The poems in Following Seas are for the most
part in the order of writing during my enlistment in the US
Navy. I spent a year and a half training to be a radar
technician in what was then a state of the art weapons
system called Aegis. I caught the USS Yorktown in the
Black Sea on her maiden cruise and was in the Battle of the
Gulf of Sidra before I'd barely spent ninety days onboard the ship.
I was lead technician and operator through two more
Mediterranean cruises including our being rammed by a
Russian Cruiser in the Black Sea in what some call the
last confrontation of the Cold War. The strangest
feeling in my life was pulling into port from twenty-nine
days at sea, a six month deployment, four and a half years
on a ship, and a six year enlistment to finally walking off that
gang plank in a few quick seconds to a new life.
A sailor's goodbye is to wish their shipmates, "fair winds and
following seas"
1984
Tilt-a-whirl
..that beautiful, intoxicating ride of seducing a good woman
Kundalini
..a witty little look at science and philosophy...on
what level(s) or dimension(s) does organized thought form?
does it exist without perception? is it at all governed by
our know laws of physics?
Turning Seasons
..this captures the feelings of old-school lovers who didn't
share their thoughts verbally...I'm glad times have changed
Rollin' Away
..about running away from pain and finding beauty and comfort
where you least expect it
Slap Your Monkey
..written in the Navy to blow off a little steam...we used to get off the
ship, get pretty intoxicated, and sing this song on the way back to the
ship
Route 69
..an erotic poem comparing making love to driving on the highway
Gentle Breeze
..based on the death of Socrates
Broken Hearts and Heavy Seas
..about a sailor leaving a lover and heading back to the call
of the sea
Hoedown at the Robot Farm
..a fantasy about a inter-planetary county fair...I was in
weapons control school where I was living and breathing
electronics...obviously
My Girl
..written in the middle of the night in boot camp. One of
my buddies came up with the melody and the line "she is my girl, the
girl I love" and wrote the rest
I Take the Blame
..about a kid being done wrong by a girl, but letting it go
1985
Barless Cage
..about the "cage" of loneliness
The Green Door
..about getting lucky one night in the local watering hole
and looking for her to come back, but she never does
Wildwood, N.J.
..about the Jersey boardwalk in 1985...it was rockin'!
Richer for the Ride
..about the appreciation of the love and beautiful found by a
wandering man
Toss Me a Line
..about that scary feeling as you open up your heart to
someone and make yourself vulnerable
On the Other Hand
..poetry and art are merely arrows shot into the infinite mind
1986
Storm at Sea
..written while waiting to go into battle in the Gulf of Sidra
(Libya) in the eighties
Blind Date
..about the thoughts that go through a person's mind before a blind
date...is fantasy more vital than flesh?
The Ballad of Manly Dan
..about a tough but promiscuous sailor who
accidentally contracts
HIV...we used to sing this at bars around the Mediterranean when I was
in the navy
Resurrection
..seems like media monsters rise up every few decades playing the
'you're not a patriot if you don't what we say' card...McCarthy in the
fifties and most recently the Bush/Rove machine
Falling Star
..about how bad the realization that you will never get to
have the lover you so desire.....star-crossed seems like such a trite,
but true metaphor
A Toast
..about feeling how that soulmate everyone says is out there may
be in some bar some place aching for you as well
Star Shell
..a melancholy song about the desire to escape the sadness of
this old planet for a better place
Birds
..about living in a cage of loneliness
Lady Doll
..about the euphoria of being a newly wed
Venice
..oh that search for something never lost or left behind
Atomic
Shadows
..this was written in 1985 which was forty years after the
atomic bomb. We're still here is what I tell my children when they worry
about all the predictions of the worlds end...although the shadows of
Nagasaki and Hiroshima still trail us
I was lead signal processor technician and
operator after being on the ship for less than a year which made me
about as cocky a young man as you'll ever meet. I was soon to be
humbled beyond measure when I popped a false positive on an HIV test in
late 1986. I had to go to civilian doctors and it took several
months to prove the Navy mistaken. I was getting over blood poison
from having my hand bit in a barroom fight when they took the tests and
I had a feeling that's what the first test was reading, but it was the
most frightening event of my life. I
immediately asked to return to the Yorktown upon being cleared for
active duty. I sometimes wondered if it was
poetic justice for writing "The Ballad of Manly Dan".
Aces and Eights
..about a hero with an incurable disease
1987
Of Flesh and Fear
...a look at partners living life with HIV (AIDS) and trying to
cope with it's reality...please practice safe sex boys and girls
Network of the Lonely
..portrait of a lonely guy walking the streets in the 1980s
Prince Charming
..about that good-time guy who beds the pretty girls but still
deals with his private insecurities
The Spirit of Yorktown
..written for my shipmates. "If you get out honorably (combat
vet or not), no matter where you go or what you do, you'll
almost always find another veteran there... and a brother with a
bond the rest will never understand."- Jarred W. Browning
(my dad)
Stark Reality
..the USS Stark was hit by an Iranian missile when it failed
to react quickly enough to the situation. We were on the USS Yorktown at
that time in harms way and knowing that incident could very well have
been us inspired this poem
The Window
..about growing up watching the Vietnam War on TV had a
profound effect on my generation...I can't believe those who were made
to go fight that mistake turned around and repeated it in Iraq...no
lesson learned
The Kiss
..about a sailor's last thoughts as his ship goes down
Tools
..this kind of puts it all in perspective...which is, it's
all perspective...possibly one of best pieces ever written
Millennium
..this was written in 1987 about the millennium which seem so far
away at the time and is actually hopeful
A Tormented Soul
.a portrait of the demon's that haunt me...I was always told
I was a miracle and god has a plan for me...that's a lot to live with
The Card
..about a kid during the Vietnam era receiving his draft notice in
the mail and knowing inside he's going to die over there
Cocoon
..an outrageous look at a man's struggle to re-enter the womb
Discipilitis
..about wanting to be a faulted martyr
Love Unreturned
..about loving a country even when it feels like it doesn't
love you back
P.O.W.
..about being a captive of loneliness and the scars it creates
Dolly Blue Eyes
..about trying to understand a mentally disturbed lover
The Warrior Poet
..about how it feels to be a warrior poet...what is it in
men that make the thrill of the hunt carry over into love?...play the recording,
the intro is Marlon Brando in Julius Caesar
C.I.C.
(Combat Info Center)
..about what it feels like to maintain and operate the most powerful weapons
system in the world...written from real experience
Christmas Time in Naples
..about being in the military and spending Christmas away from home
Santa's Greatest Gift
..a sick humored piece written while overseas at Christmas for
the second time in three years while in the navy
1988
The Mermaid
..about a sailors longing for female companionship after being
at sea for a while
Curious Boy
..about how simple being kind and caring seems through the eyes of
a child
Dangerous
..about getting picked up and having a fantasy night with a beautiful
woman but wise enough to understand the consequences
Bottled Monster
..about a lonely man seeking a woman to be his salvation
Forbidden Fruit
..about a man wrestling with fielding the advances of his bosses'
wife....ut, oh
Captain Ambition
..about how it feels to watch the fall of a
megalomaniac like Osama
Bin Laden or Adolph Hitler
Infomercial
..a satire on infomercials and nuclear holocaust...yes, it
really is! I wrote this shortly after we were rammed by the Russians in
the Black Sea
Exposure
..about the excitement of facing fear
Salem Church
..written about a spooky old church I used to have to walk past
as a child and the nightmares it gave me
Blue
Eyed Party Girl
..about pining for an old girlfriend
1989
Lyin' in the Dark
..about the duality of a married couple who play out the charade to
themselves while their heart's wonder elsewhere
Crimson Sin
..about the mess of a planet we leave the children
The Wonder Bar
..about being literally haunted by an old love
Refuge
..asks the question - are we all not Christ, the sons and
daughters of God?
House-sitting
..about a lonely guy house sitting and dreaming of what he doesn't
have, but desperately wants and needs
Edgar
..about laying in bed at night looking at the red light on the
smoke detector and wondering if it's a hidden camera...paranoia
Pretentious
..about that big timing, made up woman who wants to be a
jet-setter but needs a normal man on the side to just make love to
Katmandu
..asks the question - are we all not Christ, the sons and
daughters of God?
Detour
..about meeting and making love to a beautiful woman in the unlikeliest of
places, but it not satisfying your soul
Buried Treasures
..about an old sailor giving up the sea
Bayou City
..about a getting out of the service and going home to your girl
Tainted Charm
..about feeling sorry for Jesus' legacy
The Wave
..about the feeling of surfing the air waves
The BB and G
.. about the nightmare of an average guy...WARNING (explicit
language and images).
1990
A Mariner's Holiday
..written on the last of three holidays spent overseas in the Navy.
This poem is based on a real setting and shows the gritty reality of
what it's like to spend the holidays in a foreign port
The Last Rebel Shot
..questions if universal peace and total order is really what
mankind needs...could be boring
Winter Rose
..about the loneliness and pain of a man and woman being
seperated by a military deployment
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