DISCOVERED IN THE 40TH ANNIVERSARY OF EASYRIDERS MAGAZINE, ORIGINALLY FROM AN ISSUE PUBLISHED IN 1973–This poem was written my Renegade, when he was just an angry kid in his 20s on the staff with Bandit.
A BROTHER LOST
A Brother is lost
His soul no more to his body bound
Death was the cost
His head laid to the ground
His family, his bike
They were one in the same
He rode through each night
His scooter wasn’t to blame
The waning sound of a bike
No longer with its wheels to the ground
Like breath gasping for life
But none to be found
His bike may have been green
The bleak color we dread
But purple, red or tangerine
A Brother’s still dead
A Seventy-Four alongside the road
A tight companion, not a whore
She was his transportation mode
Though not anymore
Though the bike won’t lack attention
With the green coat concealed
The rider won’t be mentioned
When the new scooter’s revealed
Though a Brother lie dead on the highway
No one will assist
A Brother who made his own way
His people don’t know he exists
The State is his mortuary
No ceremonies held
His name on the obituary?
No one cares that he fell
The county donates the coffin
The Man the pallbearer
No hearts are softened
No weeping mourners for our Brother
His grave site is distant
The home turf won’t be dug
He’ll travel one more expanse
Across the border he’ll be lugged
And there he’ll lie
No stone shows his name
Alone he did die
No one came to claim
Only Death holds feelings
For a Brother laid to rest
Death’s tears a-streaming
For a man only he did bless
Death known as evil
Against God people spout
But where were the people
And God’s warning shouts?
Death held back waiting
He new nothing could be done
But Death wasn’t laughing
When he saw the darkness come
The small animal crosses the lonely highway
The gruesome event has passed
Covered with armor in such a way
That he is sure to last
But what is life
In an encompassing cage
To ignore the strife
And a society’s rage
But to stand amidst the elements
Explore each day aware
Traveling swiftly over the pavement
And know the whistling air
The Brother seeks not a cage of ignorance
Nor a naive cover
He reaches out for experience
And fights for his lover
Oh brother I do mourn you
And so does Death in the dark
Along with the chosen few
Who will not leave their scooters parked
We’re brothers all of us
Who fly with the night
Our scooters are part of us
We ride without fright
But inside we pause
In mournful bemuse
To say a farewell clause
For the Brother we lose
For the life we live
We can share with no others
Live only to give
And share with our brothers.
–Renegade
