Captain B

couldn’t see the bird

couldn’t see the bird
somewhere hidden in the trees
its call was
pickagrapepickagrapepickagrape
it stopped
my ears searched, perked, waited
next it sang
grapepickinggrapepickinggrapepicking

am i to drink wine?

on coffee
and a late start
she’s still in bed

woke at dawn
then slept till i couldn’t
lucid dreams
i had marginal control
i clearly found and examined my hands
but when i tried to pass through the wall
i couldn’t
but did dissolve into a geometric matrix
before changing the scene
must work on this
with intent

wonder how my friend’s journey
to listen and perhaps talk
with forest and mountain spirits
went

need the same
technically on vacation
strong urge always
to engage
in the real work

Nadsat a malenky to pony

It’s not about the cutter
Pretty polly is not the only matter
but viddying clearly in my gulliver
a whole new breed of rabbit
My glazzies blub at the thought
No more nochys unable to zasnoot
Vred to my being, pyahnitsa, longing
Something polezny and a bit bezoomny
I light a little snoutie and horn loudly
My krovvy boils with desire and my tick-tocker skips
with radosty, the thought of ookadeeting the clockwork
I smeck out loud and am shocked at my own goloss
when it reminds me i’m oddy knocky
riding the britva’s edge
My sneety is horrorshow

Tufer Won

WHO IS CAPTAIN B?

Captain B. Seafarer. Lover of shore leave. Collector of heads. Disseminator of tales. Twitter: @NPeligeiro

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Who doesn’t love a good mystery?

The mysterious and curious case of Jacobo Grinberg was brought to my attention by an associate who loves a good mystery, especially a mysterious disappearance.

Given Grinberg’s vocation and nationality as well as certain associations, I was surprised I hadn’t heard of him until this associate sent me an article.

The article then brought me to a documentary directed by Ida Cuéllar. The documentary led to viewing further interviews from family, friends, colleagues, and investigators. Then I found one of fifty plus books Grinberg wrote in his lifetime.

Has written?

Grinberg was a neurophysiologist, psychologist, and founder of the Instituto Nacional para el Estudio de la Conciencia and a graduate from the Facultad de Ciencias at the UNAM, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. I know a number of people who have studied and/or taught at the UNAM.

He went on to get a PhD in psychophysiology at the E. Roy John Laboratory part of the NYU School of Medicine. His preliminary focus and interest was electrophysiological effects of geometric stimuli on the human brain.

He established two laboratories of psychophysiology first at the Universidad Anáhuac (vince in bono malum) and then at the UNAM.

Grinberg sought to use the scientific method to examine witchcraft, telepathy, meditation, and shamanism. His aim (always a threat to his scientific reputation) was to understand the magic world of shamans, healers, and mystics. He wrote over fifty books on these subjects in relation to brain activity.

He developed the Syntergic Theory (La Teoría Sintérgica- síntesis + energía) which posits a continuous space of energy of which the average human can only perceive a very small part of and that what one perceives shapes that person’s perception of reality. The vast majority of the world’s population in the same boat i.e. agreement, subconsciously (or unconsciously) of course. His suspicion and study was to prove that this perception could be increased, consciousness could be expanded and some adepts of ancient knowledge retained and demonstrated tangible proof of higher consciousness and manipulation of what the majority perceive as reality from the ability of tapping into this higher realm.

One of his most famous books was a case study of a Mexican curandera called Pachita. She was a legendary healer. The book Pachita, Milagro Mexicano examines Grinberg’s time spent in close association with the healer, her miraculous healings, and his participation as a helper in her service as curandera and medium. He attempted to write what he saw and experienced without modifying in any way the events that he witnessed. According to Grinberg the association changed his perception of reality. He testified to those ‘miraculous healings’ where the curandera appeared to manipulate space-time and material to not only diagnose illness, perform surgeries extracting malignant tumors, cancers, cysts etc. but to also transplant organs, materialized out of thin air. Grinberg swore by it and was present on numerous occasions in his role as observer, chronicler, and assistant.

Avant-garde Chilean-French filmmaker and writer Alejandro Jodorowsky also met, observed, and wrote about his experiences with Pachita in his 1995 book Psychomagic: The Transformative Power of Shamanic Psychotherapy.

Pachita, born Bárbara Guerrero, had no recollections of the surgical procedures she performed in trance as she acted as a medium for the last Aztec emperor Cuauhtémoc who, speaking through Pachita, said God allowed him to perform through Pachita as his life on Earth had been cut short along with his work as a healer. He, through Pachita and referred to throughout the book as ‘El Hermano’, also claimed that all tales of human sacrifice were fabrications by the Conquistadores and The (pinche) Church to defame the pre-hispanic cultures.

Grinberg begins the book with a disclaimer that he reported exactly what he saw and heard, that it changed his beliefs significantly, but that access to a realm that truly exists is the key to what would be deemed supernatural.

Grinberg put forth the idea of a holographic matrix or a lattice where all is connected and the degree of the brain’s decodification of this is what we perceive as reality. Extra-sensory abilities may appear the more adept the subject be in the decodification of the lattice. In connecting points of the lattice, all the information of the universe is contained. Also of the highest importance to this concept is that the human brain is a miniature model of this hyper-complex informational matrix.

Many others, reaching far back (Anáhuac was an earlier clue), have explored the same idea, calling it by different names. Some of these names would be recognizable if cited. Familiar with many of these (and refraining from creating a list) is why I was surprised to not have heard of Grinberg till recently.

In pre-sand Egypt (and in pre-diluvial times too) and then in Tibet, China, India, Mesopotamia, Mesoamerica, Uluru, Sardinia, the Red Sea and other regions of the cardinals and ordinals, those in the know claimed the universe is mental. The Kybalion. Science journals published in recent years have also begun to suggest as much.

But the science or pseudoscience or fairy dust in your eye if you’re having trouble seeing further than the mysterious disappearance. What was that all about?

There are UFO theories. A further exploration into Grinberg and Andromeda might interest the reader should there remain sufficient interest beyond this very short summary and inquiry. In La fuerza vital del cielo anterior (1991), Grinberg wrote of having been born on a planet in Andromeda but exiled to Earth by ‘The Hierarchy’ for trespassing in a ‘Prohibited Zone’ but that after eleven reincarnations he would be able to return to his original planet.

Savvy?

Others believe, due to the nature of his investigations, that he passed bodily into another realm. Carlos Castaneda and Don Juan Matus would be two names on the –list I have not listed — of those who have expressed similar beliefs, practices, and cosmology. Those two are also candidates for the latter ‘slipping through a crack in the sky’ scenario.

And I also mention those two because Grinberg and Castaneda met on several occasions. One of the theories is that Grinberg went off with Castaneda’s group. Manuel Delaflor who worked with Grinberg for five years witnessed two of their meetings but thought it did not seem likely. The magnitude of each individual would not allow the relationship to flourish. Maybe each was better left to his own devices.

Grinberg’s work drew serious attention. His brothers, interviewed after his disappearance, claimed that he had received numerous offers to teach at other universities most notably in the United States. These positions were not attractive to him. He was content going about the work he was doing, which included mental exercises with children in hopes of stimulating telepathic or telekinetic abilities. He also worked with individuals who could enter trance and deep states of meditation and was able to measure coherency (identical waveform and frequency) and that in subjects such as these that coherency is something that can be increased upon. Trying to understand, literally, the concept of being on the same wavelength. The universities were insistent. Only after his disappearance were his visits to the University of Colorado discovered. He visited the campus many times but never flew directly into Denver or Colorado. He would fly into a neighboring state or even multiple states away.

Scientist colleagues, journalists, and even the detective, Clemente Padilla, who first worked his case pretty much agree that it was the CIA which keeps a close eye on universities as it does on so many entities. Are you sure you’ve never crossed paths with a CIA agent? How well do you really know Steve in shipping and receiving? Even Grinberg’s third wife, Teresa, just didn’t seem to check out among his family or friends and colleagues as a real person, meaning legit in who she claimed to be. They suspected her name to be fake as well as her academic credentials. Grinberg either began to suspect or he knew and slept in his car and not at home with Teresa for several months before he was last seen. Then she disappeared shortly after he did.

Friends noted that returning from a conference in Costa Rica his mood had changed dramatically. He was depressed and forlorn. Then he was hospitalized for a nervous breakdown. As if he’d been told of his inescapable fate working in highly secretive underground laboratories creating perfect soldiers or population control methods.

After mounting public pressure, and not related to any Grinberg speculation, in 2017 the CIA released thousands of secret documents. Grinberg’s name was mentioned. An article he had written and published in his 1982 book Psychoenergetics was also found among those files as was the mention of Project Stargate which sought to study the same mind phenomenon which was Grinberg’s focus but for defense purposes.

No secret, defense means offense with that entity and others.

He disappeared without word or trace on December 8, 1994 four days before his forty-eighth birthday and a long-scheduled celebration with family in his honor. When authorities went to search his home for clues, all of his work was missing. Sometime after that Teresa disappeared.

But then call off the dogs. CIA always getting the bad rap. Bees dying. Must be the CIA. Kennedy. Monkeypox.

The case officially remains a mystery.

A passage from one of his books reads:

After his passing into the other world, he would not die like the rest of the humans, he would voluntarily disappear, his body would disappear without a trace.

Hmmm.

WHO IS CAPTAIN B?

Captain B. Seafarer. Lover of shore leave. Collector of heads. Disseminator of tales. Twitter: @NPeligeiro

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NOT TO SAVE THE WORLD

It wasn’t to save the world
but i’d settle for a few

First step
flee frownland
leave the sad swamp
I yelled from the other room
that i was going
I awaited no response

And it took me
to my own
sad scene
though indeed
a majestic lake
of my youth
and maybe my whole being
one and the same

I recognized the property
but had not been up to date
with what they’d done to the place
my welcome wore out
some decades before

I expected the whole new tribe
to be amidst those summer holiday
feasts and festivities
I was wrong
It seemed interim
But there sat the matriarch

Didn’t think i’d be shot on sight
The authorities summoned
perhaps

She was into her long cup
swimming in the goblet
Her interested gaze
cut the fog and the haze
hovering between us

I know you?
she spoke aloud
sending the question off
in all directions

But she didn’t really seem to care
Fetch me some wine, boy
and pour yourself one too
if you so desire

I fulfilled the deed
filling her glass
but i’d brought my own
and now sat sipping
and lit a smoke

She wasn’t my mother
but as close as they come
Wait a minute
she said
You’re…

You held me as a child
but dropped me as an adult
I drained my glass
corked my bottle
and was on my way

Back in the other land
late afternoon
Frownland was no more
I could hear her singing
I could smell something cooking

Somethings are just the way they are
and she’ll never be
a morning person

WHO IS CAPTAIN B?

Captain B. Seafarer. Lover of shore leave. Collector of heads. Disseminator of tales. Twitter: @NPeligeiro

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GORKO ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR AND SUBLEASER MITCHELL KENNEDY, APPARENTLY UNDER THE IMPRESSION THAT GORKO POET LAUREATE AND ALL-AROUND BADASS CAPTAIN B IS AN ACTUAL PERSON, HAS DISCREETLY LEAKED US AN ‘EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW’ WITH THAT FICTIONAL POET, CLAIMING THAT HE BUMPED INTO THE CAPTAIN OFF BARBADOS WHILE DIVING FOR OYSTERS WITH HIS FAITHFUL DOG AMPERSAT TODD. HERE ARE OUR FAVORITE PARTS OF THE RESULTING FABRICATION, INCLUDING WHAT MITCHELL THINKS IS THE SPELLING OF THE MAGAZINE HE WRITES FOR.

Exclusive Interview with Gorko Gazéd Poet Laureate Captain B

AN INTERVIEW BY B.F.S. MITCHELL KENNEDY

B.F.S. MITCHELL KENNEDY: How nice of you to join us on my luxurious yacht, Captain B. Have an oyster. Is it true that you were originally a whaler?

CAPTAIN B: [REDACTED]

B.F.S. MITCHELL KENNEDY: Oh, truly very amazing, my good friend Captain B. Captain B, would you care to share some amusing anecdote about our times together in Acapulco, when we were there in 1976 galavanting with the Brazilian soccer team, in naught but swimwear?

CAPTAIN B: [REDACTED]

B.F.S. MITCHELL KENNEDY: Ha ha ha, Captain B! You truly made my buccaneer’s belly go up and down, like the wheel on the capstan!

CAPTAIN B: [REDACTED]

AMPERSAT TODD: Ruff, ruff!

B.F.S. MITCHELL KENNEDY: Ho ho ho, even @Todd loves your witty retorts! Now Captain B, wagging tongues on little birds have informed us, wink wink, that you may IN FACT possibly no longer be an eligible bachelor, or even a confirmed one such as myself. Would you be comfortable telling us a little about the new mystery lady or felluh in your life?

CAPTAIN B: [REDACTED]

B.F.S. MITCHELL KENNEDY: Oh, so THAT is her name, is it? And her pronoun is SHE!!! Well I am certainly all beet red and it is not from the sun. Captain, whatever shall we do with all of your fan ‘male’? Tee hee hee!

AMPERSAT TODD: Grrrrrrrrr….

CAPTAIN B: [REDACTED]

B.F.S. MITCHELL KENNEDY: Yes I am a bit of a wit myself, I do confess. Do you know that I also write poetry allow me to recite one of my most recent poems for y-

CAPTAIN B: [REDACTED]

B.F.S. MITCHELL KENNEDY: Oh, yes, the luncheon, I nearly forgot.

B.F.S. MITCHELL KENNEDY: Captain B! Captain! Come back!

AMPERSAT TODD: Arf, arf!

B.F.S. MITCHELL KENNEDY: I am in complete agreement, @Todd. He needn’t have SWUM to shore — we have a perfectly seaworthy dinghy stuffed with chips, beverages, and lotions.

And that is as far as Mitch got with this purely fictional interview. Nice to know he has these healthy fantasies about The Capn, though! Ta-ta.

TGG

fairy dust

she’s spritely
keeps her hair short like many a pixie would
i’ve glimpsed her a few times out of the corner of my eye
haven’t yet caught up with her
she’s quick and spry and can fly
she’s a fairy

i have to take care in my approach
even when her wings are folded
she leaves no tracks on the snowy ground
i wouldn’t want to corner her
but if i could somehow get ahead enough
to walk the path in an opposite direction
to bring about a face-to-face encounter
i may just have a little luck

till then
i’m working on brooding, brutish and heavy steps
and to do away with them
she could tell me the tales i’ve been aching to hear
and take me to the places i’ve longed to visit

WHO IS CAPTAIN B?

Captain B. Seafarer. Lover of shore leave. Collector of heads. Disseminator of tales. Twitter: @NPeligeiro

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Daddy said i had to quit you

Daddy said i had to quit you
She told the teary eyed lad
Smoking those gross cherry cigarettes
He thought made him look older, an intellectual
He’s an intelligent kid. I’ll give him that

You’re from the wrong side of the tracks
Daddy says so. Chiapas is no place
A stunning princess from Guanajuato
Could ever live

He was stunned

Sorry, Arturo, you’re a good guy
But you’re growing up quick
Rubi, gonna take some time still

If i run into him at La Chingada
I’ll buy him a drink
Display the smoking of hand-rolled
Strong and pure tobacco
As high fashion
While the bartender faithfully
Plays my list
Of essential
Rock’n roll

Spin the bottle
Point el joven
To the table of three
Universitarias
Waiting to be approached
After one more pull each
One for confidence
The other for longevity
Holster the bottle
And give the boy
With the regal name
A friendly shove

WHO IS CAPTAIN B?

Captain B. Seafarer. Lover of shore leave. Collector of heads. Disseminator of tales. Twitter: @NPeligeiro

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a happy shipwreck

a happy shipwreck
i die every night
and am born again
every day

at least that’s how it’s been going

one day i’ll figure it out
or not
and it’ll all be over
and i won’t care

all conditions, charts, and compasses
indicate to steer clear of that storm
but she’s too enticing

yarrrrrrr!
i’ll be a happy shipwreck

maybe none of the others
knew how to navigate those waters
maybe i’m the man

i’ll keep a log

i’ve got provisions
my face is cut by the sun
my skin is salty

going to make it or break it
some horizons just beg too convincingly

WHO IS CAPTAIN B?

Captain B. Seafarer. Lover of shore leave. Collector of heads. Disseminator of tales. Twitter: @NPeligeiro

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UKIYO – end

I thought I’d meet fury. I assumed anger would greet me. She was eager and anxious but only to move.

But then fury.

She swiftly decapitated the dozen ajisai I extended. A swift flash of her short sword along with a momentary flash of anger that dissipated even before the first petal hit the ground.

Raven squawked from above, ‘Should’ve brought akaibara.’

I shot him a look. He had to right his path lest that tree…

She spoke. ‘They were dead anyway and we must move.’ And that was not an unkind act. Something warmed inside of me to see some of her original mischief returned. Still there was urgency in her voice, then a slight hint of anger returned. ‘Your half witted act has impelled the half wit to act. Let’s go.’

I knew better than to ask questions and didn’t need Raven’s two-sense caw of warning from the window sill either.

I quickly mounted the steed and gave him a quick hug and whispered greetings in his ear. Enough said and we followed Niko and the mare.

Many questions were answered merely by heading in the direction of the citadel.

Raven flew on ahead and disappeared from sight.

On the high bluff heavily populated with poplars, we dismounted Kazan and Umi. I encouraged them to graze on the lee side of the hill, the side hidden from the fortress. It was grassy and good eating for a horse. To Kazan I made hand gestures that indicated the plan to stay alert and listen for my whistle should we need auxiliary.

Long hours we waited. There was no moon and it was pitch black. The fall air had a chill and a fire would have been obvious if obviously we had not been in vigil.

Just past midnight a red light flashed from a crack in the sky. We knew it was time.

Niko went left as we had agreed. Raven and I went right.

We were right there none too soon as the first cry of pain pierced the night. We had suspected the necromancer would bring friends, we just hadn’t known which. The yōkai, knee-high homunculi, had razor sharp teeth and claws. The little monster that had taken a chunk out of the guard who had cried out didn’t see the shuriken flash from my hand. For him it was too late. Raven swooped down on two more in quick succession. I’d let fly a handful more razor-sharp stars to wink at the night and cut down a few more.

Just as I was reaching for both blades the remaining imps scurried together into a perfectly round fur ball. The ball rebounded high into the air and came down with thunder that shook the ground and nearly knocked me off my feet.

There in the clearing dust stood one big version of the little hobs they had been. There it stood on hairy and gnarly feet. It beared its claws and teeth, letting out an otherworldly howl that was nearly too much for the ears to take.

‘Do not look it in the eyes!’ Raven crowed.

I’d but glanced the fiery yellow. I looked instead to Raven. ‘That’s why you are called Chie, my friend!’

Raven nodded and ascended.

It leapt. I went low. Raven stayed high. We each drew blood. I upon its terrible abdomen. Raven took an ear. Twas a din to fright a monster’s ear. I remembered a line read to me in my youth from my deceased father in a far-off land…

It gave me strength. It gave me speed. It gave me power. As rat-faced goblins they were quick and a multitud, better to use both katana and wakizashi. This beast was as tall as two men stacked and as wide as four or more abreast. Terrible to look at. He inspired fear. His greatest weapon. Bigger and stronger than the pack, he was slower. I left wakizashi sheathed and held katana in both hands, perfectly centered.

In three movements, the beast fell to its knees as its throat opened and spilled blood. The cadaver melted into a sludge and seeped into the ground.

Raven and I never gloat. Even if we did, there was no time. We flew, one with wings the other with feet.

I have nothing against red. It is one of my favorite colors and not only a wink or allusion to blood. I think of sunsets and a certain someone’s lips but only with plume in hand after the fact. Raven and I had managed to save a number of guards. Others had not fared so well and their red painted much of the gray of the stone walls of the corridor that glowed the sinister red of which I speak, spilling over the threshold of the last chamber.

We approached slowly, silently, and with caution. I had two shuriken at the ready. One for the forehead of the necromancer, one for the throat of his lover, the sister of my lover.

But behold. I had imagined two against one and Niko in desperate need of my aid. Happy I was to see the two sisters together against the one and despicable magician. Niko and her sister each held wands that threw blue and green bolts against the red cast by the nemesis. I knew the now straight, hard and bound braid, which lent him power, was my stolen topknot. I let shuriken fly.

They were not to injure, not directly anyway. When a fraction of his power and attention diverted from the other fight to knock the chromium quasars out of midair to crash upon the floor, it was enough for the sisters to knock my topknot turned wand or dome baton or crown caduceus or spine scepter from his hands, I sprang, took him down, and pinned one arm over the other. Raven was coming in for an eye but sister used her baton to hold him at bay as Niko using hers, tapped his forehead.

Now he sleeps.

I know little but not enough to talk of the topknot magic except that Niko and her sister had cured and treated them for years. Theirs had been fashioned only one long strand at a time and only on propitious dates. The necromancer used the dark arts and stolen vertebral nectars i.e. mine to fashion one in less time.

Perversion.

Niko picked up the heinous staff. She and her sister walked off into the forest for some moments to confer with their mother. My guess, to burn or bury the thing.

Appearing at the door, why neither Raven nor I suspected treachery and double cross from the sister? Because it is Niko. She would never have let it get that far along if she was not sure.

Sister Daitan (now safe to say her name?), having survived the same, is sure the dark spell can be broken and now visits and sits beside the failed necromancer as he continues in repose. She whispers to him many things.

Niko and I speak much about the sea air. I am in the kitchen capping off on my scribbles. Another round of sake has been heated. She waits for me in the other room and has unfurled maps she only acquired hours ago. Raven, Kazan, and Umi will come along too.

As talk continues, more vibrant all the time, so our itinerary grows.

FIN

WHO IS CAPTAIN B?

Captain B. Seafarer. Lover of shore leave. Collector of heads. Disseminator of tales. Twitter: @NPeligeiro

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