Song Of Cecilia -- the rock-novel begins

All original songs, writing, and performances

BY ANGELO M. BRUSCAS III
Copyright 2009, Real News Network and AMBIII Publishing

Original artwork by Michael McDowell, Hanford Calif.
and Suzy Stewart of Seattle

SONG OF CECILIA
I called into the wind, the name of Cecilia.
I called into the wind and blew her a kiss.
I dream at night I've been touched by Cecilia,
I dream at night no matter how I resist
I slept in her bed, right next to Cecilia,
I slept in the bed and tasted her heart.
I cry at night for the tears of Cecilia,
I run all day to make a new start.
Songs of the angels, spirit of a virgin dove,
I breathe her name to sing her praises
I follow . . . every trace of her wandering love.

I search the world for words of Cecilia,
I search the world for flowers for her soul.
I plant all day, seeds for Cecilia,
I pray all night and as dawn unfolds.
I shout to God, the name Cecilia,
I write her words to sing to the stars.
I live and breathe for a word from Cecilia,
I live again to make a new start.
Face of an angel, skin of a virgin dove,
I write her name and sing her praises
I trace. . . every step of her fleeting love.

I came inside the gates with Cecilia,
I came inside and came back for more.
I came inside the walls of Cecilia,
I came inside and slept on her floor
I came inside the home of Cecilia.
I came inside and now wait at her door.
Soul of the angels, wings of a virgin dove,
I call her name and shout her praises
I trace. . . every step of her exquisite love.

I write every day in the name of Cecilia,
I write every day to speak to her mind.
I look everywhere for signs of Cecilia,
I look everywhere, what she allows me to find.
I work so hard for glances from Cecilia
I work at night and into the sun.
I wander the earth in search of Cecilia,
I wander the earth in search of her love.
I believe in God because of Cecilia,
I believe in hope and in the nights I dream
I believe in love with thoughts of Cecilia
I find joy in all her songs that I sing.
I find faith in visions of Cecilia
I believe I shall never know such love again.

Song of Cecilia is a literary journey of love and a lyrical
joyride into the triumphs and depths of marriage and
divorce through these ever-shifting sands of economic,
moral and social turmoil – a novel about the mythic and
mystical music two lovers create when they begin to believe
and then shatter the myths they adopt for their lives.

The contemporary mystery-romance storyline of 112,000
words unwinds as a modern twist on “The Divine Comedy”
with obvious similarities to “The Great Gatsby” -- told
through the eyes of a writer in the maze of a major life
transformation; the spiraling economy has put an end to his
newspaper, sparking a renewed search for personal
redemption and reconnection with the lost love and the lost
music of his life. His lost love has taken on the myth of St.
Cecilia, martyred for the love of God, sacrificed for the
music of angels.

The central theme is the universality of love, the endurance
of the love of friends and family, even the love of God,
through the love of writing or rediscovering the love songs
within us all: That joyful noise of life.

The story is highlighted by the “language of love” crafted by
the central characters, Mario and Cecilia, in letters, songs,
poetry, factual experience and fictional expression,
assuming and then consuming their namesakes in the
myth of an angel and the myth of the patron saint of music..

Song of Cecilia
Chapter One

One of the things I’ve really enjoyed is the sense of so many possibilities. There are so many roles that are fun for
me to play with you. And play is fun and important. I enjoy having or creating adventures on my own and with you.
I love hiking and exploring with you. I like getting dressed up and going out with you, being sexy, sexual and
sensual for you. I like having an environment where you can be comfortable and relaxed and enjoy a nice meal. I
like it when you do the same for me. I like going with you and the kids – two, three, or the full four – and blowing
minds away. I love being alone with you and without any sense of responsibility or restriction. I loved the letters
you wrote to me, the stories of your life, the tapes you made, the songs you write. There’s been so much that’s
rich and good and wonderful. It makes me think that if we don’t have real love or the kind that lasts a lifetime, I
sure the hell am looking forward to getting there someday.

Love, Cecilia

-- Letter from Cecilia Angelique to Mario Angelo, when The Real Story of love began

“But now, as the writing on the wall accumulates, we are beginning to
awaken to the real nature of the conflict . . .the battle between judgment
and letting go, between fear and love, between our cultural conditioning
and our inner truth.”

-- Peter Russell from “Waking Up in Time”

SONG OF CECILIA: Omega Man Awakens

First came the flowers and then the songs, and then the words, words upon words upon words. It was Mario’s way. Surely,
Cecilia explained to the officer of the court as he began to read the letters, just the volume of words alone amounted to some
sort of harassment. The flowers, she admitted, were sometimes nice to receive, especially the latest bouquet, called the
“Blooming Masterpiece,” but the words and songs and endless letters had to stop. That’s why she had fled east from her
home in Seattle, to re-marry a fifth time -- now a man of the Central Washington Yakima Valley, a man like her other three
husbands before Mario Angelo -- unassuming, malleable, steadfast, stoic, unquestioning men, quiet men, gentle men who
didn‘t aspire to a literary life, men who wouldn‘t enrapture or endanger her still-fragile soul.

“Mario just never knows when to stop,” she muttered, opening up a box that was piled knee-high in letters, some dated, some
hand-written, but most typed neatly with near-perfect spelling and punctuation. Some were even written as novellas, some in
the third person, some using narrative devices, some in poetry, many in song. “Can anyone get him to stop writing to me?”

“Well does he threaten you in any way in these letters of his?” The officer looked perplexed and a bit put out of his way on
what would build to another sizzling record in Apple Valley.

“No. But that’s not the point. I don’t want to receive them. I don’t want to read them. And I want him to stop writing them.”

“What about the flowers?”

“No, I don’t want anyone to send me flowers like that, either. I can live without any more flowers out of the blue, from him or
anyone, thank you.”

It was a hot, muggy early summer day and the valley air was a cauldron of fragrant fertilizer, blowing livestock feed, dry dust,
pollen and haze. The mailman appeared at the screen door, wiped his hands on his shorts, sticky from sweating along the
morning route through the foothills of the Cascade curtain, and knocked gently with a pair of letters from his bag.

“One for Mr. McFarley, and another one of them letters from the coast to the Mrs. of the house.”

When they first appeared, she tried to refuse and return the letters altogether, sending them back to the address Mario now
had on the western-most peninsula of the state. Now, he slyly used the return address of her old house -- the home they once
shared together over 15 years of love and marriage, separation, reconciliation, and then the final divorce -- so anything she
sent back eventually returned to her in the long run. She thought the letters had run their course after she moved 200 miles
east, closer to the roots of her ancestors, finding a new man who wouldn’t write about all the things she had done wrong in
this world -- like marry Mario. Still, no matter where she ended up, sooner or later the words from the past would start piling
up again.

“See what I mean,” she said with a hint of resignation in her voice. “Here’s another one today. One after the other.”

Like many of his letters, it started with his current Free Will Astrology horoscope:

Taurus Horoscope for week of June 18, 2009

Your education is about to take a curious and interesting turn. During the coming weeks, I expect that you'll
upgrade your street smarts and explore a whole new meaning for the term "hands-on experience." You'll find out
about an area of ignorance that was so deep and dark you didn't even know about it, and you'll take aggressive
steps to get it the teaching it needs. Congratulations in advance for being brave enough to open your mind so
wide, Taurus. I'm glad you'll be hunting for a fresh set of questions.

Dear Cecilia,

My run to the beach and back today left me numb, with no real treasures to show or super-natural experiences to tell, so I
will turn back to celestial inspiration for my reason for writing today.

Seeing my horoscope, I realize that I have yet to reason with the darkest fact of all -- that it was I, not you, who broke our
marriage vows when we tried to reconcile a fatal final time. That it is me who committed adultery, on a “training camp”
football fling in Spokane no less, and then with a string of women, ending so tragically with Suzy and her insanity, while
you were undergoing cancer treatments that second time during our all-too-lengthy separation. It was me, not you, who
failed our marriage in just about every way a man can fail the love of his life during the time when you needed pure,
absolute love from me, not tainted, selfish love spread all over the Internet like I was doing in real time – time that truly
cost me all the real time I could be having with you right now. It was a time I cannot take back or change for a second, but a
time that comes back to me every single day that you are gone from my life.

I have taken great measures to change the relationships I have with women, the way I love as a man, knowing deep in my
soul that I have much to atone for in the way I live the rest of my days and nights, now fully alone and committed to only
the writing here at hand.

I remember in the early days when our beings were so sexually charged and attracted to each other that it was like making
love with the Gods, such power and grace, such climax and glory, such joy and release, wave upon luxurious wave.

One of my favorite photos of you was taken only hours before we made fabulous love on New Year’s Eve at the hotel we
stayed in on Venice Beach. It is that beautiful photo of you atop the Getty Museum, with the background of Los Angeles
stretching out to the Pacific behind you and the wind blowing through your hair. A streak of golden sunshine bathes you
from an opening in the clouds and your smile radiates the true saint of a woman that you are.

I wish upon the heavenly bodies in my well-lit sky now that we could transport our love back then and shine it forward to this
very moment in time, those emotions we shared that entire day, the exact way we felt about each other, the perfect soul
travelers, visiting your mother and Tom, prowling the floats in the Rose Parade. Heck, I even remember exactly what I had
for dinner -- the most-tender almond-crusted halibut from the Mexican restaurant near our hotel. And after we feasted, you
changed into that scarlet red nothingness and we were gone, gone, gone, gone. I barely remember watching the New Year’
s festivities from the bed as the lights went out.

I recall very little about the football game, almost nothing of the newspaper stories I wrote except that the Cougars lost
another Rose Bowl, and I could not even tell you who I interviewed after the game or what the final score was. But I can
recall every single moment that we spent together and exactly every detail of what we did, starting with the crazy time we
had finding the Torrey Pines Hilton in the fog and waking up the next morning to see what a glorious room we had; even
the used-music CDs we bought in Pacific Beach or the dinner we had with all the Seahawks sportswriters at Trader Vic’s in
La Jolla, and how I was so proud to be the only one there with his wife and the true love of his life.

I write of this today, maybe to escape the issue I first raised in this letter -- that it was my fault, not yours, that our marriage
became a living nightmare of emotion and illusion. I had the power and the strength to change the outcome, to make
more of those great Rose Bowl trip memories a reality, and I chose to squander most all of it on my own excess and
delusions.

I guess the good news is those days are in the past, which is also the bad news, too, depending upon your perspective or
mine. While it makes me happy to recall how much fun and how free we were then, how much we truly loved each other, it
makes me sad beyond belief anymore to think that I will never -- could never -- replicate such love, such wonder, such
adventure with anyone else on earth. That’s why I have chosen to write about it again, to preserve its true living beauty and
wonder, the hold fast to the love that endures – at least the lasting legacy of left you left with me.

I remember I tried to explain this to you in person one of the last times we truly talked, and your answer was: “You’re a
smart man, Mario, you’ll figure something out.”

Well, I figured it out all right, and it just continues to bring me back to my love of, and for, you, Cecilia, and all the gifts and
all the memories that you have blessed me with in this life.

So now another day without you has gone by, and I pray to God I have used it wisely and for a purpose that one day will
have a pure and clear conclusion.

Recently, I mailed you a passage torn from a book by visionary scientist Peter Russell, “Waking Up in Time -- Finding
inner peace in times of accelerating change.” The chapter concerns what is called Omega “a white hole in time,” and
Russell postulates that it might be possible to transcend space and time through something as amazing as love. Could
love be the gateway that even defies gravity?

Going back again to the opening premise of this letter, I was reading Russell to try to better understand what caused me to
lose my focus on the true and enduring, everlasting love I do have for you and will always have, more than I can even
contemplate at times, or that I have tried in vain to deny at other times in life. Russell, like Eckhart Tolle, warns that “you
have to watch out for the ego-mind and its distortions . . .”

When you begin to remove your ego and truly examine the love of your partner before you own perceptions in love:
“Suddenly, you see them in altogether different light. They seem totally changed. And yet they have done nothing; it is
only you who has changed.”

I don’t think it is possible for me to have changed my perception without changing as a person, certainly for the better and
not necessarily for myself alone. I hope the change has a healthy and happy affect on all who still love me and all who
visit and all who read me to this day. It matters not anymore. The beauty and the truth IS in the writing, the living, the
breathing, the running, the singing, and the hope is in the summer air everywhere here at the beach. This truly is my
retreat for the soul, and I would be overjoyed to share it with you someday in the spirit of the time we shared and the time
we still have before us to atone for all the love that is ours and all we left behind. I’d like to think we could gather agates
and shells and small treasures for a day or two and maybe find the soul of our true selves once again before it’s too late
and we‘re too old and set in our ways to live.

Love, Mario

PS: Sorry for the flurry of words and letters again, but I always seem to get this way coming up on what would be our
wedding anniversary. I always have this delusion that you will feel the same way about me that I feel about you, let me truly
atone for my sins, and that we will somehow join together to bring a peaceful, warm joy to each other once more. The sun
is breaking out after a day of drizzle and rain, and Father’s Day along with the Summer Solstice is right around the corner.
I miss you, miss you, miss you, Cecilia. I will simply cry like the sky if I carry on any more today.

There was little else notable about the letter, white envelope with nothing else contained inside, no photos, no hand-drawn
images, nothing blacked out and no penciled-in additions, no corrections, no apparent revisions. Just words. The officer
carefully folded the pages up and handed the letter back to Cecilia, shaking his head with a sad smile on his face:

“So you got to watch the Cougars ‘Coug it’ in their last Rose Bowl? That must have been quite an experience. Terrible game
if you ask me. But what the hay, it’s the Rose Bowl, right? I hope you at least had good seats?”

“I wasn’t there to watch the game,” Cecilia said incredulously, not at the fact that she didn‘t attend the game but at the line of
questioning.

“That was when that traitor Mike Price bailed on my Cougs and wasn‘t even there to coach when they needed him most.
Serves him right getting caught cavorting with a stripper, cheating on his wife and all. So your ex-husband was a
sportswriter? Did he know that Go-2-Guy, what‘s his name . . .”

“Moore. Jim Moore. They used to work together at the Seattle P-I. That’s where Mario and I met. But what does that have. . .”

“Yeah, that was his name. Moore, more, more, like that Billy Idol song. I saw Mr. Go-2-Guy speak before the Yakima Cougar
Club Celebrity Golf Banquet a few years back and he was just a hoot. Told this joke about a P-I sportswriter who gets
arrested using the WSU locker room to pee. As a Coug, I used to love reading that column. Whatever happened to the P-I? I
heard they went out of business or something.”

Cecilia shot him a glance that can turn most men to stone.

“Whatever happened to the complaint I was trying to file? This is just like Mario. He gets everybody sidetracked on things that
have no bearing on anything at all. It’s just the way he has of writing about everything that has to stop. If you or someone with
more power than you doesn’t do it now, he will publish it all on his God-damned Web sites like he did before and then who
knows what will happen then.”

“What will happen when?”

“Oh for Christ-sakes, mother of God. Maybe it would be just easier if I hired a God-damned hit-man to break his fingers so he
can’t write to me -- or about me -- anymore.”

“Mrs. McFarley, I have to warn you I am an officer of the court and you shouldn’t be saying such things around me, even in
jest, especially using words that some folks around these parts might consider blasphemy.”

“My name is not Mrs. McFarley, for your information, Mr. Officer of the court, it is Cecilia Angelique; and what someone might
think or do about what I say is of no concern to me and none of your God . . . blessed . . . business. Oh Christ. Obviously, it’s
of absolutely no concern to anyone but Mario what happens with these letters and words now. God has nothing to do with it.”

“I’m sorry I can’t leave you satisfied here, Ms. Angelic or Angelico or whatever. Would you like me to make copies of some
letters and place them into a file? If there is a thread or something threatening in them in the future, you let us know. Okay?”

Cecilia ushered him out into the hotter day ahead without another word, closed the door in disgust and flung the latest letter
into the fireplace. It was time to take matters into her own hands. This time, he wouldn’t have the last word alone. She still had
a say in this thing he called atonement, even if she chose never to speak another word to Mario as long as she lived.

REAL POSTSCRIPT FROM THE AUTHOR: Nick Cave has this rollicking and twisted-funny song about an author no one can
understand who keeps turning his life into fiction, in which the central chorus is: “And we call upon the author to explain.” So
let me explain what in my world of unreality and fiction (I hope you understand this is FICTION here!!!) I would love to see
happen with the central characters in this ever-evolving story: You come visit -- first to read me the riot act and stop me at the
source of my writing -- and against most logic, some might say miraculously, decide the only way to keep me from writing
about you is to move in with me. In fact, this forces me to stop writing about me and you, and gets me to start writing all the
things I never completed in the first place, like that very funny and still-timely sportswriter novel, while you get to luxuriate in all
the healthy natural pleasures and the solitude of the beach, doing whatever you want to do to fully test whether you are in the
right space and place in your life for now and into the future. You don’t need money, that we have. I can cover you on
insurance if needed. I’m still a wonderful cook and host, and I would love to have you of all people here with me to help plan
my “Travels with Charley” 50th anniversary trip -- which I would like to make if possible after Labor Day 2010, just like
Steinbeck did 50 years in the past.

Ultimately, I would love above all else in life to continue our life journey together, to have you along to catalog all our
experiences and travels and destinations just like you did on our great adventures in the past. We can go anywhere, seen
anything, learn everything there is left to life ahead and I will never write about the past again. You can chart the course,
provide the maps, even drive this time!!! And then if you are not happy, and we are not the happiest couple on earth, well you
can go back to life as you and I know it now and we bring a natural conclusion to the great love we both still share.

In true reality, I wish I could just talk to you, listen, truly listen to your voice and your wisdom. That would be enough to end the
writing, I imagine, once and for all. The offer to come and stay forever still stands forever.

Thank you for all you ever did for me. I never have been more grateful than I am now, and I mean that with total truth and
sincerity,

An Alpha dog seeking to be an Omega man,

Mario

So it seems we wax and wane on the issue of what our intimacy is. We move close and become more enmeshed
and (remember this is my perspective) there is some critical point that is breached and you drop out of sight. I see
you once a week and bits and pieces of the weekend, becoming the invisible woman. You tell me that I don’t
demand enough from you. I don’t call you enough, initiate activities, or state my needs so that you might respond
to them. You think that I don’t appreciate your need to go running, catch up with friends, or otherwise just hang
out. You have a reasonable fear and concern. Leaving your marriage might seem empty and in the end a futile act
if you’ll wind up repeating the patterns with me. I’ve tried to put it to you that I’m not opposed to your having a life
larger than our relationship. I think I really do understand even if I don’t live my life that way . . . I’d like to be more
rewarded in my activities, too. What’s more is that I’ve always lived that way and if I’m not doing it now, or haven’t
very much, is largely a combination of circumstances. You’re a much more public person than I am at this
moment. But to put it in perspective, I’ve been a visible and public person, too.

-- Cecilia in a l988 letter to Mario after he had left his first wife and first moved out on his own, later to marry Cecilia

LOST

There was a lady, laid stars at my feet.
I didn’t notice, never noticed.
Opened the skies, setting me free.
I didn’t know her, never knew her.

There was a time when I was alone.
She couldn’t see me, never saw me.
I rode the wind, where my mind would roam.
She was sunshine, blinding sunshine.

There was a vision I felt at the time.
She wouldn’t leave me, never leave me.
The earth shook below us,
the heavens aligned.
I reached to touch her, just to touch her.

Now, I wait here for you. . . . Lost without you.

Then came the daytime, lost in the haze.
I couldn’t find her, never found her.
Head in a fog, trying to find my way.
She reached to touch me, just to touch me.
There was a lady, laid stars at my feet.
There was a lady who taught me to see.
One step closer and we’ll be free.

Now I wait here for you. . . . Lost without you.

Now I wait here for you. . . . Lost without you.

Now I wait here for you. . . . Lost without you.