Musing on the Sixties
(Thanks to Joni Mitchell)
Big Sur circa '69, just starting to come down the other side of Kennedy, King, Kent State, 'Nam, a concert, not Woodstock but similar, all folk rock gospel spirituals synthesized by Sulphur spas, evergreens, the Pacific, a not-so-distant promise while whales surfaced and dreams ran naked or wore flowers, face paint, even Medieval fair costumes, long hair and bodies swaying to a visionary Kerouacs beat...
Yes, though not exactly freedom, more naive innocence, words never selected lightly, it still felt liberating after McCarthy's yea-yea pinko paranoia exiling those who were fortunate to not receive even worse.
We weren't political, were we, reading Brautigan, listening to Beatles love revolution,
experimentation,
all kid stuff really
believing in peace signs, tie-dyed psychedelia, some subculture global change...
But the bombers riding shotgun did not turn into monarchs, only tripped, a bad scene, brutal truth showed in the bones of in beaten bloodied black wings.
Were the drugs needed due to so much sight?
As a mole patiently tunneling some underground's face, maybe it is better to say effective change takes forever, and upturned stone after stone, the garden is still a hunger within reach.
