(Any musicians out there who feel inspired to put this to song are enthusiastically invited to do so. Make any changes to the lyrics you like.)
Well they met on Craigslist after decades of failure
He moved out of his dad’s house and into her trailer
He’d been a virgin for forty-nine years
She had an eye patch and a heart full of tears
They started laughing and loving, asking questions in turns
She showed him her implants and cigarette burns
He showed her the pills he took to silence the screams
They started building a paradise out of old rusty dreams
Come on take my hand,
it ain’t too little too late
I just thank god you’re here,
that was a hell of a wait
Now you with your nunchucks
and I with my axe
We will take on all comers,
we will fight back to back
He knew karate, she knew kung fu
They were totally clueless, they knew just what to do
Beating up bad guys and conjuring spells
Weaving all kinds of heaven from the boneyards of hell
One day she told him, “Get out while ya can,
My demons are ugly, there’s blood on my hands
I been stretched out and ruined through decades of pain
You’d best pack your bags now and be on your way”
He told her “You’re beautiful just as you are
Your body, your nightmares, your sins and your scars
I know you know this ain’t no summer fling
You might be missing some fingers but you can still wear my ring”
Come on take my hand,
it ain’t too little too late
I just thank god you’re here,
that was a hell of a wait
Now you with your nunchucks
and I with my axe
We will take on all comers,
we will fight back to back
He knew karate, she knew kung fu
He taught her nunchucks, she taught him to screw
He found her a ring in an old raven’s nest
She showed him the cross on her pregnancy test
Well summer cooled over and turned into spring
He made tiny nunchucks out of rattles and string
Baby came roaring out and they named her Lao Sue
And he taught her karate, and she taught her kung fu
Come on take my hand,
it ain’t too little too late
I just thank god you’re here,
that was a hell of a wait
Now you with your nunchucks
and I with my axe
We will take on all comers,
we will fight back to back
___________________
___________________
___________________
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28 responses to “Lao Sue”
Dear Caity and Tim.
Thanks so much for Lao Sue and all the inspiration you offer to this sleeping world. I hope you like the song. It was an honor to have taken part in its creation.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/15kkAsRmx_Bkip9-55p8lIXtm1YlUIYJ0/view?usp=drivesdk Caity I’m gonna send it in messenger too in hopes you’ll check it out. Lots of love/peace to you all. Jerry Forman
Terrific poem, like a green sprig forcing through a crack in concrete, art from detritus. Thank you caitlin
I am writing to you from Russia. I constantly read you and have great respect for your honest position. This poem is beautiful. I still like your other poem about whales. We published it in Moscow on our InFocus press website. I wish you light and joy no matter what! Lucie
Off subject but I received a message a number of hours ago that all computers, servers etcetera in Luxembourg have been denied access to the world wide web for refusing to shut down those websites that we tell them to shut down. We, being the U.S. government, whoever they might be.
Love is all there is.
Whatever you think of the BRI – they stand for a warless – prosperous – Rothschilds FREE world !
Putin is clearing the BELT road for humanities sake !
Thanks for the poem Caitlin.
BRI is a different master. So far, a more benevolent one by far. How does it ever end up any different though? Did we vote for any of it? Or do we ever? Do you have a vision for the world that is not first concocted by them? Of the multitude of alternatives, which come to the fore and which never see the light?
“Everyone’s anti-war until the war propaganda starts.”
Lmao … It does seem to work that way, doesn’t it.
What made this one different is the highly effective pre-propaganda campaigns allowed the transformation to happen overnight.* By my back of the evolope pole, 92.4% of America went to bed on the 23 of Feburary loving peace, and woke the next morn demanding that we bleed all Russians white while fighting to the last Ukrainian.
Or fighting to the last American pilot. That’s when the propaganda – Phase Two – really hit high gear.
“What say ye set up a no-fly zone over Ukraine?”
“Here, here!”
“The ayes unaminously have it! If the Pentagon doesn’t object, we must sacrifice our freedom seeking pilots like Kamakaze!”
*Or Osmotic Indoctrination, as it’s known in Goebellian circles.
Morning Caitlin ,
Just lovely , simply lovely.
Thanks colin
Hope someone takes you up on your song gift!
Looks like in Lao Sue’s adulthood, the fight is gonna be a whole different ball game actually. Spooky…
https://www.unz.com/article/the-project-for-a-new-american-century-and-the-age-of-bioweapons-20-years-of-psychological-terror/
Gene Genie kinda stuff and they’ll look back with nostalgy at our primitive weapons (bullets and bombs) while wishing they could put the Genie back into the bottle :o)
Thank you for the link, although I believe theG/neoliberal order/hegemony goes back to the end of WWII-my girl never came home. The WarDept did an EdwardBernays inspired rebranding, theFed signed on, the WorldBank & IMF got down with it [devalue at home, export as influence] and for the last 75 years-roughly an average US lifespan-word games have infected the average intellect and for those that didn’t succumb, there was a cabana on the beach or a shared space in collective housing, unless said effort could be pushed to the fringe.
But there’s a kill in this, and BarryObama hit it in 2015 when he stated ‘the web is the wild west’-information couldn’t be managed, presentation [narrative!] was open, and perception was a discussion topic. That is/was a huge problem for established interests, those efforts being largely unknown by the trustees who were too invested to accept decline, ala the last person selling VHS tapes.
My nickel on this going forward is that theNational [basically the Democrats, of which the NeoCons were once a part or still are] has to distance itself or fail entirely-party collapse, emergence of a viable new second, or third or sixth, which would be an insurmountable problem as no legislation could be managed-representative government would have to be principled rather than the redTeam/blueTeam nonsense we’ve been getting.
So, it looks like it will go to the state level, which will probably fail. California & NewYork & Illinois et alia will try to hold the ground surrendered by COVIDreactionaries, using mask mandates and mandatory vaccinations-medical tyranny leading to denial of autonomy and dissolution of self eventually, if it progresses, while the rest of the nation breaks up into something closer to countries than states in a union.
Whether or not another state goes for the BankOfNorthDakota model is my question, which would be awesome, and what happens to the US influence worldwide as “home” becomes a priority? Will my girl be Heidi [Swiss] or Maria [Cuba], possibly with a stop in Weimar and all the trimmings, as the neoliberal/neoconservative imperialism fails?
“We are all the sum of our tears. Too little, and the ground is not fertile and nothing can grow there. Too much, and the best of us is washed away. My rains have come and gone for now. Yours are just beginning. “
Nice lyrics, will make a good song.
PM Imran Khan live now with George Galloway on MOAT https://youtu.be/Hvc0E-SOlEo
Great stuff, Caitlin! I’m no composer, but often put new lyrics to classic tunes. Seems to me that yours would work very well with the music from John Mellencamp’s “Jack & Diane”. Need to extend the chorus or split the lyrics, but it would fit well either way. Don’t know if JM might be a fan, but if it was mine you’d be more than welcome.
This world is better because you are in it. Thank you Caitlin
Wow!
Very colourful and musical poem with a kind of Mad Max/Enter the Dragon feel to it.
It reminds me of Alan Watts telling in a book how he met the woman of his life and married her when he was also 49 (not a virgin though since he had seven children from two previous marriages). Awestruck at seeing her while lecturing in New York (she was also middle-aged), he said: “Where have you been all this time?” and she replied: “I was waiting for you”. I always loved that story.
About putting music to it, I used to write songs when I was young but this has been left in the past with a lot of other activities and I wouldn’t know where to start if I was to record a tune and send it with the present technology but I can explain how you can perhaps put music on it if you know someone who can play a few chords on an instrument.
Contrary to melody driven guys like Paul McCartney, text-driven ones like Bob Dylan, John Lennon or Don Henley often got a few words – a song generally kicks off with one sentence and then the rest has to be painfully dug out – and started putting music on them in a very basic way by just singing the words on one note and changing the chords.
This is particularly noticeable in Like a Rolling Stone where Dylan sings a monotone text over five chords I-IIm-IIIm-IV-V (or in C scale C-Dm-Em-F-G).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwOfCgkyEj0
It’s all the more perceptible in concerts where he often tries to bring his songs (even more melodic ones) down to one note, much to the chagrin of some of his fans – including me.
It’s also pretty obvious in John Lennon’s I am the Walrus on chords (in G scale) G-G7-Bb-C-D-G.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKuvJLTeJYY
Also in Don Henley’s Get over it on chords (in D scale) D-G-A.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxF0K_3lGOA
And a helluva lot more! Then of course variations and arrangements (overdubs, multiple tracks…) is what makes the difference between these guys and Average Guitar Joe but it all started with one sentence and one note like the longest journey starts with one step, as Lao Sue (:o) pointed out.
Best of luck!
It screams for music. Something between Tom Petty and Harry Chapin. (for those of you who know who he was)
On par with The Pogues Fairy Tale of New York Your poem made me weep for the hope and and commitment to action inherent in all consciousness,
Thank you Caitlan
No shit. You write just like that?
This needs a love button. Maybe because I’m older, but nothing is more loving and romantic than acknowledging someone’s scars and celebrating what made them who they are today.
I read some time back “karate” is a portmanteau of kara [empty] and te [hand].
And “kung fu” is not necessarily ‘a visually stunning way to beat someone’s ass’, but ‘skill developed over time’.
61) Wind/Lake
Sincerity/TruthfulnessWithin/FaithfulnessInTheCenter
“When one understands truth in the mind, and puts it into actual practice, the mind dies and spirit comes to life…”
“Consideration is whereby life is sought in the midst of death, freeing the innocent and condemning the guilty, enlivening what should be alive and killing what should be dead…”
“If one does not postpone death but rather hastens death, hoping for quick accomplishment, one may become a [quiet nihilist].”
–The Taoist I Ching, p.294
What asked, of three differences, is to be done?
Fire/Wind->Fire/Heaven
The old girl will remain, but she needs some work, which will demand time to unwind and deny the grinder it’s life.
As you rightly point out, what Westerners call “kung fu” refers to any skill acquired through learning or practice. The Chinese term for what we call kung fu is “wushu” (martial art) and the specific form invented by Bruce Lee by mixing Western boxing with traditional Wing Chun and tai chi – which paved the way to MMA – is called Jeet Kune Do.
I did not know of JKD until many years with the DDJ, and by then I had stood in place [yiquan via StillAsMountain, PowerfulAsThunder], stood & walked [xingyiquan, five elements] and moved between the extremes [taiji, yang short form].
After some time with an actual teacher of Aikijutsu [Icho-Ryu], these self-led understandings began to manifest in many ways, and I moved into what I call the circles [baguazhang], first Yin style [xun], then because it seemed clunky to me, Liang ding shr, which would not fight, then back to yiquan briefly, ultimately knowing it was not YSB that was clunky, but me.
Now out here in the hinterlands, I am going back to YSB, beginning again with xun, but also looking at zhen & kan & ideally gen & li, letting the neigong outlined by TomBisio have it’s way with me, mudstepping fixed palms some distance out, but also standing & shifting with Jiulong while turning also some distance away.
I like the circles, still moving, science before mathematics I have read, divination made real, although I’m always disappointed when I don’t get tazed to death waving my arms while walking round & round; fingers crossed. YSB is best in the afternoon I’ve found-good for power and fighting, although the current culture conflict does color my statement about ‘fighting like a girl [xun is the eldest daughter of YSB]’ in a certain way. Wearing a pink Blackwater hat on occasion adds to the fun, and a few of my fair sisters have noticed what remains.
What I have read of Bruce is that he rejected structure altogether, preferring spontaneity and attempting to strip away what did not work to find what had yet to prove useless, not unlike science, democracy, truth itself.
And the Chinese were doing MMA two hundred years ago, lei-tai I believe it was called, and along came some guy who said, “stand still” and everybody wanted some of that moving forward, which seems to be the best way with all things of great value, that being ‘break it, take a piece, do something new with it, and let time decide it’s usefulness.’
Did you hear the one about the guy who was theScience, the people who had theTruth, the managers of Democracy, the keepers of Education, and perhaps those who hold Money after it’s converted from Time, which dominates us all? I know I did, but I forget how it goes, and there are the horizontal, inside & dropping strikes to extend my afternoon.
Language is only a conveyance, the photo of something or someone or some time, but it not the thing itself. This is very bad news for those whose expressions need buzzwords, whose intellect is a cliche-they don’t offer life.
And if you’ve come this far, do you know if Imodium makes a hand cream?
They do not
Lao Sue, very cute.
Thank you, I enjoyed it.