Givenchy & Valentino

Givenchy (Clare Waight Keller) Haute Couture Fall/Winter 2019/2020.  

Monochromatic, feathers, and all that silver… to say nothing for the headpieces.  

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Valentino (Pierpaolo Piccioli) Haute Couture Fall/Winter 2019/2020.  

Everything about this show was simply masterful…  from the music, Ennio Morricone’s score to The Mission with the show being closed to Aretha Franklin singing Natural Woman.  So much colour, so much verve and attack; the structure and that ruffled purple gown at the end.  Bravissimo!  

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Go on cool kats, you know what to do, push down, plié, push off and start flying your merry little hearts out… cause life is a dream and you damn well can…. I love you more.  Thanks for the ongoing support… 

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©2013-2025 Arvin da Brgha.  All Rights Reserved.  

Yoko, Meghan & Cécile.

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One thing that the marriage of the TRH Duke & Duchess of Sussex has revealed, is just how hideously racist Britons are. Naturally, as all bigots especially the most invidious racially predatory will have you know, ‘It has nothing to do with race!’ The DailyMail has made an industry of acting as a de facto wing of the EDL in its campaign of destroying the marriage of the Sussexes.

Every single day its gaggle of writers launch another volley of hate to feed their hate-filled multitude of devotees whom they simply abuse in their quest for more advertising revenue. Last week, their legions of bigots were gleeful when not only was the Duchess of Sussex not at Royal Ascot but neither was her husband. Naturally, the rumour was that Her Majesty The Queen had banned the Sussexes from attending Royal Ascot. Of course, last year when Catherine, HRH Duchess of Cambridge was on maternity leave, she did not attend Royal Ascot. Furthermore, not once did her husband attend Royal Ascot. That is the tradition.

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Naturally, when these photographs of this year’s Royal Ascot emerged, the plethora of bigoted DailyMail trolls were celebratory of how happy and wholesome everyone looked. Of course, they were commenting on the homogeneity of the group; their was even talk that the RF looked so much happier without the American in their midst.

The following day, it was announced that the Royal Foundation was disbanding. This not only gave cause for wild celebration by the DailyMail trolls but in hindsight, it was speculated that the group looked as happy as they did at Royal Ascot because at that point, the dissolution of the Royal Foundation would have been known to all. This was seen as more proof that HM The Queen did not want Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex around Indeed, clearly, the Sussexes were headed for divorce and it was only a matter of time before there would be an announcement to that effect.

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By no means was tabloid culture then what it is today; however, there was no getting around the fact that there was unrelenting animus that was decidedly racist towards Yoko Ono because she was non-white. Of course, at the time as now and is always the case, there was strident denial that there was prejudice involved in the animus towards Yoko Ono. Heaven only knows that Linda Eastman was not a Briton, yet she was not reviled and hated for being an outsider as was Yoko Ono.

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So intense was the racial animus towards Yoko Ono that John Lennon had to relocate to New York City to seek peace away from being unrelentingly reviled by Britons, who were nothing more than unmasked Klansfolk; though there were three other wives, Yoko Ono was solely to blame for the demise of the Beatles. Indeed, Britons have John Lennon’s blood on their hands for having racially preyed on this man and his wife to the point where he had to flee and take refuge in a land where guns rule. Paul, Ringo nor George had to flee England because Britons did not approve of their choice of a wife.

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Neither Linda Eastman nor Montréalaise Autumn Kelly were subjected to the same animus as Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex for being outsiders marrying much-loved Britons. True, every woman marrying into the BRF experiences blow-back. Sarah Ferguson, Camilla Parker-Bowles, Catherine Middleton and on and on. Truth be told, neither Linda nor Autumn were subjected to similar animus as Yoko or Meghan simply for being Caucasian and therefore, deemed acceptable.

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Britons may well succeed with running TRH Duke & Duchess of Sussex out of town as they did John Lennon and Yoko Ono but know this, Tungsten has got powerful players in her corner. For starters, if the Sussexes were exiled, Oprah et al have the power to have her appointed as honorary chairperson of the Academy Awards – some such title of an American-British film society – not the American wing of BAFTA – which would see Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex each year present the award for Best Film at the Academy Awards.

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More to the point, when are Americans going to stop kowtowing to Britons because of the latter’s archly over-compensatory inferiority complex, of all things, masquerading as posh, sophisticated, superior and aristocratic. Why should an American actor, after having graduated with distinction from Julliard sit by and watch yet another English actor waltz in and claim the American award for best actor in a film which was not even an American production; this has repeatedly happened in the past. And so like Britons it is; they are the only island dwellers in the English-speaking world who never lose their god-awful accent regardless how long they sojourn abroad. Whether five years or fifty, you can also count on the expat English to maintain their posher-than-though English accent. Some may be readily charmed/fooled by all that posh posturing but it is so much obvious BS.

Glenn Close did not win the Best Actress BAFTA in 2019 that honour went to Briton, Olivia Colman in The Favourite. Ever possessed of this obsequious need to suck up, the Academy and its members voted Olivia Colman Best Actress at an American Awards show when the production was not an American production and Glenn Close was not going to win the Best Actress BAFTA and did not. One thing is clear from her acceptance speech, Olivia Colman is a one-hit wonder and will never win an Oscar again, just as Matthew McConaughey never will; after all, his Best Actor award was by default – so great was the need to deny Chiwetel Ejiofor an Oscar for his masterful performance in 12 Years A Slave.

When Britons prove themselves such ugly racist boors as with Yoko Ono and now Meghan Markle, why indulge, suffer or tolerate these people overlong? Throwing Oscars at them because they talk as though they’ve got a horse’s hoof stuck up their arse, there is nothing much to celebrate when one’s claim to fame is having subjugated 2/3s the world way back when and having enslaved and or brutalised those persons.

Of course, Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex chose not to move next-door to the Cambridges at Kensington Palace. For one, there is every reason to believe that the Cambridges’ marriage currently is nine parts façade and with a numerology attitude of 9, HRH Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, apart from not being the sharpest tool in the box, is also conceited, stubborn, bigoted and intolerant and also is in tight with those pompous-arsed minor royals the Michaels of Kent et famille who with their racist perspective were none-too-shy about showing their true colours, blackamoor and all with Meghan suddenly in their midst and to whom they would have to curtsy.

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A den of racial predators is no environment in which to bring up black children and that would also include those generational members of Kensington Palace staff, who would think nothing of being openly racist towards Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex and her children, For Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex the minor royal Micheals of Kent are no different to Samantha Grant and Thomas Markle Jr. She endured the racially predatory bullying in childhood, which is precisely why she has absolutely nothing to do with them and with damn good reason. Trust you me, there is not a single black person on this planet who would suffer any such environment. It is not human, not civilised and a goddamn waste of time.

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Carping on about how much better Cressida Bonas would have been as a wife to HRH Prince Henry of Wales, is a moot point. Who knows, perhaps, Harry was being forced into the relationship so that his older brother could have access to Cressida’s older sister, Isabella Anstruther-Gough-Calthorpe. Is it any wonder why Sam Branson keeps his wife as far away from the isle of England as possible. Of course, had Harry married Cressida, this newfound media love for Catherine, HRH Duchess of Cambridge would not have eventualised. She would be portrayed, even more so, by the DailyMail as workshy and they would even up the practise of only printing photographs of her when her face is at rest, which is a decidedly hard affair. For being blonde, blue-eyed and with an artisan’s fey beauty, Cressida, had Prince Harry married her in May 2018, would currently be eclipsing Catherine, who is now being seen as a fashion icon. No matter how DailyMail repackage and champion Catherine, she is a relative dud when publicly speaking as Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex has time and again proven. The Duchess of Sussex’s commanding performance at the 2018 British Fashion Awards at Royal Albert Hall truly was a study is grace, poise, elegance and commanding stage presence. You’ve either got it or, as in Catherine’s case, you don’t. Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex is quite confidently aware that a mic is Catherine, HRH Duchess of Cambridge’s kryptonite.

The DailyMail and its gang of racist boors can vent and gloat all they want but if HRH Prince Henry, Duke of Sussex were to have married a conservative Muslim and converted, for fear of ending up with their fetid skull on the small of their back, every one of their cowardly racist boors would know to keep their damn mouths shut. Of one thing they are certain, fucking with blacks will earn you no serious repercussions. The DailyMail‘s hacks have proven that England is the isle of the original hooded klansfolk; they are just a little bit more evolved to the point where their hoods have become invisible but no less ugly are they. In the end, who could give a fuck; the boors of the isle of England most certainly did not invent Jazz and speaking of which…

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After having pored through this year’s TD Toronto Jazz Festival lineup, I knew that there was only one show that I cared to attend. The Diana Ross show at the Sony Centre though tempting, however, the centre is just too cavernous a space. Jazz needs the warmth and intimacy of a smaller venue. Besides, I knew damn well that coming the day after the Pride parade, there would be queens aplenty in the audience. Most of them would be expecting the usual Diana Ross show; however, this was going to be a Jazz show.

As ever, I did not attend Pride parade, never have. Back in 1986, Merlin and I hauled arse to a dinner party in the Annex where an artistic director associate of his, held court. Frankly, neither men liked each other but for professional reasons one endured much. Among the group of 8 souls was a redhead interior decorator from New York City who was the most vile dirty-arsed bigot conceivable. Naturally, with yours truly present, he just had to wax overlong about what a scourge on human civilisation blacks the world over were.

Merlin stealthily reached across my plate and removed my steak knife from the plate and placed it to his left as I sat on his right. Finally, when we got home by cab as Merlin sought to shift my mood by playing some Miles Davis, I went and retrieved a pair of scissors and demonstrated to him on returning to the living room, “That’s it, I am cancelling my membership in Gay society. God only knows it is not as if these blasted, motherfucking lisping, bottom-feeding people invented Jazz.” For me what really settled it, was the redhead boor’s decree, “Sorry dear but there is no black in the rainbow.”

Of course, a couple of years back the Black Lives Matter delegation, which had been invited to march in the Gay Pride parade, were booed, heckled and pelted with unopened water bottles. That very day on my way home, I was also attached and it was much fuelled by the general anger at having had the Black Lives Matter contingent in the parade. To this day, the pride community are still mad at the Police and had banned them from participating in the parade, all because they allowed the Black Lives Matter group into the parade. Even though the group had been invited, they were treated by spectators as though they did something as irresponsible as simply showed up and high-jacked the parade.

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The above photograph was the look for the opening act, one of those regrettable experiences, which alas the Canada Council foists on one, god only knows why. Banal and as sexually intriguing as a live webcam set up on a couple of koala bears in repose, some things just have to be endured to get one through to the real deal. As my date, an ageing Jewish actor/writer with the most wicked sense of humour is always great company, we sat in the back row, all to ourselves, in fits of delicious giggles – we were poring through online photographs of Céline Dion parading in haute couture in Paris in the lead up to Paris Fashion Week; when asked what I thought of her whacky, over-the-top, beyond desperate behaviour, I flatly put in, “it ought damn well to be kept leashed and staked out back.”

Next, it was my turn to come undone when no sooner than having slipped in the breath mint that he whispered, “those are the new mint-flavoured super laxatives, I was telling you about.” How soul-gnawing is emulative institutional Jazz whose practitioners know nothing either of blacks or black culture? Hell, even after the bass solo, there was no applause from the house.

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Finally, like a lover with the most foul breath but whose girthsome jousting simply won’t be denied – then the malodorous rogue leaves and you shudder in disgust and return to breathing like a human rather than a goddamn humpback whale – the opening act vacated the stage and when the stagehands were done, only the grand piano was left. Out then walked Cécile McLorin Salvant with a puckish accompanist and it was readily obvious that there is an indelible soul connection between the two, which speaks to intimacy most rare and also more than a dozen past-life connections. Even Cécile’s body had changed, she looked more lived in, she was getting good loving and it showed.

Before proceeding, let me just state that this was the most phenomenal and best Jazz concert that I have ever attended. From Hoagy Carmichael, to Barbara Streisand, to Bessie Smith, every song was her own and every song was a master class in musicianship and phrasing. Then two things happened that blew me even further away; firstly, she sang, Midnight Sun. This is a song that for me as long as I live, will always evoke the most pleasurable memories of living at John Hirsch and Brian Trottier’s Moore Park Home at 187 Hudson Drive in the summer of 1990 after Merlin had passed and I reinvented self and took the time to travel. Until this concert, no one had ever done a better version of Midnight Sun than Sarah Vaughan, whose version daily played at that lovely Moore Park home.

Secondly, Cécile paused and asked if anyone in the audience was French, to which there was a boisterous response and then she asked to sing a song in French. By the time she was done, I was reduced to tears, even my usual jaded friend was blown away. At the conclusion the house went wild and I was reminded of those years living in Montréal and attending all those summer festivals across the province.

Let’s see Canadian, Diana Krall sing en Français in this supposed bilingual country and I am not talking any of that tawdry attempt at French musicianship as with the likes of Emilie-Claire Barlow et al. Unlike those frauds who suffocated the blackness out of Jazz in the 90s and beyond, Cécile is the real McCoy. The primary musical instrument in human civilisation is the voice and when it comes to Jazz, not only is it a language that is the extension of the griot tradition, nothing sounds like, feels like, moves you like the instrument that is the black voice; there simply aren’t any comparisons. This is the voice, the instrument, when on walking through your door can revivify and empower you like no other instrument can and most especially so after having experienced racial animus for the 14th millionth and fifty-seventh time in this lifetime.

During the course of the show, her accompanist did something that I had never before witnessed, Sullivan Fortner got from the piano stool to reach inside and pluck on the strings, making for all intents the most beautiful mbira imaginable. Sullivan proved himself the perfect accompanist to Cécile and it was clear by the end of the concert that these two lovely, magical and gifted souls have thankfully found each other and how we are better for them being in the world. The love and harmony they share, was as rich and smooth as the warmest honey satiating the palate. Even the encores were concerts onto themselves. If there is anything that can be said to be good, to have come from Roy Hargrove’s passing, is that it created the opportunity for both Sullivan and Cécile to form a most productive collaboration.

As we left Koerner Hall, both of us giddy with joy for having been richly inspired, there was a guy outside the theatre, hawking the program for Jazz FM. Brusquely, I declined taking one, I soon explained that I had no desire to be associated with the Jazz radio when they went and hired someone whom Merlin dismissed back in his early on-air days as VJ at MuchMusic as a smug bigoted asshole. Indeed, an ageing leopard does not his spots lose. Just for writing a few hit songs and having made a few million dollars changes nothing. As Merlin always said, “a man changes clothes and nothing else.”

Though last year, there were three good concerts during the Jazz Festival; this year, one only needed to have attended one concert and boy am I richly inspired for having done so. On parting, we both agreed that it really was an awesome concert; more than that, we admitted that it was high time that we saw Rocketman before it goes to video.

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For your ongoing support, I am ever grateful. Buy my glorious books, the incomparable series with Michael overleaves appendices; truly, they are human civilisation’s first dream memoirs.

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©2013-2025 Arvin da Brgha. All Rights Reserved,

Pilgrimage to Windsor… That Dress!

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Aerial view: Windsor Castle, Berkshire.  

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In the mad dash to board the train from King’s Cross/St. Pancras Station to Paddington Station, I boarded the wrong train and ended up losing almost of hour of valuable time.  Nonetheless to Windsor with me, indeed.  

The ride to Windsor was lovely and it was still well before before 1000 when I got into town.  So nice to know that a flash of the London Pass gets one into the Castle, plus to see the exhibition of TRH Duke & Duchess of Sussex’s wedding finery plus the outfits worn by pageboy, HRH Prince George of Cambridge and the always ‘on’ HRH Princess Charlotte of Cambridge.  

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Next, through the hurdle of being scoured by the most thorough security detail; and with good reason too.  

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The mélange of Chinese, Japanese and Korean dialects made for an interesting symphony of sounds as I made my way past security and onto castle grounds.  

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I am reminded of Vancouver Island by the hearty vegetation down below.  

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Nothing is more refreshing than the smell of moss in cooler weather.  The air is so fresh here in Berkshire.  

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The view from the Middle Ward down to St. George’s Chapel; but that’ll come after touring the castle’s state apartments.  

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The glorious view north across the River Thames to Eton College Chapel… Nothing beats being out on the terrace and looking out to the landscape below.  

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The view along the terrace towards the entrance to the castle. 

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Once inside, of course, photography is not allowed.  This, understandably, is for security reasons; it is after all the Sovereign’s main residence.  Formidable, an entrance indeed.  Touring the state apartments, the progression’s starting point was different to previous visits.  

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Without doubt, I knew that the wedding outfits worn by TRH Duke & Duchess of Sussex would not be on display in the castle’s Green Drawing Room; there is only one door into said room for the public and the other at the opposite end, leads directly into the Sovereign’s private apartments. 

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Furthermore, that single door is too narrow to accommodate persons going and coming into the Green Drawing Room, if they were to enter and exit by said door.  

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Similarly, I knew that the exhibition, A Royal Wedding: The Duke and Duchess of Sussex could not have been held in St. George’s Hall above.  There is simply too much natural light which floods the space; this could actually prove more harm than good – even though it would be best to see the dress in natural light.  Moreover, I did not expect that it would be held there as the space is too large and, frankly, with the amount of racially charged animus towards this marriage, it would likely not draw as large a crowd to warrant being staged there.  Truth be told, there were no Caucasians viewing the exhibit when I moved through it, than there were East Asian and blacks combined.  

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I will never forget my confusion on first experiencing The Waterloo Chamber in this lifetime.  I just felt as though, perhaps, my sense that I had been to Windsor Castle in prior lives or a lifetime was off.  Of course, I would learn that this marvellous salon was installed during HM King George IV’s reign, at which time, I had reincarnated into Barbados, after having been a countertenor at the court of HM King George III and during the early years of his son’s Regency.  

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Then again, those high-placed windows in the Waterloo Chamber would preclude its assignation as the setting for the exhibition, A Royal Wedding: The Duke and Duchess of Sussex.  

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Though noted for its stunning portraits of both HM Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother and HM King George VI, this room much like St. George’s Hall has too much light exposure.  

On entering the long narrow hallway with large windows that look out onto the terrace, the River Thames and the north shore beyond, one happens on a wall of linen panels which cover the floor to ceiling cabinets with priceless china from the Royal Collection.  

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Imagine all these iconic moments from the wedding of TRH Duke & Duchess of Sussex on hanging linen panels of more than 8 or more feet tall.  The effect is warm, enveloping and their size deftly impress on one, the uneclipsed love between these two star-crossed lovers.  

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Next, into the grandeur of the Grand Reception Room one slips and with the heavy red curtains drawn, the effect is even more stunning.  The large chandeliers are softly dimmed and handsomely display the bridal garments of the wedding party.  

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The embroidery on HRH Prince Henry, Duke of Sussex’s uniform, to the Queen Mary Diamond Bandeau tiara when seen in intimate detail proved more breathtaking than I had anticipated.  Goodness, even the shoes worn by Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex were exquisite.  

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What I found most interesting about the dress was its sheer simplicity.  The dress serves as a foil for the intricacy of the five metre veil entwined with the fifty-three flowers of the Commonwealth nations, along with the state flower for Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex’s home state of California.  Not until in the presence of the dress did its simplicity make sense; the dress is masterfully constructed such that its simplicity reminds one that only the expert craftsmanship of a couturier could have designed and manufactured the dress. 

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Yet, there was more to the simplicity of this Clare Waight Keller dress for Givenchy and it was not until moving around it a second time that it struck me; the simplicity of the dress speaks to the recent past of Ms. Markle’s African heritage.  Its simplicity speaks of the history of a people which was erased, wiped out by the terror of having been robbed and enslaved.  

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Yet like the simplicity which belies the masterful craftsmanship of the couturiers who created this stunning dress, there is also greatness to a people though reviled, socio-economically oppressed, criminalised, marginalised and made to feel inferior… the same people whose greatness shrines through in Jazz, for one.  Remarkably, the simplicity of the dress, is like the sheer eloquence with which HRH Prince Charles, Prince of Wales sincerely both acknowledged and apologised for the past, which his society and family had contributed to in the immense suffering of Africans; this he did this past autumn when touring West Africa on behalf of HM The Queen.  

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This was not only not a heavily attended exhibition but, at the time that I moved through it, there was not a single Caucasian viewing the wedding garments.  Though many would like to have you believe that there is no basis in race why they dislike Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex, that is just a damn lie.  Naturally, neither medicine nor academia acknowledges the existence of the racial predator as ‘No’ is the most powerful word when dealing with blacks.  Indeed, not until going to St. George’s Chapel after the tour of the castle was concluded, did one see Caucasians in numbers that reflect their proportions in the society.  Indeed, unlike previously, one was being fixed with looks that were charged with racial animus.  

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Though she is now the most reviled black woman on the planet, truth is that the soul who is now Meghan, HRH Duchess of Sussex was Margaret Beaufort, Tudor Matriarch: key figure in the War of the Roses, cousin of HM King Henry VI, mother of HM King Henry VII, mentor, counsel and favourite of her grandson, HM King Henry VIII who was much impressed by her focussed untrammelled ambition, great-grandmother of HM Queen Elizabeth I. 

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Without her drive and singleness of purpose, England may still be a Catholic nation and its language may well be French.  Nonetheless, such is the rabid, irrational tribalism that is racism; her true nature cannot be perceived by the blind who can never see either the links to the past or the bigger picture.  

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In the end, I was much inspired for having made this pilgrimage to see this dress, which in its simplicity symbolised hope, atonement and the love of two entity mates who have known each other in twenty prior lifetimes.  The simplicity of this dress proved an epiphany.  

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Statue of HM King Charles II without whose drive, there would have been no Restoration.  

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View of the round tower on exiting the State Apartments and at the edge of the Quadrangle.  

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Details of St. George’s Chapel.  

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Details… and more details.  

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Even more interesting details…

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Sadly, photography is not allowed inside the chapel.  

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Despite the general seething that being black elicited from most persons here – thanks to HRH Prince Henry, Duke of Sussex having married the black woman, I rather enjoyed revisiting the spiritual home of the Knights of the Garter.  There is a certain warmth and intimacy to the quire’s dark woods that I favour.  

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And like that, another day of adventure was completed.  

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As the train sped back to London, I spotted this queer, though, appealing architectural gem.  

As ever, thanks so much for your ongoing support and always remember to become awake when asleep into the magical realm of dreams.  

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©2013-2025 Arvin da Brgha.  All Rights Reserved.  

Crawl the Fuck In Your Casket!

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Goodness, it has been a long time since I have posted a dream herein.  I have been busy putting the finishing touches on the memoir for which many of the dreams shared herein will be featured.  The subtitle for the memoir will be: Human Civilisation’s First Dream Memoir. 

More recently, I was having a leisurely ride home in the morning up Yonge Street.  I had just ascended the last incline on Yonge before it cruises down to a level grade, then it is hang a right and cruise along Wellesley Street East and home.  Just as I crossed Carlton Street and begun the real steeply graded portion of the ride, a cab pulled up and immediately out popped a female in suit at the start of her business day; she was headed for the 24hrs Shoppers Drug Mart. 

Immediately, I opted to change course and rode around to the driver’s side of the cab and cruised along the little bit of leeway afforded as yet another condominium construction – Yonge & Grenville meant that the two lanes in each direction were reduced to only one.  As I cruised past ringing my bell, the cab driver suddenly began opening his door; I could not believe his audacity.  I shouted him down and insisted that he let me pass, to which the dirty-looking mid-aged Dravidian shot back, “Oh shut up as if you matter!” 

My heart was already pumping beyond the norm after the fright of seeing his door beginning to open as I rode alongside.  Indeed, who are we to think that Black lives matter?  As I was too exhausted to fight just then, I continued peddling hard then started back to the right and towards the curb where I always ride.  No sooner than had I made it round the front of the cab that the hairy back and arsed southern Mediterranean construction worker on the east side of Yonge Street holding up a stop sign, on having witnessed the near miss, shouted, “Kill him!  Kill him!” 

My heart only pumped even more deafeningly as his face became contorted with racially predatory hatred his ilk own so well but are forever careful to claim not to have any awareness of.  Exhausted and feeling like I was going to keel over, I soldiered on too proud to have to stop and deal with the ubiquitous ugliness that is racism.  Yes indeed, Canada is a racist hellhole and they are so stratospherically sophisticated at being venal racists that unlike their tormented neighbours to the south, they do not need the ubiquity of guns when they have quite effectively rendered Blacks as negligible as a weevil-infested bag of flour in the corner. 

Edging less gingerly up Yonge Street than normally I would, I was met two blocks north by more lane closure; yet another block long condo complex was breaking ground – east side of Yonge Street from Maitland Street south.  Riding past, I made eye contact with a mid-aged member of the local constabulary who on making eye contact smiled and nodded in kind; I have always found Toronto’s officers to be worlds removed from their counterparts in Montréal.  Getting to Wellesley Street, I realised that the store to which I would normally drop in to get my cache of lottery tickets and ice cream did not have my choice flavours. 

Thus, I hung right and began homeward east along Wellesley Street East.  Riding past, opposite the subway entrance to Wellesley Subway Station, I noticed three large 5 tonne trucks lined up along the south side of Wellesley’s eastbound lane; they actually were obstructing the bike lane.  Again, I grew understandably cautious and began ringing my bell on approaching the first of three trucks waiting to service the condo complex under construction on the north side of Wellesley where the three hundred pound-plus Dr. Edward Kamski with a drifting eye serviced one of Toronto’s largest group of AIDS patients back in the 1990s in an office low-rise tower that no longer exists.  

As I rung my bell and cruised along, I heard a male voice to my rear impatiently yelling for me to get the hell out of the way.  Finally, when I cleared the third 5 tonne truck, the White male pulled alongside on his bike to start shouting at me.  I was called a fucking stupid arsehole and a moron and called crazy for wearing a helmet with lights on at just past 0700 when the Sun had not yet fully risen.  Of course, White male bigot number 1 million and two wore no helmet and fixed me with hostile looks that were full of rage that had nothing to do with my having been in his way.  Naturally, his whiteness is his helmet and were he to have fallen, he could never possibly suffer brain injury of any kind. 

I am always so happy when the weather turns icy and snowy because all these casual cyclists who never wear a helmet and are forever speeding and illegally dashing through red lights are not a nuisance for a good six months.  Naturally, he let a green light turn red at Church Street so that he could wait for me to catch up to him after he had initially sped off owing to cowardice.  Now he had to return to get his fix of being hateful and seeking someone Black to blame all that was wrong and blameworthy in the world. 

Again, he started with the racially predatory yelling as though this was some moment in Apartheid South Africa and I was his bitch.  Because life is too short to suffer the White tribe and its fucked up psyche, I simply began singing aloud whilst drowning out his dreck – with a little change of lyrics, “Ooooh wooo wooo wooooooo, what a little sunshine wouldn’t do-ooooooo!”  Thereafter, I followed with loud merry scatting as though having to drive off another bothersome neighbourhood yapping stray dog.  You will never fucking-goddamn-arse snuff out the spirit of the people who invented Jazz!  Know that! 

Finally, I got to the store along Wellesley Street East where I have visited since it opened a few years back.  In the last couple of years, I have stridently avoided frequenting said store in daytime as there is a White female clerk there who from the first time that I entered the store, she was rude and has remained rude on the odd occasion that I would pop in. 

Last June close to the end of the school year, I dropped in the store to get a couple of lottery tickets in the afternoon whilst en route to work.  Naturally, there was a gaggle of giggly, bubbly youths from Jarvis Collegiate Institute, the city’s oldest high school.  As I patiently waited, I admiringly observed three Black males who were negotiating with their Filipino and Somali female friends.  They were giving them cash and a list of what they wanted. 

Said one youth, when asked by one of the scarfed Somali why don’t they just get their stuff themselves, “She’s a bitch!  I’m not going in there to be yelled at.”  Another of three out rightly dismissed her as a racist bigot who was always targeting them for being Black.  Straight away, I knew to whom they were referring.  Finally, I made it into the store where as I got my tickets again, the cigarette-smoking, mouth-breather whose idea of post-secondary education will amount to how to successfully cock-suck and breed more ignorant offal just had to be rude, snicker and fight-pick. 

I ignored her because again, life is way too short to have to suffer shit that just does not count.  Previously, I had walked out the store to avoid having to operatically scream at her sleepwalking hateful arse.  Of course, on that occasion, I got home only to realise that my lottery tickets had not made it from the store with me.  I then returned hours later when she was already concluded her shift to pick up my tickets. 

So there I was, after having been met by three rounds of racial animus all within five minutes of each other and mere hours of these persons having awakened; at least I was near the end of my day.  All I wanted was my blasted ice cream, my lottery tickets and go home, turn up my ever turned-on BOSE to JazzFM and have Garvia Bailey lay some culture on me.  For the brief time that I was in the store, as ever, the racist White boor kept up the usual sotto voce remarks and insisted that I get the hell out of the store and take my bike with me.  The bike she has always used as her crutch for dicking with me and since I have always had the manager’s permission to bring my bike into the store, long before she ever dropped out of high school, I had no intentions of being bullied by her. 

So I ignored her bullshit and had quite had enough when she said, “Are you deaf too; like don’t you hear me, just take you and your bike and get out of the store.”  Taking two steps back, I began channelling Leontyne Price after she has just stridden victorious offstage to rapturous applause in Tosca, to Nina Simone singing with stinging rebuke Mississippi Goddamn, to Diana Ross in her live 1992 show in New York City singing with callous brutality, Strange Fruit, to Betty Carter wrapping it all up breezily singing, Thou Swell – and you can always count on Heather Bambrick to drop some Betty Carter when she is on-air hosting on JazzFM. 

“Why don’t you go lay your fucking grey arse in the sun…” I lethally shot back, to which she rebutted aloud, “Excuse me!  Why would I want to lay in the sun?  Like, why would I want to look like… you?” 

“No sweetheart never mind that, the sooner you lay your hideous grey arse in the sun, the sooner you’ll get cancer and crawl the fuck in your casket.”  Of course, never before having had her daily fix of racially charged aggression challenged, her feeble comeback was another, “Excuse me?” said with the sort of lisp that likely meant that her brother and or father were devout cocksuckers as is one’s wont. 

Always having to have the last word, she then added, “Go on, get out the store, you are blocking the aisle.” 

“Shut the fuck up and get some sun, you fucking hideous lizard-lipped fraud.  Not only are a poor excuse for a human but you long ago used up your quota of oxygen.  Go on, crawl the motherfuck in your casket!” 

“Yeah whatever, get out of here!” 

Life is all about choice: you can either play Rodney King or you own your power and be a proud motherfucker like Lena Horne or Frederick ‘Mr. Hat’ Jones for that matter.  As I began leaving the store, right on cue, the morning radio show chimed in with the opening sounds of Robert Nestor Marley crying out, “Oh Yeah!” at the start of his famous anthem. 

Oh ye fucking gods, never before had Bob Marley sounded so sweet… been so empowering.  Getting to the automatic doors, I drowned out her bullshit as the White loutish effete Athenian – whose thick moustache likely stunk of phlegm and faeces – who was in the store observing what went down, got to the counter and began saying some shit about ‘them’; singing for joy, I joined Bob Marley and shouted, “Rasta-far-I” as I slipped through the door and into sunlight which suddenly seemed more crisp, indeed, more vibrant. 

In having taken the time to take this racial predatory boor to task, the universe had synergistically harmonised and lifted me higher as Bob Marley’s infectious idealism took control.  Never before had Marley sounded so beautiful, been so right.  Had I done as too many times previously I had, I would have suffered the indignity of being driven out of the store by the racist lout and missed out, most importantly, on that Bob Marley tune. 

I then got home, had Garvia Bailey’s magical energies groove me back to centre.  But enough of me kicking racially predatory arse; let’s then focus on the business in hand.  I found this wonderful dream of the most glorious eccentric who much informed my upbringing in Crab Hill, Sandy Point, St. Kitts.  She was the original, the real McCoy… a true eccentric.  Unlike that other Florence (Foster Jenkins) there was nothing lunatic about the eccentric Kittisian Florence (Pole). 

These marvellously uplifting dreams, which had also included a right proper astral plane fuck, were gloriously lived on Thursday, April 1, 1993 whilst the Moon then bugalooed through Cancer and my second house.  These swell uncompromisingly beautiful dreams are to found in volume XV and were audiocassette-recorded on tape one hundred and forty-seven. 

The second dream of eccentric Florence Pole was dreamt on Saturday, March 10, 1990.  At the time, it was a full Moon in Virgo and thus Luna transited my fourth house whilst being conjunct my natal Pluto and simultaneously opposing retrograde Chiron and square both natal Luna and its opposition to Mars at the ascendant.  This dream of Florence was the most lucidly awakened dream poetry imaginable. 

Go on drink from the chalice that is this rare beautiful flower; but don’t get too close and definitely do not get out of line ‘cause I’m a rapaciously carnivorous motherfucker who will hand you back your arse roughly ploughed and bloodied – beautiful flowers always have to protect themselves from being preyed on.  More than that, please know that your support these past three years have been immensely encouraging. 

I quite look forward to sharing the bounty of dreams and the story of Merlin and me in the memoir which will be dropping in coming months.  Be well and always straighten up and fly right, you cool shamanic kindred-spirited cats!  Sweet dreams whether focussed in the waking state or dreamtime; anything less is just not living. 

____________________________________

Arriving at Florence Pole’s, next door to our Crab Hill, Sandy Point, St. Kitts house, I ventured indoors.  Naturally, in this the second dream, the entire house was boarded up.

When crossing the veranda, I had cautiously treaded; I knew that the floorboards there had a history of being broken or rotted away.  On entering the doors from the veranda, in place of a living room one immediately entered a bedroom.

This was the easterly room off the veranda which, in the waking state, had always been the living room.  A large single, metallic bed sat in the center of the room.

Seeing it brought back childhood memories that were pleasant to the touch.  Though it was fairly dark inside, I knew that Florence Pole was in the house.

At one point, she called me from across the house; with that, I went in search of her.  From the room, I made it into a large, impressive hall which seemed too large to be contained in the confines of her quaint Kittisian bungalow.

I was quite surprised that it existed and its high-ceilinged beauty was inspiring.  Though the entire house from the exterior appeared to be completely boarded up and thus shutting out any possible light of day, there was a great deal of light flooding into the hall.

Several beautiful area rugs were strategically placed on the floor of the hall; the rugs, however, never overlapped.  They were in the center and were placed in square formations.

The parquetry, down the centre of the hall, was so well polished that it shined.  To see all this splendour really blew my mind.

Seeing that she is such an eccentric, I thought that perhaps she would been some celebrated aristocrat in a past life.  She certainly is an intellectual aristocrat; Florence is so fine-tuned that she is beyond the ordinary.

This makes it impossible for her to relate on the level of the mundane.  How good it was to see her ensconced in such splendour.

She is certainly an eccentric, mature-souled, evolved creature.  A breed apart and onto herself, for that matter, I thought as I moved through the palatial hall.

On further reflection, I realised that her inner life would really look this opulent.  There would be nothing but splendour here; after all, all she gets in the waking state is social ostracism and derision.

The rugs were genuine Persian rugs and were in tiptop shape at that.  They were well preserved and of the finest quality; seemingly, they were hundreds of years old.

There were two long ones, on either side, which ran the length of the hall.  Between them and the dark, rich panelling of the walls were some two feet of empty space.

The grid, which formed the rectangle of exposed parquetry, was some five by twelve feet long.  Wanting to hear the sound of my feet when striding through such a majestic place, I kept to the parquetry as much as possible.

The sunlight flooding the hall left the space infused with the very warmth of Florence Pole’s spirit.  Eventually, I entered the room off the central hall from which she had called me.

When I entered, she greeted me grandly and was truly eccentric.  She recognised me, right away, and was warm and genuinely excited to see me.

Her energies were thoroughly theatrical.  All that I could think was how wonderful it was to see her again.

Here, in this room, there was an identical bed to the one in the guest room; this one, though, was in a far corner of the room.  This room was sparsely furnished.

Over in the far southwest corner of the room, the head of the bed was facing due south.  The door faced eastward and into the hall.

There was no disputing the fact that the interior of this house was considerably larger than her waking state house.  As a matter of fact, it was palatial in dimensions and the home of a very wealthy person.

This, of course, was a metaphor for this woman’s considerable wealth of spirit, intellect and creativity.  Florence Pole has substance and it was being borne out in this dream.

That no one in the waking state actually perceived her, for her true self, is not the issue.  They frustrated her because of their intolerance but ultimately, she was not lunatic, crazy or demented.

This dream encounter validated my suspicions, held since my childhood, of her.  Style and character were innately hers.

Florence Pole had this one particular painting which was in the far, northeast corner of the room.  The painting was on the northern wall but towards the eastern edge of it.

This painting was the most incredibly beautiful work of art.  The art was held in an ornate wooden frame that was gold filigree; the frame was about two and one half inches thick.

Bevelled, the frame graded in towards the painting.  The painting was oil on canvas and was quite rich.

There was a wonderful sense of the ‘blue’; indeed, it was an aqueous sky.  On the ocean was the most magnificent large ship.

The ship was from the age of the buccaneers.  Right then and there, it dawned on me that the painting hearkened back to a past life of Florence Pole’s.

Thus, I presumed, she perhaps had been a pirate; a European pirate who had come over on one of the galleons during the 16th or 17th centuries.  Perhaps, I further speculated, she had come to St. Kitts and had so loved the place that her soul had decided to pass a future lifetime there; of course, that future lifetime is the life that she is now living.

She would definitely have been European, perhaps, British, French or possibly Spanish.  That experience, as it were, had ended up planting a seed in her soul.

There was no mistaking that this lifetime of hers presently hearkens back to a disputatious lifetime of hers; a past life in which she was White of European descent and deeply involved in the pillage, rape and plunder of the spoils of colonialism.  She had clearly had a swashbuckling lifetime somewhere back there.

The ship was brown and black with three masts.  Two of its sails were unfurled.

The ship was the most majestic vessel imaginable.  Never before had I seen a painting that was so alive with sheer realism and creative genius.

She stood there whilst admiringly looking at me as I rather admired the painting.  I knew that Florence Pole knew that I was getting the gist of the ship’s importance.

The oils used were as if still wet and slowly, hypnotically in motion.  This painting was as captivating as when I stood before Rembrandt van Rijn’s Night Watch back in 1992.

Quite simply, I was blown away by the languorousness of the painting.  This was not static; it was as if having a window onto a past in which simultaneously said ship was on the high seas centuries across time.

To say the least, Florence Pole in that past life would have been on board that ship then and there.  Perhaps, she was even the captain of the vessel.

The colours here were so masterfully rendered.  A truly realistic reproduction of things this proved.

In that sense, it truly was magical as it simply seemed to be the seed point from which the actual vessel was created.  The blues of the sea, as contrasted to the blues of the sky, were so subtle that it was mind-blowing.

This was a very rich blue with different tonalities to it.  In its subtleties, this work of art was so sublimely magical that it was mind-expanding.

Also, in the room were two antique chests of drawers.  There was as well an antique rocking chair.

This woman was so very regal and dramatic.  I rather got off on being in her presence.

We completely connected; there was no way to get around the fact that we were not strangers to each other.  She did very much so appeal to my Sagittarian energies.

Our sense of self and style were completely harmonious; in that sense, we were kindred spirits in the true sense of the word.  So very good it was to see her that I said, “Oh, it’s so very good to see you…”

With that, I grabbed her by the hand and energetically squeezed it.  She warmly smiled and together our hands remained at our sides.

The touch of her hands relayed to me that energetic spark of her soul itself.  The feel of her vibration was readily familiar.

She was showing me around the room; together, we spent much time looking over the oil painting of the galleon.  Florence Pole then told me that it was her very favourite painting and held a special place in her heart.

This, of course, made perfect sense to me as it was clearly a pivotal lifetime of hers.  Clearly, it was a lifetime in which she commandeered on the high seas and was quite the adventurer.

There was no sense that there was something lacking in her life, in this lifetime, because she was isolated.  There was a lot of processing going on in her life at present.

I had the sense that she was in the process of transiting soul ages; as a result, she was having to take stock before making the next big leap forwards.  There was nothing wrong in her present lifetime.

She was an older soul; of that much I was, for having experienced her, certain.  I then left the room and walked about the hall more leisurely whilst exploring the various rooms off the central hall.

Meanwhile, Florence Pole could be heard very beautifully singing as though I was not even there.  This was the kind of inner musings in which she constantly engaged without as much as a thought to others’ opinions.

This was one of the most pleasurably rapturous experiences.

*To have been in this great eccentric’s presence as she was simply being herself whilst caught in a groove, I thoroughly understood.  This truly was an utterly amazing dream odyssey.

Here, it was quite nice and uplifting.  More than ever, this astral plane encounter impressed on me how very rich a life this woman is leading.

She was letting me into her innermost lair whilst following her inner voice.  This was the most beautiful and intimate of dances of souls.

I thoroughly connected with the every complex idiosyncrasy of her being.  Florence Pole, contrary to waking state misperceptions, was quite grounded and completely aware of her selfhood.

This woman has achieved a great deal in this lifetime and I am very honoured to have been witness to it; a totally admirable soul.  During childhood, this woman was the object of intense study for me.

Every time that she would fly out onto her veranda, taking to the stage, I would become as if possessed by her.  There was no way to get around the fact that this was great theatre; every time she appeared, I was captivated by her every stunning, quicksilver innuendo.

What I learnt most of all, about her self-absorption, was that it does not matter what it is you do.  You simply have to go ahead and do it because ultimately no one can either stop you but you.

When it is all said and done, Florence Pole was simply exploring her beingness.  For flying out onto her veranda, in full operatic rant, she was fulfilling herself.  END.

When I ventured into another bedroom, I found there a man.  He was mesomorphic, tall and blond.  Although his body reminded me of Storm Isbister’s, I could not make out who he was.

He called me over to join him in bed – even better than I would have scripted it myself, “Oh, my goodness!  Yes… let’s make love…”

The sheets were a quilted satin, the most luxurious touch, as I seductively slithered into bed.  Passionately, we groped each other’s hard-ons whilst groaning and hungrily looking into the other’s eyes.

We truly delighted in each other’s bodies.  All the windows to the house were of course closed; thus we were provided with ample privacy.

Climbing atop him, I rubbed my cock hard against his.  As he lay back there, into the propped up pillows, his body reminded me in its largeness of Karl Weller’s.

Nimbly, I straddled him whilst making his body familiar territory and all mine at that.  We grabbed a hold of both cocks whilst frottaging atop the other.

His cock was longer and considerably thicker than mine.  He was also uncut.

What really freaked me out about the whole experience was how wonderfully real it was.  I could smell his maleness: his balls, cock, precum, armpits, sweat and breath.

Our passionate play was profoundly grounding.  After pinching hard his nipples, with my left hand, I flipped around.

Now I straddled him with my back turned to him whilst still frottaging.  With that, he righted himself by propping his upper body with the elbows.

Grabbing a hold of my contracted scrotum, I began rubbing the ridge between it and the anus against his hard, throbbing cock.  Sweaty and on the verge of going wild, I cried out to him, “Yes, oh god, let’s fuck.”

With that, I went to get a vial of lubricant that sat across the room on a bureau.  Straight away, he drew my attention to the fact that this was the dreamtime and there was no need for lubricant.

More to the point, his referral was to the condoms which I brought back to the bed.  Irritated, he shot at me, “Come on, let’s not use them.

“Look, at you.  Look at where we are, will you?”

Yet I felt the need to use them, of habit, as in the waking state.  He did not protest any further; I then began squeezing some of the lubricant into my palm.

The feel of it was so cool and luxuriant that it made me shiver throughout.  I so wanted him that I lunged at him and began passionately kissing him.

We both hungrily struggled in the other’s arms whilst consumed with one another.  The experience was so incredibly intense.

I did take note that his eyes were very waking state in focus.  That is to say, there was nothing soulful or old-souled about them.

He was very grounded, young-souled and sexually dynamic.  I am not quite certain that this was indeed an encounter with Karl Weller.

His face was not distinctive; besides, I was too overcome with lustful desire to have paid his looks that much attention.  All the way through, I kept on groaning whilst completely enjoying myself.

Nothing else in the world existed whilst being alone with him.  I was not the least bit self-conscious about Florence Pole being close by in another room of her palatial digs.

In all honesty, it was hard for me to transcend my lust and get into him.  All I wanted was to have my size queen’s every yearning fulfilled.

Nothing about him mattered to me but his cock.  I wanted his cock inside me; I wanted the feel of his powerful body all over me.

On my knees in the bed, I faced out whilst he got well lubed and slippery.  The slippery bulbous head of him was just comfortably past the plush, relaxed rim of my butthole when we heard Florence Pole noisily rushing down the hall towards us.

From outside the door, she called out concerned and wanted to know what noise was this.  Stealthily, we both leapt from the bed whilst still engaged and onto the floor.

We threw ourselves onto the ground, on the far side of the bed – north side, away from the door.  Somehow, in our energetic manoeuvre, I had managed my way on top of him whilst he was now completely buried deep up inside me.

The feel of him was mind-altering and exquisite.  Florence Pole then entered and projected her usual feisty, argumentative waking state persona.

Right away, she demanded to know what we were doing; this, of course, was her way of feigning ignorance.  She then grandly announced that she did not want us messing around or carrying on like this in her house.

Speciously, I called out to her and let her know that we were not doing anything untoward.  My left elbow was on the bed, bracing me up, whilst he was lying behind me on the floor; at the time, he was totally hidden from view.

I sat squarely on his cock, with my back fully elongated, whilst yogically breathing.  Whilst she stood there and stayed her ground, I tried to stave off her intervention but the feel of his cock thrusting unabated and rhythmically deep into me was fast rocking me to a cerebral orgasm.

To not lose it and shriek at her to get lost, it took every fibre of my being.  Consciously, I began elevating my vibration whilst simultaneously projecting this process onto her.

The object here was to quiet her fears and elevate her life condition to a place completely removed from all fears.  Try as I might, she would have none of it and simply stayed her ground.

Florence wanted to have whatever we were up to, on the other side of ‘that’ bed in ‘her’ house, to be readily concluded.  Fussily, she told me to get up and be decent.

I was not, after all, even wearing any clothes.  At this point, we had long since ripped off all our clothing.

Florence then insisted that I get dressed and immediately get going.  Pulling up off his cock, I groaned aloud as there was a vacuum tug created in the wake of his bulbous-headed departure.

I could not have cared less that she had heard it all; there was no way to have controlled such intensity of emotions.  This was the kind of cock which on seeing it in the waking state, one had to readily sublimate one’s usual posture as top and pay homage by way of experiencing a momentary lapse and play bottom.

She came over to the bed whilst insisting that we both get up and take our leave of her house.  I then suggested to my uber-lover that we slip out the house, by way of the side doors, which would have faced Jestina Hendricks’ house to the south.

He did not like the idea of being seen together when leaving the house.  Agreeing, I offered to meet him down the street after heading out the front door.

He was mindful that no one suspect him, or us, of having been physically intimate.  I then offered him to come home with me as I had to be heading back anyway.

With that, we parted and left the house at opposite ends.  Eventually, we came together around the corner of the house; there, we pretended to have just met.

We then went walking along the street.  What was really interesting was in my haste to get dressed before Florence Pole went truly wild, I had pulled on my blue jeans and forgotten to put on the underwear first.

Funnily enough, I had only remembered the underwear when I saw it fall out the left leg of my jeans.  The underwear had slipped out ahead of my pointed foot as I hurriedly got dressed.

Quickly, I grabbed it up off the floor and tucked it into my waist.  I secured it there so that it would be held in place beneath my shirt by the belt.

All that I could think of, when we were alone outside, was the fact that we had not used condoms.  All this even though I knew pretty much so that this was a dream.

In my mind, I went through a battery of fears about him being riddled with STDs of one kind or the other.  I became quite concerned and fearful.

I then got in and on entering the house, I could feel Isha da Braga’s vibration about the interior.  Pandora da Braga was there with a brown-folded brochure for a concert or some such.

We were looking at it when she began naively asking, what I had been doing; there was so much implied about the super stud with whom she had seen me out in the street.  Deflecting her intrusion, I told her that I had merely been next door to visit with Florence Pole.

Next, I pointed out that the guy was there with her.  We met and he decided to go for a tour of the place with me.

Earlier, as we walked home, I had been urging him with the suggestion that we go get a room at a bathhouse; there, at least, we could fuck our brains out.  All I wanted to do was to be with him and fuck ‘til daylight.

I told him that there was no way that we would have any privacy at my family’s.  Looking disappointed in me, he let me know that he never went to places like that and did not like my idea of finding nothing wrong in frequenting such a place.

“That’s not my scene.  I wouldn’t want to go to a place like that, at all.

“I just wouldn’t be comfortable,” he protested.

Nonetheless, I was persistent, “Come on.  It’ll be just you and me.

“We’d be together in a room, away from being spied on by anyone.”  I could see that he wasn’t going to get into it.

Contrary to the waking state arrangement, the walk from Florence Pole’s to our house was unusually long – especially for being a next-door neighbour.  Both houses are separated, in the waking state, by the narrow earthen lane.

Outdoors, it was quite sunny and bright.  This, too, had been the case inside the sky lighted grand hall at Florence Pole’s palatial digs.

Sol’s intensity here was also a metaphor for what I was feeling, deep within, as I had literally been walking on air – after having played St. George to this veritable dragon of a schlong.  Well quelle scandalle!

He would have none of my deceptive banter.  Just like that, he put in and let Pandora da Braga know, “No, no, no.  We were over there, in bed.

“And we had a good time.  We really connected and we fucked.

“I mean, we didn’t get to fuck as much as we’d like to.  But it was really a good, good fuck nonetheless.

“It’s like we didn’t do anything.  Yet, we did everything…”

Talk about being completely mortified.  Yet, there he stood all man and no bullshit.

There was no way to get around his candour.  Obviously, he was feeling the depth of sublime connectivity as much as I was.

The passion to be sure was there as well.  Though we had not been able to go all 15 rounds, it was all around a pretty damn good fuck.

Interestingly, Florence Pole’s interruption and nonstop banter moved us onto an alternate, totally unexpected plane.  We were arrived at a groove where we were able to experience the most meaningful of orgasms: an intellectual high, communion of spirits.

What passed between us was quite incredible.  Overwhelming it was and thrilling too.

He was pleased at what we had experienced and, for that matter, he could not bear to have the beauty of it marred by my being in denial of what had had transpired between us.  Finally, I felt embarrassed before both.

Pandora meanwhile, to say the least, did not much care to hear about any such thing.  Adroitly, before being possibly late for some appointment or other, she declared that she had to get going.

With that, I took my leave of them both.

*Back to Florence Pole, she was channelled by Sarah J. Chambers as being a mid-cycle mature sage.  Previously, Florence had been the daughter of the Maharajah of Jaipur in the 15th century.

Too, she has had many celebrated lifetimes on the stage; furthermore, she had had an illustrious past life in Rome.  There, she had been a celebrated sculptor some of whose works still exist.

More than that, as is obvious, she was no stranger to either Merlin or I.  Of course, Florence never did meet Merlin.  END.

___________________>0<______________________

I was on the veranda of 20 Amelia Street and this old White couple who live here in Cabbagetown were present.  They live on Metcalfe Street right at the corner of Amelia Street across the street from Mark Stuartson’s.

*This same august-souled couple also worked at Canada Post Corporation.  They worked there until long years after their official retirements.  END.

They were going home from Parliament Street across Amelia Street.  They stopped because this man was coming towards them; he stopped and they took the time to talk with him.

He was telling them, “Oh yes man.  Yup, Florence Pole died.”

I immediately ran down towards them.  I was truly stunned and called out, “Ou true!”

I ran all the way down and around onto Parliament Street.  On entering Cabbagetown’s Parliament Street, it immediately became the main road in Crab Hill, Sandy Point, St. Kitts.

You could see all the people in Crab Hill.  They were hanging out around Florence Pole’s house.

They had her corpse lain out on the veranda.  I went up filled with love and paid my respects.

I was really pleased to see her because she did look good.  Florence was the picture of ethereal serenity.

Laying there, truly in state, she was truly at peace with her ruggedly eccentric, accomplished life.  Though she obviously was not breathing, there was no getting around the fact that she was aglow.

Everybody was laughing and basking in storytelling tributes to the dear old soul.  Then somebody had us all howling when they said, “Is all dem cussing why you see ‘e live so long ‘o know.”

Truly, it was a testament to her marvellous spirit that it seemed as though all of Crab Hill, if not Sandy Point, had turned out to pay their respects.  Rightly so, Florence was being deferred to.

She lay in a vivid purple casket which sat on three sturdy-looking typical dining room chairs as those popular in West Indian homes.  Her head was facing due south towards Brimstone Hill Fortress and her feet towards the north, the main exit from the veranda and our home.

Florence wore a rich multitoned blue dress which was muted by a thin film of white diaphanous linen.  All about her body were a rich array of local flowers and that green vine whose leaves looked like miniature Christmas trees.

Though it had never been used when she was widowed, the official stairs from the main road up to the veranda was opened.  Persons would arrive to pay their respects by mounting the official, though never used, stairs from the main road.

They would then move about the casket with some speaking lovingly of her.  On the side of the casket closest to the house stood a group of women – they were actually fairly androgynous-looking persons.

Their sole purpose, it seemed, was to fulfill their role as astral guides.  Perhaps, they were astral plane habitués with an obvious soul connection to Florence.

Truly impressed, I had taken my time and stood beside her coffin.  With head cocked to the side, I lovingly looked on at a truly remarkable life in full which had been lived with the greatest panache.

Whilst admiring the collapsed lips of her supremely serene face, my already enthralled lids slid shut.  They did so more for being hypnotised by Florence’s regal beauty than for being intentionally slid shut.

Just like that, my lids reopened.  The moving dream vista before me, however, was totally gone.

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Art:  The Mary Rose and Fleet

Artist: Jean Walker

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