I hear the sounds of last night’s rain
Dripping off the guitar man upstairs
Like he’s drinking an unmarked bottle of wine
With candles stuffed inside
Green colored empties everywhere.
His pancake heart is shifting
As his torn-bottom baggy jeans scuff
His unease like a broken pencil
And no sharpener.
But two fifteen will buy a slow drip
In a soft-white ceramic self-logo
– Without refill – from a beanie-topped
Organic cycler that always smiles
And talks in soft tones to her cute co-worker
Humoring her choice in music.
Tag: man
Lipstick-Sad (day 1532)
Imagine the soul of a man
Walking streets past midnight –
Mini skirt and platforms
On a warm clear-skied romance.
But it’s not romance without a date;
Sidewalks scream lonesome
With a handbag and lipstick-sad
Long eyes on a Thursday.
Imagine the shoes of a stranger
Who yells inside a locked door
Made-up and scraping edges
Without a namesake callin’ them home.
Jenevive (day 1522)
Jenevive, I am your lover.
I am sod beneath your toes,
Life beneath your chest.
Jenevive, I am your lover.
As songs spill into night,
My word is you again.
Jenevive, I am your lover.
A star upon my sky;
This light shall never die.
Jenevive, I am your lover.
I am as ever a holy man
Who whispers deep into my hand.
A Proper Man’s Time (day 1381)
Darker abstracts of our life
Face open windows
When calms begun once again.
In a proper man’s time
There’s a short road to freedom,
In a proper man’s time
A line’s lost in old wisdom.
Could the full moon retreat life,
Could it catch hold of time?
When the blinds keep a blowin’.
In a proper man’s time
There’s a short road to freedom,
In a proper man’s time
A line’s lost in old wisdom.
Old dog’s been here resting
Against the old wooden door.
Got his head in the sunlight,
Open window no more.
My Land | Chapter IX (day 1176)
Rick-John told me how earlier on their journey they had lost two of the girls to a couple of cowboys promising a thousand acres and the most beautiful country a man had ever seen.
I suggested that maybe that wasn’t a loss and maybe it was a beautiful thing. He didn’t seem to understand what I was getting at. Perhaps he was getting greedy.
This reminded me of a legend I once heard of a man living in the wilderness with his daughters because he didn’t trust anyone and couldn’t handle losing a piece of his stead. I can’t imagine what it was like for his daughters as they birthed his children. I had always hoped that one of them was educated some how. Legend has it that his wife slit her own throat with his prized knife. The bastard didn’t even know she was missing until he looked for his knife.
Rick-John, of course, was as innocent as any bank-teller yet as foot loose and wagon jumping as any Iroquois I’d ever met.
I oiled my long barrel thinking about this, John-bo neighed softly in the darkness nearby.
[note: to read the full epic track my land]
Formulated Crumble (day 1149)
Biscuit bushes crash my landing
Stumbling from here to there
Upside down maps in a field of grass;
Whatever the cost.
Twin bed of memories;
I couldn’t sleep tonight.
I couldn’t crumble my formulated wealth
Into sub-sectional mastery.
But if I was a truth say’er
Gifting this shit into inexperienced hands…
If I was withered like soul-less dumplings
I’d be the better man, smoking gaily.
Lout (day 1139)
Don’t panic
We’ve got the hizy-hizzy heazy
Flushing down these knees
Lay it low
Like a mother-fucking flow
And come
With me
A while
Now the story here
Is about a lout
A grease so green
A log so dense
A steam to cream
The dogs always howl
The moon always cries
The birds and the bees
Are all lost in the trees
You see, the grease is a man
That scares all the dimes
A long overdue
21 gun salute
An ulcer in my throat
A never ending torrent
Dead grass wilting my boat
But I’m an undercover agent
A toonie-two balcony
Who takes the first initiative
To catch the best of them
So I’ve found the skeezy
With my mother-fucking prerogative
I built a nice and cozy
6 foot comforter
An uncles intelligence
And my pure brilliance
To take this fucker
This leach of an innocent
To that: a rat
To nibble on the little
Toes of
The mother-fucking rest of him
The lout, the host
Is in the grave.
My Land | Chapter III (day 1126)
I remember when the wind blew so hard one year it would blow over our tin cups that weren’t full on the old weathered kitchen table. Our house was warm when the fire was hot, and well ventilated in the summer – we can say that. It ain’t easy being a pioneer, when the land is dry and winters are cold.
The thoughts drain my efforts, drain my life. They’re happy thoughts when you remember the past, but they’re also jagged edges that twist the time away like yesterday was my mothers hand.
There should be holes in my heart with all the bullets I’ve let go. And all the tears that I’ve cried.
This life makes a man hard before he knows how to sing. Like the twisting pines around these parts that I know each by name.
And firewood.
[note: to read the full epic track my land]
Up Against the Wall (day 1093)
I’m alone here,
Not waiting for anyone.
This is the show space;
This is my call.
So when I lean up against the wall
Take a double notice man,
This isn’t curtain call
This is a casual evening stroll…
Saddled and suited
Eyein up the ninety suitors,
Oh everybody comes a calling
When I’m up against the wall.
Those Words (day 1062)
Don’t say those words.
Don’t whisper into the madness.
Don’t hold my hand when wind blows so strong.
For I am only a man,
A lonely man
Stepping lightly through long blades of grass
Soaked with morning dew.
Hanging on.
Lifting my love
That sits balanced on a finely pressed
Single sheet
Of stationary,
Manufactured with my namesake in mind
And imprinted with layered words
Of forgotten notes
Passed along in a time when I knew
Those words were necessary.