APRIL 8TH, 2006
My Lone Memorial to Karen (1958 – 2006)

I shed a tear or two for my dear lost lost friend, who died on April 2nd . Cause of death “lifestyle choices”. Karen, sweet, highly intelligent, talented, energetic, funny and charming, witty and wild, strong but weak, determined but scattered….what was the demon that led her to her self-distruction…I may never know…she never could tell me…i'm having trouble crying because her life was so miserable...but...
Karen, I could not love you enough to save you from yourself.

When I first met you it felt like you were a long lost sister, or a child I had never had, the connection was instant and strong. We bonded in the very first second of our meeting. I imagined that you were my twin, separated from me at birth (oh my god, my body shudders at the memory, and I wonder if you are part of my soul group , and if I am going to die in a few days, or weeks, months, as members of the same soul groups do);…and I weep…oh god oh god oh god…I can feel your spirit hovering over me…and I understand the strange dreams of the past few days…and my unwillingness to record them…

Karen, You compelled me to do crazy things , self- distructive things…I was helpless - mesmorized by the spell that you cast over me …I still cannot fathom it…and so we had to part…while I could not be with you in physical time, I always carried you in my heart!

“It’s just three miles to the river that would carry me away… two miles to the dusty street that I saw you on today , four miles to my lonely room where I will hide my face, and half a mile to the downtown bar that I ran from in disgrace…. Lord, how long am I going to keep on running? 7 hours 7 days or 7 years?...All I know is, since you’ve been gone I’ve been drowing, drowning, feel like I’m drowning in a river of tears.

…Three more days ‘till I leave this town and disappear without a trace. A year from now maybe settle down where no one knows my face, I wish that I could hold you one more time to ease the pain but my time’s run out and I”ve got to go, got to run away again.

…Still I catch myself thinking one day I’ll find my way back here and you’ll save me from drowning, drowning in a river of tears. Oh how long must it go on?...” – as i was typing, Eric Clapton’s Drowning in a River of Tears started playing, and NOW the enormity of all this strikes me, and my body is wracked with grief...i cry and cry and cry...until i am worn out, my head is sore and my eyes are red and puffy...ugh! I DO miss you, Karen, my friend, but I could not save you….and no words can express how much pain that gives me.

“…hidden in secret heart are soul-deep scars
That cry out for heaven’s stars.” (from a poem written for me in 1974)