This Book is dedicated. This Book is dedicated to Beautiful People All People Are Beautiful But esp. dedicated to Maureen Owen who made this gran voyage possible at THE ST. MARKS POETRY PROJECT in New York City AND TO LITA AND MORTON HORNICK, My publishers (Kulchur Publishing Foundation) AND TO A LONG OVERDUE and glorious meeting with my dear friend TED JOANS and TIMOTHY BAUM! When the Battle of Midway was being fought I was 2 yrs old. I was frightened of all the noise and smoke and rat tat tat (rat tat rat). It has, I guess, not quit wholly left me. It traveled with me across the farm pastures on train-tracks through Iowa. Nor for that matter, has the horrendous sight of the burning wheat fields of the Ukraine, during the summer of 1941, left me; testament like a burning bush;.. I felt the uneasiness along the boulevards in Paris in 1938 (a la Charles Boyer et Ingrid Bergman). 

     I have consistantly believed Kay Summersby's account of her romance. She's beautiful, good, loving, and true. Joe Ceravolo understands.

     All of these concerns and heart-photos traveled with me across the country. Seven Cities of Homer Seven Cities of Cibola. Dear Deer Dancer of the Yaqui Easter! With all the new movements of Liberation in the world. Fleeting steps in the lobby of the Beverly Hills Hotel with Lita, where I met Debbie only for a moment. MAUREEN, votre sourir. Tendre Comme Le Souvenir. (The inspiration for this memoire AMTRAK TREK was Maureen Owen's.) And my letters to my daughters Tatyana and Janina en route. And the Agapanthus being held so religiously by that woman on the Zephyr who boarded at Menlo Park. Dreams of that Agapanthus that travelled with her! And esp. let me cite Ms. Evelyn Ganns whom I encountered by "objective-hazard" in the dining car of the Zephyr, who recounted to me the untold story of the Chicago Ggroup of Black Literati of the Thirties, who met at 51st and So. Park, which included herself, Dr. St.Claire Drake, Ms. Gwendolyn Brookes-