Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "The O.A.Ps!" (U.K. Old age Pensioners.)

 Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "The O.A. P's!" (U.K. Old Age Pensioners.)

(dedicato: fellow youngish-old dudes, Marc Pierson, Steve Johnson, Gordon Westeran & all the Lads & Lasses who have, in their time saved/served "Old Blighty".)

"The O.A. P's! (England's Old Aged Pensioners!)

"FREEZE BUDDY!!! HANDS UP AGAINST THE WALL! (Search him Sgt. Smith/My aging Uncle/Check him-see if this Islamist Immigrant got some anti-cultural-curriculum Ducats!!!) "WE ARE THE O.A. Ps!!!"" Show him your Pensioners FREE BUS PASS, flash your cut-price dental work; Corporal Nalty. Don't take NO SHIT!" "Spread Em Buddy!!!" (DAD's ARMY/British last frontier!): WE STAGGER FOR NOBODY!!!

"The O.A.P.'s!"

.... It's not EASY to live (EXIST!) on 70 British Pounds/some change/Free Bus Pass (2026) PER WEEK let alone for U.K. Pensioners with NO option for them to go Skiing (sans N.H.S. orthopedic designer Skies) in Switzerland or enjoy a flutter in a Monte Carlo Casino... attired in last year's moth-eaten tuxedo, rather, their best MOSS-BROS, off the peg 2 piece worsted suit? (My name's BOND?)

And it's pretty (remote) hard to spring/pay for, for a weekend with your Grand-Kids in Bridlington, Brighton, Margate or Scarborough-Fair not to mention to pay/fix your leaking roof? And cutting out Coupons, bargain sales, worried about your daughter who just came home back to stay, divorcing that clown she married who U didn't much like anyway?

It's a TAD difficult having paid a LIFETIME of TAXES so that the Royal Navy can build a new AIRCRAFT CARRIER, militarily out of date/space-age DRONES can knock it out? Britania RULES the waves, yet we veterans R now all at adrift? And in the Land of Hope & Glory, just fooled & led into a Lee? Just WHO is at the HELM of, what was once, our beloved Country?

"SHIP AHOY!!!" (Crow's Nest!) -The O.A.P. crew down here in the BILGE who cannot afford basic needs; food, heating, RENT, the necessities of English Life! "SHIP AHOY!!!" Rudderless! WE-SONS-OF-A-GUN! Who, like the UNKNOWN SOLDIER sacrificed, ignored, put in the shadows, a CULTURAL SHAME, we "paid-up" old folks, who linger until the day we die....

.... But still in our hearts/from Sheffield School Assembly we still sing: "ONWARD CHRISTIAN SOLDIERS, marching AS to War! With the Cross of Jesus, going on before!"

c. June, 2026. D-DAY!!! Dave Delacroix. 

Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "Space Cadets!"

 Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "Space Cadets!"

.... EVERYONE KNOWS IT'S WINDY/NOWHERE, the "Road to Rivergaro" (See ancient Blogpost), a BLUE MOON? I saw U on a sunbeam, a SICILIAN road, your Virginity was opulent, your brothers all carried Rifles? I hid amongst the grape vines & recited verses of DANTE with all my Soul, "SEDUCTION et ABANDAMATO, guilty, but what could my inner nature DO?

.... And after MONTHS we had a Child. 

Both of our Families dis-own our Marital feast, our magic, that epiphany of LOVE. what have we done? But fell in love? Uncle Antonio, sharpening a handy Stiletto grumbles-silencio, Pappa is OUTRAGED, Mamma still is protective, your 3 sisters give me/U the EVIL EYE...like Space Cadets...old, casual boyfriends don't look U in the eye. And the newly installed (Immigration ISLAM Green-Light Scum who now clutter our streets?) clearly, on a MUSLIM whim, all prepped to stone U to death?

The Town's average (remember, U R just an un-married pregnant, late teenage GIRL), in a community of - latter-day WOODSTOCK/LOVE & PEACE/1969 - observance-resigned, yet in effect, a societal benign social-TUMOR of thought & surrounded by Social SPACE CADETS, old & young, attempting to (Huh?) right your wrong on every side?

Everyone KNOWS it's windy. If U feel like an outcast, a Refugee? Remember. Refugees VOTE with their feet. In a WORLD where we all Outsiders meet. FAR from Cultural Fascist/Space Cadets: Coffee on the pot. Tea by the kettle. Beer on ice. Whisky in the JARO. And warmth by the fire; far from the madding crowd! We roam the World to find a place where we can live, as a family and to live in our OWN "Private Idaho".

c.2026. Dave Delacroix. (Fictional story but Societal Poem,)

Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "Bell, Book & Candlestick! /"Wish U were here!"

 Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "Bell Book & Candlestick! /Wish U were here!"

DO NOT GO GENTLY into that good BLOKE; God-knows what U. R. gonna contract, nor (Lads!) that DESIREE, a Scorpion (?) with TITS to sting your TEST-TACKLES, a potential death-toll knoll? -Half drunk & as HORNY as hell; who's zooming who in the pit of sexual desire?

...Reading by moonlight, bell, book & candle, a hollow cry, (I should-a known better!?) -that - eternal - soliloquy-RE-SURFACED which Spittals in your face; a Pilgrim's Progress, a tale un-told. Even Poet CHAUCER would be be-wildered by your tale, leastways censor or review his Joke-Sack!

There's only, sometimes Glory, there's only your Song of inner Songs. Like a perfect murder: What could go wrong? There's only our desires-mischief, a Pilgrim's way to wrack & ruin, to crush a Love's competitor, a tavern-brawl a 'la Kit Marlowe, Elizabethan Poet & Spy, dagger-stabbed into literary eternity?

(BANSHEE CRIES!!!)

It's only the Bell, the (Shakespearian) "ALARUM!" some Book to re-read (Raymond Chandler?) or a Candle to light your way? -That LAST SUPPER (Why not THE LAST BRUNCH?) U enter UP to heaven or hell, to the Devil or the Angels, their delight, and YOU, a dysfunctional Pied Piper who took away the Kids but caused a Societal night? The Black Plague or a blood red river Nile? Foresight like Genius can get U hung!

Do not go BENTLEY, DAIMLER or ROLLS-ROYCE into this good night, opt for a VW-Volkswagen, something inconspicuous. A Mimi-Cooper, a Citroen CV7, a Piccolino FIAT, better still just hitch-hike? Those taciturn Gods R apt to - like USA-Immigration Control Robots - more likely to BUST, MUGG, or frick U over at N.Y.C. Ellis Island, Freedom's last turnstile! There IS no Home of the Brave. As for the Land of the Free? -Keep dreaming.

DESTINY decrees it's no longer COOL to "wander lonely as a cloud" There's always spite, jealousy or some Islamist FANATIC to shoot U down. And NO Bell, Book or Candle to protect or redeem your Soul. Vacation Postcards are "passe"; nobody these days, even Internet texting posts/writes: "Wish U were here!"

c.2026. Dave Delacroix.

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Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "Song!"

 Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "Song!"

I AM NOT THE MAN U think I am. I am not that Dude, tuxedoed, clean-cut & groomed. I am not the hero in your story. I am not some Court Fool nor your stooge.

I'm not the Man in your alphabet nor Captain of treasure-laden ship returning from overseas. That Conquistador died long ago; the El Dorado of my dreams.

I'm not the Man, the kid most likely to succeed nor school class clown, nor Rugby star, just a Man who comes home late at night & wonders where the past years sleep.

c.2026. Dave Delacroix.

Our Man in Europe/now BELIZE, Dave Delacroix: "Something Blue."

 Our Man in Europe/now BELIZE/Dave Delacroix: "Something Blue."

...I DON'T know U from EVE, a Nemesis, friend or foe or some Banshee, Witch, a LAMIA who can strangle me in reptilian coils? ...WE, lonesome hearts-vulnerability, rudderless Souls in a storm a-sea? So, make it fresh, make it Cool or maybe, if U can: Just make it Blue.

...WE have travelled SOOO far in this hemisphere, blind-on-blind yet kisses sweet, UN-knowing "a 'la" destiny, a universal sweep? Almost lost in Society's vacuum, re-surfacing UP for air? We gulp down Oxygen pretending all is Hunky-Dory! (Who came up with that one/David Bowie?) Alas, BIG-D is no longer there. (Ashes to ashes!).

Yet a forlorn "HUZZAH!". Sometimes a yawn. An exigency! A yearning, (My Japanese Girl!) to make it fresh, make it Cool, hoping we make it Blue. Something fresh, something NEW, something Cool, but all the time wishing for something Blue.

c.2026. Dave Delacroix.

Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "RAYBANS!"

 Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "RAYBANS!"

(dedicato: Johan Perez)

"Raybans."

...GOT MAH MOJO WORKING, got my ancient/misty RAYBANS (Sunglasses), got Em at the "Goodwill" store. Borrowed this tuxedo from Crooner, Steven St. James, my "winklepicker" hand-made Italian shoes, a gift from Horst, my Deutch-drummer, Hildesheim band? 

My Music Producer (Serbian/he doesn't like publicity), his Credit Card - on loan - is worth about half a Song. Alas, Hollywood, that insidious community, always anticipates you going wrong.

GOTTA DREAM, had a dream, not that U'd notice or about OUR tomorrows, about Me & You, or that KICK in my solar plexus, that tangle, & gotta FEAR, nothing is true. Was it ever?

Gotta Blue Moon in my sunset, gotta boulevard in my Soul; the only scrap of evidential existentialism that U ever, ever own?  A Bridal gown moth-eaten in your closet? There IS of course, in the WILD-WORLD that gridlock-kamikaze, a perpetual origami that butterflies, an exotic pest that never leaves U alone. Do we cease to BE?

HAMELT, confused dude, outshone by a Cigar brand. Keep that in mind.

Got my ragged Raybans -a-nose, a-dangling, an antique "pince-nez", a PROM Night, half-assed groomed from head to toe and WITH LUCK this new love of mine, never ending. (I must try to elicit her name without appearing to have forgotten it?)

Nobody's perfect. NOBODY BUT YOU in your smart-set/pristine RAYBANS (Sunglasses), the STUFF of past-perfect U never ever needs to know. S'why I'm "putting on the Ritz just this - long-since - last time. Get hung for a sheep as a lamb in this our world of pettiness, cheap-ass nickels & dimes. Ya just CAN'T sweat the "small stuff"; it's ALL "pretty-petite!"

O.K>!!! RAYBANS ON! (I got my MOJO working:) Show time!

c. Dave Delacroix. 2026.....DEAR POST READER? If U feel inclined U might post your name on the BLOG as a "Follower". No scam. All free. It'll make me look good/popular, I suppose. Thank U.

Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "The Midnight Swim."

 Our Man in Europe/now Belize/Dave Delacroix: "The Midnight Swim."

...IN THE MIDNIGHT SWIM, a splish-splash in the swimming pool, subterranean, no need for AIR, your head DUCKED UNDER and your locks feel like ROPE in need of shampoo; but your loins feel so free, in the midnight swim S-where U need to be.

In the midnight SWIM, there's no War or Peace, just the RINSING of Life's memories, the live & deceased, the latter may they R.I.P. And breaststroke or crawl, duck paddle, whatever it takes to get out of the deep end: One or the other, just don't drown.

In the midnight swim where your nothingness is ALL, U float, gazing up at the stars & lactate in your Wonder, a shattered yet benign MIRROR, reflecting the Man or Woman U thought U could have been; perhaps a Partner awaiting, poolside, with a bathrobe? A midnight swim. In a dark pool. Just a midnight swim.

c.2026. Dave Delacroix.