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Andrew Delapruch | + Follow Poet |
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Hunter S

after riding 
with the
hell’s angels,
running for
sheriff of
pitkin county 
in colorado
(speaking on
the “freak power”
platform---from
which he swore
that if he won---he
would
tear up all the 
streets, replacing 
them with newly
sodden, “never 
take mescaline 
whilst on duty,”
and legalize all
drugs to be used
solely for the 
purpose of 
recreation),
& climaxing his
life in the epic 
saga of fear & 
loathing, along
with his faithful
cohort (and attorney)---
none other than the
brown buffalo 
himself---hunter s.
& oscar packed 
“2 bags of grass,
75 pellets of mescaline, 
5 sheets of high-
powered blotter acid,
a salt shaker half full of
cocaine, and a whole
galaxy of multi-colored
uppers,
downers,
screamers,
laughers…a quart of
tequila, a quart of rum,
a case of beer, a pint of
raw
ether, and 2 dozen
amyls,”
no doubt sending the
both of them reeling 
into a frenzy that was
sufficiently documented
in his most famous book.

but it must have been during 
his time spent trying to 
uncover the “reasons” for
hemingway’s suicide, that he
himself started to think 
about his own mortality, as 
well as the extent to which he
would continue to write, 
before illness or writer’s
block (amidst anything else
that springs suddenly upon 
us) would inevitably destroy
his ability to express himself.

it wasn’t long before all this
actually happened, and at 
age 67, hunter stating in 
what his family regards as his
suicide note---aptly entitled
“football season is over,”
he stated that he had lived 17
years too long---at age 50
he had become boring & old.

unlike hemingway, who had
been locked away getting 
electroconvulsive therapy
before being let out into the world
deteriorated & destroyed two days
before he put his favorite 
shotgun’s barrel in his mouth---
hunter had thought long and 
hard about his decision 
beforehand.
he was on the phone with his
then-wife, anita, when he
ended it.  

here was a man who lived by
his own rules & no one 
else’s---whose energy so
explosive & interesting,
could only have lasted as
long as it had & not a moment
longer.

in being ahead of the curve,
& in being full awareness of
the utter shortness of being
(“being” defined as those 
years that the individual in
question understands to be
valuable to them), he blew
out his own flame.

whoosh.

Copyright © Andrew Delapruch | Year Posted 2011

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