Rebel Poem by Jim Boone

“The great ones never have any money, ”
the acting coach told Jimmy Dean

“That costs money that we don’t have,
and never will, ” the dream busters
told Jimmy me.

James I had a six year head start on
James II, and guts galore

Motherless at nine, father unable for the
next fifteen, drove my idol into a wall
of disaster on September 30,1955. I
had just comminced to fight

God bless the child that’s got his own,
Come get the child that don’t

I’m waiting!

Rebel with a cause, who had a need
to be loved, understood, great, free

a quietly powerful being who was
racing toward the finish line and
running out of breath at twenty-four

an actor on the screen who was as
great as any who had blazed a trail
across the landscape known as
H O L L Y W O O D

the tragic young man on the ground,
more troubled, determined, hopeful
and vulnerable, not knowing what
Fate had in store.

New York with sky-scraping hopes
and talented, surviving, friends to
enjoy and mourn the ride

California and the cannibals who
pounded and caressed the flesh
before picking it from the bones.

Moments he could use, anger he
could use, hurt he could use, until
he was all used up, and a giant
explosion somewhere east of
Eden, for this rebel without a
cause and a great need, doused

the lights on the passion, on
the greatness, on the ambition,
on the need - doused the fire.

You go ahead

I’ll help cleanup, take some
notes and look around beyond
the glare for the value of the
road less traveled, and the potholes
that shake and rattle a long life
until that welcomed angel of death
comes to call:

The symbol and a scribe - rebels
to the end of a life and to the ages
of resolution, with issues to the end

Known and unknown - a matter
of logistics, a matter of time.

1965/2001