Afghaneeland II
an epic poem continued
starring Col. Sheena Johnson & Capt’n Chuck Fiddler
& introducing Mamoodia
by
Rawclyde
!
~
episode 21
Taliban Focus
~
The woman in the yellow polka-dot burka
Comes back with a pot full of sweet tea
As Taliban bullets whistle & sing all around & always miss
The Taliban are so captivated they can’t hit her
~
She is so obviously good lookin’ under that burka
Such beauty glorifies the entire world
Makes it livable for humankind
And drives Taliban outta their mind
~
Ten thousand bullets miss the two Afghan soldiers too
Cuz’ they are her Afghaneeland friends
The three of them lounge on the blanket in the shade
And drink their tea
~
As the three musketeers partake
A moaning & a groaning grows louder & louder in the sky
Two A-10 Warthog aeroplanes approach
Looking for Taliban & find them
~
Behind the pile of boulders
The Warthogs find ten thousand of the culprits
And blast them into bloody pulp
While Col. Sheena Johnson & the Afghan soldiers sip their tea
~
episode 22
Battle Aftermath In Afghaneeland
~
Col. Sheena’s ex-Taliban husband
dressed like a waiter
comes up balancing on one hand
a platter of fried chicken & potato salad
~
Ever since the wedding with his lovely infidel
Habibullah’s mind has been doing triple flips
One day one way, the next day another
And today he is a really polite waiter
~
He sets the platter down
Infront of the three mouseketeers
Returns to the house to do the dishes
Col. Sheena & her soldier compadres pray & eat
~
Behind the pile of boulders
The last Taliban alive
Takes aim at Sheena right between the eyes
With his trusty AK-47 weapon
~
The devastatingly eye-enslaving empress of Pluckame
In her worn torn yellow polka-dot burka
Makes eye contact with the last Taliban alive & winks
The poor boy trembles, pulls the trigger & misses
~
The Afghan National Army GIs look at each other & shrug
“This is really good chicken,” one says
The other helps himself to more potato salad
And says, “This stuff is really good too”
~
Habibullah watches thru the window
As the hard brick of jealousy in his chest
Drops into his belly & melts into a gooey lump of love
For the legendary Col. Sheena Johnson
~
episode 23
Capt’n Fiddler Parachutes Into Pluckame
~
Ahhhhhhh, catapulting soaring roaring glory!
The boldness, the common sense of the U.S. Secretary of Defense!
Chuck Hagel has sold the entire U.S. Air Force’s A-10 Warthog Fleet
To the Afghan National Army for one dollar!
~
With a lot of training & expensive accoutrements
Now the ANA gots its own aging, rattling, deadly air-support
This Chuck is proud of that Chuck
For doing the right Chuck Chuck thing!
~
I am Capt’n Chuck Fiddler of the U.S. Army
Pulling my ripcord over the Nuristan Province of
Not Afghanistan, but Afghaneeland
A bubble full of wishful thinking inside my mind
~
A tiny dumb-ass bubble that refuses to pop
But that floats like a prayer in the ethereal reaches
Of a poor old soldier’s mind, so yes
I am parachuting out of a Warthog aeroplane above Pluckame!
~
Inside this strange bubble that will not stop
I’ve been training Afghan soldiers to fly
Now like a rain drop I am about to plop
At the feet of Col. Sheena Johnson
~
I shall serve wherever my empress be
Be it Afghanistan & be it free
So I float from above
To back the colonel’s love!
~
Yes, I float & whirl & twirl
Caught in a vortex of air swirling grand
Afghaneeland’s atmosphere gots a mind of its own
It looks like I’ll never land!!!
~
episode 24
A New Breed In The Village
~
Deception & camouflage & secret looks
Secret codes & secret trails to secret nooks
The glint of a knife & someone suddenly gone
Someone trusted suddenly faking a yawn
~
The U.S. Army colonel & her ex-Taliban spouse
Sneeking in & out of your very own house
Growing crooked, growing mean
A sudden realization that you’re a human being
~
Looking for God, looking for a friendly nod
Cleaning the dead enemy’s weapon with oil & rod
Not getting too rude while cooking some food
Trying to get some sleep but only able to brood
~
Then ye notice the bow, look close at an arrow
Accidentally shoot a poor innocent sparrow
Get the Goddess from God knows where
To finally see you & share
~
Some of her knowledge, some of her skill
Secret lessons, a miracle, a talent to kill
Hide like a gloomy secret agent everything that you are
An infinitely shining rapidly rising morning star
~
episode 25
Capt’n Fiddler’s Crash Landing
~
Floating up & down, floating all around
A floating nightmare unable to hit ground
I see Kabul, I see Herat
The parachute an eternal tea-party hat
~
Down below in Pluckame I see
The last Taliban setting fire to the voting shed
I loosen my artificial leg, it falls free
Like a smart bomb it hits him in the head
~
This vortex of wind is exasperating me
I shrug, embrace Afghaneeland reality
Dozing off with one leg left a dangle
I become a banner of star spangle
~
Sunrise sunset ticktocks by again & again
Dehydration comes along, hyperventilation too
Pretty soon I’m twirling with a crazy-boy grin
& a palpitating heart tells me I’m about thru
~
Then an arrow sticks into the heel of my one & only boot
Tied to the arrow is a very long string
This string gets taut as someone hauls me down
My last leg breaks when I slide across the ground
~
Mine is now a sorry plight
Without flight & without fight
Yours truly blacks out
& without light
~
episode 26
Coma
~
Aye, the coma long, the coma deep
The coma comatizes as in a coma I sleep
I levitate above the planet & my baboon race
I ricochet from orb to orb in outer space
~
I mingle with floating souls here & there
We meander dust-like without a care
Like molecules we form little critters & moss
Get tied together with webs of dental floss
~
An avalanche occurs & zillions are buried
No longer able to breath, a remnant of me is carried
Back to the Afghaneeland that I know
Dropped into a crack like a flake of snow
~
I hide out here for centuries without one melt
On a mountain ridge memorizing how it felt
To be alive like a snow leopard a sprint
Of the future a distant rumbling is one hint
~
episode 27
Coma II (Taliban Brains)
~
Crack a chunk of eggshell lying on the path
Murder is threatened with zealous wrath
The border gots holes, the mullah gots souls
Duck when ye dig-up yer leader’s secret goals
~
Holier-than-thou bumpkins shout
One thousand & one Taliban sprout
A mushroom cloud flowering in the sky
Pakistan spits in Big Bo’s eye
~
The pack on your back gets smaller & smaller
‘Til there’s no more to eat & nothin’s there
The enemy your mullah proposed gets taller & taller
‘Til he’s a mountain & curling clouds are his hair
~
Virgins circle around after a knock on the head
They’ve got long-feathered wings & oops, you’re dead
They chirp & chirp but you never get layed
You been buffaloed by the prayers you prayed
~
Grubby little Worm sails across the sea
He’s got ammo & a gun & he’s comin’ fer me
He blows me away, I’m gone now for writing this
A cloud now splattering him with piss
~
Ohhh a long endless coma is such bad news
Thoughts molesting n’ all I can do is snooze
Doggerel snapping at my fingers & gnawing on my shoe
Saved on the net & done yip-yipping at you
~
episode 28
Coma III
~
I love my magic carpet
I ride it every day
Now that I’m in a coma
I arrive right away
~
This morning while riding
In a shrunken state
Like an ant on a bread crumb
However, I was late
~
I was supposed to sing in
Mamoodia’s ear
Before she arose from her blankets
She’s up now without cheer
~
She peers at my somnolent form
on the mat in the corner
She is now wearing her burka
& I’m eternally the foreigner
~
Lost in a maelstrom deeper & deeper
Of comatose sleep nobody can understand
Nobody but he who voyages thusly
In strange strange Afghaneeland
~
Yes, lying there with plenty of time to think
I have discovered lots of things
How to do this, how to do that
& how to give Afghaneeland wings
~
Being as this strange land is
Really just a bubble in mine own head
I have discovered that it is I who is in charge
As I, yes, I twilight sleep on that thin bed
~
However, as I also ride my magic carpet
Here & there throughout the house
I discover my colonel
Sneaking a kiss with her ex-Taliban spouse
~
What a reminder is this!
How can it be that I rule this bubble
When Colonel Sheena Johnson rules me?
I, Capt’n Chuck Fiddler, gots trouble
~
Until I figure out what to do
I’ll continue my coma, my coma true blue
Where there is trouble, comfort may be found too
Mamoodia’s arrow stuck in the heel of my shoe
~
episode 29
Rug Rats
~
The brave people of Pluckame
Witness a convulsion of miracles in their village
In the wake of ex-Taliban Habibullah’s marriage to
Col. Sheena Johnson, errant U.S. Army
~
Habibullah’s resplendent wife via her inner ear is the recipient
Of the whispered guidance from afar of Saint Joan of Arizona
The reincarnation of Saint Joan of Arc
Whose trip from Mars to Earth is a tale in which we will not indulge here
~
I guess the exit of the U.S. Army out of Nuristan Province
And the mysterious return of the legendary colonel
Have expanded the probabilities of divine intervention
So that miracles occur one after another in Pluckame now
~
Such as the crash landing of yours truly
Capt’n Chuck Fiddler, retired U.S. Army
An artificial limb gone astray & my last leg broken
I lay in a coma and, alas, alive
~
In the corner of a back room in the humble home of the happy couple
Lay I in prostrate idiocy & miraculous survival & the ceaseless sacrifice
Of Habibullah’s cousin the unfathomable Mamoodia
Without her deft manipulations I would have died a long time ago
~
Lying in a seemingly endless coma I have managed to penetrate
The innermost laboratories of my dumb-ass brain to such a degree that
I have figured out how to miniaturize on a tiny magic carpet & fly
in & out of my left nostril to explore the doings of this household
~
Of course, flying around in such a remarkable state amongst the
Brothers, sisters, parents, grand parents, aunts, lost uncles, dug-up ancestors &
Other popping in & out neighborhood orphans of Habibullah’s household
I couldn’t help but get discovered by ~ rug rats!
~
episode 30
Floating Low Floating High
~
Ollie & his rambunctious pals
Chase me around the house
They holler “Look out!” to all the gals
And step on an unfortunate mouse
~
With jar in hand & gleam in eye
Ollie chases a tiny man piloting a speck of lint
I on my flying rug darting low & high
Escape up the nostril of myself in a coma & a leg splint
~
Meantime the election of the president never ends
It goes on & on as rogues & soldiers fight & die
Homes are ruined, masses flee, the border guard grins
And bargains ruthlessly for fees low & high
~
Pluckame, oh Pluckame, where do thee roam
In this Afghaneeland bubble made of fantasy foam
Village floating low, oh village floating high
In the cloudy tumultuous Afghanistan sky
?
~
episode 31
Floating Above Afghanistan
~
“What’s going on?” says Mamoodia, her miracle belly
Quivering charmfully in a cold morning breeze
Her belly button puckering up & alert for a clue to today’s events
“We seem to be in a bubble floating in the sky”
~
Sheena grimaces & she surmises, “Fiddler’s doing”
She & I know each other like 2 buds on the same bush
Mamoodia, my savior, replies to Sheena, my other savior
“Uncle Chucky’s coma has him, & us too, soaring”
~
Sheena shakes her head scornfully
The two half-naked women stand on the mountain ridge
Well away from Pluckame, the Afghan village
Which is totally isolated now in Capt’n Chuck Fiddler’s Sufi Bubble
~
Which is just as well because women like this
Would not get along too well in war-torn Afghanistan proper
The whole mountain ridge is in a bubble now
Floating across the pale blue above Afghanistan!
~
On my tiny magic carpet I twirl like an insect
Around my two favorite ladies of the universe
Then return to my prone comatose body
Entering thru the wide-open corridor of my left nostril
~
episode 32
Sufi Arrows
~
Endless subterfuge becomes entwined in the Afghan run-off election
The Karzai government fires half the election committee
Replaces them with ballot-box-stuffing secret agents
Front-runner Abdullah Abdullah begins a protest movement
~
Ballot-box-stuffing secret agents?
Col. Sheena Johnson & her side-kick Mysterious Mamoodia
Two archers extraordinaire take articulate aim
From Capt’n Fiddler’s Sufi Bubble floating above Afghanistan
~
Hafiz Qari and Yousef Ahmadi
Stuff ballot boxes merrily in a tiny village
Lost in the outermost dusty districts of Afghanistan
In a village of 40 people 4000 votes for the runner-up materialize
~
Thunk! Yousef’s eyes pop out
He’s got a sudden headache, a split-second later is knocked out
An arrow stuck in the top of his head
Special delivery from Mahmoodia of Pluckame
~
Capt’n Chuck Fiddler’s Afghaneeland Sufi Bubble
Takes extraordinary strides across Afghanistan’s pale blue
Arrows rain-down on ballot-box stuffers, they’re all knocked out
& a big bubble of miracle heads-out over the sea
~
Can an impossible bubble like this make a difference?
Maybe in a head or two somewhere & that is all
God only knows how the ripples from one pebble thrown in a pond
Spread & spread across the universe!
~
episode 33
Flying Booger
~
“Why do you look so close, so long
At this twilight sleeper’s face?” asks Mamoodia
Of Ollie who sits forever on my chest & peers
Up the nose of my unmoving physical self
~
“Because,” says little Ollie to his most beautiful cousin
“A tiny man on a magic carpet flies in & out
The sleeper’s crooked nose & I wanna know where he goes
So I can catch him & keep him in a jar”
~
Meanwhile below the floating Afghaneeland bubble
In the bubble-blowing war-torn land of Afghanistan
Those Afghans with Sufi arrows stuck in the tops of their heads
Wonder why they cannot remove the protruding feathered sticks
~
“Oh Ollie,” says Mamoodia to her little curious cousin
“Why must you imprison in a jar
This tiny man on his tiny carpet?
Why not let him be, flying around happy & free?”
~
Little Ollie looks up at bedazzling Mamoodia
Her naked navel nibbles at his little-boy eyes ’til
His soul is a bowl of pudding in Mamoodia’s hands
& Ollie cries out, “he is a flying booger!”
~
episode 34
An Order From Col. Sheena Johnson
~
The legendary Col. Sheena Johnson, errant U.S. Army
Notes after some observation & navigatory calculation
That Capt’n Chuck Fiddler’s Afghaneeland Sufi Bubble
Is floating over Murrieta, California, U.S.A.
~
The despicably beautiful colonel also notes
She is entrapped inside this orb
Manufactured out of unreal soap from the captain’s mind
But she is of higher rank & can issue orders thusly
~
However neither her or he is officially of the U.S. Army now
Each in actuality is a free moral agent of world reality now
But then again once a soldier always a soldier
So Capt’n Fiddler, although retired, will take an order
(From the devastatingly beautiful colonel)
~
She stands over the comatose body of the captain
Lain so wounded on the mat in a back room of her house
In the village of Pluckame on the Nuristan Province mountain ridge
That is enclosed inside Fiddler’s impossible bubble
~
Complication on top of complication has arisen
How can she issue an order to one in a coma?
Well, she simply verbalizes outloud, “Capt’n, blow this bubble back
To Afghanistan or I’ll cut off your balls.”
~
episode 35
Commander
~
Out of the watery depths of a deep coma I emerge
Upon opening my eyes I see my commander Lording it over me
Her latest order having just left the perturbing blossom of her delectable lips
Punctuated with a cutting threat that is irresistible
~
However, I am focused on my current mission like a hound chasing a rodent
And accordingly reply, “Colonel, we’re presently in position
To wreck havoc upon short-sighted ignorant mortals
Who taint the reputation of the country to which we are devoted”
~
“Be more specific & brief,” says Col. Sheena Johnson
So Capt’n Chuck Fiddler, yours truly, spits it out
“Thousands of refugee children have crossed the U.S./Mexican border &
U.S. citizens are protesting in Murrieta, California”
~
“And you want Mamoodia & I to Sufi the protestors”
Adds the colonel knowingly. She smiles. I love her.
“And after we do this you will take us back to Afghanistan”
Her eyes are ice
~
episode 36
Transformation
~
I discovered when I was young
Below the border in a Tijuana bar
That everyone on planet Earth
Is a Mexican
~
All I had to do to know this was true
Was down another shot of tequila & look around
Sure enough
Everyone was a Mexican, even me
~
Now I look around & I see
Some people don’t believe this at all
How foolish they be
We’re all Mexicans & free!
~
So, as Col. Sheena Johnson
plucks a Sufi arrow from her quiver & takes aim
From her perch in our Afghaneeland Sufi Bubble
Hovering over Murrieta, California
~
Yes, as she takes aim
At the poor misguided U.S. citizens who are protesting
The arrival of a mere 60,000 unaccompanied refugee children
From those mysterious lands below the border
~
I know that with the release of the taut string of her Sufi bow
Those protesters in Murrieta can be believers
Twang!
And now they are Mexicans too
~
episode 37
The Elder Inside The Sufi Bubble
~
Tiny bubbles & colossal bubbles
All kinds of bubbles blowing in the wind
Full of Sufi miracles
Impossible to comprehend
~
Capt’n Chuck Fiddler’s Afghaneeland Bubble
Inside which resides the mountain ridge
On which is perched the village of Pluckame
Now hovers above a borderland of Afghanistan
~
Afghan National Army soldiers fire their guns
The Taliban keep a comin’ outta Pakistan
Faraway Iraq sucks up American air support
But for one strange bubble in the sky
~
Capt’n Chuck Fiddler’s Afghaneeland Bubble
The most viable support Afghan soldiers have got now
From the United States or from their own nation
Has them buffaloed & worried
~
No Afghan president yet to replace the old one
American firepower as good as gone
Pakistan nextdoor going nuts, refugees everywhere
And Taliban!
~
40 soldiers surrounded by 1,000 screaming enemy
And 10,000 ricocheting singing bullets
Repeatedly look up & pray for a stray Warthog aeroplane
But all they see up there is a bubble!
~
Capt’n Chuck Fiddler’s Afghaneeland Bubble
Offers them as much soothing consolation as an unarmed goat
With a bell around his neck warning every Talib in the vicinity
That he is lamb-chops sneeking around
~
One Afghan patriot, Pvt. Ghani Gandhara, gets a bullet in the belly
Moans, gazes futiley at the sky & spies the damn bubble
That pretends to be a Sufi miracle floating amidst the tumultuous clouds
The wounded private cries out, “Ah shit! Allah loves the Taliban!!!”
~
One of the oldest living faces on planet Earth shows up
Magnified magnificently on the soapy orb above the profusely bleeding soldier
And, thusly, an elder of the village inside it speaks forth to Pvt. Gandhara
“Have faith. It’s all you’ve got right now.”
~
Tiny bubbles & colossal bubbles
All kinds of bubbles blowing in the wind
Full of Sufi miracles
Too wondrous to comprehend
~
episode 38
Hymn Hope
~
Haji Mujadooti an elder of Pluckame
Sits in a circle of cross-legged old ones on the floor of
Pluckame’s recently restored domed mosque
He wonders, “What now?”
~
The elders lackadaisically discuss
The presence of foreigners in their village
Fatalistically & realistically decide nothing
‘Cause nothing is up to them anymore
~
That is, nothing is up to them except
The fate of the entire nation of Afghanistan applauding below
So impressed with this bubble hovering above their heads
Afghans near & far can’t stop clapping & hooting at it
~
Haji Mujadooti excuses himself, totters to his feet
Escapes up a zig-zag mountain-ridge trail, rests momentarily
Peers outside the bubble inside which his village consistently triumphs
He peers down thru the bubble at a real borderlands fight
~
Bullets pummel & dent the helmets of ducking ANA soldiers
40 Afghans hold their own against 1,000 Taliban wanna-be’s
Wanna-be men, wanna-be angels, wanna-be dead
The soldiers matter-of-factly load, aim, fire!
~
But Pvt. Ghani Gandhara has gotten shot in the gut
Blood is the river of no return
The ANA private rapidly loses corpuscles, strength, faith
Old Haji above beams him some hymn hope
~
episode 39
Sheena’s Teepee
~
Col. Sheena Johnson
U.S. Army legend
Sets-up a teepee above Pluckame
High on the mountain ridge
~
Here she hones her arrowheads
& prays to St. Joan of Arizona
Her ex-Taliban husband Habibullah
Assists
~
Young enchantress Mamoodia
The other Sufi archer of Pluckame
Patrols
Her bow vibrant & arrows a quiver
~
Life in a Sufi bubble
Has it’s ups & downs
But mostly it floats
Miracles often occur
~
Sheena becomes so angelic
She sprouts wings
Every curve of her body
Softens
~
And Habibullah swears
He’s
Gone
To heaven
~
episode 40
Ants
~
Thousands of ants
Tumble across the raggedy ground
At the feet of Col. Sheena Johnson
& her faithful hubby Habibullah
~
The couple sit cross-legged honing arrowheads of Sufi bliss
In front of the commander’s imported Native American teepee
“I’ve never seen a horde of ants like this,” says ex-Talib Habibullah
“I wonder where they are going?”
~
Elder Haji Mujadooti having trudged up the mountain-ridge trail
Stands out of breath amidst the horde of ants, tries to say something
He slaps his pants frantically, falls down, rolls around spastically
Thus disrupting the peaceful scene with idiotic old-man antics
~
Covered head to toe with angry biting ants
He heroically stands up & despite the pain he is suffering
Says to Habibulla’s infidel wife, “Do something, Sheena!
Our courageous Afghan soldiers are dying below!”
~
Ahhh!
The commander knows Afghanistan
She knows Taliban & she knows ants too
She arises
~
The empress of the Afghaneeland village of Pluckame
Pulls Haji Mujadooti out of the jam in which he stands
“Darling husband, please tend to this poor wise man”
Habibullah smiles, arises & does as bidden
~
Barefoot, Sheena steps into the rapidly moving horde of angry ants
Not one lousy insect crawls onto one toe of the formidable goddess
She stands erect as the Rock of Gibraltar & prays to St. Joan of Arizona
Who in a distant land relays the message to heaven
~
And by God, Sheena’s Sufi bow materializes in her held out hand
Sufi armor crackles sparsely here & there on her outrageously perfect body
She picks up a freshly cut & carved & honed world-peace arrow
Fits it to the bow string, aims, shuts her eyes, let’s it go
~
The cosmic forces of the universe gather upon the arrowhead point
Thrust forward into the oblivion of every Taliban brain below
Capt’n Chuck Fiddler’s Afghaneeland Sufi Bubble
& divine revelations explode!!!
~
Suddenly beyond anybody’s wildest expectation
There are no more Taliban in the tumultuous nation of Afghanistan
The insurgents have transformed into the silliest looking little ants ever seen
All carrying rifles tinier than toothpicks
~
Pvt. Ghani Gandhara gut-shot and breathing his last breath
Picks up one of these purple insects on the end of his thumb & smiles
The Afghan National Army shall prevail at least in Rawclyde's imaginary
Pvt. Gandhara leaps beyond the veil
~
Pop!
~
entire text
Copyright Clyde Collins 2015
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photo
Pocahontas as Mamoodia
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