Walking in the light, the summer heat rising from the streets we used to beg on as familiar daze settles back over the Midwest, not to release us until the fall comes to crack our skin open and let the dreams we talked about escape and drift into grey skies, the old neighborhood bleeds but none of us feel it anymore since we took new addresses, but the beggars still speak about Vietnam and it is hard to ignore the falling of shells in their voices, the echo of protests that even now make the peace seem uneasy, I am uneasy and I think we must have seen better days but maybe I was too strung out to notice before, I do not know whether I should envy myself now or then, but baby whispers in harmony to the rustle of lazy breezes, tells me to come home, and I perform another disappearing act, the act of turning  my back, the act of tearing the roots from the Earth to get back on the road, to seek a greater death elsewhere, to read too deeply into passing interstate signs, to con someone else out of a future by way of worn out cards and mixed up tea leaves, while the lines on my own palms scream things like "You May Never Stop To Rest" all night long, but still I keep faith, my hell can wait, the devil on my back tattoos "We've got a lot of work to do" on the back of my skull, I haven't seen it in years but I feel the itch every day, I could sleep forever, I could shave my head and change my name, but I never believed in taking the high road before, it might be too late to start now