The fire is crackling,
Head slightly spinning,
The world is quiet as I write,
Zevon keeps me company tonight,
Thinking thoughts of you.

It's hard to believe you've been gone for three months already,
Three months since your sister broke the news.

Perhaps I held off writing this,
Thinking that not doing so kept some part of you alive,
That my simple denials were all it took to keep you with us.

Perhaps it was after that the anger,
Rage at what you'd done,
Bitter at the precieved betrayal,
That if anyone were to kick off this mortal coil first it was gonna be me.

Maybe it was that I was holding out hope that if I didn't write this you would just appear one day, and as long as I didn't you would say.

It might have been I was just too tired.

I remember when we first met,
I thought you as nobody more than some silly kid from Staten Island,
With dreams and delusions bigger than your stomach,
But you won me over with corny jokes and high spirits,
Whether it be because of the ****** weather,
Or when my Grandmother died.

The tears come now,
On this chilly March morn,
As I think back, to 3 months ago.

I hadn't seen your family in years,
The ones who considered me like a second son and brother,
Fearing they would hate me,
For what I wasn't quite sure,
That I hadn't done more,
That we hadn't spoke to one another in so long?
I certainly hated myself,
Driving through those Pennsylvania Wilds.

I remember the last time we spoke,
Relaxing in your familial home,
You embraced me and told me to be careful,
Telling me you loved me in your own words,
And I told you in my own words too.
God I ******* miss you.

Zevon plays on,
The tears come faster still,
The screen is blurry as I type,
Warren's words echo what I imagine yours would be.

You were a poet,
A warrior,
A brother,
My friend.

Confidant,
Motivator,
Philosopher,
My friend.

When we took you to the cemetery,
I was right there at your side,
Carrying you to where you would forever rest,
Before they sealed you in I snuck my pin into your hands,
I was afraid you'd forget me.

I was the first to leave the building,
So I could sneak around a corner and shatter.
The brave face I held for your family impossible to maintain,
I suspect your family knew,
But it was the way I was raised.

After I left for home,
About halfway I broke down again,
This time on a cliffside vista,
The landscape mostly obscured by the driving snowstorm and evening gloom.

The rest of the way I played your favorite tunes, and sang along as badly as you use to.

I miss you Mike,
And I know I will never completely understand,
But you will always be with me,
Upon my arm and in my heart,
Watching my back through all my stupid ideas.

Warren's song has ended,
The fire died down to glowing embers,
Tears dried and eyes aching,
Tiredness dragging at my bones.

But I'll heed his words, Mike,
I'll keep you in my heart for a while,
Alongside all the others.

After all,
He never said how short "a while" had to be

Walls closing in, hard to breath,
Staccato rhythmic my chest.
Looking back over every word,
How did I **** up,
Had to,
How could I not,
Dark,
Dismal,
Sinister whispers.

Been a while since I felt this sensation,
Like an unwelcome person back into my life,
****** up,
Had to,
Rata-tat-tat goes the heart.

Forgive me for my **** up,
Twas not my intent,
Words slipping out without realizing,
Hours later,
Analyzing,
Reanalyzing,
Overanalyzing?
No, wouldn't feel this way otherwise.

Apologies not enough,
What if this is the straw that breaks the back,
What if this is the point where it all falls apart?

My fault,
Of course my fault,
How can it not be my fault.
Rata-tat-tat goes the heart in the chest.

Pressure release valve needed,
None to be found,
Reach for my laptop and pound on the keys,
Will words be enough?
Will the prose suffice?
Am I bound for a torturous night of no sleep?

But I deserve it,
How can I not,
Good ol' Rob ******* up yet again,
Can't do anything right,
Could never do anything right,
Deserves all that he gets.

Vision narrowed,
Tunnel of black,
Pinpricks of light that are all that can be seen.
Turning burning eyes into watery blurs,
Rata-tat-tat goes the engine as it screams.

Yellow lines blurring past
in rapid succession like a stream of tracers
wind tearing at hair and shaded eyes
a radiant warmth from the sun huggin' the back of the neck and shoulders
racing to catch up to this wanderer's position
cursing at this lowly traveler for getting the drop on it


You know... if you spoke "sun", I guess.
(Look I know the metaphor kind of got away from me on that one, my bad.)


Regardless, where were we?
(Lines....wind.... sun metaphor.... here we are)
This lone wanderer from the ancient east
where man and land alike were choked with smoke and rusted through
(Yeah, people love that shift from normal to proto-fantastical, hero's journey and all that jazz...)
Seeking outstanding territories
untouched, ******, and new
...
...

(Does proto-fantastical even sound right? I guess that works in the sense that it alludes to some kind of ancient civilization of peoples, taking place in some fantasy realm. That reminds me, I need to check that idea I jotted down when I was at the market so I wouldn't lose the idea if I forgot it. Which I did, so hooray for good habits! ........ Why are they staring at me? OH ****!)

Sorry about that!
Totally my bad, continuing on...

(Where the hell was I?)
...
And the Wanderer enjoyed these lands? The end!

(NAILED IT!!!)

......
......

(Why are they looking at me like that?)

Rapid striking of Copper and Nickel,
Tantalizing both the ear and the heart,
What is it that this hypnotic tune,
That has both the momentum of a freight train and a falling feather,
is trying to tell us?

Realization drops like an anvil upon the egg of a quail

This siren song is calling westward,
O' Hark!
Offering both salvation and  damnation,
The Spirit of the West Herself calls,
Rattling one's teeth with her percussive thunder,
Blinding with the flashes of her lightning,
Strobe-like in both aspects,
Prostrate thyself,
For with every booming step she draws closer,
and the music grows louder.

Is that her steps now?
Or the thundering of your heart in your chest?

She whispers upon the howling winds,
Promising nothing that is in your control to change,
Only that her domain is a hard and still wild place.

It is everything you feel the desire in this moment,
An escape from this quicksand you have found yourself in,
Toward the unknown yet the sought after.

What shall happen next,
That is the chapter that we'd have to write,
For good or ill,
A sign or an omen.

Drive Forward!
With a thundering of your own,
With the ground shaking momentum of a thousand charging horses, I say!
Drive forward with a fury of your own making,
Let your purpose be just and true!

DRIVE!!!

...

And like she was never there,
The Spirit of the West disappears,
Her spectral like visage disappearing into the wall,
The vision broken,
Leaving you once again in the quiet and dimly lit room.

Leon Russell is tickling the ivories tonight,
Playing in his liquid and impossibly smooth way,
As I pull another Lucky Strike from a half empty pack,
As I contemplate the feeling in my gut.

As if an invisible hand is tugging at my stomach,
Gentle but firm,
As I contemplate the words you just sent me,
Sending me into a spiral with effortless ease.

Making me pour over every punctuation mark like it might be the Rosetta Stone that'll decipher the text you dropped into my lap before you headed to bed.

Leon croons and I ponder,
Tap tapping ash into a growing pile upon the ashtray,
How could such a slip of a woman make me so nervous I wonder,
Like I'm rock climbing without a belay.

Keeping me on my heels,
Giving me whiplash in the worst kinda way,
Loving the way it feels,
But hating how the matter won't just stop bothing me and leave me to lay.

As Leon wraps up and exit the stage,
Good ol' Taylor saunders up and after taking a seat at the stool,
And begins to expertly play.

Realization I think begins to dawn,
And frankly scares me shitless,
To find that the text is actually a wonderful and terrifying grenade in disguise.

As I sit here in a late night stupor,
Throat burning from cigarette smoke and hot ash,
I bear witness as Shaw cries out to DeYoung,
Trying so hard to give him a lift and a light,
To shore up the talented man's morale and instill a will to fight.

As he starts in on this,
I take a sip of coffee,
Burning lips and tongue upon the bitter brew,
With a muttered curse and a wince,
Eyes begin to relax just a bit,
As accolades are rained upon DeYoung.

But like that first distant rumble of faraway thunder,
That is the harpinger of a massive storm to come,
Tones beginning to change,
As if the more he speaks the more his patience wears until-

SNAP!

- an accusation is thrown out like a slap to the face,
That there's more that he can do,
If only he stopped getting in his own way.

Tap-tap upon the ashtray as ash falls into a heap of itself,
Lids growong heavier still,
The song like an anthem of conciousness,
And knowing that it would soon run out of steam.

Sweet sleep avoided,
Each nights dreams becoming vivid to a disturbing degree,
Like some kinda ****** up inversion as to how I want it to be,
Like how it use to be,
Before the hooks of this monotony sunk so deep as to embed into the bone.

The mountain seems so high as it towers overhead,
And makes me want to knock the **** out of me from so many months ago,
But erecting myself straight as tighten once again,
Clear and sharp once more.