I wrote you a folk song, sister.
Think I’ll call it “Caroline,”
after your mama’s mama
and the way she’d
slow smoke a brisket
for fifteen hours,
slapping away at the jaw harp
and kicking chickens.
Man, she had heart.

Nate and I still swing down by Early’s mill
on these summer days away from work,
and hack our way through the rushes
with that Congolese machete
Daddy gave me for my tenth birthday
(the fringes remain intact).
Nate ran into trouble,
and is back in town
for a while.

I’d say it’s about time
we rosin up the horsehair
and saw away at some old gospel staples,
the same way we did
at the fiddle contests
two lifetimes ago,
when the mountain tunes lingered
in the morning mist
far beyond breakfast.

Back when the AT through hikers
crashed at our place and brought stories of the Great Trail.

Back when my daddy wore bellbottomed jeans
and could scale a rock like some sort of deity.

Back when Nate smashed Grammie’s mason jar
of flour all over the road
and got a good whoopin’.

Back when we’d dam up the creek
and dream up images for the trees.

Back when your mama’s mama
prayed to Jesus on our behalf,
and the stars still came out most nights.
Her redwood rosary still dangles
on the mirror by my Hank Williams shrine.

Yes, I wrote you a tune from the heart, sister,
where the memory wells
flow with water from a living rock.

I hope you like it.

On a rainy Friday
My students are more pensive than usual,
Pushing their pens
Like little philosophers.

They are wiser than their teacher,
And older souls than the ghosts that float
Up and down these ancient corridors
When all the lights go black.

Children see colors in puddles
That we too could see
When we were nine.

When April falls
And the rains roll in
We haunt our old haunts
And taunt our old taunts
With curly fries and Coke

The booths still boast our hopes and heartbreaks
In pocket knife etchings and cigarette scars
From an era since surrendered to
The rocking of the river
And the imagery of time

Somewhere along the line
We abandoned those shrines
For new ones built out of sticks and sand
But those towers could only stand
As long as the wind would allow

So here we are again
The old motley crew
What’s left of us
Doin’ just like we did
Not so many years ago

Backseat Sheetzburgerz
Care not for all theze
Rave tunez blaring out of the front side stereo

What burgerz understand, and can count on, iz Zeppelin
Perfect for air guitar
At this time of night on this stretch of asphalt

All the defunct amusement parks have infrared cameraz
Well, shoot
What iz there left to do now but roam

Up and down roadz with namez
Like Spooky Nook and Crooked Crook
Until the sun darez to invade our rubber wheel realm once again

The front side disco spinnerz
Would like to go home
But the back seat burger boyz are ready to roll on

Into some sort of surreal horizon
With a cotton candy ending
And haunted housez to greet us for breakfast

Autumn falls
In sheets of creek breeze
Creeping down into town
From the valleys of the north.

We sit on Pappy’s porch rocker
And rock the night away
To the slapping of the bass fiddle
And the six string’s lullaby.

Days go by.
Years, even,
Though time is frozen still.

We walk the same hills we walked
When our days were young
And there was magic in the dusk.
But the magic is still there.
Still here.
Resting in the shadows of the mighty oak.
Crawling down the old main drag at midnight.

Autumn falls on strong yet delicate wings.
We rise, we fall.
We live.

You shot my horse at Waterloo
And ditched me in the streets
Left to drag my bleeding heart
Down to the corner Sheetz

The pay phone took my quarter
And the Fryz girl took my pulse
But in the end you need a friend
Who understands your loss

The sky was extra black that night
And the moon a cup of cream
My sweat met with the grassy dew
And brewed a brand new dream

Of kinder girls in Bennington
Or out in Battle Creek
I’ll leave behind this trail of tears
A new campaign to seek

A Saturday, slow and sleepy
Unfolds like old attic linens
And drifts along
Like pipe smoke through the reeds

On a Saturday, bleak and weary
We just can’t get our act together
With hollow talk of book nooks
High seas back road voyages
And pints of Casey’s best bitter

On a Saturday, slow and sleepy
Taking action is hard to do
So slip into a daydream
And meet me out on the fringes
Where the sun and the moon fade from sight
And time is no longer real