Winter wind makes it's way down this Virginia mountainside
creating the hum of bending trees
dogs bark at moving deer
light slowly leaves
as it nears closing time at this country store
wood burning stoves are stoked
and the small mountain town of Pine Grove
settles in for a cold night

One last visitor arrives
his quiet stride moves with the wind
I'm greeted with that childish grin
that never leaves the Birdman
he is James Dean cool
John Wayne tough
and Jimmy Stewart kind
his visits are like a good bottle of wine
always ending too soon

He winks and says; 'Goodnight brother'
then walks into the darkness
the Birdman left us this night
riding the wind to the kingdom he knew awaited him

plastic money
plastic rice
plastic taste
plastic smile
all fake!

cares and snares are all the same
and many thought it was a game
too late they found it was for good
and their lazy thought was their food

sometimes
i think i'm flying
and i ponder as i hover
over thought light as a feather
and ethereal as a mad man's dream
sometimes
i think i'm dying
because i think i'm alive
and without substance or essence
i float about free and frivolous
and make-believe that my preoccupations matter
sometimes
i think that if i cry a river like one in fever
i might find i have exorcised all the sorrow in me
and that a new regime of easy laughter comes in
sometimes ...
just sometimes

wearing his thick jacket and weary gumboots
                 the heat notwithstanding
the man is forever abroad on his strange mission
    his hat is the contraption that covers it all
as he feigns distraction and people call him mad
to live a life that has no surprises, only a pattern
how can they possibly know what he's brewing
or what he intends one blessed day to be stewing
in the big *** of dreams that he tends each day
those who want to know must,like him, be mad
only then will they see what really is in the sea
and how atlantis was a figment of souls hungry
for those unusual things from off the beaten path