus.

My girlfriend was French and wonderfully assertive,

but stalked me for a month for breaking up with her.

Classical music remained my source of solace,

and rock and roll kept me in the groove of things.

The Navy saved me from the train wreck that was home, 

but after that, I feared the volatile nature of my anger.

For two chaotic years, I lived in a kind of feral panic,

thinking that would make up for my abused childhood.

But no, it doesn’t work that way, not at all.

*Tucson, Arizona

From: A Rambly Search for 

Innocence, Time, and Love

Unpub. MS p. 9