[Marlene]

 

Excuse me, sir. I believe

you to be the person I’m

 

to see about Bree

and her ex-boyfriend, Kevin.

Are you Joseph Ward?

 

[Joseph Ward]

 

I am, but what affords me

the pleasure of your youthful

 

company this day?

 

[Marlene]

 

Johnathan and Crystal said

not to be bashful,

 

but to be careful to wear

conservative apparel.

 

They thought we should meet

early some sunny Sunday

’cause Nature’s your church

 

and you are apt to research

anything for the asking.

 

[Joseph]

 

Cordiality

aside, your smile abides

a genuine warmth

 

to last a month of Sundays.

How do you know these people?

 

Is there a problem

with Kevin that channels your

need for assistance

or is it, instead, with Bree,

or, possibly, in essence,

 

something different

other than what your intro,

with no bio, framed?

 

[Marlene]

 

My apology, I am

Marlene Marlo and I’m here

 

ably endowed with 

common sense to proclaim my

strong attachment to

 

my Uncle Marlo who chose

to pursue to cue Crystal’s

 

Johnathan to view

Compton’s three-coined-arrangement

of a better path

 

of favorable insight

concerning humankind’s plight.

 

You carry the coins

as does Johnathan’s stout band

of vigorous friends.

 

My family is well known

and shown to be helpful to

 

coin carrying folks

who revoke competition

for aggregating

 

groups of cooperating, 

decent individuals.

 

[Joseph]

 

So your cordial tone

is grown from those who are prone

to cooperate

to weave a tapestry that

entangles diverse angles

 

of all perspectives

keen to leave no stone unturned.

Picasso is proud,

 

but not all viewers perceive

meaning from pure abstraction.

 

[Marlene]

 

But I’m not speaking 

to anyone but you and

it’s true that you know

 

to wrestle the undertow

of converging subcurrents

 

of huge, crashing waves

that might become a liquid,

tumbling, wet grave-cave

 

were it not for your gusto

and good sense to dispense funds

 

to pay the expense

of fortifying mind, soul

and body blithely.

 

Personally, I enjoy

Picasso’s blue paintings best.

 

Rest assured I’m here

more for you than me to see

what can be procured 

 

to score relief from Tina’s

dilemma that feeds your grief.

 

[Joseph]

 

So, Kevin and Bree

were actually no more

than good camouflage?

[Marlene]

 

Nothing I said was a lie.

You can try to minimize 

 

or deflect to eye

some unknown, phantom-made threat

but I would not bet

 

that such strategies will please

you with fantastic results.

 

If you consult your

vast experience and Joe’s

Honor Coin you’ll join

 

your two best attributes to 

compute that which will appease

 

any doubt about

my sincere honesty for

reciprocity

 

to honor all your effort

to assist other struggles

 

to enlist samples

of alternatives to hard

core status quo blows

 

to progressive shifts that shield,

preserve and nurture all lives.

 

Our first meeting

deserved special attention

to secure, first, your

 

best appraisal of time spent 

with an unknown entity.

 

Speach is linear

unlike showing a photo

that explodes meaning

 

completely and instantly.

I had to find time to paint

a full photograph 

of myself with your best friends.

Marlo’s a surname

 

of a family greatly

invested and completely

 

interested in

developing the human 

consciousness beyond

 

the confined blindness that moves

animalistic instincts

 

to react to facts

hard wired in D N A

that stays the course for

 

animals that do not plan

proactively to refute

 

a narrow command

that may stand in the way of

a better life choice.

 

Uncle Marlo decided

to voice his learned advice

 

to entice his friend, 

Johnathan, to recommend

to his close fellows

 

Compton’s perspectives because 

he knew that Johnathan would,

 

pursue because his 

close companions already

abandoned sanctioned

 

unfettered competition

as a holy position

 

to evangelize.

Johnathan and my uncle

maintained their prized ties

up until he passed last year

with an air of contentment.

 

[Joseph]

 

So, we’re a pair, then?

 

[Marlene]

 

Oh, we’re inseparable.

You’re amenable

 

to a loyal friendship with

one who carries the three coins

 

and readily joins

enthusiastically

the quest to live more

 

harmoniously even

when stressed by obsessed doctrines

 

of competitive

superiority that

gives much to a few

 

leaving the majority

to stew about their bad luck

 

for having a life

stuck in poverty’s low class

or the scarcity

 

of opportunity for

some middle class improvement.

 

[Joseph]

 

So your prophesy

is we will be best of friends.

 

[Marlene]

 

Each of our souls

 

intends to transcend upward 

or forward toward expanding

 

our consciousness

of the reality we,

three, are a small part.

 

[Joseph]

 

“We three …” Who is the third soul

to behold the gains our

 

brains will obtain and

maintain as the foundation 

for more expansion?

 

[Marlene]

 

Why Tina of course though she’s

yet to endorse the value

 

of clinical help

to pursue Bartholomew’s 

imposed dilemma

 

from his inflicted trauma

of child sexual abuse

 

for six confusing

years mixed with fear and tears laced

with beer and other

 

intoxicants promoting

addictions’s solution to

 

love and happiness.

Did Bartholomew love, or

consume, her young soul?

 

Did she presume naively

that she was fully worthy

 

of kind affection?

Is this not the swirl that hurls

your thoughts to frenzy?

[Joseph]

 

You seem to be completely

in tune with my mind’s monsoon.

 

[Marlene]

 

The grand Marlo clan

understands its brand of help

conveyed to persons

 

who’ve displayed simple ways to

offer relief to other’s

 

grief perpetrated

by narcissistic beliefs

of would be false chiefs.

 

You, Joseph, and Johnathan,

Crystal and all their fellows

 

echo the same core

scenario for increased

personal growth for

 

release of harmonious,

stabile methods of seeking

 

to stretch the framework

of consciousness with a depth

of comprehension

 

of Creation’s Masterpiece.

Like Tina, choose to engage

 

or to stay away.

I offer to you that which

you offered to her.

 

Does it not occur to you

that this is a centered point

 

of Compton’s condensed

view of Creation’s true move

in lieu of giving

ultimatums or sanctions.

Choose a path to traverse and

 

immerse your self in

its terrain that just might change

out of range from your

 

initial vision that weighed

your decision one way or 

 

the other trying

to cover contingencies

that cannot be seen

 

to intervene poor judgements.

Your cauldron of confusion

 

regarding Tina’s

simmering broth of very

dark illusions feeds

 

your soul with stark, tasteless pleas

from bad hallucinations.

 

You’re troubled with a 

befuddled mind and could use

my probing views to

 

diffuse your mental fog like

the rising sun’s morning rays.

 

You should know you too

have trust issues akin to

Tina’s strong need to

 

control and be fully self

determined even if it

 

ruined her best chance

for happiness. Be gracious

grant me one day’s grace

to trace lines that might unwind

the tangled, mental vines that

 

bind your troubled soul.

 

[Joseph]

 

So, how do you know the whole

import of Tina’s

 

self imposed tort to thwart good

male fellowship for macho

 

bravado that shames,

defames and proclaims gentle

action unmanly?

 

[Marlene]

 

It’s handy for family

to share and reflect about

 

the affairs of those

who propose to expose cloaked,

priceless subtleties

 

that can free mankind to be

more than instinctive mammals.

 

The Marlo clan are

fans of all coin carriers,

so, we talk among

 

ourselves about who delves

in the advancement of one’s

 

personal attempt

for improvement. We all share

to help prepare us

 

to help the unaware to

fair better from the contact

 

that will then extract

new insights to fight against

naïveté and

ignorance which in essence

is the root of all earthly

 

human suffering.

Cooperating along

with education

 

is the best resolution

to replace the disgrace of

 

bullets, bombs and war

or narcissistic, selfish

greed that needs to be

 

heaved upon history’s past

heap of atrocious conduct

 

to pluck the human

soul from being stuck

in perpetual

 

stagnation that continues

to devolve a loveless life

 

of violence void

of any condolences.

Hell is self imposed

 

always as a consequence

of slighting one’s true nature.

 

You were very smart

to embark with Cole and his

fellows to start their

 

remarkable adventure

to secure a well prepared

 

presentation to 

elicit conversations

about humankind’s

 

frustration to find useful

resolutions to earthly,

 

daily suffering.

Tina was not yet prepared

to share the challenge.