I knew a name that blew
Wind so cruel it knew
An answer every night
Sleepless I lay out of sight
Enchanters sang
Each silhouette climbed
So dust stung my eyes
Glistening not a surprise
Drifting words
A lone wolf and my song
And I, dusty evermore.
My notes have all gone to yellow
Ageless they ring mellow
A bangle precedes each thy name
Faint hope but nothing remains
A fool’s enchanted again
And the walls are alive.
I awoke early with Moon Cow
To ask him if I could take his horse
I told him I was going
To go to see Amy & Frank
See how they were setting into autumn
I had hardly been able to sleep
My mind was racing and ignited
And I definitely didn’t want to
Step on any feet in my new family
How could I know?
I only had vague introduction to their culture
And could only have my own reference
With the culture I was brought up in
I wasn’t naive enough to think
I knew how to fit in just yet,
Accepted as I was.
I hoped spending the day with Amy, Frank, and Clarinet
Would answer many questions for me
Being with them filled me with so much gratitude
So much love and respect for the family unit
But this was different
Than family life of the Blackfoot
Would Willow and Lily homestead with me?
How far ahead of myself I had gotten.
They could tell I had something troubling me
Amy said: “Joe, I think the full moon is on your mind.”
I kind of looked at her surprised
Using the moonlight last night talking to Willow
I had only noticed it but not taken much account
She was entirely right
My mind was in the moon
And with the birds, and bees,
And coyotes howling in the night.
So Frank and me cut wood
And Amy made us sandwiches
And all four of us drank fresh milk
And enjoyed the early afternoon sun together
I learned that Amy was pregnant with their second
At the same time Clarinet learned
She was startled with the news
Playing as she was with a doll on the patio,
She just sat there with her big eyes
Looking at her mother
Probably as many thoughts going through her brain
As I had inside of mine.
I left with enough time
To return by daylight
Trying not to rush myself home
For I knew that I would be expected
But still so many thoughts going through my mind
Before getting home
I stopped at one of the bluffs with a view
Of the entire valley basin
And watched the sun set
With glorious reds and purples and oranges
That gave me every answer
I had ever asked before.
Can you climb into my memory,
See the ghosts that I see?
I’ve waited for a sign to be
Alone in simple harmony.
But as my days turn dark inside,
As my simple answers flirt
With necromancy,
I crave compassion, empathy,
And hope all shall carry me.
I tempted my fate,
Believing in my firm footsteps
That wiggled and diggled
And figgled and biggled.
To where was my answer,
To whom was an impulse.
To lie by my lover,
To step foot in her hearth
That lay idle; upon
Yet so astray.
For merry was my wish
To Blondy and her fish,
Merry was an inheritance
That clothed itself in
100 year old furs
And danced around with glitter
To the steady beat
Of my leather soles
As I walked on further
Towards my fate
And an undying appreciation
Of the biggleding and figgleding.
I am the rain
You are the answer
I come inside
Till you relent.
She was a woman who cared for her lovers
The same she cared for beggars and friends.
A little lone heart with a name stuffed with blues;
Hobo’s delight in a $10 Marlborough,
And my love never lasted in that smoke-house saloon.
Love in a little back door room.
My dreams and I was heartache by Tuesday.
Though I swam like a digger, I was surfaced and saved
In my own lonesome song.
She was a heart made up of elastics
And my twangy delivery
Was the Wednesday that I’d never start.
So don’t go treating your lovers
Like left over flipping page books.
It’s a forgotten stack, the dusty pile,
And we’re a never ending love song
With toes getting colder.
A common answer to sufferin we kept inflicting,
Two unspoken lovers on two lost Sundays.
Two out of tune guitars
Waiting to behold warmer mornings,
Just waiting on leftover tea.
She made me get up later
So we could talk of traveling gypsies
And listen to leftover records
We’d forgotten to play with brandy.
I collected your answers in tiny glass jars
For your leftover spells.
I wasn’t branded in passion;
Painted on that old saloon wall
With some unspoken love song
And leftover cigarettes sailing the sea
As I woke up to Wednesday
On a Tuesday afternoon.
I know that I didn’t lose my answers
When I stepped off late at night.
When I closed the door and shifted sheets.
When I spoke my prayer dance to the moon.
When I laughed heartily
Allowing my soul to saturate
Every breath you exude.
Because this is my intake
And answers don’t get lost here
Where answers don’t get forgotten.
It’s ok if you sit there
Silently waiting for an answer
I won’t say anything to break
What serenity you seem to have
For if I were to make you
A victim of my retort
I fear I would then turn you
Against your finest consort
And that, much to my disliking
Would cause me quite some trouble
Since it’s clear it’s me to blame
For this new tragedy at hand
I feel if I were to speak now
It’d be me head on a stake
So I will sit here smug like
While you quizzically
Throw me glances
And carry on habitually
Awaiting another encounter
There is no me
There is no personality
There is only little wisps of light smoke
That wander through my bones
There is no answer
There is no right
There is only footsteps pounding along ahead
That drive the future into present
There is no one
There is no indication
There is only strangling thoughts
That push away forever today
Perhaps then they would call my name
As I sat there above the clouded peaks
Awaiting the answer to the question
Begging my return
Begging the sweet angels rising up
To hold my hands in speedy descent
But like any searching soul
The answer proves within
No clouds can clutter the footpath
No unruly goat-beast can charge me
From this high scraping crag
Legs and arms holding me fast
Then Zeus, lighting bolts striking close
Leaves in his wake a sharp message
The answer cursing through my veins
No escape now from the brutal truth
No silk crested nymph to calm thy nerves
Returning to the fountain I call
There, and only there, lurches forth tremors
Sent from the deathly legions
Calling spoils to all things left touched
Rotting corpses and swarming flies
Wrenching the senses limp
Twisting and writhing: no escape
Years upon years
And only then in shame
Shall the torment stop
At once its halt
Will leave you dry
Endlessly searching like I once