You drive your big car
up to your big house.
I look through the window
after you’re inside
and see
your mink’s
been tossed
onto the chair —
damn, a mink coat?
Such an archaic tell —
don’t you
understand cruelty,
don’t you hear
the people’s disapproval,
or are you just too rich
to feel?

You and yours
are a problem to solve.
I and mine
won’t solve a thing
if we don’t choose
a little war from the tool kit.

I hate you, if possible,
even more
than I did before I spied
that coat.

I shall box you,
bury you in filth, then
bury your coat
in clean soil.

I’m going to feel alright
afterward.  A little right death
never costs that much

at first,

we’re just getting started,

and I’m sure that
unlike you,
we can stop anytime.

during a process
a mistake
a break in routine
a darkness falls again
into my life
a stone of pure gloom
I know well

as that rock strikes
it hurts to breathe
as always the air goes crisp
and sharp

I am no Stoic

if there’s something
to be learned
from the darkness
this time
I must plead
for it to be
soft learning this time
let it be
a gentle lesson
let there be
no pain
no pain
at all

As soon as I can
I’ll strike the tent,
douse the flames,
set out on the path.
With the moon’s slant light
through the trees
to walk by
and stream beds
to lead me down
from the hills,
I will not be lost
once on the way.

I will step out of the woods
to the edge of a place
I once left in rage.

What will come next?

I can’t help it —
I must find out.
When this is in me
I can’t help but move
the way moths
strike at a hot light;

this time
I may come
to the same end
as a moth,

but as I said,
it can’t be helped.

I want to go
to the top of that range
of mountains.

I want to look back
at my climb and be
satisfied, if not happy,
that I’ve gotten that far.

I want to look
along the crest
to the north and then the south,
to the mist at either extreme
where the peaks disappear
into distance.

I want to stare with longing
for a good while
at the other side
of the divide.

Above all I want the chance
to stand
upon the divide itself,

and to choose
whether to go
north, south,
back where I came from,
or into that far country
where I’ve never been.

did you fall before the strings
stopped humming?  Did you fall
to your lowdown dirty knees and
cry while you were down there?
Did you wrap your arms around it
and beg for more?

Did you call that a prayer?
Did you call it a single hymn
or a whole hymnal’s worth
of a crawl toward glory?
Did you stop to think that blues
was as much a song of Paradise
as any grand chorus?

Did you start to
imagine that heaven wasn’t on high
but rooted in the rich soil?  Did you ever
think that God is as deep
as Deep Ellum, carries us
like a freight train carries
secret travelers, can bend a note
like an ocean bends the shore,
and when the last note stops humming
you’re always going to fall on your knees,

for the blues isn’t really  a devil’s method —

if it was how could it wake up your soul
again and again
one twelve bar run at a time?