Start with a television
turned on to the left
with no one watching.

Add to it one Telecaster,
tuned mostly up and untouched,
on a stand to the right.

In between, place a man
whose friends stay away
for fear of catching

his illness, his strokes,
his mental anguish — what
have you?

What have you, indeed?
The bare bones of a problem
simply defined: simply put,

keep a short leash on memory.
Long time past is not worth visiting;
close your eyes against it.

Keep to a short time before nightfall instead,
keep no time to think of a different answer.
Keep the rest of time in the world

to pick the guitar up, tune it up,
stumble through playing a wee bit.
Nothing else will do.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

Julie, or Kate. Maybe
Joan — I can’t remember
the name of the singer
on the radio right now.

Once I could. I had a memory
close to God’s, if I can
speak of that — I promise you,
I whisper it in my head

so God won’t hear me if
in fact God is listening, which
I sincerely doubt based on
God’s inattention to various

disasters here in the moment:
marchers in our streets
confronted by sneering cretins;
the climate slowly bubbling;

inequality and poverty
endemic — who am I kidding?
God isn’t made for that. God
eats our offerings and

burps them up without a care
for the world. Julie
or Kate or even Joan don’t
matter to him, or to me.

What matters to me now
is the simple fact of living —
hanging on to moments
of peace, holding on to grace.

I listen to the radio hoping
for one moment where
it does not matter one bit
who I hear or if I can choose

one singer or another
to pin the voice on. Julie
or Kate or Joan can go forth
singing forever and a day

will come for them as it comes
for me and no one will care
amid the tumult of war
and famine, in the middle

of peace and freedom
and lack of want. No one
will care for more than
their own voice and the hope

that it will be heard.
As for me and God,
we will have their backs.
We will have them at heart

as we listen to them
and if God forgets,
I will not until I go.
Julie, Kate, Joan — I swear

I remain with you,
you have me, you have got me,
I’m your man, your biggest fan,
I will stay true, even when

you stop singing.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

On the radio
intertwined guitars
go weaving; me,
half-asleep,
thinking of how I
could play this.

Deciding I can’t
and, swallowing
my overanxious pride,
tumble into becoming
fully unconscious
until morning.

I’m not much better
when I get up; stagger out
and put the radio on.
Sit down, drink coffee;
pretty much my whole morning
till I get up and try
to play — after I write,
of course. Always
after I write. Trying to recall
what had come last night
and failing…again.

Deciding I can’t, yet
again. I will try
at some point but again,
yet again,
not today.

Writing is
all I have left. It’s not
wonderful, barely
worth noticing; still,
I write and I write.

Deciding I’m
not worthy to hold a pen.
I toss it down.
Not worthy, so I will seize
my guitar; not worthy
of that either; I set it
back on its rack and then
I sit and sit some more

as the earth moves with me,
moves under me; as the sky
moves above me, with me;
as I move with them, through them
with a guitar unplayed, a pen
unused on the scarred table;
each of us unused
as we will be for the rest
of our days.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`
onward,
T

Lonesome harmonica
sits noiselessly on my desk.

Lonely guitar unplucked
next to it on a mute stand,

rubber bands knotted together
to keep it upright and silent in place

as I am silent for once
thinking of unborn children.

This entire house will remain silent
until I do something to relieve it.

I feel like
I ought to do something

but can’t think of a thing to do
that doesn’t involve

music and kids’ laughter. Their innocence,
so I’m told, will shine through;

well, I wasn’t that innocent, ever.
My ghost children will never be either —

no one is, I think. I sit here guilty as hell
of something,

with silent musical instruments
muted up,

waiting to be played;
they will wait a long time.

A child’s laughter will forever
be missing. Harp and guitar

will forever do nothing without
me to fill this void.

As for me, sitting here in the quiet,
I’m missing too.

No one’s looking for me.
No one is listening.

Any stories I could tell
have already been aired,

any songs I could play
don’t make a sound worth hearing,

and any rate kids would not understand
a single word of each.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

It is wee bit before sunrise;
song comes forth sounding
like Everly Brothers; song
of wistful heart; cliche song
ending, switching to jaunty
ragtime beat; Doc Watson,
blind voice, song as joyful
as icon in Russian church —
no joy superficially but behind
screen of sadness — song ending;
DJ speaking of 1964, switching
over to modern noise,
bluegrass fused to rock drums; then
recording of station ID
so it will be known by few listening
at this hour, those who likely know
anyway; this ends, turns over to
someone called Nathaniel Rateliff;
music never ending at sunrise,
continuing a long night
without sleep;

listen, pal:

this boy is tired,
borderline remorseful over
being awake or at least conscious
for this concert;
eclectic, illusory
gladness over
white noise of dread;

this is sameness, penance
for rising with sunlight’s arrival,
doctor’s appointment coming;
music secondary to wondering
what happens next.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

A Telecaster on the stand
next to me:
two single-coil
pickups, one three –
way switch, a volume
and a tone knob:
that’s it. A slab
of wood mass-configured
to amplify sound
and make sonic magic

and I can’t think
of anything
to do with it.

Saturday morning: old songs
on the radio — Beatles,
to be specific. The DJ
plays a rare German pressing
of “Magical Mystery Tour.”

Strangely don’t feel
the pumping urgency
to seize the guitar and struggle
on, and on, until
I tire of the work involved
and put it back —

instead,
I sit. As if
the black and white
of the Telecaster
itself makes the fatigue.
As if I don’t dare
pick it up and try.

This house is so
quiet except for
the Beatles and my heart
so loud I can barely hear
anything else,

anything worthy
of repeating,
anything worthy
of writing down.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`
T

With you there
at the piano making
music. Your pudgy
fingers somehow

impossibly stretching
to reach the chords,
the sure way you find
the correct keys.

I sit there
between jubilation and despair
inside — a brief pilgrimage
from one mode to the other;

a move from great joy
to an envy almost as great,
my senses slipping and bleeding
between the two.

Meanwhile you continue
to play. You seem oblivious
to my swinging to your music,
a beat behind the tones,

looking like a failure to
the outside but knowing
I am in there, right there
with the swing.

I continue to hear it
I find the beat for a few seconds,
no more — and as I connect
and make right with it

you do not see but continue
to play. We are in sync
for a few seconds and God
feels it and touches me at least,

if not you, though your playing
seems to agree and for that moment
when we are in sync,
it feels like the world stops turning.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
T

I wake up. Gentle guitar, sweet voices of three women
in harmony…what is the point of listening
to this on this morning when my own voice
is raspy and leather-skinned, when
my own thought is so roughened by the night
that I am scared to sing of anything, even
my own shadow? Do I try to fall into
them, do I let my life rise into theirs?

I wake up. It is a long weekend
for some, an average weekend for me.
For some, it’s not a weekend at all —
they work through the three-day stretch
and it’s barely a change.
They long to sleep.

I wake up with them, thinking about going back
to sleep: how peaceful
the long sleep of death might be, if anyone
had come back to tell of it; the tales we tell
mean nothing except falsehoods, maybe,
of heaven, of hell.

Or maybe — there is nothing?
Who knows,
and who tells the truth
about knowing?

I wake up, finally, and decide to stay awake
at least long enough to find out, finally.
No one will come around, anyway; even if
I come to and sit up someone will deny it.

So I stay awake long enough to set it down
on paper; a lie or the truth — it doesn’t matter.
The roses will still burn, the tinder will still
not ignite. I’ll sigh the last sigh.

I will go into the mystery;
sweet song and gentle voices
behind me, my agitation will be
finally, at last, gone.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

I turn off the radio
as soon as Ella finishes
her final verse —

scatting fluidly like I wish I could,
like I wish I had at some point
in my life —

but apparently
that’s gone now
All I can do

is sit back with it
filling the room
on an unseasonable day

in Spring
and love the warmth
of the day and the swing

of the song and regret
nothing that brought me here
and accept what will take me

away
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

onward,
T

Singing for the country,
the world; a song of
terrific promises unfilled,
song of parts unified wrongly,
song of tatters stitched crazy
but holding tight;

I am girded
with a black snake leather belt
and a floppy faded black hat; no one
trusts me if they can even see me
standing on the corner singing
so loudly.

Damaged as I am,
it’s easier to stand apart from the
song, the singing even,
let the crowd walk by
not hearing; the outlandish clothes
notwithstanding I am invisible
to the crowds surging silently
forward, backward, every way
available.

I don’t care if they see me, if they listen,
if they even hear. Singing for
the whole country, the whole world;
who gives a damn if I am heard
or not?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

Radio: a guitar, words,
talk, play. The coffee
is rich and
I’m in crappy morning clothes;
I am listening to the radio.
I’m tired already and no one
gives a damn but me.

Suppose I die this morning,
this week. The sun’s
not up yet; could be today,
could be tomorrow or one day
after. I vote for a day yet to come
with some excellent guitar playing
and words, better than these,
maybe better coffee if it is possible.
I am damn sick of my life,
everyone is sick of my life.

Still, I am going to live at least
until the song changes
and I shake this off. Somewhere
it is sunrise over the earth
and I would like another cup
of coffee and maybe pick up
my own guitar and stretch my fingers
to its strings and see what comes.
I will not die sick of this life;
no one gets to be sick of it except me
and I want to leave them murmuring
about what song I was playing
when I gave up and went into the sunlight.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T

The bands I used to love
don’t love me anymore —
what am I saying, they don’t
even know me, they might miss me
one day or else they won’t;
they might tune a guitar my way
or sing a note my way but it will
not be the same.

The bands I used to love
grow static to go with the radio
and moss up. The members
grow moss and static up
with marriage or real jobs and they abandon
the music like the texture of the rock
it’s built upon.

The people I once loved to see
play their music don’t care
as I’m gone, as gone as last night’s
gig fee to beer and weed and perhaps
to food — or the odd pedal
for the odd guitar more likely;
they don’t care —
and they shouldn’t.

Their music remains behind
in spite of them. Half the music
is left in my head to fester
or to be preserved more or less
until it decays and changes to my own.
The other half gets lost in the shuffle
until I don’t recognize it except to say
I think I heard it,
once.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
onward,
T