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The Colors of Travis McGee |
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Poetry inspired by the titles of the Travis McGee series by
John D. MacDonald ( 1916 - 1986) |
| John D. Macdonald's McGee was quite a character, his houseboat won in a pokergame, The Busted Flush, and his Rolls Royce Pickup, he called Miss Agnes were a part of my teens. These 21 novels spaning the years of 1964 through 1984 were a thinking man's hero of his day, filled with social commentary and reflection on the modern changes in our culture. They showed me intelligence, wit, and social perspective in a popular fiction character for the first time. McGee was not the gumshoe probing detective of Ross McDonald , the hard boiled dick of Mickey Spillane, or even the roughshod white crewcut rogue of Richard Prather's Shell Scott. McGee was a flawed man of instinct, gut wisdom, and mostly moral character whose anchor in life was to right and aggregious wrong, save the girl, of course, and live a comfortable life with his conscience (an ongoing challenge from book to book). Something difficult for all of us I think. He was someone I admired in principle though someone I did not aspire to emulate.
The Colors of Travis McGee is not really inspired by MacDonald, McGee, or any of these great yarns, but is a skewed tribute via the inspiration that the titles gave me as a poet. Call it an interpretive work in progress. You'll notice it is not finished. I have a few to do yet it seems. Like Stephen King's Dark Tower Series or maybe even Bond which is ironically offering it's 23rd installment in 2009, The Colors series for me is an ever evolving process of discovery and expression. Maybe when I finish them all, I'll start on a few colors of my own. |
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 Actual Rolls Royce Pickup |
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 Young MacDonald |
 MacDonald nearer to the end of his Career - @63 |
 A Conception of Miss Agnes |