Levi Asher


The First Trip to Raton Canyon

He arrives at night and has a hard time finding the cabin. His mood isn't right, and the isolation and darkness immediately begin to scare him. Instead of filling him with peaceful happiness, the wild nature around gives him bad vibes. During the next few days he tries bravely to find Buddha in the sound of the crashing ocean and in the leaves of the dark trees, but the feeling isn't right. He makes a wan attempt at capturing the 'voice' of the Pacific Ocean on paper (this becomes the poem 'Sea,' included at the end of the volume) but he finally hears the ocean saying "GO TO YOUR DESIRE DON'T HANG AROUND HERE." In the Buddhist the religion the single most important instruction is to break free of the prison of desire, and so this statement, to a Buddhist like Kerouac, is quite a perilous one. Nevertheless Dulouz goes to his desire; he rushes back to San Francisco to drink himself into oblivion.

Back in San Francisco