Book of Blues

by Jack Kerouac

  And swings around right around

  the fender okay

  Orizaba rooftop, Orizaba Rooftop,

  Blue, blue, blue

  Blue’s made of shiny everyway

  Orizaba honk-honk, bus motors

  Riding high for the clutch, tired,

  Faces green on the benches,

  Ikons in the corner

  Tails of little fenelet

  serpents hanging from the fender

  Aik, motorcycle of no-cops,

  Hotrods & Deans of Mexico,

  Aik, aik, aik Mexico

  BORRACHO GUAPO BANJO

  62ND CHORUS

  Pipestoon the Ribber & wobbed

  old ladies of shame. the same.

  party twan twit Twittenden

  Charley, ‘Awfully good fuck!’

  he yells out the train window,

  to his waving host of the weekend,

  ‘I say old chap, really!!’

  and then Commando Poltroon

  comes platooning up in mudsplash,

  Monty, examining every commando

  standing naked in the rain,

  ‘That hurt?’ whacking

  a guy on the rib, ‘No

  sir,’ ‘Why not?’

  ‘Commando, sir’

  Finally he comes to a man

  with a long hardon, & whacks

  it with his military crop

  —with his baton—

  ‘That hurt?’ ‘No sir’

  “Why not?”

  “Man behind me sir.”

  63RD CHORUS

  The star is reflected in the puddle

  and the star dont care

  and the puddle dont care

  Nothing is thinking

  not even the puddle poet

  That’s why “This Thinking Has Stopped”

  Is the best way I know to imitate

  this starry state of affairs

  in puddles

  Plass! plash!—wait a minute!—

  wait a second buddy while I

  hock up old Desroches three

  sacrifices

  For each sacrifice you’re reborn

  and you’re only reborn once

  because there is only One

  Sin

  Slatter me pet Charley, T-rod,

  pettle pole and all, believes,

  and goes rosing in the woods

  Purt! Foley! Words! Names!

  Ahab, Starbuck & Pip

  Iago and Poltroon

  and Pipestaff the Ribber

  —pain, pain, the no-name retoin

  64TH CHORUS

  On the street I seen three guys

  standing talking quietly in the sun

  and suddenly one guy leaps in pain

  and whacks his fingers in the air

  as he’s burned his hand

  with a match

  lighting a butt

  The other two guys dont even

  know this,

  they go right on talking

  gesticulating with hands

  I seen it, it was on San Jose

  Boulevard in St Joseph

  Missouri, nineteen thirty

  two

  Them guys didnt even realize

  pain is one thing, everywhere?

  Whai? Every golden

  sweetgirl come & befawdle

  her pillow in my hair

  and I dont care?

  Wha?

  65TH CHORUS

  JEWISH GOY IN N.Y.

  Wha? Whaddayou mean,

  there are ten thousands mysteries

  of me by the millions standing

  with hand-molded shows

  and sports jacket

  and no hair

  bouncing along in one long corridor

  of images in a mirror

  into infinity

  eternity

  call it what you will!

  I know that!—You dont have

  pull that Buddha-stuff

  on me, Jack, I dont care

  I’ve seen me in the picture

  stretched out everywhere

  it dont matter?

  Who cares!

  I go to Lefty’s & eat pastrami

  on Sunday afternoon,

  with mustard—I go hear

  some music at Carnegie Hall

  —I lay my wife—

  I sit on the bed, work

  Who cares? Wha?

  What’s the moon got?

  66TH CHORUS

  What’s the moon got but tunes?

  Wha? I dont care I’ll talk

  I’ll stand right here talk

  till doomsday, nobody care,

  nobody say, who knows? who

  wants? What’s gonna free

  what from what? Shit!

  Gold! Girl! Honey! Call!

  What you will, call it,

  shit, I’ll sit, I’ll talk,

  I’ll hang all day, because,

  it doesnt matter, you talk

  about it doesnt matter

  but you dont realize how

  doesnt-matter

  it really doesnt-matters,

  Wow man, I mean,

  Sure, shoes, Shows, Hand

  painted molds from azimuth

  shoes, azipeth azipor

  azinine blues, you got,

  who cares, tsawright, eat,

  pickles in the barrel—

  —hail a cab—

  do what you want

  67TH CHORUS

  “It all goes down the same hole”

  said Allen, eating cake & food

  in a restaurant, with milk

  in his coffee, no milk in the can,

  no sense in the sour bottom

  of that can

  All goes up the same sky,

  all sucks on same air,

  all plops drops impregnates

  and saves anywhere

  The same limitation gentiles

  the crave for a show

  on notwithstanding lost bibles

  dedicating the mystery

  to a vain empty show,

  ‘Vanity of Vanities,

  All is Vanity’

  “Behold her breasts are like

  fawns”

  in the summer air,

  Her eyes are like doves,

  skin like the tents

  —Skin like the rents

  in the heavenly air

  68TH CHORUS

  A murder stern gird

  A million dollar ba by

  Ack

  Rowers of galleys,

  Candle lights,

  Hearners of yorn,

  Parturient ones,

  Poo,

  Patch art part tea

  Gart and band thee

  Harden thy garkle

  And get ye no purple kirtles

  Ere aye mice Burns

  Hands Mc Caedmon let loose

  His last tired crazy pom

  ‘Hung la terre,

  hang the twarrie,

  part de twaklockleme,

  gockle somackle magee’

  Down with the back rooms

  Of Dublin

  69TH CHORUS

  PRAYER

  God, protect me!

  See that I dont defecate

  on the Holy See

  See that I dont


  murder the bee

  God! be kind!

  Free all your dedicate

  angels, for me

  Or if not for me

  for anybody

  God! Hold fast!

  I’m dying in your arms

  delicately

  Ah God be merciful

  to Princeton me

  Ah God, alack a God,

  nobody farms

  amnesty

  70TH CHORUS

  I

  There’ll be no more ginger ale

  for me

  goodbye ginger ale

  when I die

  in Innisfree

  That’s where I’ll go to die

  to look and die

  I’ll never go there now

  Because I’ve already told the boys

  at the paper

  the sound is crashing me

  And they ate paper

  And it was a paper party

  But when the bell bonged toll,

  And we all had to pay,

  “Die in my arms, lamb,”

  sang Rudy Vallee

  from here to eternity

  Die in my that’s a beautiful arms,

  lad,

  Die in my that’s a beautiful arms,

  said God

  To me

  71ST CHORUS

  II

  That’s just something

  that isnt written

  in Wells’ history

  That’s something, Window Knock,

  when you can make me

  pray me

  That’ll do the reading

  in London Library

  And in Dublin I is free

  To read

  Old Innisfree

  And then I’ll read Finn

  Again, and meet Magee

  In a back alley

  And get to know

  Donnelly

  And the brothers Donnelly

  That’s where I’ll be,

  My Arma Carney,

  I’ll be dyin

  down in Innisfree

  Waiting for ye

  Mary Carney

  ORLANDA BLUES

  1ST CHORUS

  Le corp de la verité

  pourre dans la terre

  The body of truth

  rots in the earth

  nourriture dans la terre

  Sanchez fourwinds bigtown,

  dont wail that at me

  Fraserville Quebec

  comes back to me

  In the night sun sleep

  warm, store it in tanks

  Blues of Old Virginia tree

  moonbottles over kiss time

  listener appeal

  Kissland

  Kissimee Florida

  These are Orlanda Blues

  2ND CHORUS

  O Cross on my wall

  O body of Christ

  When I was awright

  Saturday night

  Little in your arms

  your thousands of years

  In electric resist I wanted

  to soul the liking I saw

  —words

  (musician pauses)

  3RD CHORUS

  This book is too nice for me

  They made Clay Felker editor

  of Esquire

  Or Rust Hills one

  and what ever happened to glass

  and the joke about the Lord.

  The Lord is my Agent.

  My message is blah blah blah

  My yort tackalitwingingly

  pasta vala tt, yea, p,

  my reurnent gollagigle

  dil plat most-rat, my

  erneealieing cralmaa

  tooth, ant, mop, sh,

  my devoid less 2 immensity

  secret muzning midnight,

  my whatzit

  you wanta

  know

  Whatzit!

  Joy Look out!

  4TH CHORUS

  Joy look in,

  look in,

  the pretty

  sin

  Loy, t a tt ct b

  I fooled with the long

  overload

  (wrong over road?)

  wronk

  What a moistious wronk

  we’re in fair words,

  or is it wairds

  in your part

  of the

  Kelp,

  Laird

  In Scotland we just throw

  the bones to the dogs

  & toast at the

  fireplace

  5TH CHORUS

  Well then let’s have a toast

  I wonder if I can write

  poems just like Gregory

  Croso:—let’s see:—

  The dead are dead,

  I’ll resurrect them with

  this song, O fall

  you fair held

  cities—

  (wood wood wood)

  O held the fair held

  in the skinny bar!

  (the skinny bar held Indian sonofabitch)

  So North Mood wrote:—

  Colting—The Gregory

  says “Eels & gripplings

  in

  my

  eaves”

  6TH CHORUS

  Finally I was in Stockholm at last

  Cold night

  Dark in Swedenborg

  Zeldipeldi my junkey friend

  from N.Y. and Maldo

  Saldo the hot trumpeter

  from Nigeria, turned on

  in the cold room overlooking

  black rooftops of winter,

  Sweden night skies February,

  Ommani pahdme horn

  I wanted to catch a train

  to the Capital

  I was on a seacoast town,

  the name of it was Fidel

  or Fido

  wow, mominu,

  You dont know how far

  that sky

  go

  7TH CHORUS

  Message from Orlanda:—

  You guys cant explore

  all of outer space, unless

  you want to spend

  a million million million

  million million million

  billion billion bullion

  bullion years at it

  —and when you gets

  there, and you cant

  even get there, give my

  regards to Captain Bligh

  And lissen, before you leave,

  how bringin my money

  with you to preserve

  in eternity, see, I

  can cash in when

  I get there & spend it

  on

  space

  travel

  8TH CHORUS

  Thats awright, space’ll carry

  us maybe like little eggs,

  the buggy children work

  their way out

  to the surface

  of the egg,

  to the shell,

  they swim soft,

  & they get there

  & meet God

  The Shell

  The Shell

  hard & cold

  against the cold

  gray sun

  blood

  in

  your


  Father’s

  Long Winter

  Underwear

  So sleep

  9TH CHORUS

  Me, I’m worried I’m a secret sinner

  and God

  Ole Tangerine

  I call Him

  because one day I was settin

  under trees

  in

  a

  chair

  And deciding what name

  to give to God, is it

  a personal God? & blam

  the little tangerine

  landed

  squarely

  on my

  head

  like Newton’s

  underwear,

  & so I saw it personal

  And I say the moral is simple

  10TH CHORUS

  But it landed right on the

  tippy tiptop

  of the sconce,

  Jazz,

  dazz,

  and that’s why I believe

  (since it’s all grinning

  in there)

  it was a little

  tap reminder

  I dont need thunderclouds!

  “Maybe Eden aint so

  lonesome as New England

  used to be,” said Emily

  Dickinson sitting with

  a tangerine in her hand

  (They shipped it from Cuba)

  It was a great show

  Gasser!

  11TH CHORUS

  I guess God is alright

  He’ll take care of us

  But there are perturbing roots

  in these trees,

  that claw in earth

  & outa fingernails

  as long as Malaya

  eat up thru sucktubes

  the juice of the mother

  Terra Firma

  Mona Leisure

  & these roots remind you

  of the roots in your grave

  I wish I could be cremated

  & sprung

  (to the wave),

  but Ah, hell, I donno

  I think I’ll go to

  Sapplewhile

  & idle away the

  unfinished poem

  12TH CHORUS

  The evening silencius

  Poetry

  is so pretty

  When you silence it like that

  It’s nice to pop pearl pages

  the candlelight, you know,

  is dedicated to poets